Chapter 17 #3
‘Yeah, but it probably won’t be someone who knows anything much.
Hang on, there must be a way in here somewhere.
We could see if something’s been copied on to someone and stored in files that aren’t so high security.
That happens a lot. People copy stuff, paste it, send it on, someone else files it. Let’s try that.’
Jo could see this was a game Bella didn’t want to lose.
‘I didn’t really think your hi-tech computer business was all about you sitting in offices late at night, surrounded by supper tins, grappling with restricted access settings.’
‘Not sure I thought it was going to be about this, but then your glamorous journalism job is about sitting outside people’s houses waiting for them to let you in, isn’t it?’
‘Not so much these days.’
‘I’m going to train up lots of minions,’ Bella added.
‘Have an empire… but of course I’ll be brought in for the really tough cases, just like Red Adair.
’ When Jo made a quizzical face, Bella explained, ‘He ran an oil well fire-fighting business, but still fought some of the fires personally, even in his sixties. Now shut up and let me concentrate. And can you go and pretend to check those screens over there, so we don’t look too suspicious for the cameras. ’
Long minutes went past. Jo watched the seconds at the corner of the screen stack up to midnight. It was already Saturday. She still had two potentially front-page exclusives to write. Well, make that, she had one to write and one to bloody well find.
Why wasn’t she getting this? Katie Theroux has had Quintet, but nevertheless, she catches this different strain of whooping cough from Joan Theroux – her aunt maybe – who caught it in the lab. So, it’s something being investigated in the lab – maybe for vaccination development?
And this somehow relates to a pathology department in London that has been given a large donation by Wolff-Meyer.
Pathology, post-mortems, tissue samples – the hospital couldn’t have given old samples to Wolff-Meyer, could they? Wouldn’t it have needed consent from patients? Relatives? But then, the samples were really old, weren’t they? Some from the nineteenth century. They were out of copyright, as it were.
Jo did not like the thought taking root in her mind that if some old diseases could be revived, wouldn’t that be an exciting new market for vaccinations? Or maybe it wasn’t so sinister, maybe old diseases were simply being studied and used to help formulate new vaccinations?
‘Here we go, here we are,’ she heard Bella say, ‘I’ve found a copy…
Look at this. It’s an inventory of everything that the hospital sold to Wolff-Meyer.
It includes “a unique selection of brain tissue samples removed from corpses and preserved in wax in the 1800s”.
’ Bella continued to quietly read from the document as Jo came and peered at the screen with her: ‘“Each comes with full annotations, causes of death, symptoms of illness, age and medical history of the patient. This is a unique medical record of infectious illnesses and other causes of death in London in the latter half of the nineteenth century.”’
‘Jesus. I thought they just made a donation. I didn’t realise they’d bought the contents of the department. How the bloody hell can the hospital be allowed to sell this?’ Jo exclaimed. ‘Shouldn’t it be preserved for the nation?’
‘You’ll probably find it was a private hospital at the time the collection was made, so now it’s the private property of the trust. Probably someone from Wolff-Meyer sits on the board of the trust. Maybe they want to set some old diseases on the loose and sell a few new drugs.’
‘I’m trying not to think that,’ Jo admitted. ‘I’m trying to believe there is a good explanation, that it’s good science to look into what was bumping people off in the 1800s and learn from it. Maybe they were hoping to pick up some variations which they could make more effective vaccinations from.’
‘Hopefully,’ Bella said. ‘But I don’t think you’re going to find out tonight. Look at this,’ she pointed.
The words on the screen were transforming into an unreadable numeral code and computer hieroglyphics.
‘I think maybe, Jo, as a precaution,’ Bella was clicking, dragging, typing rapidly on the screen, ‘you should get your things together, but slowly and naturally as if it’s all part of the plan and leave the building.
Just in case anyone arrives to chat to us. ’
‘You’re joking? What about all that juicy stuff on the pertussis outbreak I was hoping to look at?’
‘Not tonight, I’m afraid. We’ll have to come back another time. I have to be on the safe side, here, I don’t think an arrest for breaching security protocol would look so great on my CV.’
‘OK, look, I’m packing, I’m smiling casually for the camera. And now I’m all set to go. Glad to have been of help to you tonight, Mizz Browning.’
‘Glad you could make it too. We must break into some top security files again soon.’
‘Can I ask them to call me a cab, down at reception?’ Jo wanted to know.
Bella shook her head: ‘Best not. Just leave without a trace.’
‘I will phone you, very soon.’
‘If I can get this to calm down, I’ll see what else I can find for you, OK?’ Bella said.
‘Thank you, Bella.’ And with that Jo headed out of the room in the iron grip of the size five shoes and down the long corridor to the lift.
Two streets away from the building, Jo had to take the shoes off again.
Her feet were already shredded and bleeding, she was going to cause permanent damage if she went any further.
It was ridiculous to walk the pavements of London in bare feet, she was risking much more than bleeding blisters doing this, but she knew that just two streets down was an all-night caff frequented by cabbies where you could almost always get a taxi.
There was a damp chill in the air she recognised as the temperature drop that happened just before dawn.
She felt so tired, achingly, bone tired.
She wanted a hot bath, lavender oil, to sneak into her daughters’ bedroom, smooth down their covers, kiss them and run a hand over their silky hair, followed by ten uninterrupted hours of sleep in a clean bed.
And absolutely not a single one of those things was coming her way.
For a passing moment she wondered if she was still up to this job.
If she still had the energy for the office politics, the hours, the travel, the stress.
Then the jab of adrenalin at the details scribbled on notepaper in the inside of her handbag revived her.
The faintest sliver of light was visible behind the tall buildings ahead of her. The sky would soon turn pale pink, and when she finally landed a cab, she would be driven home through the cool quiet of a London dawn.
At home, she would wash, change, make herself a cup of tea, then get into her car and set off on the final phase of this adventure.