Counterfeit (The Jim Slater series Book 2) Page 12

  For a fleeting moment I wondered whether I’d acquired the taste for malt whisky myself, or whether I’d inherited it with this body. There was a time when I’d ask myself a lot of questions like that. Not any more. My brain was well integrated with this body now and it had served me well. I’d moved on.

  Abby was talking to Stefan.

  “I still don’t see how they can hide what’s going on,” she said. “What about the packaging? That must be in the inventories somewhere. Whatever their legitimate production is, they must be holding ten times that many cartons to package the counterfeit stuff.”

  He shrugged. “They can just say they ordered a year’s supply to get bulk reductions while the price was good.” He turned to me. “There are the computers in process control, though. If you could get access to them you’d find a program for producing counterfeit drugs, wouldn’t you? What do you think, Jim?”

  “My guess is they store the legitimate programs there and the counterfeit ones separately. As you go in the door, someone else could be coming out with all the incriminating evidence tucked away on a key fob.”

  He sighed. “You think the parent company knows what’s going on?”

  “If they are they should have reported it.”

  “Unless they’re involved.”

  Abby broke in. “Oh come on, Stefan! What have they got to gain?”

  Stefan pursed his lips. “I don’t know. Just the way Martino behaved. He was real cagey.”

  We sipped our drinks for a while. Then Abby took it up again.

  “All right, let’s go back to this list of factories. They’re all over the place: China, India, Malaysia. You go to the originators of another drug that’s being sold in a counterfeit version – a drug like Dopranamid. They also outsource production so you repeat the performance we went through today and get another list of factories. You compare the lists. If the same one appears on both lists, you’ve got the source of the fakes.”

  “That’s smart, Abby,” Stefan said, “but it won’t work. The big pharmas demand an exclusive contract, otherwise there’s a danger of commercial secrets leaking to a competitor. It’s not just the drug, see. The way it’s formulated can affect where in the body it’s released and how quickly. It could take months of research to establish the best method. They can’t afford to give information like that away.”

  “Then the list doesn’t get you any further. ”

  I smiled. “It does, I believe.”

  The double doors opened again.

  “Pardon me, folks, your table is ready. Would you like to come this way?”

  “To be continued,” I said, draining my glass.

  We followed the swinging hips of the waitress into the restaurant. It was a large room and all the tables were set, but it looked to me like only half were occupied. She led us to a table close to some other customers. I shook my head and pointed to one further away.

  I made no attempt to resume until the starters had been cleared. By this time Abby was savagely tearing small pieces off her bread roll. To aggravate her a little more I was deliberately oblique.

  “There’s a very old story, and it goes something like this. A man comes to a border crossing, pushing a wheelbarrow. The customs officials are suspicious. They search the wheelbarrow but it’s just filled with rags and old clothes so they wave him on. The next day the same man comes along, wheeling a barrow, and they repeat the procedure. This goes on for months. Finally, in desperation, one of the officials says to the man, ‘We’re convinced you’re up to something, but we don’t know what it is, and it’s driving us mad. We promise not to take any action if you’ll tell us. What is it you’re smuggling?’ And the man replies, ‘Wheelbarrows.’”

  Stefan laughed. “You’re right, it is old.”

  Abby pulled a face. “What’s that got to do with it?”

  “Quinoxocarb. The drug doesn’t tell us anything – it’s just a chemical, right?”

  “Yes…”

  “Well, what we’ve been overlooking is the vehicle – the ‘wheelbarrow’. The clue isn’t in the drug at all; it’s in the filler.”

  Now they were both looking mystified. Stefan placed his elbows on the table and clasped his hands, waiting. Abby sat very straight, her brows knitted in a frown.

  “Look,” I went on. “Stefan’s analysis showed that the filler was calcium carbonate. What’s calcium carbonate? Limestone. Why are they using limestone? Because it’s cheap. Why is it cheap? Because it’slocal!”

  Stefan raised one finger from his clasped hands and pointed it at me.

  “So we need a pharmaceutical factory that’s close to limestone deposits. But that could be almost anywhere!”

  “No, I don’t think so. Stefan, you’ve got access to a scanning electron microscope, haven’t you? The type that measures X-ray emissions? You used it to get the composition of the inks on those packages.”

  “Sure we have.”

  “Okay. When you get back I want you to run the same kind of analysis on these tablets. My guess is they won’t have purified the limestone, just crushed it to a powder. There’ll be traces of other elements. Your analysis will give you a signature of what’s present and the relative amounts. From that we can pinpoint which particular limestone deposit it came from.”

  “We can?”

  “Yes. People have been collecting that sort of data for years. It helps in all sorts of academic fields, from tectonic shifts to palaeontology.”

  Stefan’s chubby face lit up. “That’s brilliant. I can’t wait to try it.”

  Abby’s lips were slightly parted. “How the devil did you know all that?”

  “Geology was one of my subsidiary subjects at university.”

  A different look entered those amazing blue eyes. For a few moments the ice melted and I found myself bathed in unexpected warmth. When she spoke again her voice had lost its hard edge.

  “I underestimated you, Colonel Slater.”

  “Never underestimate the enemy, Lieutenant.”

  A slow smile spread over her face. “No enemies at this table, Colonel. But there is an enemy all right, and maybe we’re getting closer to him.”

  18

  We all caught early morning flights, Abby and I to Raleigh-Durham and Stefan to Washington.

  Stefan must have gone straight to the lab to start on the analysis because he sent me an X-ray spectrum the following day. Now the ball was back in my court; I had to compare it with known limestone deposits. I knew there was an on-line database designed for precisely that purpose, but I hadn’t used it since I was at university. I found it and uploaded the data. It made short work of the comparison, which was a shame in a way because I was enjoying the academic exercise. There was a close match with limestone from a string of sites in Rajasthan and Haryana, northern India, where the rock was mined extensively. I displayed a map of the sites and showed it to Abby.

  Her face fell. “I thought we could narrow it down. That’s a huge area.”

  “True, but you can’t plonk a drug company just anywhere. People have to travel, so you’ve got to have good connections. My guess is it’ll be somewhere near Delhi or Jodhpur. They both have airports.”

  “All the same…”

  “I know. That’s why we need that list from the reluctant Mr. Martino.”

  *

  Harries received the list two days later and forwarded it to Stefan and me. Abby was in my office when it arrived. I sensed her excitement as we pored over it.

  There were seven companies, dotted around India, China, and Malaysia, just as Martino had said they would be.

  She ran her finger down the names.

  “Two in India. This one’s in Kerala. That’s in the south. What about this one, Nissim Laboratories? Where’s Mahendragarh?”

  “No idea. Hang on.” I brought up a map on my desk screen, and entered Mahendragarh in the search box. I looked quickly up at her.

  “Northern India. Haryana. Bang in the limestone area – and only abou
t fifty miles from Delhi.”

  Her eyes lit up. “Let’s tell Stefan!”

  “I’ll set up a holoconference. It’s more secure.”

  The holoconference suite could hardly be called a suite: it was a small, windowless room with a projector on a low table, a control panel, and several chairs. We closed the door, sat down, and waited.

  Fifteen minutes later the projector stuttered into life and Stefan appeared above the table.

  “Hi, you two. You get the list?”

  “Yes, that’s why we’re calling. Stefan, we’ve got a hit. One of those companies, Nissim Laboratories, is in an area where they mine limestone. And the impurities there match what you found when you analysed the tablets: same elements, same proportions.”

  “All right!” Stefan rubbed his hands together. “What’s the next move?”

  Abby said, “We could take the evidence back to Kappa.”

  Stefan shook his head. “They haven’t done anything about it up to now. They could just bury it. Do more harm than good.”

  Abby looked from Stefan’s holoimage to me and back again. “But why? Why haven’t they identified the companies and exposed them?”

  “I was thinking about that on the flight back,” Stefan said. “Remember what Harries said? Kappa’s new antimalarial, Quinocitab, is due to be launched in a year or two, about the same time as the patent on Quinoxocarb expires. When that happens there’ll be a free-for-all on manufacturing Quinoxocarb and the company won’t be able to compete on price, for either the old drug or the new one, unless—”

  Abby pointed at him. “—unless Quinoxocarb’s been rendered useless because the organism’s resistant to it!”

  “Precisely. In a way the counterfeiters are doing Kappa a favour. Quinocitab may have a similar name but the pharmacological target is different. It would almost certainly be effective against the resistant organism. Its market will be assured.”

  I was thinking quickly now. “Someone like Quilter would have a legitimate reason for visiting every factory, wouldn’t he?” I said. “Checking on quality and all that. He’d only need a few minutes alone with the CEO on each trip…”

  Abby’s eyes widened. “Quilter? Oh surely not, Jim! I thought he was very open and helpful.”

  “Maybe. Maybe it was just a convincing act.”

  “Hey guys,” Stefan said. “Let’s not get ahead of ourselves here. I didn’t say they were responsible for making the counterfeit version; I only said it would work to their advantage. All they have to do is turn a blind eye; that way they’re not committing any crime. And what’s good for Quinoxocarb could be good for other drugs, too. Kappa’s a big outfit. They could have a major launch nearly every year. They have to be sure each of those products is profitable.”

  “My God,” Abby said. “How widespread is this? Is Kappa the only company doing it?”

  “Probably not,” Stefan said. “Quinoxocarb is made by Kappa, but Dopranamid isn’t. The packaging on the fake Dopranamid was perfect, too. I looked at some other samples as well. The Corps has an Emergency Response Team in Mexico right now. They’ve sent me suspect samples of pharmacological preps, two for TB and one for AIDS. Three more drugs, three more manufacturers. The stuff was fake all right and again the packaging was perfect.”

  “Stefan,” I said. “You looked at that packaging in great detail. You reckon it’s the real thing?”

  “I’m ninety-nine per cent sure it is.”

  “But you don’t think the packaging firms are supplying rogue factories.”

  “Like I said before, it would be commercial suicide. And they have no need to. Their order books are full with legitimate contracts.”

  “Then it has to be the subcontracted companies.”

  Abby frowned. “There’s a problem with that. Stefan said these subcontracts are exclusive.”

  “That’s right,” Stefan agreed. “They have to be.”

  “So it’s not just one company out in India or Malaysia or somewhere that’s doing it. For every legitimate drug there has to be another subcontracted factory producing a counterfeit version.” She looked from Stefan to me. “See what I mean? We know of two that are producing fake antimalarials. Stefan’s just told us about three more, for other diseases. That’s five from our records alone. So how many in total? Ten, twenty? All suddenly producing fake drugs with perfect packaging? I don’t buy it.”

  “Well it may not be suddenly,” Stefan said quietly. “We’re just uncovering the extent of the trade; it could have been going on for a while.”

  She shrugged. “Okay, it’s not suddenly. Makes no difference to the argument.”

  “I can’t see any other explanation.” I said. “It has to be the subcontractors.”

  “All doing the same thing? It’s too much of a coincidence.”

  I hesitated, then said slowly, “Suppose there’s an overarching organisation? An outfit that goes round looking for factories that can make fake drugs for them. That would explain it.”

  Abby turned to me. She had that strange look in her eyes again. “Yes… it would.”

  Stefan came back. “It could account for the scale of the operation, too. From what I’ve seen, these small outfits have no interest in the retail end of things. Once they’ve manufactured the product they just want to offload it and let someone else worry about marketing and distribution. But if, as you say, there’s another contractor for the counterfeit drugs they can handle all that side for them.”

  An image entered my mind, a rolling cloud of smoke rising over the remains of a twin-engined aircraft that had just been blown to smithereens.

  I straightened up. “Okay, Stefan. Look, this has been very helpful. We’ve defined the task now.”

  “Oh. Right. So what’s the next move?”

  “I don’t know, we’ll have to think about it.”

  “Well, if you need any more help you know where to come.”

  “Thanks a lot, Stefan. Really appreciate it. We’ll say goodbye for now.”

  “Okay. Take care, you two.”

  Abby said “Will do. ’Bye, Stefan”.

  I switched the projector off and Stefan’s holoimage shrank to nothing.

  She turned on me angrily. “You cut him off a bit short, didn’t you? What’s the idea?”

  “It’s a different ball game now.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “I’ll tell you. Let’s go, we’re all done in here.”

  We left the conference room, blinking in the sudden daylight, and headed back towards my office. Behind us an irregular percussion from the distant firing range echoed off the buildings.

  Abby kept pace with me. “Go on, then, what was all that about?”

  “Look, ask yourself what kind of organisation can handle a racket like this. These companies are small but they have good, solid, legitimate contracts. There’d have to be damned good reasons to get involved in an illegal operation: a lot of money or threats of violence. Either one takes resources and it’s got to be repeated for a number of companies, probably in several different countries.”

  “Okay, the organisation would have to be multinational and well capitalised.”

  “Exactly. So things have changed. I thought we were dealing with one nasty little rogue outfit. Now I know different. Sure, we could go after this company – Nissim Laboratories – but even if we could shut them down it would hardly affect the trade. It’s like fishing for minnows when there’s a shark in the water.”

  “I agree. We need to target the larger organisation.”

  “Which is in an entirely different league. Look, you said I was on a crusade and you weren’t wrong. But when I involved you I didn’t know it was going to escalate like this. I smell danger, Abby. I’ll take what comes but no way am I justified in exposing Stefan to a risk like that, and the same applies to you.”

  “What are you saying?”

  “I’m giving you leave to return to your regular duties.”

  She stopped de
ad and turned to me. Her cheeks were flushed.

  “You’ve got a damned nerve! You drag me over here to help you and then you’re ready to pack me off the moment there’s a whiff of trouble.”

  “I’m telling you, Abby, this could get really dangerous. I have no right to—”

  “Let me tell you something, Jim Slater. An assignment in a place like Medellín is no sinecure. I didn’t spend all my time behind that desk, you know. We went out to those villages prepared to meet people who hated our guts. We carried sidearms – and we knew how to use them. This isn’t my first brush with danger.”

  “All right, but it’s one thing to deal with a local hothead and quite another to take on a bunch of professional criminals, people who kill as a routine part of the job.”

  “I thought you wanted my expertise on this mission.”

  “I did, but—”

  “Well, you have it. Now stop playing Sir Galahad. I’m not a damsel in distress. I can look after myself.”

  I heaved a sigh. “Okay, okay.” I started down the path again and she fell into step. “I only meant it for your good.”

  Her voice dropped. “I know.”

  We reached my office and went inside. I pulled a chair out for her and settled into my usual position behind the desk.

  She was all business. “So what’s next?”

  “The PHS is too big for me, Abby. I have questions to ask and I want to get the answers without being bounced from one building to the next. What I need is a place with a real focus on the counterfeit drug industry. Somewhere close to the action, where they’ve got first-hand experience.”

  “NAFDAC.”

  “NAFDAC?”

  “Yes, the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control. It’s in Nigeria. They’ve probably got more experience with counterfeit drugs than anyone else in the world.”

  I pointed a finger at her. “Excellent. Then that’s where we’ll go next.”

  “You know, I’m sure the PHS has cooperative agreements with them – sharing information, lab analyses, that sort of thing.”

  “Good. Then you should be able to secure an introduction for us.”