A Suitable Vengeance

Ten minutes later, a man came into the reception area, swinging shut a heavy, panelled door behind him. He introduced himself as Stephen Malverd, offered his hand in an abbreviated greeting, and pulled on his earlobe. He was wearing a white lab coat which hung below his knees, directing attention to what he wore upon his feet. Sandals, rather than shoes, and heavy argyle socks. He was very busy, he said, he could spare only a few minutes, if Mr. St. James would come this way…


He strode briskly back into the heart of the building. As he walked, his hair—which sprang up round his head wild and unruly like a pad of steel wool—fluttered and bounced, and his lab coat blew open like a cape. He slowed his pace only when he noticed St. James’ gait, but even then he looked at the offending leg accusingly, as if it too robbed him of precious moments away from his job.

They rang for the lift at the end of a corridor given over to administrative offices. Malverd said nothing until they were on their way to the building’s third floor. “It’s been chaos round here for the last few days,” he said. “But I’m glad you’ve come. I thought there was more involved than I heard at first.”

“Then you remember Michael Cambrey?”

Malverd’s face was a sudden blank. “Michael Cambrey? But she told me—” He gestured aimlessly in an indication of the reception area and frowned. “What’s this about?”

“A man named Michael Cambrey visited Project Testing, Department Twenty-Five, several times over the past few months. He was murdered last Friday.”

“I’m not sure how I can help you.” Malverd sounded perplexed. “Twenty-Five isn’t my regular patch. I’ve only stepped in briefly. What is it that you want?”

“Anything you—or anyone else—can tell me about why Cambrey was here.”

The lift doors opened. Malverd didn’t exit at once. He appeared to be trying to decide whether he wanted to talk to St. James or merely to dismiss him and get back to his own work.

“This death has something to do with Islington? With an Islington product?”

That certainly was a possibility, St. James realised, although not in the manner that Malverd obviously thought. “I’m not sure,” St. James said. “That’s why I’ve come.”

“Police?”

He took out another card. “Forensic science.”

Malverd looked moderately interested at this piece of information. At least, his expression indicated, he was talking to a fellow. “Let’s see what we can do,” he said. “It’s just this way.”

He led St. James down a linoleum-tiled corridor, a far cry from the reception and administration offices below. Laboratories opened to either side, peopled by technicians who sat on tall stools at work areas that time, the movement of heavy equipment, and the exposure to chemicals had bleached from black-topped to grey.

Malverd nodded at colleagues as they walked, but he said nothing. Once he removed a schedule from his pocket, studied it, glanced at his watch, and cursed. He picked up speed, dodged past a tea cart round which a group of technicians gathered for an afternoon break, and in a second corridor, he opened a door.

“This is Twenty-Five,” he said.

The room they entered was a large, rectangular laboratory, brightly illuminated by long ceiling tubes of fluorescent lights. At least six incubators sat at intervals on a work top that ran along one wall. Interspersed among them, centrifuges squatted, some open, some closed, some humming at work. Dozens of pH metres lay among microscopes, and everywhere glass-fronted cabinets held chemicals, beakers, flasks, test tubes, pipettes. Among all these accoutrements of science, two technicians copied the orange digital numbers which flickered on one of the incubators. Another worked at a hood, from which a glass cover had been pulled down to protect cultures from contamination. Four others peered into microscopes while another prepared a set of specimens on slides.

Several of them looked up as Malverd led St. James towards a closed door at the far end of the lab, but none of them spoke. When Malverd rapped once sharply upon that door and entered without waiting for a reply, the few who had given him their attention lost interest.

A secretary, who appeared as harried as Malverd, turned from a filing cabinet as they entered. A desk, a chair, a computer, and a laser printer hemmed her in on all sides.

“For you, Mr. Malverd.” She reached for a pile of telephone messages which were joined together by a paper clip. “I don’t know what to tell people.”

Malverd picked them up, flipped through them, dropped them onto her desk. “Put them off,” he said. “Put everyone off. I’ve no time to answer phone calls.”

“But—”

“Do you people keep engagement diaries up here, Mrs. Courtney? Have you evolved that far, or would that be too much to expect?”