The Tattooed Man hag-2

by Alex Palmer

  Pure steel, he thought. She has a backbone of pure steel. No one runs a business like this without it.

  He glanced at Sam. She was silent, watching. Behind her was Elena’s second bodyguard, always in their company. Brinsmead’s strange face drew his gaze in much the same way the dead had when he’d seen them seated at the table at Pittwater. You couldn’t help but be drawn to stare at something so wrecked. Harrigan looked from Brinsmead to Sam to Elena. There was no way to know what their separate motives towards each other might be. For all he knew, they were three thieves forced together, each planning the other’s death. He followed Elena back into the lift without speaking.

  15

  When they were downstairs, on their way to Elena’s office, Brinsmead turned to Harrigan. ‘May I sit in on your meeting with Elena today, Commander?’ he asked. ‘I may be able to answer questions on the scientific side in more detail than she can. If you’re going to invest, I’m sure you’d like to know all sides of the operation.’

  ‘I asked the commander for a private meeting, Daniel. I don’t think he was expecting your company.’

  ‘I don’t mind if Dr Brinsmead joins us,’ Harrigan replied, curious to see how this strange dance between the two of them might work out.

  Elena seemed to be teetering on the edge of saying that wasn’t going to happen when she changed her mind. ‘Then let’s go in,’ she said.

  They entered a spacious office with its own view of the central garden. As well as Elena’s desk, there was a lounge suite in front of a coffee table looking out of the windows at the fernery. The lush growth provided privacy. Someone had placed a folder and laptop on the table.

  ‘Please sit down,’ Elena said. ‘The lounge is the most comfortable place. Coffee?’

  ‘Thanks,’ Harrigan said.

  ‘Not for me,’ Brinsmead said. ‘I can’t taste it.’ It was another barb, one so lightly spoken as to be almost delicate.

  Harrigan sat in one of the lounge chairs, sinking into the leather. Brinsmead sat in one of the single chairs. Sam positioned herself near the door, the male bodyguard by the window. Both stood watching intently, silently. The silence became a dead weight. Elena poured coffee from a silver pot into fine white cups with complete calmness. In her high heels, she was taller than Grace. She had slender ankles, well-shaped legs. Harrigan observed all this coolly; she did not attract him. Photographs lined the top of a nearby cabinet. The largest was of an old man, probably in his mid-eighties.

  ‘My father.’ Elena had followed Harrigan’s line of sight. ‘Jean Calvo. He’s still very much in charge of his own business affairs, his mind is very active. I’m sure you’ve noticed how much older he is than I am. He was in his fifties when he married. My mother was only in her twenties. They weren’t a happy couple. She left when I was six. I hardly saw her after that.’

  She handed him his coffee. Harrigan wondered why she’d want to introduce this kind of personal history into a meeting with a stranger like himself. Perhaps she thought she was softening him up.

  ‘I’ve met Jean a number of times,’ Brinsmead said. ‘He holds on to everything he has very tightly indeed. I don’t think I’ve met anybody with a stronger grip.’

  ‘I have a strong one myself,’ Elena said, almost offhandedly. ‘My father learned his strengths the hard way. Let me tell you his story, I think it’s significant. At the end of World War Two, my father was a displaced person, stateless. All I know about his war years is that he worked in a forced labour camp where most other people died. He refused to die. He survived by obliterating the first years of his life from his mind. He still won’t tell me where he was born. All I know is it was somewhere in Eastern Europe. Even his name isn’t his own. He took it from a list of the dead in a displaced persons camp one day. He said it would do for him. He built everything we have from nothing.’

  ‘Very successfully,’ Harrigan felt obliged to say.

  ‘It gave me an isolated childhood, one full of threats of abduction. I’ve lived with bodyguards all my life. I’ve learnt how to deal with it.’

  Harrigan looked at another picture showing Elena with a man much closer to her own age. Both were smiling.

  ‘That’s me as I used to be,’ Brinsmead said. ‘I met Elena at a research institute in London five years ago. She was in management, I was in research. We know each other very well.’

  ‘We do,’ she said, an indefinable edge to her voice. ‘That’s how I knew Daniel was the right man to run our signature project. Not because of his terrible experiences but because of his skills. He has a lot of talent to bring to bear here.’

  ‘As soon as I heard Elena was setting up here, I asked her for the chance to be involved and she gave it to me. It was the opportunity of my lifetime.’

  ‘I like to be generous.’

  Harrigan found himself wondering if she’d had the option to say no. Brinsmead was speaking directly to Harrigan and didn’t see the look Elena gave him. It was a strange mixture of emotional pain, distrust and deep anger. Old love gone bad.

  In his photograph, Daniel Brinsmead was good-looking, fashionably dressed, the top few buttons of his shirt open. Around his neck he wore a square gold locket. Someone who could play the field, promise possibilities they could forget as soon as they started talking to the next woman in line. Elena Calvo could be vulnerable to someone like that. But why continue with a connection that seemed to have lost any mutual affection, even descended to a mutual antagonism? Maybe she was ruthless. If he was the best, then she wanted him regardless of what it cost her personally.

  Elena had sat down and was sipping her coffee. She sat close enough to Harrigan to assume some kind of mutual purpose. She was a very attractive woman. He was glad he had no interest in her to complicate things.

  ‘What I’ve shown you is only one side of what we do here,’ she said. ‘We have a lot to offer besides our research program. Security is very important to us. I’m always interested to meet people like yourself who are specialists in that field.’

  ‘Why is security so important here?’ Harrigan asked.

  ‘Mainly because of industrial espionage. Our intellectual property is our most significant and valuable asset. We have to protect that investment.’

  ‘How does your company actually work?

  ‘You can call me a facilitator. Life Patent Strategies manages the patents on a very large body of genetic information, which my father and a number of other business people have purchased over the years, mainly in Europe and America but also here.’

  ‘They’re called the Abaris Group,’ Brinsmead interrupted. ‘You should tell the commander about them, Elena.’

  ‘We don’t usually discuss Abaris,’ she said, without taking her eyes off Harrigan.

  ‘Abaris are influential, Commander. They’re a small and exclusive club that you have to be invited to join. The group has investors from all over the world and includes some very well-known entrepreneurs and several ex-politicians. It’s very wealthy all told.’

  ‘Are you a member?’ Harrigan asked Elena.

  ‘She will be when her father dies.’ Brinsmead continued to speak for Elena. ‘He was the founder of the group. She’ll take over from him.’

  ‘It’s a cooperative,’ she said quietly. ‘I would have to be accepted by the other members.’

  ‘Why the name?’ Harrigan asked.

  ‘In Greek mythology, Abaris was a priest of Apollo,’ Brinsmead said. ‘He had special powers of invisibility and flight and also the power to cure diseases. Curing diseases is what LPS is about. This corporation is an offshoot of Abaris-its child, if you like. Elena is running it for them.’

  ‘Abaris is a financial group that has been very strategic in its purchases,’ Elena said in a cool voice. ‘It has focused throughout on the regenerative capacities of the human body. Buying patents is only part of the story. Patents are mainly nationally based and they expire after certain periods of time. Abaris has put considerable funds into researching the potent
ial application of its patented gene sequences. As a consequence, it has built up a very substantial body of intellectual property. What my company does is offer other scientific research groups the opportunity to come here and develop the possibilities of that knowledge. We license access to our intellectual property while retaining ultimate ownership of any of the results of the research. Say if a vaccine were produced, we would market it and the profits would be ours. The glory and a very generous percentage of the royalties would belong to the research team.’

  ‘So no one here actually works for you,’ Harrigan said.

  ‘I do have my own in-house scientific staff. They have their own program. Daniel’s project is an example of that. But I built this facility mainly to accommodate people who aren’t employed by me. These research teams are bound by contracts. These contracts specify a certain ongoing amount payable for access to our intellectual property and, of course, our facilities, which, as I’ve said, are state of the art. I work very hard to make sure that all facilities available here continue to be of the highest standard.’

  ‘There’s something you should know about those contracts, Commander,’ Brinsmead said. ‘They’re a binding legal agreement on the product to be provided and contain a scientific specification of the work to be carried out. Imbedded in that information is also a record of the ownership of the genetic patent rights and the intellectual property. Every contract that Abaris has written has that ownership information. If you have the contract, then you have that information as well. It’s Abaris’s way of protecting its intellectual property rights and its profits. I’m the only researcher in this building who isn’t bound by one of those contracts.’

  Elena had been about to take a mouthful of coffee. She turned to look at Brinsmead as he spoke, blinking a little, frozen in that pose, cup in hand.

  ‘Would you have an example of one of these contracts?’ Harrigan asked Elena.

  ‘No, I’m afraid I don’t. I wouldn’t see it as relevant to our discussion,’ she said with a smile.

  ‘The people you contract in do your work for you. But you don’t pay them, they pay you.’

  ‘The original investment was ours. Unless people want to wait for our patents to expire and then do our research all over again, and, of course, pay for it again, this is the best way for them to access the knowledge we’ve already gained. It’s a legitimate enterprise. I have a waiting list of people who want to apply here. We can do a great deal of good.’

  ‘All owned by you, except for Dr Brinsmead’s project, which is in the public domain?’

  ‘Yes, that’s the exception. Daniel and I came to that agreement mainly because it was such a personal matter for him. Now, Commander, I have a question for you. You asked for Daniel to be here to answer your questions. But our discussion is about to focus on your interests. Would you prefer him to leave or stay?’

  ‘What can you have to say to the commander that I couldn’t hear?’ Brinsmead asked.

  ‘That’s his decision,’ she replied.

  Harrigan decided the time had come to oblige. ‘I would prefer a one-on-one meeting, yes.’

  Brinsmead looked from Elena to Harrigan. Snookered.

  ‘All right.’ He got to his feet. ‘I’ll pack up my tent and disappear into the sunset. Nice to meet you, Commander. I’m sure Elena will make you the offer of a lifetime. I’ll be in the lab if anyone wants me.’

  He walked out without looking back. Harrigan watched Elena watch him leave. Just as it had been earlier, her face was expressionless, unforgiving. She turned to Harrigan. Again, her smile appeared at once.

  ‘I always keep a bodyguard with me but today I’m going to be different,’ she said. ‘I’m going to trust you. Sam, that will do for now. I’ll call you when I need you. Thank you.’

  ‘If that’s what you want, Elena, I’m on my way,’ Sam said. She glanced once at Harrigan and walked out.

  ‘Damien, if you could wait in the inner room.’

  ‘Sam is very professional,’ Harrigan said as soon as the door had closed and they were alone.

  Elena seemed surprised. ‘I would hope so. All my staff are professional. Why do you say that?’

  ‘I wondered where you found her.’

  ‘There’s no secret to that. She came from a security agency my father and I have used for many years.’

  ‘Who are they?’

  ‘Why do you want to know? Are you considering offering her a job?’

  ‘Like you, I’m always on the lookout for good people, Dr Calvo.’

  ‘Please call me Elena. Sam was a policewoman once, but that was some years ago. She came from Griffin Enterprises. I was lucky to find her. I was very much in need of someone at the time and her skills are rare. You can ask her if she wants to change jobs but I don’t think your wages will match mine.’

  ‘May I ask why you need someone with Sam’s skills on your staff?’

  ‘I’ve received any number of threats in my life. Threats of abduction and murder. Threats from animal rights activists. I need someone to keep a discreet eye on the people who threaten me. Better than waiting for it to happen.’

  ‘Very wise,’ Harrigan said.

  Elena smiled.

  ‘There’s another matter we need to discuss now, which is actually to do with your murder inquiry. Like everyone, I’ve seen the photographs of the victims at Pittwater. It’s a tragedy. Julian was a very troubled but gifted young man. I was ready to offer him a job. He had skills that could have been developed. I didn’t have the chance.’

  A little unwillingly, Harrigan had to accept that her grief seemed sincere.

  ‘But what you really need to know,’ she continued, ‘is that I recognised the fourth victim, the one you haven’t officially identified. His name is Jerome Beck.’

  ‘Is there a reason you didn’t ring the hotline with this information?’ Harrigan asked.

  ‘I wanted to tell you in person. Jerome used to work here. Unfortunately, he’s not someone many people would choose to associate with.’

  ‘But you knew him. How did you meet him?’

  ‘He was an administrator in a research facility I was managing in London a number of years ago. The same place I met Daniel. Jerome tried to harass me late one night in the car park. He was drunk. Not long after I came here, he contacted me and said he’d come to Australia as well. Could I employ him? At the time, we needed someone very badly and I hired him on a short-term contract because he had the necessary experience. I soon realised he was an alcoholic and I had to dismiss him. After that, he started to make abusive phone calls. I asked Sam to watch him. She discovered he kept company with known criminals. In fact, at one time, he attempted to have one admitted to this facility.’

  ‘Do you know who this known criminal was?’

  ‘One of the other victims, Michael Cassatt. At the time, we were completely unaware of who he was. It was a great shock to me.’

  ‘We need to interview Sam if she’s been tailing them.’

  ‘I should warn you that everything she does for me is covered by a strict confidentiality agreement. All my security staff sign them. My solicitors have the information she collected. I’ll ask them to contact you. They’ll answer any questions you may have.’

  ‘We’ll need a formal statement from you as well,’ Harrigan said.

  ‘I’m happy to do that. Enough of this. We’re both busy people. This is my card, please keep it. As I’ve mentioned before, there are other opportunities here besides investment. I can’t offer you anything with the kudos of being the police commissioner, but I can offer you an executive position in charge of security with a very competitive remuneration package.’

  ‘I have to say I wasn’t expecting anything like that.’

  ‘I’m not offering you the position just because of our corporate needs,’ she said. ‘I’m an individual woman, a single woman, and I have to be sure of my personal safety. I want someone reliable, someone who’s on my side. You have a very good reputation.
’ She reached over and extracted a sheet of paper from the folder on the table. ‘This is my offer. Please consider it.’

  Harrigan’s budgetary habits had been formed by watching his mother spend hours carefully choosing his clothes at the local op shop when he was a boy. He was still careful with his money. If he accepted Elena Calvo’s offer, he would never have to be careful again.

  ‘What would I have to do to earn this?’ he asked.

  ‘I’m looking for someone who will know how to remove any threats to me, internal or external, while at the same time protecting my personal reputation. You would need to be prepared to put both my own and my corporation’s interests before anything else. You would have to sign a confidentiality agreement and I would expect your complete loyalty.’

  ‘What does “remove” mean?’

  ‘Make safe,’ she replied. ‘How you achieve that end is entirely up to you, but it would have to be effective. You could also expect my complete support for whatever action you undertook. I’ve always believed that loyalty works both ways. But I would also expect complete discretion from you regarding your actions.’

  ‘Do you want to be a little more precise about what these threats might be?’

  ‘Perhaps not until you’ve given me a firm answer to my offer,’ she said. ‘From what I know of you, I don’t think you would encounter anything outside your experience.’

  ‘You’ve checked me out,’ he said.

  ‘I always check the background of people I have an interest in employing.’

  ‘Given what you’re asking of me, can I ask you a question about Dr Brinsmead?’

  ‘What do you want to know?’

  ‘Dr Brinsmead and Beck worked at the same facility in London that you did. We’ve established that you knew both men. Did Daniel Brinsmead know Beck?’