Whiteout - Ken Follett [77]
Kit took a deep breath. He knew exactly what he had to do. He needed to work fast, but carefully.
First, he accessed the program that controlled the video feed from thirty-seven closed-circuit television cameras. He looked at the entrance to BSL4, which appeared normal. He checked the reception desk and saw Steve there, but not Susan. Scanning the input from other cameras, he located Susan patrolling elsewhere in the building. He noted the time.
The computer’s massive memory stored the camera images for four weeks before overwriting them. Kit knew his way around the program, for he had installed it. He located the video from the cameras in BSL4 this time last night. He checked the feed, random sampling footage, to make sure no crazy scientist had been working in the lab in the middle of the night; but all the images showed empty rooms. Good.
Nigel and Elton watched him in tense silence.
He then fed last night’s images into the monitors the guards were currently watching.
Now someone could walk around BSL4 doing anything he liked without their knowing.
The monitors were fitted with biased switches that would detect equipment substitution, for example if the feed came from a separate videotape deck. However, this footage was not coming from an outside source, but direct from the computer’s memory—so it did not trigger the alarm.
Kit stepped into the main control room. Daisy was slumped in a chair, wearing her leather jacket over the Hibernian Telecom overalls. Kit studied the bank of screens. All appeared normal. The dark-skinned guard, Don, looked at him with an inquiring expression. As a cover, Kit said, “Are any of the phones in here working?”
“None,” said Don.
Along the bottom edge of each screen was a line of text giving the time and date. The time was the same on the screens that showed yesterday’s footage—Kit had made sure of that. But yesterday’s footage showed yesterday’s date.
Kit was betting that no one ever looked at that date. The guards scanned the screens for activity; they did not read text that told them what they already knew.
He hoped he was right.
Don was wondering why the telephone repairman was so interested in the television monitors. “Something we can do for you?” he said in a challenging tone.
Daisy grunted and stirred in her chair, like a dog sensing tension among the humans.
Kit’s mobile phone rang.
He stepped back into the equipment room. The message on the screen of his laptop said: “Kremlin calling Toni.” He guessed that Steve wanted to let Toni know that the repair team had arrived. He decided to put the call through: it might reassure Toni and discourage her from coming here. He touched a key, then listened in on his mobile.
“This is Toni Gallo.” She was in her car; Kit could hear the engine.
“Steve here, at the Kremlin. The maintenance team from Hibernian Telecom have arrived.”
“Have they fixed the problem?”
“They’ve just started work. I hope I didn’t wake you.”
“No, I’m not in bed, I’m on my way to you.”
Kit cursed. It was what he had been afraid of.
“There’s really no need,” Steve told Toni.
Kit thought: That’s right!
“Probably not,” she replied. “But I’ll feel more comfortable.”
Kit thought: When will you get here?
Steve had the same thought. “Where are you now?”
“I’m only a few miles away, but the roads are terrible, and I can’t go faster than fifteen or twenty miles an hour.”
“Are you in your Porsche?”
“Yes.”
“This is Scotland, you should have bought a Land Rover.”
“I should have bought a bloody tank.”
Come on, Kit thought, how long?
Toni answered his question. “It’s going to take me at least half an hour, maybe an hour.”
They hung up, and Kit cursed under his breath.
He told himself that a visit by Toni would not be fatal. There would be nothing to warn her that a robbery was going on. Nothing should seem amiss for several days. It would appear only that there had been a problem with the phone system, and a repair team had fixed it. Not until the scientists returned to work would anyone realize that