Ken McClure - The Lazarus Strain

The real question he had to ask himself was, would the police investigation take a different course if he gave them a possible alternative motive for Robert Smith’s death? At the moment, they would be mounting a major offensive to tackle the animal rights brigade over the identity of Ali, hoping it might lead not only to him but also to the three Asian men in the Land Rover who had murdered Smith. He couldn’t see that changing even if he told Giles about his suspicions. For the moment he would let things take their course. It might be Machiavellian, but media pressure was on the police right now to hunt down Smith’s murderers and that was fine by him: he didn’t want to ease it any by throwing them a ready-made diversion concerning a monkey’s identity and a possible health hazard.

Steven’s mobile announced an incoming message. It said, ‘Dunbar: Code Green’, indicating that his Code Red status had been activated. It also listed a telephone number. Steven called it and made his first request to the duty officer. ‘I need to know something about how you buy monkeys in this country,’ he said. ‘How you go about it, who does it and who has been doing it over the past three months?’

Steven called the Crick Institute and asked to speak to Leila Martin, telling the operator who he was and stressing that it was important. He still had to wait for over a minute but smiled when he heard the French sounding, ‘’Allo.’

‘Dr Martin? This is Steven Dunbar of Sci-Med.’

‘I remember, the science policeman.’

‘If you insist,’ said Steven. ‘Look, I know you must be terribly busy working on the vaccine but I’d really like to speak to you. There’s something I have to clear up and the sooner the better.’

‘I’m sure I’ll be here in the lab whenever you care to call,’ said Leila. ‘My social life seems to be a thing of the past.’

‘I’m sorry,’ said Steven. ‘I know you’re in a race against the clock but it is important or I wouldn’t have bothered you.’

‘If you say so.’

‘It shouldn’t take long,’ said Steven. ‘How about tomorrow morning around eleven?’

‘I’ll be here.’

The first thing that struck Steven next morning when he saw Leila Martin walk towards him was that she managed to look sexy even in a loose-fitting lab coat. Not too many women managed that.

‘Nice to see you again,’ he said.

‘As you’re a policeman, I’m not sure I can say the same for you,’ said Leila, but she was smiling when she said it. ‘We can talk in my office.’

Leila took off her lab coat and hung it on the back of the door before smoothing her skirt and choosing to sit down and face Steven in front of her desk rather than from behind it. He couldn’t help thinking about the old Hollywood ruse of making beautiful actresses wear glasses when they wanted to suggest intelligence. Leila wore glasses. He couldn’t help but notice the sound her stockings made when she crossed her legs.

‘How can I help?’ she asked.

‘You probably remember that one of Professor Devon’s escaped experimental animals bit a member of the public?’

‘I remember well enough but the animals didn’t escape,’ corrected Leila. ‘They were deliberately set loose by the unspeakable people who murdered Tim Devon.’

Steven conceded the point. ‘The man who was bitten died a couple of nights ago in a private clinic. His wife is now also very ill.’

‘Are you going to tell me that they were infected with the Cambodia 5 virus?’ asked Leila.

‘Yes, I am.’

‘Oh my God, that is awful.’

‘I take it you knew nothing about Professor Devon working with Cambodia 5?’

Leila shook her head. ‘I knew of course, that he was running some experiments that he couldn’t talk about — we all knew that — but not that he was working with Cambodia 5 here in the institute. I didn’t know about that until the people from your Department of Health approached me after Tim’s death and asked me if I would continue development of the vaccine.’

‘That’s what I thought,’ said Steven. ‘The thing is, the animal that bit the dead man had been vaccinated before being challenged with Cambodia 5 and yet it still proved to be infectious… We were wondering if you were using the same seed strain for your vaccine?’

‘Because if I was, it would be no good?’ said Leila.

Steven nodded.

‘Relax, Dr Dunbar. Professor Devon left notes on three possible seed strains he had constructed and hoped could be used against the Cambodia 5 strain. I found a slight flaw in the one he chose to try first so I rejected that in favour of one of the others when I took over.’

‘A slight flaw?’ said Steven, unable to keep the surprise from his voice.

‘No criticism of the professor intended,’ said Leila reading his mind. ‘Tim didn’t have the results of some tests available to him when he had to make the decision. Certain aspects of the haemaglutinin structure made the strain unsuitable for vaccine production.’

‘I see,’ said Steven. ‘Can I ask how your work is going?’

‘Perhaps you would like to come down to the lab and see for yourself?’

‘I’d love to.’

‘You’ll have to gown up.’

Steven was shown to a cloakroom outside the lab suite where he changed into green surgical scrubs and put plastic covers over his shoes. He covered his hair with a surgical hood and adjusted his mask so that his mouth and nose were properly covered. He met Leila outside.

‘We will not be going into the virus lab itself,’ she explained, ‘but even so, I don’t want to risk introducing any contaminants from the outside world. As you know, if bacteria were to get into the egg culture room we would lose everything and there would be no time to start again. We all gown up, even for the outer rooms.’

Leila placed her key in the electronic lock outside the lab and entered a five digit code: the mechanism buzzed and the door clicked open. Leila nodded to the technicians who were working inside and led the way over to a long, rectangular window in the far wall. ‘That’s where the race is being run,’ she said.

Steven looked through the glass into an adjoining lab where row upon row of hens’ eggs were incubating under dull red lights.

‘The seed virus for a vaccine against the Cambodia 5 strain,’ said Leila. ‘It’s now just a question as to whether enough will grow up in time to make the schedule for commercial production.’

They both watched as a technician working inside the egg lab examined the eggs one at a time by holding them over a simple box with a light source inside it. The Technician, who was wearing a full biohazard suit, acknowledged Leila’s presence at the window and angled the box so that she and Steven could see what he could see. The light shining through the thin shell showed up the developing embryo inside. The extra heat from the light bulb made it move. Steven thought it looked like an ultra sound scan of a human foetus.

‘We inject the virus into the amniotic cavity,’ said Leila. ‘And let nature take its course.’

‘Can you monitor viral growth?’ asked Steven.

‘We occasionally withdraw amniotic fluid from a single egg to check the titre,’ said Leila. ‘One egg will yield about two millilitres of amniotic fluid containing several billion virus particles if the conditions are right.’

‘But of course, there’s no way of knowing whether the seed strain you’ve chosen will be effective against the Cambodia virus until you try it?’ said Steven.

‘That’s true,’ said Leila. ‘But we can do certain lab tests,’ said Leila. ‘Of course, animal tests are out of the question after what happened.’