“Why the sudden interest, if I may ask? The last time we spoke about marriage...at that party in Las Vegas, you were dead against it!”
“Yeah, but that was then, and this is now. Things have changed. I’ve decided I want kids. This whole Crown of Thorns project has got me thinking. At first I thought I would just adopt the Christ child, but now I’ve decided that instead of getting some unknown surrogate mother and then adopting him from her, I’d do the decent thing and get married first. My wife can be the surrogate, and you can get her pregnant…so to speak. No son of mine is going to be a little bastard! Especially not the next leader of the greatest nation on earth.”
“So why Clara?”
“Because she’s the only woman I trust, and besides, have you seen the arse she’s got on her? She’s gorgeous!”
The logic couldn’t really be faulted, and Tim found himself a little impressed by the reasoning behind the plan. It made good sense, in a convoluted sort of way.
“So when’s the magic date then?”
“You tell me! I told Clara this morning, and she seemed really pleased with the idea. She’s flying in tomorrow night for the weekend. We’ll arrange it then. All you have to do is tell me when she has to be ready to be implanted and I’ll marry her the week before…”
“That could be sooner than you think...maybe even within the next month...”
“Fine by me. So tell me now what you learned from the team in Vale yesterday.”
Tim settled back in his chair and took another long sip of his malt, swallowing it slowly so that he could savour the flavour of the peat in the back of his throat. Whisky drinking was one of the few things in his life that never failed to give him pleasure. Normally he would save something like a thirty year old malt for a better occasion, but the journey to Vale had taken a lot out of him and he felt the need of the kick the whisky gave him when it reached the stomach and the alcohol bit hard.
“The trip was both good and bad. Unfortunately progress has been slower than expected. The team there came up against a small problem...” For a second Tim thought about explaining the details to the President but then thought better of it. He would never understand it. “…but it’s been taken care of now. Tell Clara to be ready on the 15th of January. We’ll fly her from Washington to Vale. She’ll be there for about a month, during which we will monitor her progress and check things out. I’ll make arrangements for you to visit her whenever you want.”
“Good. Listen, while you’re here, there’s a couple of other things that I want you to take care of...”
Tim could guess what was coming next.
“I’ve written down a few names of people that know a little too much about Clara. Could be a little bit embarrassing…if you know what I mean…It might be better if they disappeared. I want you to take care of it. Let’s say, before the end of the year?”
The President reached into one of his desk drawers and pulled out a piece of paper containing a short list of names. He slid it over the desk to Tim. Tim stirred uneasily in his chair. He knew that he had no choice in the matter. It was his job. And if he didn’t do it, someone else would and his name could be added to the list. He had his family to think of.
“...And I want you to create a new identity for Clara. Make up a personal history, give her a new family, a new background…the works. Something that will 'impress the press'. Make it good. Then come the New Year I want you to leak the romance to the press about a week before we get married. Let's make the magic date the 7th of January. That’ll give us a week for a honeymoon…”
“Do you want me to arrange the honeymoon for you?”
“Yes…I’ll ask Clara where she wants to go later…by the way, she likes the name Danielle. Dani for short…You can make up the surname. Don’t forget her parents are Italian.”
The President finished the last of the bourbon and moved to the bar again, waving his glass gently in the air and raising his eyebrows as if to ask Tim if he wanted some more malt.
“No. Thanks. I’m fine.”
“There’s one more thing. What are you doing about the Oxford team?”
“What do you mean?”
“Don’t you think we should do something about them? It’s more than coincidence that the comet almost crashed into England. Unless we do something about them they’ll beat us to it and the Christ child will be born there...”
“And what do you suggest we do?”
“Take them out.”
“You can’t seriously be suggesting that we assassinate a group of the world’s most famous and respected scientists?”
“Why not? They pose a threat to the future of our country!”
The President knew that even he was on dubious ground here.
“The international ramifications of such an action could be devastating. If England were to find out about where the backing for such an action came from, it could be viewed as an act of international terrorism or even an act of war. It would put unnecessary pressure on our already volatile 'special' friendship.”
“Okay. Okay. I’m not telling you to take the whole team out. Just use our agent in England to take out one or maybe two of the team…do what you can, man...do what you can!”
“I’ll look into it.”
“Good. By the way, what plans have you made for giving us our own home grown comet?”
Tim had hoped the President had long forgotten his stupid idea of setting off a nuke above the atmosphere to make it look like a comet had chosen America as the land of birth for the Second Coming of Jesus Christ.
Obviously he had not.
“ I’ve made the necessary inquiries. The truth of the matter is that any airborne nuclear explosion is totally out of the question. I’ve never said ‘no’ to you on anything before, but on this one I am. I’m responsible for the security of you, your administration and in part for the whole of this nation. An atmospheric explosion would take out most of our electronic communications and kill thousands of people through radiation fallout...”
If the President hadn’t been in such a good mood, maybe Tim’s refusal would have pushed him too far, but thankfully he didn’t seem to notice it and he brushed it aside lightly.
“…Yes, I know, …you’re right. Forget that idea! Not one of my best, but I bet that you’ve come up with something to replace it. I know you, Tim and you would never say ‘no’ unless you’ve had a better idea yourself.”
“ The guys at NASA tell me that they have an old space shuttle that’s still usable. I took the liberty of buying it for you. The plan is to fill the payload with a variety of different metals which make a hell of a show when they burn. Rare metals like chromium, zinc, magnesium, with aluminium and a whole bunch of other special alloys mixed in. We’ll fly the shuttle by remote pilot and skim it across the atmosphere from New York to Los Angeles, jettisoning bits of the payload as it goes. Then somewhere above the Rockies, somewhere visible from San Francisco, we’ll let it re-enter the atmosphere and burn up…”
“…As the payloads and the main body of the shuttle burn up, people on the ground will see a glowing trail of greens, blues, reds, oranges, yellows and bright, bright white like they’ve never seen before. As it happens we’ll get all the major media to cover it, and send out the coverage world-wide. No one will know that it’s a man-made phenomenon and with a little bit of good PR we’ll easily be able to out stage the European comet.”
“And the Vatican?”
“You’re meeting with the new Pope next week. We’ll give you the text of a Press release, which you will ask him to release. To make this effective we want the Vatican to talk down the European comet, and get them to back the press release we’ve already given out about the defective spy satellite. In particular, the new press release will announce that the world should still keep an eye out for the ‘real’ comet, which we will then provide a few weeks later."
"We have to give the media some time to build the hype up before we burn the shuttle in the atmosp
here above America. We only have one chance to do this so we have to make it good. And we have to be careful with the timing of it. We only want to do this thing if the work at Vale goes well, and we’re in a position to proceed with the implantation on Jan 16th. To be safe we would want another couple of weeks to make sure the pregnancy isn’t rejected.”
“Makes sense. So what is the timing then?”
“I would think that we should plan for Pope Peter to denounce the European comet in his New Year’s speech from the Vatican. Then if everything goes well we plan for the shuttle to burn up on Feb 15th. That gives us a month to make sure the pregnancy is well advanced and everything seems fine. No point in creating a lot of hype in the media if we can’t deliver the goods!”
The President leaned across the table and shook his hand.
“Great. Sounds like a plan Tim...Sounds like a plan!”
.
Chapter Fifty Three
Washington D.C.
Wednesday 7th Dec 6 P.M.
.
The door of his chauffeur driven car closed quietly behind him, and Tim sank back into the luxurious black leather upholstery. He pressed a button on the armrest beside him and spoke briefly to the driver in front.
“Corporal, that’s all for tonight. Can you take me home now please.”
“Certainly Mr Curts.”
A bullet proof dividing partition separated Tim’s compartment from the driver, and for the first time that day Tim was able to relax alone with some time to himself. He needed to do some thinking.
Foremost in his mind was the work that he had just authorised to be started in Vale. It occurred to him now that perhaps he could be making a mistake.
In truth, Tim only seldom made mistakes. His judgement was normally impeccable first time round and he was one of those few people who could size up a situation in seconds and make a decision immediately, and each time making the right decision. But on the plane back from Vale the seed of a thought had germinated at the back of his mind. Perhaps he was wrong to authorise the geneticists in Vale to artificially force the cloning process by using neutron radiation techniques.
What if the radiation was to inadvertently affect the DNA of the cloned child and cause some sort of genetic mutation? Was that possible? According to Jeff and Dave the risk was minimal, and anyway now he had briefed the president he knew that he had no real choice in the matter. It was too late to do anything about that decision. The project could not be halted.
Then there was the issue of persuading the Vatican to issue a false press statement. Captain Everton, one of his trusted aides, had last week flown to the Vatican to meet with Pope Peter. The Pope, under duress and a fair degree of blackmail, had agreed to go along with their wishes, but still Tim felt uneasy about it. He felt bad about forcing the Catholic Church to lie so blatantly.
Tim wasn’t a Catholic himself, but he had tremendous respect for the Catholic church, and counted many faithful catholic believers amongst his closest friends. It was with a modicum of shock that Tim realised what the problem was.
He was developing a conscience.
A conscience and what he did for a living were mutually exclusive.
Tim was getting too old for the job. So far in his career he had managed to maintain his self-respect, but with the development of a conscience he knew he would be in danger of becoming a big-time hypocrite. For example, Tim knew that going on a pilgrimage to seek a miracle from God, then subsequently forcing God’s elected representative on earth to issue a false statement to all His followers were not exactly the actions of a consistently pious man.
And then lastly, what was the first commandment? Thou shalt not kill? And what was it that Tim was just about to organise on behalf of the President?
Tim had counted twenty-three names on the list, not including the four people who made up the team in Oxford. And he knew that there would be others to come when the President remembered them on the days leading up to the wedding. And all of them innocent.
For Tim, that was going to be the hardest job to arrange, and he knew that if he didn’t do it now, he never would.
He reached forward and pressed another button on the console built into the arm rest. A panel slid down on the seat underneath him and a phone slid out and up. Tim picked up the receiver, punched in his private pin number and authorised the required degree of scrambling and waited for the test tone to be sent to and from the scrambler. He heard the familiar tone which signified his personal digital scrambler was in operation and he dialled a number which he knew off by heart.
A voice answered, the dulcet tones stirring a mixture of feelings within him as he listened to his contact in the CIA request the codeword.
“Chinatown.”
“Tim, how can I help you?”
“I have a few names for you. It would be helpful if you could do their laundry for me?”
“No problem. When do they need their laundry back?”
“By New Year’s Eve.”
“Okay. Who are they?”
Tim read off the list, confirming the spelling of a few of the people, and reading a few notes the President had made against some of the names. When the list was complete, his contact at the CIA hung up, and Tim verbally instructed the scrambler to switch itself off. As he replaced the phone and watched it slide gracefully into the panel beneath his seat he swallowed hard, fighting against the feeling of nausea which he felt in the pit of his stomach. His contact in the CIA was a fast worker. All of the people whose names were on the list would be dead within a fortnight.
.
---------------------
.
The Cadillac swung up the drive onto the gravel road leading to Tim’s house in Belgravia. He stepped out and started walking up the steps leading to the entrance to the Victorian style mansion which he called home, leaving his luggage to be brought in by the driver.
It had only been a few days since he last saw his wife and he had missed her. He was looking forward to seeing her again. And his daughter. Oh god, how he longed to see and hold his daughter again. How much time did he have left with her?
The pain he felt at that thought pierced him deeply in his heart and for a second he stopped, only half way up the flight of stairs.
“Pull yourself together man…you have to be strong!” he muttered to himself.
He readjusted his tie, stretched his neck within the confines of his collar and straightened his back. He had to face facts. He had tried to make his case to the God above, but it had failed. It was God’s will that she would be taken from them...
The door to his house burst open and the light from inside poured out onto the porch, illuminating the small figure of a girl from behind. She stood in the doorway with her arms outstretched and before Tim could recognise her, she ran towards him taking the steps two at a time and jumped up into his arms.
“Daddy…daddy…”
Tim wrapped his arms around the girl, letting his attaché case and hat fall to the ground and roll down the steps.
“Tina, my darling Tina…how…you’re walking...jumping...how? What?...”
Already the tears were forming in his eyes and as the driver stood at the bottom of the stairs looking up at the couple in disbelief, Tim threw back his head and cried aloud to the stars above.
“Thank you God…Thank you!”
.
---------------------
The Walker Clinic,
Cambridge, England
Thursday 9th Dec 3pm.
.
Louisa sat nervously beside Doctor Rohloff, the German paediatrician who five years before had come to England to establish and head-up the Walker Clinic. They were sitting in a tastefully decorated 'lounge' style consultation room, lounging on two large red couches, separated by a large glass coffee table. A colourful bouquet of flowers added to the relaxing surroundings. All you would expect from one of England's top infertility clinics.
Doctor Rohloff and Professor Wainright ha
d been friends for years, and under Doctor Rohloff's guidance, the Walker institute was pleased to help out the I.G.E.G.G.M. whenever it could be of assistance.
Doctor Rohloff understood the sensitivity of the issue that could still be associated with placing cloned babies with adoptive parents, and so he personally made the selection, ensuring that the needs of his clients would be met above all else. He understood the importance the work the I.G.E.G.G.M undertook, but his interest in helping out was not in furthering science, but solely in increasing the happiness of the couples who came to him, desperate to adopt or have a child of their own.
Louisa had contacted the Walker Clinic a few hours after the team meeting on the Wednesday morning, one of a number of calls she had made to the various agencies she dealt with. She had expected that it would be several weeks, or more realistically, several months before any of her contacts would be able to find someone suitable, if at all.
Although the Professor and the Doctor were good acquaintances and trusted each other implicitly, Louisa had decided that it would be best not to explain the full nature of their request. Rather, she had simply told Dr Rohloff that their latest course of research was at a crucial point, and they had identified that 'there were chromosomes present in the womb of most women which for some reason or other, hindered the growth of cloned embryos. However, they had established that the womb of a virgin did not contain these chromosomes, and as part of the work they were currently embarked upon they were keen to proceed now to full term growth of an embryo within the womb of a virgin. Of course, the implications to science if they were successful were incalculable…etc. etc. etc.'
She hoped that the Doctor knew sufficiently little about genetics to realise that what she was telling him was, for the most part, complete rubbish. Incredibly, he bought it.
"Yes, we would be glad to help you out. In fact, it seems rather incredible but only last week we had a young lady join the clinic, who seems to meet your requirements exactly! I have her file on my desk just now..." The Doctor had replied on the phone.
The Messiah Conspiracy - A gripping page-turning Medical Thriller - [Omnibus Edition containing Book 1 & Book 2] Page 27