Steven was used to seeing John Macmillan in fighting mode. Over the years he’d seen him take on cabinet ministers and win. He had made a prime minister back down on one occasion. His only yardstick lay in being sure he was right. The odds against him had never mattered as long as he was convinced that he was doing the right thing. But now, he was seeing a man who was coming close to exasperation with a political class that seemed to march to a very different drum, constantly avoiding action in favour of seemingly endless discussion and debate. He hid any sign of his thoughts as Macmillan looked up from his desk and asked, ‘Have you seen the armourer?’
Steven said that he had, but added, ‘There’s no reason to believe that chummy last night had anything to do with what we are interested in.’
‘Maybe not, but he was a Russian bodyguard and he was chasing you.’
‘Point taken.’
Steven left Macmillan’s office and found the missing ‘reason to believe’ as Jean handed him a file and said, ‘Here is the information you asked for on Sergei Malenkov and furthermore, we have a positive ID for the man in the photo you took last night.’
‘Who is he?’
‘Sergei Malenkov.’
Steven sank down into a chair opposite Jean’s desk. ‘Well, well, well,’ he muttered.
‘Good or bad?’ Jean asked.
‘Surprising,’ said Steven. ‘Malenkov is turning out to be a big player, the man who probably knows exactly what has been going on, the man who recruited and paid Martin Field and probably Simon Pashley too — Scott Jamieson is looking into that as we speak — but why was he calling on Dimitry Petrov?
‘He could have been offering his condolences on the death of his son,’ Jean suggested
‘A good thought,’ said Steven. ‘But, if these two know each other well, maybe Petrov knows what it’s all about too.’
‘An even better thought,’ said Jean.
Steven read through the file on Malenkov. He was enormously wealthy — even by Russian oligarch standards — something he had achieved through Russian mining interests, which were still substantial, despite several acrimonious disagreements with the current regime in Mother Russia. Steven immediately saw the parallel with Dimitry Petrov. Maybe these two were even business partners.
There was one major difference however, Malenkov had not moved to London; he still lived in Moscow where he enjoyed a lifestyle commensurate with his wealth. He was regarded as a brilliant business strategist, but someone who resented the interference of political ideology in what he saw as strictly business decisions, hence his uneasy relationship with the ruling elite. Steven thought he was ticking a lot of boxes.
Scott Jamieson called in late afternoon. Simon Pashley’s widow had allowed him to go through her husband’s things — those that hadn’t been removed by the police for their murder investigation. He had found what he was looking for in two appointment diaries. The first had been listed as lunch with Sergei Malenkov at a London restaurant some eighteen months ago — probably the first meeting between the two men as Malenkov’s name had been spelt out in full. A further meeting had been listed as lunch with S.M. at the same London restaurant around six months ago.
‘Perhaps to discuss success of Pashley’s contribution and details of how payment would be made,’ suggested Steven. ‘You did really well, did you have to tell Mrs Pashley what you were looking for?’
Jamieson said not. ‘I feigned disappointment at not finding anything and thanked her for her cooperation.’
‘Excellent, we’ll have that beer soon.’
‘Several.’
Several things had become clear. Sergei Malenkov, the brilliant businessman, was a major player if not the major player in what he was investigating. So why was he still alive when the other players had been assassinated? Steven went for the simple explanation; Malenkov was not an expatriate, he lived in Moscow not London and setting up a killing on Malenkov’s own patch, would be a much tougher proposition. It would be easier to wait until he ventured abroad.
When he did travel abroad, Malenkov made sure he was still not an easy target. Steven had experienced this for himself. The Russian moved around in a limo which could well be armoured and was accompanied by at least one bodyguard who was alert and knew what he was doing — probably ex-KGB.
Steven struggled with one question that needed answering. Why had Malenkov risked coming to London at all when everything had gone so disastrously wrong and what did he want with Petrov? Between them, they controlled a great deal of the mineral mining interests across the Russian Federation, so he supposed they could be collaborating over business... but it could be something else. Petrov had lost his son and that may have united the pair against a common enemy. The prospect of a street war between Russians and Chinese on the streets of London did not bear thinking about.
Nine
Tally worked hard over the next few weeks to establish herself in the newly created tier of area management, corelating the response of the various volunteer groups within her assigned area. She understood the need for cooperation and knew what could happen when the desire of volunteers to help in a crisis situation became a competition between well-meaning people — they would end up getting in each other’s way. Television pictures from disaster areas around the world all too often showed pictures of eight or more people attempting to carry a single stretcher as they sought to attract albeit deserved credit for their efforts. This was human nature, something that Tally knew had to be accepted and accommodated. Attempts to change human nature were always doomed to failure, but good management could prevent conflicts arising in the first place.
Rather than just tell various individuals and groups simply what she wanted them to do, she would tell them why she was making her request and explain how their efforts would fit in with what she was asking others to do. People liked being kept in the picture and responded well.
Unfortunately, creating harmony among the volunteers was not the only challenge she had to deal with. It was clear that a certain number of the indigenous population were seeking to minimise the seriousness of the situation in order to protect their continued trade and employment situations, which was not only being put under strain by fellow workers going down with the disease but also by the fact that frightened immigrant workers were seeking to flee the country.
Although difficult to quantify, the problem was thankfully not as marked as it had been in previous outbreaks because of the financing of radio and television information channels and the handing out of leaflets, but it was still there and new drawbacks were being discovered — not least that the leaflets were being printed in languages which many of the population didn’t speak. A large number of minority languages were spoken in DRC and translators were thin on the ground.
The problem of the vaccine having to be held at extremely low temperature had been addressed by organising the few freezers capable of maintaining temperatures lower than -60 degrees centigrade in a chain system across the region so that time outside the freezer was kept to a minimum as the vaccine travelled to targeted groups who had already been identified as contacts and assured by other volunteers that help was on the way to keep them safe. They would be prepared and ready when the vaccine arrived.