Brian Freemantle: Dead End

In such an internationally established, acclaimed and aggressive pharmaceutical conglomerate, there were obviously laboratories in every overseas division of Dubette Inc., but each was effectively a subsidiary of the North Virginia headquarters at McLean’s Priority Park, just off the 495 Beltway. That laboratory was designed to a rigid structure that provided the name by which it was universally referred to: never Research and Development but always the Spider’s Web, which was apposite. The office of the fittingly spindle-limbed, bespectacled vice president, Dwight Newton, was at the very centre of a concentric series of specialized research departments and divisions. Included here, because their cure or prevention was the Holy Grail of commercial medical research, were a variety of cancers, AIDS and its human immunodeficiency virus precursor, HIV, both A and B strains of hepatitis, the common cold and a variety of frequently mutating fatal influenza viruses. The final, outer circle was devoted to what was, with surprising unprofessionalism, suspiciously regarded as the new and unproven science of genetics and its engineering for medical benefit.

It was here that Richard Parnell had been allocated his laboratories.

Parnell liked America. He liked its can-do ethos and same-day deliveries of whatever he’d wanted to furnish the new, easily arranged apartment rented on the first day, and day-one car purchase – and most of all he liked the more than trebled salary that made everything affordable. And still left him with more money than he’d earned – apart, of course, from the international recognition that had resulted in his being headhunted from Cambridge – as a leading participant in Britain’s considerable contribution to the global genome project codifying human DNA.

It was a reputation Parnell was determined to increase, which made his relegation to the outer circle an absurd and irritating dismissal he was about to rectify.

Like the spider’s web after which it was nicknamed, the expanding circles were each linked by connected, threading corridors, all glassed and therefore all visible to everyone along his route to the vice president’s inner sanctum. As he walked the gauntlet, Parnell was aware of the attention and recognition of people on either side, and recognized the point to the pretentious, outer-space laboratory design. No one could approach the spider-like man without being seen, to initiate the paranoia. Is he being promoted over me? Have I made a dismissable mistake? Am I being reprimanded? Am I going to be fired?

It was a good feeling, not to be afraid: to be sure enough of himself and his international reputation to do what he was about to do.

Professor Dwight Newton was thin to the point of being emaciated, a cadaverous face dominated – almost overwhelmed – by overly heavy, black-framed spectacles, stick-thin arms protruding from the sleeves of a white laboratory coat. Forewarned by his outside secretariat, Newton was standing, a tall man although still shorter than the broad-shouldered, athletically bodied Parnell.

‘Good to see you again, Dick! Good to see you! Sorry it hasn’t been sooner. Must say, though, I don’t understand your memo…’ There was a helpless sweeping gesture towards the empire beyond. ‘So much to keep a handle on… never a moment…’

‘It’s a big operation,’ acknowledged Parnell.

‘The biggest, worldwide,’ said Newton. ‘And you’re part of it now.’

Parnell said: ‘That’s what I very much want to be, part of it. But a proper part.’

Newton’s affability went out like a switched-off light. He picked up and let drop Parnell’s meeting request and said: ‘So what’s all this about keeping all your equipment on hold and not advertising for staff?’

‘I’ve nowhere to put equipment. Or staff,’ declared Parnell.

Newton gave an uncertain laugh. ‘You’ve got your own internal laboratories! What… two separate working spaces, offices, secretarial space? Everything you could want…?’

‘In the wrong place. I’ve been appointed Dubette’s professor of pharmacogenomics, applying what I did in England to drug development here. To do that, I need to be alongside the laboratories and the people developing those drugs. Not isolated as I have been.’

Newton frowned. ‘Everything radiates out from what has to be the most tightly and securely controlled working area.’

‘I didn’t accept the offer here in order to be a totem, just a recognizable name on a staff list,’ said Parnell. ‘If I’m going to make any contribution to Dubette’s research and development, I need to be at the centre of things. If I’m not, it makes quite pointless my being here, as part of the Dubette empire.’

Pinpricks of anger began colouring Newton’s face. ‘I don’t believe Archimedes’ principle came to him when he overflowed the bath water. Research here is programmed, according to a strict schedule of antibiotic exploration. Which is the business we’re in.’

‘I don’t believe the Archimedes legend either. Nor see how it’s supposed to fit what we’re talking about,’ rejected Parnell. ‘It’s now been recognized that the majority of what pharmaceutical industries produce does nothing to alleviate, help or – by the very worst analysis – save the lives of people they’re supposed to help with the drugs they’re offering. If I can create the proper research team, working in proper, liaising research with medical expertise, Dubette could revolutionize diagnostic approach. It’s an approach already being tried in Europe, and one upon which I’m well advanced, from my work on the genome project.’ Parnell, resigned to the thought that his job was over before it had begun, supposed he could always stay in Washington for an extended holiday, to minimize the loss on the apartment lease, and whatever else was non-refundable, before moving on. He was probably still within his relocation budget in any case.

There was another edge of uncertainty in Newton’s laugh. ‘You’re talking as if you can walk away if you don’t like the housing arrangements.’

‘That’s exactly how I’m talking.’ Parnell was glad he hadn’t advertised vacancies in his new department and given people false hopes.

‘You forgotten you’ve got a legally enforceable contract, studied and agreed not just by Dubette’s lawyers but your independent attorney as well?’

‘It very specifically sets out in that contract that I shall have every research facility I might need. Which I don’t have. I don’t intend any ridiculous breach-of-contract litigation against Dubette. I’ll just resign and we’ll both put it down to experience.’

‘ You don’t intend any litigation!’ exploded the research director, incredulous. ‘You think this organization lets people walk away just because they don’t have a desk by the window!’

‘I’m not complaining about not having a desk by the window,’ retorted Parnell. ‘I’m saying I do not have my contracted working conditions and facilities. Now tell me what you’re saying. Are you telling me that if I resign, Dubette will take me to court?’

‘You’re damned right I am.’

‘OK,’ said Parnell, rising. ‘I’ll see the lawyer who negotiated for me, and get my resignation letter in to you in the next day or two.’

‘Sit down,’ ordered Newton, sharply. ‘You’ve scarcely been here long enough to find the washroom. Let’s not get off to a wrong start, the two of us. You want a change of location, I’ll see what I can do. But if we’re going to work together, there’s something you’ve got to understand very clearly… I don’t like – won’t have – confrontations.’