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Chapter 114

‘DoctorMukherjee is five minutes away from accessing the stomach,’ Doyle said. ‘They’re getting all the sponges ready so they can mop up the stomach liquid spillage.’

‘Gross,’ Poe said.

‘It’s beautiful, actually.’

‘Got to agree with Poe, Estelle,’ Flynn said. ‘It’s absolutely gross.’

Doyle grinned.

A theatre nurse unwrapped a clamp. Another unwrapped the surgical spoon that Mukherjee would use to empty the stomach. It reminded Poe of something he wanted to ask Doyle.

‘What about packaging for his tablets?’ he said. ‘If the Botanist’s fooling his victims into taking the wrong medication, they have to be in professional packaging, surely. If you always get your Viagra in a blister pack and suddenly it turns up in a brown envelope, you’re bound to think twice about taking it. I don’t care how horny you are.’

‘Getting medication into blister packs is even easier than making the tablets, Poe,’ Doyle said. ‘Hand-operated blister-packing machines cost less than a thousand pounds. They’re sort of like miniature trouser presses. And blank blister pack sheets come in every shape and size you might need. Round, rhombic, capsule, you name it. You put the tablets in the empty bubbles then slot the sheet into the machine, along with the soft-temper aluminium foil that comes with the blank blister packs. You pull down the machine’s handle and it simultaneously applies heat and pressure. The heat warms up the lacquer coating on the foil and the pressure seals it to the blister pack.’

‘But they wouldn’t have the correct writing on the foil?’

‘Not unless he has access to a machine that prints them at the same time, but I don’t think that’s the problem.’

‘Oh, what is?’

‘It’s the medication box and the instruction sheet and the chemist’s label with the patient’s personal information that’s the problem. You put a professional-looking blister pack into the right medication box, and no one will notice there’s no writing on the foil. Work out how he gets the wrong medication into therightbox and you’ve cracked it.’

‘OK,’ Poe said. ‘Assuming he can do all that. And say he’s managed to hack the NHS, or something equally unlikely, and say he has a fool-proof system for making his medication look like their medication, there’s still a major stumbling block.’

‘Which is?’

‘How does he get it to them?’

‘He posts it, I assume.’

‘Doesn’t work,’ Poe said. ‘Let’s say you get your regular medication through the mail, and let’s say he posts his through your letterbox. What happens when the real medication arrives? Beck’s good, but I don’t think he’s found a reliable way of intercepting the mail. Not one of his victims mentioned duplicate medication and they lived all over London, so we know he wasn’t doorstepping postmen.’

‘That sounds like a detective’s problem,’ Doyle said. ‘But not one you can discuss now.’

‘Why not?’

She nodded at the laptop. ‘The stomach’s open.’