by Ken McClure
‘Merryman are being asked to step up vaccine production, but it could well be too late.’
Macmillan nodded. ‘We’re always a bit too late in this country. It’s a way of life… but when it comes to locking stable doors after the horse has bolted we have the most secure doors in the world.’
Steven was a little disturbed at hearing Macmillan sound so cynical. It was unlike him. ‘MI5 are pretty sure the would-be attackers are “home-grown”, to use their word.’
‘So the disaffected of Leicester or Birmingham are seeking to wipe out the country they were born in… ye gods.’ Macmillan looked Steven straight in the eye. ‘Strikes me we’re going to need all the good people we’ve got. I take it you will stay on at Sci-Med until… such times?’
Steven nodded.
‘I suppose in the light of what you’ve just told me this pales into insignificance, but what’s been happening with your investigation?’
‘Everything’s pointing to Carlisle and his pals being involved in mass murder back in the early nineties.’
Macmillan’s eyelids shot up.
‘They were killing off people who were costing society a lot of money.’
‘A population cull?’
‘That’s what it looks like, but I don’t know how they were doing it. Nothing was ever found in any of the bodies subjected to PM examination. Highly dependent people just conveniently died after being treated in the Northern Health Scheme area.’
‘But they must have died of something.’
‘Natural causes.’
‘Which means what?’
Steven narrowed his eyes as he considered the question. He decided not to bring up Jean Roberts’s suggestion of an unknown toxin. ‘No,’ he said slowly, ‘they died of what they were expected to die of. They all had conditions that required treatment by either their GP or College Hospital… and they were all prescribed appropriate medication
…’
‘But they still died of their condition, so maybe…’
‘They weren’t treated at all,’ Steven finished.
Macmillan nodded. ‘They were culling the population by denying treatment to those who were perceived to be a drain on resources. So the question is, how did they manage to withhold treatment without anyone noticing?’
‘That’s where French’s computer expertise must have come in,’ said Steven. ‘He must have come up with a program that would take into account the age and medical records of the patients. If you were on the wrong side of the line — too old, long-term sick, increasingly infirm, a drug addict or suffering from an incurable condition — the computer decided you got nothing.’
‘And that’s where Schreiber’s pharmacy would come into its own. They must have come up with drug packaging that looked like the real thing but held pills or capsules that contained nothing but… sugar or chalk, useless placebos.’
‘It was that simple,’ said Steven with a final shake of the head. He exchanged a wry smile with Macmillan, a pleasing moment for both men, who recognised that they were still a good team and, more important, would continue to be. Nothing had changed as a legacy of Macmillan’s illness.
‘But we’ve no proof,’ said Macmillan.
The men knew each other well enough for Macmillan to interpret Steven’s look as comment about the age of the crime and the fact that the perpetrators were all dead, not to mention the new horror they were now facing. ‘You should still carry on,’ he said. ‘I think we owe it to the people who died. Not least the journalist and the doctor who worked out what the bastards were up to.’
Steven nodded.
‘Besides, it’ll take our minds off what we have to look forward to. God help us all.’
Steven said, ‘Schreiber’s long dead, but French was alive and well right up until the meeting in Paris. If they were planning to reintroduce the scheme, the software must be around, probably in the Deltasoft offices.’
‘A raid?’
‘A raid,’ agreed Steven.
‘You’ll have to clear it with the Home Secretary. French was a powerful man, a stalwart of the community and a big donor to the party.’
‘You don’t think…’ began Steven hesitantly.
‘Perish the thought,’ said Macmillan. ‘She’s the Home Secretary.’
Steven resisted the temptation to point out that John Carlisle had been the health secretary, but Macmillan noticed he was biting his tongue. ‘Charlie Malloy is coming to see me tomorrow. I’ll ask him to have everything ready to go the minute you get approval from on high.’
Steven nodded his thanks. ‘Good to have you back, John.’
‘Thank you.’
Steven had anticipated a difficult interview with the Home Secretary. He wasn’t disappointed. The fact that he had been more than forthright at the COBRA meeting didn’t help.
‘If your reputation for success didn’t precede you, Dr Dunbar, I would be tempted to turn down your request and dismiss what you’ve just suggested as being too ridiculous for words. Are you seriously telling me that the government of the day was party to such an outrage?’
‘No, Home Secretary, I’m not. I think the health department back then was infiltrated by others — I’m sorry I can’t be more specific — but John Carlisle, the then secretary of state, was certainly part of the conspiracy, knowingly or otherwise.’
The Home Secretary diverted her gaze for a moment before saying quietly, ‘I think it was “otherwise”.’
‘I’m sorry?’
‘Carlisle called me before he died. His wife and I were friends when we were younger.’
Steven was aware of the pulse in his neck as a long silence ensued.
‘I thought he was just trying to save his own miserable skin — and he was — but he came out with some ridiculous story about having his career ruined by other people when he was health secretary back in the early nineties. Claimed he was stabbed in the back by people he referred to as the Schiller mob, who were pursuing their own agenda.’
‘But he didn’t know what they were up to?’
‘If he did, he didn’t say — and that would have been the time to say it. If ever there was a time to show the strength of your hand… But I thought he was making the whole thing up, so I didn’t probe. Mind you…’
Steven’s eyes opened wide, encouraging the minister to say more.
‘I have heard rumours from time to time about… some faction calling themselves the Schiller Group. But you know what Westminster’s like. Rumours abound.’
‘The Northern Health Scheme wasn’t just the project of a few,’ said Steven. ‘It had powerful backing, not least from those who got John Carlisle elected in the first place and oversaw his rise through the ranks.’
‘Well, it was all a very long time ago — not that that excuses any of it in any way if what you say is true — but I just wonder if this is the right time to be destroying confidence in the government?’
‘Is there ever a right time?’
‘Point taken,’ conceded the Home Secretary with the merest hint of a smile. ‘I will sanction your raid, but I must ask that you be discreet. Our country is by all accounts about to face one of the biggest crises in its history. The population must have trust in their leaders if we’re to get through this.’
‘Understood, Home Secretary.’
Steven returned to the Sci-Med offices and sat thinking for a moment, his hand resting on the telephone. It had been his intention to call Charlie Malloy and give him the go-ahead for a police raid on Deltasoft, but the Home Secretary’s request for discretion was playing on his mind. She was right: this was not the time to unearth a huge scandal involving a past government minister.
A raid on Deltasoft would not in itself do so, but it would certainly attract the attention of the national press who would then see it as their business to find out what it was all about. He took his hand off the telephone while he asked himself a few questions. Would French have kept such sensitive software in the company offices
and labs where others might stumble across it? Deltasoft had grown into a major player, successful and well respected. It was unthinkable that the entire staff would be complicit in some right-wing conspiracy.
French had been a very clever man; he would have worked out that keeping details of his illicit activities in a building full of computer experts in their own right might not be such a good idea. Maybe he kept it under lock and key, or whatever the computerised version of that was these days, but it might be even safer to keep it somewhere else. At home, perhaps?
Steven knew nothing about French’s widow other than that she, like the other relatives of the dead, had not known anything about the Paris meeting. This suggested that she had not been part of the conspiracy. She could, of course, have been lying, but according to the police report she had been utterly shocked when informed about her husband’s death, not only by the death but by the location — she had kept asking what he had been doing there, seemingly fearing that he might have been having an affair. She still could have been acting, thought Steven, but if not, it gave him an idea.
‘All set to go?’ asked Jean when he emerged.
‘Change of plan. I need all you have on Charles French’s wife, and I need the address of the family home.’
‘Right,’ said Jean, taken a little by surprise. Steven had told her of the Home Secretary’s approval for a raid before he’d changed his mind. ‘I have her on the database.’
She brought up the relevant information on her monitor. ‘Here we are. Maxine French, aged forty-seven, parents both GPs in Surrey, a Cambridge graduate like her husband, only in French and Italian, worked as a translator in the early years of their marriage but gave that up to become a lady of leisure when Deltasoft took off.’
‘Did she have anything to do with Deltasoft at any point?’
‘Not that I can see,’ said Jean, checking her screen. ‘She appears to have filled her time with charity work, served on several committees, chair of two of them, a pillar of the community just like her husband. She had a particular interest in underprivileged children. They both had.’
Steven held back a comment about the great and good and their charities. ‘Address?’
‘Clifford Mansions in Kensington. They have the penthouse.’
‘Set up a meeting, will you?’ Almost as an afterthought, Steven asked, ‘Does the name Schiller Group mean anything to you?’
Jean narrowed her eyes. ‘You know, I think it does. I’m sure I came across something recently to do with that but for the life of me I can’t remember what.’
‘Let me know if it comes back to you.’
TWENTY
James Black was last to arrive for the meeting he’d called of the Redwood Park competitions committee — he’d been caught in a traffic jam for twenty minutes.
‘We were beginning to think you’d decided to up sticks and disappear,’ said Toby Langton.
‘Now why would I want to do that?’ replied Black with a forced smile that contrasted with the worried expressions of the others.
‘For God’s sake, Sci-Med have the files from College Hospital. They’re going through them as we speak,’ said Elliot Soames.
‘So much for taking Dunbar out of the game,’ said Rupert Coutts.
‘It wasn’t a serious attempt,’ said Constance Carradine. ‘More of a spur of the moment thing when we heard he was going to search the cellars. An opportunity too good to miss. Anyway, a junkie got the blame. No harm done.’
‘Aren’t we missing the point here? Sci-Med are going to find out exactly what was going on in the north in the early nineties.’
‘They may suspect something was going on but they won’t know what,’ said Black. ‘People died, but that’s what people do, especially sick ones.’
‘I still don’t like it,’ said Soames. ‘They’re not stupid. They just might figure it out.’
‘Even if they do, they’re not going to be able to prove anything after all this time, and even if they could, they’re hardly going to let the press in on it, are they? A coalition government hanging on by its fingertips would be swept away in the resulting storm of indignation, leaving us with the prospect of anarchy. It’s little more than an academic exercise for Sci-Med. They’ll pat each other on the back for working it out and then move on to more relevant matters like the threat that’s hanging over our nation.’
‘Aren’t you overlooking the Paris meeting?’ said Langton.
All eyes turned to him.
‘If Sci-Med are bright enough to work out what the Northern Health Scheme was all about, they might figure out what the purpose of the Paris meeting was too — all the people from the Northern Health Scheme getting together again? They’re bound to suspect that the whole business was about to be repeated.’
‘Let them,’ said Black. ‘If French and co. had had their way, they’d be quite right, but they all died and so did the Northern Health Scheme. Although…’
The others found the pregnant pause unbearable. ‘Although what?’ prompted Langton.
‘I’ve taken steps to provide some “proof” for Sci-Med if they’re clever enough to find it.’
‘Proof of what?’ asked Rupert Coutts.
‘Proof that Charles French and his colleagues were indeed planning a repeat of the Northern Health Scheme. They’ll be well pleased with that.’
‘You’re enjoying this, aren’t you, Mark?’ said Constance with an air of disapproval. ‘It’s not a game. The future of our country depends on our success.’
‘And it’s in good hands,’ said Black. ‘But you’re right. I do enjoy an intellectual challenge.’
‘Frankly, I’d feel happier with Dunbar and his cronies out of the way,’ said Constance.
‘Me too,’ said Soames.
‘Dunbar and Sci-Med are no threat to us,’ insisted Black. ‘Sci-Med are on the verge of clearing up a twenty-year-old puzzle, with all those involved now dead. End of story. If we sanction any kind of action against them, it might signal that either we’re not all dead, or we have something to hide and we think Sci-Med are getting too close. We can do without that kind of attention. Our project is on track and everything is going to plan. All we need do is keep our nerve. All right?’
One by one the others nodded their agreement.
‘Good,’ said Black. ‘I’m told that Sci-Med were present at the COBRA meeting yesterday. I should think events of long ago are the last thing on their minds right now.’
Maxine French smiled as Steven was ushered into a stunning room with glass walls on three sides, all of them affording access to a magnificent roof terrace and breathtaking views beyond. Steven felt as if he had seen that smile before. It was the one that ladies of a certain class and political inclination used to put lesser mortals at their ease.
‘Good of you to see me, Mrs French, and at such short notice. Your tireless charity work is well documented.’
‘One does what one can,’ said Maxine with a self-deprecating smile. ‘But I am intrigued, doctor. What exactly does the Sci-Med Inspectorate do?’
Steven told her briefly.
‘Science and medicine progresses at such a rate these days; I’m sure you must be kept very busy,’ she said. ‘But how exactly can I help?’
Steven was aware of his pulse rate increasing as he prepared to take his gamble. ‘Your husband wasn’t just a brilliant scientist, Mrs French… he also served his country in another capacity…’
‘I knew it!’ exclaimed Maxine with an expression that would have served a lottery winner. ‘Charles was such a patriot. No one ever loved his country more than my husband. That’s why he was in Paris, wasn’t it? He was on secret business on behalf of the nation?’
Steven couldn’t believe his luck. His gambit had worked so well he feared that Maxine was about to break into the national anthem. ‘Yes indeed, Mrs French, Charles was working for the government.’
‘I knew it… I knew it. It all makes sense now.’
‘The thing is…
Charles was holding some material that must not be allowed to fall into the wrong hands. His untimely death means that we aren’t quite sure… where it is. I suppose I was hoping that you might be able to help.’
Maxine walked over to where a painting of an English landscape hung over a rectangular marble fireplace set into the wall and housing living flames over a bed of cobbles. She swung the painting back like a door to reveal a safe, causing Steven to reflect on people’s lack of originality, and to reckon that it would have taken a burglar all of thirty seconds to find and maybe another thirty seconds of threats before Maxine revealed the combination. Not very secure at all.
Maxine, however, was to prove him wrong. For a moment he thought the safe was empty when she opened it, but she removed something small and signalled that Steven should follow her outside to the terrace. He saw that she had a plastic card in her hand as she led the way to a small alcove among the plant pots. There she swung open a small trellis that was apparently on hinges and inserted the card in a hidden slot in the wall. It was swallowed like a bank card and a small screen appeared as a dummy brick facing slid back.
‘Don’t touch it!’ warned Maxine as Steven leaned forward to take a look. Steven recoiled at the panic in her voice. ‘It’s a biometric panel,’ she said, putting her own fingertips on it and holding them there for a few seconds. The panel slid back to reveal the contents of a small safe set into one of the apartment’s concrete support pillars. Maxine retrieved a number of disks in plastic cases and handed them over to Steven. ‘I think these are what you’re looking for.’
‘Thank you, Mrs French,’ said Steven, trying to appear calm. He couldn’t resist asking, ‘What would have happened if I’d touched the screen?’
‘It would have blown your face off, doctor.’
Steven silently reconsidered his earlier critical thoughts about the security arrangements. Even if someone had tortured Maxine to reveal the whereabouts of the disks she could simply have handed over the card, shown her attacker where the safe was and stood well clear.
