The Lazarus Strain (13 page)

‘So you’ve already asked her?’ said Steven.

‘I’m sorry?’ said Lees.

‘Dr Martin, you’ve already asked her.’

Lees suddenly saw what Steven was getting at and smiled disarmingly. ‘I’m sorry if you thought that presumptuous but I felt that we had to put the idea to her before I approached you people on the subject . . . otherwise . . . there wouldn’t have been any point . . .’

Nicely done, thought Steven. Lees was doing the little boy lost act to perfection and it got murmurs of understanding all around the table.

As the meeting broke up and people started to leave, Lees caught up with Steven and Macmillan in the corridor. ‘I believe you chaps are in possession of a certain key-card that belongs to DOH? I think you will agree that the sooner we remove all traces of the Cambodia 5 virus from the institute the better?’

Steven said, ‘The card should be back from the lab tomorrow.’

‘The lab?’ exclaimed Lees, unable to keep the surprise out of his voice.

‘We asked for some tests on it,’ said Macmillan unhelpfully.

‘I see. Perhaps you’d be so good as to call me and I can make arrangements for its collection,’ said Lees.

‘No,’ said Macmillan.

Lees was taken aback again. ‘I’m sorry; I don’t think I quite understand . . .’

‘The virus in that safe is one of the most dangerous pathogens on the face of the Earth,’ said Macmillan, ‘whatever the anomalies of the regulations.’

Nice one, thought Steven.

‘Absolutely, I have no argument with that,’ agreed Lees. ‘That is exactly why I want it removed.’

‘Then until that time we should observe security precautions to match the danger. If we hand over the card you will be in possession of both keys – not good practice.’

‘I hardly think . . .’ began Lees.

‘Professor Devon hardly thought that animal rights extremists were going to attack his institute,’ said Macmillan. ‘I think Dr Dunbar should retain possession of the one we hold until such times as secure arrangements are in place for the opening of the safe.’

‘Very well,’ said Lees with a sigh of resignation.

‘I’ll call you when the card comes back and we can arrange for myself and the other key-holder to be present at the Crick at an agreed time,’ said Steven. ‘I’ll leave it to you to arrange suitable secure transport?’

‘Of course,’ said Lees. ‘Might I ask why the card was sent to a lab?’

‘Just a precaution, Mr Lees. We wanted to be sure that Professor Devon was the last person to touch it.’

‘But he was the only person at the institute who even knew of its existence,’ said Lees. ‘Who else did you have in mind?’

‘We didn’t,’ said Steven. ‘Call it routine Sci-Med procedure. Who is the second card holder by the way?’

‘As a matter of fact, I am,’ said Lees.

‘Then I’ll see you up at the institute in the next few days,’ said Steven.

* * * * *

Frank Giles drove through the black iron gates of Stratton House and slowly round the semi-circular drive, taking comfort from the crunch of his tyres on the gravel. ‘Hi honey, I’m home,’ he murmured in admiration of the solid stone-built building with its tall Georgian windows and Virginia creeper clambering over the walls. There was a black Volvo 4 x 4 sitting to the right of the steps leading up to the front door so he parked beside it and got out to the sound of dogs barking and a power saw operating somewhere in the woods which surrounded the property on three sides. His tug at the brass bell-pull was rewarded with a distant ringing and a fresh outbreak of dog barking. A tall, blonde woman appeared at the door, holding back two black Labradors on their leads.

‘Yes?

Giles showed his warrant card. ‘DI Giles, madam. I wonder if I might have a word with Mr Hugo Blackmore?’

‘Hugo’s not in at the moment. I’m Ingrid, Hugo’s wife. Can I help?’

‘I’m afraid not, madam. Any idea when your husband will be back?’

‘He went into Nottingham early this morning but he did say he’d be back for lunch. What time is it now?’

‘Ten to twelve,’ replied Giles.

‘Then perhaps you’d like to wait?’

‘That’s very kind,’ said Giles. ‘You’ve got quite a handful there,’ he said, eyeing the dogs straining at the leash.

‘They haven’t had their walk yet,’ said Ingrid. ‘Come through: the kitchen’s warmer.’

Giles followed the tall slim woman into the kitchen and saw what she meant. The Aga had done its job.

‘Tea? Coffee?’

‘Coffee would be good.’

‘I hope Hugo’s not in any trouble.’

‘No trouble, madam, just a few questions about the Hunt I believe he’s involved with.’

‘Involved with?’ laughed Ingrid. ‘It’s his whole
raison d’etre
. God knows what’s going to happen when this legislation to ban hunting goes through.’

‘You don’t sound terribly upset by the prospect,’ said Giles.

‘I’m Swedish,’ replied Ingrid. ‘Many English customs are a complete mystery to me and always will be, I fear. Milk? Sugar?’

‘White, no sugar,’ replied Giles. ‘You speak perfect English.’

‘I know the words,’ smiled Ingrid. ‘I don’t always know all the nuances. I constantly get into trouble.’

‘So do I,’ laughed Giles. ‘Although with me it’s the words not the nuances that get me into bother.’

‘You probably just say what you think,’ said Ingrid, ‘just like people in Sweden. It’s much harder to find out what people really think in this country. They say one thing but mean another.’

‘Have you been married long, madam?’

‘Six years and please stop calling me “madam”. I met Hugo when he came to Sweden with a trade mission. I was working for a biotech company.’

‘So this will be quite a change for you,’ said Giles.

Ingrid’s reply was cut short by the sound of a car horn outside. ‘You’re in luck,’ she said. ‘Hugo’s back early.’

Ingrid excused herself and went off to meet her husband. No doubt she would warn him of the police presence in the house, thought Giles.

‘What can I do for you, Inspector?’ asked the tall, handsome man who came into the kitchen. Giles disliked him on sight but admitted to himself that this might have something to do with the fact that he was tall, handsome, rich and had a beautiful Swedish wife. Silverspoonaphobia had always been a problem for him. ‘Just a few questions about your involvement with the Thorne Hunt, sir.’

‘Tony’s not made it illegal already has he?’

‘Tony, sir?’

‘Tony Blair and his merry band of yobbos, trots and social workers who wouldn’t know the country if you stuck an oak tree up their arse with directions pinned to it.’

‘Well, I’ll leave you boys together,’ smiled Ingrid, as she backed out the door.

‘I understand you had a bit of trouble a couple of months back,’ said Giles. ‘With hunt saboteurs?’

‘We have trouble with them all the time. There’s a type of person who becomes a hunt saboteur, you know, Inspector. Feckless bastards, the lot of them.’

Giles had noticed this. He had also noticed there was a type of person who appeared on horseback at hunt meetings but didn’t say so. ‘I understand there was one occasion recently when you were pulled from your horse by one of these saboteurs, sir?’

‘Him?’ exclaimed Blackmore. ‘The wog? Whoops, shouldn’t say that I suppose; I could end up in the dock these days. Mustn’t upset our Muslim brothers, must we eh? Oh no. They can come over here and yank me off my bloody horse and kick shit out of me but say anything about it and you’re in trouble. Crazy!’

‘Are you saying the man who pulled you from your horse was coloured, sir?’

‘You bet he was.’

‘Did he say anything to you, sir?’

‘No, he was enjoying kicking me while I was down too much.’

‘Did anyone say anything to him?’

‘One of the great unwashed called out, ‘Leave him be, Ali, he’s had enough.’

‘You’re sure he was called, Ali, sir?’

‘Aren’t they all?’

Giles remained silent.

‘Yes, Inspector, I’m sure.’

NINE

‘Are you seriously telling me that you want to start looking for someone called Ali among the Asian community across Norfolk and the Midlands?’ exclaimed Chief Superintendent Rydell. ‘Please tell me this is some kind of seasonal joke.’

‘I know it seems somewhat daunting, sir’ said Giles.

‘Somewhat daunting?’ mocked Rydell. ‘Christ! Half of bloody Leicester is called Ali!’

Giles remained silent, knowing that Rydell would realise what he’d just said and hoping this might strengthen his own position.

Rydell interpreted the silence correctly. ‘You know damn well what I mean Inspector and you also know I’m no racist.’

‘Of course not, sir.’

‘But facts are facts. It would be like looking for someone called Wu in China.’

‘Or a Freemason in the police force; spoilt for choice.’ Giles received a black look. ‘I know what you mean sir, but if we don’t follow this up we could be accused of allowing a psychopath to continue wandering the streets.’

‘If we were to even contemplate such an investigation with so little to go on, it would swallow up our budget for the next ten years,’ said Rydell.

‘I wasn’t suggesting we do that, sir.’ He had a mountain to climb here. ‘But I tend to believe Shanks when he says it was this Ali character who tortured and murdered Prof Devon. I think some more enquiries - confined to the animal rights people and known hunt saboteurs - might well yield more information about the man in question.’

Rydell shook his head. ‘No,’ he said. ‘Draw a line under this one. I want you to charge Shanks with both murders. Even if there were three people involved, we got two out of three and let’s settle for that. If at any time in the future someone with that name and a connection to the animal rights mob should come to our attention, we’ll consider reopening proceedings and certainly interview him about the Devon killing.’

‘Yes sir,’ said Giles, with an air of resigned acceptance.

‘Any word of the missing monkey?’

‘Still out there somewhere,’ said Giles.

* * * * *

The key card appeared on Steven’s desk just after eleven next morning. It arrived by special delivery along with a note suggesting that he call the lab.

‘Good news and bad news,’ said Dr Mac Davidson, the chief of Biosciences, the lab that Sci-Med used for independent analyses. ‘We did find evidence of someone other than Timothy Devon having touched the card recently. We got two DNA profiles from it. One was Devon’s.’

‘You did?’ exclaimed Steven.

‘The bad news is that we can’t tell you who the second person was. It wasn’t anyone connected with the case so far and there was no match for the profile on the police computer.’

‘So it was someone without a police record?’ said Steven.

‘That’s about the size of it,’ agreed Davidson. ‘Could be perfectly innocent. Your call. You decide.’

Steven thanked him and put down the phone. He let out his breath in a long exasperated sigh. Why was life continually like this, he wondered. A simple yes or no answer to a question would be a welcome change instead of being continually presented with what politicians would call, ‘a range of possibilities’ – twin brother of a ‘raft of opportunities’ and equally ill-defined. Had someone other than Devon really tried to use that card or was there an entirely innocent explanation for the second profile? It could even have been his own DNA when he thought about it. Although he had tried to avoid touching the card when he’d removed it from the safe - had worn gloves for the procedure - it was still just possible that he had contaminated it. The act of putting surgical gloves might have involved touching the outside surface of one or other of them at some point, causing the transfer of a few epithelial cells which could in turn have been transferred to the card. The PCR reaction used by the lab to amplify tiny amounts of DNA on any surface was incredibly sensitive. He could of course, ask the lab to analyse his own profile for elimination purposes but that led on to thoughts of asking everyone at the institute to do the same. He called Lees to tell him of the card’s return.

‘Then I suggest that we meet tomorrow morning at the Crick and move this damned virus before it causes any more trouble,’ said Lees. ‘I take it your “routine” tests revealed nothing to worry about?’

Once again, Steven noticed Lees distance himself from responsibility. He really was establishing himself as one of Whitehall’s finest when it came to moving his arse out of the firing line. ‘Nothing to keep us awake at night,’ replied Steven, not wanting to say anything more.

‘Good. How about eleven?’

‘Fine. Where’s it going?’ asked Steven.

‘Porton Down,’ replied Lees. ‘Best place for it. Bomb proof container in an armoured van with armed police escort. We’d hate to further incur the wrath of Sci-Med.’

Steven ignored the snipe. ‘Good,’ he said. ‘See you at eleven.’

At three in the morning Steven saw the irony in telling Lees there had been nothing to keep them awake at night when he found himself lying awake wondering about the unknown DNA profile on the card. It was, strictly speaking, none of Sci-Med’s concern. Their interest lay in what the escaped animals had been carrying – and a right can of worms that had turned out to be and one that wasn’t quite over yet with one animal still at large - but that was no excuse for adopting blinkered vision and rushing for the finish line. Sci-Med investigators were given a great deal of latitude in how they went about their business and they had been hand-picked for the way they thought. They didn’t miss much. Going off at a tangent was actively encouraged by John Macmillan in people who had demonstrated the value of doing so in the past. ‘Pick away at it’ was one of his favourite expressions. Steven was one of those who recognised that problems were seldom circles; they were more often spheres. Trying to get an overall picture which would embrace all dimensions could rival mapping the dark side of the moon at times but it could also be a seductive challenge. He gave up on sleep and got out of bed to make some coffee. It took him an hour’s consideration but he did come up with a couple of things he might do the following day. The first involved him leaving early and getting up to the Crick Institute in time to have a talk with Nick Cleary before Lees arrived with the virus removal crew.