Altered Life

by Keith Dixon

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  I WALKED LAURA back to the office and said I’d be in touch. I’d seen a plaque in the foyer which told me that the company Brands leased their offices from was based in Warrington. I wanted to know how security at the offices worked, so I climbed in my Cavalier and headed north up the M6, crossing the Thelwell Viaduct with hundreds of other pilgrims and peeling left immediately to exit the motorway and weave through Warrington’s suburban hinterland. Two miles of low concrete warehouses, petrol stations, bleak housing estates and roadside hoardings crawled past my windows. The grey detritus of an industrial neutron-bomb—the people were gone, but the buildings, such as they were, remained.

  I parked in a shopping centre that seemed only half-finished and walked to the grey sixties office where the leasing agents were housed. It looked like a slightly worked-up gigantic breeze block, with windows. Pale sunlight struck the side of the building but like me seemed reluctant to enter.

  At the reception desk I asked to speak to someone about security in the buildings that they leased. The woman behind the desk put down her crossword magazine and gave me an odd look. She dialled an extension, spoke briefly, and told me to wait. I sat in a soft plastic chair that exuded the musty smell of furniture that’s been stored in a damp warehouse. Glossy magazines on a low table advertised the range of high-tech offices leased by the company throughout the North West. An air of tragic banality lay over the whole enterprise. I supposed someone had to lease buildings, but it seemed like a seedy business in these surroundings.

  Five minutes later a man with a distended stomach opened a glass-paned door into the reception area and lifted one of his chins towards me. I followed him down a corridor painted institutional beige, then into his office. A single fluorescent strip overhead sent out a flat light that barely crept over his desk, a bookcase, his computer and two wooden chairs.

  In this small room I began to smell the rank odour of the man’s sweat gathering in the folds of his nylon shirt. It reminded me of the fat boy at school that we all bullied.

  ‘Micky Turbot,’ he said, holding out a stubby arm. I shook his hand briefly—it had the firmness and consistency of a bunch of Lincolnshire sausages. The effort of walking down the corridor seemed to have exhausted him. He fell into the chair behind his desk and sipped from a plastic beaker of orange juice. I waited for him to regain his breath.

  I told him my name and said that I was working for Brands on some investigative work.

  ‘Who are Brands?’ he said.

  ‘Tenants of yours in Waverley. They pay you a lot of money every month.’

  He took the insult. ‘We lease over three thousand properties in the North West. Don’t get shirty because I don’t recognise one name.’

  ‘They’ve been in the news lately.’

  ‘Oh them. Poor buggers. Man and wife, wasn’t it?’

  ‘I’d like to ask you some questions about security in the offices they lease from you.’

  He had a round face in which the eyes were small and never looked directly at you. Now they darted away as if hunting down a swarm of invisible wraiths in all four corners of the room. ‘What kind of questions? Why should I tell you anything?’ he said.

  ‘There’s a swipe card system. You swipe to get in and out.’

  ‘That’s not a problem, is it?’

  ‘Can the cards be duplicated?’

  ‘No way. Each card has a reference for the building, for the lift and for the main office door. They’re good as gold, matey.’

  ‘Who makes them for you?’

  ‘Do them ourselves. We get the cards printed up with the magnetic strip laid on. Then we just magnetize them as and when.’

  ‘So you have batches of blank cards lying around somewhere, just waiting to be magnetized.’

  ‘Each one’s individual, of course. Different strokes for different folks. Ha!’

  He was beginning to feel more cocky now, confident in his expertise. He took another sip of his orange juice. ‘If you use ‘em properly there’s nothing safer,’ he said. ‘Worked for a company once used keypads—you know, type in your security number. What a bloody disaster. They gum up, stick, get dirty. Too many moving parts. Course, next on the agenda is eyeball recognition. Look into this mirror, quick scan, buzz, you’re in. Dutch are the ones ahead of the game. All the best talent over there. Mate a mine’s earning a fortune, sitting on his arse in Zuider Zee, coding for Microsoft. I tell you, matey, we’re always behind the curve over here. Never catch up.’

  He sat back in his chair, breathing heavily. His navy suit was shiny at the elbows and his shirt showed dark patches in ridges across his belly.

  ‘So if I’m Brands,’ I said, ‘and I take on a new recruit, what do I do to get a swipe card?’

  ‘Easy. You phone up, identify yourself and we send one out in the post.’

  ‘So I could be anyone ringing up?’

  ‘Don’t be silly. We have your name registered and you have to give us a code number. We weren’t born yesterday.’

  ‘So who does the ordering for Brands?’

  ‘That’s confidential, matey. I don’t know you from Adam. You walk in here cool as you like and start asking questions. How do I know what’s going on?’

  ‘That’s just the point,’ I said. ‘You don’t seem to get it. One person’s been murdered and another one kidnapped, and the one who was killed was sitting in a room that was supposed to be secure because of your cards. If I were you I’d be wanting to find out what’s going on, not playing the Jobsworth with me.’

  ‘Now hold on—’

  ‘Are you going to give me that name or do I have to go and talk to the Senior Investigating Officer? He’s always on the lookout for people to help him with his enquiries.’

  He stared at me, then turned to his computer and gripped his mouse. A few clicks later he turned back to me. ‘It’s someone called Gerald Finch,’ he said coldly. He must have seen the expression on my face. ‘Don’t get excited, though. I don’t suppose they’re recruiting any more. They haven’t had a new card in the last six months.’