32
Veynerdi switched on various machines. Their glittering lights and computer screens revealed the true dimensions of the laboratory: a large room, cluttered with analytical equipment, whose walls were divided between bay windows and cork lining. The bench and stainless-steel table reflected each light source, stretching them into green, yellow, pink and red filaments.
The biologist pointed to a door on the left. "Get undressed in the changing room, please."
Anna disappeared. Vetnerdi put on some latex gloves, laid sterile sachets on the tiles of the counter, then stood behind a long line of test tubes. He looked like a musician preparing to play a glass xylophone.
When Anna returned, she was wearing just a pair of black panties. Her body was thin and scrawny. Every time she moved, her bones seemed to be about to tear through her skin.
"Lie down, please."
Anna climbed up onto the table. Whenever she made an effort, she seemed more robust. Her dry muscles swelled her flesh, giving a strange impression of strength and power. This woman was concealing a mystery, a latent energy. Mathilde thought of the shell of an egg, transparently revealing the form of a tyrannosaurus.
Veynerdi removed a needle and a syringe from their sterile packs. "We'll start with a blood test."
He stuck the needle into Anna's left arm, without causing the slightest reaction. He frowned, and asked Mathilde, "Have you given her a sedative?"
"Yes, an intramuscular dose of Tranxene. She was highly agitated this evening, so…"
"How much?"
"Fifty milligrams."
The biologist grimaced. This injection was going to interfere with his tests. He removed the needle, placed a dressing in the crook of Anna's arm, then slipped behind the bench.
Mathilde followed his every move. He mixed the blood he had collected with a hypotonic solution, in order to destroy the red corpuscles and leave only the white ones. He placed the sample in the black cylinder of a centrifuge, which looked like a little oven. Turning at a thousand rotations per second, the machine separated the white corpuscles from the final residue. A few moments later, Veynerdi extracted a translucent deposit from it.
"Your immune cells," he commented for Anna's benefit. "These are the ones that contain the information we're interested in. We'll now take a closer look…"
He diluted the concentrate with some saline solution, then poured it into a flow cytometer -a gray block in which each corpuscle was isolated and subjected to a laser beam. Mathilde knew the procedure: the machine was going to locate the defensive molecules and identify them, thanks to a catalogue of markers that Veynerdi had compiled.
"Nothing very important." he said after a few minutes. "All I've found is contact with quite ordinary illnesses and pathogenic agents. Bacteria, viruses… though fewer than average. You led an extremely healthy existence. madam. Nor have I found traces of any exogenic agents. No perfume. No particular impregnations. A real blank slate."
Anna sat motionless on the table, her arms crossed over her knees. Her diaphanous skin reflected the colors of the security lights: like a piece of glass. it was so white it was nearly blue.
Veynerdi approached. holding a far longer needle. "We're now going to perform a biopsy"
Anna stiffened.
"Don't worry" he murmured. "It's painless. I'm simply going to remove a little lymph from a ganglion in the armpit. Lift your arm, please."
Anna raised her elbow above the table.
He introduced the needle while mumbling in his smoker's voice, "These ganglions are in contact with the pulmonary region. If you have breathed in any particular particles, a gas, pollen, or anything significant, these white globules will remember."
Still drowsy from the tranquilizer, Anna did not jump in the slightest. The biologist went back behind his counter and proceeded to carry out some more procedures.
Several minutes passed, then he said, "I've found nicotine and tar. You used to smoke in your past life."
Mathilde butted in. "She still does."
The biologist nodded in reply but added, "As for the rest, there is no significant trace of any particular atmosphere or surroundings." He picked up a small flask and went over to Anna once more. "Your globules have not retained the sort of memories I was hoping for, madam. So we shall now try a different sort of analysis. Some parts of the body do not conserve the print of external agents, but their actual traces. We are now going to explore these microstocks."
He brandished a jar. "I'm going to ask you to urinate in this flask." Anna got slowly up and returned to the changing room. A real zombie.
Mathilde observed, "I don't see what you'll find in her urine. We're looking for traces going back over a year and-"
The expert cut her short with a smile. "Urine is produced by the kidneys, which act as filters. And crystals build up inside them. I can detect traces of these concretions. Some date from several years ago and can tell us much about the subject's diet, for example."
Anna returned to the room, holding the bottle. She seemed increasingly absent and alienated from the work being performed on her.
Veynerdi used the centrifuge once again to separate the elements, then turned to a new machine: a mass spectrometer. He deposited the golden liquid inside, then started the process of analysis.
Greenish waves came up on the computer screen. The scientist clicked his tongue in exasperation. "Nothing. This young lady is decidedly difficult to read…"
He changed tack, concentrating even harder, taking more samples, running more tests, plunging within Anna's body.
Mathilde followed each motion and listened to his commentaries. First, he removed some dentine, living tissue inside teeth in which certain products, such as antibiotics, can build up in the blood. Then he looked at the melatonin produced by the brain. According to him. the level of this hormone, which is mostly produced at night, could reveal Anna's old routine of sleeping and waking.
Then he carefully removed a few drops of fluid from her eyes, which could contain minuscule residues of certain foods. Finally, he cut off some hair, which retained the memory of exogenic substances and then secreted them in turn. The phenomenon was well known. The body of a person poisoned with arsenic will continue to exude the substance after death, through the hair roots.
After three hours of tests, the scientist had almost admitted defeat. He had found nothing. or nearly. The portrait he could offer of the previous Anna was insignificant. A woman who smoked, otherwise leading a very healthy life: who probably suffered from insomnia, to judge from the irregular levels of melatonin; who had eaten olive oil since her childhood-he had found greasy traces of it in her eyes. The final point was that she dyed her hair black. In reality she had lighter hair, which was almost red.
Alain Veynerdi took off his gloves and washed his hands in the sink cut into the bench. Tiny beads of sweat were glistening on his forehead. He looked exhausted and disappointed. One last time. he went over to Anna. who had gone back to sleep. He walked around her, apparently still searching, seeking for a sign, a hint that would allow him to decipher that diaphanous body.
Suddenly he bent down over her hands. He took hold of her fingers and looked at them attentively. He then woke her up. As soon as she opened her eyes, he asked her with barely contained excitement: "I can see a brown stain on your fingernail. Do you know where it came from?"
Anna stared at her surroundings in confusion. Then she looked at her hand and raised her eyebrows. "I don't know," she mumbled. "It's a nicotine stain, isn't it?"
Mathilde joined them. She, too, could now see a tiny ochre mark on the tip of the nail.