Lost Causes (11 page)

Drysdale appeared again in the company of Paul Drinkwater as Steven was finishing in A&E.

‘What on earth happened?’ asked Drinkwater.

‘Someone opened a steam valve in the tunnel as I was leaving.’

‘Christ, they were quick off the mark,’ said Drysdale, a comment that made the other two look to him for more.

‘The winos,’ said Drysdale. ‘And the junkies. They see the tunnels as a nice warm place to kip down. That’s why we keep the access doors locked, but of course they were left open while Dr Dunbar was down there.’

‘Oh, I see,’ said Drinkwater. ‘You think one of them must have come across Dr Dunbar and seen him as the face of authority?’ He turned back to Steven. ‘How bad is it?’

‘They’ll mend,’ said Steven, holding up his bandaged hands and feeling slightly woozy because of the painkillers he’d been given. ‘It could have been a lot worse.’

‘Dare I ask if you found what you were looking for?’

‘I did. That’s why I’d like the doors to be locked and kept that way until I can arrange transport for the files I’m
interested
in.’

‘Of course,’ said Drinwater. ‘Dennis, can you see to that?’

Drysdale nodded. ‘No problem. Mind you, if there’s a heating problem somewhere in the hospital …’

‘No one goes down there alone,’ said Steven. ‘I’ll arrange with the local police for an officer to be present to accompany anyone who has to go down in an emergency.’ 

Drysdale nodded. ‘Very well.’

They were interrupted by the arrival of a well-dressed man in his late forties whose dark suit and silk tie suggested
management
. ‘Dr Dunbar? I’m so sorry. I’ve just heard what happened. I’m Clive Deans, the hospital manager. I’m sorry I couldn’t welcome you earlier, and now this. Absolutely awful. What can I say?’

‘You’ll excuse me for not shaking hands,’ said Steven.

‘Look, maybe you shouldn’t drive. Why don’t you use the hospital suite we use for relatives? It’s empty at the moment. You can get a good night’s rest, and if you need any more painkillers you’ll be in the right place.’

‘Thank you. I think I’ll take you up on that.’

He was shown to the suite and given a couple of internal telephone numbers to call if he needed anything. Deans left him alone, still apologising for what had happened, and Steven used his mobile to start making calls, phoning Jean Roberts first.

‘Jean, I’ve had a bit of an accident. There are a number of things I’d like you to do.’

‘Doesn’t sound like an accident to me,’ she said, after obliging him to tell her what had happened.

‘Be that as it may, I’d like to get the records back to London as quickly as possible. We’ll need a courier service and we’ll need a team of analysts to work on them when they arrive. I also need you to arrange with the local police to mount guard on the cellars in College Hospital until we get the records out. Anyone who has to go down there must be accompanied, and no papers are to be removed.’

‘Understood. Are you calling a code red on this?’

Steven hesitated for a moment. He’d often requested a code red – official approval for a full investigation with a number of Home Office powers being invoked – but never found himself in a position to actually sanction one. ‘Not yet,’ he said. ‘Let’s request co-operation at the moment. If we don’t get it, we’ll start thinking about a code red.’

‘Very well. ‘I’ll keep you informed of the arrangements. Do you still intend to visit Gordon Field in prison?’

‘I’m going to drive over there in the morning.’

‘Take care, Steven.’

For some reason Steven found Jean’s parting words
thought-provoking
. He wasn’t entirely convinced that he’d crossed the path of a down-and-out in the tunnel. He wanted to believe it, because any other explanation implied that it had been an attempt to stop him or his investigation and indicated that someone had a powerful reason for ensuring that sleeping dogs were left that way. However, he had no wish to share these thoughts with anyone else at the moment – least of all Tally, because of the alarm he’d cause – so his injuries were put down to the accepted version of events when he phoned her.

‘Oh, you poor thing. How bad?’

‘No lasting damage, but bloody painful at the time. I’ve had them dressed and taken a couple of painkillers so I’ll get a good night’s sleep and be out of here in the morning. I’m going to see Gordon Field in Leigh Open Prison in Yorkshire.’

‘Sounds like a nice day out,’ Tally joked. ‘Will I see you later to kiss your hands all better?’

‘I may have to come back here.’

‘Of course, the transfer of the files. Oh, well …’

‘Then maybe I’ll take a day off. Maybe you could do the same. We could go somewhere?’

‘I’ll see what I can do.’

Leigh Open Prison was located in a remote part of the Yorkshire moors, far enough from transport links to deter thoughts of earlier-than-planned release for the fleet of foot should the idea occur. George Plumpton, the governor, a large man with a florid face and an obvious penchant for tweed, welcomed Steven to ‘our humble abode’ with the offer of tea and ginger biscuits, which he accepted. ‘So, it’s Gordon Field you’re here to see?’

‘It is.’

‘Not planning to go ten rounds with him, are you?’ said Plumpton, alluding to Steven’s bandages.

‘I was rather hoping I wouldn’t have to. In fact, I was hoping he’d be a model prisoner?’

This prompted a laugh to escape Plumpton’s mouth before it was entirely free of biscuit, and he wiped the crumbs from the scatter area. ‘They all are. Mainly middle-class chaps with jobs that brought them too tantalisingly close to other people’s money and, in a moment of madness – as their defence counsel would maintain – they gave in to temptation and changed the course of their lives.’

Steven nodded. ‘Have you noticed anything out of the ordinary about Field?’

‘Like what?’

‘Does he have strong views about anything? Politics? The system? The unfairness of it all?’

Plumpton shook his head. ‘Far from it. Some of them seek to atone for past mistakes by going too far the other way, if you know what I mean. They find religion and decide to bring it to the rest of us, devote themselves to lame ducks and good causes, but Field just keeps his head down, does what he’s told and serves his time without comment.’

‘Thanks,’ said Steven. ‘That’s helpful.’

He was shown to an interview room where Field was already waiting. He said who he was and sat down opposite the
prisoner
. ‘Mr Field, I’d like to ask you about your time at College Hospital in Newcastle.’

‘What would you like to know?’ replied Field in
well-modulated
tones.

Steven eyed him up, looking for signs of dumb insolence, but found none. ‘Exactly what were you and French and Schreiber up to?’

Field recoiled a little and Steven thought he saw nervous uncertainty in his eyes. ‘What d’you mean? I was the hospital manager. I did my job. End of.’

Steven shook his head. ‘No, no,’ he said with a smile. ‘We both know that’s a bunch of crap. I think you were involved in something that’s going to end up with you moving to a very secure prison indeed, where Leigh will just be a distant memory of holidays past.’

‘I swear to God I had nothing to do with whatever these bastards were up to.’

‘I’m not God and I’m not interested.’

‘Okay, look, I admit I played a part in the Greta Marsh deception but I didn’t have much choice. You didn’t say no to French and that bloody woman Freeman.’

‘Greta Marsh was the patient being operated on when her surgeon died?’

‘That’s right. They didn’t want any publicity. That bloody Freeman woman didn’t seem to give a fuck about her husband dying. All she and the others were interested in was making the press go away. College Hospital was to be about good news, nothing else.’

‘Tell me about the deception.’

‘Greta was left blind and brain-damaged. She was shipped off to an institute called Harrington Hall, and French and his buddies hired an actress to take her place at a press conference to assure everyone that Greta was okay.’

‘And James Kincaid?’

‘Who?’

Steven kept quiet and just stared at Field until he said, ‘Oh, the journalist, right? He kept popping up like a bad smell.’

‘So you killed him.’

‘No, I had nothing to do with that,’ insisted Field, beginning to panic. ‘I admit I was involved in scaring him off after he broke into Harrington Hall and got a bit too close to the truth for comfort, but that’s as far as it went. As God’s my witness …’

‘So what were French and his pals up to? The thing you had no part in …’

‘I don’t know. I was an outsider. They didn’t tell me anything I didn’t need to know. As far as I could see, they seemed to be doing a pretty good job. They ran a very efficient operation that all the staff and patients liked …’

‘But?’

‘Somehow, they weren’t exactly the sort of people you’d expect to be doing that sort of thing, if you know what I mean. They weren’t natural candidates for the caring professions.’

Steven understood his meaning very well. ‘And John Carlisle, where did he come into it?’

‘The health secretary?’ said Field, appearing amused. ‘He popped up at intervals with his entourage and took any credit that was going. He smiled a lot and made the right noises. Did what politicians do.’

‘You said French and Schreiber ran a very efficient operation. What exactly did they do in a practical sense?’

‘French oversaw the computing side of things, Schreiber organised the pharmacy and liaised with the supply company.’

‘Which was?’

‘Lander Pharmaceuticals. I think Schreiber had some connection with them.’

‘And Antonia Freeman? What did she do?’

‘Lady Antonia? God knows, but everyone seemed shit scared of her, like she was the real boss.’

‘Of what?’

Fields shrugged. ‘I dunno. It’s funny. They seemed like a bunch of individuals but they weren’t, if you know what I mean?’

‘No.’ 

‘Well, they seemed to have access to … back-up services. They knew where to hire an actress to play Greta Marsh. They knew where to come up with heavies when Kincaid had to be warned off. Things like that. It was like they weren’t alone. Little helpers just appeared when they needed them.’

Steven nodded, thinking about someone to open a steam valve. ‘Thank you, Mr Field. I don’t think I need to take up any more of your time.’

‘Take up as much of my “time” as you like,’ said Field. ‘You do believe me, don’t you?’

‘Yes, I do,’ said Steven, getting up to go. He did not add that one of the main reasons for believing Field was the fact that he had been left alive when all the others hadn’t.

Steven was half an hour into his journey back to Newcastle when Jean Roberts phoned. The courier company had been briefed and would be on site at College Hospital at four p.m. if that was convenient.

Steven checked his watch and said that it would.

‘I’ve also recruited a team to start work as soon as the records arrive. They’re people from the Department of Health, and the permanent under-secretary insists that Sci-Med foots the bill.’

‘No problem.’

‘And one other thing. I’ve managed to trace a doctor who worked with Neil Tolkien at the time of the Northern Health Scheme. She was one of the voluntary team who worked with heroin addicts at the time. Her name is Mary Cunningham; she’s still a GP in the area with a practice in Lamont Avenue.’

‘Excellent. I’ll look her up.’

It was just after six p.m. when Steven watched the second of two courier vans leave College Hospital for London, laden with the medical records of patients treated between 1990 and 1992 when John Carlisle was health secretary and the sun was shining brightly on his career. Drysdale, the clerk of works, was on hand to lock up the cellars and return the trolleys the couriers had been using, and Paul Drinkwater was there to represent hospital management, his brief being ‘to see that things went smoothly’.

‘Will you be bringing them back?’ he asked Steven.

‘Do you want them back?’

‘Not really. They’re officially off-system. It’s just a question of data protection.’

‘We’ll take care of that.’

Steven phoned the surgery in Lamont Avenue and was asked if he was registered with Dr Cunningham. He explained who he was and asked if it might be possible to have a word with Dr Cunningham that evening. A long pause was ended by a suggestion that he come round after evening surgery. She should be finished by seven thirty.

Mary Cunningham proved to be a tall, studious-looking woman, somewhere in her forties, her hair starting to grey and the first lines of age appearing at the corners of her eyes and mouth. She looked over her glasses at Steven as he was shown into her consulting room by a receptionist who already had her coat on, ready to leave.

‘Good of you to see me,’ he said.

‘I’m intrigued,’ said Mary Cunningham. ‘Unless you just want me to change the dressing on your hands,’ she added, noticing his bandages.

‘Accident with a steam pipe,’ said Steven with a smile. ‘Actually, no. I understand you knew Dr Neil Tolkien?’

‘Neil? My God, that was a long time ago. Yes, we worked together on a drug rehabilitation programme not long after I’d qualified. I was young and idealistic.’

‘And you’re not any more?’

‘Neither young nor idealistic,’ said Mary. ‘The passage of time I can do nothing about, but ideals tend to be modified through experience and the evidence of one’s own eyes.’ 

‘Sounds like there’s a pretty serious change of heart in there somewhere?’

‘Indeed. I now believe that the war against drugs – as they insist on calling it – is a complete waste of time and money, and has been for years.’

‘A point of view I’d have no trouble at all in agreeing with,’ said Steven. ‘But when you worked with Neil …’

‘We thought we could turn things round, rescue the fallen from the gutter, put addicts back on the straight and narrow, rebuild broken families …’

‘With the help of the Northern Health Scheme, I
understand
?’

‘It was very good,’ said Mary. ‘Gave us all the help we asked for in terms of medication, but we were fighting a losing battle.’

‘One in which Neil lost his life,’ said Steven.

‘Poor Neil. Yes, he and his girlfriend, a nurse, both died. The police told us they’d got on the wrong side of some criminals who didn’t like what the clinic was doing. They suggested we close it down.’

‘And you did?’

‘We did.’

‘Why do you think they targeted Neil and his girlfriend and not you or your other partner …’ Steven looked at his notes, ‘Dr Mitchell?’

‘Gavin Mitchell. He died a couple of years ago. It was pretty clear they targeted Neil because he’d teamed up with a journalist: the criminals feared exposure.’

‘Do you believe that?’

The directness of the question seemed to take Mary by surprise. ‘I’m not sure I understand …’

‘It’s a simple enough question,’ said Steven with a smile designed to soften the impact of the observation.

‘Yes, it is,’ conceded Mary. ‘Actually … I’ve always harboured doubts about Neil’s death.’ 

Steven waited for more.

‘Neil thought there was something wrong with the new health scheme. He thought some of our patients were dying when perhaps they shouldn’t have.’

‘Were any of those deaths ever investigated?’

‘Yes, routinely, but there were never any suspicious
circumstances
. The deaths were always due to the various medical conditions the deceased were suffering from.’

‘Despite the medication?’

‘Despite that.’

‘Thank you, Dr Cunningham, you’ve been most helpful.’

‘Have I?’

Steven smiled. ‘Enjoy your evening.’

‘What time d’you think you’ll get here?’ asked a surprised Tally when Steven said he was planning on driving down to Leicester.

‘Late.’

‘Well, don’t wake me.’

‘Yes, dear.’

‘My God, has it come to that?’ said Tally, utterly failing to conceal the amusement in her voice.

True to her word, Tally was fast asleep when Steven got there. He found a note saying that there was food in the microwave:
give it two minutes
. He closed the kitchen door so that the ping wouldn’t wake Tally, and helped himself to a beer from the fridge. He turned on the small TV and kept the volume low while he caught up on the news. The Tories and Liberal Democrats had agreed to form a formal coalition.

‘After placing their respective principles on a small bonfire,’ Steven muttered, as he removed his risotto from the microwave. ‘There’s nothing quite like the smell of power, is there, chaps?’

Half an hour later, he manoeuvred himself carefully and quietly into bed beside Tally. ‘About time too,’ she said. 

Steven uttered a despairing, ‘Oh, God, I was trying so hard not to wake you.’

‘I know.’

‘But now that I have …’

Over breakfast next morning Steven told Tally about meeting Mary Cunningham, and of her suspicions concerning Neil Tolkien’s death.

‘Pretty much what you suspected already,’ said Tally.

‘But there was one thing. She said that some of the deaths Tolkien was concerned about were investigated – presumably by routine PM – and nothing suspicious was ever found.’

‘So either the bad guys devised the perfect crime or the good doctor’s imagination was working overtime.’

‘And James Kincaid’s was too and their imaginations got them killed? I don’t think so.’

‘So where do you go from here?’

‘Let’s wait and see what emerges from the medical records. Are you going to be able to take a day off sometime soon – like tomorrow?’

Tally shook her head. ‘I did try, but there’s no chance until the weekend. My boss is away till Friday so I’ll have to be there.’

Steven looked disappointed. ‘Pity. But let’s do something at the weekend?’

‘That would be nice. Do you want to visit Jenny?’

‘No, not this weekend. Let’s have some
us
time.’

Tally left for the hospital and Steven drove back to London through pouring rain. The Porsche was not much fun to drive in wet conditions on the motorway, being low on the ground and ultra susceptible to the spray clouds thrown up by lorries. Steven decided to take an unscheduled break at a service station to get some coffee and a bit of a rest from the high level of concentration demanded by the drive. He had just come to a halt in the car park when his Sci-Med mobile rang.

‘Steven? Where are you?’ asked Jean Roberts. 

‘On my day off.’

‘Not any longer. The Prime Minister has called a meeting of COBRA. He wants a Sci-Med presence.’

‘Where? When?’

‘Conference room A in the main Cabinet Office building in Whitehall. Three p.m.’

‘I’ll be there.’

‘Good. I wasn’t looking forward to telling the new
government
that neither you nor Sir John could make it.’

‘What’s all the fuss?’

‘I don’t know. There was no warning.’

‘Exciting. I’ll call in at the Home Office afterwards.’

‘Maybe we’ll have something for you on the medical records by then. The team supplied by the health department has been working through the night.’

Steven called in at his flat to shower and change. Jeans and sweatshirt were exchanged for dark blue suit, china-blue shirt and Parachute Regiment tie. He had been to a couple of COBRA meetings before but always with John Macmillan. Such
meetings
were called by government to discuss imminent problems of national significance, the composition of the committee varying with the nature of the emergency. Not only would he be on his own this time but the politicians present would be strangers to him – appointees of the new Prime Minister, including the new Home Secretary who was technically his boss.

Steven could feel the burden of expectation start to weigh him down. John Macmillan knew his way around Whitehall; he didn’t. The fact that the new administration was a coalition was going to make it even more difficult to tell the organ grinders from the monkeys. But then that was going to be true for a lot of people, not just Sci-Med.

As he walked along Whitehall, trying to guess what the convening of COBRA might be about, he couldn’t help but feel that this would be the perfect time for any faction wishing harm to the UK to strike. The ruling coalition comprised a party that had been out of power for over thirteen years and another who hadn’t known it at all in living memory. Ministers would be not only strangers in their own departments but also alien to their new colleagues.

The civil service would, of course, keep everything running, and might even relish the chance of being even more in charge than usual with dependent strangers in their midst, but when it came to making big policy decisions under extreme or
emergency
pressure the test was yet to come.

‘Hello, Steven. I heard you were back. Good to see you,’ said a voice behind him as Steven climbed the stairs. He turned to see the head of MI5 with one of his colleagues.

‘You too,’ he replied automatically. Relations between 5 and Sci-Med weren’t always cordial when 5 did the government’s dirty work and Sci-Med shone a spotlight on it, with John Macmillan asserting that no one should be above the law – an attitude that had delayed his knighthood for many years.

Steven nodded to one or two familiar faces from the Metropolitan Police and the civil service. There was also a
military
presence, but the ministerial contingent from the Department of Health – the government department he usually had most dealings with – seemed to be entirely made up of unknown faces.

The deputy Prime Minister made apologies for the Prime Minister’s absence without giving a reason, and got down to business straight away.

‘Intelligence suggests that the UK will be subjected to a
chemical
or biological attack in the very near future.’

He had to pause to let the hubbub die down.

‘How reliable is this intelligence?’ asked the health secretary.

The head of MI5 said, ‘We’ve had a tip-off from an
anonymous
source.’

‘So it could be a hoax?’ 

‘It could be. On the other hand, it might not be. We’ve been told that Islamic fundamentalists are behind it. We don’t know much more than that.’

‘Do we have any indication at all about the nature of the attack?’ asked the Met commissioner. ‘Gas? Chemicals? Anthrax?’

‘I’m sorry. We don’t know.’

‘Which means we can’t prepare,’ said Steven.

‘We can certainly tighten security at all airports and rail and ferry terminals,’ suggested the commissioner.

‘Our intelligence suggests they are already here,’ said the head of MI5, a comment that provoked another hubbub. ‘We think the terrorists are home-grown,’ he clarified. ‘Our colleagues in MI6 have heard nothing of an attack coming from outside the UK.’

‘But you have no inkling at all of the nature of the attack?’

‘I’m afraid not.’

‘Which means we’ll have to initiate standard emergency procedure in all our cities without telling the services what they’re up against,’ said the Home Secretary.

‘Containment must be the immediate aim,’ said the deputy PM.

‘Let’s hope it’s a gas attack,’ said Steven. ‘At least that will be localised. If it’s microbiological, the chances are we haven’t got any hope at all of containing it.’ He was immediately aware of the discomfort his comment had provoked.

‘I don’t think we need such negative thinking,’ said the cabinet secretary.

Steven bit his tongue. He knew he was prone to saying more than was wise at such meetings, and had no trouble at all in imagining the kick on the ankle John Macmillan might have given him at that moment. Truth had to be approached in a more circumspect fashion in the corridors of power, which usually meant tiptoeing through a minefield of other people’s egos and sensibilities. 

‘Our emergency services are the finest in the world and have been trained over many years for just such eventualities,’ said the Home Secretary.

One of the Department of Health people, a confident-looking man named Norman Travis, Steven learned from his desk name plate, said, ‘With all due respect, sir, I think the problem arises in not knowing exactly what “eventuality” we might be dealing with. As Dr Dunbar says, a gas attack will, by its very nature, be limited in area, and our services have been trained to deal with that sort of incident, but if it should turn out to be anthrax or even, God forbid, smallpox … we will have a much more challenging situation to deal with.’

That’s how to go about it, Steven thought to himself. Travis even finished his comment with a disarming smile. Steven
remembered
that this was the man who had led the negotiations with the pharmaceutical companies over vaccine production to a successful conclusion.

‘I think our experience with the swine flu pandemic will stand us in good stead,’ said the deputy PM.

Steven shook his head slightly and looked down at the table as he kept hold of his tongue.

‘But you don’t agree, doctor?’ challenged the cabinet
secretary
, who had noticed his reaction.

Steven lost the struggle. In for a penny, in for a pound. ‘The handling of swine flu was a complete and utter disaster and one that we should learn from, not crow about.’