Gridlock (19 page)

'All right, Digby boy I'll cut the crap, shall I? We know you take it up the arse and we know that on the night before your speech one of your bum boy pals visited you in your hotel room wearing a dress and false eyelashes. We also know that the following day he blackmailed you into cocking up your career. Here's his picture. He's Scottish.'

It was moments like this that made Galton's day. Digby went from white to green. He actually gagged and croaked as his stomach turned over with fear and loathing.

'May I come in now?' enquired Galton.

'What for?' asked Digby, in a ghastly whisper.

'Well, it might be possible for us to add a slightly more favourable slant to what is, after all, a pretty seedy story, if you were able to see yourself clear to confessing everything exclusively to the
Sunday Word
and giving us the background of your queer ways, you know. Did some wicked old bugger have you when you were a kid and set you on the path to frightfulness? Very mitigating that, Digby, very mitigating.'

For a moment Digby even considered it, making up some awful fiction about being forced to be gay at school, pleading with Galton to go easy. But then a spark of sanity, perhaps even honour, bubbled its way to the surface and Digby realized that there was not a chance in hell of Galton going easy, and anyway, he had been lying for too long.

'I have nothing further to say,' replied Digby.

'We shall have to go with the story as it stands, Digby,' said Galton.

'Go to the devil,' said Digby, slamming the door, but Galton had sold his soul that way a long time before.

The beautiful Panther Chief Executive had been running quite a while now, but Digby wasn't going anywhere. He just sat there, with the car in neutral and a hosepipe running from the exhaust pipe in through the top of the slightly open passenger window. Digby's eyes were closed. The internal combustion engine had claimed another victim.

Deborah and Toss had not spoken much in the week since Geoffrey had been murdered. Neither of them could think of anything to say, the shock was too great. Toss, who had actually seen him die, could not expunge the vision of Geoffrey's last seconds from his mind. Deborah, who had loved Geoffrey, and felt as one with him in the colossal battles of his life, was quite simply bowed down with grief.

Whilst there was still the police to deal with, they had both held up quite strongly. Deborah had tried desperately to interest the police in the disappearance of Geoffrey's invention, but since the Office of Patents vigorously asserted that they knew nothing of any invention and Deborah could not produce anything to substantiate her claims that an invention had ever even existed, the police were inclined to believe that Geoffrey lived in a world of fantasy and delusion, probably chemically induced.

'Drugs, sir, gotta be,' DC Collingwood opined to the superintendent as they left. 'These spasos, well, they got nothing to live for, have they? Not surprising a few of them turn to the honeyed oblivion of drug-induced ecstacy. The bloke couldn't pay for his trips and hits and pops, sir, so he got done, simple as that, I reckon.'

Deborah had hoped that Geoffrey's funeral might provide a catalyst whereby she might come to terms a little with the dreadful mourning which haunted her, but it didn't.

'After a lifetime of struggle and torment,' the vicar had said, trying to be nice, 'our brother Geoffrey is happy in God.'

Deborah squirmed, even in death, Geoffrey was being defined by his disability. The vicar, nice bloke though he was, was offering comfort in the idea that, in a sort of way, death was a release for Geoffrey. Without saying it, he was suggesting that it must be so bloody awful being a spastic that, in a way, even having your head blown away with a sawn-off shotgun was sort of preferable. Deborah knew Geoffrey was not happy in God, he had never wanted to die. He hadn't wanted to be a spastic either, but that was beside the point. He had definitely never wanted to die. He wanted to work, write, drink, enjoy his friends and, if possible, have it off occasionally. None of which, Deborah imagined, you could do with God. It just wouldn't be right.

'As we all know,' continued the vicar, 'Geoffrey rose magnificently above the burdens that God chose to place upon his shoulders. The Lord moves in mysterious ways and we can never know what purpose he had in so afflicting Geoffrey. Perhaps he understood Geoffrey's strength, and wished to use him as an example to others who were not so strong.'

'That makes sense,' thought Deborah. As tears streamed down her cheeks, her thoughts flooded with the occasions when Geoffrey's indomitable spirit and wit had proved to her how strong she could be herself, even from her chair.

'Whatever purpose God saw for Geoffrey upon earth, it is done now,' the vicar concluded. 'For Geoffrey's struggles are over, and he is at peace.'

But Deborah knew that he wasn't. She wanted to shout. She wanted to scream to them all that Geoffrey's immortal soul was about as peaceful as Beirut. She gripped Toss's hand as anguish flooded through her. Geoffrey's work, his engine, the one he had designed for her, was gone. Gone for ever. How could he ever be at peace? Everything he had dreamt of had been stolen and he wasn't there to put it right.

At the graveside they watched Geoffrey's small coffin being lowered into the grave.

'Leave plenty of room, guy,' murmured Toss under his breath, 'because the geezer is going to be doing a lot of turning in the grave. He is going to spin.' Toss's thoughts were along similar lines to Deborah's. He knew that Geoffrey had failed, they had all failed.

In the days after the funeral the torment had increased. Deborah could find nothing to do with herself, nothing to occupy her mind. It was the weekend and she had decided that she would seek grief counselling on the Monday, the victims support group had been in touch and she had got the number of an analyst from a friend.

'I know it seems kinda New York to be going to an analyst,' Deborah had said to Toss, her eyes red with a week of crying. 'But I can't go on like this. It's worse than when I was crippled. He came to us for help. Now he's dead and his engine's gone and we don't know who did all this to him, Toss. We've no-one to fight, no-one to blame. It's the impotence that's killing me inside. If we had just one clue, Toss, just something to think about, something to do, I think I would be all right, but we don't. We've got nothing, and we never will, we're tiny people and we've been stepped on.'

That had been Saturday night, the Saturday that Digby turned the key of his ex-ministerial limo. As Digby breathed himself to death, Deborah cried herself to sleep.

By Sunday morning Digby's suffering was long over, but for Deborah there was no relief. Often, at times of great unhappiness, a person will wake up and check themselves, wondering for a brief second, ecstatic with potential, whether the load has been lifted, only to realize a moment later, as the liquid lead runs into the stomach, that nothing has changed.

Deborah hauled herself out of bed and went through into the kitchen to make coffee, imagining, as she did every time she entered her kitchen-cum-laundry area, Geoffrey's last terrible dash for freedom.

Some people had recoiled at Deborah wanting to continue to live in a flat, in the garden of which a close friend had had his head blown off only a week before. These people had no idea what it is like to be a paraplegic. Deborah could not simply move in somewhere else. Her home was her haven. There, everything was designed as much as possible to work for her, as opposed to the exact opposite, which is how everything is designed in the outside world. Deborah needed that home, and anyway, it was hers. She would not leave it just because some evil lowlife had invaded it. Toss, on the other hand, would have liked to move, but he stayed for Deborah's sake. He didn't like it, he wanted desperately to get away from the gloomy presence of tragedy and the constant reminder of the appalling moment in the garden. But he had to stay.

Toss was still asleep as Deborah made the coffee, but his paper had been delivered. He favoured the
Sunday Word.
'Just for a laugh, know what I mean. See who's screwing who.'

Deborah always claimed to be stunned that Toss would pay good money for such drivel. However, like everybody else, she would flick through a copy herself when she got the chance.

And there it was. The clue she had been wishing for. Deborah did not realize it at first, she was merely reading with interest the surprising secret life of an ex-cabinet minister. Halfway through the article, however, she came to the meat of the matter. A sideline issue to most readers, nothing like as interesting as the stockings and suspenders, but it was life and death to Deborah.

Having got through its story that Parkhurst was being blackmailed by a Scottish transvestite railway nut, bent on hijacking the Government's BritTrak scheme (probably the most accurate front page the
Sunday Word
had ever printed), the newspaper went on to explain . . .

During the
Sunday
Word's painstaking investigations, the Minister made a cowardly and dishonourable attempt to throw us off the scent. Explaining his conference cock-up by claiming that Samuel Turk, the chief executive of Global Motors, had been blackmailing him. The reason for this, nervous Parkhurst claimed, was that Turk had stolen plans for a 'miracle motor' from the Office of Patents, and that Parkhurst had been on to him.

The
Sunday Word
approached Mr Turk, who strenuously denied the accusation. We also contacted Deirdre Whelk, the senior civil servant at the Office of Patents, who denied any knowledge of a miracle motor. There had been a break-in, she admitted, but nothing had been stolen.

An hour later, when Toss wandered in wiping the sleep from his eyes Deborah had already decided what she had to do.

'Toss, the time has come to fight back,' she said, in a firm, decisive voice. He looked at her in surprise. It seemed to Toss that Deborah had been speaking in a sombre weepy monotone for so long that he had forgotten what her usual voice sounded like.

'Yo, girl,' he replied, 'what is happening with this new-found decisiveness? Has an alien with a positive attitude taken over your body?'

'Toss, I know who has Geoffrey's engine designs . . . it's all here in the paper. It's a guy called Sam Turk, an American I am shamed to say.'

'Well, they can't all be like you and the Statue of Liberty,' said Toss, kindly.

'Thanks, I hope I look as good as she does when I'm a hundred years old. Listen, this guy is the head of Global Motors, and I am going in there, and I am going to get Geoffrey's engine back.'

Later that same Sunday, the unwitting target of Deborah's increasing wrath was in Geneva facing the representatives of the world's oil producers. They were a powerful crowd but Sam Turk eye-balled them without a flicker of nerves. Turk had been Global Motors' principal union-breaker back in the Fifties. During those heady days, he had thought nothing of having decent men beaten and the frighteners put on their families. He had been 100 per cent in bed with the mob, kept a baseball bat on his desk and stood as godparent to the children of made men. Sam prided himself that it took quite something to scare him. He didn't know it, but as he sat staring down at the oil men, that something was sitting in a wheelchair in London staring at his face in a newspaper.

The Union of Oil is the loose cartel by which many of those states which produce petroleum products organize their affairs and attempt, when they're not at war with one another, to prevent damaging competition.

Never had a U of O delegation been organized so quickly as the one which Bruce Tungsten and Cornelius Brandt had brought about. Even when they were fighting, Union of Oil diplomacy happened at a fairly leisurely pace. Decades of sucking out of the ground a liquid for which the whole world thirsted had led to a lack of urgency, perhaps even complacency, in its dealings. Another block to the Union operating in a time-effective manner was the disparate nature of its membership. It was made up of a mixture of feudal monarchs, military dictators and elected prime ministers. In fact, such were the differences of principle and method within the group, that everybody knew that anything the U of O decided might, at any time, be completely ignored by one or other of the countries involved.

Not only was it extraordinary that the U of O had assembled so quickly, but it was extraordinary that it had assembled at all, because at the time of their meeting with Sam, the Union of Oil was supposed to be hopelessly divided. The conventional wisdom amongst diplomatic circles was that it would be months, perhaps years, before they could be persuaded to even talk to each other. The problem being that one of their number had invaded a neighbour, the aggressor claiming that the neighbour had been stealing its oil by means of long bendy pipes that tunnelled deep and looped under the border.

None the less, all the member states sanctioned this meeting, including the two belligerents whose soldiers were at that moment locked in mortal conflict. The reason being that when figures as senior to Western oil interests as Bruce Tungsten, America's Mr Automobile, and Cornelius Brandt, the boss of Imperial Oil, shuttle red-eyed from country to country announcing that oil will be economically dead inside two decades unless immediate action is taken, even the slothful U of O gets its arse into gear.

The meeting was, of course, conducted in the deepest secrecy. The current war had caused both the United States and the European Community endless diplomatic and military inconvenience. The leaders of those powers would clearly have been none too pleased to learn that after months of refusing to meet, representatives of the two belligerents were now having tea together. Of course the other, even more important, reason for secrecy was that the meeting involved the suppression of an invention which could bring great benefits to humankind. The last thing anybody needed was moral dilemmas to muddy the deal.

Cornelius Brandt had been surprised when it was Sam Turk, not Bruce Tungsten, that he met at Geneva airport. Cornelius was extremely tense, it is never any fun having to tell the people upon whom you rely for your livelihood that they are about to get stung for a gigantic amount of cash. Of course it was not Brandt's fault, but none the less he could not help feeling that the affair, once concluded, was likely to sour his business relationships for some time to come. Perhaps it was the tension that made him so brusque.

'What are you doing here, Turk? Yes?' he snapped. 'They are expecting Tungsten, they want the master not his dog.'

If Sam was stung by this rather rude remark he did not show it.

'Well, ol' pal,' he grinned, 'I decided I needed the trip.'

In fact Bruce had also been extremely surprised when Sam had announced that he would convey a sample of Geoffrey's design to the Geneva meeting, and strike the deal himself. Bruce had argued forcefully that, since he had set up the meeting, it should be he that chaired it.

'I don't see that, Bruce,' Sam had said affably. 'Setting up the meeting was where the influence and credibility were required, but now you've done that, why it doesn't matter a damn who actually shows them the engine. Ronald McDonald could do it and the results would be the same. The engine does the talking, ol' pal.'

This had prompted Bruce to, again, make the point that he himself, as co-conspirator, had yet to set eyes on these magical designs. Sam protested that he wasn't exactly going to fax them to the States, but assured Bruce that his curiosity would be satisfied the moment he got to London. However, by the time Bruce did arrive in London, Sam had already arrived in Geneva, where he and Cornelius Brandt were getting into a limousine.

Take us up around the lake a little,' Sam said to the driver, explaining to Brandt that he required privacy in order to offer Brandt further information. Brandt said nothing and sulked.

Soon they were amongst the countryside and Sam got out of the car.

'You go hiking if you want,' said Brandt, staying put, 'I hate trees.'

Sam walked round to the driver and gave him 5,000 American dollars.

'That's to have your panel beaten out and fix your paintwork, son,' he said, before walking round to Brandt's side of the car. Brandt's look of surprise soon turned to fear as Sam dragged him out of the car by the collar, threw him face down over the bonnet of the big Mercedes and bashed his head a couple of times against the beautiful, smooth metal.

'You got yourself a bargain, kid,' said Sam to the astonished driver while still holding Brandt face down on the bonnet, 'they build these Mercs like fucking panzers. Why I don't think I've scratched it. If this had been a British car his head would be buried in the road.'

Sam pulled Cornelius Brandt round to face him, there was a huge nasty bruise on his forehead and his nose was bleeding.

'OK, listen up, little Dutchman!' said Sam, still with the same big smile and easy manner. 'Don't call me a dog, OK? Don't put me down and be mean, you understand? I hate it.'

Sam pushed Cornelius Brandt back into the car and ordered the driver to head for the private villa where the momentous deal was to be discussed.

On arrival at the villa, Sam and Cornelius had been met by the chief technical officer of the Union of Oil. Sam presented him with a copy of Geoffrey's plans and he took them away for study by a team of top engine brains and fuel heads. After that, Sam and Cornelius waited. They knew that they would not be received by the Union representatives themselves until after the engine's credentials had been established.

The hours passed, lunch was served, and then tea. Not a word passed between Sam and Cornelius. Conversation is always a bit stilted between two people, when one of them has recently beaten the other up. But Sam was a naturally gregarious soul and the silence really got on his nerves. As the long hours ticked away, he began to wish that he had not dealt so roughly with Brandt. Eventually he could bear it no longer.

'Hell, if I'd a'known we were gonna be sat staring at each other all day, I never would have buried your ugly mug in that car hood,' he said by way of conciliation.

Cornelius said nothing, refusing even to look Sam in the face.

'What, are you going to sulk all day?' said Sam. 'OK, so I bruised your head. Here, look, does this make you feel any better?' and with that Sam leant his big body forward and headbutted the table, making all the tea things rattle. 'How was that?' he enquired, a nasty bump already rising on his forehead. Still he was received in stony silence . . . 'Oh, yeah, I forgot,' Sam continued, 'I slammed you two times, didn't I?' and again Sam whacked his head down on the table, this time making the top jump off the sugar bowl.

'Mr Turk,' the Dutchman said, as if speaking to the opposite wall, 'your football yob behaviour, which is like a thug or something, yes? is not edifying, it is not smart. You disgrace yourself, yes?'

'Aw diddums,' said Sam not very cleverly. And silence returned.

Another fifteen minutes passed, it seemed like fifteen years. Sam sighed, paced about the room, sat down, drummed his fingers, sighed, got up again, whistled a couple of bars of 'Forty-Second Street', accompanying it with a little shuffle, sat down again, picked up his teaspoon, sighed, then started tapping his teaspoon against his cup. Now it was Brandt's turn to be consumed with irritation.

'Don't tap please, yes?' he said through gritted teeth.

Sam stopped tapping. Then after about a minute he started again. 'Ching, ching, ching,' went the teacup. Cornelius Brandt's face grew tense, but he said nothing.

Sam kept on tapping. He tapped and tapped and tapped. Having tapped out the 'William Tell Overture' on his cup about fifty times, Sam decided he could do better than that. He stopped tapping and rolled up a little pellet of bread, which he flicked at Cornelius, making a noise like a cannon. More pellets followed.

'Enemy sighted, sir,' said Sam, playing at being a military commander. 'Little Dutch faggot, range eight feet. OK, let's hit 'em with a thermonuclear, intercontinental ballistic bread pellet from Uncle Sam. Ready, aim, fire.' The pellet hit Brandt on the nose.

Sam upgraded his technology. He employed a knife to improve the force and accuracy of his projectiles. He used up all the bread on his own plate in some twenty or thirty pellets. 'Peow,' he said, followed by the sound of an explosion whenever he managed to hit Brandt's head.

'Excuse me,' Sam said, leaning across, 'could I have your bread if you're not using it? Mine is all through.'

Cornelius cracked, he snatched up his teacup, which happened to be half full of cold tea, and hurled the liquid into Sam's face. Sam then emptied the contents of the pot over Cornelius, a teabag ending up perched on top of his head.

Silence fell again and not another word was said between the two men until an emissary arrived to inform them that the Union of Oil was ready to talk.

The gathering was not as large as Sam had expected. Not every country involved was individually represented and only the four largest oil companies had sent delegates. However, those in attendance had authority to speak for all, so the atmosphere was heavy with money and power.

'My science officer informs me that Mr Tungsten did not exaggerate, and nor did you, Mr Brandt.'

The bearded and berobed prince was attempting to play it very calm and regal and was not doing a bad job of it. However, Sam, who had seen a hundred men bluffing in his time, could see that the oil potentate was badly shaken.

'You undoubtedly have in your possession a technological breakthrough which could, we agree, one day produce a viable alternative to the petrol engine.'

'Oh, is that so?' said Sam.

'Yes, it is, and we congratulate you,' answered the prince.

'Well that's nice, Your Highness, but congratulations, even from a big cheese like yourself, trade pretty light against the US dollar.' Sam was standing four square, a big bruise on his forehead and tea stains on his collar.

'Yes, we have no doubt that if you continue along the lines that your research has taken you so far, one day, in as little as perhaps ten years, you may produce a viable prototype. A prototype which would undoubtedly put in question the long-term future of the petro dollar. We thank you most sincerely for bringing the matter to our attention.'

'Well, thank
you,
Your Highness,' said Sam rather nastily.

'You were right to think that we would be interested in acquiring the world rights to the research you have conducted so far. We concur that it is essential to the Union of Oil's long-term interests that we maintain control over such developments—'

'Excuse me, your Highness,' Sam interrupted the prince. The prince was extremely surprised, having never been interrupted before. In fact, the prince was on the verge of ordering ten lashes for impudence, but he was reluctantly forced to recognize that he did not have the authority at the present time. The prince's surprise and irritation was to turn to anger, moments later, as Sam's tone became clear.

'I wonder if I might just dig out my big shovel here, Prince, and start to shift a little bit of this bullshit,' said Sam. Cornelius Brandt instinctively stepped away from him, half expecting a bolt of lightning to put an end to Sam's impudence. The prince raised an elegant eyebrow.

'Explain yourself, Mr Turk. If possible without recourse to the language of the gutter,' he said.

'Oh, I'm sorry, Prince. I didn't realize a guy who would cut off a thief's hands for stealing a goat would be quite so sensitive.'

'Kindly keep your tired and unimaginative prejudices to yourself, Mr Turk, and stick to the point. What have I said that you consider to be so foolish?'

'Oh, it's just something in phrases like "one day", "in ten years", "prototype", those kind of words, Prince. Words that sort of give the impression that you're trying to bull me about how much you reckon what I got is worth.'

'On the contrary, we accept absolutely that you are in possession of a major breakthrough. We wish to acquire the rights and we are prepared to offer yourself and Mr Bruce Tungsten eight million United States dollars each, for the world patent.'

'So long, guys,' said Sam, heading for the door. 'Get yourselves a copy of the next issue of
Scientific American,
the death warrant of your industry is going to be on the cover. You can keep those designs if you like. We're registered in the US and Bruce Tungsten will have the damn things rolling out of Detroit before you know it.'

'Mr Turk,' spluttered Brandt.

The prince nodded a tiny nod and Sam's way was blocked by two gentlemen in suits who had been standing by the door.