46
The Fighting Germs

I sat up again and looked up Kiel’s university address: eighth floor of the Forschung Center for Life Sciences. The Forschung Center was on what they called West Campus, a sprawling extension of the university where giant research buildings sat. I drove up and down hills and found a public-policy institute, engineering, chemistry and physics, and finally the Forschung, tucked into a side of the farthest hill. Unlike the part of the campus I’d visited last week, there weren’t any guard stations. Bonus for the weary detective: the Forschung had its own parking lot.

However, there was also a guard in the lobby, who asked my business with Dr. Kiel. I couldn’t think of a clever cover story: I said I was there to discuss bioweapons, particularly anthrax.

Unlike the sheriff’s deputy, the guard wasn’t alarmed. I guess anthrax was all in a day’s work at the Forschung Center. He called up to the eighth floor. Time passed. People came and went through the locked doors, which needed a key card for access; I couldn’t get in unless I mugged someone in the parking lot to steal a card.

I checked my messages. Seventeen from Chicago clients, including one from Troy Hempel. Nothing from Lotty—her surgical day must be running long. Nothing from Jake. The only cheering message came from Mr. Contreras, happy he was leaving for home in two days: “It’s beautiful here, doll, but I want to be home. I miss you and the dogs and the little volcano on ice skates.”

I shifted uneasily, wondering what the volcano was doing. When I texted her, she assured me she was fine; Cady had invited her home to supper again. Cady’s granny was super nice. Bernie didn’t understand why I had a problem with her.

I wandered around the lobby, looking at portraits of bygone KU cell biologists. Noble P. Sherwood had a magnificent mustache and looked like Teddy Roosevelt. Cora Downs had done impressive work on tularemia when STEM women were as rare as unicorns. David Paretsky had done something unusual with peptides in a beast called rickettsia.

In a corner of the lobby, in the shadow of a display case, I came on a framed copy of the photo of “Dr. K’s Fighting Germs,” the picture of the lab team that had won a charity softball game I’d seen online in the Douglas County Herald. I was pretty sure one of the young men grinning in the background was the original of the face Sonia kept sketching.

I was heading over to the guard to ask him to check on Dr. Kiel when a young woman in a lab coat came out and looked at me doubtfully.

“Are you from Dr. Kiel’s lab?” I asked. “It’s V.I. Warshawski.”

She ignored my outstretched hand. “He said to tell you he doesn’t know anything about anthrax.”