by Peter Damon
Michael shrugged. “Nothing can be kept hidden for very long in this day and age,” he agreed. “But perhaps these people, whoever they are, would like to make a bit of money out of it, before the big corporations make it impossible to compete with them,” he pointed out.
“Ah, yes. We understand. We have money, plenty of money. Go talk to your friends, tell them they can all become very rich men and women, if they would only share their knowledge with us first.”
The car stopped and the door was opened.
“Mr Bennett. We like you. We hope you do not end up like your wife, yes?” the Russian murmured as he was allowed out, their contact details tucked into his breast pocket.
Michael took a deep breath as the car returned into the traffic and turned right onto Queen’s Road. He had been dropped off exactly where they had picked him up, but now he was shaking and exhausted, images of the burnt out frame of his car at the front of his mind.
Stopping at the nearest bus stop to sit down, Michael reviewed the brief meeting. His hunger had gone, replaced by a need for a drink.
+++++++++++++++++
Frankie muttered to himself as he closed the bulky overcoat around his wiry frame and walked rapidly up the path to Professor Rolle’s cottage.
The houses along the short street were rich and inviting, their presence making his palm itch. At one time he would have already known their security precautions, right down to the type of locks on their doors and the fastenings on their windows. At another time, he would have known to the pound how much lead was on their roof and guttering. Times change, he reflected, knocking on the door and waiting.
The door opened and the professor beamed out, a hand extended. “You must be Frank Hill,” he said, shaking the slender man’s hand and pulling him into the house. “About time we talked,” he continued, closing the door behind him before offering to take Frank’s coat.
“What, did Michael tell you I would be coming?” Frankie asked as he was led into a warm and cosy kitchen where a short and thin woman worked with compact movements to prepare tea and biscuits for them, softly humming to herself.
“Didn’t need to,” the professor told him, a hand rising to sweep his hair back. “Of course you’d have concerns, and want them verified by others,” he agreed.
“The money has me the most worried,” Frankie admitted as a cup of tea was put in front of him. “Royal Staffordshire,” he noted.
“Oh. Do you collect, Mr Hill?” Mrs Rolle asked, a glow to her cheeks.
“Not me,” he admitted. “My mother though, she were a big collector, and she taught me what to look out for, and what to stay clear of,” he told her. “Now this; this is nice,” he said. “Still got the gold on it,” he nodded, raising it to sip the tea.
“Money?” the professor enquired.
“Yes. I’ve bought vehicles and rented a warehouse,” he explained. “Not doing much work while I’m at this lot, either,” he said.
“So, what do we owe you?” the professor asked.
“Ten grand should see you square, and give you all the vehicles in top condition at the end of it all.”
The professor rose to fetch his tablet while Frankie talked fine porcelain with Claire, examining the various cup and saucer sets that the Rolle’s had and complementing her on her good taste.
Using the tablet, it was an easy matter to access the online banking site, and use the widget they had provided to authorise a bank transfer directly into the company that Frankie had set up.
“Done!” the professor announced. “Anything else?” he asked.
Frank sighed. “This is all going to work, isn’t it?” he asked. “Only, me and my family have put a hell of a lot into this. We’re not going to survive if this doesn’t work,” he pointed out, for the first time voicing his fears.
The professor nodded. “I know Frank. But we’re in exactly the same situation. If this doesn’t work, then every one of us related to the project is going to disappear. So we have to make it work; there are no alternatives.”
Frankie nodded and shook Rolle’s hand before wishing them a good night and hurrying out. He decided he’d just quickly check some of the vehicles at the warehouse; make sure they were airtight. You could never be too careful.
+++++++++++++++++
Herbert returned to the kitchen to sit facing his worried wife, taking her hands in his to grip them in his own.
It’s dangerous, isn’t it?” Claire said, searching his face for the truth. “This project.”
“Michael and Frank are taking the brunt of the risk,” he explained.
“Herbert! You have to promise me that you’ll be safe!” she told him, gripping his hands.
Herbert patted her hand in reassurance. “Why don’t you make a fresh pot of tea,” he suggested.
June 1st
It was shortly after 10am when Sir Richard Phillips telephoned Michael Bennett with the news.
“I’m terribly sorry, Michael. I know how close you both were. Professor Herbert Rolle has been found dead at his home this morning. It looks like a break-in,” he said.
Michael rushed round to the Rolle house, arriving out of breath to find that red police tape had been put across the road and uniformed police were keeping the public back as forensic teams, in their white protective suits, scrutinised the property inside and out. The scene, together with the measured pace of the forensic teams, seemed out of place to Michael’s beating heart and mind-screaming thoughts. He needed to work; he needed to remain factual and analytical, focused on events and not feelings.
He pushed his way through the audience of curious passers-by and held his Press card high to get the nearest policeman’s attention. The uniformed constable pointed him towards a small group of plain clothed police, and Michael hurried over to them, his heart hammering.
“Michael Bennett, Cambridge Chronicle. Can you tell me what happened?” he asked of the group while leaning over the tape to get their attention.
They turned to look towards him, the tall and slender woman with her back to him turning to face him, her eyes showing her sorrow.
“Michael? Hello Michael. It’s Heather; Heather Wilson. Detective Inspector Heather Wilson,” she told him, reminding him of a dark haired student, an inseparable friend of both his and Wendy’s. “I heard you were back in town,” she told him, her eyes studying his worried features.
“Heather!” he gasped, memories flooding back, deepening the sickness he already felt for the loss of Rolle. “Heather, what happened?” he asked.
Heather turned to say something to the other officers, and they strode away leaving her sad eyed in front of him, her hand on his arm as she steered him away from Rolle’s home.
“A break in, I heard,” Michael told her. “Did he surprise a burglar?”
“This wasn’t a burglary,” Heather shook her head. “Do you know what he was working on, Michael? Anything that was confidential or with great commercial applications?” she asked.
Michael shook his head while screaming inside. “Why? What happened Heather?” he asked, almost pleaded.
Heather sighed. “Professor Rolle died from injuries that appear to have been made in order to get information from him,” she murmured, choosing her words carefully.
“Torture?” Michael gasped.
Heather nodded and bit her lip the better to control her own emotions. She had seen plenty of dead bodies in her time with the Cambridge Constabulary, but none so brutally traumatised, the toes crushed, the fingernails torn away, skin cut and pierced. “So you see, if there’s any information you have, anything at all,” she told him.
He shook his head again while his eyes went beyond her, to the spectators pressing upon the line of police tape. He saw Chinese features on many of them, and some stared back at him, pointing him out to their colleagues with small nudges of their elbow.
“Claire. Where’s Claire?” he asked suddenly.
Heather sighed. “We don’t know, Michael. But we’ll find
out,” she promised, her eyes bleak.
Michael took a breath and turned away, his taut and aching belly demanding alcohol almost as badly as his brain.
+++++++++++++++++
SOCO had finished and allowed DI Wilson and her team into the cottage. Other than the small sitting room where Herbert Rolle’s blood saturated the woven rug, the disarray in the other rooms owed more to the police than to others.
“We need to check the CCTV,” Heather pointed out, nodding to her sergeant as he made a note in his pad. “Have the neighbours been interviewed yet?” she asked.
“They didn’t hear anything,” she was told, soliciting a grunt of amusement. Neighbours rarely heard anything, a standing joke in all police forces.
“Check his diary, email and phone logs. Perhaps we’ll be lucky,” she murmured, glancing again at where Professor Rolle had been found, tied to a chair. “Have a look for Mrs Rolle’s diary and phone too. The entry may have been made there.
“Didn’t he have a tablet?” she asked.
“We think so, but we’ve not found it,” one of her team told her.
“See if you can trace it,” she told them, knowing it would be a very stupid man who would leave the tablet so that it could be found electronically.
+++++++++++++++++
Dr Cannon closed the door to Sir Richard’s office and looked with concern towards the Vice Chancellor.
“What do you think?” he asked, meeting her eyes.
“I think things are bad,” she answered carefully.
Sir Richard sighed with grief and took out his handkerchief to blow noisily into it.
“Do we know what happened?” she asked.
Sir Richard shook his head. “The police are saying little,” he explained.
“And Claire?”
“Still missing,” he nodded.
Dr Cannon licked her lips and considered her words carefully. “Has anything else happened that might indicate whether his attackers gained any private details?”
Sir Richard shook his head and took a steadying breath. “No, but I’ve spoken to Professor Lovell so that he can take whatever steps he needs to ensure the finances aren’t compromised.”
Dr Cannon nodded. “I suppose that’s all we can do,” she admitted.
Sir Richard nodded. Their course was set. To veer off or even attempt to abandon their plan, might lead to even more deaths, more disappearances.
+++++++++++++++++
Stan Charway swore, and when that didn’t dispel the anger he felt, he brought his fist down onto his desk. He had just caught the image of Bennett being invited into a large and dark saloon car from the previous day.
A face popped its head round the door to look at him worriedly, and Stan quickly wrote the car registration number onto a Post-It to pass it to his aide. “Get that to our men, and the police. I want it, and the men who drive around in it, picked up.”
“The police will want a reason, Sir,” the aide reminded him.
Stan shrugged. “Suspected murder,” he suggested. It might even be true, but he doubted it. The Russians shared too much with Britain and Europe to be so senseless. The Chinese, however, were a different matter. The problem was finding them.
+++++++++++++++++
Michael wrote Professor Rolle’s obituary. He wouldn’t allow anyone else to do it, even at the editor’s urging. No one could do Rolle the proper justice; only he. He knew some of the statistics by heart; the years of teaching, the quality of student he produced, many going on to top positions in research. His dedication to his subject, the books he’d written.
Michael knew there were other things he needed to consider; his own safety being one of them, and yet he refused to think on those issues and focused instead on just the obituary and the need to ensure it was just right.
He had just about finished when he noticed he had a visitor sitting in front of him.
Stan sat quietly, waiting to be noticed. There was no rush, not now.
“My condolences on the death of your friend,” Stan told Michael, seeing the pain behind his eyes.
Michael nodded, no strength left in him reply with words.
“And the death of Professor Rolle too, I understand,” Stan said softly, watching Michael’s reaction to his barb.
“John. You’re talking about John Dalton,” Michael said for clarity.
“Of course,” Stand nodded. “What exactly was he doing, out in Germany?” he asked.
Michael shrugged. “John was always the strange one,” he murmured.
“Yes. A practical recluse for 10 years, and then he suddenly sells up, starts his own business selling very good anti-snoop devices to large German firms, and then buys a one-way ticket to Japan, of all places!” Stan shook his head. “Strange. Very strange,” he admitted. “Oh, did I forget to mention; he was actually in the offices of Fernsehen Zentral just days before that strange occurrence of their satellite being launched on their doorstep.
“And didn’t I see your name on another article just yesterday; the Americans believed last April’s so called hoax story about space launches and came offering the university $200 million dollars if they’d share the technology with them.”
“If that was all, Mr Charway, only I’m a little busy at the moment,” Michael told him.
Stan sighed theatrically. “Why don’t you tell me where you fit in to all this, Mr Bennett?” he asked softly, almost kindly. “You don’t want the Russians picking you up again now, do you?” he asked. “And then there’s the Chinese. You definitely do not want to be picked up by the Chinese,” he warned.
Michael looked at the sly man and shrugged. “What’s to tell?” he asked. “The facts speak for themselves; while a member of British Intelligence, based right here in Cambridge, focuses his attention on the death of a British national, shot by German police at Frankfurt International Airport, a senior professor at Cambridge University is tortured and killed in his own home, and his wife goes missing, believe abducted. Even the Russians offer their condolences. What do you offer, Mr Charway? Is that the story you want me to tell?” Michael asked.
“I don’t think you should try publishing that story, Michael,” Stan told him as he stood. “I’m here to help you, you know,” he explained, but Michael was already shaking his head.
“No,” he told the stooped man. “The only people you’re here to help are the authorities, and they are very much looking after their own; always have, and always will.”
“But its falling apart Michael!” Stan pressed. “Rolle dead, Fernsehen Zentral telling everyone in glowing lights that their satellite was privately lifted, Cranfield University effectively telling everyone their experiment was a UK lift.”
“What’s falling apart, Mr Charway? What? There is nothing to fall apart other than the misguided attributions being forwarded by you and others in authority, which I might add, have led to at least one death. Don’t you read the Guardian newspaper? Haven’t you seen their investigation into what the USA is doing?” Michael asked.
“I have, and it’s just another attempt to mask the truth. Do you think I don’t know of your links to the Guardian paper?” Stan asked. “And to top it all; Cambridge students are falling over themselves with pride. Why, because it originated here.
“Don’t you see Michael? If you don’t give me the details soon, we may not even be able to save those poor lads down in Japan.”
“What boys? What about Japan?” Michael asked with every appearance of incredulity. “What are you going on about now?”
Stan made a snorting noise and turned away to stride noisily towards the door.
Michael waited until he could no longer hear the man’s receding steps, and then began typing again. Stan Charway was right in one respect; he shouldn’t publish that story. It would draw far too much attention towards him. But that wasn’t to say some boys in the Smoke wouldn’t like it. Politically, it was right up their street Michael reflected while putting the email together. He was smiling vici
ously when he pressed the send key.
“Michael?” the editor asked from his doorway. “Are you alright?”
“I’m getting there Gary. I’m getting there,” he promised.
+++++++++++++++++
Frankie stopped work as the news on the radio announced the death of Professor Rolle at his home overnight. The police were treating his death as suspicious and were asking members of the public with information to come forward.
The rest of the team had also stopped by the time the news had moved to the weather update. They looked towards Frankie, faces set to stone.
“Paddy, go call that cousin of yours, the bouncer from the Parlour Bar in Chelmsford. See if he and his brothers might come up to Cambridge for a short holiday, will you?” he asked.
“My pleasure, Frankie,” Paddy nodded, setting off to find his phone.
The team got back to work, satisfied that Frankie would deal with it. Frankie worked mechanically while judging his options, a nasty feeling in his water.
+++++++++++++++++
Cheryl sat behind the wheel of her BMW. She had hurriedly pulled off the E37 motorway and parked in a lay-by just west of Bremen, Germany. Her hands shook on the steering wheel and her eyes stared out through the windscreen, seeing nothing as she digested the news from the radio; the death of Professor Rolle in his Cambridge home.
Michael words haunted her. “This is the world we live in. Any number of people would give their right arm to have and control this chemical.” he had said.
She had known the dangers, or had she? Had she really considered the lengths that would be taken to get a hold of their technology?
Cheryl began to weep, hoping it was for Rolle’s death but with the shaming realisation that it was for her own safety.
+++++++++++++++++
Stan hadn’t finished. Once he returned to his office, he closed and locked the door before picking up the phone to talk to his boss, Sir Arthur Coleman. The conversation didn’t take very long, and Sir Arthur Coleman’s summary of events didn’t read particularly well, not for Stan anyway. It wasn’t everyday that a professor of Cambridge University got killed in his home, and certainly not while some 25 members of the British Intelligence forces where on active duty in the city. Knowing of a link to Japan helped a little. That was a nice little nugget of information, but it shone brightly only because it stood on its own.
