Zuo Chong, Gui Youguang, and Ling Sanping quickly walked to a row of flat houses located in the corner of the hospital. They were called flat houses, but they were actually on the back of a low mountain, five or six meters high from the lowest point of the courtyard.
The house faces south, with a fence behind the north wall. You can see the roofs of several houses in the distance. This is the pharmacy of Renxin Hospital, where all the hospital's medicines are stored.
The purpose of locating the pharmacy here is to avoid humid air and direct sunlight as much as possible, because not only penicillin is afraid of the sun, but many medicines require a cool environment for storage.
At this time, security inside and outside the pharmacy was tight. A group of small spies stood with guns and surrounded five or six pharmacy staff and guards in the middle of an open space, temporarily restricting the movement of these people.
"Chunyang, inform the Second Division. Counter-espionage is an ancient job. Let him check their financial situation and interpersonal relationships. If there is really an insider here, it is probably for money."
Zuo Zhong glanced at the crowd, then walked to the door of the pharmacy without saying a word, took the flashlight handed by his subordinates, and shone a light into the dark room with his backhand.
Under the light, several medicine cabinets were placed across the room, and were also placed in a circle on the four walls of the southeast, northwest, and north. A simple and elegant wooden cabinet on the north wall caught Zuo Zhong's attention.
The cabinet is about two feet high and one foot long and wide. It is shaped like a safe. The outside is painted dark brown. There are several copper hoops on the surface. There are dozens of dense pores on the top and four thick tiger legs on the bottom.
Looking more closely, there are three drawers on the cabinet, each with a pair of semicircular brass handles. The middle drawer is also equipped with a hidden lock. There is also a copper basin at the bottom of the cabinet, with water drops dripping from time to time.
Zuo Zhong put on his shoe covers, carefully avoided a few clearly visible footprints on the ground, walked against the wall to the cabinet, raised his hand and touched it, and immediately felt a hint of cool air.
This is a freezer from the Republic of China era. In April, the temperature in the mountain city is already over 20 degrees. If you want to store penicillin dry powder for a long time, this is an indispensable piece of equipment.
Contrary to what many people imagine, freezers appeared in China very early. During the Shang Dynasty, the ancients already knew how to use ice to preserve food. During the Warring States Period, the nobles even used ice containers for drinking.
It is very simple to use ice cubes for refrigeration, but because ice cubes are difficult to preserve in hot weather, an insulated ice cellar must be built for storage, which only the nobles and businessmen can afford.
In the Republic of China, when the previous dynasty fell, the ice cellar lost its largest customer and turned to the private sector. Natural ice began to be supplied to restaurants, hospitals, snack shops, and ordinary people's homes, and was no longer monopolized by the government.
During the hot summer months of May, June, and July in the lunar calendar every year in Shancheng, ice delivery workers will deliver natural ice cubes preserved in winter to users on a load before 8 a.m. every day.
After the user receives the ice cubes, he places them in the upper and lower drawers of the freezer, and the items that need to be refrigerated are placed in the middle. As the ice cubes melt, the temperature inside the refrigerator decreases.
On the one hand, it can cool the items inside, and on the other hand, the cold air is also emitted from the air holes on the upper box cover, which can also reduce the room temperature. It is regarded as a rustic air conditioner.
A double lining of tin and lead sheets and an inch-thick wooden box wall provided an insulating layer, and with sawdust in between, a block of ice could slowly melt over a day.
The next morning, unplug the bottom and top corks, drain out the melted ice water, and then add new ice to continue using it. This will completely ensure that the properties of the medicine are not affected.
Zuo Zhong took out Ling Sanping's key and put it into the keyhole of the middle drawer and turned it gently. After a click, the secret lock was opened, and the two iron cans Zuo Jun brought were placed firmly inside in the mist.
After taking out the tin can and looking at it for a while, he turned around and called Gui Youguang in, asking him how he knew the medicine was missing. The missing 500g of powder could not be seen from the outside.
"Deputy Director, look."
Regarding this question, Gui Youguang took a register book and a steel scale from the table in the room, pointed to a long list of records about Class A drugs in the book, and answered.
"The No. 1 drug is penicillin. Every time it is tried, the outgoing weight and remaining weight will be recorded. This is what I requested, in order to prevent someone from stealing the drug.
I had just finished arranging the security work in my humble position, and suddenly thought of a problem. The insider could leak the information about penicillin, and he could also attack the drug itself, so he immediately came over to check.
Dr. Ling's last test was three days ago, and the medicine jars and freezers were not touched since then. After comparing the weights, we found that the medicines were missing, and the time of the crime can be determined to be within three days.
Then I asked people to control the suspicious person to prevent anyone from escaping and report to you immediately. Deputy, this is my fault. If I could weigh myself every day, this would not happen. "
Zuo Zhong waved his hand to interrupt the other party's review, and carefully checked the register. The records showed that after the last test, the two cans of medicine, including the can, weighed 4,800 grams in total.
He picked up the steel scale and weighed the medicine. Sure enough, there were only 8 kilograms and 6 taels left, which was a full kilogram short of penicillin, and the two jars were half a kilogram short each.
This shows that the person who stole the medicine was very cautious and worried that taking medicine from one jar would be too conspicuous, so he took a portion of the powder from two jars to reduce the probability of being discovered.
So the question is, how do drug thieves avoid other people?
Ling Sanping said before that the pharmacy is manned 24 hours a day and supervised by security guards. If someone opens the freezer to take medicine for a long time, it is impossible not to be discovered.
After thinking about it, Zuo Zhong turned his attention to the freezer. If the medicine was not stolen by someone inside the pharmacy, could the thief come from outside?
If you want to take an item from a confined space and you can't get through the main entrance, you have to drill a hole. It happens that the pharmacy is so close to the wall, so this is indeed a possibility.
"There is light, move it away from me."
Zuo Zhong kicked the freezer next to his feet and stood to the side. Such a thick piece of wood plus lead and tin plates weighed hundreds of kilograms. Naturally, the dignified deputy director of the military command did not have to do such rough work.
Besides, when Gui Youguang heard the order, he spat into the palm of his hand, bent down and hugged the bottom of the freezer and lifted it hard. The muscles on his arms bulged, and he moved the heavy freezer to the side.
A flashlight pole swept across the north wall behind the freezer. The solid blue brick wall was intact and there seemed to be no problem, at least there was no hole visible at a glance.
Zuo Zhong squatted down and turned to look at the wall, then turned to look at the back panel of the freezer, and found that the back panel was unusually flat and covered with a layer of dust.
The freezer was left behind by the French. Due to its weight, it was rarely moved. It has been placed here for so many years, so it is normal for there to be dust.
But he turned his head sideways, and through the light of the flashlight, he was keenly aware that the dust in a circular area with a diameter of more than ten centimeters in the middle of the backboard seemed lighter.
Zuo Zhong frowned, sniffed, and immediately smelled a faint smell of paint. The next second he raised his fist and smashed it hard, punching a big hole in the back panel.
Gui Youguang's eyes nearly popped out when he saw this scene. When did the deputy director become a martial arts master? He immediately fell into deep self-doubt.
He couldn't cut through the one-inch-thick hardwood board with lead and tin plates, not to mention his fists, even with an axe. He couldn't do it anyway.
"Why are you still standing there? Go call someone."
At this time, Zuo Zhong stood up slowly, stared at the green brick wall and said coldly: "Send people to block the surrounding traffic, control the nearby residents, and arrest all men, women, and children.
Be careful when searching, especially in the house adjacent to the pharmacy. You must first check whether there are traps or booby traps behind the door. The person who stole the medicine is likely to be a professional spy. "
He originally thought that the person who stole the medicine was doing it for financial gain, but now it seems that he was wrong. To be able to repair the wall and the freezer so perfectly, the person who did it must not be an ordinary person.
What's more, there is no need for the thief to go to great lengths to restore the scene to this state. This is only required for intelligence operations. The purpose is to delay as much as possible the time for the military commander to discover that the medicine was stolen.
As for why intelligence agents want to steal drugs, the answer is easy to guess. Either someone wants to verify the efficacy of penicillin, or they want to analyze the ingredients and copy it.
Gui Youguang figured it out instantly, nodded and ran out to greet the little spy. Soon a group of people rushed out of Renxin Hospital and detained all the surrounding residents and passers-by.
Half an hour later, Wu Chunyang and Gui Youguang arrived in the dark after receiving the news. As soon as they met, Gu Qi reported the investigation results against the pharmacy staff and guards to Zuo Zhong.
According to the salary list of the General Affairs Department and through questioning of people around them, it can be determined that these people's economic and interpersonal relationships are normal, and nothing suspicious has been found for the time being.
There is always a reason for a person to choose to betray, whether it is money, sex, power, or belief. If no reason can be found, it means there is no evidence.
Now that it was known that the theft of the medicine was an external crime and there was no conclusive evidence, it would be inappropriate to lock up the people in the pharmacy, so Zuo Zhong waved his hand and ordered them to be released.
However, they still couldn't go far and were ready to be interrogated at any time. The thief accurately punched a hole in the back of the middle drawer through a wall. This was by no means a coincidence.
Looking at the agents who were amnesty, Zuo Zhong pondered for a moment and introduced the general situation and current findings, with a very angry tone.
Ling Sanping on the side sighed. He didn't know what to explain now. In any case, it was a fact that the thief stole the medicine under his nose.
But how did the other party do it? There was always someone in the pharmacy. Could it be that no one heard the sound of the other party tearing down the wall or destroying the freezer? Or are the hospital staff a bunch of deaf people?
After hearing this, Wu Chunyang and Gu Qi looked at each other, their eyes filled with anger. This thief not only stole the medicine, but also slapped their military commander in the face!
Even one's own medical base can have such a low-level security loophole. What will people outside think if they find out? Xu Enzeng and his like would probably laugh out of their dreams.
Everyone was silent for a long time. Zuo Zhong took the lead to leave the hospital. He wanted to see who was drilling the hole. The others followed closely, and the group walked towards the house.
