Radical Reaction

by Dawn Marsanne

  ‘What do you do all day?’

  ‘Me? I manage things,’ said Christian, defensively.

  ‘Excellent. Well from now on you are going to manage things and also recruit patients for the trials and Julie or Judith or whoever she is will be getting a month’s notice as from today.’

  ‘You can’t be serious! I am far too busy! I’m the director of operations here!’

  ‘I found out from ClinTry how much you are paid and quite frankly it’s too much. You have let things slip. I am going to manage things and you are going to use your clinical knowledge to recruit patients.’

  ‘I’m not sure I can accept that, it’s a complete change of my contract.’

  ‘Excellent, I see you are finally catching on to what I am saying. I was beginning to think for a moment you were a bit, how shall we say, thick?’

  ‘Now just a minute. There’s no need to be rude. I could take you to a tribunal you know?’

  ‘You could, but I wouldn’t advise it. I’ve never lost a tribunal case. There have been a few I grant you.’

  Christian stood up and went to look out of the window. He felt like pinching himself. Was he still asleep and having some sort of a dream? He sat down once more and Ron turned around the photo on his desk.

  ‘This is a lovely family photo. Your wife I presume?’

  ‘Yes, Geraldine with my two children, Persephone and Rufus.’

  ‘She’s a nice looking woman, isn’t she?’

  ‘Er, yes, I guess she is.’

  ‘Has she undergone a lot of plastic surgery?’

  ‘What? No, never? I don’t know why you are asking that?’

  ‘Because she looks very different from the lady,’ Ron emphasised the word lady and made inverted commas in the air, ‘the lady who spent the night with you in my hotel, The Cedars on Thursday night of last week.’

  Christian sat completely still. A wave of nausea and panic washed over him. He felt faint and his face flushed crimson. He had no idea that Ron owned The Cedars hotel.

  ‘Yes, indeed, you were having your bit on the side in my hotel and I’m sure your lovely wife would be very interested to hear about it.’

  ‘You wouldn’t.’

  ‘Wouldn’t I?’

  ‘You see I’ve been doing my homework whilst you have been getting your leg over,’ Ron paused. ‘Your two children go to a very expensive private school. You have an expensive house. Your finances are rather stretched and I wouldn’t be surprised if you regularly dip into your overdraft,’ he paused to observe Christian’s reaction. ‘In short, you cannot afford to lose this job, nor can you afford a messy divorce.’

  Christian took a sip of water but spilt most of it down his chin. He put the glass back on his desk and wiped his face with his hand.

  ‘So, don’t you think it would be good to have a change of job description. Do some real clinical work instead of pushing a pen and tapping away on your laptop all day?’ Ron raised his eyebrows. ‘Excellent, I’ll take that as a yes.’

  Christian tried to speak but no words would come out.

  ‘Now, I’ll leave you in peace as you will need to speak to Judith.’

  ‘Send me a list of the Phase I clinical trials you have booked in.’

  Christian scribbled this down on a post-it note.

  ‘Now, as you know this promising cancer drug is being developed only just down the road. This could be a way to redeem the company’s reputation. Discovered and trialled in Persford. Although of course there will be trials in other parts of the country.’

  Christian nodded. He felt like he was back at school listening to the headmaster. Ron had assumed total control of the situation and he was merely a pawn. Considering he had no previous experience of science he was putting on a pretty good show.

  ‘Now, I think there will be a huge demand for this potential drug and a little bird tells me that as it looks so promising that Phase I and Phase II might be run with some overlap.’

  ‘Well, that often happens when there is a perceived benefit to seriously ill patients,’ added Christian, feeling he should try to contribute something in this rather one-sided discussion.

  ‘We are going to make sure that we get as many patients as possible to benefit from it here, aren’t we?’

  ‘Well, yes, I suppose so. But prioritising medical need is not for us to determine. Cancer Research will have a hand in it, as will consultants at specialist cancer units and it will also depend on whether the patient is well enough to receive the treatment. There are protocols laid down for this sort of thing.’

  Ron smiled. ‘Oh, Christian, what a poodle you are. Abiding by all the rules and regulations. Sticking to the letter of the law. Is it any wonder you are in the position you are?’

  Christian frowned. ‘I’m not sure I’m with you. Can you explain?’

  ‘I can and I will and I’ll be back in a few days.’

  Ron marched out of the office leaving Christian completely shell-shocked. He loosened his tie and put his head in his hands. What on earth had he got himself involved in?

  Chapter 31

  The talk organised by the Interfaith society was due to take place at the University at 6 p.m. Already there was a heightened security presence on campus. After lunch, the students union began to organise an anti-Israel protest on the main forecourt. Although noisy, it appeared to be peaceful and their banners portrayed familiar slogans calling for “Rights for Palestinians” and opposition to Zionism.

  Nick had popped out at lunchtime to pay a cheque into his bank and upon his return had seen the security guards beginning to man the approach to the main administrative building which adjoined the library. He spotted his friend Mark Jameson and jogged over to him.

  ‘Hi, Mark, I wondered whether I’d see you today.’

  ‘Hi, Nick. Yes, I’ve just done a full night shift at the Science Park so I only had three hours’ sleep.’

  ‘Well, I won’t distract you. Hope all goes well and there’s no trouble this evening.’

  Mark beckoned Nick over to one side. ‘We’re a bit worried, to be honest. I can’t understand them agreeing for this to go ahead.’

  ‘Free speech and all that,’ added Nick.

  ‘Yes, well that’s all well and good but the big cheeses who make the decisions aren’t having to deal with things on the front line. They are in their offices.’

  ‘True,’ nodded Nick.

  ‘I don’t know what’s suddenly happened here but we are having much more graffiti recently. Slogans being daubed. I just don’t know why there’s been a sudden spate of incidents.’

  ‘Tell me about it, I hear the latest updates from Polly each evening.’

  ‘Did you see that march in the town on Saturday?’

  ‘No, we kept out of the way. What about you?’

  ‘No, I stayed home with the kids but some of my colleagues are special constables and they were involved keeping the peace. There were some ugly scenes.’

  ‘Awful. I saw it on the local news.’

  Mark looked past Nick and realised he should join his colleagues. ‘Anyway, mate, I’ll have to go. See you around sometime. We need to have some beers.’

  ‘I’ll get back to you. Sometime soon as I’m off to India. I’ll tell you all about it.’

  ‘Great, I’ll look forward to it.’

  **

  Sidney Failsworth was drinking his cup of tea whilst Ron perused the notes he’d brought around. Ron looked particularly studious in his tortoiseshell rimmed reading glasses. For someone with little formal education, he had done remarkably well for himself. Sidney, on the other hand, had a degree and several high-level accountancy qualifications and although financially secure could never even dream to have a fraction of Ron’s wealth. Ron wasn’t afraid to take risks and those had paid off. Some people were like that, they had the Midas touch.

  ‘Very comprehensive, Sidney, I hope it didn’t put you off your game of golf?’

  ‘Ha, not really, my source, shall we ca
ll him was most forthcoming. I think there is more than a bit of ill-feeling towards Councillor Long.’

  ‘So, Mr Long received around fifty grand as a backhander on this last development did he?’

  ‘Yes, and that’s probably par for the course, no pun intended. In this last instance, there was huge opposition from locals about increased traffic and incursion into some nature site. But, well, they found some loophole in the planning laws or created one and it all went through.’

  ‘We’re sure that it’s not someone having us on are we?’

  ‘Oh, yes, we know that money was laundered through a hairdressing business of his wife’s. Some large sums kept being paid in for refurbishment and then it never happened. Deposits paid to a builder and then returned. You know how it works. Then the councillor had his own house extended.’

  Ron reached into his desk drawer and retrieved an envelope which he handed to Sidney.

  ‘A little bonus, just to say thanks.’

  ‘Ron, there’s no need. Really. It wasn’t difficult.’

  ‘Take it, I insist. Treat yourself. Take that lovely wife of yours away for a weekend or something.’

  ‘If you insist, thank you.’ Sidney put the envelope in his briefcase and prepared to leave.

  ‘Right, well I better get a move on. I’ve a couple of clients still to see this afternoon.’

  ‘Bye, I’ll see you in a couple of days then.’

  The two men shook hands and Ron opened the door for Sidney. He sat back at his desk quietly for a while, mulling over things in his mind. He took out his phone and brought up a familiar contact. The phone rang a few times and the contact answered.

  ‘Hello, Jed! Got a little job for you. Pop around this evening at 8 p.m.’

  **

  After Ron had left his office, Christian had gone out for a walk to get some fresh air. He felt like a shower as his shirt was sticking to his back and his face felt greasy. What sort of guy was it who could march in like that and start laying down the law? He knew just how to manipulate people and exploit their weak points. Christian simply could not afford to lose his job and due to extreme stupidity and recklessness was now in danger of having his dirty little secret exposed to Geraldine. At times like this, he wished he’d not given up smoking. He kicked at some protruding clumps of grass on a verge to vent some of his anger. He felt like punching someone, preferably Ron Radford’s smug face but instead, he had to go back to work and chat with Judith who through no fault of her own was about to lose her job.

  As he wandered back he wished that he could rewind his life back to the time they were in Hertfordshire. Admittedly he hadn’t earned a huge salary there but it was quite sufficient to live on. The children were happy in a good state school and they had a house which was adequate. Now they were financially stretched to the limit and his wife seemed to think they had joined the smart set in society. Her desire to climb the social ladder was eating away at them and destroying their marriage. If she hadn’t been so obsessed with that he wouldn’t have sought company elsewhere.

  Back inside ClinTry he stopped by Judith’s office and asked her to come and see him.

  ‘Oh, what do you need to ask me? Do I need to bring any files?’

  ‘No, just yourself. Ten minutes?’

  ‘Sure,’ she replied.

  Christian retrieved Judith’s personnel file and flicked through it. She’d done a solid job in her time at ClinTry and had come with glowing references. She would be sure to get another job but it would doubtless mean moving out of the area. It was going to be a difficult conversation.

  Judith knocked on the door and he called for her to come in.

  ‘Hi, take a seat.’

  ‘Everything OK Christian? You look a bit, well, off-colour.’

  ‘I’m OK, I think I might be coming down with something.’

  ‘Oh dear, hope it’s nothing serious.’

  Christian smiled weakly. ‘There’s no easy way to say this, Judith, but I’m afraid ClinTry is going to have to make some economies. As you know, our balance sheet hasn’t been too healthy recently and with new management, I’m afraid we need to cut our overheads.’

  Judith looked close to tears. She was no fool and it was obvious that she was being let go.

  ‘Haven’t I done a good job,’ she asked, her voice breaking.

  ‘Of course, we will give you a superb reference. I’m sure you will have no trouble getting another position.’

  ‘But I’ll have to move. That’s really expensive. I might not be able to sell my house. Oh, God. What a nightmare,’ and she put her head in her hands.

  ‘I’m so sorry, It’s out of my hands. Mr Radford told me today.’

  ‘I see, well, he’s the boss, I guess. I need to leave you now, I’m sorry, I’m just too upset.’

  ‘Of course, we can go through the fine details tomorrow. Again, I’m really sorry.’

  Judith got up to leave. ‘So who is going to recruit the patients for the trials then?’

  ‘I am,’ he replied.

  ‘You? But you are the Director. Won’t you have too much to do?’

  ‘Ron is going to be doing a lot of the management. He’s very keen to get involved.’

  ‘I see. Well, you know where I am, for the time being,’ she added and left.

  Christian looked at his watch. He needed a drink but that would have to wait until he got home. He wished he had a bottle of whisky in his desk drawer like in the TV programmes. If the day weren’t bad enough already he could add a charge of drink driving on top everything else. Luckily that temptation wasn’t available. He started to check his emails when his phone rang.

  ‘Christian, there’s a Ms Helen Jenner here to see you from Cancer Research, she says she’s got a meeting with you.’

  Not for the first time that day Christian’s heart started to race. He didn’t remember anything in his electronic diary. Was he completely losing it? He rechecked his diary but there was no appointment listed.

  ‘I’ve nothing in my diary. There must be some mistake.’

  ‘Just a minute, I’ll speak to her.’

  Christian continued to scroll through his calendar and emails but could see no meeting arranged with Cancer Research.

  ‘Christian, I’ve spoken to Ms Jenner but she’s adamant that she personally phoned you to arrange the meeting.’

  ‘OK, you better show her in. I’ll try to sort this out.’

  Christian straightened his tie and checked his appearance using the selfie feature on his phone. He didn’t look at his best but at least he was presentable.’

  There was a knock on the door and Fay ushered in the visitor.

  ‘Dr Dalton,’ she said, approaching his desk, offering her hand.

  Chapter 32

  Adam Newman made his way into the room where the Interfaith talk was being held and scanned the rows of seats. Walking up towards the front he spotted Hannah Gregson.

  ‘Hi, Hannah, mind if I join you?’

  ‘Adam, hi, sit down,’ replied Hannah moving her bag from the adjacent seat.

  ‘So, who is it you know here in the Interfaith group?’ asked Adam.

  Hannah nodded towards Rachel Goodman who was on the stage chatting to the speakers. ‘Rachel over there, I go running with her. I’m not actually a member of the Interfaith group but she was telling me about the talk and it sounded really interesting, so I thought I’d come along.’

  ‘Yes, I googled the two speakers and it’s amazing what they’ve done.’

  ‘Well, it’s a nice surprise to see you. When we spoke about it yesterday you didn’t say you were going to come along.’

  ‘No, well I wasn’t sure but I got my reaction sorted out and so I thought I’d come along instead of heading home. It’s good to hear an eminent scientist first hand. His research is really well known.’

  ‘Yes, it’s fascinating work,’ added Hannah.

  ‘I’ve not mentioned it before but I’m half Jewish, on my father’s side of the family
, so as we have a few relatives in Israel it gave me another reason to come along. Besides, I’ve nothing much to do this evening. It’ll stop me pining at home on my own without Zoe as well,’ he joked.

  ‘Yes, I guess it must be hard just seeing her at weekends.’

  ‘It’s not too bad, London isn’t far away, it could be worse. She’s coming down here next weekend.’

  Their discussion was halted as Rachel took the microphone and called for quiet.

  ‘Ladies and Gentlemen, thank you all for coming this evening. It’s really good to see such a high turnout. I can see a lot of familiar faces but also some new ones. I’m sure you will find this a very interesting forty minutes or so.’

  Adam looked over his shoulder and saw that there were just a few seats empty towards the centres of rows. A few students were wearing kippahs and several of the young women were wearing hijabs. There were also some staff members he recognised. Rebecca Levinson was sitting in the front row along with some other people he couldn’t put names to.

  ‘Oh, one thing I forgot to mention,’ said Rachel, ‘we are filming the talk and it will be available on the University website in a couple of days. So without further ado, I would like to introduce the two speakers.’

  Rachel gave a brief resumé for Noam Peretz and Omar Khatib. As she listed their academic achievements and more recently their charitable work, Adam began to think that at some point in the future he might like to take a break from chemistry and take part in some charitable work himself. Not in the Middle East but closer to home working with the underprivileged. He was brought back to the moment by Rachel announcing who was the first to speak.

  ‘Well, both of our speakers were so polite that they thought the other should be the first to speak.’

  ‘Afraid, more like!’ shouted someone in the audience with good humour.

  ‘Very true!’ replied Noam.

  ‘So, we tossed a coin!’ said Rachel, ‘ and wait for it...’ she teased. ‘Omar won, so he’s going to go...wait for it.. go second!’

  The audience laughed.

  ‘Noam, over to you.’ Rachel left the stage and sat down next to Rebecca Levinson on the front row. Rebecca whispered something in her ear and Rachel smiled.