Ken McClure - Resurrection

‘’Can’t think,’ admitted Dewar, although he had just remembered that Sharon Hannan had happened to say that this had taken place before Kelly had lost his job. Maybe this was relevant.

‘I’m going to have another go at getting Denise Banyon to talk,’ said Dewar. ‘She knows far more than she’s let on so far.’

‘Anything you’d like me to do?’

‘There is one thing you might be able to help me with.’

‘Oh yes?’

‘I need a home for a cat.’

‘You’re serious?’

‘”Fraid so.’

Dewar drove back to the Scottish Office, very conscious of what was in the vials sitting in the box on the floor behind him. He’d gone to considerable trouble to individually wrap them using toilet roll from the pack he’d found in a cupboard to provide protection from any sort of impact. The whole box was then wrapped up in the plastic bag that had held the cat food. The last thing in the world he — or indeed the city needed, was for him to be involved in any kind of an accident. In the event, he reached the Scottish Office without incident.

He took the box with the vials up to his room and put them safely away in a drawer to await Malloy’s arrival. It seemed such a mundane thing to do with enough virus to wipe out the city and more but there was no call for drama, he reasoned. A convoy of police cars, sirens wailing and lights flashing could be summoned to take the vials to safe-keeping at the university but right now, that wasn’t necessary. The vials were perfectly safe as long as the glass didn’t break.

He called Mary Martin to say that he had to speak with the team who had dealt with the decontamination of Kelly’s flat. She promised to ask them to get in touch when they returned from their current assignment. ‘Is it urgent?’

‘Very.’

Dewar sat down and embraced a few minutes silence while he got his thoughts in order. He still couldn’t make much sense of a putative link between Kelly and Pierre Le Grice. It was very much a case of the old question, why on earth would Le Grice involve someone like Kelly? But, as far as he could see, the alternative to that scenario was even more unattractive. It would involve the virus not having come from Le Grice at all. He’d have to consider that there might be another source of virus out there, a completely different one, one that he hadn’t even imagined.

The phone rang. It was Karen.

‘I’m in Edinburgh,’ she said.

‘Where about?’

‘I’ve just come in from the airport. I’m going to take my stuff down to Mum’s and then I’ll come back up. Maybe we could meet? I’ve to report with the other volunteers to Dr Martin at the Public Health Service at six this evening.’

‘I’m going to be tied up this afternoon. I’ve made some progress at last. I’m not sure where it’s going to lead me but you’ll be carrying your phone?’

‘Yes.’

‘I’ll get in touch the minute I’m free.’

‘Take care, Adam.’

‘Nobody’s hero, that’s me.’

‘If only that were true,’ said Karen. ‘Please be careful.’

Dewar went down to the communications room to see how things were in the estate. He left instructions that he be called as soon as Malloy arrived.

‘The police have been touring with loudspeaker vans telling the people that the vaccine will be here tomorrow and where they should go to get it.’ said the official currently in charge of the room.

‘Please God they’re right,’ said Dewar.

‘Superintendent Tulloch was adamant that good news was needed to head off any more trouble. It’s his responsibility.’

Dewar reflected that it wasn’t going to matter a damn whose responsibility it was if the vaccine didn’t come soon. ‘What about the no-go area?’ he asked. ‘Anything happening?’

‘The yobs are still in control. There’s been no attempt to re-take it. The police are keeping a low profile. I think they’re hoping that the broadcasts about the vaccine will tip the balance in their favour and the ordinary people inside the area will stage their own revolt.’

‘Has anything at all been getting in or out?’

‘They’ve let in ambulances to remove sick people and they allowed a doctor and nurse in this morning to see a sick child.’

Dewar nodded.

‘Dr Malloy is here,’ said a woman’s voice behind him.

Dewar returned upstairs and greeted Steven Malloy. ‘The vials are in my room,’ he said.

Malloy raised his eyebrows but didn’t say anything. He followed Dewar upstairs and stood by while Dewar carefully removed one of the vials from the drawer and then from its wrapping to hand it gingerly to him.

Holding it carefully in two hands, Malloy took it over to the window and examined it. After a few moments he sighed. Strangely, there was an element of relief in the sound. He looked at Dewar. ‘These didn’t come from the institute,’ he said. ‘They’re very old. Nobody’s used FD capsules like these for years.’

‘Maybe Le Grice used old equipment to avoid detection? Something he found in a basement maybe?’ said Dewar.

Malloy shook his head. ‘I’m afraid not,’ he said. ‘What’s good news for the institute is bad news for you.’ He looked at the vial in his hand again. ‘This vial is really old … in fact, I’d even suggest that these numbers on the strip inside the vial … four and nine, forty-nine stand for 1949, well before the institute was even built and certainly before Pierre Le Grice was born.’

Dewar closed his eyes and said in a flat monotone, ‘That means there is another source of the virus out there and we’ve no idea where it is.’

‘Bloody hell,’ said Malloy.

‘Sweet Jesus Christ,’ muttered Dewar.

‘We could be sailing up shit creek here. Government secrets and all that.’

‘What d’you mean?’

‘It was before my time of course, but you hear these stories about so-called defence initiatives at the time of the second world war when the government experimented with all sorts of disease-carrying bombs. I suppose I’m thinking of Gruinard Island off the west coast of Scotland, the one they infected with anthrax and consequently put the island out of commission for over half a century.’

Dewar nodded. ‘I think there was some kind of accident with plague too on Salisbury Plain if I remember rightly,’ he said.

‘That sort of thing,’ said Malloy. ‘A lot of it went on in the forties and fifties.’

‘So now we have to consider that somebody has stumbled across a stash of secret wartime biological weapons,’ said Dewar.

‘Just an idea,’ said Malloy.

‘But at exactly the same time the Iraqis come to Edinburgh, trying to persuade people to make smallpox for them? I don’t think I buy that.’

‘I agree, it’s stretching coincidence a bit far,’ conceded Malloy.

‘Even so, I’ll get Sci-Med to check out your idea but getting any information out of the ministry of defence can break your heart. They’ve turned stone-walling into an art form. But whatever they say, there’s still a linking factor in all of this,’ said Dewar. ‘One that involves the institute.’

‘If you say so,’ said Malloy.

‘As for getting more information right now …’Dewar took a deep breath and said, ‘I guess it’s going to be all down to Denise Banyon now, bless her little cotton socks.’

‘Anything I can do?’

‘If you’re still willing to take the cat, I’ll give you the address. Maybe you can go over and pick her up? Her name’s Puss.’

Malloy left to drive over to Jutland Place and Dewar called George Finlay at the Western.

‘She’s complaining of a sore arm at the moment, the flu-like symptoms shouldn’t be far behind.’