Алистер Маклин: Red Alert

‘Yes, sir,’ she muttered through clenched teeth.

Philpott lit his pipe and sat back in his chair.

‘This negative side has only surfaced since you teamed up with Graham. It’s obvious that some of this contempt he holds for the law has rubbed off on to you. It might be your way of getting him to accept you as an equal, I don’t know, but it won’t do you any good if you’re transferred to another team.’

‘I resent that, sir. I’ve never tried to prove anything to Mike. If he can’t accept me for what I am, that’s his problem. Not mine.’

The intercom buzzed. Philpott flicked on the switch. ‘Yes?’

‘Mr. Kolchinsky’s here with Mike Graham, sir,’ Sarah said.

‘Send them in.’ Philpott switched the intercom off and activated the door with the transmitter on his desk.

Kolchinsky greeted Sabrina with a quick handshake then sat down and lit a cigarette.

‘Afternoon, sir,’ Graham said to Philpott, then sat on the couch beside Sabrina. ‘How you doing?’

‘Good,’ she replied with a smile. ‘And you?’

‘Okay, I guess. Where’s C.W.?’

‘Paris. Jacques is briefing him.’

‘Can we begin?’ Philpott asked, and waited until he had their attention before continuing.

‘Sergei and I had an hour-long meeting with the Secretary-General this morning about this Code Red you’ve been assigned to cover. That, in itself, should give you an idea of the severity of the situation. How often does the Secretary-General involve himself personally in a case? Sergei will brief you, he’s been monitoring the case from the start. Sergei?’

Kolchinsky stubbed out his cigarette and got to his feet.

‘Last night four terrorists from the Red Brigades broke into the Neo-Chem Industries plant outside Rome.’

‘I take it this is the same Neo-Chem Industries who own that glass and aluminium monstrosity over on West 57th Street?’ Graham asked.

‘That “glass and aluminium monstrosity”, as you call it, is their international headquarters,’ Kolchinsky told him. ‘They have fourteen plants outside the United States and are widely regarded as one of the foremost pharmaceutical manufacturers in the world.’

‘Pity about their taste in architecture.’

‘Let’s stick to the briefing, shall we?’ Philpott said, eyeing Graham sharply. ‘Go on, Sergei.’

‘One of those killed during the break-in was the plant’s senior scientific adviser, Professor David Wiseman. He’d worked for UNACO in the past as a consultant, which was why we were able to gain access to his personal files within hours of his death. A team of scientists from our Zürich HQ took a complete inventory of his stock but found only one item missing. A vial encased in a metal cylinder identical to this one I got from the Test Centre.’

Sabrina took the metal cylinder from Kolchinsky and turned it around in her fingers. ‘And nothing else was taken from any of the other laboratories?’

‘All the other laboratories were still locked when our people got there. No, the terrorists knew exactly what they wanted and where to find it.’

‘What was in the vial?’ Graham asked, taking the metal cylinder from Sabrina.

‘I’m coming to that.’ Kolchinsky lit another cigarette and dropped the match into the ashtray on Philpott’s desk. ‘According to the files Wiseman kept in his personal safe he had been working on two projects that hadn’t been sanctioned by the company. One was to procure a quantity of sleeping gas for the Rome cell of the Red Brigades.’

‘And was the Rome cell behind the break-in?’ Sabrina asked.

‘Yes,’ Kolchinsky replied. ‘The second project involved viruses. Six months ago he set out to develop a highly contagious recombinant DNA virus which could potentially kill millions of people if it were ever released into the atmosphere. He completed his work on it a fortnight ago.’

Sabrina sat forward, her arms resting on her knees. ‘And the Red Brigades took the wrong vial?’

Kolchinsky nodded grimly. ‘Both were stored in metal cylinders. The only way of telling them apart was by their different serial numbers. The vial containing the sleeping gas was found in Wiseman’s office.’

‘What about the antidote?’ Sabrina asked.

‘He was still working on it at the time of his death,’ Philpott replied.

‘But surely if all his work’s been documented then our boffins can come up with an antidote themselves?’ Graham said, handing the metal cylinder back to Kolchinsky.

‘I don’t know how much you know about recombination, Michael, but basically it needs the genes of two virus strains to conjugate for it to be successful. An antidote can only be developed if both strains of the virus are known. In this case both strains were artificially created in his laboratory. He referred to them throughout his files simply as “alpha” and “beta”. He was the only person who knew what they were.’

‘And now he’s dead,’ Sabrina muttered, rubbing her hands over her face.

‘What if the sleeping gas was just a red herring and the virus was destined for the Red Brigades all along?’ Graham said.

‘That was my theory, until this arrived on my desk.’ Philpott removed a telex from the folder in front of him. ‘It’s a transcript of a taped message the Italian government received earlier this morning. The voice has been identified as Riccardo Ubrino, one of Rome’s senior Brigatisti. He’s threatened to open the vial at ten o’clock on Thursday morning unless he sees a live telecast of Rome’s jailed brigade chief, Lino Zocchi, being put on an aeroplane bound for Cuba. What is significant, though, is that he refers to the contents of the vial as “sleeping gas”. Why continue the pretence knowing that the authorities will have already discovered the truth, unless he genuinely believes he has the sleeping gas?’

‘I don’t get it, sir,’ Sabrina said, frowning. ‘Have we been called in because the Italian government won’t comply with his demands?’

‘We’ve been called in because the Italian government can’t comply with his demands. Zocchi’s dead. He was shot by an unknown gunman an hour after the government received the tape. The authorities have instigated an immediate news blackout on Zocchi’s death. The prison itself has been isolated. The authorities have come up with a story that there’s a bout of acute conjunctivitis amongst the prisoners so that news of Zocchi’s death can’t be leaked out to visitors. But it can’t remain isolated indefinitely. The vial has to be found. Quickly.’

‘Can’t the authorities get around the table with senior Brigatisti and explain the situation to them?’ Sabrina asked.

‘They already have,’ Kolchinsky replied, resuming his seat. ‘Word is that Zocchi masterminded the break-in from his prison cell. It was done without the knowledge of the committee, so none of them know where Ubrino’s gone to ground. They have no way of contacting him. And even if they could, who’s to say Zocchi didn’t give him instructions to open the vial in the event of his death?’

‘To make matters worse, the gunman who shot Zocchi was in a police helicopter, or what looked remarkably like one,’ Philpott added. ‘Put yourself in Ubrino’s shoes. An hour after the government receives his demands, Zocchi is killed by a gunman in a police helicopter. Coincidence?’

‘It’s obviously a set-up, sir,’ Sabrina said.

‘Try explaining that to the Red Brigades,’ Philpott replied.

‘But why us, sir?’ Graham asked. ‘Why haul us back from leave when you could have brought in one of the other Strike Force teams?’

Philpott removed a second telex from the folder. ‘This also arrived this morning. It concerns Wiseman’s brother. You might remember him. Richard Wiseman. I believe he was one of the more colourful officers in Vietnam.’