Gone Underground

by Phil Brett

  And with that, people left.

  Except Victoria Cole and yours truly.

  14. Oenothera biennis

  Joseph and Kemal had said their fond farewells, promising to keep in touch with Victoria, and had given me a perfunctory goodbye nod. I rang Youssef Ali. Mother Kalder had brought up no slouch.

  Guessing who I was ringing, Ms Popular perched on a desk opposite and waited to witness my magic and hear what comrade Ali had to say.

  On the fourth ring, he answered. It was on 2D visual. Judging from the sound of water running, not to mention the clanking cutlery, the sight of taps and plate racks, plus the fact that he was wearing yellow rubber gloves and was holding a dessert spoon, I took a wild guess that he was doing the washing up after the evening meal. Mum Kalder had also not neglected to teach her son analytical skills. Alternatively, Ali was frequenting some specialist sex club.

  He answered with a weary voice. Not a sex club then. He gave an aside to an unseen person, who had obviously asked an unheard question. ‘Peter Kalder. It’ll be about Olivia.’

  Not knowing really what that might signify, I went straight to the reason for my call, ‘We’ve been looking into Olivia’s movements over the last few days and were at the Thames Estuary Wind Turbine Array . . .’

  I paused to see his reaction.

  Which was to put down the spoon. The gloves stayed on. Then he spoke. ‘You were there? I had no idea. Sounded terrible.’ His voice was devoid of any emphasis or emotion. ‘It’s all over the news. Some of the discussion groups are linking it with the attack on the Hackney East underground yesterday.’

  An unseen voice spoke in the background. Whatever they had said, it caused him to veer off the subject of the wind farm attack. ‘Don’t know if you heard, but another engineer died from the Hackney. Bastards. Total F1 bastards.’ Although the words conveyed anger and contempt, his tone didn't. It remained flat. ‘They had been hopeful about his chances but his injuries were just too sincere. He was a party member—’

  Again, the mystery voice could be heard muffled against your standard kitchen sounds. I faintly recognized the voice as belonging to Ali’s partner, whom I’d met on a few occasions.

  Ali responded to whatever had been said. ‘Yeah, Pete. You might know him – Thierry Walsh, party member. You'll know him because of his name. His middle name’s Henry. His parents named him after Thierry Henry, the football player. His parents are Arsenal mad, hence the name. Poor sod. Must class as child abuse.’

  Even his attempt at banter sounded tired. Ali was feeling the loss of Olivia keenly, because both he and his boyfriend were fanatical Spurs fans, so normally you'd expect a good round or two of banter over footie. Grief weighed down his voice, killing any emphasis whatsoever. Or at least sounded as if did. It could be real; it sounded it. Then again, it could just be an act.

  Fact was, that I had no idea who he was talking about, illustrious name or not. I decided not to point this out to Ali and just let him carry on. Moving on from names, he embarked on a lengthy and rambling monologue over the issue of media coverage. Why he was doing this, I wasn't sure. Did he think I had rung up for a cosy chat on the state of the nation?

  He paused. Remembering that I was still there and where I had said I had been, he muttered, ‘Must have been awful. You must be shaken.’

  Now, if you couldn't enjoy the limelight when you'd had machine guns firing at you, then when could you? So, I described in detail our experience, including how we had stopped them. I made it 'we', although I had done very little. I made sure to avoid looking at Victoria whilst I did so.

  Feeling that the intros were over, I dragged us back to the subject of the call. ‘Anyway, whilst we were there, we found out that Olivia had been there at the wind farm, doing her 'rooted in the community' thing and whilst she was there she rang you..’

  ‘You think it’s linked?’

  Momentarily, I lost my thread. ‘Oh, the attack with her murder? Er, no, not really, not directly, but we’ve set up the CIMC, and we’re—’

  ‘Yes, I heard. So what do you think is the reason?’ It was odd being interrupted by someone who looked and sounded like a depressed robot. It didn’t seem to fit – you got interrupted by hyper enthusiasm, not melancholy. His random thoughts were making it difficult to pin him down. He didn’t sound like someone hiding another life. He sounded like someone mourning one that had been lost. But then, it might all be a facade. What I had noticed was that my point that Olivia had tried to ring him had been forgotten about, so I asked him again.

  It didn’t seem put him off. Perhaps, he’d given himself enough time to think of an answer.

  ‘I didn't speak to her,” he said. ‘I saw she'd rang. Actually, she tried to ring me on several occasions, but I was busy myself, planning for the conference, so couldn’t get back to her . . .’ His voice trailed off into a haze of regret for a missed opportunity to help a dear friend. Or maybe that was just the effect it was supposed to have. ‘If I'd gotten back to her, it might not have happened. Oh, Olivia. Poor Ol.’

  ‘So, you had no contact with her, by any means, over the four days prior her death?’

  ‘No, none. Like I said, I’ve been snowed under by preparing for the conference.’ He paused and closed his eyes. ‘I should have got back to her.’

  ‘You're involved in the International Environment Conference as well?’ I said – a statement destined to be a contender for the most bleeding obvious one of the year.

  ‘Yeah. A good part of it is going to be devoted to the ability of the world to provide clean and safe water for its population.’

  ‘I know you two were very close. How often did you keep in touch?’

  For the first time, emotion showed, and there was an ever so slight flinch of his head and twitch of his jaw upwards. For a fraction of a second, his face decreased in circumference. Behind him, I saw a large, strong hand rest on his shoulder. His head tilted to meet it, which seemed to have the desired effect. Choosing his words carefully, he nodded and replied, ‘Every day. She was like a sister to me. I know that sounds cheesy, but it’s true, and not just in the political sense. But this conference is seen as a big thing. Not only for the obvious reason of slowing down global warming, but also to try and help ease our isolation. We’ve even managed to get delegations from countries that are boycotting us. I was just too busy to talk to her.’

  ‘Have you still got her message?’

  He gave a strange look. ‘No.’

  ‘Why not?’ I asked, thinking it odd that one from such close friend hadn’t been saved. Surely, he would have done so until he had had a chance to reply. And with her passing, I would have thought that he would have kept it for sentimental reasons.

  In front of me, I saw Cole nod, impressed at the question. Praise indeed. I might even be getting a certificate soon.

  His answer surprised me. ‘I did. I checked after seeing you. The shock of the news had made me clean forget that she’d tried to contact me . . .’

  So that was my next star question answered then.

  ‘The thing is, when I went to listen to it, I found that it had gone.’

  ‘Gone?’

  ‘Gone. Erased. Not by me. Someone else.’

  ‘Why couldn't it have been you?’

  ‘Pete, they were all gone. Every single message from her, across all medias, has been erased. It was like Olivia had never spoken to me. I was going to tell you—’

  ‘When?’

  ‘When were they erased or when was I going to tell you?’

  ‘Both!’ I said, feeling somewhat frustrated that such a thing, if true, wouldn’t be something he had thought should be communicated as soon as possible.

  My tone put him on the defensive, ‘I was going to contact you tonight but, Pete, it’s mad at the moment. I only found out they’d all been erased this morning. It really is hard at the moment. It’s 24/7.’

  I paused, thinking whether Glen Bale or Asher Joseph might be able to use their IT wizardry to
recover them. I reckoned not. It was pretty obvious to me that this would be MI5's doing, and they'd not be sloppy enough to allow that.

  Suddenly, his expression changed. We weren’t talking a party face or guffaws of laughter, but it did appear marginally more positive. ‘Didn't she try yours as well, babes?’

  I saw the hand leave his shoulder and heard the man in question leave, saying that it was in the lounge.

  ‘Did Nevin speak to her?’ I asked.

  ‘No, no, he was asleep. He was on shifts then. He just said she’d rung.’

  I was prevented from saying anything more when Nevin returned and thrust the phone into Ali’s still gloved, hands. I wondered if the fact that they hadn’t been removed was any type of metaphor of how he saw me. A virus, maybe?

  Taking his partner’s phone, he pressed send. A 3D image of Olivia Harrison appeared to the right of my screen, between Cole and me. She was dressed in a charcoal trouser suit and black shirt. Her hair was tied back in plaits. She looked like she was standing next to a large, shiny, silver surface. The date at the bottom indicated that it was Tuesday. Just a day before she was killed.

  ‘Nev, hi. Sorry. Yeah, how are you? Look, I’ve been trying to get hold of Youssef for days. I know he’s up to his neck with stuff, but I need to talk to him. I been finding out some very strange things, and I really mean REALLY strange. I need to talk to him. Be a mate and tell him to give me a ring.’

  She was calm but determined. There was a definite look on her face. A look that could only described as being worried. Very worried.

  ‘He needs to get back to me ASAP. I don’t want to talk too much over the phone, and the net's no better; it has to be face to face. We need to arrange to meet. Look, I’m going to see someone who I believe can fill in the missing part of a puzzle I’ve been looking into, and then I have to speak to Youssef. Wednesday afternoon would be good for me to meet up.’ She paused, thinking, and then as much to herself as to him, muttered, ‘Cos’ both me and him need to have a word with Jackie about this.’

  She switched off.

  My mind went buzzing.

  ‘Any idea what she wanted to talk to you about?’ I asked, ignoring the bee in my head.

  ‘None.’

  ‘You sure?’

  His jaw dropped a fraction.

  I didn’t have time to act as nurse maid. ‘You can’t think of anything?’

  ‘No, not a thing.’

  ‘And you didn’t know that she was going to be at Battersea that morning?’

  For a minute, the pain on his face was joined by puzzlement. ‘No, why? I hadn’t spoken to her for days—’

  ‘Days? When exactly was the last time you had any contact with her?’

  He fingered one of his gloves.

  ‘Er, I guess, it was a week ago, at the NWC meeting about future power sources. You must remember: there were guest speakers from Portugal, about the revolutionary situation in their country.’

  I didn’t. I was probably having sessions with Dr Brakus. That was my life. Not revolutionary situations. ‘Did you talk?’

  ‘Yes, we had a chat during one of the breaks. We shared a foul tasting tea and a cheese sandwich which tasted like soggy cardboard.’

  Ignoring the temptation to explore the catering at the governing body of the workers’ state, I asked, ‘About what?’ I wasn’t even bothering to maintain my usual sensitive, refined politeness. I demanded answers.

  He fiddled a bit more. ‘Er, I don’t know. It wasn’t anything exciting. She was looking into how we could phase out the environmentally unfriendly energy production; you know: oil, fracking, nuclear and the like. She didn’t go into any details. Just standard stuff.’

  ‘What precisely did she say?’

  Now clearly flustered, he made a great show of racking his brains, before coming out with pretty uninteresting facts about the power industry.

  ‘And you never spoke again?’

  His voice was breaking. ‘N . . . no-o. That . . . was . . . the last time.’

  ‘And she didn’t mention what she might have found out which was bothering her? You told us when we spoke to you that she had previously mentioned ‘moles’. She didn’t mention it then?’

  ‘No, it was just about her job. She made no mention of security agents.’

  I didn’t believe him. For weeks she talks about MI5 infiltration, then she quietly goes back to how we are going to keep the light bulbs on? It didn’t make sense.

  He kept to his story though. It was obvious that I wasn’t going to get any further, so I thanked him and abruptly ended the call.

  I wanted to know what Victoria thought. ‘If what Ali says is true, then Olivia considered visiting the sub-station vitally important. Someone else certainly thought it important and killed her immediately afterwards. It wasn’t just your common or garden variety work-related visit then. Who is supposed to be looking into that?’

  Cole replied, ‘Jack Foxton, as he's from the area. But maybe we should go ourselves, if it’s it that important?’

  ‘Could be. Let’s finish these calls and think about it.’

  Cole agreed and made her next one. For a few minutes, I just sat there thinking about what Ali had just said. He claimed that all the communications between him and Olivia had been erased. If that was true, and it was a big IF, then it was obvious that the security services had hacked in and wiped all the history of communications. But they weren’t that clever; they hadn’t reckoned on Nevin receiving a message. But were they really that dumb not to have thought about his boyfriend?

  There were plenty of questions which needed to be answered. The obvious being why she had been murdered. Bale’s theory was that she was the latest cadre to be murdered by the forces of reaction trying to weaken the leadership. But something in me doubted that. All the cloak-and-dagger stuff of the missing last days indicated something else. I was sure that she had found out about something or someone. But then the same questions came thick and fast. Like, for starters, what had she been doing for the two days preceding her murder?

  Urgency hung in the air like a storm about to strike. Neither of us spoke about what Ali had said. We didn’t need to. The obvious thing to do was to chase the numbers we did know: the people Olivia had rung whilst at the wind farm. That would at least fill in some of the blanks.

  We shared the list. For the next three hours, I rang, got through, was put on hold, diverted and given other numbers. Some were at work, but most weren’t. Three were eating, two drinking and two at meetings. One I couldn’t reach. There was a host of technicians, engineers and admin staff from the multitude of power industries. It was very detailed, important to energy creation, and as dull as cold, stagnant dishwater with the leftovers of a salad floating in it. None of it seemed to give any clues as to anything of worth.

  Olivia had been checking the latest data related to the quantity of power each sector produced. Politically, they were a varied bunch and, in personalities, an odd and crazy patchwork. I had hoped to have a full picture of the murky espionage world she had been investigating. But rather than ascertaining a network of spies, I had received a wad of info on bloody power production. There didn't appear to be anything remotely murky about the calls she had made. Not even a touch of sediment. Hopefully, my final call would be more useful than the others. I had tried it before; indeed, it had been the first I had made for the simple reason that it had been the last one Olivia had made before she had left the wind farm. However, there had been no reply or answering service, so I tried again with fingers crossed.

  They must be magic fingers, because this time it was answered by face beaming with a smile. ‘Yeah, hi.’

  ‘Janet Kovac?’

  ‘Yeah, how can I help you?’

  Now that was a question. She radiated bonhomie, not in the slightest put out by the call. Detecting a faint American accent, I wondered if good humour was now genetically programmed into our cousins. She was probably in her mid to late forties, shoulder length hai
r and had sparkling eyes from behind glasses. Not having an official title, I felt free to create my own. ‘My name’s Pete Kalder. I’ve been assigned as special investigator by the NWC and Battersea Workers Council to look into the murder of Olivia Harrison. I’m accountable and answerable to them and directly to Jackie Payne. I’d like to ask you a few questions.’

  The electronic ID, which Bale had given us, flashed up. She barely gave it a glance, ‘Okay.’ She smiled. ‘Sure, of course. I was really sorry to hear about her passing. I’ve met her a few times and she seemed a genuine woman.’

  I refrained from asking what a fake one might be like. ‘Thank you, and yes, she was. First off, can you tell me exactly where you work and what you do?’

  It was the question I had led with all evening and rather than get the reply, “Oh I’m a hired assassin”, the replies had been fancy titles which basically boiled down to being technicians and engineers. This time, alas, was no different.

  ‘Yeah, sure. I’m the Flow, Proppants and Fracturing Monitoring Tech at the Shale Gas Extraction Plant at South Downs.’

  Obviously seeing my eyes glazing over and the dumb look of incomprehension on my face induced her to explain. ‘My job, I guess, is to make sure that the compound we inject into the rock is at the right pressure and mixture, and also to monitor the flow of the gas outwards. As you'll know, extraction is an aging process and we've had to go deeper and harder, using different chemical compounds, than previously. I check that everything is sound.’

  That I could understand. ‘Comrade Harrison rang you Monday lunchtime. Can you tell me what the call concerned?’

  She thought for a second. ‘She wanted to hear what our latest output was and what it was projected to be for the coming months. I told her it was looking good. I gave her the latest figures. We had a discussion about them. She seemed fairly happy. She then asked about the mood of the workforce. I told her that, remarkably, considering the Party's attitude to the process, it was positive. Staffing levels are good, with very low skiving rates. Absenteeism is virtually nil.’