“Might I speak to him, please?”
There was some scrabbling and talking in the background, then a clear, heavily-accented voice came on the line.
“Hello? Dr Harker?”
“Dr Arisov. This is something of a surprise. Why did you not telephone or e-mail?”
He lowered his voice to a whisper, but there was no mistaking the urgency in the man’s voice.
“I must see you in person. Today.”
“I am injured and cannot travel. Have you money for a taxicab?”
“Yes, yes. What is the address?”
“Number sixteen, Chuffnell Mews, Marylebone, NW1.”
“Bless you, Sir. I shall hasten to you without hesitation, deferment or cunctation.”
“Delighted to hear it.”
He terminated the call and I set aside my telephone.
“What was that about?” Urban-Smith had materialised in the kitchen doorway, clad in his favourite shirt, slacks and ever-present Eton tie.
“I am expecting a visitor. Russian doctor chappie; may know something about these deaths.”
“Aha!” He clapped his hands delightedly. “Perhaps the trail is not as cold as I had surmised. Mind if I sit in?”
“Not in the least. In fact, I would be grateful. There was a dreadful sense of forboding in his manner. I don’t like it, Fairfax. I don’t like it at all.”
*
The layout of number sixteen, Chuffnell Mews is slightly curious in that the living room stretches right from the front of the house to the back, affording a view of both Chuffnell Mews and the rear courtyard from the one position. So it was that Urban-Smith and I were witness to Dr Arisov’s arrival by taxicab at a little before ten o’clock.
The doctor clambered nimbly from the taxi, and scurried up our front path with grim resolve etched upon his features. There came to our ears an enthusiastic rapping at the front door, followed immediately by Gonzáles frenzied barking and the sound of Mrs Denford’s stealthy footfall upon the stair. Within a few moments, Dr Arisov had been admitted to the front room, and he stood in the doorway, his suspicious eyes darting from Urban-Smith to me, and back again as we rose from our seats to greet him.
“Dr Arisov,” I said, extending my hand. “I am Rupert Harker and this is my friend and colleague, Mr Fairfax Urban-Smith.”
“Urban-Smith?” Arisov’s eyes widened. “Surely not Fairfax Urban-Smith, detective, author and paranormal researcher and investigator?”
“The very same.”
We all shook hands, and I indicated for Dr Arisov to be seated. He was a rotund gentleman, only a few inches taller than myself, with a few wisps of white hair clinging to the top of his round head. Although his ruddy cheeks and expansive waistline indicated a fondness for the finer things in life, his faded corduroy trousers and too-small overcoat suggested a man of limited means.
“I must say,” said I, “that this is indeed an unexpected pleasure.”
“It is kind of you to say so, Doctor.” He shuffled restlessly in his seat. “Before we continue, gentleman, I must ask that you treat what I am about to tell you in the utmost confidence.”
We indicated our agreement.
“As soon as I received your e-mail,” he continued, “I knew what had happened. I assume that you have read my research papers on pigbel.”
“Pigbel?” asked Urban-Smith.
“Yes,” he confirmed. “Pigbel; it is a form of severe bowel infection that causes inflammation and necrosis of the intestine. Very unpleasant.”
“Severe enough to cause a person to ignite?”
Dr Arisov put his hands together and placed them over his mouth, evidently torn between his need to speak out and his desire to withhold the truth. I felt the influence of a guilty conscience.
“Please continue, Doctor,” encouraged Urban-Smith. “Any information that you have may prevent further loss of life.”
He sighed deeply and lowered his hands.
“Gentlemen, I am not proud of my role in this affair, but nor am I ashamed, for I have done what I have done in the service of my country.”
*
17. Vector
“As you already know, I was born and raised in Russia; Chelyabinsk to be exact. I graduated from The South Ural State Medical School in 1970, before working as a medical resident in the regional hospital. During this time, I became fascinated by infectious diseases; how could an organism so small as to be invisible to the naked eye have such a profound effect on the human body?
“I specialised in microbiology with a particular emphasis on research, and during the 1970s I was most prolific, and so I suppose it was inevitable that those papers which have brought me to your attention would also attract the attention of the KGB.
“In June of 1977 (I remember it well, for there had been a minor outbreak of diphtheria across the city, and I had planned to make it the subject of my next research project), I was approached by a representative of the KGB’s medical research division, and offered a secondment to the State Research Centre of Virology and Biotechnology in Koltsovo, also known as the Vector Institute. I was promised access to state of the art research laboratories including biohazard containment facilities and access to live smallpox virus.
“It sounded like a dream come true, and I accepted without hesitation. You will think of me as naive, for I truly believed that I had been selected for a programme to enhance our understanding and treatment of deadly diseases, but it soon became apparent that the Vector Institute was part of the Biopreparat.
“The Biopreparat, as you may or may not know, was the Soviet Union’s biological weapon research programme, initiated in the early 1970s under the auspices of Leonid Brezhnev. At the time, the Soviet Union was a signatory of the Biological Weapons Convention of 1972, which forbade the development of any such programme. Our work was top secret, and it was made plain that to speak of it would result in swift and decisive punishment.
“I had not long since been researching pigbel, a form of inflammatory gut infection caused by clostridium perfringens. This, as Dr Harker knows, is the bacterium that also causes gas gangrene, so named due to the production of gas from infected muscles as they become necrotic. Pigbel is rare in the developed world, but Russia in the 1970s had its fair share of poverty and malnutrition, and I personally treated several cases of the disease during my time in the regional hospital. I submitted a number of case studies for publication, but the Glavlit forced me to remove all references to the disease being encountered within the Soviet Union. They would not tolerate any suggestion that the population was subject to hardship or poverty of any kind.
“You see, gentlemen, the Cold War was very much a war of propaganda, and all media, including medical journals, were thoroughly vetted and censored. However difficult our life appeared to those in the West, you can be assured that it was, in fact, far worse; and no more so than for those who did dare to speak out. As a matter of fact, those activists and dissidents who were brave enough to do so risked becoming test subjects for the biological agents developed at the Vector Institute.”
*
“You used human guinea-pigs for your research?” I was appalled.
“Indeed we did, Dr Harker. Political prisoners, dissidents, criminals for whom there was no room in the overcrowded prisons. Towards the end of the decade, samples were being flown to Afghanistan to be tested on prisoners of war.”
“You speak of this so casually,” I said. “Does it not affect you?”
Dr Arisov shrugged resignedly. “I have had almost thirty years to atone in private, Dr Harker. I shall not do so for an audience.”
“You were speaking of pigbel,” said Urban-Smith, keen to bring the conversation back to its original bearing.
“Indeed I was.”
*
“My remit was to identify potential disease pathogens which could be enhanced for use against an individual or population, but with minimal risk of collateral damage. You see, whereas a gas or toxin will disperse
in time, an infectious disease will continue to spread unchecked, and could decimate a wider population than the one intended.
“Additionally, once a biological agent has been deployed, it can readily be identified, and a vaccine or suitable anti-infective agent rapidly developed and distributed, rendering that pathogen obsolete. But, what if one were to develop a strain of bacteria that could not be identified; one that would destroy all evidence of itself?
“Clostridium bacteria produce both heat and gas as they metabolise, and I postulated that, with the correct catalyst, it may be possible to speed the metabolic reaction to such a rate that infected tissue would be burned beyond recognition. With this in mind, we began our research in earnest. A team of industrial chemists laboured for several months without success until, in late November, a brilliant chemist was flown in from Munchkingrad, a Dr Saxon Schwarzkröte. We were told little about him, merely that he was a noted chemist, but from the moment he arrived, it was plain to all that this was no ordinary man.
“My word, what a specimen of manhood! He stood well over six feet, even taller than your good self, Mr Urban-Smith, but broad and powerful. Despite his size, however, no mindless brute was he, for his wits were honed sharper than a knife-blade. His knowledge and intuition of chemistry was incredible, uncanny even, as if he could picture each molecule, and calculate how it may interact with another.
“He had defected from West Germany only two years before, an outsider in every way, yet his commanding presence and charisma shone out like a beacon. Right from the start, we deferred to him, each and every one of us, even those with greater experience and qualification. I cannot explain it, but there was something about him that elevated him beyond the ordinary; a natural leader among men, you might say.
“I have never seen a man work with such fervour, and no triviality, joviality or informality could distract him. On many occasions, I attempted to engage him in conversation about family, or the arts, or some item of interest from the daily papers, but I would be swiftly rebuffed, and I soon desisted.
“From morning to night, he toiled in the laboratory, designing and synthesising enzymes and proteins to accelerate bacterial metabolism. Through a combination of amino acids and synthetic enzymes, he increased the rate of denitrification and methane production almost fivefold, but this did not seem to translate to an increase in disease potency; yet he did not give up. He would sit in solitude for hours, sometimes days on end, turning the problem over and over in his head until I feared that he may lose his reason. He would lock himself into his office, gibbering and muttering to himself, sometimes weeping and cursing, but we were too afraid to interrupt him.
“Don’t take me in error, gentlemen; he was never aggressive or hostile to any of us, but there was a restless energy within him, like a caged tiger pacing to and fro in front of its bars, and none of us wished to incur his wrath. Each day, I would listen at his door, and each day, the ranting and babbling from within would become a little louder and a little wilder, until I began actively avoiding him whenever he deigned to leave his office or chamber, for fear that he may lapse into psychopathy. Mercifully, my fears did not come to pass, and in the first week of February, he made a breakthrough in his research.
“One of the interesting features of disease-causing clostridia is that they produce toxins. Some of these, notably tetanus and botulism toxins, are extremely potent and often fatal. The species that causes pigbel is no exception, and it was this toxin to which Dr Schwarzkröte turned his attention. He discovered that the toxin’s effects could be enhanced by the addition of a small amount of cadmium, and soon thereafter, he found the correct combination of ionic solution, enzymes and amino acids that would result in a new disease, although you will not find it in any text or journal.
“He named this disease, bacterial necrotising gastroenteritis (BaNG for short), and its effects upon the human body were devastating.
“We exposed a group of ten test subjects to the enhanced clostridium perfringens via their drinking water and covertly monitored them. Within twelve hours, the first victim had begun to exhibit symptoms. I remember him well, a tall young man who had fallen foul of the authorities for some unstated discretion; we were never told of his crime. At around four o’clock, he was noted to collapse, complaining of abdominal pain, and I was instructed to don biohazard clothing (gown, rubber boots, facemask and the like) and make a physical examination.
“He looked on the edge of death, pale, tremulous and coated with sweat. I lifted his shirt and placed a hand on his abdomen, and it was as tight as a drum, blown out like a pregnant woman’s, and warm as a radiator. He groaned and writhed at even the lightest touch, but I was forbidden to administer any morphine in case it tainted the progress of the disease.
“I comforted him as best as I was able, and proceeded to check his vital signs, but when I did, I could scarcely believe the evidence of my own examination. His temperature was over one hundred and ten degrees and rising fast. I checked it again and again, but the result was the same. One hundred and twelve, one hundred and thirteen, and still it rose. He rolled onto his side to vomit, and it was all I could do not to vomit also, for his vomit was black and bubbling as it hit the floor, like boiling tar, and the stench was awful, like rotten meat on a hot stove.
“His heart was pounding in his chest like a piston engine, so fast that I was unable to count it. I ran to the observation window of his room and begged to be able to give him something for his pain, but there was no time. With a screech, he flung himself onto his back and thrashed as if in the grip of some great seizure, and all the while his abdomen swelled further and further until the inevitable happened.
“With a sizzling hiss, his abdomen burst open, releasing a great jet of steam, blood and offal. It was too much for me, and I hammered on the door like a lunatic until allowed to escape. I ran to the corner of the room and was barely able to rip the mask from my face before I collapsed and began to vomit, over and over again as if my tortured being was trying to purge itself of the horror that had been witnessed.
“By the time I was able to stagger back to the observation window, the man was engulfed in flame. I watched as his arms slowly curled in towards his chest and his body bent forward as if he were trying to sit up, but I knew that he was dead, and the movement was simply due to the contracting muscles and tissues as the intense heat drove the moisture from his body.
“The blaze lasted for almost twenty minutes, and no attempt was made to extinguish the flames. As we watched, the room filled with a curious, thick smoke, which coated the window almost completely. Once we were sure that the fire had run its course, I donned my mask once more and cautiously made my way back inside.
“Of the young man, there was nothing left but a black stain on the floor and a single foot. Within two days, each of the other subjects had developed a terrible fever, and by the end of the fourth day, they were all dead, burnt to almost nothing.
“Naturally, I was asked to examine the remains. I took scrapings and swabs from the unburnt body parts, the residue upon the walls and the stains upon the floors. I inspected all the samples beneath a microscope, but there was no sign of infection to be seen, and we grew nothing from the swabs.
“We had succeeded; an infection that could be spread via food or water, that was unstoppable once symptoms or signs developed, and that would destroy all evidence of its own existence.”
*
“It was both terrifying and wondrous.” Dr Arisov removed his handkerchief from his pocket and wiped a light sheen of sweat from his brow. Clearly, the memory of his experiences had caused some little excitement. “Thankfully, it was never used outside of The Vector Institute, and once the Soviet Union was dissolved, all stocks were destroyed; or so I believed. Gentlemen, you must imagine my surprise and loathing when I received Dr Harker’s e-mail. I had not expected to see such a thing again.”
“Dr Arisov,” said Urban-Smith. “Does the name, ‘Kibu Wala’ mean anything to you?”
He shook his head. “No, Sir.”
Urban-Smith waved his arm dismissively. “Then it is of no matter.”
I however was not feeling so charitable.
“Kibu Wala is, or should I say was, a village in Northern Ethiopia,” said I through gritted teeth. “In the mid 1980s, its water supply was poisoned, and all the villagers perished in flames.” I clenched my fists in anger. “Does that jog any memories, Doctor Arisov?”
“My God!” he muttered, his eyes wide with surprise. “Please, gentlemen; I implore you. You must believe me, I never knew. I would never have been a party to such a thing.”
I banged the arm of my chair, and he startled. “You were responsible for this atrocity. You were instrumental in identifying a suitable disease to modify. What did you think would become if it?”
“No!” he shouted. “I never believed it would be used.” He waggled his finger at me. “Look at our nuclear arsenal; we had enough weapons to destroy the entire World, but never since Hiroshima has a nuclear explosion been unleashed upon any person. Those weapons were just a show of force, a disincentive to our enemies. What did your Prime Minister, Harold Wilson, call it; an independent nuclear deterrent? This was the same. We knew that the United States had huge stockpiles of biological and chemical weapons. Our only defence was to threaten to retaliate in kind.” He gripped his hands tightly together as if in prayer. “I never expected BaNG to reappear.”
I took a deep breath, composed myself and rose from my chair. I had listened to quite enough of the man’s excuses.
“Doctor Arisov.” I extended my arm, and he hurriedly stood and shook my hand. “Thank you for visiting. I trust that you can find you own way out.”
Urban-Smith followed suit, and together we watched Dr Arisov scuttle away down the hall and out through the front door.
“Well,” I blustered. “What a rogue.”
Urban-Smith snorted with amusement and lowered himself back into his favourite chair. “He certainly has got your goat, Rupert.”
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