Donovan met them at an unmarked door in the back of a hotel and showed them through three layers of security before leaving them with Lestrade. He stood alone in a carpeted hallway impatiently waiting for them.
"At last!", he said as John and Sherlock arrived. The guards closed the doors behind them.
"What is it?" Sherlock asked.
"The general that I was telling you about. This is where we were keeping him." Lestrade began.
"Were?" John asked, "Is he missing?"
"Worse than that." Lestrade opened the door to the suite to reveal a room with a green carpet and gold chairs, and on the carpet, a body, "He's dead."
John walked over to the body and put a hand to his neck.
"How long?" Sherlock asked.
"Less than an hour." Lestrade replied. "We've been keeping it quiet in the hopes that we can discover the culprits before they flee the area. We are certain that the kind of person employed to do this job will not leave until they are certain that they have succeeded."
John looked up, "Well they have succeeded. Oxygen deficiency. This man asphyxiated. Probably poison."
"That's what's got us so worried." Lestrade motioned to a man huddled in the corner of the room. "This was the general's personal aide," he said. "He ate and drank everything that the general did, and yet he is fine. He called us as soon as the general was starting to feel sick, but it was too late."
Sherlock walked over to the thin black man. He sat in a chair his face a mask of sadness. "What was the last thing that he touched?" Sherlock asked.
The man pulled himself to his feet with some effort. Walking over to the table he pointed to two glasses .
John on the floor was still examining the body. "Sherlock," he said, "his breath, there's a smell...what is it? Almonds perhaps."
Sherlock was putting on his black gloves. He picked up first one glass and then the other and smelled them. "Yes, the smell of bitter almonds, cyanide. In one glass but not the other. "
"If it has a smell, wouldn't he have noticed it?" Lestrade asked.
"Not everyone can smell cyanide. It is a genetic trait. Fortunately it is one that both John and I share." Sherlock turned and asked the aide, "where did these glasses come from?"
"That shelf there," the man said, "But I washed them out myself by hand with soap. If there was anything on the glass, I would have cleaned it. Also, if only one glass was poisoned, how would they know which glass I would give to the general?"
Sherlock walked to the bar. He turned on the water and smelled it catching a drop on the end of his glove, he tasted it.
"Sherlock have a care." John said, "We are talking about poison."
Sherlock opened the cabinet and picked up each glass on the shelf smelling it. Then he turned back to the aid who stood looking down at the body of the general. He was visibly rattled. John stood up and with a hand on his arm led him to a chair.
Sherlock said, "explain to me exactly what you did before the General died."
The man looked up at Sherlock and then glanced at the body before saying, "The international court accepted his evidence today and decided to take sanctions against the government. We were hoping for more, but this is very good news. He says to me, "Let's have a Vodka to celebrate?" The man paused, his face a picture of pain.
"Go on" Sherlock said.
"I walked over and took two glasses from the shelf. I rinsed them in the sink, and then wiped them with the same towel. I poured in the vodka, and then served it."
Sherlock rushed over and picked up the towel sniffing it. "Nothing," He said dropping it back on the counter before examining the bottle of vodka. He smelled it, then he poured a tiny bit of vodka onto a saucer. He dug under the sink taking out a small bottle of ammonia. He poured the ammonia into the vodka but there was no reaction.
"What are you doing?" John asked.
"Testing for cyanide in the vodka." Sherlock said as he carefully poured vodka from the general's glass into another plate to which he added ammonia. It bubbled and turned black. Sherlock smiled. "Hydrogen cyanide polymerizes spontaneously at room temperature in the presence of ammonia. Hydrogen cyanide is one of the fastest working poisons."
"But how did it get here?" Lestrade asked. "This room has the highest security imaginable. The food was shipped in weeks ago to await the general's arrival. Every carton was checked. No one knew which safe house he would be in. And Frederick here ate and drank exactly the same things as the general. "
Sherlock knelt down beside Fredrick so that he looked into his eyes.
"Tell me exactly what was said." Sherlock insisted.
The man closed his eyes visibly shaken and then he looked down and began to talk. "I said, 'Sanctions won't help M'bane escape to the West.' He said, 'even so, it is a good thing. It is also good that you are here with me'. " The man paused, " He said, 'You have been my rock and I couldn't do it without you I love you more than any brother.' and I said, 'I love you too.' then he said, 'Let's have a vodka to celebrate.' I washed the glasses. 'Make mine on the rocks' he said 'and do you know when dinner will arrive because...' "
"Stop!" Sherlock said an expression of discovery on his face. He ran over to the sink and opened the ice bucket sniffing it.
"The ice!" John said.
"Yes." Sherlock said, "the ice."
"But why didn't the ice in your glass kill you?" Lestrade asked Fredrick.
"I don't take any," he replied.
"Where does this ice come from?" Sherlock asked looking around the room.
"Someone just brought it when we asked." Fredrick said to Sherlock's retreating back.
"Lestrade!" Sherlock called, "Show me."
"This way." Lestrade said leading them out of the room and down a hallway into another corridor that led to a small kitchen.
"The general's food is prepared here." He said.
Sherlock opened the refrigerator looking at the ice. He put a cube on the table and tested it. "It's in this ice as well."
"Then one of the cooks or possibly someone who moved the food in must have poisoned it." Lestrade said. "But everyone's background was double checked, triple checked. It's impossible that one of them did it."
"Once you have eliminated the impossible, whatever is left, however improbable must be the truth." Sherlock said as he closed the door, "John help me with this will you please."
Sherlock and John pulled the refrigerator away from the wall and Sherlock touched the tube leading from the ice maker. He traced it across the wall to a faucet that it passed over to exit the room through a small hole in wall. Sherlock pulled on the tube. He dug with his finger around the crack looking through the hole at another room.
"What's on the other side of this room?" Sherlock asked.
"Uh, I don't know." Lestrade replied. "a restaurant I think."
"That's where the cyanide came from, that must be where the assassins are. Come on John, If we're fast enough, we might catch them."
Lestrade rolled his eyes and sighed as they ran past him. "At least wait for back up will ya?" He said, but they had already gone.