“What kind of help do you need? I am just a clerk. What can I do?”
“I need some information. Just so I can understand how something works in the hospital. No one will ever know it came from you.”
“What can I tell you? I’m a teacher, not a medical person. It’s because of your stupid Department of Education that I am where I am, surrounded with cruel, ignorant rodents. You should save your time with me, and go interrogate someone else.”
“This isn’t an interrogation. It’s just a friendly chat. And it’s your job I’m interested in. Part of it, anyway. I just need to understand how one thing works. Then, I’ll be able to see how something else was able to happen. Something you absolutely won’t get in trouble for.”
“I can try, if that will help keep my name out of the mud. Which thing?”
“You don’t know what I’m going to ask you about? You don’t have any idea?”
“No. My job is very boring. I can’t imagine how talking about it can help anyone. But I’m willing to try, if you tell me what you want to know.”
“Well, I’m interested to know what happens when the containers of special waste arrive from the other hospitals. You helped keep the records, didn’t you?”
“I did. But that doesn’t happen any more. Not since some of it was stolen. Now it all goes to another hospital. Someone there does all the logging in and out.”
“I know that. But can you tell me how you used to do it, when the waste still came here?”
“It was easy, to tell you the truth. A trained monkey could have done it. On the morning of the transfer, I got an e-mail, which was also copied to my boss. It told us the number of canisters that were coming, what was in them, and gave a code number for each one. Then, when the truck arrived, I went outside with a barcode reader. I scanned the codes, and if they matched the e-mail, everything was okay.”
“So all the containers had barcodes on them?”
“Yes. The code identified the container, and also what was inside it. The system was very good. It meant no one could send too few containers. And they couldn’t lie about what was inside.”
“That’s good.”
“Yes. It was very well thought out. A copy of the e-mail went to my boss. The barcode reader automatically copied its results to him, too, so no one could hide anything. Once the containers were safely inside, the technicians would check them, as well. If anything was wrong, they would flag it up. And there were outside technicians who we could call in if we were worried about anything.”
“That sounds pretty thorough. But tell me something. What if someone wanted to sneak an extra container into the vault. How could they do that?”
“They couldn’t. It would be impossible. The delivery scan wouldn’t match the e-mail. The system would pick that up automatically, even if I didn’t notice there were the wrong number.”
“But what if you accidentally forgot to scan one of the containers? Couldn’t it be missed?”
“No. Once again, the scan would not match the e-mail. And the e-mail is known about by the original hospital, and my boss. You see, that’s the strength of the system. At no time does it depend on only one person. If something was done wrong, by accident or on purpose, two other people would see. As well as the computer. It’s as they told us on the training. Impossible to fiddle.”
“It does sound like a strong system, Amany,” Melissa said, shooting me a disappointed glance in the mirror. “Thank you for explaining it to us.”
Chapter Twenty-Four
“It does sound pretty watertight,” I said. “Do you mind if I just ask one thing, though?”
The woman shook her head.
“You said you scan the barcodes,” I said. “That sounds complicated. How do you do it?”
“Complicated?” she said. “It’s the easiest thing in the world. You take the scanner and point it at the barcode. That’s all there is to do. And you can tell you’re pointing it in the right place, because it shines a red light.”
“So the scanners are portable?”
“Of course. You would need a crazy long wire, otherwise.”
“And what powers them? Batteries?”
“They are rechargeable. You never have to change the batteries.”
“What if you forget to plug then in? What if the batteries go flat?”
“They last for weeks. And we have spare ones. And the truck brings a spare one of its own, which is charged up by the engine. We’ve never had a problem, and I doubt there could be one.”
“What if they break down?”
“Then we’d use a spare one. We have several, like I said. But I can’t ever remember that happening.”
“OK. Forget about the handsets for a minute. What if the system went wrong? The computer system itself, I mean. The place where the scanners send the information to be matched with the e-mail?”
“It is very well designed. It never goes wrong.”
“Never? It never throws a fit? Melissa, have you ever heard of a computer system like that?”
“No,” Melissa said. “I’ve never heard of a computer that’s not constantly falling over, in fact.”
The woman stayed silent, but turned her head to look out the opposite window.
“Seriously,” I said. “You’re saying this system never crashes?”
“I don’t recall that ever happening,” the woman said.
“Okay. Let’s just go with the idea that this thing is bullet proof. We’ll take your word for it. But let me ask you something else. There must have been an emergency procedure for you to follow, just in case there ever was a crash?”
“The hospital is very thorough. There are processes and procedures and roadmaps and guidelines for more or less everything.”
“Including what to do if the barcode scanner system wasn’t working?”
The woman said nothing.
“Amany?” Melissa said. “What’s your answer? This is all part of keeping you out of trouble, you know. Don’t dry up on us now, or you’ll only be hurting yourself.”
“OK then, yes,” she said. “There was a procedure. But it was just for emergencies.”
“About this procedure,” Melissa said. “How did it work? What did you have to do?”
“It was easy,” she said. “The barcodes have little numbers underneath them. You just had to write them down and then key them in to a special form on the intranet. But like I told you, the scanners never went down so that’s not important.”
“There’s something we should, perhaps, have explained at the start,” I said. We’re not the regular police. We have access to things that most people can’t get their hands on. For example, we could get a copy of the maintenance file for every system in that hospital as easily as you could buy a morning paper. Do you follow me?”
“Yes,” she said. “I do. And I bet you could get my attendance record, too. And if you did, and you checked, you would find no scanner breakdowns for any days I was working.”
“I’m sure you’re right. But here’s my real question. How many times would the records show you’d entered the details manually, anyway, even though the system was working?”