After the Truth (Book One)

Two

I could start with the first moment, the first victim, that set me on the path to the UN. However, I do not have the time either tonight or tomorrow to start that early. Instead I shall start with the most significant step in my early investigation into what was to come.

My colleague Evelyn Apate and I flew into Canada, landing at Montréal-Trudeau airport. At the time both of us still worked for the Global Alert and Response programme, part of the World Health Organization. Our arrival was being kept as low key as possible. We were told a driver would be waiting for us, but they would not be openly displaying a WHO logo. It was a lie I had been part of before.

I spotted our driver immediately we emerged from passenger arrivals. The short man wore thin framed glasses which didn't suit his round face. He held a sign with "William Hunter Odell" written neatly upon it and he was nervously scouring the crowd flooding towards him. As well as our plane from Geneva, busy flights from Paris and Seattle had landed about the same time.

I pointed out the man to Evelyn and we side slipped through the stream of people towards him. When I touched him on the arm, he physically jumped.

'Dr Longdon?' he said and then peered at Evelyn. 'Dr Apate?'

In the noisy airport terminal, it was impossible to hear Evelyn's tut at the man pronouncing her name wrong, something Evelyn disliked intensely. He had pronounced it "app-ate". She politely corrected him that her last name was pronounced "ar-par-tee".

I confirmed my name was correct and the man introduced himself as Albert Bayley, of the Montréal Public Health department.

He didn't seem to know what to do next and we stood in silence for a few moments before I asked whether he had a car. When he nodded, I had to encourage him to take us to it.

'Oh, sorry, of course,' Albert said, fumbling with the sign. Even though it had been in code he seemed desperate to ensure it was concealed under his jacket before he led us out of the airport terminal.

'Do you know who William Hunter Odell was?' I asked.

Albert shook his head. 'I was given the name as a suggestion.'

'He was a Canadian judge and politician in the nineteenth century.'

As I said, it was a lie I had been part of before.

Albert offered to take our luggage, but then saw the two laptop bags and two suitcases we had and realised his inadequacy at being able to carry them all. I told him we were fine to carry our own bags. I added we were very keen to get to the mortuary.

The word mortuary stiffened Albert's resolve and he quickly pointed outside and began to stride through the airport crowd. He looked back only once to make sure we were keeping up. Albert led us through the cold Montréal evening air to the short-term parking and a dark Mercedes.

'Whose idea was the name?' I asked, interested in who was creating the lie from the Canadian side.

'Dr Welby, he is Assistant Deputy Minister in charge of the Infectious Disease Prevention and Control branch of our national health agency.'

I knew William Welby from when I had led the response on the SARs outbreak back in 2003. Back then he had been part of the Toronto Public Health department.

'I'm glad to see the devious mind of Dr Welby is still working,' I said with a smile.

Albert seemed to be on the edge of a nervous breakdown, he was continually scanning the parking lot to make sure we were not being watched.

'He said it wasn't a good idea for the media to find out there were two doctors from the World Health Organization arriving in the city on short notice.'