Along with the blood, Margaret had sent urine, bile, stomach contents and a portion of liver for analysis. There was still a good fifty millilitres of Sui’s blood in the refrigerator available for testing. Margaret drew off most of it into a small glass vial which she sealed and labelled and packed carefully into her purse.
Professor Yang arranged for a car and driver to take them across town. Ploughs had been out on the Fourth Ring Road, and they made slow but steady progress through the lines of traffic heading north before turning off on the slip road on to Souzhou Street and driving deep into Haidian’s university-land.
Beijing University, known simply as Beida, sat in splendid snow-covered isolation behind high brick walls, an extraordinary rambling campus of lakes and pavilions and meandering footpaths. Professor Xu’s office was on the second floor of the College of Biogenic Science. He could not have been more different from Professor Yang — short, round, balding, with tiny wire-rimmed glasses perched on the end of a very small, upturned nose. Yang always cut an elegant figure in his immaculately pressed dark suits. Xu sported a well-worn, padded, Chinese jacket open over a tee-shirt and baggy corduroy pants. He smoked constantly, and his brown suede shoes were covered in fallen ash.
The two men shook hands with genuine pleasure and clear enthusiasm. There was an exchange which Margaret did not understand, but which made them both laugh aloud. Xu turned to Margaret. ‘He always more lucky than me, Lao Yang. Always with pretty girl on his arm.’ His English wasn’t as good as Yang’s.
‘That’s because I’m so much better looking than you, Professor,’ Yang said. And he turned to Margaret. ‘He was an ugly boy, too.’
‘But smarter,’ Xu said, grinning.
‘A matter of opinion,’ Yang said sniffily.
Xu said to Margaret. ‘Lao Yang say you need some help. He owe me so-oo many favour. But I do favour for you.’ And suddenly his smile was replaced by a frown of concentration. ‘You have blood?’
Margaret took the vial out of her purse. ‘I hope it’s enough. I took it from a young man who was suffering from an unusual heart condition. Hypertrophy of the microvasculature.’ Yang quickly translated this more technical language. Margaret went on. ‘I am wondering if his condition might have been brought about by some kind of genetic disorder.’
Xu took the vial. ‘Hmmm. Could take some time.’ He held it up to the light.
‘We don’t have much time,’ Margaret said. ‘This condition has already killed several people, and may well kill several more.’
‘Ah,’ Yang said. He laid the vial on his desk and lit another cigarette. ‘Why you think there is genetic element?’
‘To be honest,’ Margaret said, ‘I don’t know that there is.’ She glanced at Yang. ‘I’m making a wild guess, here. That these people might have been subjected to some kind of genetic modification.’
Yang translated, and Margaret could see that Xu found the suggestion intriguing. He looked at Margaret. ‘Okay, I give it big priority.’
On the way back in the car, Yang and Margaret sat in silence for some time, watching the traffic and the snow. They were back on the ring road before Yang said to her, ‘You think someone might have been tampering with the DNA of these athletes?’ He, too, was clearly intrigued.
Margaret looked embarrassed. ‘I’m sorry Professor, I hope I am not wasting your friend’s time. It really is the wildest stab in the dark.’
A police Jeep, windows opaque with condensation, was parked at the front door of the Centre of Material Evidence Determination when Professor Yang’s car pulled in opposite the basketball court. As the professor helped Margaret towards the steps, the doors on each side of the Jeep opened simultaneously, and Li and Sun got out in a cloud of hot, stale cigarette smoke. Margaret turned as Li called her name, and she saw him limping towards her on his stick. At least, she thought, he still appeared to be in a job. She searched his face anxiously as he approached, and saw tension there. But also, to her surprise, lights in his eyes. She knew immediately there had been developments. ‘What’s happened?’ she asked.
He said, ‘I know why they shaved the athletes’ heads. At least, I think I do. But I need you to prove it.’
Yang said, ‘Well, let’s not stand here discussing it in the snow, shall we? You had better come along to my office and we’ll have some tea.’
Li could barely contain himself on the walk along the hall to Yang’s office. Well over half the day had gone already, and his revelation was burning a hole in his brain. Yang told his secretary to make them tea, and swept into his office. Li and Sun and Margaret followed. Yang hung his coat on the stand and said, ‘Well? Are you going to put us out of our misery, Section Chief? Or are you going to stand there dithering until the tea arrives?’
Li said, ‘It’s the hair. If they were taking drugs there would be a record of it right there on their heads. Even if they managed somehow to get the stuff out of their systems there would still be traces of it in their hair.’
‘Jesus,’ Margaret whispered. ‘Of course.’ And now that it was out there in front of her, she wondered why it had not occurred to her before.
Li said, ‘I’ve already done some research on the Internet.’ And Margaret knew that the hours she had spent schooling him on how to get the best out of a search engine had been worthwhile. He said, ‘I found an article in a forensic medical publication. It seems some French scientists recently published a paper on hair analysis in a test group of bodybuilders. They found that…’ he fumbled in his pocket for the printout he had taken from the computer. He opened it up, searching for the relevant paragraph. ‘Here it is…that, quote, long-term histories of an individual’s drug use are accessible through hair analysis, whereas urinalysis provides only short-term information. End quote.’ He looked up triumphantly.
Yang said, ‘But if they all had their heads shaved, how will we ever know?’
Margaret said, ‘But they didn’t, did they?’ She turned to Li. ‘The weightlifter who died from the heart attack. He still had his hair.’
‘And plenty of it,’ Li said. ‘A ponytail halfway down his back.’
Margaret looked troubled. ‘The only problem is,’ she said, ‘I have absolutely no expertise in this area.’ She looked to Professor Yang. ‘And I’m not sure if anyone here does.’
Yang’s secretary knocked and came in with a tray of tall glasses and a flask of hot tea. ‘Ah, good, thank you, my dear,’ said Yang. ‘Ask Doctor Pi to step into my office for a few moments, would you?’ She nodded, set the tray down on his desk and left. The professor started pouring. ‘You know Doctor Pi, don’t you, Margaret?’ he said.
‘Head of the forensics laboratory, isn’t he?’
Yang nodded. ‘Spent some time last year on an exchange trip to the US.’ He smiled. ‘One of my little hobby-horses, exchange trips.’ He started handing full glasses of tea around. ‘I believe Doctor Pi took part in a study in South Florida to ascertain cocaine abuse in pregnant women by performing hair assays.’ He grinned now. ‘You never know when such skills might come in handy.’
Doctor Pi was a tall, good-looking young man with a slow, laconic manner, and impeccable American English. Yes, he confirmed when he came in, he had taken part in such a study. He sipped his tea and waited expectantly.
‘It was successful?’ Margaret asked.
‘Sure,’ he said. ‘We found we could reliably look at drug exposure months after it had passed out of the urine or the blood. Anything up to ninety days after. A kind of retrospective window of detection.’
Li said, ‘If we could provide you with a hair sample would you be able to analyse it for us, open up that retrospective window.’