The Chemical Detective Read online

  Look what the cat dragged in, Christ Almighty, but she looked a mess: hunched, crumpled, squalid. How could he ever have dipped his pen in that ink?

  He signed the papers and waved her away. The meeting dragged on, but he’d lost his train of music.

  ‘Any other business?’ Robin asked, scanning the table.

  Frank could see the group relax, amazed that a meeting with him could have turned out so tranquil, so amicable, so civilised. So boring and unproductive – time to pounce.

  At the other end of the table, the HR director raised a hand. The ugly dwarf had no pretentions to glamour. Nicola was sensible shoes and supermarket value-pack knickers; he could tell without ever having seen them.

  ‘About the team-building event—’

  ‘Cancel it.’ Before Nicola could protest, he held up a hand and continued. ‘We have one other item to discuss.’

  He strode to the full-length window. His mouth hardened as he stared out at the river. Four o’clock in the afternoon, and it was almost dark outside. The sodium lights cast an egg-yolk glaze over the towers and open staircases of the production buildings. Steam puffed into the sky and the intermittent screech and bang of conveyors carried through the pitter-patter of rain. God, it was an ugly shithole. Built in the 1980s and falling to bits. Well, its days were numbered.

  ‘I’m cancelling the UK expansion project,’ he announced.

  The distributed murmur rose to a crescendo of confused protest. Frank addressed the window, admiring his reflection, speaking softly to force them to stop whining and listen. ‘We are competing with the giants of the developing world – Brazil, Russia, India and China. That’s where our future lies. Those are the only expansion projects that will get funding in future.’

  ‘Projects like Smolensk Two?’ asked Eric, the dry Scottish voice of the engineering manager dripping with venom.

  ‘Exactly.’

  ‘Late, incomplete and already over budget?’

  Frank shot him a look of contempt. ‘Smolensk Two is already in production.’ Wasn’t it? Suddenly uncertain, Frank stomped back to the table and leafed to the page on the board papers with production figures. ‘Page seven,’ he snarled. ‘Or can’t engineers read?’

  Robin shook his head. ‘That’s not new production. It’s recycling. Rejected product collected from customers in Europe and sent to Russia for rebagging.’

  Frank stood still, erect, alert. ‘Explain?’

  ‘The labour costs here are too high to make recycling economical. So, reject goes east for recovery,’ Robin said. ‘And actually, there is a problem with the Smolensk numbers—’

  Frank interrupted him and addressed Eric. ‘When was the Russian expansion due to start up?’

  ‘Last quarter.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘Problems with equipment delivery, I believe, but—’

  ‘Why did no one tell me?’

  Robin and Eric exchanged glances. ‘The UK engineering team were . . . not involved with the Smolensk project.’ Robin chose his words carefully.

  Eric was more forthright. ‘You specifically excluded us, told us to keep our bloody noses out and leave it to Ivan. Told us we slowed projects down by insisting on proper engineering studies and—’

  ‘Intolerable excuses.’ Frank slammed his fist onto the table. Executive reward was heavily weighted towards international expansion. If any target was missed, then his bonus payment would vanish. Russia had to produce. How else was he going to keep his yacht? ‘I want a full report on my desk by tomorrow.’

  ‘Then you’d better call Ivan yourself,’ Eric retorted.

  ‘Get out!’ Frank shouted. ‘All of you.’

  The team didn’t need to be told twice.

  Frank glared at Nicola as she waddled round the table. Why was she always last? She wasn’t his appointment, but it was easier to leave her in post until he’d finished pruning the team.

  It sometimes amused him the way the fat cow tried to conceal her animosity. She didn’t bother to smile any more, but nor did she bare her teeth and hiss, which is what he suspected she wanted to do right now.

  Today he was not amused.

  ‘Nicola, wait.’

  He stared down at her. She must have remarkably short legs. ‘Could you have a word with Shelly about her appearance?’ he said. ‘I think it would be better coming from another woman.’ He smiled internally as she flinched. ‘I know it has been difficult for her since the bereavement,’ he continued, ‘but I expect certain standards to be upheld. She was looking positively bedraggled today.’

  ‘I’ll deal with it.’ Nicola nodded and started to turn away. Not so fast.

  ‘That new girl, Raquel, can stand in as my PA for the next few trips.’ Frank paused, choosing his next words carefully. ‘Until the situation is resolved.’

  Nicola wheeled round and stared directly at him. Her mouth opened and closed like a fat, wet goldfish, eyes darting left and right. Was she considering her options? He returned the eye contact, staring into her soul, daring her to fight back. She lowered her eyes. Lily-livered lackey, she was cunning enough to pick her battles. There was no love lost between ugly Nicola and once-stylish Shelly. The HR director took a deep breath and spoke slowly, choosing her words carefully. ‘I understand and share your concerns about Shelly,’ she said. ‘Leave it with me.’

  The repulsive little troglodyte had a special vacant expression that annoyed him much more than open rebellion. The lights were on, but no one was home. Nicola was not stupid; she had locked away part of her spirit. He saw that she was not afraid of him. Perhaps he could change that.

  Frank returned to the window. A Russian ship approached the dock, a mournful honk answered by a sharp toot from the tug boat guiding her to berth.

  The Smolensk production expansion was late. Why had no one told him? Ivan and his team needed shaking up. Time to go to Russia and do it himself.

  Tuesday 1 March, Kranjskabel, Slovenia

  Jaq arrived before dawn to prepare the explosives for the helicopter crew. Routine stuff, create a shock wave just above the snowpack. No experiments, no data collection – this was the kind of job the air crew liked best. Hurling explosives out of a moving helicopter, wireless detonation and suddenly a cascade of snow came spilling down the mountainside and it was safe to ski again. She often went with them for the ride, but today she had other things to do. Thirty-six suspicious samples to analyse.

  What was in the reject pallet? Jaq had worked with explosives long enough to know the material in the lumpy bags was not pure ammonium nitrate. Crystalline powder, yes. Pure white, no. The colour was not conclusive; it could come from impurities – traces of iron gave a pink tinge, heat damage a yellowish hue. But there was something else about the samples that had nagged her all evening. Something fishy. One bag smelt fishy. Literally fishy. The stench from rotting fish. Or certain chemical compounds. Just a whiff, no more.

  Why had the lorry driver been so anxious to get the Zagrovyl samples back? Why had Laurent been so keen to comply? And why had he behaved so strangely?

  After the lorry left with the reject pallet, her boss found reasons to keep her from the lab. Laurent never held impromptu meetings – a slave to his calendar – and yet he suddenly insisted they meet and talk about some insanely dull improvement programme he was launching. Then there was a scheduled meeting about today’s blasting, after which Laurent escorted her back to the laboratory. She jumped at the chance to escape from him when Rita offered her a lift home.

  Laurent, like most bad bosses, hated to be challenged. So she deferred her plan to examine the samples again. Because she had to book out the explosives at daybreak anyway. And Laurent was not an early riser.

  The stars faded as Jaq locked up the warehouse, the opaque sky-ink bleeding from black into translucent blue. She saluted the helicopter as it banked overhead, her heartbeat accelerating with the whirring blades. On the far side of the snowy hill the laboratories awaited her, square white rooms with grey bench
es, stuffed with the analytical tools to unlock any mystery. Time for action.

  Chemistry had moved on from the days of the school lab. Now the benches were crowded with machines, featureless boxes of varying shapes and sizes, all connected to computers.

  The eight normal samples – four from the first pallet and four from the replacement pallet – had already been processed by the lab. Jaq checked the results. All good. Approved.

  The Italian analyst, Rita, arrived and bid Jaq a cheerful good morning, adding, ‘Can I help?’

  ‘Thanks.’ Jaq made a decision. ‘But this is one I need to do myself.’

  Jaq donned a white coat and safety glasses before opening the fridge. She placed the thirty-six little glass bottles on a steel tray and lined them up in six rows of six, labels facing forward. The preparation was simple. Gloves on. Unscrew the cap. Use a thin metal spatula to remove a few milligrams of powder. Tip it onto a transparent quartz disc about the diameter of a two-pound coin but thicker. Press another disc over it and make a sandwich. Slot into the carrier. Press a button and see it disappear into the black box. Replace screw cap on sample bottle. Remove gloves. Note down sample number and time. Repeat thirty-five times. Plus one – a sample of pure ammonium nitrate, the standard, for calibration and comparison.

  As the results spilled out, she scratched her head. Just as she thought. Not ammonium nitrate. But what was it? More tests required.

  Her phone pinged. A text message.

  Can we meet?

  It was signed by someone she had never heard of, Dr C. Hatton.

  Wrong number. She ignored it and programmed the next tests.

  Ping. Another message appeared.

  From Zagrovyl.

  The spatula clattered to the floor. Caramba! Were those bastards telepathic? She squinted at the halogen lights above the bench. Had Laurent installed cameras up there, or was information being streamed from the analytical machines straight to Zagrovyl? Was the mysterious Dr Hatton watching her as she puzzled over the results of the samples she wasn’t meant to have? She made a face, sticking out her tongue and rolling her eyes for the invisible camera.

  ‘Everything okay?’ Rita retrieved the spatula and placed it back on the tray, suppressing a smile.

  Jaq hung her head, a flush of embarrassment warming her throat. Get a grip. She dialled the number for Dr Hatton. It went straight to a generic voicemail. She didn’t leave a message.

  Ping! Jaq jumped.

  Not phone. In person. Urgent. Café Charlie. 11am?

  Why did someone from Zagrovyl want to meet with her? And why in a café in the centre of Kranjskabel? Why not here? Well, they could whistle for it. Book an appointment via Sheila, the department secretary, like any normal supplier. She got back to work.

  Rita hovered. ‘Are you ready for the inspection?’

  ‘What inspection?’

  ‘Dr Visquel. He’s doing random 5S checks at eleven.’ Rita coughed. ‘Best to tidy everything away.’

  Santos. Laurent and 5S. Another of his gobbledegook management initiatives. Best avoided.

  Jaq checked her watch. Ten thirty. She pulled back the blind. The storm had finally blown itself out and the sky glowed bright blue again. She could ride down. Clear her head. Leave the samples on to run against a range of different standards. Try to make some sense of the results when she returned.

  Jaq grabbed her bag. ‘I need to go out for a bit.’

  Rita grinned. ‘Good idea.’

  First tracks. The snowboard cruised over the pristine surface, powder over hardpack, smooth on the slide with enough bite for the sharpest cuts. Crunchy.

  Jaq made it to the edge of town before swapping the snowboard for spikes. As she bent to unclip, a screech reverberated up a narrow side street. It took her a moment to identify the source. The red-and-white-striped awning of Skipass restaurant was unravelling, lumps of snow falling from the folds as it stretched.

  A snowplough rumbled past, followed by a stream of cars. A welcome smell of coffee hit her as she entered the brightly lit café.

  Jaq stashed her board in the rack and scanned the clientele. Skiers. A group of teenagers. No one who resembled a chemical company representative. She headed towards an empty table when a woman in turquoise salopettes waved from a booth at the back of the café.

  Jaq approached her. ‘Dr Hatton?’ she asked. ‘From Zagrovyl?’

  The woman nodded. ‘Camilla,’ she said, and extended a hand with painted nails.

  Jaq removed a glove, her hand cold in contrast to Camilla’s warm handshake. Like Jaq, she wore no make-up and the uneven tan suggested she spent time on the high slopes, wore goggles and took the sport seriously. Aged anywhere between forty and sixty, impossible to tell; expertly styled short, white hair and startlingly green eyes.

  ‘May I call you Jaqueline?’ Her English had a hint of Central Europe, or perhaps Scandinavia.

  ‘Jaq is fine.’

  ‘I wasn’t sure you’d come.’

  Quite right. What on earth was she doing here? ‘I needed a decent coffee.’ Jaq ordered an espresso from a passing waiter, and Camilla asked for more water.

  ‘Here, let me help you.’ Camilla seized Jaq’s bag and hung it on a hook on the edge of the booth, draping her ski jacket over it. ‘So, Jaq, how long have you been with Snow Science?’

  The question was friendly, an icebreaker, but the eyes were searchlights sweeping over Jaq’s face, not the eyes of someone who indulged in small talk. So Jaq did not indulge her.

  ‘I assume you know about the mix-up?’

  Camilla dropped her eyelids, hooding her eyes. ‘Some delivery problems? All sorted now?’

  ‘I took samples.’

  Camilla met her eyes and blinked, reassessing. ‘And you analysed them.’ She nodded to herself as if she would expect nothing less. ‘So, what did you find?’

  Jaq scanned the room. This was not an appropriate place for the discussion. ‘Why did you ask to meet me here?’

  ‘I’m on holiday, so this is more of a courtesy call.’ Camilla smiled a radiant blast of charm. ‘I thought maybe we could keep this informal – talk off the record?’

  ‘Far too serious for that.’ Jaq made to stand up.

  ‘Why?’ Camilla put out a hand to detain her. ‘Why are you worried about reject material scheduled for recycling?’

  It was a good question. Why was she wasting time on it? Because everyone seemed so determined she shouldn’t. Not good enough. That just sounded contrary. Where to start? Because it smelt fishy. That sounded mad. ‘Because something is being transported in wrongly labelled bags.’ That sounded lame.

  Camilla’s eyes narrowed. ‘What do you mean?’ She didn’t seem entirely surprised, more like someone feigning surprise and doing it badly. Dissembling. Real surprise makes your eyes open wide.

  Jaq reached for her bag. ‘Come with me to Snow Science and I’ll show you.’

  ‘I can’t,’ Camilla said. ‘Your boss is Laurent Visquel?’

  Jaq paused. ‘Yes. What about him?’

  ‘We don’t get on,’ Camilla said.

  You and me both. The waiter arrived with coffee and water. Jaq sat down again. ‘Why?’

  ‘It’s complicated.’

  Jaq shook the packet of sugar by the corner. She tore off the top and tapped half the contents onto a spoon above her cup. ‘Come on, you’ll have to do better than that.’

  A man with a briefcase brushed past the booth; Camilla waited until he was out of earshot. ‘You remember Laurent’s paper on artificial glaciers?’ she asked.

  Snow Science received massive funding to research alternatives for water storage. Over half the earth’s fresh water is stored in glaciers. And glaciers are melting. Jaq nodded and tipped the sugar from her spoon into the coffee.

  ‘There is a civil engineer in Ladakh who spent his retirement creating artificial glaciers. Laurent stole his data.’

  Jaq stirred her coffee. It didn’t surprise her. Her boss was lazy. And prickly. ‘Lau
rent wouldn’t like being found out.’

  ‘It wasn’t just the plagiarism.’ Camilla frowned. ‘Laurent made some dangerous simplifications. He totally underestimated the risk of flash floods.’

  Jaq nodded. She’d worked on the use of explosives for controlled release from glacial lakes. ‘What happened? Did you make this public?’

  ‘No.’ Camilla shook her head. ‘A private agreement. Laurent retracted the paper and reissued it with acknowledgements and corrections.’ Camilla smiled. ‘And the Ladakhis received a generous donation towards their research from the private purse of an unknown benefactor.’

  Jaq laughed, suddenly better disposed towards Camilla. My boss’s enemy is my friend. She sipped her coffee.

  ‘Your publications, on the other hand, are beyond reproach,’ Camilla said. ‘I particularly enjoyed your paper, Natural Danger. People forget about natural poisons like ergotamine and botulism.’

  Jaq acknowledged the compliment with a little flash of gratification. A reminder of happy days as a visiting lecturer at Teesside University; the paper had caused some controversy at the time but was now largely forgotten. Either Camilla had seen it when it was first published, or she had done some thorough research. A shiver of unease rippled across Jaq’s skin. What else did she know about? The inquiry that had almost ended Jaq’s career, forced her to seek this quiet research job far from Teesside?

  ‘What is your role in Zagrovyl, exactly?’

  Camilla reached for an inside pocket and fished out a business card.

  Camilla Hatton, Zagrovyl, Director of Change.

  ‘A roving remit. I’m a troubleshooter.’

  ‘Well, you have some trouble to shoot at here.’ Jaq inspected the face of the woman opposite. Intriguing. She didn’t fit the traditional mould of a Zagrovyl director. Female, that was rare enough, but – unless Jaq was completely mistaken – a core of integrity shone through. Why else would she take an interest in Laurent Visquel’s perfidy? Or was that a smokescreen? She was hiding something, knew more about the mislabelled bags than she admitted. The address on the card signalled the Teesside office, head office. A place Jaq knew only too well. Someone in Zagrovyl must be worried if they were sending a director from head office to Slovenia.