“I can’t help that. At the moment there just isn’t enough to go on. Of course if the two of you want to conduct a little private research, that’s fine so long as you maintain strict confidentiality.”
Maggie spoke up again.
“Molecular biology is an expensive business, Minister. There’s no way I can do it without proper support, and I can’t ethically use grant money that was awarded for other purposes. Isn’t there some way you could make funding available?”
Monteith thought for a moment, then shook his head. “No, I can only free up contingency funding like that to deal with a catastrophic situation, and right now I’d have a job convincing anybody that there is one. If things change I’ll reconsider it. Right, that’s the position. I’m grateful to you both for bringing this to our attention.”
Terry glanced at Maggie, who half-closed her eyes in a gesture of weary acquiescence. They stood.
“Well, thank you for your time, Minister, Sir Ashley.”
CHAPTER 10
“Well that didn’t go as well as I’d hoped,” said Terry, holding the door open for Maggie, then following her onto the pavement.
“How can those idiots sit there and do nothing?” she said angrily. “We could be dealing with a global disaster and they wouldn’t even investigate it! What’s wrong with them?”
They took a taxi to their hotel. Terry had guessed there wouldn’t be time to catch a train back after the meeting with the Minister, so he’d booked them into a hotel in Half Moon Street, off Piccadilly.
The cab pulled up outside their hotel and they went inside. “Come on, I need a drink,” Maggie said, heading for the hotel’s Cocktail Bar. She ordered a gin and tonic and a double whisky before Terry had even reached the bar.
“Good choice,” he said and they flopped down into a couple of arm chairs. He sighed. “I guess we just weren’t persuasive enough.”
“Rubbish. You laid everything out perfectly. Only a moron could misunderstand you. These bureaucrats make me so angry.”
“I know what you mean and I suppose I should feel angry too, but I just feel… well, deflated. As things stand I’ve made matters worse, not better. Now we’re in a Catch-22 situation: we can’t get support without evidence and we can’t gather evidence without support. Monteith and Gibbs probably think I’m a nutcase and a doom-monger. They can’t believe anything disastrous is going to happen – oh, correction: they believe it’s just enough of a possibility to slap the Official Secrets Act on the whole thing.”
“Can they really do something like that?”
“I don’t know. He might have been bluffing, but I’m not sure I want to find out the hard way.”
“Christ, Terry, there’s got to be something we can do.”
“You heard the Minister; they’ve tied our hands.”
“Officially, maybe. But as he said, they can’t stop us acting in a private capacity, can they?”
He looked at her. “What do you mean?”
“What’s the weakest link in our case?”
Terry paused, but it seemed Maggie meant the question to be rhetorical and continued.
“It seems to me the key is what’s going on in the Sargasso Sea. The best possible scenario is that there’s only one mutant organism in those waters, and it’s the same as the one we found in the river.”
“Right, which would mean it hasn’t been spreading from one type of organism to another. But didn’t your colleague say that what was in the river was a freshwater organism?”
“Nostoc, yes. But you know the differences between those organisms are subtle. Maybe the mutation also brings about a slight change in appearance so that it only looks like Nostoc. Or maybe there was a mixture of algae in that sample; Jake identified Nostoc correctly, but another species in there was actually generating the ammonia.” She shrugged. “These are remote possibilities, but plasmid exchange is a crucial issue so we need to be certain of our ground.”
“How could we settle it?”
“Well, if there are multiple organisms, all producing ammonia, and they’re different again to the one in the river, that’s strong evidence for transfer between species.”
“The doomsday scenario.”
She swallowed. “Yes. The doomsday scenario.”
“Could that be established fairly easily?”
“Yes, if we went to Bermuda and got a sample of their waters.”
He gulped on his drink and coughed. “You’re not serious?”
“Why not? An economy flight to Bermuda, a couple of rooms at a bed-and-breakfast and the hire of a boat, and we’d have the answer.”
“Just like that?”
“Just like that. Remember what’s at stake here. Come on Terry, we’d only need a few days, a week at most. We can leave this weekend. I bet we’re both owed loads of leave from the university and we can get others to cover for us if necessary. If we meet any resistance from the higher ups we’ll just tell them it’s top secret government stuff.”
She laughed and he joined in.
“Okay,” he said. “You’re on.”
CHAPTER 11
Bessie Johnson presided over her tiny dining-room like a benevolent mountain.
“Now what would you dear people like for breakfast? You can have waffles or pancakes with maple syrup. Or scrambled eggs with bacon and sausages and tomatoes…”
The trip had been easier to organise than Terry had thought, despite the fact that a few mistruths were required to comply with the Official Secrets Act.
Terry noticed Maggie’s sickly expression. “I think I’ll just have coffee, thanks,” she said.
“Jus’ coffee? That ain’t enough to keep a termite alive!”
“Maybe some toast?” Maggie ventured.
“Ah right, and what you want on that? Scrambled eggs and …”
“I don’t suppose you have any marmalade, do you?”
Bessie’s eyes lit up. “I sure do. And none of your shop-bought garbage, either. This was made by my own fair hands.”
She held up two pink palms, the only inch of her that wasn’t a deep nut brown. Then she seemed to catch herself, and the three of them dissolved into laughter. When they’d recovered, Terry added:
“I’d love some toast and marmalade, too.”
Terry soon realised Bessie wasn’t exaggerating. It was the most delicious marmalade he could ever remember tasting. Even then they couldn’t do justice to the mound of toast that was placed in front of them.
“My Mum used to make marmalade,” Maggie said. “When I was little I’d help her cut up the peel.”
Terry smiled. He had a mental picture of a little Maggie perched on a stool at the counter-top, legs swinging, tongue protruding from one corner of her mouth, cutting up oranges and fluffing up her dark curly hair from time to time with sticky hands. He wiped his own fingers on a paper napkin.
Bessie came to the table again. “You had enough?”
“We have, thank you,” said Terry. “That was great.”
She beamed. “And where you off to this fine morning?”
Terry said, “We thought we’d go down to St. George’s Harbour and look around.”
“Aaron can take you. He’s going to town.”
“I wouldn’t want to put him to any trouble.”
“What trouble? It’s on his way and he like the company.”
Bessie’s husband dropped them off at the harbour, where they hoped to find a boat that would take them out to collect their samples. They waved goodbye, then turned around. In front of them was a great crescent of intensely blue-green water. White sails flashed in succession as yachts came about to leave the harbour.
Maggie shook her head. “You know, when we were coming in to land I thought it was tinted by the cabin windows or maybe a trick of the light. But the water really is that colour.”
“Amazing, isn’t it? I suppose it has something to do with the pink sand.”
All along the harbour, vessels rocked gently at their moorin
gs. A stiff breeze from the Atlantic set in motion the irregular music of halyards chiming against masts. Behind them on the quayside, and rising in tiers beyond that, were buildings painted in white and pastel shades of pink, red, yellow, green, and blue, each capped with a low white roof. Sunlight reflected back at them from every surface.
“This place reminds me of the Amalfi coast,” said Maggie putting on a large pair of sunglasses that Terry though looked uncharacteristically modern and expensive. “A present from a wealthy Aunt,” she added as if reading his mind. Terry put on his own pair of worn and scratched aviators that he’d found in his classroom one day and nobody had ever claimed.
Maggie grinned at him. “Cool prof. Present too?”
“Sort of,” he replied smiling back at her.
He turned and looked out to sea, breathing in air laden with salt, seaweed, fish, diesel fuel, tar… everything, it seemed, but ammonia.
“It’s hard to believe there’s a problem somewhere out there, isn’t it?”
Maggie nodded. She looked up and down the harbour. “Where do we start?”
“Let’s divide our efforts.” He pointed to the left, where a towering cruise ship had berthed. “You start down there and I’ll take this side. We’ll meet…” He looked round, then pointed to a café with some tables and chairs outside. “We can meet there about twelve-thirty. Sound good?”
“Sounds good. See you later.”
There was no shade outside the café where Terry waited but the inshore breeze was cool and he was comfortable enough in his cotton T-shirt and jeans. When Maggie arrived she was carrying her lightweight jacket and her face was flushed. He smiled and held the door open for her.
It was warm inside and there was a heavy smell of cooked fish. The lady behind the counter was, however, happy to make them coffee and a couple of sandwiches. They took the tray to one of the tables outside. Maggie drained the glass of iced water in front of her and sighed.
“That’s better.”
“How did you get on?” Terry asked.
“Not great. They’re happy to take you out for diving or fishing or just a cruise, but the moment you say where you want to go they suddenly lose interest.”
“Same here. You told them we have respirator masks?”
“It made no difference. It’s the weed. There’s a risk of getting caught in it and fouling the engines. Apparently there’s quite a bit floating in the water even away from the big mats.”
“But that’s the stuff we want to sample, isn’t it?”
She nodded, her lips tight. “The trouble is, if they take us as close as that they have to spend the next day cleaning it all off before it’s safe for them to go out again. Just not worth their while. At least that’s what they say.”
She turned her attention to the sandwiches, which were generously filled and decorated with crisps, coleslaw, and salad. “Wow. Next time I think we’d better order one for both of us. How did you get on?”
“Pretty much the same as you. I got fed up in the end – went down to the quays and just walked along, chatting to any crewmen I could find. It did give me one lead.”
“Oh?”
“Yeah. There’s a guy here called Max Gibson. They say he knows these waters better than anyone. If he won’t do it, then nobody will.”
“Did they say where we can find him?”
“Should be on his boat. Up that way.” He pointed. “It’s called Cleaver II. Worth a try.”
The commercial boats they’d seen already were gleaming white-and-chrome, multi-deck affairs, festooned with aerials. Expecting something similar, they walked right past Cleaver II and had to ask and double back before they eventually found it. It was a no-frills fishing vessel, drab but well-scrubbed, with a wheelhouse up front and an afterdeck and not much more. They glanced at each other. Terry shrugged.
“As long as it’s seaworthy, I suppose.” They stepped onto the wooden jetty that ran alongside and he raised his voice to speak to a figure moving around on deck. “Hello there. I’m looking for a Captain Max Gibson.”
The man straightened up. The peak of a battered white cap cast a dark shadow across his face. “An’ now you found him,” he called back, in a voice as deep as the Caribbean Sea.
“All right to come aboard?” Terry asked.
“I’ll come to you,” he replied. He walked along the afterdeck, hopped onto a bulwark, and down onto the jetty.
Terry looked into a face the colour and texture of dark brown leather splintered from exposure to salt wind and sun. He in turn was surveyed by liquid, dark brown eyes with bloodshot whites.
“You wantin’ me?”
Terry began carefully. “People round here say there aren’t many who know these waters better than Captain Max Gibson.”
Max’s eyebrows made the briefest of excursions. “I guess people say right. ‘Xcept people round here call me Max. Where you wanna go?”
“About ninety nautical miles north-east of here.”
Max frowned, then a faraway look entered his eyes. “Been a long while,” he said. “Used to go up there, crewin’ on a fishin’ boat when I was a kid. Get a lot of eels.”
It was just what Terry wanted to hear. “Would those be the English eels that go out there to spawn?”
“Yeah. American eels, too. Come out from the East Coast. You wanna fish for eels?”
“Not exactly. My friend Maggie here is a biologist. She’d like to take some samples from the ocean out there.” He took the plunge. “Near the place where a powerboat called ‘Fair Wind’ got stuck about a year back.”
Max’s face clouded. He dropped his voice. “Nobody go out there now, mon. Too dangerous. Full of weed. Foul you up before you know.”
“We don’t have to go right up to the weed mats, just near enough to get some samples.”
Something between a grunt and a laugh escaped from Max’s throat. “That stoff don’t stand still for you, mon, it move around. And people died on that boat.”
“We know, but we’ve got top quality respirator masks with us, so if we run into some foul air we won’t be at risk. It’ll only take a few minutes to get the samples and then we can clear out.”
Terry could almost see the man’s mind working. It was still quite early in the tourist season and demand would easily be satisfied by the luxury vessels further up the quay. A boat like this wouldn’t attract a lot of business right now. It was better to take it out than keep it in harbour, even if there was a small element of risk.
Max shook his head slowly from one side to the other. Then he swung a hand around, pointing to the cloudless blue sky and the incredible green water. “Look at this place, mon. We can go cruise round the islands, or I can take you fishin’, scuba divin’, anythin’ you like. Now why you want to go to a God-forsaken place like that?”
Before Terry could reply, Maggie said:
“I know it sounds strange, Max, but there’s some really interesting stuff in the water out there and I just set my heart on getting hold of some of it.” She smiled up at him and Terry could see Max’s eyes soften.
“Straight out, and straight back?”
“Yes.”
He pursed his lips, then shrugged. “Right now I got some work to do on the boat. Tomorrow mornin’, though.”
Maggie’s face lit up. “That would be wonderful.”
“Need to make an early start. Which hotel you stayin’ at?”
Terry answered. “It’s not a hotel. We’re staying at the Johnson’s guest house. It’s – ”
“I know where it’s at.” His expression lightened. “Bessie and Aaron. Good. Josiah Smith can crew for me tomorrow. He lives close by – he’ll give you a lift in. Be ready for him ’bout seven-thirty.”
“Brilliant. Thanks very much.”
He pointed. “You go on up to the office now and make the bookin’.” He withdrew a cell phone from a pocket. “I’ll tell them to give you a special price, otherwise they gonna charge you for a full day’s fishin’.”
Maggie reached out and gave the man’s forearm a little squeeze. “Thanks again, Max. See you tomorrow.”
As they walked towards the office Terry said, “You certainly worked your charm on him.”
“I think he took us for a honeymoon couple. Better not push it too far. He knows the Johnsons. He could find out we’re booked into separate rooms.”
“See, I told you we should have booked a double.”
“Behave yourself, Terry.”
Terry glanced at his watch. It was after two o’clock. They had risen at six and left harbour shortly after seven that morning. Lulled by the rhythmic rocking of Cleaver II and the incessant throb of her twin motors, Maggie had dozed off and Terry was feeling his own eyelids drooping. He got up and went out onto the open afterdeck, turning his face into the refreshingly cold breeze. Some sea spray prickled his cheeks and he felt alive and alert. He stood, hands on hips, swaying with the motion of the boat, scanning the ocean. Out here the water looked very different from the harbour; it had taken on the deep grey of the open Atlantic and the waves were flecked with white. He bent over the gunwale and looked down. The waves were rising high enough against the hull for him to reach out and plunge his hand below the surface. Viewed through the water, the skin took on a sickly hue. He withdrew his hand and as the breeze dried it the shine of the water receded, leaving behind a greenish powder. He frowned, then brushed his hands together to dust it off.
He looked round sharply as the engines changed note. Maggie jerked awake and rubbed her eyes. Max was staring intently at the horizon and Josiah Smith had his head around the side of the wheelhouse, straining in the same direction. Maggie joined Terry on the afterdeck, both of them following Max’s gaze. At first they could see nothing unusual. Now that the boat was moving forward more slowly it was pitching and screwing, making it hard to get a clear view of what lay in front. Then Terry pointed.
“What?” Maggie shouted over the engines. “I can’t see anything.”
“The waves. They’re flatter out there.”
She narrowed her eyes and compared the ocean ahead and behind them. “I see what you mean.”
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