The Tightrope Men / The Enemy

by Desmond Bagley

  I looked, being careful to step behind him. At first I didn’t see it. ‘No tricks. What am I supposed to see?’

  ‘The cabinets. Two are broken.’ He whirled on me. ‘I’m getting out of here.’

  Blindly he tried to push past me, ignoring the gun. He was in a frenzy of terror, his face working convulsively. I stiff-armed him but his panic gave him added strength and he got past me and headed for the door. I went after him, reversed the pistol and clubbed him over the head. He went down like a falling tree.

  I dragged him away from the door and went back to see the damage. Two of the panes in the incubating cabinets were broken and fragments of the petri dishes were scattered on the floor as were slimy particles of the cultures they had contained.

  I whirled round as the door of the laboratory burst open. There stood Archie Ferguson. ‘You’re right, Mr laggard,’ he said. ‘It’s another damned Gruinard.’

  ‘Get out!’ I yelled. ‘For your life, get out!’ He looked at me with startled eyes, and I pointed to the glass wall at the end of the room. ‘Go next door - I’ll talk to you there. Move, man!’

  The door slammed shut.

  THIRTY-SEVEN

  When I picked up the microphone my hand was shaking almost uncontrollably. I pushed the transmit button and heard a click. ‘Can you hear me, Archie?’ Ferguson, on the other side of the glass, nodded and spoke but I heard nothing. ‘There’s a microphone in front of you.’

  He looked about him, then picked it up. ‘What happened here, Malcolm?’

  ‘This place is bloody dangerous. Tell your men not to enter any of the laboratories - especially this one and the one across the corridor. Do that now.’

  ‘I’ll have guards on the doors.’ He dropped the microphone and left on the run.

  I went across to Cregar who was breathing stertorously. His head was twisted in an awkward position so I straightened him out and he breathed easier but showed no signs of coming awake.

  ‘Mr Jaggard - are you there?’

  I went back to the window to find Archie and Robbie Ferguson and a third man, one of the biggest I’ve seen, who was introduced as Wattle Stevenson. Archie said, ‘It would seem you have problems. Is the lassie across the corridor the one you looked for?’

  ‘Yes. You haven’t been in there, have you?’

  ‘No. I saw her by this arrangement we have here.’

  ‘Good. Keep out of there. What size of an army did you bring? I heard of twenty boats.’

  ‘Who told you that? There’s only the six.’

  ‘Have any trouble?’

  ‘Not much. A man has a broken jaw.’

  I said, ‘How many people are there in this place?’

  ‘Not as many as I would have thought. Maybe a dozen.’

  Ogilvie had been right. It didn’t take much to run a microbiological laboratory; perhaps half a dozen technical staff and the same number of domestics and bottlewashers. ‘Put the lot under arrest. You have my authority for it.’

  Archie looked at me speculatively. ‘And what authority would that be?’ I took out my departmental card and held it against the glass. He said, ‘It doesn’t mean much to me, but it looks official.’

  ‘It takes you off the hook for invading government property. You did it on my instructions and you’re covered. Oh, if you find a character called Max I don’t care how roughly he’s handled.’

  Robbie Ferguson laughed. ‘He’s the one with the broken jaw. Wattie, here, hit him.’

  ‘Och, it wasna’ more than a wee tap,’ said Wattie. ‘The man has a glass jaw.’

  ‘Wattie won the hammer throwing at the last Highland Games,’ said Archie, with a grim smile. ‘Besides, it was the man, Max, who sent Wattie away with a flea in his ear when he offered to help. What’s to do now?’

  ‘Did you ring Ogilvie as I asked?’

  ‘Aye. He said he already knew about it.’

  I nodded. He would have talked with Cregar. ‘I want you to ring him again and the call put through to this telephone in here. You’ll find a switchboard somewhere.’

  ‘You can’t come out?’

  ‘No. You have my permission to listen in when I talk.’ There was a groan behind me and I turned to see Cregar stirring. I said, ‘Tell your men guarding the laboratories it’s just as important that no one comes out. In fact, it’s more important. This place being what it is there’s probably some guns somewhere. In emergency use them.’

  Archie looked grave. ‘Is it so fearsome a thing?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ I said wearily. ‘I’m just taking prophylactic measures. Get busy, will you?’

  I went back to Cregar, helped him to get up, and sat him in a chair where he slumped flaccidly. He was dazed and in shock; too old to cope with the rough stuff any more. I said, ‘Cregar, can you hear me?’ He muttered something indistinguishable, and I slapped his cheek. ‘Can you hear me?’

  ‘Yes,’ he whispered.

  ‘Don’t try to leave. There’s a man outside with orders to shoot. Do you understand?’

  He looked at me with glazed eyes, and nodded. ‘Doesn’t matter,’ he muttered. ‘I’m dead anyway. So are you.’

  ‘We’ll all be dead in a hundred years,’ I said, and went to look again at the cultures in the broken petri dishes. The stuff looked harmless enough but I was careful not to touch it. Penny had described the elaborate precautions which were taken to prevent the escape of dangerous organisms from laboratories and, according to her, the lab I was now in wasn’t up to snuff for what Carter had been doing.

  The cultures could have been ordinary E.coli and, as such, perfectly harmless. But if they were cultures of E.coli which Carter had diddled around with then they could be dangerous in totally unpredictable ways. Cregar wasn’t a scientist but he knew what Carter was up to, and the broken dishes had been enough to scare him half to death. From now on no chances would be taken and I hoped there had not been an escape already when Archie had opened the door. I didn’t think so - the laboratory had low air pressure and I’d got him out fast.

  Twenty minutes later I had Ogilvie on the phone. I wasted no time on politeness and answered none of the questions he shot at me. I said, ‘This is a matter for urgency, so get it right the first time. Have you something to write with?’

  ‘I’ll record.’ I heard a click.

  ‘Cregar’s laboratory on Cladach Duillich has run wild. There’s one serious case of infection and two suspected. The organism causing it is new to medicine and probably manmade; it’s also highly infectious. I don’t know if it’s a killer but it’s highly likely. You’ll have to set the alarm ringing and probably Lumsden, Penny’s boss, is the best man to do it. Tell him hospitalization for three is needed in P4 - repeat - P4 conditions. He’ll know what that means. Tell him I suggest Porton Down, but he might have a better idea.’

  ‘I’ll get on to it immediately,’ said Ogilvie. ‘Who are the three?’

  ‘The serious case is Penny Ashton.’

  There was a sharp withdrawal of breath. ‘Oh, Christ! I’m sorry, Malcolm.’

  I went on, ‘The suspected cases are Cregar and myself.’

  ‘For the love of God!’ said Ogilvie. ‘What’s been going on up there?’

  I ignored him. ‘There’s a helicopter pad on Cladach Duillich so Lumsden had better use a chopper. Tell him the man to see here is a Dr Carter. He’s the chap who cooked up whatever hellbrew has got loose.’

  ‘I’ve got that.’

  ‘Then make it quick. I think Penny is dying,’ I said bleakly.

  THIRTY-EIGHT

  Cregar and I were in an odd position. Loathing each other beyond all belief, we were condemned to each other’s company for an unspecified period. The next few hours were to be extremely uncomfortable, but I tried to make them as comfortable as possible.

  Archie Ferguson came back as soon as I had spoken to Ogilvie and the expression on his face was terrifying. He looked like one of the Old Testament prophets might look after inditing one of the more
dire chapters of the Bible. ‘May their souls rot forever in hell!’ he burst out.

  ‘Take it easy,’ I said. ‘There are practical things to do.’ I thought of Ogilvie recording my telephone conversation and it gave me an idea. ‘See if you can find a tape-recorder. I’ll need it.’

  Archie simmered down. ‘Aye, I’ll see what I can do.’

  ‘And we’ll need food in here, but you can give us food once and once only. What you do is this. You open the outer door of the laboratory and put the food on the floor just inside. Tell me when you’ve closed the door and I’ll come out and get it. It can be done once only because I can’t risk contamination through the air lock, so you’d better give us enough for three meals. If you can find vacuum flasks for coffee that would be a help.’

  Ferguson looked past me. ‘Is yon man the Cregar you spoke of?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Then he gets nothing from me.’

  ‘You’ll do as I say,’ I said sharply. ‘We both eat or neither of us eats.’

  He took a deep breath, nodded curtly, then laid down the microphone and went away. Half an hour later he came back. ‘Your food’s there. I did better than flasks; there’s a coffee percolator to make your own.’

  ‘Thanks.’ I had another idea. ‘Archie, this laboratory is maintained at a lower air pressure than the outside. That means pumps, and pumps mean electricity. Put someone to watch the generator; I don’t want it stopping, either by breakdown or lack of fuel. Will you see to that?’

  ‘Aye. It won’t stop.’

  I went into the air lock and got the food—a pile of sandwiches—and also found a small battery-powered cassette tape-recorder. I put everything on the table next to the telephone. Cregar was apathetic and looked at the sandwiches without interest. I filled the percolator from a tap on one of the benches and got the coffee going. Cregar accepted coffee but he wouldn’t eat.

  Unobtrusively I switched on the recorder; I wanted Cregar condemned out of his own mouth. I said, ‘We’ve a lot to talk about.’

  ‘Have we?’ he said without interest. ‘Nothing matters any more.’

  ‘You’re not dead yet, and you may not be if Ogilvie does his stuff. When did Benson learn of Ashton’s interest in genetics?’

  He was silent for a moment, then said, ‘Must have been 1971. He saw that Ashton was keeping up with the girl’s studies, and then starting to do a lot of work on his own, usually at the weekends—a lot of calculating. He tried to get a look at it, but Ashton kept it locked away.’ Cregar brooded. ‘Ashton never did like me. I’ve often wondered if he knew what I was doing.’ He waved his hand at the laboratory. ‘This, I mean. It’s supposed to be secret, but a man with money can usually find out what he wants to know.’ He shrugged. ‘Anyway, he made damned certain that Benson didn’t lay an eye on his work.’

  ‘That empty vault must have come as a shock.’

  He nodded. ‘Benson knew about the vault but never managed to get inside. And when Ogilvie told me it was empty I didn’t believe him. It was only when he offered to let one of my forensic chaps look at the vault that I accepted the fact.’ He looked up. ‘You’re a clever man. I never thought of the railway. I ought to have done. Ashton wasn’t the man to fool about with toy trains.’

  Now Cregar had started to talk he positively flowed. I suppose he thought there was no reason to keep his silence. It was a sort of deathbed confession.

  I said, ‘What I can’t understand was how you engineered Mayberry’s acid attack—and why. That’s the bit that seems senseless.’

  ‘It was senseless,’ said Cregar. ‘I had nothing to do with it. I didn’t even know Mayberry existed until the police tracked him down. Do you remember when you appeared before the inter-departmental committee, Ogilvie said something about you “exploding Ashton out of Stockholm”? Well, I exploded him out of England.’

  ‘How?’

  He shrugged. ‘Opportunism combined with planning. I’d been wanting to have a dig at Ashton for a long time. I wanted to get him out of that house so I could get into that vault. I thought whatever he had would be ripe. I’d already made preparations—rented the flat and opened the bank account in Stockholm, got the Israeli passport, and so on. All I needed was a trigger. Then along came that maniac, Mayberry—most opportunely. I got Benson to panic Ashton, talking of threats to the other girl, and so on. Benson told him my department couldn’t cope with that sort of thing unless Ashton got out, that we were prepared to help and that we had a safe hideaway for him, which of course we had. And after all that the damned vault was empty.’

  ‘But why did Benson kill Ashton?’

  ‘Standing orders from thirty years ago,’ said Cregar simply. ‘Ashton wasn’t to be allowed to go back to the Russians. If there was a chance of him falling into Russian hands Benson was to kill him. Benson had every reason to think you were Russians.’

  ‘Jesus!’ I said. ‘What sort of man was Benson to kill Ashton after being with him thirty years?’

  Cregar gave me a lopsided smile. ‘He had gratitude, I suppose; and personal loyalty—to me.’

  I remembered my musings in the dark room and, out of curiosity, said, ‘Cregar, why did you do all this?’

  He looked at me in surprise. ‘A man must leave his mark on the world.’

  I felt chilled.

  There wasn’t much I wanted to know after that, but, the dam now broken, Cregar rambled on interminably, and I was glad when the telephone rang. It was Ogilvie. ‘There’ll be an RAF helicopter on its way with a medical team. Lumsden thinks you’re right about Porton and he’s made the arrangements.’ He paused. ‘He also wants me to pass on his apologies—I don’t know why.’

  ‘I do. Thank him for me. When will the chopper get here?’

  ‘They’re assembling the team now. I’d say six hours. How’s Miss Ashton?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ I said bitterly. ‘I can’t get to her. She’s in a coma. You can tell that to Lumsden, too.’

  Ogilvie was inclined to talk but I cut him off. I wasn’t in the mood for that. Half an hour later the phone rang again and I found Archie Ferguson on the line. ‘There’s someone called Starkie wants to talk to the man Carter. Shall I let him?’

  ‘Let me talk to Starkie.’ The earphone crackled and a deep voice said, ‘Richard Starkie here—is that Dr Carter?’

  ‘Malcolm Jaggard here. Who are you?’

  ‘I’m a doctor speaking from Porton Down. Are you one of the infected men?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Any symptoms starting to show?’

  ‘Not yet.’

  ‘If Carter manufactured this bug he’ll know more about it than anyone. I need the information.’

  ‘Right,’ I said. ‘If you don’t get satisfaction from him let me know. Are you on the line, Archie?’

  ‘Aye.’

  ‘Let them talk. If Carter wants persuading I’m sure you know what to do.’

  They came for us seven hours later, dressed like spacemen in plastic clothing with self-contained breathing apparatus. They put us in plastic envelopes whole and entire, plugged in an air supply and sealed us up. We stopped in the air lock and the envelopes and themselves were drenched with a liquid, then we were carried out to the helicopter where I found Penny already installed in her own envelope. She was still unconscious.

  THIRTY-NINE

  A month later I was feeling pretty chipper because Starkie had given me a clean bill of health. ‘For three weeks now we’ve inspected every damned E.coli bug that’s come out of you and they’re all normal. I don’t know why you’re still lying around here. What do you think this is, a doss house?’

  He hadn’t always been as cheerful as that. At the beginning I was placed in a sterile room and untouched by human hand for the next two weeks. Everything that was done to me was done by remote control. Later they told me that a team of thirty doctors and nurses was working on me alone.

  Penny did better. For her they apparently mobilized the entire medical resources o
f the United Kingdom, plus sizeable chunks from the United States and the Continent, with a little bit from Australia. The bug she had was different from the one I’d caught, and it was a real frightener. It got the medical world into a dizzy tizzy and, although they were able to cure her, they wanted to make sure that the bug, whatever it was, was completely eradicated. So I came out of Porton Down a month before her.

  Starkie once said soberly, ‘If she’d have been left another day with the minimal attention she was getting I don’t think we could have done it.’ That made me think of Carter and I wondered what was being done about him. I never found out.

  When I came out of purdah but before I was discharged I went to see her. I couldn’t kiss her, or even touch her, but we could speak separated by a pane of glass, and she seemed cheerful enough. I told her something of what had happened, but not everything. Time enough for that when she was better. Then I said, ‘I want you out of here pretty damned quick. I want to get married.’

  She smiled brilliantly. ‘Oh, yes, Malcolm.’

  ‘I can’t fix a day because of that bloody man Starkie,’ I complained. ‘He’s likely to keep you in here forever, investigating the contents of your beautiful bowels.’

  She said, ‘How would you like a double wedding? I had a letter from Gillian in New York. Peter Michaelis flew over and proposed to her. She was lying in bed with her left arm strapped to her right cheek and swaddled in bandages when he asked her. She thought it was very funny.’

  ‘I’ll be damned!’

  ‘It will be a little time yet. We all have to get out of our hospitals. Is four months too long to wait?’

  ‘Yes,’ I said promptly. ‘But I’ll wait.’

  I didn’t ask anyone how Cregar was doing because I didn’t care.

  On the day I came out of the sterile room Ogilvie came to see me, bearing the obligatory pound of grapes. I received him with some reserve. He asked after my health and I referred him to Starkie, then he said, ‘We got the tape cassette after it had been decontaminated. Cregar won’t be able to wriggle out of this one.’