by Ken McClure
‘Really?’
‘I didn’t want him getting his hands on any live patients,’ smiled MacLeod.
Both men laughed.
‘It hasn’t stopped him getting to the top,’ said Bannerman.
‘Intellectual short-coming seldom does in my experience,’ said MacLeod.
‘So academia wasn’t for you?’ said Bannerman.
‘It certainly wasn’t,’ agreed MacLeod. ‘Academics are more institutionalized than prisoners in jail, only they don’t realize it.’
‘Why general practice?’ asked Bannerman.
‘I wanted to be part of a community, not something outside it. As a GP I’m at the heart of things. I’m in at the beginning and I’m there at the end. It was what I wanted to do and I’ve never regretted it.’
‘There’s not too many people can say that about their lives,’ said Bannerman.
‘On the contrary, Doctor,’ said MacLeod. ‘A lot of people say it but whether or not it’s true is an entirely different matter.’
‘Point taken,’ conceded Bannerman.
‘Would you join me in a drink, Doctor?’ asked MacLeod, opening his desk drawer and taking out a bottle. ‘But first be warned that if you should happen to say, “It’s a little early for me” I may be inspired to violence.’
Bannerman smiled and said, ‘I would be honoured.’
MacLeod poured the whisky and Bannerman asked, ‘What happened about the examination of the bodies?’
‘They were taken to the small cottage hospital facility we have at Stobmor. Dr Gill performed elementary examinations and then Dr Napier took over the brunt of the laboratory work while Gill went around asking questions. After a few days it was decided that the bodies would be taken to Edinburgh for full autopsy.’
‘I didn’t realize you had a hospital in the area,’ said Bannerman.
‘It’s more of a clinic, really,’ replied MacLeod. ‘But we have a nursing sister and it’s somewhere where small or emergency operations can be carried out, should the need arise.’
Bannerman wondered about MacLeod’s ability to operate at his age but did not say anything. MacLeod smiled as he read his mind and said, ‘We can call on a surgical rota from Inverness and Glasgow.’
‘I see,’ said Bannerman.
‘And now you are going to ask me about the power station,’ said MacLeod.
‘I am?’
‘Yes.’
‘How did you know that?’ asked Bannerman who was increasingly enjoying MacLeod’s company.
‘If you are looking for a likely cause of mutation in a virus, you could hardly ignore the presence of a nuclear power station next door could you?’
‘Once again I have to take my hat off to you Doctor,’ said Bannerman, with a smile. ‘Has the presence of the station caused any health problems in the area?’
‘It’s hard to be objective,’ replied MacLeod. The population is so small up here that it’s difficult to gather meaningful statistics.’
‘You have a higher than average childhood leukaemia incidence,’ said Bannerman. ‘I’ve had a look at the figures for the area.’
That’s a good example,’ said MacLeod. Two years ago our figures were slightly below the national average. Two cases last year, one in Stobmor and another in one of the outlying farms, were enough to push us into the “statistically higher than average” category. It could have been chance.’
Bannerman nodded and said, ‘I thought that might be the case.’
‘Lies, damned lies and statistics,’ sighed MacLeod. ‘But that’s not to say that the children didn’t get it from the presence of the station. We just can’t prove it one way or the other.’
That brings me to my next question,’ said Bannerman. ‘Do you have any radiation monitoring equipment?’
MacLeod said that he had, adding, ‘I was given it when they opened the station, a battery operated Geiger counter and calibration kit.’
‘I’d like to borrow it,’ said Bannerman. ‘I want to take a look at the boundary land between the station and Inverladdie Farm.’
‘By all means,’ said MacLeod. He got out of his chair and slid open the bottom cupboard door of a bookcase that held volumes of medical text books. He brought out a wooden box fitted with brass catches, which he unclasped. There we are,’ he said, removing the cylindrical monitoring probe. ‘Better check the batteries.’
EIGHT
Bannerman decided that it was about time that he took a look at Stobmor, Achnagelloch’s neighbouring community. He ascertained that it boasted a hotel, then arranged by phone to have dinner there at eight o’clock. He left his own hotel at six and drove the seven miles over to Stobmor, leaving himself plenty of time to look round.
In many ways Stobmor was little different from Achnagelloch, although it did possess a small office block, an unimaginative concrete box with signs saying that it was the headquarters of the Dutch quarry company, Joop van Gelder. Further along the road Bannerman found the cottage hospital that MacLeod had mentioned although, at the moment, it seemed empty and showed no lights. There was a board outside giving emergency telephone numbers. In the main street he found the local job centre with a lighted window and looked at the cards for a while to see what was on offer in the area.
There were ten vacancies. There was a post for an electrician at the quarry — preferably with knowledge of electric motors. Three further jobs at the quarry were for labourers. There were openings for two security guards at the power station — ideally with a services background — and there was a lab technician’s job in the monitoring section. The remaining positions were for domestic help and for a shop assistant’s post in the local mini-market. There was one farm job on the board: it was for a sheep worker at Inverladdie.
As he walked the streets Bannerman passed the primary school with its child paintings stuck up proudly in the windows. Road safety appeared to have been the theme, with traffic lights and Zebra crossings well to the fore. One window was entirely taken over by a cardboard cut-out policeman holding up traffic with a hand that appeared to have sausages for fingers.
Bannerman noticed that there was no shortage of cars parked in the streets, many with registrations younger than three years old. He took this as a barometer of the prosperity of the town. The quarry and the power station had ensured full employment in the area. He wondered how long Inverladdie might have to wait before a man opted for a farm labourer’s wage instead of the more lucrative alternatives.
Bannerman’s theory of general prosperity seemed to be reinforced by the fact that the houses seemed well-cared for and the gardens tidy and meticulously tended. Many of the houses appeared to have undergone recent upgrading; their doors and windows had been replaced. This was a working community, well ordered and probably quite content, thought Bannerman. He made his way towards the Highland Lodge Hotel in Main Street and a dinner he was now ready for.
The dining-room of the hotel was empty when Bannerman went in, although he noticed that another table had been set for half a dozen people. It was cold in the room and he rubbed his hands together and shivered as he sat down and took the menu from the girl who had showed him in. Happily she took the hint and lit a butane gas fire that stood in front of the fireplace with its empty and cheerless grate. The butane burner made a noise like a propeller driven aircraft approaching from afar. It made Bannerman think of the war film, The Dambusters.
‘You’re not from round here,’ said the girl when she came back to hover, with her pad and pen at the ready.
‘Does that mean that local people wouldn’t dream of eating here?’ asked Bannerman, immediately regretting his mischief-making when he saw the girl blush deeply.
‘Oh no,’ she exclaimed. ‘I just meant that it was unusual to see a tourist at this time of year. Lots of people eat here, honestly.’
‘I’m sorry,’ said Bannerman. ‘I’m sure it will be very nice.’
‘Mr van Gelder, himself, is giving a dinner party here later,’ said the gir
l, indicating to the set table.
‘A more than good enough recommendation I’m sure,’ said Bannerman, wishing that he hadn’t upset the girl in the first place and resolving to give her a big tip whatever the food was like. He guessed that she was a high-school girl making some money with an evening job. She had an openness and innocence about her that made him feel old.
‘Would you like a drink while you’re deciding?’ she asked.
‘I’d love a gin and tonic,’ replied Bannerman with a distant smile.
The meal proved far better than Bannerman had dared hope and was without doubt the best meal he had eaten since the one Shona MacLean had cooked. He found himself reluctant to leave the dining-room, which had warmed up considerably, and gladly accepted the offer of a second refill to his coffee cup to go with another cigarette. He was thinking about Shona MacLean when the all male dinner party arrived. He found that he recognized one of them. Jack Sproat, the owner of Inverladdie Farm was the second man to come into the room.
The newcomers were all laughing at something but the smile faded from Sproat’s face when he saw Bannerman sitting there. He detached himself from the party and came over.
‘I didn’t expect to find you here Doctor,’ he said.
‘I fancied a change,’ replied Bannerman, evenly.
‘How is your investigation going?’
‘It’s not really an investigation,’ replied Bannerman. ‘‘I’m just checking to see if anything was overlooked at the time.’
‘Who is your friend, John?’ asked a voice with a pronounced accent.
‘This is Dr Bannerman, Joop,’ replied Sproat. ‘He’s from the Medical Research Council. He’s looking into the deaths of my workers.’
‘Won’t you join us, Doctor?’ asked the man with the accent.
“Thank you but I’ve just eaten,’ replied Bannerman, looking at the smiling man with the short, cropped fair hair. Bannerman thought him to be in his early fifties, although he looked younger at first glance because of his good teeth and a smooth, slightly tanned skin. It was a complexion he associated with wealth.
‘Just for a drink perhaps?’
‘All right, thank you,’ replied Bannerman, and he got up to join the others.
‘I’m Joop van Gelder,’ said the smiling man, getting up to shake Bannerman’s hand and bring another seat for him. Bannerman was introduced to the others in turn. Two of the remaining men were Dutch; the other three local farmers and land-owners.
That was a terrible business at Inverladdie,’ said van Gelder. ‘Meningitis seems to be on the increase these days.’
‘I think Dr Bannerman believes my sheep killed them,’ interrupted Sproat. There was an embarrassing pause before the others laughed.
‘Surely not?’ said van Gelder, who hadn’t joined in the laughter.
The truth is that we don’t know where the bug came from Mr van Gelder, something my profession is always reluctant to admit. In the end we will probably call it a virus infection; we usually do in these cases, and then the public thinks how clever we are.’
The men laughed again and this time van Gelder joined them. ‘How refreshing to find a doctor who doesn’t take himself too seriously,’ he said. ‘We must have another drink.’
Bannerman declined this time, saying that he had to be going and that they must all be hungry. He wouldn’t delay them any longer. ‘I recommend the fish,’ he said, getting up from the table.
“Then I will have it on your recommendation,’ said van Gelder, getting up and shaking Bannerman’s hand again. ‘Nice to have met you Doctor.’
Bannerman turned to Sproat and asked, ‘If it’s all right with you, I’d like to visit Inverladdie again tomorrow?’
‘You’re welcome,’ said Sproat.
Bannerman had a night cap back in the bar of his hotel. The quarry worker he had met on the previous evening was sitting at the counter and he chatted to him for a while before going upstairs. He looked at his watch and dithered for a moment before deciding to phone Shona MacLean. She replied after the third ring and sounded sleepy.
‘Sorry, did I wake you?’
‘Oh it’s you!’ exclaimed Shona.
‘I thought I’d better check that you didn’t have any problems with the police?’
‘No, not at all. I called them when you left and told them about finding Lawrence’s body at the foot of the cliffs. They arranged for it to be taken back to the mainland.’
They treated it as an accident?’
‘I think so.’
‘‘I’ve told the people in London that it wasn’t.’
‘Good,’ said Shona. ‘He didn’t deserve to die like that. How is the investigation going?’
‘All right, I suppose,’ said Bannerman. ‘I had a talk with the local vet who seemed. thick.’
‘Thick?’
‘The more I think about it the curiouser it becomes. I’m the second investigator from the MRC who has been up here to ask him questions about the Scrapie outbreak at Inverladdie Farm where the men died and he still hasn’t twigged to what we’re getting at.’
‘Maybe he’s being deliberately obtuse?’
‘But why?’
‘Can’t help you there,’ said Shona.
The local GP was quick enough to figure it out. He’s a wily old bird. I liked him a lot. I think he twigged to some kind of Scrapie involvement from the first time he was called out to the patients.’
‘What’s the next move?’
Tomorrow I’m going to examine the land between Inverladdie Farm and the nuclear power station, to see if I can find any trace of a radiation leak having occurred.’
That sounds dangerous.’
‘It only sounds dangerous,’ said Bannerman. ‘Actually it involves little more than going for a walk with a torch-like thing in your hand.’
‘All the same, I think you should be very careful.’
‘‘I will,’ said Bannerman.
‘You will let me know how you get on?’
‘If you want me to,’ said Bannerman.
‘‘I do,’ said Shona.
Bannerman lay back on the pillow and reflected on how nice it had been to talk to Shona again and how good it was to know that they would be in touch again. All in all it hadn’t been a bad day. On the bedside table lay the Geiger counter that Angus MacLeod had loaned him for examining the boundary area tomorrow. He moved it slightly to one side and switched out the light. The room wasn’t completely in darkness; light from a street lamp across the way made patterns on the ceiling as it shone through the waving branches of a tree outside the window. He thought about Shona’s plea that he should be careful, and a cloud crossed his mind as he remembered the broken body of Lawrence Gill lying on the rocks.
Bannerman drove the Sierra as far up the Inverladdie Farm track as possible and then parked it out of the way of any vehicle that might want to pass. He had hoped for good weather but the fates had other ideas. There was a strong westerly wind and the sky promised rain in the not too distant future. Bannerman changed his shoes for his climbing boots and zipped himself into his shell jacket and waterproof trousers, before protecting his face with a woollen balaclava and pulling up his hood. He collected the rucksack containing MacLeod’s Geiger counter from the boot, before locking up the car and setting off up the east side of the glen. He was breathing hard by the time he reached the head of the glen and could see the power station away to his right.
Sproat had been correct about the terrain on this side of the glen. The ground fell away steeply and was riddled with cracks, gulleys and peat bog. It looked as if at some time in the past the ground had breathed deeply and caused a general upheaval in the landscape. This was not the kind of place to break an ankle in, he reminded himself as he went over slightly on his left one. He was going downhill but the effort required seemed greater than on the climb up the glen.
Although the power station was probably not more than a mile away, as the crow flew, the need for constant detour and c
limbing down into and up out of craters meant that Bannerman had covered nearly three times that distance before he reached the area around the perimeter fence. After a break of a few minutes to get his breath back, he had a cigarette in the shelter of a large rock before starting out to follow the line of the fence down to the railway track and beyond to the sea where he planned to begin his examination of the ground.
He got out the Geiger counter from his rucksack and checked the condition of its battery, despite having inserted a new one that morning. He turned the sensitivity switch on the side to B-CHECK. The needle rose well past the red minimum mark, so he turned the switch to its most sensitive setting to start a rough scan of the area. With his back to the sea, he crossed the single-track railway line leading to the quarry and began to walk slowly back up the line of the fence. He held the sensor in front of him and swung it slowly backwards and forwards to cover as wide an area as possible.
Apart from an occasional click from the instrument as it received natural radiation from the atmosphere the pointer hovered quietly on the base line. Bannerman pushed his hood back a little so as not to miss any sounds coming from the small speaker in the side of the instrument. Suddenly he heard a loud rasping sound, but it came from behind him. He turned round to see an inflatable boat, its bow bouncing over the waves, coming straight for the shore. Its outboard engine was buzzing angrily.
As he watched, Bannerman grew alarmed when he realized that he was the object of attention for the men on board. The three of them jumped out into the shallows below him and waded quickly to the shore to start running towards him. They were carrying automatic weapons. He soon found himself being gripped firmly on both sides by the arms.
‘What’s your game, then?’ demanded the third man who stood in front of him with sea-water dripping from his oilskins.
‘I think I might ask the same of you,’ said Bannerman, with more courage than he felt. ‘I am on Inverladdie Farm property and I have permission to be here.’
‘A smartarse, eh?’ sneered the man. ‘Let’s get him back.’
Bannerman protested loudly but he was manhandled down to the beach and forced into the boat. Once on the move, he sat quietly. The sound of the engine and the heavy sea made conversation impossible and, for the moment, there was no place else to go. He looked at the three men who seemed to be doing their best to ignore him. All were dressed in the same weatherproof uniforms with a badge above their left breast which said, SECURITY. Their boots were of the commando type which laced up well above their ankles. They sat with the butts of their automatic rifles on the wooden floor of the boat.