‘Still,’ says Ingrid, ‘I’d like to know more about his activities. I believe he may have put Blake up to planting a bug on my laptop.’
‘Ask Blake, then.’ Jane suddenly stands up and takes out her phone. ‘Ask her all about it.’
She glances at the screen of her phone and thumbs a button, then turns and starts hurrying towards Harkness’s desk.
We’re all too surprised to react.
There’s a whirring noise and I see a steel-shuttered screen descending from the ceiling. It’s coming down fast, like a fucking guillotine. It’s between us and the desk. And Jane is already the other side of it.
I jump up. So does Filippo. We both move towards Jane. But it’s too late. The screen thwacks down into a metal groove in the floor. I hear bolts clicking into place. Jane’s out of sight now. The office has been cut in half. She’s in one half. We’re in the other.
Filippo crashes into the screen and literally bounces off it. He slides down on his knees and rests his head against the steel. He mutters something under his breath.
‘What just happened?’ Ingrid asks.
I’m not sure if she’s expecting an answer.
But she doesn’t get one.
French groaned and sat up. He raised one hand to his head and squeezed his eyes tightly shut, as if to ward off a pulse of pain. Then he opened them and looked blearily at Don through the shadows of the cellar. Belatedly, he seemed to focus on Harkness, who lay motionless in a pool of blood at the foot of the stairs.
‘What happened?’ French asked in a slurred voice.
‘You killed him,’ said Don. ‘You fired your gun as you dragged him down with you.’
‘Fuck.’
‘Is true,’ Zlenko called from the hatchway.
French squinted up at the Russian. ‘Fuck,’ he repeated.
‘But he told Don how to get into panic room before he died, I think.’
French turned his gaze back to Don. ‘Is that right?’
Don nodded. ‘Yeah. He did.’
French scrabbled around, found his gun and pointed it at Don. ‘Tell me.’
‘Put gun down, Amos,’ Zlenko called. ‘Or maybe you shoot him also.’
French appeared to register the point, albeit reluctantly. He lowered the gun. ‘How do we get into that room, Don?’
‘I’m not completely stupid. Take me to the house and I’ll open the door for you. Then we’re done. That’s my offer.’
It was an offer French considered for several long moments. Then he said, ‘OK. Let’s go.’ He turned on to his side and raised himself unsteadily to his feet.
‘D’you need help to get up the stairs?’ Don asked.
French scowled at him. ‘I’ll manage. Move.’
Don had to step over Harkness’s body to reach the stairs. He climbed gingerly up them and emerged into the daylight to see Zlenko stirring the ashes of Wynsum Fry’s burnt clothes with the toe of his boot.
Zlenko looked at Don and gave him a one-sided smile as he clambered out of the hatchway. ‘You saw card in witch’s pocket? Devytih pik.’
Don shrugged helplessly. ‘The card showing on the bottom of the pack? It was the nine of spades.’
‘Da. Nine of spades. Card of death.’
‘If you say so.’
‘But is Harkness’s death. Not mine.’ Zlenko chuckled. The irony evidently amused him. ‘Now everything OK.’
French appeared behind Don, hauling himself to the top of the stairs. He paused to suck in some breath and looked up. ‘Everything isn’t OK for you, Don,’ he panted. ‘Remember that.’
Filippo slithers round and slumps back against the steel screen. He shakes his head slowly and mutters something I can’t make out.
‘Talk to us, Filippo,’ I say, dropping to my haunches beside him. ‘What’s Astrid done?’
He doesn’t look at me. But he does reply. ‘The call must have been a message from Jack. She sealed herself in there with his computer to stop me operating the override.’
‘The override for what?’
‘Cascade.’
‘What does that mean?’
‘You’ll find out soon. Everyone will.’
‘How soon?’
‘I don’t know. It hasn’t happened yet. That’s why she’s locked me out. To make sure I don’t stop it. She only pretended to agree with me. It will happen for certain now.’
‘What will make it happen?’
‘Opening the panic room at Wortalleth West.’
‘That’s the trigger?’
He nods dolefully. ‘Sì. Cascade cannot be stopped now. Better you don’t know what’s coming.’
‘Maybe it can be stopped. My friend Don. He’s in Cornwall. He might be at Wortalleth West. Or close by.’
‘Ah. Your friend. The useful idiot.’
‘That’s not what he is.’
‘If he’s at the house, you can’t contact him. Mobile signals are blocked to protect the integrity of the system. If he’s not at the house, it’s too late.’
‘There’s a landline, though. I can get through on that.’
Filippo frowns at me, like he’s considering whether to pin any hope on what I’ve just said or not. ‘Landline?’
‘Isn’t it worth a try?’
He’s still frowning. But he nods faintly. ‘Sì. It is worth a try.’
‘But you’re going to have to tell me first what it is we’re trying to stop.’
He jumps up, pulling me to my feet with him. ‘No time. Make the call.’
‘No.’ I shake him off. ‘Tell me what this is all about, Filippo. Or I do nothing.’
He grimaces, like he’s in pain. ‘You’re crazy. There’s too much at stake for a long explanation.’
‘Then make it a short one.’
‘Make the call.’
‘Tell me.’
For a second, he stares at me dumbly. And I stare back. One of us is going to have to give way. It’s not going to be me.
The four-by-four lurched and juddered along the rough track and the farmhouse passed from sight round the swell of the hill. Zlenko was driving, relaxed and self-assured now his brush with black magic had been resolved to his satisfaction. French was sitting up front beside him. Don was in the rear. There was nothing he could do to escape his fate, whatever it was. The lassitude of hopelessness had overcome him.
‘Got it,’ said French as they rumbled through the open gateway into the last stretch of track before the lane. He had been fiddling with something since leaving the farm and now Don saw what it was: a bloodstained mobile phone. ‘The message Jack sent back there. To someone called Astrid Townsend.’ French looked over his shoulder. ‘Heard of her, Don?’
Don shook his head. ‘No.’
‘“Cascade imminent.” That was the message. What the fuck does it mean?’
‘Nothing to me.’
‘Me neither.’ French switched the phone off. As they swung out into the lane, he lowered the window and tossed it into the hedge. ‘We don’t need Jack any more. We’ve got you, Don. Our very own Ali Baba.’
Filippo looks at me hard. He must be able to tell I’m not going to blink first. ‘Merda,’ he mutters. Then he says to Hertha, ‘Get Ingrid out of here. Wait for me in your office.’
Hertha responds with a question in German. She sounds clipped and panicky.
‘I don’t know,’ says Filippo. ‘But Ingrid shouldn’t hear this.’
‘That makes me think I should hear it,’ says Ingrid.
‘Get out, Hertha,’ Filippo shouts. ‘Gehen Sie weg.’
He looks kind of wild-eyed now. And he sounds close to the end of his tether. Hertha gets that even if Ingrid doesn’t. ‘OK. We’ll go to my office. But I’ll, er, need a full report, Filippo.’
‘Just go.’
Ingrid looks as if she’s going to object. But Hertha’s tugging at her elbow. ‘I’m sorry, Ingrid. I really think it’s best if we leave. I need to consult Head of Security about this screen. I was unaware it existed
.’
‘It seems there’s quite a lot you’re unaware of,’ says Ingrid acidly. But it doesn’t matter. They’re halfway through the door by now. I glimpse the Alp outside, looking confused by their hustled exit.
Filippo pushes the door shut and turns the handle as far as it’ll go, locking us in. He turns to look at me and runs his fingers through his hair. His eyes are bloodshot. His hands are trembling.
‘Please,’ he says. ‘Make the call. It’s our only chance.’
‘Explain first.’
‘It will take too long.’
‘That’s your problem.’
‘No. It’s everyone’s problem.’
‘You’re the one wasting time, Filippo.’
‘OK, OK.’ He holds up his hands. ‘I’ll tell you. You want to know. So, I’ll tell you.’
ONE
ZLENKO CUT THROUGH the Laflouder fields housing estate on his way to Wortalleth West, bypassing the centre of Mullion. The rear doors of the car were on childproof locks. Don had no way out and he was only too well aware French would turn his gun on him if he had to. They travelled as if in a bubble, insulated from the carefree summer’s day around them.
Shortly after turning out of Laflouder Fields on to the Poldhu road, they passed Ray Hocking’s house. Linda was coming out of the front door at that moment, shopping bag in hand, unaware of the consequences of her betrayal of Harkness to Wynsum Fry. And that, no doubt, was how she preferred it.
It occurred to Don that French and Zlenko were in denial too. Without Harkness, it was unlikely they would be able to make any sense of whatever they found on the panic-room computer system. But they did not want to think about that. They needed a conclusion of some kind. And they meant to have it.
Filippo moves to the foot of the conference table. He leans forward, pressing his hands down against the flat wooden surface. He lets out a long, composing breath. Then he begins.
‘Jack and Astrid took me onboard twelve years ago. They convinced me. I believed what they planned to do was right. I still kind of believe it. I just can’t—’ He pushes his hair back. ‘To hold global temperature increase to two degrees above pre-industrial we have to cut carbon emissions to fifty per cent current level by 2050 and then go on cutting down to zero. That won’t reduce the temperature rise, but it will hold it at two degrees, where it will stay for a very long time because of the amount of carbon dioxide already in the atmosphere. That means we can’t – absolutely can’t – go above eight hundred gigatons total carbon emissions. We are over five hundred already. That leaves less than three hundred to go. At current rate, ten gigatons a year, we have less than thirty years to go. Then emissions will have to drop to zero straight away. If not, climate change becomes dangerous. Floods. Storms. Droughts. Famine. Like we’ve never seen before. You understand? For the human race … total disaster.’ He stares at me. ‘Sì? You do understand?’
‘’Course.’ And I do, kind of, though I can’t remember anyone actually spelling it out to me like he has.
‘Meantime we’re destroying hundreds of thousands of other species on the planet. Plants and animals. Current estimate is at least twenty per cent of all species extinct or near extinct by 2050. There have been five mass extinctions on Earth in the last half-billion years. This will be number six. The worst since the dinosaurs were wiped out by the dust from a massive asteroid strike sixty-six million years ago. But we will have caused it. Us. L’umanità. The human race. You understand?’
‘Yes,’ I reply. ‘I understand. But what’s this got to do with—’
‘Jack wants to stop it happening. So does Astrid. So do I. So does anyone with a brain. But Jack decided to actually do something about it. That’s why he got into pharmaceuticals. He calculated they would be the answer. He recruited Astrid to help him. Then me. We developed a programme to get the result we agreed the world needs: the nanobot programme. Everyone who’s used a Harkness Pharmaceuticals drug or cosmetic over the past five years has nanobots in their bloodstream. Also everyone who’s eaten food grown using Harkness Pharmaceuticals pesticides or meat from animals treated with Harkness Pharmaceuticals antibiotics. Beauty treatments. Headache cures. Anti-malarials. Pain relief. Elixtris. Fenextris. And the rest. Nanobots are in all of them. Millions of people have swallowed them and injected them and absorbed them through their skin. They’re everywhere. They flush out of the system eventually, but they get replaced by more, all the time, rolling out of our factories around the world. Click, click, click, click goes the production line, feeding them out. More and more and more and more. They’re a plague without symptoms. Until …’
‘Until what?’
‘Until they’re switched on. Doctor Tau has cracked the problem that’s held back nanotechnology for the past decade. How to control nanobots from outside the host. How to trigger their pre-designed function. His technique is basically a chain reaction. Trigger one and it triggers another, then another, then another, as long as they’re within ultrasonic range. He calls it – we call it – Cascade. The Wortalleth West system is powerful enough to initialize the process. There are overrides here and in Locarno that only Harkness and I know how to operate. Otherwise, no control. No way of stopping it once it starts.’
‘And what will start it?’
‘Breach of the panic room. Jack tried to make it easy for me. Someone will break into the room eventually. They’ll trigger Cascade. We won’t actually have done it. But they won’t realize what they’ve done. Only we will. Soon, though, very soon, the effect will be clear.’
‘What is the effect?’
‘Doctor Tau believes we’re planning to use his technology to phase nerve-stimulation therapy powered by nano-transducers. But I redesigned the components so the nanobots will discharge an electrical signal modulated to interfere with the bioelectronic system of the host.’
‘Interfere with? What does that mean?’
Filippo looks at me for a long moment before he answers. Then he says, his voice so soft I only just catch the words: ‘Un arresto cardiaco.’
‘What?’
‘Heart failure.’
‘You’re serious?’
‘Completely serious.’
‘How many?’
He shrugs. ‘More than anyone will be able to count. But more than enough also … to keep temperature rise below two degrees.’ He shrugs again. ‘It’s crazy and it’s totally sane all at once. Humans are the biggest threat to the human race and all the other species on Earth. You cut the number of humans – you cut it enough – and the threat, it does not go quite away, but … it reduces. It reduces massively. You understand?’
I understand. I look at him and I believe him. This is what Harkness designed Wortalleth West for. This is why he took all those steps to protect the power supply to the panic room. This is why he doesn’t care about prosecution or imprisonment in the US. This is his masterplan. And all I can say is, ‘Fuck.’
Don saw the battered pick-up truck parked up by the garage block as they drove up to the front of the house. French saw it too. ‘Whose is that?’ he snapped.
‘Sadovot,’ Zlenko replied. ‘Woman who digs.’
‘The gardener? Shit.’ French looked round at Don. ‘Why didn’t you tell me that?’
‘I don’t recognize the truck,’ Don lied – unconvincingly, he suspected. In fact, he recognized the truck very well. What he could not understand, since Glenys had told Blake Harkness had instructed her to stay away from Wortalleth West until further notice, was what she was doing there.
‘Can you see her anywhere?’ French asked, peering up towards the garden.
‘Nyet,’ said Zlenko.
‘Does she have a key to the house, Don?’
‘Not as far as I know.’ That at least was not a lie.
‘OK.’ French thought for a moment. Then he said, ‘If she doesn’t bother us, we won’t bother her. Let’s get this done.’
French got out of the car. His face was grey and drained of blood and he look
ed unsteady on his feet. Don reckoned he had to be suffering from concussion after what had happened at Tredarvas. He waggled the gun at Don, signalling for him to get out too.
Zlenko brought up the rear as they climbed the shallow steps to the front door. French unlocked it and in they went. After he had closed the door behind them, he stood listening for a moment. No sound reached Don’s ears. He had no reason to think Glenys was in the house, though she was unlikely to have gone far without her pick-up. ‘Check the terrace door and the back door, Gennady,’ said French when he had listened long enough.
Zlenko crossed the hall and went out into the passage running along the rear of the house. Don heard a rattling of a handle. Zlenko came back and announced, ‘Nichivo.’ Then he headed for the kitchen and the utility room.
A few seconds later, he called out, ‘Come here. Bihstri.’
‘Move,’ said French. He gestured for Don to lead the way.
They went through the dining room into the kitchen. He was not there. They pressed on into the utility room.
Don flinched in shock when he saw the reason Zlenko had called them. The door of the freezer had opened, probably because of the weight of Coleman’s body inside. But he was not inside any longer. His swollen, half-frozen, half-thawed corpse lay on the floor in a pool of water like some massive deep-sea fish discarded on a wharf.
‘He fell out,’ said Zlenko.
‘Yeah,’ said French. ‘So I see.’
‘What you want do?’
‘Nothing. We don’t have time for you and/or Don to bust a gut heaving him back in the freezer. Leave him where he is and let’s get on with what we came here to do. Is the back door locked?’
‘Da. Locked.’
‘Then it’s over to you, Don.’ French smiled grimly. ‘Time to open the panic room.’
I look at Filippo. I scan his face for any sign – any hint – that he doesn’t really mean what he’s said. I don’t see any. ‘This is true?’ I ask numbly.
Panic Room Page 35
