Bright Air - Barry Maitland [97]
I got to his front door soon after eight. He buzzed me in and met me on the landing of the twenty-eighth floor as before, and took me into his flat.
‘Drink? Scotch?’
‘Thanks.’ I watched him as he fixed them, thinking how amazingly well he’d done in such a short time. Surely he couldn’t have been in practice much more than a year? Two at the most. Already I thought he was beginning to cultivate those little quirks that some lawyers like to affect—a flamboyant curl to the hair, a mild extravagance of dress—to make them distinctive, even a little eccentric. He had great survival qualities, I thought; ambitious, focused, intelligent and charming.
‘Here.’ He handed me the tumbler and sat down opposite me. ‘Cheers.’
‘Cheers.’
‘So … your trip.’
‘Has Bob Kelso spoken to you?’
‘Indeed. He told me about your little adventure. Pretty impressive, actually. He said you got to the top of Balls Pyramid. Amazing. You must be in better shape than I thought. Anna too.’ He grinned. ‘Bob phoned me as soon as he’d put you on the plane back. The poor bloke was worried. It wasn’t his fault. He just got caught up in something he wished he hadn’t.’
I didn’t say anything, watching his face, his body language.
‘He said you found a note.’
‘That’s right.’
‘Can I see it?’
‘I haven’t got it here.’
‘Well, what did it say?’
‘I’d rather hear your side of the story, Damien.’
He looked rather pained. ‘You don’t have to be like that, Josh. From what Bob said you’d pretty much worked it out anyway.’
‘Go on.’
‘About the eggs, right? It was true. Marcus had been collecting eggs for sale to dealers for some time apparently.’ He saw the look on my face. ‘I know! It sounds incredible, Marcus of all people. The thing was that, brilliant scientist as he no doubt was, he was pretty hopeless at getting research money. He was arrogant, he thought the review process demeaning, and he’d managed to offend or personally insult just about every one of his peers at one time or another. As a result he wasn’t very successful with his grant applications. So he decided to supplement his research money by selling eggs. The way he put it to us, his birds were helping him save their necks by making a small contribution. He insisted the numbers were small, and made no difference to the breeding populations.’
‘When did he explain this to you?’
‘After we agreed to be part of his team. As he described it, it didn’t seem like such a big deal. Marcus was the expert, and if he said it was okay, well, we thought it must be all right. It was a matter of loyalty as much as anything else.’
‘Yes.’ That did sound right. They were all very loyal to Marcus, their hip priest.
‘Are you telling me that Luce was in on this?’
‘No. I doubt whether she would have agreed to it, but Marcus never took the chance. He thought she was very special, you know. Full of the ideals that had driven him, and she trusted him implicitly. And that was the problem. She had no idea. Marcus asked me to be her climbing partner and help her do the scientific stuff and keep her out of harm’s way, while the other two did the collecting. We thought it was all a bit of a lark.’
I felt that old nauseous reflux of jealousy. He had to stay close to her, distract her, amuse her.
‘Why didn’t Marcus just leave her out of the team?’
‘He couldn’t. She was mad keen to go, she was the brightest student, the best climber. He just couldn’t.’
‘But she found out what was going on?’
‘I think she began to get a hint of something almost as soon as they arrived on the island. It’s hard to keep secrets when you’re all living together—a whisper, a nudge, a conversation that stops suddenly when you walk into the room. But she couldn’t be sure, not until the yachts arrived. Marcus wasn’t a very good actor. He got pretty anxious as the time got closer. There were some heated phone calls. The dealer was putting pressure on him. Marcus began to get very agitated during the party at the Kelsos