Bite (32 page)

There was no reply.

‘I've never seen your face, Alex and I don't know anything about you,' Max said. ‘Maybe I just fell for a bunch of bullshit.'

‘Suspicion is a fine trait, keeps you alive. But there's a time and a place for it. Everything I told you is true. It may not have been everything I could tell you, but that's a different matter.'

‘This is a GPS phone isn't it? There's a bug in the phone, isn't there Alex? That's how he found us. He was wearing an earpiece.'

‘No. Let me level with you. We always know roughly where you are, but never exactly.'

‘So there
is
a bug in the phone.'

‘No, it's a normal phone. We could have got you a GPS phone, but maybe that would have made you a little suspicious. We were pretty sure you weren't a geek, but we wouldn't want to take the chance. However, we don't need anything in the phone to know roughly where you are, who you are talking to and what you are saying. We just have abnormal powers, courtesy of some high-level security clearances. We got a little piece of software grafted on to the front end of the telecommunications switch for the service provider. Our software compares all mobile account numbers in use to our ‘wanted' list. When there's a match it grabs the identity of the radio cell antennae which is handling the call, and dumps a digital copy of the call into a file where we can decrypt it later. Most cells only have a kilometre radius in big cities, so we only know where you are to that degree. Of course if you move and your signal is handed off to another transmitter then we know more precisely where you are, the border between two cells.'

‘And you knew where Lisbeth was from her phone?'

‘Only roughly. She was somewhere in Utrecht this morning. Believe me Max, it's not as much help as you would imagine. Utrecht is a big place. This afternoon we just knew you were somewhere in central Amsterdam, south of Central Station, north of Leidseplein, we couldn't have directed someone right to you, no way.'

‘Anvil must have a phone, any ideas where he is?'

‘He has lots of phones, usually stolen and used for a week or less. We never know which number he's on. Now stop telling me how to do my job and listen. These latest killings have basically blown it for us.'

‘Lisbeth and the barman?'

‘And your friend the powerlifter, Janus Pretzik.'

‘Him too? Jesus Christ.'

‘Yeah. Used a blowtorch on his head until it exploded. Four murders in a week is more than anyone can keep under wraps. I tell you Max, the Dutch cops were already going crazy, called in their biggest political allies. There's a meeting at noon tomorrow between the Dutch prime minister, his security advisers and the Amsterdam police chief. After Lisbeth, I just know we're going to lose. At noon tomorrow Voos and company will get free rein on Anvil, and we will just disappear into the sunset.'

‘What's the problem if Voos nails him?'

‘The problem is she won't. Anvil's a professional at disappearing. He will slip away again, take his diamonds and pop up somewhere else. The Dutch cops will forget about him and it'll be back in my lap, round and round again until I'm an old man or until I'm fired.'

‘So what are you going to do?'

‘It's what
we
are going to do, Max.'

‘Count me out, Alex. If you couldn't save Lisbeth you can't save me. I'm not too stupid to see your game. Lisbeth was the best bait to lure Anvil out of hiding, but he got her and left you holding an empty hook. Now you're gonna do the same with me. If I succeed in finding Erica, you follow and get Anvil. Your dirty work gets done at arms length, if I fail I'm just a crazy loner and nothing to do with you. Disposable and deniable. Am I wrong?'

‘No, Max. You're not wrong,' Alex chuckled. ‘But I figured pretty soon we underestimated you. That's why we want you aboard. You've done well already. We're getting details of a barge bought two years ago for de Wit under the company name Xenix Environmental. We just don't know where it is yet. Maybe we could find it by noon tomorrow.'

‘If I could trust you guys to back me up, I'd go for it, just for a chance to find Erica. But I'm not sure you're on the level with me. What if I kill Anvil, okay? You would let me take the rap on my lonesome?'

‘Max, Max, Max. Of course we wouldn't. We'd back you one hundred and ten per cent.'

‘Yeah, right.'

‘Hold on.' Alex muted the phone for a minute. ‘Okay, here's the deal. I'm going to introduce you to our head of strategy, face to face and his real name. We're going way out on a limb for you here. Go to the Oude Kerk, which is an old church smack in the middle of Amsterdam's Red Light Area. He'll find you there. Wait at the tomb of Cornelis de Graeff, which is near a marble partition at the western end.'

‘What time?'

‘We're in a hurry. It's quarter of six now. I guess you can make it by quarter past. When you meet him you will trust us, of that I assure you.'

I am more and more convinced Jarman is going crazy. I can hear scraping every night. He has loosened one of the bars in the grille and uses it to scrape away at the cinderblock. He talks to himself all the time as he does it. I have told him it is pointless, that there is nowhere to run to out here, but he doesn't listen. This is a dangerous time for us. The government isn't ready to talk, and we don't seem to be worth much as hostages. If they find out Jarman is trying to escape, I fear we may both be killed.

(Erica's Diary 1992)

Penny Ryan tore open the Fedex parcel, and pulled out the thick wad of documents, copies of entries made in Pharmstar Corp's huge database of patents in Atlanta. Professor Friederikson was at her side, comparing a thick ledger of patented compounds with Pharmstar's entries.

‘What about this one?' Penny said, pointing to a slim entry. ‘It just says “extract of unripe fruit of an equatorial tree called gwuia. Supposed anti-malarial properties found in monkey tests”.'

‘Is that all the detail it gives?' Friederikson peered over her shoulder. ‘The dates match. Yes, the chemical formula is identical too. So Pharmstar does own rights to Xenix's drug.'

‘No wonder it took so long to find. Pharmstar only acquired the patent when they bought a Swiss testing company, Tetro-Meyer oHG, in 1992.'

‘And it looks like they never really investigated it,' Friederikson said.

Penny looked up. ‘Ever heard of the gwuia tree?'

‘No. But I can look it up, and where it comes from.'

‘And now I have the exact date I can cross reference it to the clinical committee. Then we can get the names of everyone who was there when it was discussed.'

Gaptooth and Rambo-Rambo discovered the damaged cinderblock in Jarman's cell this morning. I think Jarman was expecting to be beaten up, but the guards just looked at each other and nodded before leaving. I was relieved when he told me, but he said he had a bad feeling about it.

He was right.

Fifteen minutes later there was a rumbling noise outside. Something was being manhandled close to the wall. Gaptooth walked above us on the grille, threading cables under the zinc eaves. I shrank into a corner of the cell when I heard Crocodile's voice. He ignored me, but stood over Jarman's cell. What he said next I will never forget:

‘Dr Herrera, we have brought you electricity, as we promised.'

Then I heard the cough-cough of the generator starting up. I had never heard it before except in the evenings, when Crocodile ran his lights and refrigerator. Rambo-Rambo and Gaptooth dragged Jarman to an empty cell at the far end of the building. Something panicked him when he got there, and there was a scuffle. I heard Jarman pleading. He kept saying ‘please no.' He said he was sorry for the trouble he had caused, but the only reply was laughter. I had never heard him crying before. Something was absolutely terrifying him.

Then the generator revved up, and there was a buzzing noise from the cables threaded over the cells.

I have heard screams in my life before. But nothing, absolutely nothing, can come close to this. I clamped my hands over my ears, but the agony they put Jarman through played in my head like an endless tape. My nose prickled with the stench of scorched flesh and the tang of ozone. The fifteen minutes of animal howling seemed like an eternity. When they brought him back, he couldn't speak. I asked him repeatedly how he was. When he finally spoke, more than an hour later, his voice was slow and ragged: ‘I cursed my mother for having borne me into the world to endure that. Erica, whatever they ask you to do, do it. Don't risk suffering what I suffered.'

He said they had attached electrodes to his nipples and genitals and inside his mouth. I had no words. Instead I reached out my arm through the grille until I could feel his. I felt the grip, trembling, but still strong.

(Erica's Diary 1992)

The last time Max had seen the Oude Kerk was on his way to Purple Haze, and finding it again among the maze of Red Light District alleyways took a while. In windows lit by fluorescent purple or pink strip lights, bored hookers in lingerie perched on stools, an occasional smile or wink breaking through the indifference. Groups of nervous youths passed by, laughing and pointing.

The church itself was massive, half shrouded in plastic sheeting and scaffolding where workmen had been spray cleaning the outside. Max picked his way through the orange plastic barriers, piles of roof tiles and pick-up trucks to a sign which in six different languages stated the obvious: closed for renovation.

The door wasn't locked, and from inside came the whine of power tools. He walked through a small vestibule and stepped over a bunch of cables into the cavernous interior, which was arranged like a basilica. The central nave, high and airy, was laid out with chairs and lined with family stalls, like raised wooden theatre boxes, with their own gates and roofs. Parallel to the nave were two vaulted arcades the size of tennis courts, floored with worn flagstones and tombs, but otherwise empty.