Carver

83

Thursday, 30 June

Parkview Hospital

The media were informed that Malachi Zorn had rested well overnight. He was not yet well enough to give a full-scale press conference. He would, however, consent to a brief one-on-one interview with an ITN reporter, on condition that the resulting material was made freely available to any news outlet that wanted it. The lucky woman who got the job was sent on her way to what she and her jealous colleagues all considered a potentially career-making encounter, with suggestions for questions ringing in her ears.

No one thought of asking Zorn, ‘How much are you being paid to do this?’ If they had, they might have caught Michael Abraham Drinkwater enough by surprise that he would have blurted out the truth: ‘One million dollars.’ He had sensed the Brits’ desperation, stuck to his guns, and insisted on receiving the second half of the money Zorn was due to pay him. In the end, Young had been forced to give in. And so Drinkwater had gone back into character again.

The interview took place in Drinkwater’s room. He spoke from his bed, sitting up, with a pile of pillows behind his back. To add to the drama of the occasion, a bandage had been wound round his head and he was wearing dark glasses to shield him from the glare of the TV lights. There were bruises, cuts and swellings on the left-hand side of his face. They had been put there by a make-up artist.

‘When the car was first attacked, it stopped very suddenly and I was thrown forward and hit my face against the seats in front,’ Drinkwater explained, as the interview began, using lines given to him in advance by Cameron Young’s top writers. ‘Guess I should have worn a seat belt, huh?’

He managed a weak, battered smile. ‘But you know, it might have saved me. I was right on the floor of the car, between the front and rear seats. So I was sheltered from the rest of the attack.’

‘Have you seen the statement released last night by the Forces of Gaia, the terrorists who claimed responsibility for the attack on you yesterday and for Tuesday’s atrocity at the Rosconway oil refinery?’

‘Uh, no… no I haven’t. But I heard about that. My doc told me about it.’

‘Do you have any message for those terrorists?’

‘Well, I guess I wish they hadn’t tried to shoot the messenger! And I hope that the police can arrest them, and that justice can take its course. But really I’m not the issue here, and nor are these terrorists. The important thing is that decent, hard-working people died on Tuesday, and they deserve to be remembered. Their sacrifice must be honoured. Their deaths must not be in vain. We need to take the whole issue of energy security much more seriously. I’ve been saying this for a long time, and it’s just terrible, to be honest, to be proved right in this way.’

The reporter put on her most soulful expression and nodded thoughtfully. ‘So how did it feel when some people suggested that you had been behind the refinery attack?’

‘Well, you know, it wasn’t easy hearing that. I lost a very dear friend in Nicholas Orwell at Rosconway. And it was a miracle that I didn’t die yesterday afternoon. You can take it from me, I didn’t order anything. I’m a trader. I make deals. I don’t kill people.’

‘Well, speaking of deals, you were planning to launch your Zorn Global fund here in London tomorrow with a gala reception in the City of London. Will that be going ahead now?’

‘Absolutely. I’m alive. I’m in one piece. And I will not give the terrorists the satisfaction of beating me. I’ll be there…’ Drinkwater leaned forward conspiratorially. ‘And I’ll tell you what, maybe I can fix you an invitation, too!’

Cameron Young was watching on a live feed to his office at 10 Downing Street. ‘Cheeky beggar!’ he said, to no one in particular. Still, there was no harm in a little humour. If they got through the next couple of days with the markets steady, Zorn Global’s investors happy, and the real Zorn satisfactorily dealt with, that million dollars would look like a positive bargain.

Malachi Zorn was watching, too. So far as he was concerned, the information that Drinkwater would be hosting the reception in his place was the best news that he could possibly have been given. He immediately contacted Razzaq.

‘The reception is going ahead as planned,’ he said.

‘I see,’ his security chief replied. ‘So can I take it that we will be proceeding exactly as we had originally planned?’

‘You certainly can,’ said Zorn. ‘We’re going to make a killing.’