The Tattooed Man hag-2

by Alex Palmer

  ‘Commander Paul Harrigan?’ a female voice asked.

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘I’m Dr Elena Calvo. Please forgive me for ringing you so late. I believe you’ve heard of me. We have a mutual acquaintance in Senator Edwards.’

  Harrigan switched on the speakerphone.

  ‘Yes, we do,’ he said cordially. ‘The minister mentioned you to me in very positive terms. It’s not so very late, Dr Calvo. What can I do for you?’

  ‘Please, call me Elena. I know from our mailing lists and also from Allan that at one stage you were interested in investing in my corporation, Life Patent Strategies. I wondered if you still wanted to pursue that.’

  ‘Do you think it would be a good thing for me to do?’

  ‘I think it would be very worth your while, yes.’

  ‘In that case, I had thought seriously about it.’

  ‘Good. I always think it’s important to look after individual investors as well as the large institutional ones. Would you like to come and visit our research facility? I think you’ll find it very impressive.’

  ‘I can be there as soon as tomorrow morning if you like,’ Harrigan replied. ‘I’ll have a few spare hours if that suits you.’

  ‘That would suit me perfectly. I should warn you it’s quite a drive. We’re out at Campbelltown.’

  ‘That’s fine.’

  ‘Then we’ll expect you.’ She gave him directions for what would normally have been a journey to the end of the city. Tomorrow it would be a small diversion from his preordained route. ‘I have you down for our launch tomorrow night as well. I think you’ll find a visit to Campbelltown will be a very useful background to that occasion.’

  ‘As it happens, Dr Calvo, I have to be somewhere else tomorrow night,’ Harrigan said. ‘Can I send someone along in my place?’

  He looked at Grace who nodded.

  ‘Certainly. Who would this person be?’

  ‘A friend of mine. Grace Riordan.’

  ‘Yes, of course.’ There was a faint edge of disappointment in her voice. ‘Are you sure you can’t be there yourself?’

  ‘I’m afraid it’s impossible.’

  ‘I’ll put her name down in that case. She will be able to understand what this is about?’

  ‘I don’t think she’ll have any trouble.’

  ‘Then we’ll expect her in your place tomorrow night and we’ll see you tomorrow morning. Good night.’

  The room went silent.

  ‘Do you mind going to the launch?’ Harrigan asked Grace.

  ‘No, it’ll give me a chance to get frocked up. If you’re down at Coolemon, I can do something up here. How did she get your number?’

  ‘Legitimately. I would have put all those details down when I first applied for her company’s prospectus. She’s been thorough.’

  ‘She’s been digging into your life. She knew about me,’ Grace said. ‘Yes, of course. That was a slip. See if she doesn’t try and take your meeting down to a personal level in some way.’

  ‘Why do you say that?’

  ‘Just the way she talked to you. It was a little too intimate for someone she’s never met. And why should she be unhappy if I’m going to be at the launch instead of you?’

  Harrigan decided to avoid the question.

  ‘That’s her problem, not ours,’ he said. ‘You said Sam Jonas was at Freeman’s house today.’

  ‘Yes. Why?’

  Harrigan turned on his computer and displayed the photograph of Sam watching Beck and the Ice Cream Man in a run-down pub.

  ‘This is from Freeman’s CD. Jonas has been undercover, keeping an eye on Beck and his associates for her boss for months by the look of it. Until today, Freeman was the last of them left.’

  ‘She didn’t talk like she was planning on killing either of us. But she knew something was going to happen and she wasn’t going to interfere,’ Grace said. ‘She knew I had a gun. According to her, the question was whether I’d use it.’

  ‘She didn’t try to offer you a bribe or threaten you? Try to get this tape out of Freeman in any way?’

  He passed it to Grace who looked it over.

  ‘No, she was completely hands off. She said that was how she did things. Why?’

  ‘I’m trying to work out her motivation,’ Harrigan said. ‘My guess is that tomorrow Elena Calvo is going to offer me a good sum of money for that tape. You’d think if Jonas was working for her, she’d have tried to get her hands on it as a matter of urgency.’

  ‘That kind of dirty work may not be Sam’s job. She might just handle the intelligence side of things. Have you listened to this? What’s on it?’

  ‘Information that seriously implicates both Calvo and her father in whatever Beck was up to and links LPS to money laundering.’

  ‘How would Calvo know you’ve got it?’

  ‘Marvin rang tonight. He wanted to know if there was any evidence at Freeman’s house that might affect the investigation. Specifically, did Freeman give you anything like a tape or photographs?’

  ‘Are you sure he wasn’t just being Marvin?’

  ‘No, there’s nothing in this for him. Everything he does is worked out to take him one step closer to the commissioner’s office. Today, he made a fool of himself in front of a federal government minister and put God’s nose out of joint, not once but twice, trying to get control of this investigation. I told him I had the tape and the CD, but I didn’t have them here and I hadn’t listened to the tape.’

  ‘Paul, that was a really dangerous thing to do. What if Marvin blows the whistle on you?’

  ‘He won’t. If these pictures ever get out, maybe he won’t lose his job but he’ll never get to be police commissioner. By his own admission, your gunman today has these pictures and I’m very sure he’s pulling Marvin’s strings. Half an hour after I tell him what I’ve got, Elena Calvo rings with a friendly invitation to morning tea. Marvin’s told his handler, his handler’s told the boss. My guess is there’ll be plenty of inducements offered tomorrow.’

  ‘Are you going to turn them down?’

  ‘What do you think? Why are you asking me that?’

  ‘Because when you say no, you’ll have made yourself a target. If today’s gunman was prepared to put three bullets into either me or Freeman to get hold of that tape, then he won’t care if he does the same thing to you. From what Freeman told me, he’s the one who worked the Ice Cream Man over. What if he does that to you?’

  ‘Grace, I’m not having him coming after you.’

  ‘I don’t want to see you end up looking the way the Ice Cream Man does now. Don’t do this to me,’ she said.

  He was about to say it was exactly what she had done to him earlier on today, then changed his mind.

  ‘I’m big enough and ugly enough to deal with him. I’m expecting him. Mike wasn’t.’

  ‘Do I get to listen to this?’ she asked, handing the tape back.

  ‘It’s more dangerous information.’

  ‘It’s a bit late to worry about that now.’

  ‘You need to be armed,’ he said. ‘I’d feel better if you were. I do have a gun you can have. I keep it down in my cellar. It’s illegal but it’ll protect you.’

  He didn’t tell her that it was a significant gun in his life and nothing other than the present circumstances would have made him offer it to her.

  ‘No, leave it,’ she said. ‘I can fix up a gun through work.’

  ‘Won’t they ask questions as to why you want it?’

  ‘I can handle that.’

  ‘I didn’t mean to insult you today,’ he said. ‘I do respect your judgement. You’re brave and this information is very important. But you put yourself in danger when you didn’t have to. You do that deliberately sometimes.’

  She looked at him with that glint in her eye again. Maybe she was thinking: and what have you just done? He would have replied that he’d had a better reason than she did.

  ‘Let’s not go back over the argument. Let’
s just forget it,’ she said.

  Harrigan put Goya’s Los Desastres de la Guerra back on the shelf. Until the morning, his time was his own.

  ‘Then we’re both off duty,’ he said.

  She smiled. ‘For a little while anyway.’

  At least making love was easy. For a space of time, neither of them had to think about anything else except each other, their mutual warmth, the ease with which they did this. It felt so uncomplicated; it always had between them. How can you walk out when it’s like this, he thought. Later, he was to consider that sitting with her own thoughts in a late-night laundromat had been a more powerful persuader than anything he had said to her or indeed any fear that she might be in danger herself. At that moment, there were no such thoughts in his head. They slept deeply and dreamlessly. There might have been no evil in the world.

  14

  Elena Calvo’s directions brought Harrigan to Campbelltown on the far southern edge of greater Sydney, a landscape of new and half-built suburbs merging into the countryside. He drove to the far end of an industrial estate surrounded by bare fields burnt in the drought. The isolated remnants of bushland were visible on the hillsides in the distance. On the way to the estate, the traffic was light; once there, the roads were mainly empty. No one was following him.

  The road led him in a circle around the Life Patent Strategies building. It stood on a broad acreage surrounded by a high fence with powerful lights spaced at intervals along the perimeter. At night, the ground would be brightly lit. The building itself was startling. It appeared to be diamond-shaped with its four points extending into the grounds. The external walls were covered with a blue steel mesh constructed from large and interlocking triangular units. Two storeys of tinted windows reflected a skewed sunlight through the mesh. At the far end, smokestacks glittered in the clear air.

  Harrigan drove up to a gatehouse at the sole point of entry. A security guard signalled for him to stop. Boom gates stood between him and another set of high steel gates giving entry to the grounds. His ID was checked, an e-tag attached to his car and the boom gate raised. The steel gates opened for him automatically as he approached; he drove in and they closed behind him.

  A newly built access road took him across grounds that showed the signs of recent and extensive landscaping. Wide areas were beginning to green. The guard’s direction led him to the eastern apex of the building, where the access road met a driveway leading to a blank wall made up of a high, wide metal door. Sam Jonas was waiting for him on the corner, a tall figure in a cream pants suit. Her slim form was a white shadow against the building’s grey and blue bulk. She had her hands on her hips and was balanced lightly on pale court shoes. He’d been told to expect her. He stopped. She went to the passenger side of the car and opened the door.

  ‘Good morning,’ she said. ‘I’ve been sent to escort you in.’

  ‘I need an escort, do I?’

  ‘You do. Mind if I get in?’

  ‘Go ahead.’

  She slid into the passenger seat. Her face had a light touching of make-up. Her black hair was plaited up at the back of her head, the way it had been the first time he’d met her.

  ‘We meet again,’ he said. ‘This time you’re all dressed up.’

  ‘Elena has very particular standards of dress for the office. Leathers are okay out on the road but not at LPS. Another thing you’ll find out about Elena.’ Sam looked at him sideways. ‘She’s very good at not letting the right hand know what the left hand is doing. When you’re talking to her, it’s a good idea to keep to the information she wants from you. Otherwise, she’ll shut you down.’

  ‘Elena’s the boss, is she?’

  ‘Oh yes.’

  ‘Don’t worry, I don’t want to embarrass anyone. I’ll keep our chat confidential. Where to now?’

  ‘Before we move, are you armed?’

  ‘No. What about you?’

  For an answer, she opened out her jacket to reveal a white silk shirt but no weapon.

  ‘A personal bodyguard with no side arm. Why not?’

  ‘Elena doesn’t allow firearms into the building.’

  ‘Not even for her bodyguards?’

  ‘Not for anyone. I don’t know if that includes her. If you’re not carrying, let’s go. You’re looking at the entrance to the building’s garage. Drive straight ahead. The door will recognise your e-tag and open for you.’

  He started his engine and moved slowly forward. The metal door slid open and then, when he had driven down a short slope into an underground car park, closed silently behind them. The car park was lit by overhead lights; its bays were full. Sam directed him towards a visitor spot at the far end, near a set of bronze-coloured glass doors.

  ‘Fort Knox,’ he said.

  ‘This is just the beginning. I assume you’re carrying a mobile phone or a beeper?’

  ‘Both, as it happens.’

  ‘I’m sorry but you’re going to have to hand them in at the desk. We don’t allow any means of private communication into the building. Not even Senator Edwards got to take his mobile phone inside. Don’t worry, the storage is secure. The way it’s set up, you’re the only one with the key.’

  Harrigan could have argued. Of all people, he had to stay contactable.

  ‘Anything to oblige.’

  ‘That’s a good way to start where Elena’s concerned. Being obliging.’

  ‘How long have you worked for her?’

  ‘About a year. She pays well. Everyone here’s very well paid. It makes them loyal.’

  ‘Does money make you loyal?’ he asked.

  ‘It depends on what you think loyalty is. For a lot of people, loyalty is money.’

  ‘I asked about you.’

  ‘Money’s not an issue for me. Yes, I am loyal if you want to put it that way, but my loyalty is something you have to earn. If you’re worth it, then I give it. Otherwise, forget it. Come on. Let’s go inside.’

  They got out of the car. The bronze-coloured glass doors slid open for them. They walked into a sparely furnished foyer where one security guard stood beside an internal door and another behind a counter. Despite what Sam had just told him, both were armed. They had the shaved heads and humourless expressions of ex-prison guards. The wall behind the counter was covered by a bank of video screens.

  ‘We need a visitor’s badge with executive level clearance for Commander Harrigan and a locker for his mobile phone and beeper,’ Sam said. ‘Dr Calvo should have sent the request through.’

  The guard placed a small metal box on the counter. ‘Please open that,’ he said.

  Harrigan took out a compact if thick gold badge, almost like a large and heavy gold cufflink, decorated with the initials LPS in an ornate design.

  ‘You can use that as a key to open locker number eight,’ the guard said. ‘You’ll be able to store your devices in there. Then if you could keep that badge on you at all times, it will allow you access throughout the building. It doesn’t need to be visible but it does need to be on your person.’

  At the impress of the badge, the locker opened. Harrigan put his mobile and beeper inside.

  ‘Nothing can open that door now but that badge,’ Sam said. ‘You get to take it with you when you leave. A gift. That’s one of Elena’s ideas. She likes people to have souvenirs of their visits here. Once you’ve left the building, it’ll be deactivated.’

  ‘Can it be reactivated?’

  ‘For that to happen, you’d have to come in here and have it done at the desk. You really have to be invited all over again.’

  ‘Is it really made of gold?’

  ‘Gold-plated.’ She smiled sarcastically. ‘Only top-level guests get one of those. Everyone else gets the basic metal.’

  Harrigan dropped the badge into his shirt pocket. He thought of the Ice Cream Man being ushered in here by Jerome Beck late one night. He glanced around. There were cameras watching his every move.

  ‘How long do you keep your CCTV tapes?’ he asked.

>   ‘We archive them for at least twelve months.’

  ‘In the building?’

  ‘Oh yes. Very securely. I don’t go anywhere near them. If I don’t need something for my work, it’s off limits.’

  The internal door slid open to reveal a small antechamber where there was a lift. Sam activated it with a key.

  ‘Is this your only entrance?’ Harrigan asked.

  ‘This is the main external entrance. There’s a delivery dock to the north where the smokestacks are. There’s a third entry via the roof near Elena’s office, which is on the other side of building. That’s locked with a door built to withstand an atomic blast, I think.’

  ‘I thought you said no firearms. Those guards were armed,’ Harrigan said.

  ‘They’re just there to mind the gate. Their access is limited to that area and they can’t bring those weapons into the building proper. You should know that my access throughout this building is limited as well. I can’t take you into any of the labs, for example. I’d only have access to a lab on specific orders from Elena.’

  ‘Where can I go on my pass?’

  ‘Wherever Elena thinks you ought to be able to go.’

  ‘She has all the keys, does she?’ he asked.

  ‘All the keys, the combinations, passwords and overrides. Who else?’

  The lift arrived and they stepped inside. The building had three levels: Basement, First, Second. Sam pressed Second. Quickly they were there. The lift opened.

  ‘Welcome to Elena’s kingdom,’ Sam said.

  They stepped out onto a mezzanine above an atrium that soared to the height of the building. A glass wall stretched from floor to roof in front of them. A broad set of stairs led from the mezzanine to a paved area below, where doors in the glass wall opened onto a garden in the centre of the building. It was planted with well-grown tree ferns, flowering shrubbery and rich green vines. It had a cool look. A pathway led from the glass doors to the centre where Harrigan could see an ornamental pool set round with tables and chairs. The garden was covered by a glass roof, turning the whole space into a climate-controlled greenhouse.

  ‘Very impressive,’ he said.

  ‘It is, isn’t it? It’s the organisation summed up for you. They make it very hard for you to get in, but once you’re here, they make you very comfy. This corporation consumes what it needs to operate. It’s how it works. Like some blind organism. On the basis of need, nothing else.’