The Chemical Detective

by Fiona Erskine

  Camilla glanced over her shoulder and then leant forward, lowering her voice. ‘Jaq, do you know where Sergei is?’ There was an unusual quality about Camilla’s voice, a grave intensity.

  Jaq raised an eyebrow. ‘Who the hell is Sergei?’

  Camilla put a finger to her lips and whispered. ‘Sergei Koval, your predecessor at Snow Science.’

  Jaq had a vague memory of hearing the name. ‘The Russian?’

  ‘Ukrainian.’

  Jaq shrugged. ‘I haven’t a clue.’

  ‘Has he made contact with you?’

  ‘No, why should—’

  ‘Did he leave anything for me? A key?’

  A twist of unease spiralled from Jaq’s stomach and tightened her throat. A key? Why would a Snow Science employee leave a key for a supplier? ‘No.’

  Camilla glanced over her shoulder again. ‘Notes? Files? Data? A memory stick? Anything? You sure he didn’t leave a key?’

  Jaq tried to follow her gaze. Nothing but skiers and holidaymakers crowded at the coffee bar, paying no attention to two women in a corner booth. Why all this fuss and drama? She raised her voice, establishing her refusal to engage. ‘Why would he leave you a key?’

  A shaft of sunlight penetrated the back skylight, making Camilla’s white hair glow. Ethereal, angelic. ‘I have to find it,’ she whispered.

  Jaq pressed against the padded seat, distancing herself. ‘I don’t understand,’ she said. ‘What is your connection with Sergei Koval?’

  Camilla shifted in her seat as the waiter approached. She waved him away and checked the room before continuing. ‘He contacted me about some irregularities.’

  ‘Irregularities?’

  ‘Some discrepancies with Zagrovyl-sourced products.’

  ‘What sort of discrepancies?’

  ‘I wish I could tell you more.’ Camilla sighed. ‘Before we could meet, he vanished.’

  Vanished. Jaq wrapped her arms around her chest, suddenly cold.

  ‘Why did Sergei contact you?’ Jaq said. ‘Don’t Zagrovyl have special departments to investigate quality complaints?’

  Camilla pursed her lips and wrinkled her nose. ‘Sergei knew that I was investigating something a little wider.’

  ‘Involving Zagrovyl, your own company?’

  ‘Involving the whole supply chain.’

  A prickling sensation on her skin made Jaq want to scratch, but she resisted the urge. ‘So, you check how Zagrovyl chemicals are used after they leave the factory?’

  ‘Something like that,’ Camilla said.

  ‘And Sergei had information?’

  Camilla nodded.

  ‘But he left before he could give it to you?’

  Camilla scrutinised her face. ‘He told me he was keeping the evidence in a safe place, and when we met he would give me the key.’

  ‘As in code, password?’

  Camilla raised her glass to the light, watching the colour change as it rotated. She appeared to come to a decision. ‘I took it to mean a real physical object.’

  ‘Camilla, what exactly do you want?’

  ‘I’ll level with you,’ Camilla said. ‘It’s personal, not official Zagrovyl business. But it is important.’ She fixed Jaq with a penetrating stare. There was pain there, and passion. ‘Sergei wouldn’t communicate by phone or email. He wouldn’t talk to anyone except me, and then only face to face.’ She lowered her head. ‘I will never forgive myself if anything has happened to him.’

  Jaq’s stomach did a double somersault. Happened to him? Sergei had moved on. That meant he’d had enough. Packed it in. Resigned. Found something new. ‘Why should something have happened to him?’

  Camilla dropped her gaze and inspected her manicured fingernails. ‘When I heard that you had taken his place, I wanted to meet you,’ she said. ‘In the hope that you might help me. But also to warn you.’

  Jaq frowned. ‘About what?’

  ‘Jaq, we need to find that key.’

  Who was this woman? Since when did she call the shots? ‘There is no we here, Camilla.’

  ‘Then you need to find the key,’ Camilla said.

  Jaq gave an exasperated snort. ‘I don’t need to do anything.’

  Camilla placed both her hands on the table. ‘Come and work for me.’

  Work at Zagrovyl again? No, thank you. Once bitten, twice shy. ‘You must be joking.’

  ‘I’m deadly serious,’ Camilla said. ‘Think about it.’

  Jaq sprang to her feet. ‘I don’t need to think about it. The answer is no.’

  ‘Be careful, Jaq. The less you know, the safer you’ll be.’

  A threat?

  ‘This is part of something big.’ Camilla dropped her voice to a whisper. ‘Strange things may happen. Keep away. Stay safe. Don’t get involved. It could be dangerous.’

  Basta. Enough. Jaq seized her ski jacket. The hook underneath was empty, bare, shining brass. Where was her bag? There, on the floor, just below the hook. How the hell had that happened? She reached down to retrieve it, her hand darting to the inside pocket. She muffled a gasp of relief as her fingers curled round the bulge of keys. All secure.

  Camilla bent down and caught Jaq’s arm as she rose, holding on longer than was comfortable. ‘If you won’t help me, stay out of this, Jaq,’ Camilla said. ‘For your own safety.’

  Rushing to retrieve her snowboard, Jaq almost collided with a man backing into the café, shaking his snowy boots onto the street.

  ‘Jaq!’

  Surprised? Certainly. Dismayed? Impossible to tell. At least he remembered her name.

  ‘Hi, Karel.’

  ‘It’s great to see you,’ he said.

  A throwaway phrase. Polite and meaningless.

  He kissed her on both cheeks with cool lips. ‘Can I buy you a coffee?’

  ‘I’m just leaving.’

  He tilted his head, blue eyes flashing under fair lashes over cheekbones like razors.

  ‘Another time?’

  ‘Sure.’

  ‘I wanted to get in touch.’ His cheeks flushed. Did he blush when he lied? Or was she being unfair? The effect of the warm café after the winter air outside. ‘I don’t have your number.’

  Jaq hesitated. What did it matter? She reached into her jacket and handed him a business card. A movement from a booth caught her eye. Camilla was standing, peering across at Karel. Time to leave. A bus inched up the hill. The shuttle for Snow Science. Faster than running.

  ‘Must dash.’ Jaq made a phone sign with her thumb and pinkie. ‘Call me?’

  The bus stank of sweaty socks. She nabbed a seat by the window and rubbed condensation from the glass as the bus trundled past the café. No sign of Camilla following her. Good.

  Through the café window, she glimpsed a flash of golden hair as Karel bent his head to talk to someone. She couldn’t see who it was, nor did she really care.

  Jaq had some chemical detective work to do.

  Tuesday 1 March, Kranjskabel, Slovenia

  By the time Jaq returned to Snow Science, the samples had vanished.

  She stood in the centre of laboratory number five and blinked. Que loucura! No tray, no spatula, no samples, no quartz cells, no printouts. The bench tops blinked back at her, the bare surfaces polished and shining. Everything gone. But where?

  The low hum of the machines mocked her as she searched in drawers and cupboards. Nothing. She checked the device that had been rerunning the samples while she was out. It had powered down. She opened it up to retrieve the sample cells. Empty. She called up the memory to see the results of the last runs. Wiped clear.

  Little bubbles of rage expanded as they rose, exploding with a howl of fury. No one heard her. Laboratory Five was empty. Not just of her samples and results, but of people as well. No Rita. What was going on? Jaq ran, searching for someone to question. A flash of silver from the snowsuits, the reflective strips sparkling under the corridor lights; limp, headless puppets mocking her. No one in sight. She followed the corridor down to the t
raining block and ran right into a crowded lecture theatre.

  ‘Ah, Dr Silver, so glad you could join us!’ Laurent stood on the podium in front of a crowded auditorium. Jaq groaned inwardly. She had totally forgotten about the training, the new initiative launched by Laurent – Workplace Organisation and Standardisation. 5S. Everything in its correct place. Tidiness for idiots.

  ‘Take a seat.’ Laurent made it a command, not an invitation, indicating an empty row at the front.

  Jaq ignored his accusatory finger and slipped into a back row next to Rita, the analyst from Laboratory Five.

  ‘As I was saying,’ Laurent resumed the lecture, ‘the Japanese first introduced 5S. It translates as “sort”, “set in order”, “shine”, “standardise” and “sustain”.’

  ‘What happened to my samples?’ Jaq whispered to Rita.

  Rita frowned and shrugged.

  ‘They were on the bench, next to where you work,’ Jaq hissed.

  ‘I thought you’d finished,’ Rita whispered back. ‘All tidied away. His orders.’ She nodded her head at Laurent, who was explaining the benefits of the new workflow system.

  ‘Where to?’

  Rita mimed a dumping motion.

  ‘The bin?’ Jaq hadn’t thought to check the bin. There was still hope.

  Rita shook her head and whispered, ‘Recycling.’

  The incinerator. ‘What the fuck!’ The words exploded and ricocheted around the lecture theatre. Several heads turned.

  Laurent ignored the interruption, adopting his most lugubrious smile as he welcomed several colleagues to the podium to explain the detailed roll-out of 5S to Snow Science.

  There might still be time. The samples were small, a few grams from each bag. The Snow Science incinerator was designed to handle explosives. But everything was checked first. Jaq sprang to her feet and exited the training, letting the door bang behind her.

  She sprinted down corridors, cutting across the snowy mound that separated the warehouses from the laboratories and offices, swinging left across the helicopter landing circle and into the utilities section. Wisps of steam rose from drains in the boiler house, a constant psst! psst! of steam traps discharging condensate into the tiled drain channels. She ran past the hiss of a pneumatic air leak and the roar of a diesel turbine. Faster. She was breathing heavily by the time she arrived at the recycling section.

  Too late.

  The operator opened the sight glass on the incinerator and Jaq bit her lip as the samples fell into the flames.

  ‘Dr Visquel said to give this priority,’ the operator said.

  Oh, he did, did he? The underhand, treacherous, useless snake.

  The glass melted, the powder sizzled and flared with a series of exploding blue and orange fireballs.

  Jaq waited for Laurent outside the lecture theatre.

  ‘Dr Visquel, we need to talk.’

  ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘I think we do.’ He gestured towards his office.

  Sheila, Laurent’s secretary, turned as they entered, greeting Jaq with a question about the warehouse vending machine. ‘Small triangular key with two prongs. Can’t find it anywhere. Have you seen it?’ Jaq raised her eyebrows to warn her that now was not the time. Sheila winked behind Laurent’s back, locked the filing cabinet and left, closing the connecting door.

  ‘Why did you destroy my samples?’ Jaq kept her hands clasped together, focusing her fury on keeping them still.

  Laurent sauntered over to his desk and sat on a leather chair.

  ‘I’ve no idea what you’re talking about.’ He opened a desk drawer and extracted a pair of nail clippers. ‘And before we discuss anything else, how do you explain your outburst in my lecture?’

  ‘I was working in Lab Five.’ Jaq laced her fingers together and squeezed, dissipating the anger so she could keep her voice level and slow. ‘I was analysing some samples and they disappeared.’

  ‘Take it up with the lab technicians.’

  Typical. Find someone else to take the rap. ‘I already spoke with Rita. She said you ordered it.’

  Laurent inspected the nails on his left hand.

  ‘If you were absent,’ clip, clip, ‘for the 5S inspection,’ clip, clip, ‘then you have only yourself to blame.’ Clip. Laurent snipped the final nail and swapped the clipper to his other hand. ‘Did you book the experiment into the logbook and get an SP5 sample number?’

  The man was insufferable. ‘There was no need. I was doing the analysis myself.’

  ‘Did you label the samples with the SB5 barcode?’ Clip. Clip.

  Worse than insufferable, a halfwit. ‘I already told you . . . I was trying to identify them.’

  ‘Did you program the machines with the SP5 sample number?’ Clip. ‘Or scan in the SB5 barcode?’ Clip.

  No, not a halfwit, an evil orc. ‘You know I didn’t.’

  ‘Did you write up your results on the SR5 results sheet?’ Clip.

  Jaq clenched one fist and slammed it into the palm of her other hand. ‘Stop pretending this is about lab protocol. You destroyed my samples deliberately. You gave it priority. Why?’

  Laurent swept his hand across the table. The nail clippers jumped and clattered to the floor. ‘I will not have the programme jeopardised!’ Little flecks of spittle dusted his moustache. ‘We get the quality we are prepared to accept. Zero tolerance to deviation is the only way to raise standards. I will enforce it. Do you realise how important this is for the future of Snow Science?’

  ‘What, 5S?’ Jaq laughed out loud. ‘Glorified housekeeping?’ Could he be that stupid? No, he was hiding something. ‘I don’t believe you.’

  Laurent bent down to retrieve the clippers. ‘I gave you every opportunity, Jaq,’ he said. ‘I tried to help you to integrate.’ He shook his head slowly. ‘But you spurned me.’

  Christ, was that what it was all about? Rejecting Laurent’s clumsy pass in the karaoke bar? Leaving with a gorgeous young stranger instead of shagging the ugly old boss? Good lord, what century did Laurent think he was living in?

  Laurent folded his arms across his chest. ‘The funding from the consortium depends on us introducing normalised working practices.’

  Oh, to wipe the condescending smile from his face with her boot. ‘It is not normal to destroy other people’s samples,’ Jaq said.

  ‘We have systems,’ Laurent said. ‘We have protocols. If you are not with us, then you are against us. I can’t have one arrogant individual ruining the efforts of the team.’

  Arrogant! That was rich, coming from him. ‘In what way am I—?’

  ‘Enough!’ Laurent held up both hands, palms outwards. ‘I am willing to forgive your profanity in the lecture theatre, your wild accusations and disrespect in my office, your failure to observe laboratory protocol, but only,’ he slammed his hands down on the desk, ‘if this is the last time I hear about those blasted Zagrovyl samples. Do I make myself clear?’

  Oh yes, perfectly clear. Laurent was taking instructions from Zagrovyl.

  She slammed the office door as she left.

  Tuesday 1 March, Jesenice, Slovenia

  Boris secured the load and closed the curtain of the SLYV lorry. Loaded with eighteen pallets disguised as explosives, the SLYV wagon was finally ready to roll.

  He chanted along to Masters of Rock on the approach to Lake Bled, the rising sun blinding him as he turned east. Sliding on a pair of sunglasses, he paused to stare at the fairy-tale castle perched on a cliff above the frozen water and frosty island. General Tito once kept a summer house here. Good choice. They didn’t make dictators like they used to.

  Boris bypassed Ljubljana and crossed the border into Hungary at Pince.

  Click. 46.53320, 15.60110. Intensity 72X, 648C

  A customs officer waved down the lorry and indicated a side bay. Boris pressed pause on ‘Time to Change’. The thrum of the engine replaced Pavel Slíva’s guitar riff as he rolled down the window.

  ‘Where did you pick this up?’

  Boris handed over the
paperwork. ‘Snow Science, Slovenia.’ He watched in the side mirror as she took the papers and walked to the back of the lorry, his mouth suddenly dry. Had he forgotten anything? Yuri normally made this run. But Yuri had fucked up once too often. Picking up the wrong pallet, leaving one behind that could expose the whole supply chain. Blow the operation wide open. Boris had taught Yuri a lesson. Yuri wouldn’t be driving again. Not for SLYV, and not for anyone else.

  She was back. ‘Final destination?’

  ‘Smolensk.’ Boris pointed to the false delivery address on the paperwork. ‘Zagrovyl, Russia.’

  ‘Open up, please.’

  ‘Back or side?’

  ‘Everything.’

  Was she on the make? Should he have slipped her some cash with the documents? Her body language didn’t invite it. Sour-faced knedlík. Too late now; if he misjudged the situation it would make things worse. Best to play by the rules.

  Boris unlaced first one side curtain and then the other, his fingers freezing against the metal rings, burning on the rope. He followed her as she walked round, checking each pallet against the paperwork. This one was thorough. And that’s when he noticed it.

  The last pallet. The one Yuri had left behind. The one he’d gone back for. Tears in the stretch-wrap. Tape on the bags just under the tear. Why? Shit. To close the sample slits. Not just the top four bags, the decoy material, but all thirty-six bags underneath.

  Suka.

  His heart pounded at the realisation. The new engineer at Snow Science, the kurva had lied. She’d taken forty samples and only returned four.

  For the first time in months he craved a cigarette.

  The customs inspection finished, the ošklivý knedlík handed him his papers. ‘Drive on.’

  Boris pulled into the next lorry park and made the call.

  Tuesday 1 March, Kranjskabel, Slovenia

  Jaq lay on her bed and stared up at the magnolia ceiling. Low and featureless, a miserly skim of matt paint hid cheap woodchip. The hum of traffic swishing through slush penetrated the thin walls and echoed off empty spaces.