The Devil's Landscape

by Ken McClure

  ‘There’s a world of difference between that and being embraced by academe, said Steven. ‘Anyone who crosses their invisible line and strays into what might be considered show-business can be in for a very hard time indeed.’

  ‘Something you don’t realise until the knife goes into your back,’ smiled Tally.

  Steven told her about the opinions Dorothy had expressed at the meeting about the direction of current research funding.

  ‘Wow.’

  ‘Wow indeed, but not entirely without foundation,’ said Steven quietly.

  ‘Maybe . . . but I mean . . .’

  ‘Not the wisest thing to come out with?

  ‘Quite, I mean you’ve got to play the game, haven’t you?’

  ‘Maybe it should depend on how clean the game is,’ said Steven.

  ‘You don’t think it is?’

  ‘People are people. Human nature rules at whatever level of society you’re in.’

  ‘Not a happy thought if you really believe that the research grants system is corrupt. Do you?’

  Steven shook his head. ‘No,’ he conceded. ‘Well, not at the level of cash exchanging hands in brown paper bags, but it’s not above having an old boys’ network who scratch each other’s backs. As to whether it extends to standing in the way of first rate research in order to settle old scores . . . who knows? John is going to try and find out at one of his lunches.’

  Tally smiled. ‘Where the real truth leaks out.’

  Steven nodded and asked, ‘How was your day?’

  ‘Life is good,’ replied Tally. ‘I am practicing medicine instead of spending my time arguing about targets and filling in forms.’

  ‘Being a consultant suits you.’

  ‘Nothing to do with that,’ said Tally. ‘We’re well funded and well managed. I now work in a proper hospital instead of being treated as a form-filling, box-ticking piece in a board game for third rate politicians and mediocre managers. It’s all about choice for patients, my backside. It’s all about money. Period.’

  Steven smiled. He was used to hearing Tally sound off about the shortcomings of the National Health Service He was even pleased that her promotion and move had apparently done little to blunt her views, but felt obliged to point out what John Macmillan had said about special funding for Great Ormond Street.

  ‘I suppose,’ Tally conceded. ‘Maybe I should keep my mouth shut, smile sweetly and be terribly sympathetic to medics less fortunate than myself.

  ‘Well, I was wondering how long it would be before the establishment gets to you and bends you to its will. You’ll be co-opted on to one committee after another until you can’t say a word without offending someone you shouldn’t.’

  ‘Aint gonna happen.’

  ‘Mm, maybe we should go out to eat before you start wearing a bow tie and playing golf.’ said Steven.

  ‘Maybe we should go out to eat before I pour the contents of this kettle over your head?’

  The food at the Jade Garden Chinese restaurant was as good as it always was. Steven had been a regular there since joining Sci Med; Tally had only been there twice before – with Steven when she’d come to visit – but it was now a favourite haunt for them both.

  ‘Will John continue to lobby on mass vaccination?’ asked Tally after they’d placed their order.

  ‘I’m sure he will,’ said Steven, ‘but I think we’re both resigned to failure until . . .’

  ‘Until what?’

  ‘Until something actually happens . . . either by deliberate attack or through some awful epidemic arriving on our shores through chance or circumstance.’

  Tally ended the ensuing pause. ‘Would you like to hear a happy story?’ she asked.

  ‘You bet. Have you got one?’

  ‘One of my patients, a little blind girl; is going to get her sight back.’

  ‘Surgery?’

  Tally shook her head. ‘Stem cells. Isn’t that just brilliant?’

  ‘Now that is a happy story.’

  ‘Stem cell technology is just so exciting. It’s going to bring about such a revolution in medicine.’

  ‘Even if it’s a bit of embarrassment to science,’ said Steven.

  Tally raised an eye.

  ‘Science doesn’t really understand how stem cells do what they do.’

  ‘As a clinician, I must say I don’t really care. It’s then end result I’m interested in. What’s their problem anyway?’

  ‘Differentiation,’ said Steven, ‘the holy grail of biology. How do absolutely identical cells in terms of their DNA diverge to become limbs and organs which are totally different from each other? Science doesn’t know but stem cells do. If we put them in the right place they’ll do the job for us.’

  ‘And that’s all I care about,’ said Tally. ‘If stem cells can make my patient see again, they can keep their secret.’

  Steven nodded. ‘Actually,’ he said thoughtfully, ‘they may not be keeping their secret that much longer.’ He told Tally about Dorothy Lindstrom’s claims for epigenetics. ‘It makes so much sense,’ he added. ‘The DNA can’t change so it must be the switchgear that does the trick.’

  Tally made thoughtful imaginary circles on her napkin with her forefinger. Eventually she looked up and said, ‘You know, there are times when I think we know so much and then, quite suddenly, I feel like we know nothing at all.’

  ‘Join the club.’

  THREE

  A month passed before John Macmillan decided that his unofficial enquiries as to why the Lindstrom group had been turned down for funding were not going to bear fruit and he said as much to Steven.

  ‘It’s very strange,’ he said. ‘I don’t usually have trouble finding out what I want to know from Whitehall people, but everyone I spoke to below the Home Secretary herself genuinely didn’t seem to know. I’ll keep trying of course, but I’ll have to think of a different approach.

  ‘Ask the Home Secretary?’

  ‘Maybe not. A bit difficult if personal vendettas are involved.’

  Steven thanked him for trying and said he planned to set up a meeting soon with Owen Barrowman to find out how things were going. He’d pass on the bad news.

  * * * *

  Owen Barrowman entered, The Moorings, the riverside pub where he had agreed to meet Steven at eight. It was a quarter past. He spotted Steven sitting in a corner, reading a newspaper and nursing a half empty glass.

  ‘Sorry I’m late, good to see you again,’ said Barrowman shrugging off his jacket and asking if Steven was ready for another. Steven said not and waited while his companion got himself a beer from the bar.

  ‘My sincere apologies, I hate being late but I forgot I had a meeting with my volunteer at Moorlock Hall today and it took longer than I’d anticipated.

  ‘Moorlock Hall?’

  Barrowman tapped his fingertips lightly off his forehead before saying, ‘Sorry, I’m not thinking straight, there’s no reason why you should know about it. I hadn’t heard of it myself until a few months ago. It’s all very hush hush.’ Barrowman leaned across the table to explain in muted tones just who were being held in Moorlock Hall.

  Steven let out his breath in a low whistle. ‘I can see why they might want to keep that quiet,’ he murmured. ‘It probably contravenes every human rights regulation in the book. Do you know who sanctioned the place?’

  ‘I didn’t ask. To be honest, I don’t care. I just saw it as an opportunity to get data from some of the worst criminal psychopaths on the planet.’

  Steven smiled at the single mindedness of the career scientist. ‘And has it turned out that way?’

  Barrowman paused before saying, ‘Only one of the inmates agreed to take part in the study, a bit of a disappointment, but there’s something scarily special about this guy – one of the worst according to the medical superintendent and he’s certainly the most intriguing subject I’ve come across. Maybe you’ve heard of him, Malcolm Lawler?’

  ‘God, yes,’ Steven replied. ‘It was a long t
ime ago, but I remember him, an absolute monster. He was all over the papers for weeks. Why did someone like him agree?’

  ‘The director thinks he was curious.’

  ‘I can’t say I envy you your choice of project,’ said Steven with a shake of the head. ‘You must have to read up on what these people have done before you meet them, go all through the details?’

  ‘That’s part of it, yes. I need to know everything in order to link up possible traits with genetic or biochemical factors.’

  ‘Doesn’t it get to you?’

  ‘I have the occasional wobble.’

  Steven raised his eyes at the word ‘wobble’.

  ‘Bad dreams, the occasional sleepless night, a certain loss of belief in human nature, shall we say.’

  Steven nodded. ‘I can empathise with that.’

  It was Barrowman’s turn to raise his eyes.

  ‘Army,’ said Steven. ‘I saw a bit of human nature in my time. It was quite an eye-opener to see what human beings will do to each other when they think they have some sort of official approval.’

  ‘There’s a difference between what you witnessed and the horrors my lot got up to,’ said Barrowman. ‘Mine needed no approval from anyone.’

  ‘A different level of evil,’ said Steven. ‘You should be careful.’

  Barrowman’s eyes asked the question.

  ‘Continued exposure to evil can be . . . problematic. People have been known to change after such exposure.’

  ‘Cold war brainwashing?’

  ‘Actually, I was thinking more about the studies done in Nazi Germany before the second world war. Ordinary decent people who felt outraged by what was happening to their country went along to Nazi party rallies to protest and came away as committed Nazis. Their anger and outrage had left them vulnerable to the power of suggestion. The filth flooded in and changed them forever.’

  Barrowman nodded. ‘It works both ways,’ he said. ‘Many people went along to the Billy Graham rallies in the nineteen fifties, curious to see what was going on and came away as committed Christians. They got swept up in the fervour they experienced in the huge venues that were used.’

  Steven smiled and said, ‘Somehow I suspect you are about to suggest it was all down to epigenetics.’

  ‘Absolutely, throwing the right switches . . . and the wrong ones.’

  ‘Scary, but you and the group are going to be able to explain it soon?’

  ‘Frankly I’m not sure how much longer the group is going to last,’ said Barrowman. ‘We’re running out of money.’

  ‘Still no sign of funding?’

  ‘Afraid not.’

  ‘It’s bizarre,’ said Steven. ‘I take it Dorothy kept trying for funding after the government turned her down?’

  Barrowman nodded. ‘She drew a blank everywhere. I keep thinking it doesn’t make any sense. She has a worldwide scientific reputation and epigenetics has to be the coming thing in research. Maybe the public don’t know too much about it, but everyone in science is saying so.’

  Steven nodded. ‘My boss is still trying to find out why government support didn’t materialise, but he’s hit a brick wall.’

  ‘Thank him for trying.’

  ‘Correct me if I’m wrong, but I got the impression you’re in a slightly better position than the other members of the group in that you had accumulated quite a lot of data before you joined Dorothy?’

  ‘I was able to collect quite a lot of samples from prisoners in high security places and I’ve done some preliminary analysis, but we have to depend a lot on favours from other labs when it comes to use of equipment for screening and sequencing.’

  ‘Any interesting results?’

  Steven noticed a slight reluctance to answer the question. He smiled and said, ‘No details, just a general enquiry.’

  ‘I’ve seen some marked differences in the data but not enough to be absolutely sure. It’s so frustrating. I just wish I had discovered Malcolm Lawler earlier. I’m convinced he’s going to be something really special.’

  ‘But you’d have enough to publish if the worst came to the worst and the group collapsed?’ Steven probed.

  ‘I’ll be able to get a couple of decent papers out of what I have, but that’s not what I really want.’

  ‘Of course not,’ said Steven. ‘It’s Nature or nothing.’ He couldn’t help but think that naked ambition was sometimes very unattractive. ‘How about the rest of the group?’

  ‘Again, a few promising lines, but we’re all in the same boat really; we need more time and more data.’

  ‘And that requires money,’ said Steven before finishing his drink. ‘Another one?’

  ‘I don’t think so,’ said Barrowman. ‘It’s been a long day.’

  Steven smiled. ‘Sounds like it. Well, I look forward to hearing how you get on, especially with your real baddie.’

  ‘I’ll keep you in the loop,’ said Barrowman. ‘I’m going to make as many visits to Moorlock Hall as I can in the next few weeks just in case the university pulls the plug. At least, if I have the samples, they can sit in the fridge until happier times. Maybe you’ll let me know if Sir John finds out anything?

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘How did your meeting go?’ Tally asked when Steven got home.

  ‘Things are getting pretty desperate for the Lindstrom group. They can’t go on for much longer without new funding and people are starting to look through the jobs pages of New Scientist.’

  ‘Does that include your man, Barrowman?

  Steven explained why Barrowman was in a better position than most. ‘He managed to collect quite a lot of samples for his study before Dorothy relocated, but he thinks he might be on to something special with a prisoner being held in a secret place . . . but that’s another story.’

  ‘I’ve got time if you have, said Tally.

  Steven told her about Moorlock Hall and watched her mouth fall open.

  ‘That sounds like a real fun place to work. Is that legal? I mean keeping it a secret?’

  ‘Probably not,’ said Steven with a shrug. ‘But it sounds like a damned good idea to me. They’ve let out too many monsters to walk the streets and commit mayhem all over again.’

  ‘Surely, you’re not questioning the competence of our psychiatric colleagues?’ asked Tally, tongue in cheek.

  ‘No, no,’ replied Steven. ‘I think the emperor’s new clothes are absolutely lovely.’

  Tally fell silent and Steven sensed that she was thinking about something else he’d said earlier – he knew that look.

  ‘Did anyone come from the US with Dorothy?’

  ‘Just one I think, a young post-doc, Jane Lincoln.’

  ‘I suppose I was wondering why anyone would do that. I mean, Dorothy decides to change her field, gives up a position at Yale – one of the finest universities in the USA – crosses the Atlantic without any guarantees for the future and one of her post-docs says, count me in. Does that sound right to you?’

  ‘Now you come to mention it . . . I suppose it does sound like a bit of a leap in the dark. Mind you, she might have been keen to stay with a big name.

  ‘Suppose you’re right,’ Tally agreed, ‘but travelling three thousand miles to end up working in an English university few people have ever heard of for only a few months before being told you’re out of a job doesn’t sound like a brilliant career move to me,’

  ‘Ah, the insight of hindsight,’ said Steven. ‘Dorothy’s a very persuasive woman and I don’t think she imagined for a moment she’d be turned down for funding.’

  The Home Office

  ‘I have a question for you,’ said Steven to his boss. ‘What do you know about Moorlock Hall?

  John Macmillan shook his head slowly before admitting, ‘Never heard of it. Should I?’

  Steven filled him in on the details as given to him by Barrowman.’

  Macmillan frowned. ‘Good God, where is this place?’

  ‘Middle of nowhere according to Barrowman. It’
s an old Victorian asylum which now plays host to fourteen people who would have been executed in times past.’

  ‘So why are they keeping them there instead of somewhere like Broadmoor?’

  ‘A decision was made that they would be taken out of the system, never be subject to review and therefore never be released.’

  ‘By whom?’

  ‘That’s not clear, but it seems it was taken after a killer named Clifford Sutton was released from Broadmoor, having been “cured” and went on to rape and kill again. The press and the public were furious and a plan was hatched to make sure nothing like it could happen again. Prisoners – or patients depending on your point of view – from across the UK who were judged beyond redemption were quietly transferred to Moorlock Hall, never to be released or even considered for release. Officially it doesn’t exist.’

  ‘So how the hell did Barrowman find out about it?’

  Steven told him.

  ‘The old story, two can keep a secret if one of them is dead.’

  ‘Should we be interested?’

  Macmillan made a face and leaned back in his chair. ‘I don’t think it’s a matter for Sci-Med, do you?’

  ‘Personally, I think it a pity that the cat ever got out the bag.

  ‘I’m inclined to agree: it wouldn’t worry me greatly if they transported these people to the planet Zog, but my concern is that Sci-Med might be thought negligent if we knew about this situation and neither said nor did anything. What do you think?’’

  Steven considered for a few moments before saying, ‘I’ve forgotten what we were talking about . . .’

  Macmillan smiled. ‘So be it, but chances are it’s not going to stay a secret for much longer. Once this gets around Whitehall there are those who will be bound to see a way of using it for their own ends.’

  FOUR

  ‘Well, here we are again,’ said Malcolm Lawler as Owen Barrowman was shown into the interview room at Moorlock Hall where Lawler had been strapped to his chair in preparation.