Alchemist

  She knew that, inevitably, with almost every drug on the market there was a downside; there were always a small number of people who suffered side-effects. It was perfectly understandable that the newspaperman was distraught about what had happened to his own family, and would clutch at any explanation for the horror – but was the discovery that two other people had experienced similar symptoms going to prove anything at all?

  And there was a deeper moral issue beyond this: even if there was a link to Maternox, millions of people around the world had been helped by the drug: there were numerous healthy children in the world who owed their existence to it. With all pharmaceuticals, it was a question of weighing the good and the bad and making cold, hard decisions. Percentage chances. It was easy to look at percentage chances when you were dealing with anonymous statistics. Much harder when it was a real human being whom you loved – and difficult to accept the risk if it involved someone you loved.

  But if the newspaperman was right in connecting the break-ins, that pointed to something altogether more sinister. She needed more information, she decided, before she did anything at all; it was far too early in the Bannermans’ relationship with Bendix Schere for her to start making waves – she was having enough problems preventing her father from upsetting people, without going around asking awkward questions herself; and she had a horror of suddenly finding her name plastered all over the media.

  Mr Wentworth seemed a decent enough sort, but he was a journalist and she’d had enough experience over the years to know that the press considered the pharmaceutical industry – and everyone connected with it – a legitimate target. You had to be very careful indeed with them.

  She indicated left and nudged her way aggressively into the clogged near-side lane, returning a furious blast of a horn with a two-fingered flick, then turned sharply into a side street, slowed down and scanned the pavement.

  She braked as she saw an empty call-box ahead, pulled over and hurried in, yanking the door shut behind her. She pushed a coin in the slot, opened her diary, turned to the page where she’d written the number Wentworth had given her last night, and called it.

  ‘Thames Valley Gazette,’ a woman answered.

  ‘May I speak to Zandra Wollerton, please?’

  ‘Her line’s busy – shall I put you through to the News Desk?’

  ‘I’ll hold.’

  The black digits on the indicator displayed 97p credit left. She tapped the small shelf, and glanced at the business cards stuck to the wall. Monica. French Masseuse. Soothe away those tensions. Gabriella. Latin lessons and correction therapy. Donyelle. Ebony; skin two.

  She often wondered who these women really were. She had read an article in the Independent recently that said a lot of them were educated types making easy money. Through the misting window, she saw a tramp shambling along in a filthy coat, clutching a ragged bundle.

  ‘Putting you through now,’ the switchboard receptionist said, interrupting her thoughts.

  A moment later she heard a hard, sharp voice that sounded in a hurry. ‘Zandra Wollerton.’

  ‘Hello – my name’s Montana Bannerman – Hubert Wentworth asked me to get in touch –’

  ‘Right,’ the reporter cut in, abruptly. ‘He told me you’d be calling. Be best if we could meet somewhere. Some place near your office.’

  ‘Or I can meet you in Berkshire, if that’s easier?’

  ‘I have to be in London at midday tomorrow. Are you free late afternoon?’

  ‘Yes – I’m flexible – I could fit in with –’

  ‘How about four o’clock? Trying to think of somewhere near you where we could talk. Do you know the Thistle Hotel?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘It’s about five minutes’ walk. Corner of Mottram and Gower Place – big ugly building, looks like a multi-storey.’

  ‘I’ll find it.’

  ‘There’s a coffee shop on the first floor, called the Woolsack.’

  ‘Can you tell me what you look like – so I can recognize you?’

  ‘It’s OK, got your photo on file from the takeover article. I have cropped black curly hair and glasses, and I’m short, OK?’

  ‘I’m short too,’ Monty said.

  ‘Has its advantages. Four o’clock, the Thistle,’ said the reporter, and hung up.

  Charming, Monty thought. Anyone would think she was doing me a favour. She replaced the receiver and change spattered into the slot.

  She scooped it up, then as she turned, her heart jumped. The doorway was blocked by a tall man in a turned-up raincoat, wearing dark glasses in spite of the rain. A shimmy of fear ran through her. He was standing absolutely motionless, staring straight at her.

  Instinctively she stepped back. Wild thoughts raced through her mind. Could call the police. Just punch 999; her mouth felt dry with panic. The booth suddenly felt like a prison. There was only one way out, and he was standing right in front of it. Thoughts of the break-ins the newspaperman had told her about flashed through her mind. Ruthless, shadowy men in masks and leather gloves stopping at nothing. Christ, hadn’t done anything, just spoken to – then she noticed the golden dog beside the man, the retriever with the short handle to his wrist and she suddenly laughed at her stupidity in panicking and pushed open the door.

  ‘It’s free, sorry to have kept you,’ she said. ‘I’ll hold the door for you.’

  The blind man murmured his thanks and stepped carefully past his dog into the booth.

  Monty walked along the corridor, peering in through each lab window in search of Jake Seals. She finally saw the Chief Technician in a small, otherwise empty laboratory at the far end, where a number of her father’s experiments were in progress.

  Wearing a protective suit, gloves and glasses, he was standing just beyond the massive chromium head of an emergency shower, carefully hefting a blue bucket out of a Perspex-fronted fume cabinet labelled; DANGER! BIO-HAZARD!

  He placed the container on a white speckled work top, unscrewed the lid and set it down; then lifted out an amber half-gallon Winchester bottle that was covered in a protective film, and set that down on the work top, using all the care and respect that the handling of corrosive and toxic substances required.

  Monty waited until the bottle was standing safely, then said: ‘Good morning, Mr Seals.’

  He turned and looked at her, removed his glasses and shook his long, lank hair away from his face. ‘How you doing?’

  ‘OK, thanks. Did you have a good weekend?’

  ‘It was all right,’ he said, with a sly grin. ‘You?’

  She shrugged, feeling awkward under the intensity of his gaze. His eyes seemed to be X-raying her as if he was trying to pry out any secrets. He did this constantly and it irked her. His whole manner irked her. ‘Reasonable, I suppose. What’s in that bottle?’

  ‘Bendix Soup.’

  ‘Oh yes? What do you have with it – croutons?’

  ‘You can have croutons if you want. Problem is they’d dissolve before you got a chance to eat them. So would the spoon and most of your face.’

  ‘Nice!’

  ‘I can think of a few people I’d like to serve it up to.’

  ‘I’m sure you can. Does it have any other name?’

  ‘BS93L5021.’ He raised his eyebrows.

  ‘Sounds a mouthful.’

  ‘You don’t want to know it; it shouldn’t even be here – ought to be in an isolation chamber. Typical of the kind of shit Bendix Schere produces. It doesn’t even officially exist.’ He shook his mane of hair. ‘Ever read Kurt Vonnegut’s Cat’s Cradle?’

  ‘Yes – it’s one of my favourite books.’

  ‘Remember the chemical Ice Nine?’

  ‘The stuff that was developed for the Vietnam war or something? If you dropped it in a swamp the whole caboodle would freeze over?’

  Seals nodded. ‘This is about as potent. Dump a gallon of this in a swimming pool and it would strip your hide off in seconds if you jumped in. It’s really horrible. Get it on yo
ur bare skin and there is nothing you can do – there’s nothing that will neutralize it. It’s the most highly carcinogenic substance in existence; it dissolves flesh and absorbs into the blood stream simultaneously, causing almost instant internal haemorrhaging and destroying the lungs. It’s the foulest concoction I’ve ever come across. If I told the Department of Environment about this stuff they’d cordon the whole building off, and I’m not exaggerating.’

  Monty was used to being in the vicinity of toxic substances, but even so this made her uncomfortable and she edged slightly back from the cabinet. ‘Presumably it has a use?’

  He gave her one of the withering looks that always made her feel like an imbecile. ‘I’m sure Bendix Schere would have made it just for fun, even if it didn’t.’

  She smiled, a little uncertainly.

  ‘Actually, although it’s horrible, it is clever stuff. Still under development, so nothing’s been done about registering or patenting it. Part of our existing work here is the area of genetically engineering resistance to pollutants in crops and simple life forms. Right now toxic-waste levels are rising in the oceans all the time and getting in the food chain. A lot of natural substances are being turned carcinogenic by pollution.’ He tapped the jar. ‘What this little darling does is replicate the effect of toxic waste, with a high magnification factor.’

  She glanced up at the massive head of the shower bolted to the ceiling a few yards behind her, wondering how effective water would be if any of the toxin got splashed on to human skin, then back at the bottle. ‘What’s my father using it for?’

  ‘Quite a few applications – basically it speeds up lab experiments when you’re examining the effect of carcinogens on susceptible genes.’

  ‘I’m surprised he’s allowed it in here – he’s got very definite views on these kind of substances.’

  ‘I’ve noticed,’ Seals said. ‘Actually, I think he shares a few of my opinions about this company.’

  Monty hesitated. ‘Last week you hinted there were things you wanted to tell me about Bendix Schere, and said we should have a talk some time, away from here?’ She looked back at him. His face was expressionless for a moment. ‘Are you free for lunch in the next few days?’

  ‘Free today,’ he said.

  They sat in a gloomy pub with blaring rock music, too close to a speaker for Monty’s comfort. Jake drank his way steadily through his second pint of beer; Monty had only taken a few sips of her glass of white wine.

  ‘I’ve never heard of Cyclops Syndrome,’ he said and tossed his hair back. He shook a Marlboro out of a pack, without offering her one, and lit it with a book match. ‘Three cases doesn’t sound much.’

  ‘Number thirty-two!’ a voice called out.

  Monty looked at the ticket in front of her. ‘That’s us, I’ll get them.’

  She went to the counter, collected the sausages and chips for Jake and the tuna salad for herself and took them back to the table. ‘Want any mustard or ketchup?’

  ‘Ketchup,’ Jake said.

  She brought the ketchup over, together with knives, forks and napkins, and sat down again.

  ‘Maternox is made at several different sites,’ Seals said. ‘At Reading, Plymouth and Carlisle here in the UK. In Connecticut, Maryland and Hawaii in the US. In Korea, and I think in Cape Town and Melbourne. There’s also a plant making it under licence in Russia. There’s always a chance of a rogue batch – but the quality-control procedures make it pretty improbable that it would ever reach the retailers.’

  He drew again on his cigarette, stubbed it out, then shook some ketchup over his chips. ‘There are a whole series of monitoring tests done throughout the manufacturing process: control of the physical form, the biological form, control of the formulate – everything, right through until it’s packaged. From every lot and batch number Quality Control put random capsules aside, break them open and test them.’

  ‘What kind of test?’

  ‘Chromatography analysis. A moving solvent produces a unique fingerprint – or pattern – of the materials, in a sample which is read through dyes or ultraviolet light.’

  ‘Is there any way at all a rogue batch could get through Quality Control?’

  He picked up a chip with his fingers and ate it. ‘There is a flaw with our chromatography system as it is set up – it will only give us info on what we are looking for; the method won’t show up anything we are not looking for.’

  ‘Such as?’

  He shrugged. ‘If someone has added something they shouldn’t have done.’

  ‘Why would they do that?’

  ‘I’ve known it happen; a company wants to alter the design of a drug, so they quietly slip a few batches in among the existing product and watch to see what happens; saves messing about with early-stage clinical trials with animals.’

  She stared at him, shocked. ‘You’ve known it happen?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Maybe abroad in some unscrupulous labs, perhaps, but not with a company like Bendix Schere, surely?’

  He raised his eyes. ‘You’re talking hundreds of millions of pounds in revenue a year on some formulae. If a company like Bendix can knock three years off its research, that’s another three years in which it can be earning from the drug.’

  ‘But the dangers are phenomenal – they just couldn’t take the risk of getting caught.’

  He held up his right hand and rubbed his forefinger and thumb together. Monty could read the signal clearly. Money, bribery. Even so, she felt a little heretical when she asked: ‘Is there any way you can check batch numbers of the Maternox these three women took?’

  She justified the question by telling herself that if Jake could get the batch numbers and they could then test a few samples, it would conclusively prove to Hubert Wentworth that there was nothing wrong with the pills. And it would nip in the bud any possible risk of bad publicity for the company.

  He speared a stack of chips with his fork, then raised them up over his plate, to let the steam escape. ‘I know Rick Wilson who’s in charge of Quality Control at Reading – we were at college together. I can have a word with him, see if he can identify the batches for me. They always retain a few samples from each batch in case of problems – I might be able to persuade him to run a check on those – or I could get him to send me over the release specification and I could do it myself.’

  ‘I’d be really grateful,’ she said.

  ‘Anything to put the boot into Bendix is fine by me,’ he said, and pushed the tangle of chips into his mouth, chewed, then gave her a smug grin. ‘End of the month I’m outta here. Going to Cobbold Tessering with a fifty per cent rise. I’ll see Bendix Fucking Schere in Hell.’

  Monty sipped some more wine. ‘Why – what is it that you have against them?’

  His eyes shot towards the door and she saw a sudden flash of fear in them. A deep, intense fear that transmitted to her, sending a chill wisp of air curling through her gut.

  Anxiously, she followed his gaze to a man who had just come in, solidly built in his late thirties, in a brown anorak. Then across to another man, with sandy hair and freckles, who was seated reading a newspaper, only a few chairs away from them and well within earshot. She wondered why she hadn’t noticed him when she had brought the food over. Probably because there were dozens of people she had not glanced at. She looked quizzically at the lab technician. His face was drained of colour and he looked even more pasty than normal.

  ‘You OK, Jake?’

  He nodded, mouthed a silent warning at her, sipped his beer, then said, breezily and loudly: ‘So what hobbies do you have when you’re not at work?’

  22

  Bill Gunn sat, stunned, in front of the wall of monitors in the enhancement room. Only one, the thirty-six-inch high-density screen in the middle, was switched on.

  An audio tape screeched as he touched ‘Rewind’ and watched the digital counter on the control panel, pressing the ‘Stop’ key as it hit the mark. Then he eased several level contro
ls forward, further filtering out the background sound, and played the tape again:

  ‘I’ve never heard of Cyclops Syndrome.’ Jake Seals’ voice. There was the sound of a match flaring. ‘Three cases doesn’t sound much.’ Jake Seals’ voice again.

  He stopped the tape, quivering not just with anger but with shock. Where was the leak? Where the hell was the leak?

  ‘Number thirty-two!’ a background voice called out.

  ‘That’s us, I’ll get them.’ Montana Bannerman’s voice.

  ‘Ketchup.’ Seals’ voice. ‘Matemox is made at several different sites. At Reading, Plymouth and Carlisle here in the UK. In Connecticut, Maryland and Hawaii in the US. In Korea, and I think in Cape Town and Melbourne. There’s also a plant making it under licence in Russia. There’s always a chance of a rogue batch – but the quality-control procedures make it pretty improbable that it would ever reach the retailers.’

  Gunn’s cup of coffee in front of him had gone cold, but he didn’t even care; he listened through to the end of the tape, then played it one more time. Got you this time, my friend, he thought. Got you by the scruff of your nasty little neck.

  He hit ‘Stop’, leaned back in his chair and pressed the video sync button. On the screen in front of him he could see, in black and white, Jake Seals and Montana Bannerman seated in a pub having lunch. Bill Gunn did all his monitoring in black and white. Colour might be prettier, but black and white gave better definition, particularly in low light. He glanced at the red digits of the clock of the panel, and then, as if he did not agree, checked his Rolex. 7.45.

  ‘Shit!’ He had promised Nikky he’d be home in good time to take her to the theatre. Shakespeare. She was studying literature at the University of London. He didn’t mind a bit of culture now and then. He was taking her to Othello at the Old Vic tonight. It was a play full of intrigue and he liked intrigue; if Othello had only had as efficient an eavesdropping system as the one he ran at Bendix Schere, Desdemona would never have died.

  Nikky was a good kid. Twenty. Two years since he’d divorced the bitch who had ruined his life for a decade. Even now it hurt him to say her real name, the wounds were that deep; so she remained the anonymous bitch. Nikky would grow up, get bored with him, find someone closer to her own age and settle down one day. But in the meantime it was good, it was what he needed. Wild sex, few questions and unfettered hero-worship. There had been worse times in his life. A lot worse.