What Really Happened on the Diamond Princess?

BEFORE DAWN ON the 5th of February, Captain Gennaro Arma sipped espresso in his tidy office, wondering how bad the news would be. He wore a crisp black uniform with shiny brass buttons and lifted the tiny cup with fingers swathed in cheap latex gloves. The passengers on the Diamond Princess were mostly asleep, and Arma, not long awake himself, brooded over the possibilities. He hoped for a Return to Normal: He would thunder up the engines and glide the Diamond from its anchored stillness out in Tokyo Bay into the port of Yokohama. Passengers would trudge down the gangway, Samsonites rumbling, a little befuddled by their brush with calamity but on their way. Then there was That Other Option, less clear and more ominous. Hearing a knock—there they are—Arma strapped on a surgeon's mask, opened the door, and greeted two Japanese health officers who strode in, also wearing gloves and masks, ready to deliver the verdict.