Resurrection

TWENTY-TWO

Dewar called Karen’s mobile number on the way back. ‘Where are you just now?’ he asked.

‘I’ve just come back up to town.’

Dewar glanced at his watch. It was coming up to five o’clock. ‘What d’you say we meet for coffee? Then I’ll run you over to Public Health in time for your meeting.’

‘What about the cafe in the Royal Mile?’

‘Fifteen minutes.’

They met up in a small coffee shop in the Royal Mile which they’d frequented on previous visits to Edinburgh, usually on Sunday mornings after walking in the old town and before returning to London after spending the week-end with Karen’s mother.

There was only one other couple sitting there when Dewar arrived five minutes late. Karen was sitting in the opposite corner nursing a cappuccino. She got up and he hugged her. ‘Good to see you but I still wish you hadn’t come. More coffee?’

‘No, I’m fine and no lectures please.’

Dewar smiled. There was no point in arguing.

‘The city seems remarkably calm,’ said Karen, when Dewar returned from ordering black coffee at the counter.

‘The Scots aren’t big on panic,’ said Dewar with a smile.

‘I know we’re not but I did expect people to be a little less laid-back over something like smallpox.’

‘So far, we’ve been lucky,’ said Dewar.’ The problem’s remained confined to the Muirhouse estate.

‘You mean things might be different if it broke out in Morningside or Comely Bank?’

‘Call me cynical.’

Karen smiled. ‘You look tired,’ she said.

‘I’m okay.’

‘You said you’d made progress?’

Dewar nodded. ‘I more or less stumbled over the reason for the outbreak. I found the virus cultures that started the whole thing off.’ He told Karen the story of the cat rescue. ‘Trouble is, I only found the vials Kelly gave to Hannan. The others are still hidden in Kelly’s flat. ’

‘So you were right about a laboratory source. Well done. What’s the institute saying about the egg on its face?’

‘The virus didn’t come from the institute,’ said Dewar.

‘You’re kidding!’ exclaimed Karen.

‘I know, it’s almost unbelievable but it didn’t.’

‘So where … ‘

‘The vials contain freeze-dried virus from forty or fifty years ago.’

‘Freeze dried?’

‘One of the best ways of storing viruses long-term.’

‘I know. I went to medical school too,’ said Karen. ‘I was just trying to think who would want to do that.’

‘Steven Malloy suggested the Ministry of Defence. I’ve asked Sci-Med to check out any interest the MOD might have had in smallpox in these parts in the past.’

‘As if they’d admit it,’ said Karen.

‘Macmillan carries a lot of weight in Whitehall. If anyone can get it out of them, he can.’

‘But at the moment, you’ve no idea where these vials came from?’

‘In a local sense, yes. Kelly was working as a digger driver on a new housing development when some man approached him and asked him to do a bit of private digging on the side. According to Kelly’s girlfriend, he unearthed a store of these vials for this character. Kelly, being Kelly, assumed they contained drugs. He went back later and helped himself. You can fill in the rest.’

‘My God. He injected? …’

‘Both he and his pal, Tommy Hannan.’

‘God, what a nightmare! So where was this place? And the man? Who was he?’

‘I’m trying to find that out.’

Karen looked at the clock on the wall. ‘I’m sorry. It’s time I was making a move.’

Dewar paid the bill and drove Karen over to Public Health headquarters. The pavement outside was crowded with volunteers — about thirty in all, who’d come in from all over the country and were converging for their introductory briefing from Mary Martin. Karen saw some people she knew and, kissing Dewar on the cheek, she went off to join them. Dewar was about to drive off when he saw Mary Martin in the rear view mirror pull up behind him in her Volkswagen Passat. He got out to exchange a few words.

‘Did Malcolm get in touch?’ she asked, locking her car door — a task made difficult by the fact she was carrying a briefcase and a number of files tucked under one arm. She seemed harassed, an impression heightened by her hair blowing over her face in the wind.

‘He did but unfortunately he didn’t come across what I hoped he might. I’m going to have to go to Kelly’s flat myself.’

‘You can’t,’ said Mary flatly. ‘It’s in the no-go area.’

Dewar stood there, stock still, as she brushed past him, greeting the volunteers and apologising for being late. Karen, who, like the others, had turned to witness Mary Martin’s arrival, noticed the look on Dewar’s face and came back over to him as the crowd filed inside. ‘Something wrong?’ she asked.

‘I’ve just been told the yobs have control of the virus.’

‘You’re serious?’

‘I didn’t realise Kelly’s flat was in the no-go area. I’d been assuming it had been left safe and secure after the Public Health people had dealt with it. Now it’s under threat from any yob who cares to break into it. With a bit of luck, they won’t realise what’s in there but this changes everything.’

‘What are you going to do?’

Dewar looked at her distantly. ‘I’ll have to find some way of getting in there to recover the vials.’

For once, heavy town traffic was welcome as Dewar drove back to the Scottish Office. He needed time to think. He hadn’t even considered that Kelly’s flat might be in the area controlled by the yobs. He tried convincing himself that there was no reason for them to break into it but, on the other hand, Kelly was a known addict; he associated with known addicts. Someone might just have reasoned that he might have had drugs hidden away there and, as he wouldn’t be needing them any more, … It was too risky to leave to chance. He’d have to recover the vials as soon as possible. But how?

Instead of driving straight back to the Scottish Office he took a detour to Fettes police headquarters and sought out Grant. ‘I’ve got a problem,’ he said.

‘Join the club,’ replied Grant.

‘I’ve got to get in to the no-go area in Muirhouse. I’ve got to get into Michael Kelly’s flat.’

‘Then you want the Brigade of Gurkhas,’ said Grant sourly.

‘I’m serious.’

‘I can see that,’ said Grant. ‘Are you sure this is absolutely necessary? I mean a matter of life and death. Absolutely no alternative?’

Dewar shook his head. ‘Believe me, there must be a million things on this earth I’d rather do,’ he said. ‘Kelly left some glass vials in the flat. They contain pure, concentrated smallpox virus.’

Grant’s eyes widened. ‘How the f …’

‘Don’t ask. But you can see why I’ve got to get them back.’

‘Bloody hell,’ murmured Grant. ‘Have you told old Cammy Tulloch about this?’

Dewar shook his head. ‘No, I wanted to hear what you had to say first. ’

Grant sighed and swung his feet up on the desk. He thought for a moment before saying, ‘Tulloch would go by the book; he knows no other way. In the circumstances that would probably mean a full scale assault on the block using armed officers. He’d figure that something as big as this would warrant it. We could be talking big time casualties here. World war three maybe. The trash maybe don’t have guns but by God they’ll make up for it with bricks, bottles and Molotov cocktails. They’ll burn the flats down rather than surrender them.’

‘Paradoxically that would be an acceptable outcome,’ said Dewar. ‘At least fire would destroy the virus.’

‘Maybe one problem solved,’ said Grant. ‘But as I see it, the trouble would spill out into other areas and there’s a real chance we’d have widespread anarchy by morning. No law and order at all.’

‘We’ve got to keep what order we have,’ said Dewar. ‘It’s vital that the vaccine programme goes ahead or we can kiss good-bye to the city.’

‘Then you’re talking an under-cover operation with just a few people,’ said Grant.

‘I suppose I am,’ agreed Dewar. ‘In fact, I’m thinking just two. What d’you say?’

Grant looked at Dewar without expression. He said, ‘You’re asking me to engage in a covert operation without my superior officer’s knowledge, knowing that he’d be totally opposed to it?’

‘You know the flats; you know the people; you know the good guys from the bad guys and most importantly, you know how they think,’ said Dewar.

‘That still doesn’t get me in there in the first place.’

‘I’ve been thinking about that on the way over. I heard earlier the yobs were letting in ambulance crews. There was also a report about a doctor and a nurse being allowed in to visit a sick child.’

Grant smiled cynically. ‘Sounds like them,’ he said. ‘They all like to think they’re Robin Hood at heart.’

‘Be that as it may, I thought we might borrow an ambulance and answer an emergency call.’

‘Might work,’ agreed Grant.

‘Well?’

Grant sighed and shook his head as if to show it was against his better judgement ‘I don’t know,’ he said. ‘It’s been a while since I worked the area but some people might just remember me. That could be bad news.’

‘I take your point, said Dewar. ‘But maybe with a cap on and a change of uniform …’

‘I must be crazy but okay, I’ll do it,’ said Grant. ‘I’ll organise an ambulance and some uniforms.

‘We’ll have to choose our time,’ said Dewar. ‘That means waiting until we see how the night’s going.’

‘If the yobs come out to play again tonight it might not be possible at all,’ said Grant. ‘They may use fire barriers again to stop any invasion of what they see as their territory.’

‘If you monitor things here, I’ll do the same. It won’t take us long to meet up if the moment seems right.’

Dewar drove on down to the Scottish Office. There was a message waiting for him from Sci-Med in London. The Ministry of Defence hadn’t stone-walled this time. They had stated categorically that smallpox had never been used in any experimental programme instigated by them and had at no time been seriously mooted as a potential biological weapon either during the second world war or afterwards in the cold war period. They cited the existence of a highly effective vaccine as sufficient reason to rule out its use as a potential agent.

‘Well, well,’ muttered Dewar. ‘Where does that leave us?’ He looked for the other message he was expecting but found nothing. There was still no reply to his enquiry about the location of Michael Kelly’s last job.

Dewar found Hector Wright down in the operations room updating his epidemic map with the day’s figures coming in from the hospital.

‘How’s it looking?’

‘See for yourself,’ replied Wright.

Dewar took a closer look at the map of the Muirhouse estate with each red-flagged pin indicating an confirmed smallpox case. He asked what the blue markers were.

‘Schools and church halls to be used as vaccination centres. Many of Mary Martin’s team have spent the day preparing them. All we need now is the vaccine.’

‘And the black ones?’

‘Temporary morgues, should we need them. At the moment the crematorium is coping.’

‘Gut feelings?’ asked Dewar.

‘The vaccine has to come tonight, not just for practical reasons but for psychological ones too. If we don’t have some good news soon all that fear and uncertainty out there is going to change to anger and resentment.’

‘I understand the police have been telling the people the vaccine will be available from tomorrow,’ said Dewar.

‘I think Tulloch was trying to stave off another night like last night. It’s a big gamble. If the vaccine doesn’t come and all hell breaks loose tomorrow, I suspect the superintendent’s going to be spending a lot more time with his family.’

‘I hope he’s successful for personal reasons apart from anything else, said Dewar.

Wright looked at him quizzically.

‘I’ve got to go in there tonight.’

‘What the hell for?’

Dewar told him.

‘Bloody hell, that’s all we need,’ exclaimed Wright. ‘The loonies in charge of the asylum.’

‘Maybe you can show me on the map exactly where Aberdour Court is?’

Wright turned back to the map and traced a curving pattern in the air with his pen. He homed in on one spot and then looked at Dewar over his glasses. ‘Right in the middle of the no-go area. You must be mad. Surely the police, if they knew what was at stake would …’

‘I’ve already been down that road,’ interrupted Dewar. ‘I’ve been talking to Grant at police headquarters. The likely backlash from a mob-handed police raid might make things infinitely worse in the long run than they are at the moment. The vaccination programme would be hopelessly disrupted and the epidemic would almost certainly spill over into the rest of the city.

Wright shook his head but he saw the sense in what Dewar was saying. ‘Need company?’ he asked.

Dewar smiled. ‘That was a kind thought, and a brave one,’ he said but Grant and I have worked out a plan we think will work providing the streets aren’t blocked off.’ He told Wright about using an ambulance.

Wright looked dubious. ‘As I understand it, the yobs have been letting ambulances through in the daytime. No one’s tried it at night yet.’

The same thought had occurred to Dewar. He shrugged and said, ‘If we don’t try it we’ll never know.’

A meeting of the crisis management team was scheduled for seven but it was nearer half past before enough people had arrived. Tulloch sent his apologies but the night had already started as far as he was concerned. He was needed elsewhere. Mary Martin was late through welcoming the new volunteers and assigning them tasks for tomorrow.

‘Do you have enough people?’ asked Wright.

‘I think so. The response has been good. I’m going to continue using my own people for new patients and contacts because they have local knowledge. The new people will be used mainly to man the vaccination centres. They are all qualified so little or no training will be required. They can get straight into it.’

George Finlay was the last to arrive. He didn’t bother with apologies. He simply smiled and said, ‘I’ve just heard. The vaccine is on its way.’

The relief round the table was palpable. People just hadn’t realised how tense they had become over the delay with the vaccine. It was like having a dull, nagging headache suddenly disappear.

‘The first shipment is due in at the airport at around eleven tonight. If the vaccination centres are functional we’ll take it directly to them. What d’you think?’ asked Finlay.

‘Fine by me,’ said Mary. ‘They’re all set up and ready to go. Just as long as Superintendent Tulloch manages to keep the trouble confined to the no-go area. I don’t want my people being stoned or fire-bombed.’

‘I’d better put the superintendent’s mind at rest about the vaccine and tell him his gamble paid off,’ said Finlay. ‘Maybe he can continue with the street broadcasts throughout this evening. Might help to keep things calm.’

‘Good idea,’ said Dewar without declaring an interest.

‘When shall we open the centres for business?’ asked Finlay.

‘The sooner the better, I would have thought,’ said Rankin.

‘First thing tomorrow,’ countered Wright. ‘If we open the centres through the night we’ll just be ensuring a large number of people on the streets during the hours of darkness. I don’t think Superintendent Tulloch would welcome that.’

There was no real dissent after Wright had pointed this out.

‘Very well, seven thirty tomorrow morning,’ said Finlay. ‘I’ll relay the information to Superintendent Tulloch. Mary, you’ll probably want to deploy your people to the centres to get ready for the arrival of the vaccine?’

‘Gladly,’ said Mary Martin, smiling for the first time in many days. ‘I’ll just have go find some of the people I’ve just said good-night to! Tell them they won’t be going to bed after all. Luckily they’re all being put up at the same hotel.’

Finlay reported that there had been no surprises that day in terms of numbers of new cases adding most importantly, that the disease was still confined to the estate. ‘We’re coping,’ was the bottom line.

‘Maybe someone’s smiling on us at last,’ said Wright.

Dewar called Sci-Med in London to ask why there had been no answer as yet to his enquiry over the location of Michael Kelly’s last job.

The duty officer answered. ‘Mr Macmillan thought you’d be calling,’ he said, sounding slightly embarrassed. ‘Apparently the building company are having a little trouble with their records …’

‘You mean Kelly’s employment didn’t go through their books,’ said Dewar with world-weary cynicism. ‘He was taken on as casual labour, a day at a time, cash in hand and they’ve no idea where.’

‘Something like that. They say they’re going to make their own enquiries. Ask their squad leaders if they remember him. That sort of thing.’

‘Jesus,’ murmured Dewar. ‘I hope somebody told them they’re about to have the Inland Revenue Service going through their financial trousers like a ferret with attitude if they don’t get their finger out?’

‘I believe Mr Macmillan did mention something along those lines,’ said the duty officer.

‘Get back to me as soon as you hear.’

Dewar went downstairs to the operations room. Hector Wright was there. ‘Everything’s okay at the moment,’ he said.

Dewar looked at his watch. It was eight thirty. He called Grant. ‘Seems quiet enough. What d’you think?’

‘If this was a western I’d say it was too quiet, I don’t like it,’ replied Grant. The bastards could be up to something.’

‘Maybe it’s just the good news about the vaccine taking the edge off things,’ said Dewar.

‘You wish. Let’s give it another half hour then we’ll chance it if it’s still quiet. I’ve got the ambulance outside.’

Dewar stayed down in the operations room, familiarising himself with the surroundings of Aberdour Court on Wright’s map while he listened in for any change in the situation. At eight fifty reports of a stone throwing confrontation started to come in from police patrolling the northern edge of the no-go area.

‘Just kids,’ was the phrase Dewar latched on to. The estimated age of the stone throwers was fourteen. There was no response from the police. Grant called just after nine. ‘I’m game if you are?’

Dewar drove over to Police Headquarters and changed into the green overalls of an ambulance crew man. Grant had already changed. He was carrying a clip board and looked the part. The vehicle was parked in shadow round the back.

‘Harry Field, my mate at ambulance HQ says if we break it, we pay for it,’ said Grant. ‘Who’s going to drive?’

‘You’d better. You know the streets. I’ll do the talking.’

They climbed into the ambulance and put on their forage caps. Grant familiarised himself with the controls before starting the engine. Before taking away, he turned to Dewar and said, ‘I hope you feel better about this than I do.’

‘The words scared and shitless spring to mind,’ replied Dewar.

‘Let’s do it.’

‘Son et lumiere?’ asked Grant as they pulled out on to Crew Road.

‘Why not.’

With lights flashing and siren wailing, they accelerated down Crew Road until they could see the barrier at the Crew Toll roundabout. ‘Are they going to stop us?’ Grant wondered out loud.

‘No reason to,’ said Dewar. ‘Might be different coming out.’

They were within two hundred metres of the striped bar across the road when it rose and they were waved on through. Dewar lifted his arm casually in thanks as they sped past into the estate. ‘So far so good,’ he said. As he himself had said there was no reason for the soldiers to stop them but it was still nice to have it confirmed that they weren’t carrying a huge sign on the front saying, ‘This ambulance is not for real.’

They turned off the siren and slowed down as they navigated the narrower streets of the estate, passing occasional police cars touring the area with their loud-speaker messages about the vaccine’s imminent arrival. Dewar looked to see if he could see Karen when they passed a church hall with a Health Board mini-bus parked outside and people carrying equipment inside. She wasn’t among them.

‘Here we go,’ said Grant as they came to an open space and saw the police cars up ahead. They were blocking the road about two hundred metres from the start of the no-go area. ‘I just hope Cammy Tulloch isn’t slumming it with them or I’ll have some explaining to do.’

Grant slowed the vehicle right down, leaving twenty-five metres between them and the patrol cars in the road, hoping to avoid interview. He stopped at fifteen metres, letting the engine idle and their blue lights continue to flash silently in the dark. The gambit worked. The police, watched by the posse of journalists and cameramen who had moved into residence beside the barrier, moved their vehicles aside and waved the ambulance through. One officer steeped up to Dewar’s side as the eased their way past. Dewar opened the window.

‘You’ll be stopped up ahead. If they say you can’t go in, don’t argue and don’t try to. Just turn around and leave. It isn’t worth it.’

‘Understood,’ said Dewar.

They moved on slowly across no man’s land until a group of five men materialised out of the blackness. Two, wearing leather jackets and jeans, held up their hands.

‘Just like wood lice creeping out of a tree,’ murmured Grant.

‘Where d’you think you’re going?’ asked a thin youth with spiky black hair. He was carrying a baseball bat. He smacked the end of it in his palm as he spoke and smiled at the look on Grant’s face. Most of his front teeth were missing, leaving a dark gap when he parted his thin lips;

‘We’ve had an emergency call from Aberdour Court,’ said Grant. ‘A sick kid, sounds like appendicitis. Stand back please.’ He made to wind up the window.

‘Just a minute pal,’ threatened gap teeth. ‘You don’t go anywhere withoot oor say so.’

Dewar could sense Grant’s anger straining at the leash. He recognised Grant’s diplomacy threshold wasn’t ideal for the job in hand. He leaned across to intervene and said, ‘So what’s the problem?’ he asked pleasantly.

‘Open up the back.’

‘Look a kid’s life is in danger,’ said Grant.

‘Open the fuckin’ back or your fuckin’ life’s in danger,’ said the gap-toothed yob, his features exploding into snarling anger.

‘I’ll do it,’ said Dewar, putting a restraining arm on Grant. He got out, feeling suddenly very vulnerable as the night engulfed him and the men moved in closer. Three of them had baseball bats resting on their shoulders. All chewed gum. He had the ridiculous thought that they looked like dairy cows chewing the cud. He walked round the back of the vehicle and opened up the doors. Gap tooth climbed inside to inspect the interior. Dewar could see he was enjoying his moment. He didn’t look the part but he was behaving like a German officer looking for a suspected escape tunnel in an old war film. He tapped the walls and floor of the vehicle while Dewar stood by, outwardly respectful but inside thinking if the yob had a second brain it would rattle.

Having established that the ambulance was not a Trojan horse full of policemen, hiding in the wheel arches, the yob stepped out on to the road and asked. ‘What gear are you carryin’?

‘Gear?’

‘Drugs, ya bampot.’

‘Not much,’ shrugged Dewar.

‘See’s a look.’

Dewar opened up the scene of incident case and the yob had a rummage. He stuffed what he fancied into his pockets.

‘We might need that,’ said Dewar.

‘C’mon Durie, the guy’s right, the kid might need it,’ said one of the watching band.’

‘Shut yer hole!’ snapped gap tooth.

The speaker lapsed into sheepish silence while gap tooth finished taking what he wanted then got out. ‘Right, you,’ he said to Dewar. On you go. And don’t talk to any strangers’

He seemed to think this was enormously witty. He burst into laughter and turned, encouraging the others to join him. They all obliged.

Dewar smiled. He didn’t need a second invitation. He closed up the back and climbed in beside Grant.

‘Fifteen million years of human evolution and we reach that, said Grant with disgust as they moved off.

‘Maybe he had a deprived childhood,’ said Dewar, tongue in cheek.

‘I know what I’d like to deprive the little bastard of,’ said Grant, slowing the vehicle again to manoeuvre round a burnt out Ford that had been dragged off to the side but not quite off the road. ‘That’s Aberdour Court up ahead.’

Dewar looked at the huge tower block, standing tall against the night sky, its front elevation pock-marked with lights, many of its balconies still draped with washing that had been soaked earlier in the sudden heavy rain and which been allowed to remain there, as optimists looked to a drier tomorrow.

‘Seems quiet enough,’ said Dewar as they came to a halt on the broad tarmac apron outside the front entrance.

‘With a bit of luck it’s going to be, in, out and away,’ said Dewar.

‘Providing they leave the wheels,’ said Grant, as he locked the vehicle and pocketed the keys before joining Dewar. They took a stretcher with them to make their visit seem plausible to anyone watching.

‘Where you goin’ mister?’ asked a ten year old by the entrance. He held a lit cigarette in his hand, quite unselfconsciously. He could have been Humphrey Bogart in Casablanca..’

‘What aren’t you in bed?’ retorted Grant. ‘You’ve got school tomorrow.’

‘Nae school,’ replied the boy. ‘It’s closed.’

‘So it is,’ agreed Grant. ‘I forgot. If you want to make fifty pence, keep an eye on the ambulance, will you?’

‘Make it a quid and you’re on.’

‘All right, a quid it is.’

‘In advance.’

‘D’you think I came up the Clyde on roller-blades?’ exclaimed Grant. When we come back, providing you’re still standing beside it and it’s still got wheels and an engine, you’ll get your money.’

‘Nae problem. Any shit and I’ll get my brother to them.’

The boy ran off to stand by the ambulance. Grant and Dewar took the lift to the eighth floor and walked along the gangway to Kelly’s flat. Grant brought out a bunch of keys and said, ‘Just as well Kelly wasn’t a dealer. Some of these guys put on steel doors that withstand Cruise missiles.’

The door opened with the third key he tried. ‘We’re in business,’ said Grant.