Ken McClure - Pandora's Helix

“A few nasty bumps on the head and probably a hang-over from what was injected into you but apart from that, no damage.”

“Good,” said Neef. “Now I’d like to go. I’ve got lots to do.”

“I’m afraid that’s not possible yet sir. The police and some Ministry people are insisting that you stay where you are until you are, debriefed, I think the word was.”

“How long is that going to take?”

“They’ve been informed that you’ve come round, sir. It shouldn’t be long.”

“Look I have to at least phone someone,” said Neef, making for the door and opening it. There were two policemen standing outside. Neef closed the door again.

“Sorry,” shrugged the doctor. “They’ll probably be here soon.”

The young doctor was right. Four men wearing civilian clothes but showing warrant cards arrived within ten minutes and spent the next four hours questioning Neef. He was both exhausted and exasperated by the time they were through.

“Can I please go now?” he asked.

“I’m afraid not sir, not just yet,” replied one of he policemen.

“Why the hell not?”

“We’d like you to wait here until we’ve found Dr Pereira.”

“Pereira? Where the hell does he come into this?”

“We’ve had an APB out on him for some time sir. It shouldn’t be long before we find him and then we can sort this whole thing out.”

Neef saw that further argument was useless. He watched as the four men left and resigned himself to more waiting.

It was almost midnight before a commotion outside the door said that something was happening at last. When the door finally did open, Neef got up to welcome Max Pereira.

“What the hell’s going on Mike?”

“I’m not sure myself,” replied Neef. He told him about the fire and Farro-Jones’ subsequent arrest.

“Jesus!” exclaimed Pereira. “You’ve had quite a day.”

“Farro-Jones had been experimenting with an unlicensed virus,” said Neef. “He was using one of the cystic fibrosis kids as a guinea pig.”

“I know about the virus,” replied Pereira but he didn’t elaborate.

One of the policemen who had interviewed Neef earlier came in to say that a meeting had been convened down in the pathology lecture theatre. The two of them were ‘requested’ to attend.

Neef and Pereira accompanied the policeman in silence, their footsteps echoing through the deserted corridors at that time of night. When they got to the lecture theatre they found that chairs had been brought in and positioned round the long table that normally sat in front of the blackboard for student demonstrations. Klein sat at the head with Waters to his right. The other ten places or so were taken by ministry and police officials. Neef and Pereira were placed together at the foot of the table facing Klein.

Klein welcomed them and said, “Gentlemen, I’m sure we all regret the happenings of the last twenty four hours. I think I speak for all of us when I say that we must do all in our power to minimise the resulting damage.”

Neef and Pereira exchanged glances.

“But however awful the experiences have been — particularly for Dr Neef, I understand, we must keep a sense of proportion and priority, so first I have some good news. We appear to have contained the cancer outbreak. There have been no new cases reported among the contacts we have been keeping in isolation. One more week and I think we can confidently raise the restrictions and consider this outbreak over.”

“Good,” said one of the ministry people.

“I’m sure everyone will be glad to get back to normal so it’s just a question of how we can put all this behind us as quickly and as painlessly as possible and with minimum lasting damage to all parties.”

Neef and Pereira exchanged another glance.

“I’m talking about a damage limitation exercise, gentlemen,” said Klein. “I’m sure you will all agree with me that it serves no real purpose to prolong this unfortunate business with lengthy enquiries, the preparation of reports and the encouragement of prurient press interest which will only serve to promote fear and alarm in the general public.”

“Perish the thought,” thought Neef. It’s keep your mouth shut time again. He saw Pereira had reached the same conclusion.

“Frankly, I am asking for your cooperation in putting an end to this business,” said Klein, looking at Neef and Pereira.

“What exactly are you proposing, Dr Klein?” asked Neef.

“In return for your cooperation and silence, we in turn, will take no further action in bringing a prosecution against Menogen.”

“What?” exploded Pereira. “You know damn well that Menogen had nothing whatever to do with it!”

“Absolutely!” agreed Neef, equally angry. “It was all down to Farro-Jones and his damned ambition.”

“Unfortunately Dr Farro-Jones cannot be here to defend himself,” said Klein.

“Only because he’s in police custody!” stormed Neef.

“I understand that Dr Farro-Jones has undergone some kind of mental breakdown. He has been transferred to hospital. It may be some time before we can question him but of course, we accept your assertion that he has been engaged in illegal experimentation on Susan Little,” said Klein. “Most reprehensible and most regrettable but there is no actual evidence that links these experiments to the cancer deaths.”

“Jesus!” said Pereira.

“Susan Little was the link between Melanie Simpson and Jane Lees,” said Neef, exasperation in his voice. “They both visited her.”

“But there is no actual evidence to show that Susan Little died of lung cancer at all,” said Klein.

“Farro-Jones had the pathologist, Miller cover it up,” said Neef.

“The pathologist in question being unfortunately dead,” said Klein acidly. “And I must remind you that no virus has yet been found to be responsible for the deaths. We still feel that the most likely event was the escape of some unidentified infectious agent from the premises of Menogen Research. We are prepared to accept that this was in no way due to negligence on the part of the staff at Menogen, and that it was a one off occurrence that no one could have foreseen. That is why we are prepared not to prosecute in return for your cooperation.”

Neef could hardly believe that Klein was being so obtuse.

“No deal,” said Pereira quietly.

It had much more effect than if he had said it angrily. Neef had the distinct impression that Pereira had been holding something back. A number of men moved uncomfortably in their seats. Klein seemed more discomfited than most. “I’m sorry you feel that way,” he said. “But you leave me no alternative...”

“You know, don’t you?” interrupted Pereira. He was looking at Waters who had remained silent throughout.

The down-turn to Waters’ lips quivered slightly. “I don’t know what you mean,” he said.

“Yes you do,” said Pereira. “You’re a virologist like I am, a good one too otherwise you wouldn’t be at the Porton fun factory.”

“I really must ask you to come to the point, Doctor Pereira,” said Klein.

Neef could see that he was rattled. He felt himself relax as he realised Pereira must be holding some kind of ace up his sleeve.

Pereira said to Waters. “You saw the virology reports just as I did. You took Charlie Morse’s body away for investigation. What you didn’t know is that I had a sample from Douglas Cooper’s lungs to work on.”

Waters and Klein looked at each other. This was clearly unwelcome news to them. Klein swallowed. “What are you suggesting?” he asked, as if he feared the answer.

Pereira said, “The routine virology reports on the dead patients showed the presence of Rhino virus, Adeno virus and para-Adeno virus, all viruses that you might expect to appear in any virology report on a patient with pneumonia but the para-Adeno virus caught my attention. I analysed it as best I could in the time available. It wasn’t an ordinary example of para-Adeno virus at all. It was obviously one that had been modified for use as a Gene Therapy vector. The technicians who were looking for a new virus wouldn’t have realised this at the time. I think Farro-Jones created a virus vector, based on para-Adeno virus, that would carry the CF gene into the host cells of cystic fibrosis patients and integrate it into their chromosomes but it’s my guess that wasn’t good enough for him. He wanted to go one step better and give the vector a specific target site on the DNA. Unfortunately it seems the target he came up with happened to be a proto oncogene. When the virus integrated it caused the cell to become cancerous. Somewhere along the line he had the double misfortune of the disabled virus becoming active again. In short, he created a virus that turned lung cancer into an infectious disease.”