Dust to dust

TWENTY-ONE

‘You still seem troubled,’ said Tally as they sat having breakfast together with the sun streaming in through the kitchen window, creating an oasis of light.

‘I thought this investigation was over but it’s not,’ said Steven. ‘Someone’s been playing me for a fool.’

‘In what way? I thought you said everything was straightforward.’

‘That’s what I thought. But that’s what I was meant to think. I’ve just realised what’s been niggling away at me ever since I went up to the Scottish Borders. The timing was all wrong.’

Tally looked blank. ‘Whose timing? What timing?’

‘MI5.’

Tally’s eyes opened wide. ‘Am I missing something here?’ she asked, a look of bewilderment on her face. ‘What on earth have MI5 got to do with anything?’

‘When Motram lost his mind and there was a possibility that his entering the tomb at Dryburgh might have had something to do with it, John Macmillan told me that Porton Down were interested.’

‘The microbiological defence establishment?’

Steven nodded. ‘And that made sense. You’d expect them to be, in the circumstances. In fact, I was worried about them getting there and stopping anyone else gaining access, but the Public Health people beat them to it: they had already been inside the tomb to take samples by the time I phoned. Porton still weren’t on site when I arrived. An MI5 officer who’d been detailed to look after their interest did turn up but he arrived after me and told me he was expecting the Porton people the following morning. They were just pulling into the car park when I was leaving.’

‘So?’

‘They were going through the motions,’ said Steven. ‘They knew damn well that Motram’s condition had nothing to do with any new virus inside that tomb. They turned up to collect samples for my benefit.’

‘Oh, God,’ said Tally. ‘You’re about to cross swords with MI5 again, aren’t you?’

‘Not deliberately,’ said Steven. ‘But I’m not going to end the investigation just yet.’

Tally suddenly realised she was going to be late if she didn’t get a move on. She went into overdrive, muttering about what she had to do at the hospital, gathering her bits and pieces together, hopping on one foot while she pulled a shoe on to the other and finally kissing Steven on the cheek before rushing out the door. Steven smiled at the ghost of Tally past and cleared away the breakfast dishes, still wondering how best to approach what now seemed to be an entirely new investigation — one that he would have to seek John Macmillan’s approval for before proceeding. But if MI5 and Porton Down had not been in any great hurry to investigate what had caused John Motram’s condition… it suggested they already knew.

‘Aren’t you reading too much into this?’ asked John Macmillan. ‘I mean, it could be that Porton were just a bit slow in getting their act together.’

‘Porton and MI5 slow off the mark when the possibility of a new killer agent was in the offing?’ exclaimed Steven. ‘I don’t think so. Public Health had had time to examine the chamber, take samples, confer with the hospital guys and actually work out what had caused Motram’s illness before they arrived. If the security services had really believed there was a possibility of something new and nasty being down there…’

‘Public Health would never have got near the place,’ Macmillan conceded.

‘They were putting on a show of turning up and taking samples for our benefit.’

‘But why?’

Steven took a moment before saying slowly and deliberately, ‘I thought about that all the way down. The only explanation I could come up with was that MI5 knew exactly what happened to John Motram: they might even have been the cause of it, with or without the collusion of Porton Down.’

Macmillan wore the expression of a man who had just been given some very bad news. ‘And why would they do something like that?’

‘I’ve no idea. I may be quite wrong, but I’m now pretty sure Motram’s illness has more to do with a dead marine and a bone marrow transplant than it does with mouldering corpses in a medieval Scottish tomb.’

‘What do we know about this dead marine you’ve suddenly become interested in?’

‘Nothing as yet. I thought I’d talk to you first, see what you thought.’

‘I take it that means you’d like to run with it?’ asked Macmillan, without much enthusiasm.

‘If only because someone at 5 or Porton thought they’d put one over on us.’

‘Not a good reason,’ said Macmillan flatly.

Steven tried again. ‘Cassandra Motram is a very nice woman, a hard-working GP whose husband — also a decent person by all accounts and a brilliant academic in his field — is now close to death. I think MI5 had something to do with it, or know who did.’

‘Better,’ said Macmillan, ‘much better. I’ll have Jean come up with what she can on the dead marine. Meanwhile, perhaps you can find out something about the transplant Motram was involved in?’

‘On my way.’

The sun was shining when Steven left the Home Office so he chose to walk back home along the Embankment, pausing to sit on a bench and watch the river traffic pass by. He planned to phone Cassie Motram later to ask for more details about her husband’s dealings with the London hospital, but for the moment he concentrated on the toxic spores and how they came to poison Motram. If Steven was right about MI5’s knowing more than they were letting on, it raised the possibility that Motram had been poisoned deliberately.

No one had been in the tomb before Motram so the spores couldn’t have been planted there: the poisoning must have taken place before Motram went into the tomb. This would explain why Kenneth Glass and his people had failed to find the deadly spores in the air samples they’d taken from the chamber. There never had been any spores in the chamber.

But if this were so, Motram’s attacker would have had to be in a position to administer the toxin at exactly the right time in order to create the red herring of his being affected by something in the tomb, something that the lab would uncover and blame on the dust. That surely narrowed the field down to Motram’s three colleagues; the two men from the geo-survey firm, and the on-site observer from Historic Scotland, Alan Blackstone.

Not a promising cast of suspects, but then Steven remembered that others had been present on site that morning. Tony Fielding, lying in Borders General Hospital, had told him that people from Health and Safety and a doctor from Public Health had been present before work started, and what’s more, the four involved in the opening of the tomb had been given injections just before they started work. Injections.

Steven called Kenneth Glass at Public Health.

‘Hello, Steven,’ said Glass, thinking he would be calling about the screening of the chamber. ‘All samples from Dryburgh are still negative, you’ll be relieved to hear.’

‘Thanks, Kenneth, but it’s actually something else I’m calling about. One of your medics was on site the morning the tomb at Dryburgh was opened. He took some health details from the guys involved and gave them anti-tetanus injections.’

‘Really? That’s news to me. Do you have a name?’

Steven felt his blood run cold at Glass’s response. ‘Afraid not. I’ll try and get one if you like.’

‘No, it’s okay. I’ll ask around and get back to you.’

Steven realised that he didn’t have names for the Health and Safety representatives either but maybe Motram had mentioned them to his wife. He’d ask Cassie later when he called.

His phone rang and he just knew it was going to be bad news.

‘Hi, Steven. I’m afraid no one here knows anything about giving anti-tetanus shots to the guys at Dryburgh. In fact, at that time, we didn’t even know it was happening.’

‘Thanks,’ said Steven. ‘I was afraid of that.’

He ended the call and shivered as he thought about his latest discovery. It now seemed likely — even probable — that someone had turned up at Dryburgh Abbey, purporting to be from Public Health, and injected John Motram with the mycotoxin that had scrambled his brain. That explained perfectly the absence of spores in the air samples and the ‘large dose’ hypothesis. But only John Motram had been targeted. Three others had received injections without any ill effects. It had been a specific attack on Motram… because… he knew something about a marine who had been killed in Afghanistan?

This changed everything. He decided that a phone call to Cassie Motram would not be good enough; he’d go back up north and talk to her personally. He also needed to see Tony Fielding again to find out what he could tell him about the people from Health and Safety and Public Health or, more correctly, the people who weren’t from Health and Safety and Public Health. He’d phone Cassie to let her know he was coming and then drive on up to Borders General to talk to Fielding.

Steven was still thinking about it all when he got back to his flat. He didn’t know much about mycotoxins but Porton Down certainly would. Someone somewhere had taken the decision not to kill Motram but to scramble his brain instead. ‘All heart, you bastards,’ he murmured as he filled the coffee holder and switched on the espresso machine.