Alchemist

by Peter James

  She came back with two Styrofoam cups. ‘I’m afraid the coffee isn’t too brilliant on this floor.’

  ‘Now she tells me,’ he said with a smile, accepting the cup.

  She sat back down. ‘You’re in Group Patents? A patent agent?’

  ‘Uh huh. I’m a patent attorney – kind of the American equivalent.’

  ‘Where are you from?’

  ‘Washington. Ever been there?’

  ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘A few times. My father’s given several talks at Georgetown University.’

  ‘That’s where I was an undergrad. It’s a good place.’

  ‘We’re going over in a few weeks – he has to do a short promotion tour for his book. It’s just come out in the States.’

  ‘What’s it about?’

  ‘It’s called The Gene Bomb – The 21st Century Holocaust.’

  He looked at her and quietly tested the water. ‘Sounds controversial?’

  ‘Very. My father tends to be controversial. Rather too much for his own good.’

  ‘I’ve kind of noticed – reading through his published papers – he doesn’t seem to have too much truck with a lot of the conventions of his profession.’

  ‘No, he doesn’t.’

  ‘How about you?’

  ‘I do my best to keep him on the straight and narrow.’

  ‘You don’t go along with his view that patenting is wrong?’

  She shook her head and he saw a trace of sadness in her expression. ‘My father is a genius, Mr Molloy, but like a lot of geniuses he doesn’t always live in the real world. I understand his feelings about pooling knowledge, particularly with genetics, but I actually believe in the patenting system. I believe in this company – I feel a great sense of privilege to be here.’

  Conor’s spirits dropped a fraction as he read the sincerity in the expression that accompanied her words. She wasn’t just saying it to impress.

  Give me time, he thought. Give me time and I’ll change your mind about this company. I promise.

  17

  Reading, England. Tuesday 13 September, 1994

  Tiny balls of rainwater rolled around on the glistening bonnet of the small blue Nissan. The inside of the car reeked of polish; the vinyl dashboard and the parcel shelf were buffed to a gloss, the carpets freshly shampooed. The last time he had been in his father-in-law’s car, Alan Johnson reflected through his misery, it had been a tip, littered with old newspapers, sweet wrappers, yellow Post-it notes. He must have had it specially valeted for the funeral.

  The wipers swept an arc in front of him, but he saw only a blur of rainwater that was indistinguishable from his tears. They were pulling up outside the house now; the late roses still in bloom in the front garden were bowed beneath the weight of water. Sarah’s roses; she had watered them, tended them and she would never see them again. She would never see any more flowers.

  Gone.

  Dead.

  Not coming back. Ever.

  Five o’clock and it was growing gloomy. The sparse grass looked sodden and forlorn; a sapling cherry supported by a stake stood in its midst. All the windows were dark. No lights on. Sarah always told him it was important to leave lights on when you went out; she was practical, much more practical than himself. She did the shopping, paid the bills, juggled their bank balances and their overdrafts, organized the essentials. He stared at their home, barely a year old, modern, cosy, newly decorated. Sarah had chosen the colours, the curtains, the furnishings, the kitchen units. She had made it warm and cheery; now it looked dark and forbidding. And empty.

  God, it looked empty.

  He turned to his father-in-law. ‘Will you come with me – I don’t think I can face going in there alone.’

  ‘Of course, of course,’ Hubert Wentworth said quietly, pulling on the handbrake and switching off the engine. He leaned back, looking exhausted from the strain of the day and took a deep breath. ‘You – ah – can stay with me, if you’d rather.’

  Alan shook his head. ‘Thank you – I need – need to –’ His voice tailed. He needed to be alone with his grief, but he stared fearfully at the house; at the abyss.

  It would be better once they went inside. He would switch on all the lights, turn up the heating. A slight panic was seizing him because he was already unable to picture Sarah clearly; her image kept slipping from his mind and he could only recall sections of it: the texture of her hair, the shape of her mouth; the colour of her bare shoulder; he was even having problems recalling her voice; just snatches of words, of the way she said his name. She only existed for him in fragments, like pieces of a vase lying shattered on a floor.

  He pulled the rumpled handkerchief from his pocket, sniffed and dabbed his eyes. Oh God, dear God, please bless my darling Sarah and give me strength to cope, he prayed silently.

  There was a sharp click as his father-in-law released his seat belt and slowly eased his bulky figure out of the car. Alan was grateful for the company of the kindly journalist, aware of Hubert Wentworth’s own sadness also. They shared an unwelcome common bond: the older man had lost his wife in a tragic way also, many years ago. And now he had lost his only child as well.

  Images remained burned into Alan’s mind. The surgeon’s knife slitting open Sarah’s navel, the ribbon of blood following the blade’s path. The nurses clamping back the parted skin; the surgeon pushing his gloved hands inside the opening. Then the slimy, wriggling creature, trailing a long white cord, raised into the air.

  Their baby! Their baby had been born! God had made everything all right!

  Then the silence.

  No. Oh God, please no.

  The tiny human shape coated in wet blood thrashing like a hooked fish. The mass of misshapen flesh; the empty skin; no nose, no mouth, just the one eye, oddly slanted in the centre of what might be the forehead.

  And after that, a merciful blur.

  Cars were parked in driveways along the street. Lights were on in all the other houses; televisions flickered through their windows; two kids roller-bladed along the pavement. Life was being lived; but Alan wondered why as they walked to the front door, the cold wind and rain lashing them. It was a Georgian-style door, painted green, with a brass knocker. Sarah’s choice.

  Alan was grateful to his father-in-law for the silence. He knew that he should have organized a party after the funeral, a wake, they were called. But that sort of thing was Sarah’s domain, she had always been good at organizing, and it seemed only yesterday that they had sat together, selecting items for their wedding list, writing out invites. He would not have had the strength to face those same people at the house today.

  Merely walking into the crematorium had been an ordeal; there had been a large turnout, mostly faces he did not recognize. Some cousins whom he barely knew had showed up, but that was all the representation from his side of the family. Other than his bedridden mother, who had been unable to leave her nursing home, he had no close living relatives; his father had been dead nearly a decade.

  Sympathy. What the hell good was sympathy? As he pushed his key in the lock, all he could see was the brass handles on the coffin on the catafalque; and they weren’t even real, just plastic coated to look like brass. A sham, an illusion; they were the regulation: environmentally friendly, the undertaker had told him. He saw the blue velvet curtains slowly closing in front of the coffin, closing on his Sarah. Heard the ghastly electrical hum. Then the music, Sarah’s favourite piece, ‘Oh For The Wings Of The Dove’. He wondered who knew, who had suggested it.

  The hall was unwelcoming. As they shut the door behind them, the howling wind seemed to have followed them in and was still blowing. It seemed to be coming from above them. Alan switched on a light and a door slammed upstairs.

  Both men glanced at each other, their grief momentarily suspended as they stared up into the darkness of the landing. Hubert Wentworth put a steadying hand on his son-in-law’s shoulder. ‘You – ah – must have left a window open.’

  Alan swallowed,
his eyes locked on a framed sampler on the wall which read: ‘God Bless This House.’ A window open, yes, of course. His grief had been playing havoc with his mind. He had put the newspaper and the morning post in the fridge yesterday. Emptied an entire plate of food he had just microwaved for his supper last night into the dustbin by mistake. Autopilot; he was running on auto and the system had gone wonky.

  Both men mounted the stairs. As Sarah’s father switched on the landing light, the first thing that Alan saw was the cheery blue and white china sign tacked to the door in front of him: ‘Baby’s Room.’ He had to force himself to grip the handle, turn it and push the door open.

  A great weight seemed to be pushing back against the door from the other side and a howling draught greeted him. Then he gasped in shock: the window had been smashed; almost all the glass had been knocked out and lay in jagged pieces on the yellow carpet. A mobile of flying animals spun and clattered above the brand new cot. The eyes of the two mourners met and exchanged a mutual signal of alarm.

  Alan had heard about this; callous burglars who read the death notices and raided homes during the funeral. But they wouldn’t have done that to him, not the way Sarah – and the baby had died – no, surely?

  Hubert Wentworth moved quickly as if suddenly transformed into an athlete, striding out and opening the door to the master bedroom. Alan followed: all the drawers from Sarah’s dressing table had been pulled open and their contents strewn on the floor. The wardrobe doors were hanging open and most of the contents lay scattered.

  Alan’s eyes sprang to their wedding photograph in the silver frame on the windowsill and a strange feeling of relief gushed through him at the realization that the thieves had not, at least, taken that. He registered that the radio was still there and the small portable television and he wondered why. Then he entered the small ensuite bathroom. To his surprise the mirrored door of the medicine cabinet was open and several vials of pills and ointments had been knocked to the floor. The doors of the cupboard beneath the fitted washbasin were open also, and the contents emptied haphazardly.

  ‘Christ – what the hell did they want in here?’ Alan shouted in sudden fury. ‘Drugs? Is it bloody kids looking for a high?’

  The newspaperman was silent. He strode out of the room and went back downstairs. Alan followed. They checked the sitting room, the dining room, the kitchen; none of the downstairs rooms had been touched.

  Hubert Wentworth picked up the phone and called the police. When he’d replaced the receiver, Alan said, trembling: ‘Do you think we disturbed them? Is that why they haven’t taken anything down here?’

  By way of answer, Wentworth stood up, climbed the stairs again and went back into the bathroom, staring around thoughtfully. ‘Be careful not to touch anything,’ he said as his son-in-law joined him.

  ‘Bloody kids!’ Alan said again, close to hysterics.

  Hubert Wentworth seemed far away. ‘Kids,’ he said, reflexively. ‘Kids.’ He knelt suddenly and squinted at a prescription vial on the floor, trying to read the label. Then he looked back up. ‘Was Sarah on any medications?’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Anything – any kind of medication at all. Was she taking anything for her pregnancy; or before the pregnancy?’

  ‘Well – yes – yes, she was.’ Alan’s face reddened and he stammered a little. ‘We – we’d been trying for a baby f-for th-three years. W-w-why?’

  The newspaperman’s expression darkened, just a fraction. Then he said gently: ‘Just a wild stab in the dark. I wouldn’t wish to jump to any conclusions. We – ah – should – ah – see what’s been taken. The police will have some ideas, perhaps. It – ah – it is far too early for conclusions.’

  18

  London. Friday 4 November, 1994

  Seated at the dining table in Charley Rowley’s London home, Conor Molloy felt he had entered a totally different world.

  The small and elegant Georgian terraced house was imbued with an air of Old Money that he had previously only encountered in books and in the movies. Oil paintings filled much of the limited wall space; some were portraits of ancestors; some, bucolic country scenes and others, stormy seascapes. The carpet was buried beneath fine, well-trodden scatter-rugs, and every piece of furniture was an antique; there were some things that even today’s finest interior designers could never emulate, Conor thought, and this room was one. The only way to acquire this effect was to inherit it.

  The oval mahogany dining table had the right amount of scratches; the knives had blades worn thin with age, and bone handles that were cracked and stained; tiny mounds of salt sat in blue glass in silver holders, and the cut-glass goblets and tumblers were suitably mismatched. Charley Rowley sat at the head of the table, in a purple waistcoat over a striped shirt, green cords and suede loafers, reaching the punch line of a joke he had already told Conor, and which Conor had heard a year before in Boston.

  ‘And then he said: I can’t remember where I live?’

  There was a roar of laughter, followed by isolated snorts and brays as the others latched on, one brain cell at a time. Conor drained his glass of claret; he was feeling dangerously light-headed and realized he had lost track of how much he had drunk. Champagne; Chablis; now this Forts de Latour. He was feeling bullish, a little over-confident; playing the role of Mr Innocent Nice Guy was coming easily, in spite of the fact that none of the company interested him, least of all Rowley’s girlfriend, Lulu, who was overweight and overbearingly loud.

  He picked up his balloon of Armagnac, swilled the amber liquid around, his thoughts slipping to Montana Bannerman, as they had done repeatedly since his second meeting with her two days ago. He compared the genuine warmth of her smile with the strained laughter of these supercilious young women, and realized he was more smitten than he liked to admit. But he was going to need a lot more help from her with her father’s papers, so he was going to have plenty of excuses to meet her again.

  He had ceased to bother about his blind date, who had been seated on his right and had not asked him one single thing about himself all evening. Pretty amazing, he thought, considering she had spent a year in Washington. She had responded to his own attempts at conversation with a mixture of monosyllabic replies and selective deafness. Obviously didn’t fancy him. Well, the feeling was mutual, he decided, glancing sideways at her now.

  Amanda something-something. Velvet headband, black dress that looked like a corset with her boobs shoehorned in the cups and bulging over the top. And she revolted him by chewing Nicorette gum between every course. ‘Just given up, darling,’ she had said, addressing him the way she might have spoken to her hairdresser.

  ‘Conor, your turn,’ Rowley said, blowing out a cloud of cigar smoke. ‘Any good jokes?’

  Conor had been wracking his brains desperately for the past ten minutes, trying to think of something appropriately lewd and funny that wasn’t a hundred years old. He had come up with only two gags both of which had now been told. ‘How about my party trick?’

  ‘What’s that?’ said the man opposite him.

  ‘I can hypnotize people.’

  ‘Yah?’ said the girl at the far end of the table, on Rowley’s left. She had long straight blonde hair and a pouting, almost aggressively beautiful face. ‘I think hypnosis is a big con; that guy on the television fakes it, you can see he does.’ She lit a cigarette with a gold lighter. ‘Anyhow, I don’t see how you can prove someone’s hypnotized – they could just be acting.’

  ‘I could hypnotize you and prove it,’ Conor said.

  ‘No way. People have tried before. I’m not suggestive – or whatever the word is.’

  ‘You don’t need to be. I can hypnotize anyone. It’s Camilla, right?’

  ‘Corinthia,’ she said.

  ‘OK, Corinthia. You want me to prove it to you?’ He was aware of the sudden silence.

  ‘Yah, go ahead – but I apologize in advance for ruining your trick,’ she said with a trace of hostility.

  ‘
OK.’ Conor stood up and walked, unsteadily, around the table. He nodded at his host. ‘Charley, mind if I sit in your place for a moment?’

  Rowley vacated the chair and Conor sat down; the girl wasn’t quite so striking close up; he could see through her make-up that her skin was sallow. ‘Want to put your cigarette down first?’

  She shrugged and set it down, then stared back at him defiantly. Conor picked up the cigarette and held it by its lipsticky butt. All eyes were now on him. He turned it around theatrically, making an arc with the smoke, then pushed the left-hand cuff of his jacket and shirt up his wrist, exposing his watch and a couple of inches of bare skin above it.

  He blew gently on the lighted end of the cigarette, making it glow a fierce red. While it was still glowing, he brought it slowly down on to the skin above his watch. There was a smell of singed hair, then a slight rustling sound as he crushed the cigarette out on his wrist. One of the women gave a tiny shriek of horror.

  He continued stubbing the cigarette, rotating it methodically, then held up the blackened, crumpled end for all to see, savouring the shock on their faces.

  ‘Have you got asbestos skin or something?’ said a rather arrogant male art dealer.

  Conor shook his head. ‘Power of the mind.’

  ‘It’s impossible,’ Corinthia said. ‘It’s obviously some clever sleight of hand.’

  ‘You must have switched cigarettes,’ Lulu said.

  ‘I could do the same on any of you,’ Conor said. ‘I could prevent you feeling pain.’ He smiled. ‘Would someone like to volunteer?’

  Corinthia looked at him hesitantly. Then she thrust her hand forward. ‘Burn me and I’ll sue,’ she said.

  There was a titter of laughter.