Kill and Cure

by Andy Ashdown Design

We both do.’

  They came up to the edge of James Street. On one corner, Andersons the insurers, and on the other, the tinted window façade of the Moorcroft Pharmaceutical building. Stich was first to notice the yellow police tape strung out around two thirds of the road. Just the other side of it was a posse of people gathering around a thickset man.

  ‘Stich, where are you going?’

  ‘To take a look.’

  ‘It’s police business,’ Susan said, pulling him back.

  ‘So?’

  ‘So, leave it to the police.’

  ‘Come on, it won’t be for long. I’m interested that’s all.’

  ‘But you never stop for stuff like this. You hate rubber-neckers.’

  ‘It’s just for today.’

  ‘Stich, I don’t have time, I need to be back in the lab for 1.30.’

  ‘Two minutes.’

  Further behind the police line were half a dozen people engaged in activities that, until now, Stich had only ever seen on television. He watched one of them on a ladder inspecting a CCTV unit bolted to a sidewall.

  ‘Hey, Susan!’ A woman bounded up and planted a kiss on Susan’s cheek. ‘I knew that was you.’ She wore a white polo neck, grey slacks and a broad smile.

  ‘Trinny Becker?’ Susan looked surprised.

  Trinny swept back her deep, curly red hair. ‘The 20

  very same.’

  ‘I thought you were in Prague.’

  ‘I was. I’ve been here at Moorcroft for two weeks.

  I’m running my own group.’ She leaned in with a wide grin. ‘B-cells – early gene expression – no less.’

  ‘Wow.’

  ‘I know, I can hardly believe it myself.’

  Susan turned to Stich. ‘Stich, this is Trinny … a very wet Trinny.’ She pulled her towards the umbrella out of the fine spray. ‘Coatless and – if she’s not careful – a prime candidate for pneumonia.’

  ‘I came out for a crafty ciggie,’ said Trinny, ducking under. ‘Terrible about what’s happened, isn’t it?’

  Susan glanced at Stich. ‘It looks pretty serious.’

  ‘There are police crawling all over the labs, asking questions.’

  There was a slight pause before Susan gestured towards Stich. ‘Anyway, Trinny, this is my fiancé, David Stichell. Trinny and I worked in the same lab at Immteck for a while. That must be, what, two years ago?’

  ‘At least,’ gushed Trinny. ‘Isn’t it exciting to be working at the same place again? I saw you in the lobby this morning so I knew you were here. What group are you with?’

  ‘I wasn’t here this morning.’

  ‘Yes, in the lobby about 7.00. You had that outfit on.’

  ‘No, I was at the Immteck lab in Holborn at 7.00.

  I still work for them.’

  Trinny frowned. ‘I could have sworn it was you.’

  21

  Susan shook her head and interlocked her arm around Stich’s. ‘It must have been someone else.

  Look, Trinny,’ she said, checking her watch, ‘I really must dash, I’ve got a lot to get through this afternoon. How about you give me your number and I’ll call you.’

  ‘Sure,’ said Trinny, fishing out a card from her pocket and handing it over. ‘That’s a direct line. I’m free most lunchtimes, or evenings if you’d rather.

  We’ve got a lot of catching up to do.’

  ‘Give me a week or so.’ Susan pulled on Stich’s arm.

  ‘Speak soon, huh?’

  * * *

  ‘Guess who else works at Moorcroft?’ asked Stich, shaking the umbrella as they reached the stone forecourt outside Liverpool Street tube station.

  ‘Surprise me.’

  ‘Mags.’

  Susan didn’t respond.

  ‘Magenta Rosti. I saw Ethan’s mum today.’

  He guided her away from the main drag towards the perspex barrier edging the gallery above the main concourse.

  ‘Stich, I know who Mags is.’

  ‘Small world.’

  ‘I suppose so. Now, you’ll be at Holborn at 5.00?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘Okay, baby,’ she said kissing him on his cheek.

  ‘I’ll see you then.’

  22

  5

  The road was mid-afternoon quiet. The only slight disturbance to this ideal was Alice. Stich’s young daughter was refusing to get in the back of the car.

  Apparently, it was much more fun being at the front with her dad. She was old enough to know her own mind too. At the grand age of four and a half, she brought all her experience to bear. Stich opted for a stand off and waited, hands on hips, trying to look stern. She looked at him though teary blue eyes, a teddy clasped to her chest. Every now and then, she pushed a strand of her dark, wavy hair away from her face, and pulled at her white socks.

  ‘You can get in the front with me when you’re six,’ he said after a minute of silence. ‘It’s not safe yet. You’re too small.’

  She wriggled about a bit on the pavement and shifted the position of the teddy.

  ‘So, are you getting in the back or not?’ Stich asked.

  ‘I need to go toilet,’ she said.

  ‘You’ve just been.’

  She wiped her nose with her hand. ‘I need to go.’

  ‘I don’t believe you.’

  Alice gazed off into the distance and feigned disinterest. A stalling tactic.

  23

  The ball was very much in Stich’s court. He decided to take action. ‘Okay, that’s enough. This is not a debate,’ he said, reaching forwards. He picked her up and got the back door open. She started crying immediately. Stich strapped her into the child seat, closed the back door and got into the front. He shut his eyes and tried to ignore the screams.

  They were well on the motorway before the crying stopped and she drifted off to sleep. Stich kept a careful eye on her in the rear view mirror; her face calm now; maybe a touch of redness around her eyes where she had been rubbing them. She looked beautiful, though; God, she was so like her mother. For a moment Stich wondered about her –

  where she was, what kind of life she was living.

  Then he stopped himself. He had gone down that road too many times in the past. It did no good. He had a new life now. A life he was building for him and Alice.

  Susan was a big part of that.

  ‘Don’t wake her,’ Loni said as Stich fished Alice out of the back seat and carried her into the bungalow Loni had lived in for thirty years.

  ‘But she won’t know I’ve gone.’

  ‘That’s okay. If she wakes now, she’ll cry when you leave.’

  Stich laid Alice on the sofa and Loni covered her with a duvet. She didn’t open her eyes once. He bent down and kissed her on the forehead. ‘I’ve left a change of clothes in the bag,’ he said. ‘Her teddy’s in there too.’

  24

  ‘Don’t you worry about any of that,’ Loni replied. ‘I’ll find everything.’

  He smiled. ‘I know.’

  * * *

  Stich arrived dead on 5.00 despite a snarl-up on Marylebone and Euston Road. Susan was waiting on the stairs of the Immteck building sheltering from the rain, a Barbour jacket fastened up to her chin, the collar pulled high.

  She seemed small and vulnerable as she stood; timid even.

  A captive bird.

  Stich hopped out, threw the carry-on into the boot while Susan strapped up in front.

  Still and compliant. All the while its heart beating out of control.

  What made him think that?

  ‘Did you drop Alice off okay?’ Susan asked as Stich fired the engine.

  He nodded. ‘She was sleeping when I left.’

  They began a two-hour M4 drive – much of it spent on the brakes – that meant it was pitch black when they made the grass ridge overlooking Maxi’s place. About ten miles west of Bristol, Lansdowne Farm was set on the edge of a patchwork of land that was currently being pummelled by streaks of rainwater. Stich he
ard thunder in the distance as he looked down from Lansdowne Hill towards the farmhouse below.

  ‘Childhood memories?’

  25

  Susan turned to him. ‘Something like that.’ She ducked under his umbrella. ‘I was thinking about my dad. We travelled down here on the train the first time I came. Uncle Maxi met us at the station and presented me with a bike. It looked like a small BMX with stabilisers. I’d never been so excited. Dad wouldn’t recognise Maxi as the same man now.’

  ‘He means a lot to you, doesn’t he?’

  ‘Uncle Maxi was the reason I got interested in science. His company had patented a technology that led to the very first home testing kits.’

  ‘Testing kits?’

  ‘You know, to see if you were pregnant. He talked to me like I was an adult. I loved that.’

  Stich pulled her closer. ‘What time’s he expecting us?’

  ‘Depends if he’s picked up the phone messages I’ve left him.’

  ‘Well, the lights are on so someone’s in. Come on, let’s go.’

  ‘Give me a minute,’ she said, pulling an orange envelope from inside her jacket. ‘I need to send this.’

  ‘Anyone I know?’

  She shook her head. ‘A girlfriend in a lab out in Strasbourg. She’s just published. I’m sending my regards.’

  ‘Here, take this,’ he said, offering the umbrella.

  He got back in the car while she strode towards a solitary post-box by the roadside. Watching her through the rain, the light from the headlamps illuminating her face, Stich realised she was right.

  They did need to get away. These couple of days 26

  would be good for both of them.

  Once she was back in the seat next to him he gunned the car forwards, steering down an unmade road to the farmhouse. The potholes jerked them along until they reached the shingle nearer the house, which crackled reassuringly as they pulled up in the driveway. He killed the engine. Susan leaned back in her seat and closed her eyes.

  ‘Peaceful?’

  She nodded.

  ‘Luggage now or later?’ Stich asked.

  ‘Later.’ She slammed the car door and called over her shoulder, ‘Let’s go round the back.’

  Susan always did this when she visited Maxi. As a child, she would tap on the French windows at the back of his place to signal her arrival. It was their secret code, one that continued into adulthood.

  The farmhouse was rustic. Brick built, sprawling with white rendering and straw-coloured roof tiles.

  At the back it was mostly glazed. They peered into the study. The heat from inside had misted the glass and Susan rubbed the outside to clear it. She cupped her hands over her eyes.

  ‘He’s sleeping,’ she whispered.

  Stich scanned the room. ‘Where?’

  ‘On the leather chair.’

  He could just make out the swivel chair. It was turned away from them, but there was no mistaking the back of Maxi’s head resting on it.

  ‘I’ll tap gently,’ she said, ‘I don’t want to frighten him.’

  Stich looked past the chair to the bookcase. He 27

  could see movement in the darkness.

  ‘Hold it, Susan, there’s someone else with him.’

  She frowned. ‘Where? I don’t see anyone.’

  Stich squinted. ‘Yeah, there is, over by the bookcase.’

  Susan pushed her face right up to the glass. ‘Is he talking?’

  Stich nodded. Maxi did seem to be talking to someone on the other side of the desk. Suddenly he became animated, his arms gesticulating.

  A man stepped into view. Tall and lean, wearing a pair of steel flexi-rim glasses.

  ‘Told you,’ Stich whispered. ‘You recognise him?’

  She shook her head. ‘He can’t be a local or I’d know him.’

  Maxi leaned forward as if to make a point, only for his body to jolt. The scream from Susan echoed in Stich’s ears. She stood staring through the glass, transfixed. Automatically Stitch turned to check behind him. Then Susan screamed again, this time Stich’s name. There was some movement and he caught sight of Maxi slumped forward in his chair.

  The phone! Susan had a mobile. Police … She fumbled in her pockets, got the phone out and he grabbed it from her just as his world imploded.

  ‘No!’ The word roared from his mouth as the glass shattered. Susan fell backwards. Stich reached for her. ‘Susan!’

  Her head rocked away from him. He grabbed her, pulling her close. Susan’s face looked startled, as if caught in a camera flashlight. In an instant, the image seared itself onto his mind: eyes closed, a 28

  strand of hair on her forehead, the dark, perfectly circumscribed puncture in her chest, and a steady stream of blood.

  She was dead. The horror propelled him and he turned quickly, taking her with him, crouching low without thinking. From the corner of his eye he caught movement a few feet away from the window. There was a sharp crack of broken glass and Stich felt a searing sensation in his thigh. He managed a couple of strides before a white-hot pain burst through his leg. Stich gasped and stumbled forwards. Susan fell away from him, out of reach.

  There was no way he could make it to the car now.

  In the darkness he could see a small wooden building perhaps twenty metres away. He pushed himself towards it.

  Someone was through the French doors – Stich could hear the commotion behind him. His senses hyped to fever pitch now, his need to get away as desperate as anything he had ever felt in his life. He looked over his shoulder. The killer was striding forwards, right arm raised. Stich knew what was coming. He hurled himself through the open entrance of the building, expecting the second impact. There was the spit of the silencer but no pain. The bullet had missed.

  The building was crammed full: tables, plants, forks, pots … Stich crawled into the farthest corner and waited, his clothes sodden with instant sweat.

  He could hear his own breath, rapid and shallow.

  The killer’s was deep and measured. Stich heard it clearly as he came in. From his crouched position, 29

  he could see him moving slowly, picking his way.

  Stich pushed himself deeper into the corner, willing the killer to leave, to give up the chase and go back to the house.

  But he didn’t. He kept coming.

  To Stich’s right, a huge pane of glass formed much of the back wall and beyond that lay the gardens. Maxi must have stood here a thousand times, tinkering with plants, potting up seedlings and enjoying the view. Up on his haunches now, he inched towards the window. He could hear the killer’s breath, maybe ten metres from where he had hidden. Stich eased forwards, brushing a rickety, wooden table, knocking over some coffee jars. The noise smashed through the quiet. He tucked his chin to his chest and charged forwards, ignoring the pain. There was the explosion of splintered fragments as he crashed through the glass – and then the pant-pant of his breath as he emerged on the other side. He moved without thought as to where he was going, no longer sure where the killer was, all the time waiting for the shot.

  A fence rose up, and then uneven ground which gave way to nothing. He plunged downwards, his legs instinctively trying to find footing. His shoulder slammed into something hard – and then he was rolling. It seemed to go on forever. The last thing he felt was the water.

  30

  6

  On the fourth floor of the Immteck Pharmaceutical building near Holborn, Clive Rand had completed a third inspection of the band of DNA on his electrophoresis gel. Its molecular weight was far heavier than those in the earlier samples. He hunched over his lab bench as the display on the PCR machine signalled another completed cycle of DNA amplification. The spray from two desk lamps clamped over his pod formed a pair of rich, white-light puddles illuminating a bench now littered with used and discarded eppidorfs, pipette nozzles, bits of purification kit, and gel slices. All of it a testament to the volume of work he had got through these past few hours. He had performed this run half a doz
en times already and still couldn’t believe the result.

  Clive glanced at the timer display: he had five minutes before amplification was complete. After that, he would run the samples through a gel and see what he had.

  Who was he kidding? He already knew. It was a fluke, really. He had been using a genetic probe to isolate DNA from the tumor biopsies taken from Krenthol trial patients. This was a routine lab procedure and the results had always been consistent.

  31

  Until last night, that is.

  Since then he had not left the lab. What had changed? He went through the scenario once again.

  He had used the same procedure, same equipment, same probe, same reagents, same … same probe?

  Clive left his seat and went to the refrigerator. The opaque tube that held his probe looked like a thousand others. He studied it closely, and then, as the top caught the light, he noticed something he hadn’t seen before. The word, Tum-8, was scribbled on the lid in felt pen. Clive was always meticulous when it came to labelling his work. Someone else had done this. Where was the probe he had been using before?

  He went back to his seat still holding the tube in his fingers, turning it over, inspecting the fluid.

  Clearly someone meant him to get this new result.

  His old probe would never have found the heavier band of DNA. It wasn’t designed to.

  Then it hit him.

  ‘Susan!’ Clive swivelled his seat, yanked out his desk drawer and flipped through his diary. He sprinted through the lab to the communal phone in the centrifuge room, found the page with her number and punched it in.

  ‘Come on … come on.’ Clive tapped his hand on the desk and waited for her to pick up. The message service kicked in and he listened to the cheerful greeting: ‘Hi, this is Sue Harrison. I can’t take your call just now but if you leave your name and number, I’ll get back to you as soon as I can. Thanks!’

  He waited for the tone. ‘Susan. It’s me, Clive …

  32

  You switched probes, didn’t you? I know about the viral DNA in these samples. And you do too … God, Susan, this is madness … Call me as soon as you get this – you’ve got my number.’ He rang off, looked up Susan’s home number and dialled it. Another answer service, and he left the same message, then grabbed his coat and exited the building.