by Hylton Smith
“So you are sure that the Colony does not know of this Iranian plot?”
“One can never be absolutely certain of such things, but I am very confident that the orchestration you refer to with respect to the civil unrest is related to this Genetic Profile Directory. The Colony appears to be using this fear to incite mass demand for extradition of extremists. Although my organisation could never have direct dialogue with the Colony, we do understand that the police have their ways of ‘monitoring’ their activity. I am led to believe that Chief of Police Bradstock has his finger on the pulse. One such example of this is his efforts to avoid this Banks murder straying on to our chessboard with Iran. He has so far managed to contain the investigation to where it should be – Britain. What cannot be ruled out is the personal relationship of Banks and Beresford. Although the government is annoyed at Banks’ intent to allow the fruits of joint investment to ripen in Germany, it is known that Beresford was prepared to take direct action to stop him. In fact his people planned to intercept Banks before he and one of his technical people departed for Cologne, only to find he had already been terminated. We have sketchy information that the technical man is still ‘in the care’ of the Colony, which is undesirable. Bradstock is very keen to get him back, and has moved the entire C.V. Killing investigation to Durham, to minimise the chance of enquiries straying on to the aforementioned chessboard.”
“And you don’t know who actually killed Banks?”
“No, and that is difficult to fathom because there was only a brief window of time between him separating from his friends after the football match and when he was to be confronted by the Colony. During this time he seems to have split from the technical man who was to accompany him to Cologne. I have to admit we lost him at that time. Maybe he knew he was being tracked. Word has it that the Colony knew of his intent to meet with someone at a particular place, but when they arrived he was already dead. You can see how important this technical chap is. Bradstock is still hopeful he can trace him and extract him alive.”
“Thanks for that Simon. It is extremely unhelpful, and I am so pleased we had this chat. We are both unhappy that I now know.”
Chapter 25
Saturday November 17th 2018
Donald Price tried to make pleasant conversation with Vivienne on the flight.
“Mr Price, let us not pretend to be friends. You were friends with my husband. Your company is a supplier to mine, nothing more – there’s no special relationship. Apart from this grubby exercise we are on today we have nothing in common as individuals. I suggest you make good use of the short flight in the same way I am trying to do. I’d be grateful if you would not keep interrupting my train of thought.”
When they disembarked and made their way to a taxi stand, something caught Price’s attention. A TV monitor showed a picture of the Prime Minister and the breaking news strap at the bottom of the set indicated that it was about plans to tackle the social unrest. The moving strap had a reference to the Genetic Profile Directory. Price asked the attendant of the coffee bar to turn up the volume.
Patrick Carlyle had not slept following his whistle-stop chopper visits to see the residue of the urban carnage, and the revelations of Halliwell-Jones. He had freshened up, got his aide to request TV time for an emergency announcement and awoken Lawrence Morton. The appearance of the Home Secretary alongside him was not requested, it was demanded. Carlyle had decided to buy time. His speech had not been rehearsed and Morton was, like the TV audience, hearing it for the first time. In essence, the P.M. claimed that the glitch in the Genetic Profile Directory had been identified and recovery of the data was imminent.
“Furthermore, we have reviewed the situation in anticipation of restored access and concluded that the valuable data should reside in the custody of those who can benefit most from its existence. To that purpose it will be transferred back to the National Health Service. It will be set up so that it is only accessible by specific Consultants within the service. Those who can demonstrate direct patient benefit from such data will be registered users. In order to achieve this, future confidentiality is paramount and patient approval will be sought on a case by case basis. We have taken the decision to move this information from a political sanctuary to one of doctor-patient confidentiality where it should be. The date of the transfer will be announced as soon as the N.H.S. can decide on the access levels, as we do not want the government to participate in the exercise. The Home Secretary will relinquish custody on receipt of the N.H.S. readiness to accept such an undertaking. The Health Secretary will coordinate the handover.”
Carlyle had gambled on this effectively removing the oxygen which was sustaining the flames of civil unrest. He also recognised that the fire would have to burn itself out, and Halliwell-Jones’ disclosure about the Colony’s orchestration had to be tackled or even chanelled to the safe margins of condemning extremism. His apparent U-turn as leader of the government was simply rationalised as the acceptable price of democracy.
As they stood and watched this in the airport, both Price and Vivienne Banks contemplated how this was going to affect the content of their meeting with Chen. They had the time in the taxi to adjust their respective agendas. They met Chen during his self-regulated lunch break. Vivienne insisted that they hired a hotel room and used room service. Chen knew of a small hotel nearby which he had used before renting his existing property. Vivienne listened intently to ensure there was no discrepancy between what Price had said and what she was hearing now. She was quite impressed with his ability to précis without leaving out salient detail. Then she asked her first question.
“Why did you want to leave Gladstone-Klein?”
He did not evade the question to avoid Price’s embarrassment. “I felt underused and undervalued.”
She turned to Price. “You didn’t try to keep him?”
“Of course, but I eventually saw that he needed a bigger challenge.”
“And there was not such a challenge you could offer?”
Price was anxious to guillotine this subject, but Vivienne had already noted the cynical expression on Chen’s face.
“Very well, we should move on to the joint demand you have made. Mr Price, I concede that what you have said ties up with what my finance director has admitted with respect to the initial down payment. It’s therefore a matter of finding a way to lose the balance in my operating statement. If you would be so kind as to leave me to explore this with Mr Chen for his part, I will discuss your situation on the return flight. I’d prefer it if the two of you were remunerated in different ways and did not know of the mechanism employed for the other person. I will make my own way back to the airport. Goodbye.” Price rankled at being treated like this in front of Chen and scowled as he departed. The next question was unexpected.
“Are you still undervalued Mr Chen?”
“In some ways I guess, but it’s much better than being under Price’s thumb.”
“I mean are you undervalued when the current project is finalised?”
“Right, I see what you’re getting at. I’m a senior analyst and earning good money, but I’m still not stretched in intellectual terms. I’ll be speaking to my boss when we’ve finished the restoration task.”
“I have a proposal which may or may not interest you. If you would consider working for me, then we would have an interesting starting point.”
“Working for you, in what capacity?”
“I want Gladstone-Klein out. I’d like you to replace their system with one which only you and I know how to access. The vast majority of my company’s value is in unrealised intellectual property. I don’t want Price anywhere near that again. You would have sole responsibility and I’m sure we can agree a suitable financial reward, beginning with cutting Price out of the payment of the balance.”
“I didn’t see that one coming. How do you propose to do that?”
“Well, if we can divide both your own and his balance over an agreed period it simply goe
s down as salary. I don’t have to justify a one-off payment, and you don’t have to explain a huge cash injection into your bank account. Initially you can be a consultant and when you’re ready we employ you full time, so that the implementation of your system and Price being relieved of the contract is seamless. It could fit with your task here because I understand you can’t just fix the problem overnight without raising suspicion. You could keep me in touch with your progress and be doing the initial consulting in tandem. Is that the kind of challenge you were looking for?”
“It certainly is, how do you explain to Price that he is not going to be paid?”
“I don’t, as far as he is concerned I will have convinced you that I am going to honour the debt, but in order to avoid Inland Revenue snooping, it has to be paid in small amounts. Also, it can’t begin until you have restored the Directory to the satisfaction of the Home Office and are free of suspicion. By the time this occurs we just give Price the bad news.”
“Sure, but he will then renew his demand.”
“Of course, but I thought that you knew the Gladstone-Klein system as well as the one here at the Home Office. You know ours and how to lock Price out of it. Part of your challenge will be to threaten Price with infiltration and planting of evidence which would compromise his position with his employer and even result in his arrest. So, you tell me.”
“You really have been thinking about this. What you suggest is perfectly feasible, and also offers me the chance to put the smug bastard in his place. How do you suggest we put this offer into a legally enforceable contract?”
“I’ll have my solicitor draft something on Monday and get it to you as soon as possible. Your consultancy fees and salary will cover the £800,000. Read the small print to make sure you’re happy with the safeguards for Bio-Cure which I’ll have to include. Then we can sign the legal contract. There’s one other essential requirement from my side. We will need another copy of the recovered Directory when you have it. You may not know that the original you supplied is still in my husband’s briefcase, wherever it is. If his killers open it the self-destruct feature will erase it. And if the killers don’t open it because they believe it was only important to prevent it from being used, I will need to be able to surrender a copy to the Home Office as a gesture to convince them that Bio-Cure is being run in a different way. Although they don’t know of Alistair’s copy yet, we can’t rule out a scornful Donald Price tipping them off when he knows he’s been stung by us.”
When she met Price on the plane he was curious, and she convinced him that she had placated Chen, with the assurance that the balance would be paid in full once he had finished his restoration programme.
“I’m afraid the same situation applies to you. I want to be absolutely certain that there is no fallout from the Home Office, before I complicate matters by having to explain giving away half a million pounds to one of their employees and another half a million to his former employer. This is non-negotiable, so if you can’t wait I’ll take my chances with pleading innocence and call your bluff, with the attendant counter-promise that you will lose your contract with Bio-Cure and your American bosses will be told exactly why.”
*
Eva Roberts did not treat Saturdays any differently to any other day. She had drawn another conclusion and wanted to share it with Renton and Forster. As Bradstock’s shift system did not begin until Monday they wearily agreed to indulge her.
“There was no new body discovered yesterday, one week after the one dangling in the Thames. Either we just didn’t find it yet or there is a change in pattern. In my experience, serial killers who communicate with the police are driven by quite specific motives. The note may be the signal of change insofar as the baseline has been established, and the latest victim, Andrew Todd, is part of the altered pattern. He was linked, but different. He worked for Banks, so he is linked to the very first murder. He was a Muslim, and therefore linked to all of those who followed Banks, except he was a convert, and Banks himself was a non-believer. He was also the first victim we were told about by a note, and was almost unrecognisable compared to his living form. If we have a single killer, and I’m not yet fully convinced that we have, then we can expect another note sometime soon. I’ve been trying to overlay the various aspects of the victims in a similar way to that which Stephanie did, and I don’t yet see a clear motive. The macro locations of Newcastle and London don’t tell me much other than Newcastle is the place of Banks’ origin and London is where he probably died. The vocations of the victims are confusing, being technicians, including a doctor, and water authority employees. The Muslim faith is the strongest common factor and it will be interesting to see if that continues. The specific location of the bodies does match up with their employment and I’m sure this is important, but we don’t yet have the link with those specific jobs. Now, what does all of this mean? I’m not easily convinced to set up a profile on insufficient evidence, but I am close to being convinced that these were far from randomly selected victims. At the very least, they were chosen to fit the pattern, which we only partially understand. There are many ways of finding people these days who fit into your chosen grid search – the internet being a prime example. It may be that not knowing the victim personally isn’t a disqualifier, or even part of the design. I’ll be reporting this to Bradstock, but I wanted to tell you first that I don’t agree with his statement that too much time has been concentrated on the case of Alistair Banks. I agree with your allocation of resource Inspector Renton, because I am certain that Banks is the key to all of this, with the proviso that we are indeed dealing with a single killer. He’s not going to like me saying this, so I’d like your input.”
They looked at each other and gestured to one another to go first. Renton conceded. “Can I start by saying something you must have heard many times before?”
“Is it that you don’t have much faith in anything but hard evidence?”
“Yes, that’s my trade, from apprentice to experienced officer. Anyway, that’s not all I was going to say. My position is that I want this killer or killers to be caught – period. I don’t have to be a forensics graduate to appreciate how some seemingly spurious finding becomes crucial. I don’t have to be a convert to your psychological approach to attach importance to what you say. If it makes sense to me then I am with you, if not you either have to explain it better or find more reasons to convince me. It’s not that different from what you have just said yourself – ‘with the proviso that we are dealing with a single killer.’ I find your analysis of the evidence refreshing and helpful, and I didn’t think I’d be saying that today.” Forster simply echoed this sentiment. She then said something which she was at pains to point out was not in contradiction to what had gone before.
“We have missed something which would either solidify or rule out a serial killer. The old adage of opportunity comes to mind, and I would like to go through the entire forensic evidence from all of the victims with both of you. Will you arrange this with Clive Donoghue and the London forensic presence for Monday?”
Renton nodded reservedly. “Bradstock wants new initiatives, whatever that means. I doubt he will be happy for a trawl of existing stuff, he wants new evidence to magically appear.”
“If you’re with me on this, I’ll handle Bradstock.” This elicited a wry smile from both Renton and Forster.
Chapter 26
Graham and Finley were pleased with the outcome in the Capital and the consequent contagion around the country. In moving the crosshairs to the Midwest they had a very specific target. In their convoluted view of even-handedness they wanted to take out someone who was the antithesis to Purdil Pitafi. It was also likely to cause much bigger ripples in terms of national significance. Abu Mensah just happened to be the fountainhead of Muslim Shield activities in Birmingham. His day job was as senior cleric in a particular Mosque. The methodology which they favoured was one of ruthless simplicity. The kidnap of the child of an extremist would start the bal
l rolling, and then the bargaining would begin. A little girl’s life saved in exchange for two other lives was considered to be the cleanest option. The girl would go free once the extremist father met in the Mosque office with Abu Mensah, to plead for the ransom for the kidnappers. All he had to do, when it was agreed, was to make the call, and his wife would confirm that their daughter was alive and well. The suicide of the father for such a noble cause would be embraced, and Mensah would also become a martyr. If the kidnappers did not hear the explosion from their nearby vantage point then both his wife and daughter would perish. They expected collateral damage from the blast, but even if there wasn’t, the rage would be focussed on Enigma. They were not yet at the detailed planning stage, and Halliwell-Jones knew nothing of the threat.
*
On calling at the hospital Renton was confronted with really good news. Ben Adams had recovered speech function. It was very deliberate and obviously difficult for him, but he was able to tell the doctors that he had no feeling in his left arm. Both legs and his right arm were fine. Renton’s instinct was to embrace his friend, but knew that was silly.
“It’s so good to have you back Ben. I can’t tell you what a relief it is. Anyway, I’m more interested to hear your voice than my own. How do you feel in general?”
“I – I don’t know.” There was a considerable pause. “I can’t ss-see you very clearly. It feels like, like a film over my eyes, you know. I don’t know. I don’t know. I can’t remember much.”
