Alchemist

by Peter James

  One hundred and fifty examiners worked in this building, wielding the power to make or break both small-time inventors and multi-national corporations – by granting or rejecting patents for products as diverse as self-replenishing mousetraps, steam engines smaller than a grain of rice, prosthetic phalluses, or a pocket-size purifier for turning urine into mineral water.

  Conor sat in the functional metal-framed visitor’s chair in his friend’s untidy office, and stared across a desk piled high with bulging folders, all marked with the file number of his application. US Patent Office examiners were strictly discouraged from lunching with patent agents and attorneys. A cup of coffee in the office was all that was permitted before the boundary into bribery was deemed to have been crossed.

  Conor had finished his coffee an hour ago, but Schwab still had not refilled the empty percolator next to the crash helmet on the table behind him.

  Instead Schwab sat hunched over the desk, picking on trivial point after trivial point. He was as sloppily dressed as ever, wearing a baggy grey and white striped shirt with the cuffs rolled up and a tie at half mast. In deference to modern style, his hair looked as if he had just received a severe electric shock.

  Conor was finding it hard to concentrate; Schwab seemed even more pernickety than usual today and they were progressing at a snail’s pace. Conor’s thoughts were almost entirely about Monty, hoping to hell she had made it safely to an airport and on to a plane.

  He glanced at his watch. 11.30. That made it 4.30 p.m. London time. If she’d caught a direct flight at nine in the morning her time, the earliest she’d get here would be midday local time. It would take half an hour to disembark and get through immigration and baggage claim, at the very least. Fine, she’d have to wait in the bar, that would not be a problem. More of a problem was his uncertainty about whether the airport would be watched. But no one would have any reason to suspect she was coming here ahead of schedule, would they? Unless they’d actually followed her to the airport at her end, of course.

  A waving hand caught his eye and he looked at Schwab with a start.

  ‘Hello, Conor. Are you on this bus with me?’

  Conor smiled thinly. ‘Sorry,’ he said.

  ‘You look tired – been partying? Old age creeping up? You can’t take this gadding around; I can’t either. If I don’t get in bed by ten-thirty I’m a wipe-out next day.’ He looked back down at the document he was studying. Then he nodded at the bundles Conor had unloaded on to the flat table behind him. ‘OK, let’s move on; so what you got buried in there?’

  Conor eyeballed him, trying hard not to look as if he was hiding anything, but his heart was not really in the game. ‘Buried? Oh, c’mon, man.’ His voice sounded forced and he knew it.

  Schwab smiled. ‘Hey, c’mon yourself.’ He tapped his chest with a massive index finger. ‘Do I look like some kind of root vegetable or something? You dump five piles of prior art on me when you know I’ve only got a couple of hours’ reading time left and you’re gonna pretend you’re not hiding something in there?’

  ‘Nothing important; I’m not going to pull something like that on you.’

  Schwab shrugged. ‘It’s your neck in the noose.’

  ‘I know.’ Conor stared out at the dreary view of another high-rise, twenty yards away. He wanted out of here, out of this cluttered office with its lousy view, and its empty coffee machine, and this old friend of his who had grown so goddamn self-righteous.

  He wanted to tell Schwab that Bendix Schere stank and he should throw the entire application in the trash can, but this was no moment to start burning his bridges. So he forced himself to sit tight, as if this was a normal meeting like any other.

  ‘Conor, what we need to do now is work right through the application and deal with all the points, and then sort this prior art out.’ Schwab removed a bundle from a folder and slipped off the elastic bands holding it together. ‘OK, here’s the first problem – only a small one. The E-coli – you state here in the application and I’ll quote: “Comprising and consisting essentially of …”’ He looked up at Conor quizzically. ‘I’m afraid I’m going to need you to change the wording from comprising and consisting of to just comprising. It’s bad use of language.’

  Conor looked at him in amazement. ‘But what the hell does that have to do with the actual application?’

  Schwab had the grace to look apologetic. ‘Yah, I agree, its a nit-pick. I’m afraid it’s the Group Director’s new peeve – it’s really not worth arguing if you want this to get through quickly.’

  Conor nodded at a row of certificates on the wall. ‘I don’t believe this, Dave. Is that what you got those certificates up there for? Good grammar? You get the Split Infinitive Award of the Month or something?’

  Schwab grinned and Conor saw a trace of his old friend come through. ‘You gonna spend the rest of your life in this place?’ he asked him.

  ‘No way – didn’t I tell you over the phone when we spoke – couple of years and I’m outta here. Julie and I are heading out to Oz when she finishes her postdoc.’

  ‘Sure, I forgot.’

  Schwab leaned forward. ‘You’re forgetting a lot of things today, man – you OK? I mean you sure it’s just jet-lag? You look like shit.’

  ‘I’m OK.’

  Schwab looked at him thoughtfully. ‘You want to take care of yourself, Conor. Don’t go overdoing it. These big companies work the ass off bright guys like you. I’ve had patent attorneys break down in tears right in that chair where you’re sitting. Not worth it. Got to take time out to smell the roses, huh?’

  Conor nodded and said nothing.

  ‘Even the biggest bastards in history gave their staff time off, you know. You have to relax sometimes, lighten up. Even the goddamn Medicis gave their henchmen a break.’

  Conor stared back at him, startled. ‘Medicis?’

  ‘Yup – and they were real bastards.’

  ‘I forgot,’ Conor said. ‘You used to be a Renaissance freak.’

  ‘Still am.’

  ‘Tell me something, Dave, did the Medicis have any connection with the pharmaceutical industry?’

  ‘Well, there were plenty of alchemists trying to turn metal into gold and to find cures for disease, but there wasn’t any pharmaceutical industry in the fifteenth century.’ Schwab rolled his tongue around his mouth, looking pensive. ‘Although I guess you could say the Medicis were pretty well up to speed with the medical knowledge of their time.’

  ‘In what way?’

  ‘They used it to their advantage, the way they used everything to their advantage. Like they had a kind of neat trick for keeping their domestics: when new staff first joined, they poisoned them.’

  ‘Come again?’

  ‘Secretly. They gave them a drink laced with a very slow-acting mercury-based poison. Then they gave them the antidote in their food.’

  Conor frowned. ‘Why do that?’

  ‘Simple; you digest mercury and it stays in your system for life, right?’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘So – the combination of chemicals the Medicis gave their staff could never be eradicated from their systems. But it could be contained with an antidote; so long as they took the antidote twice a day, they were fine. But the formula and elements of the antidote were a secret. Ergo the staff could never leave; they needed the antidote, so they were wholly dependent on the Medicis giving it to them. If they left, they would be dead within a few weeks.’

  ‘The Medicis really did that?’

  ‘Yes. It was their way of creating staff loyalty. Has a certain kind of macabre elegance about it, don’t you think?’

  Conor felt a sudden tremor as the realization struck home. ‘Sweet Jesus!’ he exclaimed. ‘They couldn’t do that!’

  ‘They did, Conor – it’s documented.’

  ‘I – I don’t mean the Medicis.’

  Schwab gave him an odd look. ‘What do you mean?’

  Conor glanced down at the floor, unable to continue. �
��I – it – it’s not important,’ he said. ‘Forget it.’ But his brain was busy racing with excitement, reeling with horror, at the enormity of the implications.

  The Medici Trial.

  The words burrowed through his mind.

  Medici Trial.

  How far had Dr Bannerman got with his tests on the Maternox? Had he identified the DNA? Because if he had, and if Conor was right in his very latest assumptions, there was no question that in doing so the scientist had signed his death warrant. And Monty’s, and Wentworth’s, and his own.

  No question at all.

  99

  Wednesday 7 December, 1994

  At ten past five in the evening, Gunn lifted the phone on his desk and punched two keys for a stored number to Maryland. He was answered by a gravelly voice on the third ring.

  ‘McLusky.’

  ‘Good afternoon, Mr McLusky, I was expecting to have heard from you.’

  There was a silence, then the head of the Bendix Schere United States Security Operations said, with a slightly embarrassed laugh, ‘Oh – ha – yeah, Major Gunn, I was just waiting for positive confirmation before disturbing you.’

  ‘It’s after midday – I thought you were dealing with things last night.’ Although the line was secure, Gunn was sometimes guarded in what he said over it.

  ‘That was our plan, but I’m afraid it didn’t work out.’

  ‘Why the hell not?’

  ‘I can’t answer that right now. Seems like he spent the night other than in the hotel – maybe he was visiting a floozie or something.’

  ‘You mean you don’t know?’

  ‘He checked in but he didn’t spend the night in his room.’

  ‘You lost him, is that what you’re trying to tell me?’ Gunn thought about the overweight ex-FBI officer with his walrus moustache and salt-and-pepper hair. He was a good operator, dependable and ruthless when required. It was unusual for him to make any kind of error. But he was nudging sixty; maybe he was starting to slacken off.

  ‘No, we didn’t lose him, Major, I guess he just gave us the run-around for a few hours. We have him under surveillance right now; he’s located in his business meeting and we’ll pick him up when he leaves the building.’

  ‘Good.’

  ‘No change in your instructions, Major Gunn?’

  ‘No. I just want it to look convincing.’

  ‘No problem in that division.’

  ‘You also didn’t come back to me yet on his background.’

  ‘We’re still working on that one. He’s a talented guy, knows how to cover his tracks pretty good. I figured since you’d upgraded us from just identifying him to dispensing with his services, there wasn’t such an urgency on his background.’

  ‘I always like to know who I’m killing, Mr McLusky,’ Gunn said wryly. ‘I consider it to be good clinical practice. And good clinical practice is very important to the company.’

  100

  Washington. Wednesday 7 December, 1994

  ‘This is a breach of regulations, Conor, I don’t know if I can do it.’

  ‘You’ll have it back in a few hours.’

  Dave Schwab shook his head. ‘I’m not comfortable about it.’

  ‘Dave – remember that time I covered for you with Julie? When she rang up wanting you and I told her you were crashed out, like stoned out of your brains, while you were shagging that little thing, what was her name – Hollis Emmerson?’

  ‘That was then and this is now, man. Life’s changed lanes, this is the real world.’

  ‘And nothing counted then because we were all students and you hadn’t taken Julie down the aisle?’

  ‘Yes.’

  Conor stared at his friend. ‘Well, you were sure as hell scared out of your fucking brains you were going to lose her. Now it’s my turn, I’m scared and I need a favour.’

  Schwab looked dubious. ‘I could get into all kinds of trouble over this.’

  ‘Dave – come on; get real, like you just said yourself. This is the Civil Service in the United States of America, they can’t stop you having friends, they can’t hang you over a loan to a pal – one that doesn’t have anything to do with business.’

  ‘They might not see it that way.’

  Conor was beginning to lose his temper. ‘But they’re not ever going to know. Jesus Christ, why the fuck should they?’

  Schwab raised his hands. ‘OK, OK, take it.’

  ‘You’ll call Julie, tell her I’ll be round for the other helmet and leathers?’

  ‘I’ll call her. My leathers are in the cupboard behind you.’ Schwab reached wearily behind him, picked up the crash helmet and handed it to Conor; then he dug in his jacket pocket and tossed over a set of keys. ‘You take the elevator down to the basement and turn right. You’ll see it, a red Suzuki seven-fifty. You ride up the ramp and the doors’ll open automatically.’

  ‘I’ll drop it off at your place later this afternoon.’ Conor took out his wallet. ‘And I’ll even give you thirty bucks for your cab fare – that about cover it?’

  Schwab shook his head vigorously. ‘Oh no, definitely not; that would be a bribe, man. I take that and my ass is grass. Just take the goddamn bike and get out of my rug, do what you have to do.’

  Conor stood up. ‘Always knew you were one of the good guys, Schwab. One day you might even find a certificate on the wall from little ole me.’

  The bar in the departure lounge at Dulles Airport was crowded and at first, as Conor approached with Schwab’s crash helmet under his arm, he thought Monty had not yet arrived. Then he saw her shock of blonde hair, and his heart jumped. She was sitting, bundled up in her mackintosh, reading a magazine, her small suitcase on the floor beside her.

  She noticed him when he was a few feet away, looked up distractedly for a moment, then her face broke into a smile that he wanted to hold in his memory for ever.

  He plonked the helmet down on her case and they hugged each other tightly, clinging as if terrified some external force was going to rip them apart. Monty pressed her lips to his and they kissed fiercely for a long time before they spoke.

  ‘Conor,’ she said, breathlessly. ‘You’re here, you’re OK!’

  In response he expressed an identical concern for her. ‘God, I’ve been so worried about you. You made it!’

  She pressed her face against the soft leather of Schwab’s biking gear. ‘You look cool in this – I didn’t know you were a closet Hell’s Angel.’

  He smiled, curling his arms around her and cradling her. ‘First time I’ve ridden a Suzuki in about fifteen years.’ He looked around as he spoke, but there were far too many bodies for him to be able to single out the one that might be watching them. He knew for sure he had not been tailed from the Patent Office. ‘No news on your father – or Wentworth?’

  ‘No.’

  He kissed her. ‘Let’s move outta here, we’ll talk later.’ He tucked Schwab’s crash helmet back under his arm, and was stooping to pick up her suitcase when she took a step back suddenly and he saw her expression change; her eyes turning fiery.

  ‘Where are we going, Conor?’

  ‘A place we’ll be safe, and where there’s someone who can maybe find your dad.’

  ‘Why the mystery?’

  He smiled awkwardly, taken aback. ‘There’s no mystery.’

  ‘You told me a few days ago that you would explain everything in Washington. Well, I’m here,’ she said defiantly. ‘And I want the explanations now. Right now.’

  ‘Monty, there’s no big deal I’m hiding from you, I promise. It’s just –’ He sighed. ‘I guess the truth is just so fantastic that maybe I wasn’t sure myself – nor was I sure that you’d believe me if I tried to explain it to you.’

  ‘Try me,’ she said. ‘Tell me what we’re up against.’

  ‘Follow me,’ he responded, ‘and you got yourself a deal.’

  101

  Conor swung the motorbike off the Beltway, and on to a wide, quiet road through lush suburban coun
tryside, being careful to keep within the speed limits. He saw nothing following him in his mirrors.

  Despite everything, he was enjoying the exhilaration of the ride and the snug grip of Monty’s hands round his waist, and felt a nostalgic yearning to own a machine like this again. Maybe when all this evil was over he would buy one, he thought wistfully, and take her on a long trip somewhere warm and safe. If they were still alive and if there ever was a safe place for them again.

  He turned left at an intersection and accelerated, his eyes fixed now on the building looming up about half a mile ahead, a massive, bland high-rise. A couple of hundred yards short of it, he pulled into the kerb then killed the engine, jamming his feet firmly on the ground against the enormous swaying deadweight of the Suzuki, and pushed up his vizor.

  Monty climbed off, relieved that her suitcase, perilously strapped to the top of the pannier, was still there, removed her helmet and shook out her hair, then stomped her feet on the ground. She was bitterly cold despite Julie Schwab’s fleece-lined leathers which she was wearing over her own clothes.

  She followed Conor’s gaze and examined the high-rise right in front of them. It was a muddy-brown colour and appeared, at first sight, to be two buildings, one behind the other; but as she looked harder she could see it had been designed in two tiers, the far one several storeys higher than the one which faced them. Its sheer size gave it an air of importance, but Monty thought, in spite of that, it looked ugly and charmless. A gaggle of protesters, gathered outside the main entrance, suddenly broke into a chant as a male figure emerged and crossed the quiet street to a cab rank.

  Conor seemed strangely silent.

  ‘What is this place?’ she asked.