“How the hell do I know?” Dooley snapped. The ceaseless chatterings of the monkeys and the proximity of the dead woman made him want to desert the place. “Let’s leave it be, huh?”

McBride ignored Dooley’s request; equipment fascinated him. He stared entranced at the encephalograph and electrocardiograph; at the printout units still disgorging yards of blank paper onto the floor; at the video display monitors and the consoles. The scene brought the Marie Celeste to his mind. This was like some deserted ship of science — still humming some tuneless song to itself as it sailed on, though there was neither captain nor crew left behind to attend upon it.

Beyond the wall of equipment was a window, no more than a yard square. McBride had assumed it let on to the exterior of the building, but now that he looked more closely he realized it did not. A test chamber lay beyond the banked units.

“Dooley…?” he said, glancing around. The man had gone, however, down to meet Carnegie presumably. Content to be left to his exploration, McBride returned his attention to the window. There was no light on inside. Curious, he walked around the back of the banked equipment until he found the chamber door. It was ajar. Without hesitation, he stepped through.

Most of the light through the window was blocked by the instruments on the other side; the interior was dark. It took McBride’s eyes a few seconds to get a true impression of the chaos the chamber contained: the overturned table; the chair of which somebody had made matchwood; the tangle of cables and demolished equipment — cameras, perhaps, to monitor proceedings in the chamber? — clusters of lights which had been similarly smashed. No professional vandal could have made a more through job of breaking up the chamber than had been made.

There was a smell in the air which McBride recognized but, irritatingly, couldn’t place.

He stood still, tantalized by the scent. The sound of sirens rose from down the corridor outside; Carnegie would be here in moments. Suddenly, the smell’s association came to him. It was the same scent that twitched in his nostrils when, after making love to Jessica and — as was his ritual — washing himself, he returned from the bathroom to bedroom. It was the smell of sex. He smiled.