“And how is suspicious activity—should there be any—discovered?”
“All the usual means. Close-circuit TV, magic eyes, alarm systems, time locks. Whatever the security people think up, we install. I think there are so many systems that anybody wishing to enter would be exercised in cutting out all the mechanical and electronic safeguards—all of which are fail-alarm. Then there are human guards and dogs.”
“In other words, neither you nor Toinquet are likely to have any security worries which could stem from a break-in.”
“None whatever. Short of an armed raid by a considerable number of highly trained men, we reckon we are safe in that respect.”
Masters made no comment. He knew that the loophole which could not be plugged was the open mouth with the wagging tongue behind it. Nobody had yet managed to padlock that. When this thought struck him, he was inclined to offer up a little prayer of thanks. Still tongues were of no help to him.
When they arrived in the lobby of the complex, they were booked in by the custodian. Masters looked about him. The building was as strong as a pill box. Ultra modern; ultra clean. The floors shone; the paintwork glistened. The bullet-proof glass in the windows sparkled. Swinging fire-doors of polished mahogany with narrow peep-holes of wire-reinforced glass were everywhere.
“Where is Doctor Winter, please?”
The uniformed man replied that there was a Group meeting in Winter’s office, called to redistribute the workload because of Mailer’s death.
“Please don’t interrupt it,” said Masters.
“As you wish.”
“There’s a couple of chairs in the alcove, Director,” said the custodian. “If you want to wait.”
“Thank you. Please let Dr Winter know we are here and would like to see him when his conference ends.”
They rounded a baffle wall and found the two chairs, a coffee table and a few magazines. As they sat down, Masters said, “My visit here is entirely in the pursuance of the job I have in hand. What I mean is, I haven’t come to rubber-neck, nor do I want blinding with science—literally.”
“I’m afraid that unless you are adamant—demand that your conversations shall be conducted in words of one syllable—you can’t hope to escape the jargon and the enthusiasm which will drive these people into lengthy and—to the layman—incomprehensible diatribes concerning their work.”
“What about you, Director? Can you tell me what goes on without confusing me?”
“I can try. Do you know anything of nuclear physics?”
“So little that you must assume I know nothing of it.”
“As you wish. I told you last night that Group Six is engaged on tests concerning the shielding of small, tactical nuclear reactors.”
“For driving boats and aircraft?”
“It’s important—the world energy situation being what it is. Some people—particularly the Americans—are beginning to champion the use of hydrogen for aircraft fuel.”
“Wouldn’t that be highly dangerous? Hydrogen, I thought, is highly explosive. Wasn’t it used in the gas bags of some of the airships, with disastrous results?”
“It was, indeed. But the amazing thing is it is no more likely to explode than some of the liquid fuels that the States use in jets—liquids that we over here don’t like at all, although we had to use them on occasion when the fuel situation was desperate. No, the protagonists believe that if you can get your hydrogen out of a flimsy gas bag and into a pretty solidly built fuel tank, you’ll be quite safe.”
“You sound as if you disapprove of the scheme.”
“I feel that our job as scientists is to come up with solutions which will not saddle the man-in-the-street with a large financial burden nor spoil his countryside for him.…”
“Nor necessitate the building of plant which can blow up with devastating effect if a spark gets near some volatile substance.”
“Quite. Now, in theory, this hydrogen scheme should be relatively cheap, in that water—and there’s plenty of it in the seas—is two-thirds, in volume, hydrogen. All one has to do is extract it. A relatively easy process. And remember that when hydrogen burns as a fuel, it combines with oxygen in the air to revert back to water.”
“But?”
“First off, the amount needed would pose tremendous problems. One would have to use nuclear power to produce it, and the question of storage would be almost insuperable. It has been estimated that we should need half a million tons a year. Half a million tons of the lightest substance known!”
“Wasn’t coal gas largely hydrogen?”
“To be sure. Carburreted hydrogen. But can we honestly ring Heathrow with giant gasometers?”
Masters shuddered mentally at the thought: the eyesore, the danger, the navigational difficulties, and much more which even he could envisage.
“So you’re looking for a way to make the provision of small nuclear reactors a feasible proposition?”
“That’s it. As you must know, the rays or particles given off by uranium—particularly the Gamma rays—are lethal. The particles excite each other. Uranium atoms split—fission reaction. They excite each other again, they reach critical level and grow in intensity. All very dangerous. They must be shielded by dense material to prevent escape. So far, lead has always been used. We’re trying an alternative dense shield—deuterium oxide.”
“I see,” said Masters gravely.
“You know what deuterium oxide is?” asked Crome with a grin.
“No, I can’t say I do.”
“To you—heavy water.”
“Ah!”
“That rings a bell?”
“Of Commando raids on heavy water plant in Norway during the war. I’ve read of them.”
“I guessed that was it. Deuterium is the mass two isotope of hydrogen. Symbol H two or D. When it collects some oxygen it becomes heavy water, and it’s not difficult to make, nor is it rare in nature.”
“No?”
“It is thought that in ordinary drinking water there are often particles of heavy water.”
“You surprise me.”
“I thought I would.”
“A question, if I may. Who is responsible for handing each Group its brief or protocol or whatever instructions they receive for directing their research?”
“I am. But I try not to lay down the law so narrowly as to inhibit the natural inventiveness of the staff. And, of course, my directives for any project are never issued before discussion with the scientist who heads up the team.”
“In this case, Doctor Winter. How old is he?”
“Over fifty.”
“Why is he still here in the second league at his age?”
Crome shrugged. “Some say a scientist is at his creative best in his thirties.”
“Could it be that he is not so outstanding a scientist as some of his subordinates are or have been?”
“That is very true. Several men from his group have been moved on.”
“And up?”
Crome nodded. “But Winter is a solid man. I can best describe him as probably the ideal type of scientist to head up a workaday group in a place like Pottersby. He will never indulge his own flights of fancy because, able scientist though he is, he lacks the vital creative spark that the great innovator must have. But he will nurture creative talent in others. Am I giving you a picture you can recognise, Mr Masters?”
“I think so. I imagine he is the equivalent of what is known in industry as a line extension man or, if you prefer it, the D half of R and D. Once the initial research is done he can cope quite adequately with the development side of things.”
“I don’t think I can better that as a superficial description of Winter—so long as you bear in mind that he has, when all’s said and done, a vast amount of personal knowledge and talent.”
“How successful has his particular piece of current research been up to date?”
“Don’t think me equivocal, Mr Masters, but success in research can be positive
or negative. You may not be quite so happy with negative results, but at least they tell you what you can’t do, even if you don’t learn what you can do.”
“I have much the same experience—frequently,” said Masters. “The negative side often serves to eliminate suspects, and so helps me considerably.”
“My best reply to your question is, then, that we are progressing slowly. There’s been eighteen months’ work done on this project.”
“A fleabite in research time, I suppose?”
Crome grinned. “The bible would call it less than the twinkling of an eye.”
“No chance of a little fortuitous serendipity?”
This time Crome laughed aloud. “Serendipity is literally a fairy tale in our sphere. Horace Walpole coined the word after a fairy tale, and the faculty of making happy and unexpected discoveries by accident in nuclear physics is fairy-tale stuff.”
“I’ve sometimes done it,” murmured Masters.
“Because you’re dealing with humans who, as you rightly pointed out a few minutes ago, are capable of any action. They are distinguished from everything else in the universe by the possession of free will. Nuclear particles behave in a predetermined pattern. And that pattern is like a child’s toy compared with the innumerable capabilities of the human brain. Somewhere along the line one brain will make an abnormal move due to expectations preconditioned by previous acts. Your brain can note it—be it word or gesture. You have the ability to seize on to it, recognise it, place it and use it. This is what makes you a good detective.”
Masters didn’t reply. There was no reply that sprang readily to a mind already preoccupied with the thought that Crome would make a pretty tough adversary for a detective. A man with the mind not only of a top-grade scientist, but that of a philosopher, too. He understood what made a detective tick. The exact mechanical method of working was probably not known to him—as shown by his earlier questions—but such details were immaterial when he was capable of empathy on such a mental scale as he was now showing. Masters—not for the first time—wondered about Crome and braced himself to produce—much as lower-grade soccer sides are popularly supposed to do when faced by superior-grade opposition—his best form.
His thoughts were interrupted by a phone bell which rang outside the little alcove where they were sitting. They heard a murmur of voices and a few seconds later the custodian poked his head round the partition.
“Doctor Winter has finished his conference, Director. He’s coming to collect you.”
Crome got to his feet. Masters followed him into the vestibule.
“While you’re here, Director, sir,” said the custodian, “would you like a ticket in the sweep?”
“Which one is this?”
“National, sir.”
“So early? There must be weeks to go.”
“It takes weeks to get round this lot, sir.”
“I’ll have a couple. One in my name, one in Superintendent Masters’.”
The custodian grinned. “Hope you get a good horse, Super.”
It was while the man was recording the wager that Winter came through the swing doors accompanied by Dorothy Clay. Crome turned towards them.
“Good morning, Cecil, Dorothy.”
“Director. You wanted to see me?”
Crome explained the purpose of his visit. The custodian took the opportunity to ask Clay if she would care to buy a sweep ticket.
“No, thank you. I don’t bet.”
“Hardly a bet, Doctor. Just a flutter. Doctor Winter will have a quid’s worth.”
“He will not. Don’t ask him. He does not bet, either.”
The custodian stared at her, open-mouthed. Masters, an interested onlooker, was not left long in doubt as to the reason for the uniformed man’s surprise.
“Doesn’t bet? Doctor Winter? I’ve known him have a bob on a horse a score of times. He’ll bet on anything. You ask him.”
“I will not ask him. And he’s too busy for you to interfere.”
At that moment, Crome turned to Masters. “I’m so sorry not to have introduced you immediately. A bad habit of scientists, I’m afraid—to forget the niceties and get down to the subject in hand.” He looked at Clay. “Dorothy, Cecil, this is Superintendent Masters. Doctors Clay and Winter.”
Masters disliked handshakes during investigations. He could never rid his mind of the unpleasant thought that he could be shaking hands with a monster. But there was no avoiding them this time, because the woman scientist made the first move despite his own obvious reticence. Clay’s hand was pudgy and moist. That of Winter dry and shrivelled. Masters thought they represented a tactile summing up of the visible impression he gained of their two owners. He was reminded of the two little figures that pop in and out of their china house to let the world know whether the weather is to be wet or dry.
“Doctor Clay is just going across to the library for me,” said Winter. “So if you two gentlemen would care to come to my office… ?”
Green had joined Toinquet in the Security chief’s private office in the original house. This was to the left of the main front door. Behind it lay Toinquet’s general office and beyond that the central registry in which all classified documents were deposited in safety cupboards with combination locks.
Green was sitting astride an upright chair of varnished wood with a green plastic seat. A rather crumpled Kensitas dangled from his lower lip. He was watching as Toinquet approved duty roster lists of custodians and guards. The lists were being presented by a diminutive middle-aged woman whom Toinquet addressed as Alice throughout. She wore rimless spectacles and had a bird-like, colourless face. Even her clothing—which appeared to be a hand-knitted costume—was carried out in thrush colours which, Green thought, would be fine on the feathered variety, but not on the human ones. But her choice in colours in no way seemed to detract from her businesslike air nor the efficiency and forthrightness with which she presented her material and answered her boss’s questions. After she left, through the communicating door to the general office, Green asked: “She your Man Friday?”
“Alice? Indispensable old girl. Ex-WRAC. She took the staff college course many moons ago. Just the administrative part of it. Passed with flying colours.”
“What’s she doing here then? Why isn’t she a brigadier or something?”
“Retired. Never married. We asked her to come here. Positively vetted women of her calibre are hard to come by in out-of-the-way places like this. The job suits a spinster, and it’s one she knows how to do better than any of us. She types, does confidential filing—the lot.”
“Lucky old toff, you! Got a light, by the way?”
Toinquet threw over a box of Swan.
“Ta! Mind if I keep them?”
Toinquet shrugged. “You always were a scrounging bastard, Greeny.”
“That’s what I’m paid to be. Now I want to scrounge some information. Lists of climbing members, those who go on the week-end jaunts and so on.”
“Oh, yes. By the way, don’t spread it around that I keep these lists. The members wouldn’t like it.”
“Invasion of privacy?”
“They’d call it that.”
Green thought this was typical of Toinquet. He’d produce some bit of sub rosa information to prove his efficiency, but he’d keep it well hidden in order not to jeopardise his popularity. Green mentally summed him up as a two-faced bastard.
“How much do you really know of their private lives, Widow?”
“The picture builds up.”
“Of who sleeps with who?”
“We don’t get much of that.”
“How much, exactly?”
“A bit among the unmarrieds. We’ve a young chap called Newsom, for instance, who’s attractive to the birds. I know he has his bit of fun—handed to him on a plate.”
“By the birds?”
“We have quite a number of young women here with B.Sc. degrees. They’re the lab juniors, if you like.…”
“I’ve got a hierarchy list,” said Green. “There’s nearly thirty thousand boffins employed by the state and government sponsored scientific agencies. Funny thing is that there are more Principal Scientific Officers than Senior Scientific Officers, and more of them than Higher Scientific Officers. Like a South American navy—more admirals than matelots.”
“Then there are Scientific Officers and lastly Assistant Scientific Officers. It’s these last I was mentioning just now. They’re knowledgeable and trained well enough to take readings, keep research notes and so on without the more qualified people having to worry whether the jobs are done properly or not. And it’s among these that you usually find the bedworthies. Some of ’em aren’t bad-lookers, particularly when the choice is limited.”
“But no scandals—marriage break-ups, divorces and so on?”
Toinquet shook his head. “You’re barking up the wrong tree if you’re looking for motives in that area, Greeny.”
“Glad to hear it. Now what about those lists?”
Toinquet opened a desk drawer and took out a file. “I had Alice bring these in earlier. The three trips you’re interested in are marked. Help yourself. You won’t mind if I carry on with a bit of work while you browse?”
Green was pleased to be left in peace to do his scanning. Armed, as he was, with the bits of gossip which each of his colleagues had repeated the night before, he had some idea of what to look for.
He had been glancing through the various sheets for several minutes when there was a knock at the door and Hill came in. Toinquet looked up. “My men at the gate tell me you’ve been out.”
Hill wasn’t sure from the tone employed whether this was a question asking where he’d been and what he’d done; an accusation of having left barracks without a pass; or simply a statement to show that Toinquet was very much on the ball and that nothing that went on in the Centre escaped his eagle eye.
Hill, however, was not prepared to be fazed by it, whichever it was. He put his hand in his pocket, took out a packet of Kensitas and threw them across to Green. “I went to get the DI some fags from the village shop.”
Dread and Water Page 8
