Cry of the Needle

by Radford, Roger

  ‘You know, the bizarre symptoms we suffer have been compared to a burglar alarm that goes off for nothing. The injured nerve bombards the brain with repetitive painful impulses. Because our brain just can’t ignore the impulses any better than our ears can stop listening to the shrill of the alarm, nerve pain will remind itself as long as it hasn’t been switched off. In our case, of course, the pain becomes chronic. The wiring starts to go haywire. In response to the damaged nerve fibres, new ones sprout out all over the place, but they keep making the wrong connections. It’s like a spaghetti junction with all the roads making wrong connections. What this means for us is that practically anything we do develops into an attack of pain.’

  The Irishman was silent for a few seconds, then, ‘Magda?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘What about suffering for a cause?’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘What do you think about the IRA?’

  ‘I think,’ she answered unhesitatingly, ‘that after years of war, peace is the better option.’

  ‘Did you think their cause was just?’

  ‘Maybe, but not the manner in which they expressed it. I can understand loyalty to a cause, but not when it makes innocent people suffer.’

  ‘Loyalty is the principle that guides my life, Magda. I think those who are disloyal to a cause are the scum of the earth.’

  Magda was surprised by his sudden vehemence, but did not respond.

  ‘You know, I was a Catholic living in a sea of Protestant bigotry,’ he went on. ‘You don’t know what it’s like to live as a minority.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ she said with feigned indignation. She was eager to lighten the conversation, ‘I’m a down-at-heel aristocrat. If that isn’t a minority, then I don’t know what is.’

  Kelly laughed. He realised that he was being too open, and he was thankful that she had steered the discussion into humour. He leaned over and pressed his lips against hers. Magda von Esterhazy would never divert him from his course, and there was no doubt that she might be hurt in the process.

  And it was tearing him apart.

  CHAPTER 13

  ‘Fuck Derek Sutton,’ screamed Kevin Kinloss like an off-key bagpipe. His wrath caused the Scotsman’s angular features to pull tight until he resembled a Highland Goshawk that had just dropped its field mouse lunch in mid-flight. Kinloss then turned on his unfortunate minion with a steely-eyed glare that would have unsettled William Wallace. ‘What d’ya mean, you found nothing, man. I know for sure he was working on a new formula.’

  Although no Braveheart, Michael Bannister was enjoying a newfound self-assurance, the confidence of a man who knew he held an ace up his sleeve. ‘Then you shouldn’t have fired him,’ he said with unusual bravado.

  Kinloss glared at Bannister with undisguised contempt. The talentless interim director of science was of little use to him now, but the Scotsman knew Klein would take a more lenient view. His soon-to-be erstwhile partner was just too damn soft when it came to hiring and firing. When Jack Proctor eventually took over the company, Bannister would rapidly find himself the star of a downsizing operation.

  ‘So, Michael, d’ya think you’re capable of carrying the day with our new patch?’

  Bannister smiled wanly at the sarcasm in Kinloss’s voice. ‘I’m sure of it, Kevin. I’ve been working on a few ideas of my own, and I believe I can crack the present problems.’

  ‘I’ve got the greatest faith in you, Michael,’ said Kinloss with thinly-disguised sarcasm. He knew the dick brain couldn’t crack an egg with a sledgehammer.

  ‘I won’t disappoint you,’ said Bannister, who then wheeled around and left the Scotsman’s office with as confident a stride as he could muster.

  Damn them all, thought Kinloss. There was no proof that Sutton had taken his work in progress home with him. If he had done so, then theoretically that belonged to the company, although there was no way he could force the old drunk to divulge anything. It would, however, have been nice to take a little bonus for Jack Proctor when he crossed sides. The chairman of Parados had told him to be ready to act at a moment’s notice. Timing was everything, and the Scotsman knew that all hell was about to break loose sooner rather than later.

  ‘Something’s afoot,’ said Fiona Harrington. ‘I had lunch with Sharon Proctor today, and she’s more uptight than I’ve ever seen her.’

  Tring smiled. ‘The plot thickens,’ he said mockingly. ‘She must have a lot to hide.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I thought I’d save it all for a bedside story.’

  ‘No give, no bed, Mister Tring.’

  The professor laughed heartily, and then looked around the restaurant self-consciously. ‘Shush,’ he whispered, ‘you don’t want anyone to hear what a brazen little vixen you are.’

  ‘Jonathan,’ she said with a glare, ‘if you don’t tell me this minute, I’ll stand on this table and strip naked.’

  He laughed again. ‘Promises, promises.’

  Only when Fiona started to undo the top buttons of her blouse did Tring realise his lover meant every word. ‘Hey, hold on, girl, that’s for my eyes only.’ Without further ado, the scientist recounted his meeting with Sharon Proctor, interrupting it only for mouthfuls of a particularly succulent fillet mignon.

  Fiona Harrington, her reporter’s instincts rising to the fore, slammed her hand on the table. ‘I knew something wasn’t kosher. So Sharon’s worried that when the dirty tricks start, Abe Klein might have something up his sleeve.’

  ‘Klein might not have, but someone who works, or worked, at KleinKinloss might.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  Tring ran his fingers through his thick wavy hair and scratched the back of his head. Conspiracy did not weigh easily with him, and yet he felt committed to both Fiona and to her cause. After a short pause, he told her about his conversation with Harold Spencer.

  ‘I’ve also got a gut feeling that this unknown guy could be the key,’ said Fiona, unable to disguise the excitement in her voice, ‘but how on earth do we find out who he is? There must be more than three hundred employees at KleinKinloss, and who knows which one of them might have been a homosexual partner of Locke’s. They both seem to have been eager to keep their relationship in the closet.’

  ‘So how do we start?’

  ‘You’ll have to ask Klein,’ she replied baldly.

  ‘Just like that?’

  ‘He’s your best friend.’

  Tring shifted uncomfortably. ‘I find it awkward bringing up anything to do with our respective companies, considering mine is trying to take over his. It would be unethical. Abe would expect me to be loyal to my employer.’

  ‘All’s fair in love and war, Jonathan. You owe the Proctors nothing.’

  ‘Then I should resign first.’

  Fiona Harrington squirmed. It was her job to be pushy, but not with the man with whom she knew she had fallen in love. He was just too damned altruistic. ‘You can’t resign,’ she squealed. ‘Then they really would smell a rat.’

  ‘Fiona?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘You’re not using me, are you?’ Tring regretted the words as soon as he had uttered them.

  Tears welled in Fiona Harrington’s large hazel eyes and her fresh cheeks flushed with indignation. She stayed silent though, if only because her emotions were trapped. She was angry, but at the same time she could understand why he might think of her in such a way. Everything she had done up to now bore the taint of subterfuge, everything except her feelings for the scientist.

  ‘I-I’m sorry, Fiona,’ he stuttered.

  ‘No, it’s okay,’ she said with a smile. ‘In a way, I’m glad you’d make a lousy spy.’

  ‘Then you’ll give me time to think it over?’

  ‘How long will you need?’

  ‘A couple of days.’

  ‘What’s a couple of days between friends,’ she said coyly.

  ‘I think it might seem like a lifetime to an eager
beaver reporter like yourself.’ Tring then laughed, thankful that a possible crisis in their relationship had been averted.

  What neither of them knew was that events at the London Stock Exchange were about to test relationships to the limit.

  The shop, apart from its name, was as nondescript as the parade in which it stood. Double-fronted and with mirrored glass that shielded it from prying eyes, I-Spy was a haven for all items connected to the art of surveillance. For art it most certainly was, and in the eyes of one particular practitioner, it was as good a toy store as he was likely to find anywhere.

  Kieran Kelly, dressed in navy-blue pinstripes and looking every much the executive with industrial espionage high on his agenda, inspected himself in the mirrored door. He rearranged his tie slightly, knowing full well that he was being watched from within, and then rang the doorbell. It seemed an age before the door opened and a dapper man in his early forties beckoned him to enter. The man sported unfashionable horn-rimmed glasses, greasy black hair and a pencil-thin moustache. These combined to give him the anachronistic appearance of a throwback to the sixties and the world of Harry Palmer.

  ‘Good morning, sir,’ said the salesman, ‘and how may we help you.’

  The Irishman looked around the salon. On a shelf to his left stood three CCTV monitors. Below them was a counter that was in effect a glass cabinet containing items with which any self-respecting spy would arm himself. Kelly’s shopping list was in his head. He knew the items he wanted. ‘Good morning,’ he replied confidently, ‘I’m in charge of security at my company, and we’re moving premises. We need to get our new security up and running.’

  ‘Of course, sir, I’m sure we can find something to suit your needs. Are you looking for transmitting or hard-wired devices?’

  ‘Hard-wired,’ the Irishman replied. Transmitters could be detected and then disabled. He wanted to have eyes and ears at all times.

  ‘We have some excellent CCTV cameras to go with the monitors you can see on the top shelf.

  ‘I’m more interested in your pinholes. Can you show me your self- focusing ones?’

  ‘Of course, sir,’ said the throwback, adding obsequiously, ‘I see you have an excellent knowledge of our trade.’ He then turned to open a drawer and withdrew a black camera the size of a postage stamp and with wires attached.

  Kelly played the device through his fingers. ‘I’ll take twelve,’ he said coldly. The cameras were Japanese and had infrared motion sensors adjustable to twenty-five metres. ‘Give me two toggles as well as those three monitors.

  The salesman beamed. ‘Three screens into quadrants. Good idea.’

  ‘I’d also like four radio mikes with audio threshold trips, a joystick and an A/V mixer.’ Kelly knew that the microphones would work only if background noise was ambient. Rustling leaves in a high wind would make them useless. Still, as he wasn’t paying for anything, the more toys the better.

  The salesman arranged everything on the counter and then eagerly began totting up while the Irishman looked on with apparent indifference. ‘That’ll be seven thousand two hundred and thirty pounds, please, sir, including VAT. How would sir like to pay?’

  ‘Amex Gold card,’ said Kelly flatly.

  ‘That’ll do nicely, sir.’

  ‘Perhaps you’d like to help me load up the monitors.’

  The salesman looked down at the card. ‘Of course, er, Mr Flynn.’

  Within a few moments the transaction had been completed and the goods were being neatly stowed in the rear of a Range Rover. Kelly was under no illusion that both he and the car were being captured on the shop’s CCTV, but this did not bother him in the slightest. He had stolen the vehicle ten minutes earlier, and within a few more minutes he would transfer the goods to his own car that was parked in a quiet corner of a nearby run-down industrial estate. As for the Gold card, they were two-a-penny if one knew the right people.

  ‘The motherfucking Scotch bastard,’ seethed Abe Klein and slammed down the phone. His broker had been the first to alert him of events that were rocking the pharmaceutical sector of the London Stock Exchange. Soon the world and its neighbour would be contacting him for a quote. The press would have a field day. He was just about to dial his partner’s extension when there came a knock at the door.

  ‘Who is it?’ he screamed, his churning anger almost uncontrollable.

  The door opened and the American’s nemesis stood before him with a grin that would have curled the whiskers of a Cheshire cat.

  ‘Don’t tell me you didn’t expect something like this, Abe,’ said Kinloss smugly. ‘I’ve been telling you for weeks to accept Proctor’s approaches.’

  ‘You asshole.’ Klein was boiling, his saucer-like brown eyes bulging from beneath his shining pate. ‘Proctor must have offered you a pretty penny for you to dump all your shares.’

  The Scotsman was unfazed by the outburst of his Bilkoesque former partner. ‘That’s for me to tell, and you to find out.’

  Klein stood up behind his desk and tried to make himself appear taller to the lanky Scotsman. ‘I oughta wipe that fucking supercilious grin off your face.’

  ‘You don’t frighten me, Klein.’ It was now a case of surnames only.

  ‘Don’t you ever heard of loyalty, you Scotch sonofabitch.’

  ‘Scots,’ Kinloss corrected. This time it was his turn to seethe with indignation. ‘Don’t speak to me about loyalty. While you immersed yourself in your laboratory, I was the one who kept this company afloat. If it wasn’t for me massaging the investors, you would have gone under ages ago.’

  The American leaned forward onto his desk and stared squarely at Kinloss. ‘I’ll still not sell out to that ugly fucking bulldog.’

  ‘You’re pissing in the wind, Klein. The institutions won’t let you hold out for long. They’ve seen their investment drop forty per cent in minutes. The only way they can recover their money and make a premium is if Proctor steps in.’

  ‘You’re a fool, Kinloss. What makes you think Glaxo and the rest of them won’t outbid Parados.’

  The Scotsman smirked but remained silent. Nice try, he thought, but the KleinKinloss profile did not support any bid other than that of Parados.

  ‘You’d better clear your desk and get out,’ said the younger man through gritted teeth. Kinloss, still standing by the door, turned to go, and then halted. ‘To paraphrase you Yanks, science is softball and finance is hardball. The bottom line always wins at the bottom of the ninth inning.’

  ‘Get out,’ said Klein quietly, suddenly deflated by what he knew to be an economic truth.

  The American watched his erstwhile partner leave, and then held his head in his hands. Everything he had worked for was about to be swallowed up. Kinloss just could not see that sometimes the realisation of a dream was more important than money. Yet the boy from Brooklyn knew that finance directors who were not motivated solely by the bottom line were few and far between. It was just that the betrayal had been so crass. He wearily switched on his intercom. ’Maggie, if any members of the media call, just tell them I’ll be issuing a statement at one p.m.’

  ‘Right, Mr Klein,’ said the secretary. ‘By the way, your wife said to ring home as soon as you can, and I’ve got Jonathan Tring on hold. He insists on speaking to you.’

  Abe Klein hesitated. Who knew if his best friend was also an enemy from within. He then quickly dismissed the thought, although he feared that the events of the last few minutes could drive a wedge between them. He would prefer to believe that Tring would have had nothing to do with Proctor’s plots. A further betrayal would be too much to bear. ‘Put him on,’ the American sighed.

  ‘Hello, Abe.’

  ‘Yes, Jonathan,’ he answered, sensing the coolness in his own voice.

  ‘I’m calling from home,’ Tring said gravely. ‘My girl friend’s a reporter and she just rang me with the news. Abe, I want you to know that I didn’t know anything about this.’

  Klein hesitated, then, ‘I believe you, Jonathan
, but I may soon find myself sojourning with the ladies of the borscht belt in a Miami Beach advanced age recreational facility.’

  Tring laughed, thankful that his friend still retained his indomitable Jewish humour. ‘They won’t be putting you out to grass just yet, Abe.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I need to see you. I know all the shit’s starting to hit the fan and I want to help.’

  ‘But you’re pitching for the enemy.’

  ‘Well, to paraphrase the Arabs, Abe, your friend is now your enemy’s enemy.’

  ‘I don’t understand.’

  ‘Is Rachel’s chicken soup still on for Friday night?’

  ‘You know it is.’

  ‘I’ll explain everything then – oh, Abe?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I’d like to bring my girl friend. You’ll like her, especially what she has to say.’

  ‘But you said she was a reporter.’

  ‘She’s on your side, Abe, believe me.’

  Normally Abe Klein would have burrowed away until his intrigue had been satisfied. But this time his mind was too full of the consequences of his partner’s actions. ‘The more the merrier,’ he said. ‘Roll up for the Last Supper.’

  ‘Just one thing you can be sure of,’ said Tring.

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘There’ll be no Judas present.’

  ‘Pity,’ said Klein sneeringly, unaware that Tring was alluding to himself. ‘Maybe I should invite that bastard. Chicken soup laced with arsenic. Speciality of the house for that Scotch sonofabitch.’

  ‘Friday night, then,’ said the professor, and replaced his handset, little knowing that it contained yet another of a phalanx of bugs installed on the orders of a pug-faced Yorkshireman who needed to satisfy a pathological urge to spy on everyone and everything.

  When Jack Proctor discovered that his own director of science was intent on betrayal, it neither surprised nor fazed him. Every man had his price, whether that price was in gold or in women. In fact, he reckoned that what appeared at first to be a disadvantage might be turned to his own favour. Fiona Harrington, however, was a different kettle of fish. She was the surprise packet, and he knew he had no control over the little bitch. All that nonsense about being an IT sales executive. She was a journalist, and reporters were the scum of the earth, always poking their noses into other people’s business and writing lies. He had debated with himself whether to let his wife in on his discovery, knowing that it would hurt Sharon more than anything to know the truth about her so-called friend. On the other hand, if there was one person who could wheedle information out of anyone, it was his very own Southern belle.