Deadly Misconduct

by R. J. Amos

  I followed through the pages and found some sentences that interested me greatly.

  ‘Healthy mice that receive a dose have symptoms that look like a heart attack. PM on mice shows no atherosclerosis. Nervous system was over stimulated leading to death.’

  The symptoms of the healthy mice were exactly the same as those of Professor Conneally. That looked like pretty serious evidence against Joshua. This was a strong indication of his involvement.

  There had to be a page somewhere that told me what this chemical was. Something more than UL0710 – the code he had given it.

  Biochemists drive me mad. Don’t they care what the actual structure looks like? Surely it’s the way the chemical is made that does the job. I looked through books and pages and article drafts. Finally I found a table with all the structures of the different drugs he was using in his experiments.

  There it was. UL0710. Looking just like one of the structures I had sketched from my analysis. When things calmed down again and I was in a position to gloat I would have to tell Susannah that the structure was more like my structure B than my structure A. I got it right.

  But right now this was more evidence. Joshua was definitely involved. And why? I was pretty sure I knew. The gossip at the biochemistry building had made it fairly obvious.

  Now I turned to the thesis for evidence. If the healthy mice were dying, it should have been recorded for publication somewhere. You can’t leave out information like that.

  There had been nothing about possible side-effects (death is a pretty serious side-effect too) in the abstract so I looked elsewhere. I searched electronically, I searched the piles of papers, the printed sheets of thesis drafts, the early drafts of journal articles, there was no mention of the deaths of healthy mice anywhere in any of it. The lounge room started to look like a mountain in the alps, like it had snowed paper – there were paper drifts on the floor, on every chair, on every surface. But apart from in the lab diaries themselves there was no trace of the information that the healthy mice had died. Nothing.

  Obviously this was it. This is the big issue that caused the end of Joshua’s career. This was the disaster. This was the cheating in the PhD thesis.

  It didn’t have to be a disaster, though. It could have been dealt with correctly and Joshua would still have had a worthy PhD thesis. I wondered just what went wrong in the end. Did Joshua decide not to include this very important problem with his new drug lead, thinking it would mean the thesis could not be published, and he would not gain his doctorate? Did Conneally tell him that it would be ok, that others would find the problem later and that he could go ahead without it? And how was it found out? And how was Joshua told that his career was over?

  I was sure that this time I had found the person responsible for the murder of Professor Conneally. Joshua had to be the one to have poisoned the professor. And with his wonder drug too.

  But how? He hadn’t been anywhere near the restaurant. I hadn’t seen him there at all that night – Misaki, Robbie and I had carefully examined all of the delegates in our time-wasting before our meal was served. We were closely watching everyone at the table. Joshua was not there.

  But he’d done it somehow. I knew he was involved. And one way to find out how, was to ask.

  I had driven to the university, found a place to park the car, and tried to figure out how I would begin the conversation with Joshua. How did one start to accuse someone of murder? ‘Joshua, I think it’s time you confessed’ what authority did I have to say that? Or ‘Would you like to tell me the story of how you murdered Conneally?’ Not really smooth. I prayed that I’d find the words once I got there. And that Susannah would be happy to work with me. So much could go wrong. My stomach tightened and my mouth felt dry. How would he respond?

  I knocked on Susannah’s office door.

  ‘Hi Susannah, I need to interrupt whatever you’re doing. I’m sorry but this is really important.’

  Susannah looked up from her computer, ‘Of course. I’m intrigued. What do you need?’

  ‘I need two things – I need a private conversation with Joshua, maybe you could bring him here? And I need someone, maybe Dan, to look in Joshua’s office and lab and in the waste for vials or containers or anything labelled UL0710 or anything with the label recently ripped off, or anything with a structure matching this one.’

  Susannah looked at the structure I showed her and her eyes widened.

  ‘Joshua?’ it didn’t take much for her to put two and two together. I had always known this woman was brilliant, but I was impressed.

  ‘I’m almost completely sure.’

  ‘Have you told the police?’

  ‘I’m only almost completely sure. That’s why I’m here.’

  ‘Ok, I’ll put Dan and Liv onto the searching and I’ll bring Joshua here. But I’m not leaving. This could get dangerous.’

  Susannah left the office and I sat and waited, once again running through my head the possible openers for the difficult conversation ahead.

  ‘What’s going on? What do you need to talk to me about?’ I heard the defensive grumble coming up the hallway.

  ‘Actually Joshua, it’s me that wants to talk to you,’ I said, ‘have a seat.’

  He sat down, glancing at the door where Susannah stood, trying to look casual. I gathered my thoughts and started to talk. I told Joshua all that I had found out about his past. That he was a student under Prof Conneally, and a good and clever one at that, and that they discovered something very exciting. A possible treatment for motor neurone disease.

  Joshua stared at me as I spoke. His jaw dropped open and he kept shaking his head like he couldn’t believe what he was hearing. And then he spoke, suspicious and cautious, ‘Yeah, you’re right. It was a breakthrough.’

  ‘But something went wrong, didn’t it? I’ve looked at your books, your lab diaries. Some of the mice were dying.’

  ‘How did you find that out? I thought it all would have been thrown out years ago! Why are you telling me all this?’

  ‘Is it true though? Can you tell me about it?’

  There was a long silence, and I was scared that he’d get up and leave the room. I looked up at Susannah and she stood a little straighter, blocking the doorway. Then Joshua decided to speak.

  ‘I guess so. Yeah, some mice were dying. The healthy ones. The controls. The sick mice – the transgenic mice – they were great on the drug. Did you see the footprint trace? It took them so much longer to get sick, and they lasted a whole month longer than we thought they would.’

  ‘Only a month, then they died?’ said Susannah shrugging her shoulders, ‘Didn’t you want them to get better?’

  Joshua looked at Susannah with eyes full of contempt, ‘They don’t get better. This is neuron damage, not a grazed knee. All we’re trying to do is give a better quality of life, a longer life. A month with a mouse is equivalent to years, maybe even decades of human life. Don’t you know anything?’ His fists clenched and unclenched on his knees and I watched and worried. This was getting scary. What was I going to do if he got violent?

  ‘So, you got excellent results for the sick mice then ...’ would the distraction calm him down?

  ‘It was unreal, really excellent. Longer life, later onset, just amazing.’ Joshua leant towards me, his hands waving as he explained the medical breakthrough. Susannah relaxed and leant against the door frame. I realised that I had never seen Joshua this animated, that talking about his research was tapping into a part of him that had been pushed down and hidden all this time. What I had thought was his normal way of being was probably a super depressed state. All these years, pushing down all the desires of his heart. Hope deferred makes the heart sick. This guy had been sick for a decade.

  I didn’t want to lose the happy Joshua again by bringing back his depression, but unfortunately it had to be done. I had to get to the bottom of it all. Whether he got violent or not.

  ‘The dead mice?’ I prompted and Joshua retreated back into h
is shell.

  ‘Yeah, the dead mice. Like I said, the sick mice improved massively, but when we gave the drug to the healthy mice they died.’

  ‘Why do you think they died?’ I probed.

  ‘It was like, I dunno, maybe the drug stimulated the heart too much and the healthy system couldn’t cope. It always looked like a heart attack but we would check and there were no signs of heart disease so we figured it was a nervous system thing.’

  ‘But you didn’t write about that in your thesis?’

  I kept my tone gentle, understanding, I wanted to get to the emotional reasons why Joshua had felt that murder was the only option. I wanted to help him to see what he had done.

  ‘Conneally said not to. No-one believes me, but it’s true. He said it wasn’t part of the story. He said that the main idea in my thesis was that the sick mice got healthy. That the issue with the controls would only be important later, when the drug was being patented or improved, or whatever – somewhere in a trial before it was being sold to the public. So no, I didn’t write that bit up.’

  ‘And you went ahead and submitted the thesis for examination.’

  ‘Yeah, I submitted.’

  Joshua became silent again.

  ‘So?’ I prompted after what felt like an age, ‘What happened?’

  ‘What do you expect? An examiner’s report came back asking about controls. He said that the thesis wasn’t complete without the bit about the healthy mice. He asked whether we had done any experiments with healthy mice at all. So of course we said yes, and we gave the results, and then it all hit the fan. I was accused of hiding the negatives, and it all went higher up and Conneally just dropped the lot on me – didn’t take any of the blame himself. Told them I’d hidden it all from him, that I’d fudged the figures.’

  ‘And you know this because ...’

  ‘It’s obvious isn’t it?’ his fists clenched and he kicked the desk in front of him, ‘What else would have happened? They threw me out, they threw all my research in the bin, kicked me out for malpractice or whatever. I was done.’

  ‘And you blamed the professor.’ Boy I was working hard at keeping my tone low. I wanted to defuse the tension here and he was getting pretty worked up. Not that I should have expected anything else – I was really poking at a sore spot. I wondered where this would all end up. I glanced at Susannah. She wasn’t leaning against the door frame anymore. She was poised ready to jump into action, to come to my rescue if needed. But we had to keep going now.

  ‘It was his fault. All of my years of study and research down the drain and nothing to show for it. No three letters after my name – no Joshua Hume PhD, no Dr Joshua. No respect for what I’d done. He took it all from me. Such a waste of my time. A waste of years of my life. Did he suffer? Not at all. Next thing I know he’s off to Cambridge. Climbing the ladder at the speed of light. And I’m here, washing dishes. Couldn’t get any other jobs. Who would employ someone who had wasted literally years of their life doing work that led nowhere, with no references, no nothing?’

  ‘You must have thought that life was playing into your hands to bring Conneally back here ...’

  Joshua slumped back in his chair and stared at the floor. ‘All the stars aligned. Everything came together. If you’re wondering how I still had some of that drug, I took it when I left the uni. Even then I was thinking of how I could get my own back. Such a long wait, but it finally happened. I got Sally to get work at the conference dinner. You know, Hobart’s a small place and it’s all about who you know. I knew people and Sally knew people.’

  Who was Sally?I looked at Susannah and she shrugged. I didn’t want to stop the flow of words here, but I wondered what this Sally was like. I mean, Joshua looked like the brains of the operation but there was another person out there who was willing to commit murder. And if she knew that we’d found Joshua, what was going to happen to us? How could we find her? We had no idea who she was but she could easily find us if she wanted to. I wondered if we were in danger, I think the same thought had occurred to Susannah too – she was glancing back over her shoulder occasionally, and rubbing her hands. We were both pretty uncomfortable with what was coming out. But Joshua didn’t really notice, he just kept talking.

  ‘It was easy. Sally didn’t know what I was planning of course. She had no idea of what the drug could do. And neither did I, really, I mean I’d only given it to mice. Who knew if it would work on a human? It was the great human trial, n=1.’

  ‘And it worked. And he died.’

  ‘And he died, yes. That was what I was hoping for, a successful trial.’ Joshua wiped his face with his hands. ‘He’s dead and it’s over. Nothing will bring him back. He is actually dead. I played this out so many times in my head, but now it’s happened. Dead. And so many people affected by this, not just him, but his family, his students, his colleagues, his friends, they are all changed by this. I hadn’t thought ...’

  ‘How do you feel?’

  Joshua shifted in his seat, ‘I don’t know why I am telling you this, but I feel shit. It’s not what I thought, I thought I’d feel, you know, like, victorious, happy, something. But I just feel guilty, just massive guilt. I can’t face Sally, how could I make her kill someone? How could I do that to anyone? I can’t face anyone. I can’t stop thinking about it.’

  I wondered whether Sally was really that innocent. Did she really not know what was going to happen? I mean, you don’t just poison someone for kicks. How would I find her? What kind of person was she?

  At least Joshua looked like he was calm again. In fact, he looked like someone who had gone through counselling – like telling someone all about it was what he’d been dying to do for years. Maybe I should be looking for a new career.

  ‘Josh, are you ready to turn yourself in?’

  ‘Do you think,’ Josh looked up at me, through unshed tears, ‘do you think, if I do that, I’ll get peace? I thought his death would end the thoughts in my head but it’s just made them ten times worse.’

  ‘I don’t know,’ I said, ‘but I reckon it’s the beginning to the path of peace. It’s a long path, but turning yourself in will be a good start.’

  Joshua hung his head as his thoughts turned inwards. I wasn’t sure what to do next but I could see that Joshua was earnest about wanting it all to be over. His bitterness had strangled all the life out of him for the last ten years. I could only feel sorry for him.

  I looked at Susannah standing in the door and staring at Joshua. She looked a bit wild around the eyes. It would be stressful to realise you were the boss of a person who was willing to murder if they didn’t get their own way. But Susannah hadn’t been in any danger really. Joshua had been totally taken up with Conneally for the past decade. It was amazing that he had got any work done at all.

  Neither Susannah nor myself had any idea what to do next. But I knew someone who knew. I pulled the phone out of my pocket to finally call Nate.

  But before I could make the call, I was interrupted by the sound of slamming doors and racing footsteps.

  The office door burst open and Nate charged in followed by a couple of police officers in uniform.

  ‘Police! Stay right there!’ he shouted at Joshua, ‘Don’t try anything!’

  Joshua looked up with a weary ‘Huh?’

  ‘Joshua Hume, I am arresting you for the murder of Professor James Conneally. You do not have to say anything but anything you do say will be taken in evidence.’

  Joshua nodded calmly.

  ‘Oh good,’ he said with obvious relief, ‘thanks.’

  That stopped Nate in his tracks. ‘Thanks? What?’

  ‘You’ve saved him a lot of trouble,’ I responded with a laugh, ‘he was just trying to figure out how to turn himself in. He’s never been in this situation before and he didn’t know where to start.’

  Joshua went quietly with the police officers, only stopping to ask me to go and see Sally and pass on his apology to her. I promised to do my best.

  Once
Joshua was safely down the hallway and out of earshot I turned to Nate.

  ‘Nate, who is Sally?’

  ‘Alicia, what have you done?’

  ‘Looks like there’s a lot of explaining to be done all round,’ said Susannah.

  ‘Yes, but not here. I think you’re going to have to come to the station with me too.’

  I felt totally drained, I looked around me for my bag and phone and was gathering myself to follow Nate when Dan burst into the office waving some sample vials and yelling, ‘Found it, found the poison!’

  Nate looked from Dan to me with such incredulity that I sank back into my chair and giggled hysterically. It had been a long day.

  The day didn’t get any shorter. There’s no way that you can discover a murderer and not incur a considerable amount of paperwork. Everyone who had been involved needed to go to the police station and make a statement. Susannah, Dan, Liv, Trudy and myself all had to give our little bit of evidence. And I had to go back to the mess in my lounge room and put aside all the important papers and hand them and all the boxes to Nate and his team. It was about midnight when I finally dropped into bed but Nate assured me that we could meet at The Lemon Tree the next day and I’d get all my questions answered.

  We all met at The Lemon Tree – Nate, Jan, and myself, but also Trudy, Susannah, Dan and Liv. Everyone needed to hear what this was about. I gave my side of the story – missing out a few of the more embarrassing side tracks. I didn’t want to look stupid, after all.

  ‘So that was the thing that set me on the right track. The gossip from the Biochemistry Department, Joshua’s incredibly bad attitude, and the knowledge that he had not completed a PhD, it all came together somehow in my head.’

  ‘But surely, it’s not that important – just for some letters after your name, surely it’s not worth killing for.’ Jan was still struggling to come to terms with the motive.

  ‘It’s a rarified environment. We all tell each other how important we are, and suddenly all you can see worth living for is the appellation ‘Professor’. You begin to believe that these people are a higher life form. You have to believe that to make it worth working for. Joshua’s ideas were only slightly more twisted than that.’ Susannah responded to my statement with a frown. This was her world, her ambition. Maybe there was a purer motive for wanting to get ahead in academia, but after this adventure I was feeling a bit cynical.