Mary O’Connor watched impatiently as Craig Samuelson helped himself to coffee and lavishly spread cream cheese on a bagel from the breakfast assortment on the sidebar. Does he think we’re all here just to watch him stuff his face?

Finally, he took his seat and Fuller brought the meeting to order. “Let’s summarize where we stand after talking to Pam Weller yesterday. Are we agreed at this point that we’re dealing with a case of fraud?”

Both Harrison and Samuelson nodded. “I’m afraid so,” Harrison said.

“Okay,” Fuller said. “Then the question before us is to make a preliminary identification of the guilty party. Is it Weller, the postdoc, or both of them acting together?”

“Nobody, in particular the postdoc, could have gotten the code to the double-blind experiment from Weller unless they broke into her home. Weller had to be involved in this,” Samuelson said.

“I know, it’s hard to imagine how the postdoc could have done this alone,” Harrison agreed. “But why would Weller even have set up the double-blind experiment if she wanted to fake the results? Without that, we’d all just be blaming the postdoc. It’s like Weller intentionally tried to incriminate herself. And that doesn’t make sense either.”

“So are you saying we should believe her story?” Samuelson looked incredulous and turned to O’Connor. “Mary, you know her. What do you think?”

“It’s not really my place to comment. Remember I’m just here as an ad hoc member to observe the proceedings.”

Samuelson let out a disgruntled snort. “Oh, alright. But I don’t see how the postdoc could have done it without Weller.”

“No, but I thought Weller seemed credible yesterday. I just don’t think we’ve gotten to the bottom of this,” Harrison said.

Fuller looked at his watch. “Well, you both have reasonable points, although personally I think it had to be both of them acting together. Anyway, the postdoc, Holly Singer, is presumably waiting outside. Shall we bring her in and see where talking with her takes us? Let’s question her rigorously about the double-blind experiment and see if we can pull something out of her.”

O’Connor gave Fuller a silent nod of approval. He was moving this in the right direction.

• • •

Holly felt almost relieved when the heavy door opened and Mary O’Connor called her into the meeting room. Her anxiety had been growing by the minute while she was waiting in the hall. She’d carefully rehearsed everything with Prescott last night, but was still worried about whether her story would be believed and how she would respond to unanticipated questions. Prescott had assured her that everything would be fine. But it would be good to get this behind her.

O’Connor introduced the four others sitting around the big table. All of them looked grim, like the pictures of scowling old men hanging on the wall. Just staring at her as if she was some kind of lab specimen. She sat up straight in her chair. I’m ready for them.

Laura Harrison began the questioning. “Holly, I know how difficult this must be for you. As you know, the results your lab reported with aneurinide have not been reproducible and we need to investigate the possibility that someone faked the data. Let me assure you that all we’re after is the truth. We’re not trying to pin anything on you, but we do need to get to the bottom of this. I hope you can work with us toward that goal. Let me ask first whether there’s anything you want to tell us?”

Holly was prepared for this. “All I can say is that the whole thing is awful. I thought I made a major discovery and now it turns out that it was all a fake. I just feel totally betrayed.”

“It is awful. And that’s why we need to figure out what happened. And if you didn’t do it, we want to clear your name,” Harrison said.

“Of course I didn’t do it! My God, you don’t suspect me, do you?”

“I’m afraid that’s the obvious possibility,” Fuller interjected. “After all, they were your experiments. Who else could have done it?”

Holly remained cool. This was expected. “The only thing that could have happened is that Pam did it. She could have come in any time the lab was empty to switch aneurinide-treated cells for healthy ones.”

Harrison looked at her with raised eyebrows. “That’s quite an accusation. Why would she do such a thing?”

“I think all she cared about was what she’d get out of these experiments for herself. From the beginning, she went right to the Director with the results. And she started talking about getting tenure, lots of job offers, a Nobel Prize, all sorts of stuff like that.”

Holly felt a sense of satisfaction as she watched the committee members exchange glances.

“I see,” Samuelson said. “But as you know, one of the things highlighted in the paper was the double-blind experiment. If I remember correctly, you gave Weller coded samples and she then recoded them before giving them to George Montague to test. How could she have faked those results when she didn’t know which of the samples you gave her was aneurinide?”

Holly took a deep breath. This was it. Her chance to pin the blame on Pam. She’d rehearsed her answer to this question over and over again, ever since Prescott had come up with the scenario months ago in New Hampshire. And now the time had come.

She looked down at the table. “I guess that’s my fault,” she said softly. “When I gave Pam the samples, she started joking around and said something like ‘which one of these is the magic bullet?’ I didn’t even think about it, but I pointed to the tube with aneurinide. After all, she was my boss, so if she asked a question I answered. She just laughed and said something like ‘great stuff.’ It seemed natural enough and I didn’t pay any attention. But now that I realize what’s happened, I can see that I messed up by telling her.”

There were looks of astonishment around the table. “So you’re telling us that the double-blind experiment was compromised! Pam Weller actually knew which sample was aneurinide?” Harrison exclaimed.

“Yes, I’m afraid that’s what happened,” Holly said.

Samuelson leaned forward and raised his voice. “But why didn’t you say anything earlier? Surely you knew the way it was described in the paper was misleading.”

Holly did her best to look contrite. “I didn’t think anything of it at the time. It seemed like Pam was just kidding around and it wasn’t important. After all, nobody except Pam and I knew which tube was aneurinide, and I never imagined that Pam could be cheating. So it didn’t seem to matter. But now that all this has happened, I guess it did.”

Fuller glared at her, his eyes hard. “Do you understand how important this is? Are you sure that’s how it happened?”

“Yes, that’s what happened. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to do anything wrong. I never dreamed anything could go wrong with the experiments.”

“Of course not,” Harrison said. “Nobody thinks that until it happens. But that certainly explains how the double-blind experiment broke down.”

Harrison looked like she was about to say more, but Samuelson interrupted. “Wait a minute, do you seriously expect us to believe that Weller snuck into the lab and manipulated the cultures in every experiment you and the others did? I find that hard to believe.”

Holly was taken aback by his hostility, but she stuck to her story. “Well, that’s what she must have done. There were always plenty of normal cell cultures around, it wouldn’t have been any big deal for her.”

Samuelson frowned and shook his head in disbelief. “And how often would she have to sneak in and make these swaps?”

“Every time we were running an experiment, I guess. But she lives close by and she always works late. It would have been easy for her to come in when nobody else was in the lab.”

Samuelson started to say something more, but Laura Harrison interrupted before he could get the words out. “So Weller would have to have come in and switched cultures during every experiment you did, right? I assume the experiments are dated when they’re recorded in your lab notebook?”

“Of course,” Holly said.

“And how often did you do experiments since you first identified aneurinide?”

“At least twice a week. Pam was really pushing us to get the paper out.”

Now Samuelson leaned forward and glared at her. “So she couldn’t have taken any trips of more than a few days while your experiments were going on, is that right?”

Holly suppressed a smile of satisfaction. Time to set the second hook. “No, she didn’t do any traveling. She was in the lab almost every day asking about the project until we got the paper out. She has taken a bunch of trips since it was published, but now that you mention it, there’ve been several experiments that haven’t worked recently.”

“That’s all well and good,” Samuelson said. “But I don’t find it credible that Weller did all this on her own. It just doesn’t make sense.”

Holly looked around the table at Mary O’Connor and the other members of the committee. Just blank faces. “All I can say is that’s what happened.”

Samuelson made a disgusted grunt and Fuller frowned at her.

“Well, the correlation of experiments with Weller’s travel schedule is at least something we can try to verify,” Fuller said. He turned to Caroline Rifkin. “Caroline, can you do some homework on this?”

“I have the lab notebooks,” Rifkin said. “But I don’t have Weller’s travel schedule.”

“I can get her travel schedule from accounting,” O’Connor said. “They’ll have records of all her travel reimbursements.”

“Excellent,” Fuller said. “Let’s adjourn for today and reconvene once the two of you have that analysis in hand. Will tomorrow afternoon give you enough time?”

Rifkin and O’Connor both nodded.

“Okay,” Fuller said. “We’ll meet here again at three tomorrow.” He turned to Holly and looked down his nose as he spoke sternly. “In the meantime, I hope you’ll think more about your story. Lying to us will only make things worse for you.”

• • •

Holly’s head was pounding when she left the room. They hadn’t bought it yet, but the follow up on Pam’s travels would help. If she stuck to her story it should be okay. And now was the time to collect that job offer.

As soon as she got back to her desk she texted Prescott.

It went okay, although they’re still skeptical. Checking Pam’s travel schedule and then at me again tomorrow. Can you come over tonight? Time to trade the drug for your job offer.

He replied immediately.

Sure. I have a dinner meeting but will be over right after, around 9. And yes, time to trade.

Holly sat back and read the text a second time. So he’s prepared to hold up his end of the bargain. Tonight’ll be big.