Fatal Impact (27 page)

Nothing would bring Emily back. But hopefully, the Quaids could form a family again.

‘Can you find out where she got the vegetables from for Emily’s diet? We still don’t know if there’s another possible source of the infection.’

‘Ahead of you there. The market she helps out at barters with seasonal employees of Livelonger Organics. She gives them bread for vegetables. No receipts, so we couldn’t trace it, but she was sure it was Livelonger spinach.’

It seemed PT – through Livelonger Organics – was the only source of the infection. They couldn’t argue contamination from other sources. Anya thanked him for letting her know and handed him back to Oliver at his request.

The kettle whistled and she lifted it off the stove. Collecting mugs from the cupboard, she made two cups of instant coffee. Long-life milk was optional.

She placed one in front of Oliver on the table.

‘None whatsoever?’ he was saying. ‘It had been wiped completely clean. Thanks. Let me know whatever else you find.’ He hung up and dumped two sugars into his coffee. ‘Len Dengate’s shotgun? The metal trigger had no prints on it. Pretty clever to shoot yourself in the gut and bother to wipe clean the trigger mechanism and dispose of the cloth in the couple of seconds before you die.’

Len’s death had to be considered more likely to be a murder now, if both Alison and Jocelyn denied wiping the gun clean. The crime scene may not have been secured, but from what Simon Hammond said, no ambulance officers were present when the police arrived. McGinley was alone in the room when they were in the kitchen, but what reason would he have for wiping the trigger clean?

Oliver knocked his mug and spread coffee on his notes. He moved the cup away and pulled out a handkerchief to wipe down his files.

It reminded her of how the files at Jocelyn’s house had been moved.

Her relief about the Quaids being found was short-lived. ‘I think someone went through Mum’s house while we were at the hospital.’ She realised how odd it must sound but if Len had been murdered, maybe someone was looking for the documents he had hidden in the chicken coop. Whoever followed them from the prison could have begun at her mother’s house.

‘Some of her files were moved around. It doesn’t sound like much, but I know exactly where they were left. To anyone else, the place looks like a horrible mess, but I know they were moved.’

‘Anyone you suspect?’

‘Two people I am aware of were in the house. My godmother and Simon Hammond. Simon brought my carry-on bag to the hospital so I’d have something to change into.’

Oliver squinted. ‘Do you still have the envelope he gave you?’

Anya retrieved it from the calico bag. It was yellow and unremarkable.

‘I put a dab of lemon juice from my salad across the seal.’

He moved over to a reading lamp by the sofa and held the envelope in its light.

A splodge appeared. ‘If he’d opened the envelope and didn’t want you to know, he would have just put the papers in a fresh one. This is the original I sent.’

‘You were testing Simon Hammond’s honesty with invisible ink?’ She almost laughed. With all the advanced technology at his disposal, Oliver used a child’s trick for secret messages.

‘It works and it’s legal. In my job, you can’t trust anyone. I don’t like that he’s been in your mother’s place without you there.’

‘He’s a country cop. It happens. It could have been someone else.’

‘I still don’t like it.’

‘There was someone else who had been in the house. Glenn Lingard.’ Anya remembered that he had made the bed because of Audrey’s back problem and been at the crisis meeting at the restaurant with Moss, his assistant, Craig Dengate and the CEO of PT, Graham Fowler. If Glenn was somehow involved in Len’s death, Audrey’s life would be shattered as would the lifelong friendship between Audrey and Jocelyn.

She watched Oliver. Working the way he did and suspecting everyone he came across must be isolating. In some ways, she felt similar. She pulled out the logbooks.

‘I know all about psych lab reports, but not so much about biological science,’ he admitted.

The principles were the same. Three books documented a study over a period of three months, and ended two weeks before Patsy Gallop was killed. Anya selected the first book by the earliest date. Patsy had painstakingly recorded every aspect of the study.

There were four separate groups of female mice. Males were excluded to avoid pregnancies complicating the results. Each group contained twenty-five animals. One was a control group, fed non-GM grain from northern New South Wales. The second was fed GM corn from PT’s crops. The third group lived on non-GM corn. The fourth was provided with a diet of GM grains. Each mouse was three weeks old at entry and weaned from its mother.

Every animal in the study was labelled so it could be weighed and measured – seven days a week. Every entry was in Patsy’s handwriting. Either she had transcribed someone else’s data, or checked every mouse herself each day for the duration of the study. Patsy even noted the batch numbers of food and the selenium bottle from which the daily doses were administered. Reading the behaviour and observations of the mice was tedious, to say the least.

Oliver stepped into the bathroom to make a call. She thought it odd that he was making a call in the coldest room in the cabin.

She began to read through the police report.

‘Got anything?’ He returned to the table and moved his chair closer.

‘Patsy recorded every detail about what the mice were given, including the batch number of the selenium bottle. I can try to work out how much was used, and how much might have been left in the bottle the day she died.’ It sounded even more like a long shot as she verbalised the thought. ‘There had to be a reason Millard made a point of telling us about the drops and teaspoons in each bottle.’ The detective didn’t dismiss the idea. ‘Consciously or not, I believe he wants us to investigate.’

Anya located the specific page. There was a photograph of the bottle, and another enlargement of the label, with batch number visible. She found Patsy’s first notation for the matching selenium. On a separate piece of paper, she tallied up the number of drops each day and counted the days selenium was administered, in case the dose was intermittent.

She calculated that the amount of selenium added to the food sources totalled twelve drops per weekday, or sixty drops per week. That amounted to a teaspoon each week for the duration of this particular experiment. Each bottle contained enough selenium solution for exactly fourteen weeks. Anya double-checked her calculations. Before allowing for spillage or drips, there had to be a maximum of one teaspoon remaining after that time; a maximum of one hundred micrograms of selenium. That was not enough to overdose on.

The fatal dose of selenium could not have come from the bottle in Reuben’s laboratory.

48

O
liver sat back down at the table.

‘Are you absolutely positive there wasn’t enough left in the bottle to give Patsy a lethal dose?’

Anya handed him the calculations to check again. He multiplied, added, then cross-referenced the bottle numbers.

‘We know the second bottle hadn’t arrived.’ Oliver circled the final figure. ‘There was a maximum of one to two millilitres left in the bottle, which is how much in dosage?’

‘One to two hundred micrograms. It isn’t enough to give Patsy the toxic levels that were discovered in her blood and urine.’

Oliver clicked his pen. ‘So where did the selenium in Patsy’s drink bottle come from?’

‘And who else had access to it?’ Anya flicked through the files. A forensic scientist had printed out a chromatograph analysis of what was left in Patsy’s drink bottle. She had been running that lunchtime and left a small amount unfinished.

There were a number of spikes on the page, each one representing a different chemical. Selenium caused the highest peak, but there were also references for three other substances: sodium, sucrose and monopotassium. The chemist’s report suggested the results could have been caused by previous substances contained in the bottle, or whatever it had been last washed in.

Obviously, Senior Sergeant McGinley and the prosecution team hadn’t thought about the logistics of how he could have poisoned someone with the contents of a bottle that didn’t contain enough to harm anyone. Neither had Millard’s defence lawyer. Reuben could now have grounds for appeal, if he decided to change his mind. Jerry Dyke’s employment at Clarkson Evergreen raised more suspicion now.

‘Selenium is a supplement and can be bought over the counter at pharmacies, health food shops and even some supermarkets.’

Anya agreed. ‘A lot of people can access it. Who knows how many people?’

Oliver was on his feet. ‘Anyone could argue that Millard knew how poisonous it was in excess. He could just as easily have added tablets to her drink that day. Or .
. .’
He paced back and forth. ‘He carefully extracted the selenium from the bottle in the lab, and replaced it with water. So Patsy was administering water, not selenium, in the mice feed.’

The second option didn’t make sense. ‘If he went to all that trouble, why wouldn’t he just throw out the empty lab bottle and remove incriminating evidence that had his fingerprints on it?’ Anya showed Oliver the report. ‘Another chromatograph, of the dregs in the lab’s selenium bottle, proved the liquid was pure selenium, not water. The contents can’t have been replaced.’

‘Then we need to find out who else had access to Patsy’s drink container. My guess would be at least Len Dengate, the secretary in the lab, and maybe the cleaners if she left it there overnight.’

Anya’s stomach quietly grumbled.

Oliver opened a packet of biscuits and offered her one.

She took it. ‘Whoever killed her had to have motive and opportunity.’

The detective agreed. ‘Reuben warned us to destroy these logbooks. If he really is innocent and knew the logbooks could prove it, it makes no sense that he wants us to destroy any chance he has of being exonerated.’

Anya thought back to how he believed being in prison was better than being dead. He was still scared someone would target him, even in prison. ‘Mincer Leske was only recently released from Risdon, wasn’t he?’

‘Did you see Reuben’s demeanour when you mentioned his name?’

She had. The blinking showed he’d been unnerved.

‘Police haven’t released Leske’s name yet to the media. That meant Reuben wouldn’t know he was dead. Seems Mincer’s girlfriend and child haven’t been located, so they haven’t been able to notify them. Once they’re found and told, the police will be free to make the news public.’

Alison Blainey had described being stopped by a woman with a child before she was beaten on the road. If Mincer committed the assault, he could have used his girlfriend to set it up.

If Millard was afraid of Leske, maybe he had good reason. ‘Could Millard have been the real target and Patsy died by mistake?’

‘Unlikely. According to the police report, the poisoned drink bottle was bright pink and had a printed label with Patsy’s name on it.’ He pulled up the image on his screen. ‘Which means the killer is either unbelievably dumb or deliberately set Millard up.’ Oliver devoured the bag of corn chips he’d bought. ‘I need some protein. It helps me think.’

‘There’s tuna.’ Anya reminded him of his early find.

He shoved his hands into his trouser pockets. ‘My mother used to make this concoction with tinned food from the cupboard on a Friday night. Tuna, peas, creamed corn all together. Still gag at the thought.’

Anya would have settled for anything right now. Her head throbbed, and she felt like there were three-inch nails in the back of her skull. While the detective took notes in between handfuls of junk food, she grabbed some aspirin from a zip purse in her bag and swallowed it down with water from the bathroom tap.

Oliver swung his jacket around his back and slipped his arms inside. ‘I’ll bring us back something from that roadhouse we passed. Just in case, don’t answer the door to anyone.’

Anya didn’t have to be reminded. Someone had followed them from the prison. Whoever it was had more than a passing interest in who visited Reuben Millard. She moved to the door and clipped the lock behind Oliver.

She Skyped Martin’s number on her laptop. There was no answer at home, or on his mobile. Next, she contacted the Launceston Hospital, who put her through to Jocelyn’s bedside phone. She was surprised when her mother answered.

‘Darling, I hope you’re not working too hard.’

The chirpy tone took her by surprise.

‘Mum, is something wrong?’

‘No, darling, of course I’m doing what I’m told. Sergeant McGinley’s here to take my statement about the other night. He says he also has some questions for you about the night of the fire.’

Jocelyn was warning her.

‘We had a bit of car trouble and decided to drop in at Uncle Arthur’s,’ Anya lied, hoping her mother would realise where she was. Uncle Arthur was what the family jokingly called her father when, after weeks of planning, he spent a weekend at the lake and came back with only one or two fish.

‘He’ll be so pleased,’ Jocelyn played along. ‘Even if Arthur can fix the engine, you’ll be too late getting back to drop in tonight. And don’t worry about trying to call, the phone reception at your uncle’s is impossible.’

‘Talk soon, Mum.’ Anya hung up. Her mother wanted Sergeant McGinley to think she had broken down and was out of contact. Jocelyn didn’t like to be pushed, especially by men wielding authority.

Anya made another coffee and thought of Len Dengate. Someone had gone to the trouble of killing him and staging a suicide. Livelonger Organics was facing ruin but Len still would have owned the land. His small business wasn’t large enough to threaten a corporation the size of PT. If getting hold of his land was the motive, then Craig Dengate had to be a prime suspect. That was if he were unaware of the will change. The police could argue that Jocelyn must have known about the will because it was hidden on her property, and she was first on the scene. Len trusted her implicitly and would have let her into the house. There had been no obvious sign of a struggle. To get that close to him, someone had to have surprised him or known him well.

Anya shuddered and folded her arms tightly across her body to stave off a draught. Len Dengate may have been killed for whatever was in these logbooks. He was convinced he was being watched and followed, which is why he buried them under the chicken pen. Jocelyn had even said ‘These walls don’t have ears’ in the restaurant. Len’s paranoia was looking justified now, especially since she and Oliver were followed from the prison. Someone still wanted the logbooks, whether they were incriminating or not.

She put another log in the combustion stove and closed the door, feeling the heat rise in her face and hands, and went back to reading about the experiments. A thud sounded outside. She stopped reading and listened.

Another thud.

Someone was outside. Oliver had been gone a few minutes. She moved to the window and looked out. No sign of the hire car.

Wind howled and the bedroom door inched open. Anya grabbed an iron frying pan. It was heavy and could do damage if swung hard enough.

Thump, then another thump. She edged towards the kitchen window and saw a kangaroo on the wooden verandah. It was foraging and bounded off when she tapped the window. After listening for another few minutes, she relaxed and returned to the table. The frying pan remained within reach.

For the first seventy days of the selenium study, it seemed everything was routine. All the mice fed and grew consistently, although it appeared the mice in the two GM groups grew bigger and heavier. Whether or not that was statistically significant was yet to be determined. The recordings and observations were repetitive and occasional words difficult to decipher. Patsy had used her own kind of shorthand at times, or her handwriting was hard to read. On day seventy-nine, two of the mice in one of the groups became sluggish and refused to eat. Their growth rate stalled over the next week. By day eighty-six, another two in the group had become unwell.

On day ninety-one, three of the mice in the GM seed group died. Here, Patsy’s notes became more detailed. She performed necroscopies on the animals. Mouse 42 died earliest and was found to have a large stomach tumour. Mouse 46 had ovarian cancer. Number 28 had tumours growing in its liver and spleen.

Eight days later, another four mice were dead, including two in the GM corn group.

Anya wrote down the causes of death. Gastric tumours were the most common, followed by endocrine organ damage and bowel cancers. In the non-GM groups, all the mice survived and appeared to have been in good health.

Reuben Millard and Madison Zane had both mentioned allergic reactions as well. Millard had specifically said cancer. The GM foods in the experiment were causing cancer in the mice. A gust of cold air interrupted and the wooden door slammed closed. Oliver hung his coat on the back of his chair and warmed himself by the stove.

‘A tree is down and blocking the road out. We’ll have to make do with tuna and crackers.’

Anya turned towards the stove. ‘I’ve found something.’

He vigorously rubbed both hands and stepped closer to peer over her shoulder.

‘The study they were working on. The mice in two groups developed cancers after about three months.’ She looked up at the detective. ‘It was in the groups fed PT-grown corn and grain. Genetically modified varieties. Necroscopy showed damage to endocrine organs, like adrenal glands and the pancreas.’ It didn’t escape Anya that her mother had a rare immune disease affecting the adrenal glands. The registrar at the hospital had been shocked by the number of cases in the north of the state. It was possible GM bread and corn products sold to locals had something to do with the abnormal rates of disease. The locals were completely unaware due to the absence of labelling on the products. Madison, the medical student had made some interesting points.

‘That would explain why there was selenium left in the lab bottle, if the research was shut down prematurely and the corn and grains abandoned.’ He slid his laptop across the table to the adjacent chair. ‘Let’s just do a literature search .
. .
Seems there was something about GM seeds put out by the University of Tasmania eighteen months ago. Let’s see if the mainstream media picked it up .
. .
Oh. This is interesting.’ He sat back and moved the screen around so Anya could see. ‘After extensive research and studies, the Minister for Agriculture proudly declared the seeds were safe, so could be planted, grown and consumed without risk or concern.’

So safe that PT was injecting millions more dollars into the area. Photographed were Moss and one of the men she and Jocelyn had seen at the restaurant: Graham Fowler, chief executive officer of PT.

‘We just found ten million reasons to keep this study quiet. The crops are already in the food supply and have been for a while.’

Oliver stretched his arms over his head. ‘Why not just sack the research team? Why kill Patsy? Reuben Millard was in charge. He was the one with the reputation in the scientific community.’

‘Maybe he was the target after all.’

He rubbed his eyes with both hands. ‘The pink drink bottle had her name on it.’

‘Exactly. These logbooks exist and were hidden. The killer had no way of knowing they hadn’t already been copied.’

‘Or that they would surface one day, like now.’

It was beginning to make convoluted sense to Anya. ‘If you can’t destroy evidence of the study, the next best thing is to make sure no one would ever take the results seriously.’

‘So rather than kill the lead researcher, you discredit him. And what better way to do that than have him convicted of the worst crime?’ Oliver hit his forehead with a palm. ‘Murder. And make it look like a scandalous love triangle. That way, you kill two birds with one stone, so to speak.’

Anya was relieved the theory made sense to the detective. ‘Nothing Reuben says or does has credibility after that.’

Reuben Millard had been the target. Killing Patsy Gallop was a means to that end.

And someone else knew it and was now dead. ‘Len Dengate had the logbooks so was aware of the cancers in the GM group,’ she reasoned. ‘Once Millard was charged, the logbooks lost their impact.’

‘That explains why he supported Millard.’ Oliver walked to the cupboard and pulled out two bowls before pouring out the Twisties. ‘Want some?’

‘No, thanks.’ Anya refilled the kettle and put another log in the stove. The heat was making her mouth dry. She couldn’t think of anything worse than salty snacks. With corn in them. She asked to look at the pack and read the ingredients. It was an Australian company but there was no mention of GM corn used in it. Madison’s comments about labelling had been disturbing.

‘Something has to have changed recently.’ He crunched into a mouthful.

‘Media and public health departments focused on Len when his crop became infected with E. coli. The POWER group heard about it and became involved.’