Bad Intentions

by Matt Lynn

  'Do we know if they are still in the country?' asked Shane.

  'Soon after they escaped we contacted the port inspectors with instructions to detain the pair of them on sight,' replied the Inspector. 'They could have made it down to Gatwick in an hour or so and jumped on the first flight with spare seats, but I doubt it. The police there are checking the flight details yesterday evening and can find no trace of them. Unless they had false passports and credit cards arranged, I think we can assume they are still in the country.'

  Shane felt confident they would have neither false passports nor credit cards available, nor would they know where to get them. But, for the moment, he preferred to keep that information to himself. 'How soon do you think you can find them?' he asked.

  'All the usual procedures are being put in place,' replied Gilbert. 'The best way to find any person is through their money. Nobody can live without money. We have alerted the banks that we want an immediate notification of any transactions they make involving plastic.'

  'How quick is that?' asked Wheeler.

  'Pretty fast,' replied Gilbert. 'It's basically the same system the banks use for stopping stolen cards. The list of stolen cards is transmitted constantly to all the electronic registers in the country over spare space on the BBC Ceefax system. Normally it just cancels the authorisation for the card. But at our request, it can also alert the machine to register its use by a suspect, and the retailer then knows to contact the bank. If they use a card, then we should know about it within two hours.'

  'What else do you have?' asked Shane.

  'They might try to withdraw cash from their bank accounts,' continued Gilbert. 'Their banks have been alerted to let us know if they do that, so again we could get a trace that way. Then there is the car. We have the registration number of the Golf they got away in, and we are alerting officers around the country to keep a watch for it. Our best hope on that front is that they trigger a speed camera. The database the cameras are connected to automatically alerts us when a suspect is photographed. That is often the best way of getting a trace. Most criminals don't pay much attention to speed limits.'

  'We would like to be informed as well,' said Shane. The Inspector frowned.

  'We are very anxious to catch these people,' added Wheeler, his voice brimming with sincerity. 'We have our own resources, and we should like to assist the police in any way we can.'

  'A few extra men on the hunt can't hurt, can it?' said Shane. The Inspector shook his head, recalling his explicit instructions to co-operate with the company. 'We'll let you know as soon as we have a trace on where they are,' he replied.

  SEVENTEEN

  Jack swept his hand across his brow and felt a trace of moisture. Sweat perhaps, he wondered. Get some guts, boy, he told himself. It's never over until it's over.

  He glanced at his watch. It was a quarter to eleven. Not much longer before they would have to check out of the hotel and step back into the outside world. It was too risky to stay here. Tara was absolutely right. The game they were playing was heavy. Very heavy.

  'Next Friday,' he told her. His voice was flat and calm, explaining each part of the puzzle as it fell into place in his own mind. 'The bid ends on Friday. Those are the Takeover Panel rules. If Kizog does not have a majority of acceptances from the Ocher shareholders by twelve noon on Friday, then the bid lapses.'

  'That gives us six days,' said Tara.

  'Do you know anyone at Ocher?' asked Jack.

  'Not really, no,' replied Tara.

  Jack paused for a moment. 'Then we will have to go through the merchant bank advising them in London,' he said. 'That's the only way it will work.' Through the fog of confusion, he believed he could see a way out. It lightened his mood, filling his mind with a sense of intellectual giddiness. 'Be patient,' he continued. 'Let me try this out on you step by step.'

  'I've got all day,' answered Tara.

  Jack stood up, and started pacing around the room. 'Let's identify what we know,' he began. 'I think everything has been staring us in the face all along. It is just a matter of seeing it.'

  Tara nodded, and her evident enthusiasm encouraged Jack. For these few seconds, the images of arrest, trial, jails, images that had been crowding his mind, vanished, and he could think clearly. 'We know Kizog is involved in creating counterfeit drugs,' he persisted. 'We also know it is involved in creating biological weapons. In particular Ator, perhaps others. Now it is a private sector company, motivated by profit, so why would it be researching weapons? Where's the turn?'

  'What's your guess?' asked Tara. 'It is known that some biochemists worked on biological weapons. But they usually worked in government laboratories.'

  'Right. But this work is being done in a private company. Kizog is not a defence company, there is no division selling weapons. But there must be a profit in it somewhere.'

  Tara's eyes narrowed as she focused on the question. 'So who are they working for?'

  'I figure there are only three possible markets.' Jack replied. 'I suppose the old Soviet Union would have been interested. Back when that still existed. I suppose there are any number of Third World dictators who might be buyers. And then there is the West.'

  'If you were approaching this as a commercial proposition, which market would you go for?' asked Tara.

  Jack hesitated, considering the question carefully before he answered. 'I think I would be reluctant to do too much business with the Soviet Communist Party. Too risky, and not enough money. I mean, we used to consider selling ordinary drugs in Russia, and it was never worth the hassle. There would be no way you would start making biological weapons for them. I suppose they might have paid reasonable money for weaponry. But the risk of detection would wipe out any potential return on capital to be made from the deal. The Third World is a better market. Certainly the oil-rich states. Those people would pay, and they would have the money. But it would still be very risky. It is hard to believe that the Government would be unaware for long of what you were doing. No. If you were going to do this, it would have to be for your own government. It would have to be licensed, contract work. With explicit permission. That is the only way it would stack up as a viable commercial proposition.'

  'The British Government,' said Tara carefully, thinking aloud. 'That's who you think they are working for.'

  Jack shrugged. 'The British, the Western alliance, who knows. I just figure they must be working for someone. A few days ago I would not have believed it possible. Now, I don't know. I'm just about ready to believe anything.'

  He sat back down again, on the floor, leaning his back against the bed. Tara ruffled his hair with her hand, her fingers lingering for a moment, and her touch felt comforting. Briefly, he was deflated by the brutality of the logic he had been pursuing.

  'We would need to prove that,' Tara said softly.

  Jack looked across the table, peering into her eyes. The sparkle was still there. The glimmer of defiance. 'What do we still need?' he asked.

  'Connections,' she replied, her voice edgy and uncertain. 'We need to know the lines between the counterfeiting and the biological weapons. It must all be part of the same picture.'

  True, thought Jack. 'And what do we want?'

  A look of steely determination crossed Tara's face. 'To escape.'

  They both paused, allowing the decision to settle in their minds. Jack knew they were taking a fearful risk. He sensed as well that the chances of success were slim. For a few grim seconds, he could feel the fear clouding his mind, blocking out all other thoughts. 'We take the information to Ocher's merchant bank,' he said eventually. 'That is the only way through. There is no point in going to the police, since we have no way of knowing who they will side with. We need a powerful ally, one that wants to see Kizog stopped, and the only candidate is Ocher.'

  Jack could feel her hand reaching out, and grasping his palm.

  'Until Friday,' she said.

  The Chairman moved softly and silently through the corridors of the office, his
feet making barely a sound as they stepped across the carpets. It was a Saturday morning, and, apart from the security guards down below, the place was almost empty; there might be a few scientists in the laboratories he supposed, but he rarely ventured into that part of the complex any more.

  His work for the weekend was almost done now. Shane and Wheeler had already met with the police, and according to their reports they had agreed to inform them as soon as any trace of Ms Ling and Mr Borrodin came to light. And Wheeler had assured him that a story would be appearing in the papers the next morning revealing that they were the criminals behind both the counterfeiting racket and the creation and spread of Ator. Indeed, he told himself. My work is almost done now.

  The Chairman permitted himself a leathery smile. It was, he acknowledged, something of a shame that matters had come to this. He peered down, through a plate-glass window at the end of the corridor, on to the complex below, and marvelled momentarily at the hundreds of millions tied up in investment, in research and patents and people. It was all very different when we started, he reminded himself. Momentarily, he recalled how the contract to work on biological weapons had first presented itself. His idea, he acknowledged, but not one he felt he should take any blame for. The Government needed the research. They knew, not just from the evidence Zmitt had presented, but from other sources as well, that the Soviets were dangerously ahead of the West in biological weaponry. They knew they had to catch up; the virus gap had to be closed, as he himself, rather wittily he thought, had put it in one of the many memoranda he had written on the subject. And they knew as well that it had to be done secretly. The softer voices, which in a democracy always had to be given their say, would never permit open research into biological weapons. No. Operating secretly through a pharmaceutical company, with the payments never even appearing on any departmental budget, was the only way it could be done effectively. It was better even for the politicians not to know. Just a few of the senior officials at the Ministry. Men who, like him, understood the fierce realities of the world.

  The Chairman turned, leaving the view of the complex behind him, and walked back along the corridor, his mind still full of reflections. The younger people could not understand how it was back then, he decided. How fearful the threat was. And how much had to be done secretly to counter it. Certainly, he conceded to himself, he was unhappy about the way things had ended up. The company, he knew, had painted itself into a corner. And it was his responsibility to find a way out. The burdens of office, he told himself with a smile.

  Jack Borrodin he felt slightly sorry for. He recalled how he had spotted him some years ago as one of the new management intake, and had marked him down immediately as a likely looking prey. There were several facts in his favour. He was honest and trusting, a straightforward, deal-from-the-top-of-the-deck character, whose instinct was to believe what he was told. Both parents dead, no brothers or sisters. Perfect, he had decided. When Jack got into trouble there would be no one to help him. Nor would there be anyone to grieve for him after he was gone. After all, he reflected, there is no point in creating more unhappiness than was strictly necessary. One does not, he told himself, like to think of oneself as a cruel man.

  Tara Ling was another matter. The Chairman had nothing but contempt for her. Because she was Oriental, perhaps, he decided. He had never liked Orientals. Too calculating. And she was headstrong and arrogant, deluded by her own self-righteousness. Not the sort of woman he appreciated. No, he decided. The world would not be a poorer place for her absence from it.

  Carefully, the Chairman turned the handle on the finance director's door, and stepped inside. He had not expected to see anyone inside and was merely completing his tour of the offices, and, on catching sight of Finer sitting at his desk, stepped back an inch. 'Just catching up on some work, Chairman,' said Finer, looking up from his computer screen.

  'Quite so,' whispered the Chairman.

  'Everything has been taken care of?'

  'I believe so.'

  Finer stood up from his chair and walked around to the front of his desk. 'I think you've done a tremendous job, sir,' he said.

  The Chairman creased his lips into a thin smile. 'Nobody would know better than you how dire our figures would be looking without the extreme steps we have taken.'

  'But it's complex,' said Finer. 'Can we be sure that everything will work out as we have planned?'

  'One can never be sure,' the Chairman answered wearily. 'But there are only six days to go. Then all of this will be in the past.'

  'And if something goes wrong?' Finer persisted. 'What then?'

  The Chairman eyed him closely. 'Then we all go down together,' he smiled.

  'True,' replied the finance director thoughtfully. 'We go down together.'

  Jack checked his watch. It was just after twelve. He stared down at the number he had jotted down on a notepad after calling an old college acquaintance on one of the Sunday papers and took a deep breath. There was, he knew, no choice but to call. Right away. Carefully, deliberately, he punched the numbers into the keypad.

  The phone rang only twice. 'Symonds,' said the voice on the other end of the line.

  The tone was crisp, upper-class, public school and Oxbridge. Jack tried to recall what he knew about Julian Symonds. It wasn't much. The head of corporate finance at Zurich Financial was a respected City figure, one of the elderly grandees who had been around before Big Bang, and who had made a bundle of money when the firm he was a partner in was sold out to one of the financial conglomerates that moved into London in the late eighties. Jack was aware that he only worked on corporate defences, declining all invitations to act on behalf of hostile bidders, no matter how huge the fees might have been. He was known as a tough fighter, a man who would consider every trick, and push every tactic to its limit, if it was in the interests of his client.

  'My name is Jack Borrodin,' said Jack crisply. There was a silence on the other end of the line. 'I don't believe you know me,' he added firmly.

  Another pause. 'No, I don't believe I do,' replied Symonds at length.

  'I work for Sir Kurt Helin,' said Jack. 'My title is special assistant to the Chairman.'

  'Then I don't suppose you should be talking to me,' replied Symonds, his voice betraying surprise, but also a hint of interest.

  'You may have heard of my colleague, Tara Ling. We are working together.'

  'I think you should come to the point,' said Symonds firmly.

  'We need your help.'

  The pause was longer this time, and, though it was barely audible, Jack could hear the man sighing.

  'I don't believe in dirty tricks,' said Symonds. 'I must warn you that if you are attempting to sell me information that might discredit your employers in the last few days of the bid then two things will happen. One is that I will tell you to go away. The other is that I will immediately inform your employers of your disloyalty.'

  'There are things happening at Kizog that it is vital you know about. Nothing about this company or about this bid is as it appears.'

  'How do you know that I won't immediately phone Sir Kurt to tell him that you have contacted me?' said Symonds bluntly.

  'I don't,' replied Jack.

  'You are taking a big chance.'

  'I know,' said Jack. 'We'll risk it.'

  Jack could feel his grip tightening on the receiver as he waited for the reply. 'If you'll chance it, so will I,' Symonds said. 'You have my address.'

  Jack could feel the muscles in his finger start to loosen. 'Yes,' he answered.

  'Six,' he said. 'I'll have about an hour free.'

  EIGHTEEN

  Tara came in a few minutes after he had finished talking with Symonds, and Jack greeted her with a smile, his spirits reviving at the sight of her coming through the door. He was, he realised, relieved to see her. He found that he hated being alone. Too many demons to prey upon his mind; demons which, for now, only she could banish.

  He had told her about the phone call, p
ointing out that they had only six hours to make the appointment. No time to waste. She sat next to him on the bed, tucking up her legs beneath her. Carefully she opened up her bag and spread out a pile of notes from her purse. 'Just over £15,000, nearly all I have,' she explained. 'You must do the same. The banks are still open until lunchtime. Empty your account.'

  'No credit cards?' asked Jack.

  'Too easy to trace,' said Tara firmly. 'Any cash withdrawals, and any credit card transactions, will instantly reveal our location to the police and to Kizog as well. Cash is much safer. It can't be traced.'

  Jack leant across and wrapped his arms around her body, cuddling her back between his palms. 'Not now,' she whispered. 'Too much to be done.'

  They threw their few belongings into the one bag, and checked out of the hotel. Jack put the tab for this bill on his credit card. There was no point in worrying about being located now. The police would soon track them to this town from the cash withdrawals, and it wouldn't take them long to figure out where they had been staying. By then they would have left town.

  Out on the street, in the midday sunshine, Jack explained about the car. 'We have to think of everything that might possibly reveal who and where we are,' he said. 'Better still, confuse them about where we are.'

  'Fine,' answered Tara brightly. 'It's a Kizog car. Bum it.'

  Jack shook his head. After withdrawing £6,000 from his account, all the cash he had, he approached a young man sitting alone on a bench on the village green. He asked him if he drove. The man said he did. Jack told him he would give him £200 to drive his car to Liverpool. There was no point in being too generous, he reasoned. He had no idea how much cash they might still need.

  The man looked at him quizzically. 'Come again?' he muttered.