The Gulf Conspiracy (11 page)

‘
Did you get the impression that your husband knew him when he turned up on your doorstep?’ asked Steven.

‘
Oh, yes,’ said Jane. ‘They’d clearly met before.’

‘
They argued?’

Jane nodded. ‘From what I overheard, Mr Maclean seemed to think that my husband had been involved in something untoward during his time at Porton. He kept insisting that he should come clean. George insisted that he was imagining things but Mr Maclean accused him of lying.’

‘
Did your husband say anything afterwards?’ asked Steven.

‘
Nothing. He refused to discuss it.’

‘
I take it you personally have no idea what George worked on at Porton.’

‘
As I told Donald Crowe earlier, none at all.’

‘
What made you think Crowe was here to check up on things?’ asked Steven.

Jane gave an involuntary laugh. ‘He told me to my face,’ she said. ‘He asked if he could go through George’s papers to make sure there was nothing there of a ‘sensitive nature’ as he so delicately put it.’

‘
You don’t like Crowe,’ said Steven.

‘
He gives me the creeps. You’d find more humanity in a bar of soap.’

‘
Did he find anything?’

Jane shrugged and said, ‘I’ve no idea. I just told him to help himself.’

‘
You told the police that there was a change in your husband after Maclean’s visit. He seemed worried? Angry?’

Jane smiled wanly and said, ‘George wasn’t really a man who ever got angry. He was very . . . even-tempered.’

Steven sensed that there was much more lying behind Jane’s choice of words but – although he was interested – it was not the right time to ask. ‘Worried then?’

‘
Alarmed would be a better word,’ said Jane. ‘He had trouble sleeping after Maclean’s visit. I was worried about him but he wouldn’t open up to me. That was George.’

Jane looked at Steven in what he found a very strange way. He imagined there was some kind of debate going on inside her head. Eventually she said simply, ‘He called a newspaper, The
Guardian
. I know because I listened in. He asked to speak to a journalist who had done a number of stories on the Gulf War over the years. His name’s Martin Hendry.’

‘
I know the name,’ said Steven.

‘
He wasn’t there but George left word saying that he had a major story for him and that he should give him a call back. Hendry did call back, about two hours later. I answered the phone. I heard George make arrangements to meet him the following day.’

‘
George didn’t tell you face to face?’ asked Steven.

Jane shook here head. ‘No,’ she said.

Steven saw the hurt in her eyes. He said, ‘As you say, he was very upset at the time.’

Steven drove back to London reflecting on his day. A lot had happened since the meeting that morning with Norris at Police Headquarters. He had parted company with the policeman, almost convinced that Sebring’s death had nothing to do with his work at Porton Down after the elimination of Maclean as a suspect, but now, after talking to Jane Sebring in the garden of her home, he had started to believe otherwise. In a practical sense there was only one lead to follow and that was Martin Hendry, the journalist Sebring had contacted at the
Guardian
. He sighed as he realised that getting anything out of a journalist about his source was going to be about as easy as getting information out of the Ministry of Defence about Sebring’s past work - or blood out of a stone. He’d have to push the murder inquiry button pretty hard to make Hendry budge.

When he phoned the paper Steven was told by the receptionist that Martin Hendry was not in the office and was asked if he’d like to leave a message. He said not and instead asked to speak to the editor. He persisted through the series of obstacles that people who answer phones seemed duty-bound to erect until he finally reached the ear of a deputy editor. ‘I really do have to speak to Martin Hendry,’ he said.

‘
Me too,’ replied the man. ‘Believe me, it’s not a case of him avoiding you. He really isn’t here. He had a story to deliver yesterday morning with a noon deadline but no show and believe me; I’m as pissed off as you are.’

‘
You’ve no idea where he is?’ asked Steven.

‘
Well, yes. I know exactly where he’s supposed to be. He told us he was going up to Scotland to work on his story. He said he had to talk to a man in Glasgow to get some details straight and then he was going to his place in the Highlands to produce the final draft. But as I say, he was due to produce it yesterday and didn’t.’

‘
Would you say this was unusual?’ asked Steven.

‘
No,’ replied the deputy editor matter of factly. ‘Happens all the time. Sometimes I think that editing a paper is like juggling with one hand tied behind your back.’

‘
Do you know where in the Highlands he was going to?’ asked Steven.

‘
No, it’s his own place and somewhere he’s always regarded as his bolthole. It’s where he goes to escape the cares of the world or when he’s feeling put-upon. He’s never been keen on telling any of us where it is, presumably in case we arrive on his doorstep armed with fishing rods and cases of lager. It’s become a bit of a joke in the office. They talk about Martin going up to Balmoral. I think he inherited the place from his parents, nothing too grand, just a hut up in the hills I think.’

‘
He must have a mobile phone?’

‘
He’s not answering. I’ll give you the number if you like but he’s probably switched it off while he’s working. I don’t think the muse cares for ‘Fur Elise’ going off every ten minutes.’

‘
How about the man he went to see in Glasgow. Do you know anything about him?’

‘
No to that too, I’m afraid.’

‘
If he gets in contact will you tell him I have to speak to him?’ said Steven. ‘It’s important.’

‘
Of course, leave me your number.’

Steven left his mobile number and rang off. He immediately rang Sci-Med to ask if they’d managed to get anything out of the Ministry of Defence.’

‘
Nothing yet,’ replied Rose Roberts. ‘I did mark it urgent but then . . .’

‘
I know,’ said Steven. ‘Keep at them, Rose.’

Steven realised that he was hungry; he hadn’t eaten properly since breakfast time. There had just been no time for lunch although he’d managed to grab a couple of sandwiches at Jane Sebring’s place after the funeral. He found he had nothing in the flat in the way of the tinned or packet food he depended on - he’d never really got round to learning to cook - so he went out to The Jade Garden, his local Chinese take-away where he was a regular at least once a week and picked up some hot food. He came back and watched the news on television while he worked his way through lemon chicken and special fried rice.

He learned that George W Bush seemed determined to extend his supposed war on terrorism by going to war with Iraq and Tony Blair still seemed solid in his support of US policy - as indeed he had been since the destruction of the twin towers - but convincing other countries of the justification of a new initiative against Saddam was proving problematical. Nothing was ever going to be quick or easy once the United Nations became involved, thought Steven. He recalled the adage of a camel being a horse designed by a committee. He turned off the TV as the news ended and put the Stan Getz album,
Jazz Samba
, on the stereo while he considered what he should do next with the Sebring investigation.

If Sebring really had given Martin Hendry a story about the Gulf War and Hendry had gone to Glasgow with it, you didn’t have to be a rocket scientist to work out that there was a good chance the man was the activist, Angus Maclean. According to DCI Norris, Maclean worked in a Glasgow hospital as a lab technician.

After wondering for a moment if it would be worth his while going up there to speak to Maclean he concluded that he had nothing to lose by doing so and maybe everything to gain. He would fly up to Glasgow in the morning but before setting off, he would call Norris in Leicester to get some more details about Maclean and his place of work.

Steven’s flight into Glasgow touched down a little after ten and he took a taxi to the Princess Louise Hospital. As both the airport and the hospital lay out to the west of the city it only took fifteen minutes. He followed the signs to the microbiology laboratories through a maze of corridors and waited in line at the Reception counter while a nurse in front of him delivered a series of clinical specimens she’d brought up from one of the wards.

‘
Jeeez-O!’ said the young male technician behind the counter. ‘Is this national-swab-your-nose-week or something?’ He was looking at the three dozen or so plastic swab tubes lying on the desk in front of him. ‘This is the fifth lot this morning.’

‘
Blame the TV news,’ said the nurse. ‘They did a scare story on MRSA last night so the powers that be thought it would be a good idea to swab the whole hospital just in case the press come to call. Image is everything.’

‘
Better cancel my summer holiday then,’ said the technician. ‘In fact, I’ll be lucky to make it home for Christmas at this rate.’

The nurse smiled and turned away leaving Steven to ask if he could have a word with Angus Maclean.

‘
Can I ask who’s calling?’ said the technician.

‘
Dr Dunbar.’

The technician pressed one of the numbered buttons on the intercom beside him and said, ‘A visitor for you, Gus. It’s a Dr Dunbar.’

‘
Never heard of him,’ came the gruff voice from the speaker.

The technician looked embarrassed.

‘
He doesn’t know me,’ said Steven and the technician relayed this information.

‘
Send him through,’ said the voice.

The technician released the electronic lock on the doors leading to the main labs and said to Steven. ‘Room nine; it’s on your right.’

Steven entered and immediately noticed the smell he associated with medical labs the world over, a mixture of organic solvents and disinfectant with undercurrents of noxious substances he’d rather not think about. He knocked on the frosted glass door to Maclean’s lab and was invited to enter with a solitary, ‘Yup.’

Maclean, a short, slightly-built man with an unfashionable crew cut and round shoulders that suggested possible chest problems was seated with his back to the door, peering down the binocular eyepiece of a microscope. ‘Be with you in a moment,’ he said.

Steven reassured him there was no hurry and took in his surroundings while he waited. A Bunsen burner was alight on the small bench to the left of where Maclean was seated, a platinum inoculating loop propped up on its base. Beside it lay a plastic Petri dish filled with a medium that Steven remembered from times past as blood agar and next to that, a box of microscope slides and a pack of coverslips. It was clear that the bacterial colonies growing on the blood agar were the subject of Maclean’s scrutiny.

Maclean finished his examination and removed the glass slide from the microscope stage to drop it into a beaker of disinfectant before jotting down his findings on the report form beside him. He turned and said, ‘What can I do for you?’

Steven showed him his ID and said, ‘I’m making inquiries connected with the death of Dr George Sebring; I understand you knew him?’

‘’
I thought the police did that sort of thing,’ said Maclean. ‘I’ve already told them all I know. I’ve no idea who killed the bugger.’

Steven nodded, deliberately making an effort to remain calm in the face of Maclean’s aggression. He said, ‘I’m not so much concerned with the criminal aspects of the case as the scientific ones, particularly where they might provide motive.’

‘
What does that mean?’ said Maclean, affecting a scowl and dropping his head slightly to look over the top of his glasses.

‘
I think we both know that Sebring once worked at the Porton Down Defence Establishment,’ said Steven. ‘I’m trying to establish if his time there might have had something to do with his death.’

‘
Well, there’s irony for you,’ said Maclean with a smile that lacked any vestige of humour. ‘You’re wondering whether his work had anything to do with
his
death and I’m bloody sure it had everything to do with that of my wife and daughter.’

‘
How so?’

‘
I don’t know how so,’ replied Maclean. ‘That’s what I’ve been trying to find out for Christ knows how many years. Bloody place. Defence establishment, my arse.’

‘
How come you know so much about it?’

‘
I was trained there when I was in the army,’ said Maclean. ‘1
^st
Field Laboratory Unit.’

‘
That’s what you told the police,’ said Steven. ‘The MOD says they’ve never heard of it.’

‘
Lying bastards,’ said Maclean.

‘
Why should they lie?’ asked Steven.

‘
Christ knows!’ said Maclean, spreading his hands. ‘God knows why they even went to the bother of setting us up in the first place,’ he said. ‘They recruited us from all over the country: they trained us to monitor and detect the use of chemical and biological weapons in all sorts of situations and then they threw away every report we ever made. Now they’ve taken to denying we ever existed.’