First Horseman, The (7 page)

Yet here again things got complicated.

As he could read the markets like no other, he was rich beyond his wildest dreams but he had been caught in a position where he could no longer participate in the activity that had made him. Not only had he more money than he wanted or needed, his reputation and the scale of the trading he needed to do to make it worthwhile were so huge that any dealing he did pushed the market out of equilibrium. Like a teenager trying to ride his old toddler tricycle, he risked breaking his cherished toy. Yet he kept up with the charts and read the financial news, as an inveterate gambler avidly scans the racing pages.

There was a tap at the window and Jim looked up. ‘Get in,’ he said, waving to Kate and putting the phone on the floor by the base of his seat.

Kate opened the door and slipped into the little capsule. ‘This is very cosy,’ she said.

‘Where to?’

She gazed at the sleek chrome and leather of the cockpit. It was bling, but kind of exciting too. The philanthropist with the black eye must be some kind of Flash Harry venture capitalist. He’d be full of himself and pretty obnoxious, she was sure. She smiled at Jim. ‘McDonald’s.’

Jim almost let out a sigh of relief. ‘Great idea,’ he said. ‘Show me the way.’

She put a book she was carrying on her lap and buckled herself in. ‘It’s just at the bottom of the hill.’

‘The hill?’

‘Go left.’

He caught sight of his face in the rear-view mirror as he pulled out of the parking space. His eye was no longer black and swollen, the bruised area was red and ringed in yellow and green. He wondered what the hell was going on inside his face.

There was only so long Jim could make a Big Mac last. Time flew, and soon enough he was pulling up outside her digs to drop her off. She lived in a tall Edwardian house, which, Jim noted, had been broken up into several student flats.

‘I really enjoyed lunch,’ he said, smiling.

‘Me too,’ she said.

He reached across her – she didn’t recoil – to open the glove compartment and take out a plastic box of calling cards. He prised it open. ‘I’d like to see you again,’ he said, handing her two cards. ‘Can I get your phone number?’

‘Of course,’ she said. She reached into her bag, rummaged around in it and finally took out a bright green plastic pen. She wrote on the back of one of the cards and gave it to him.

He jammed it awkwardly into his trouser pocket. Their eyes caught. There was a frozen moment as if God had pressed the pause button. Kate looked amazing, he thought, with her long shiny reddish hair, her large, kind, friendly eyes and curved pink lips, which glistened invitingly. He held himself in check. If only there wasn’t someone else. Kate’s body, lithe and sexy, tilted towards him in her seat. He felt as if Jane was standing outside at the passenger window, watching him.

He sank back in his seat. ‘I’ll call you,’ he said. She must have someone too, he thought. A girl like her would have any number of smart university guys chasing after her – she’d have a boyfriend for sure. She’d think him a pushy prat if he hit on to her too quickly.

Kate popped her seatbelt and opened the door. ‘Please do,’ she said, and batted her eyelids at him. How many supermodel girlfriends did he have? she wondered. The chances of hearing from him again were one in a million. A pity, she thought. Jim was a really cool guy. ‘’Bye,’ she said, and closed the door.

Jim watched her walk away, then turned his attention to driving and pulled out. When he called her he’d get her voicemail, and in a way he would be relieved and happy. He still hoped his phone would ring and that the caller would be Jane. He still wished his email would play a fanfare and it would be some terse cryptic message that meant she was back in his life. He’d almost given up hope. Soon he was going to have to admit it was over between them. He was either going to have to write Jane off for good and move on, or find out where the hell she’d got to so he could try crawling back to her. Both paths seemed like an awful punishment, but moving on seemed worse.

They had split on good terms, almost like professionals going their own way at the end of a project. Neither owed the other on aggregate after the danger they had endured. They had saved one another’s skins. She’d seemed to think that splitting up was the sensible thing to do and he’d understood the logic. They knew they were oddballs and it had seemed clear that neither of them could fit into the other’s world.

Yet without her there was still a giant emptiness in his heart, an injury to his brain that could not repair itself. He hungered for her.

There was a flash and he glanced at the speedometer: he was doing seventy in a thirty m.p.h. zone. He groaned. Pretty soon Stafford was going to have to replace the shot-up Maybach limo with one that didn’t look like it had been the subject of a car-bomb attack, because at this rate Jim would end up as a passenger with a driving ban hanging around his neck. Then Stafford, or a newly hired chauffeur, would have to drive him around.

Kate had been about to send Jim a flirtatious SMS but thought better of it. Instead she Googled him. ‘Billionaire Jim Evans, Britain’s Most Eligible Bachelor Under Thirty,’ said the headline. She clicked on the images and there he was, in a blurred long-distance shot. She couldn’t make out his face but she could tell it was him. ‘Oh dear,’ she said aloud, putting the phone down. Texting no longer seemed such a good idea. She saw him in her mind’s eye. Was he cute or was it just the money? No, he was extremely cute, even with a flaming red eye – which somehow enhanced his appeal with a touch of dash. How had he really got it? ‘Training’? Training for what, exactly? She picked up the phone and reread the message she’d been about to send him: ‘Nice to meet you. I enjoyed lunch.’

Silly. She deleted it, turned the phone upside-down and put it on the table.

She read two other articles about Jim. He was starting to seem a bit sinister. ‘No one knows exactly where his fortune comes from,’ said an article. That was a good reason not to contact him … but the slightly dangerous angle was enticing. She closed the browser. If he liked her, he would call. They all did. Then she would decide whether or not to respond. She turned the phone over and looked at the screen. No, he wouldn’t. Who was she kidding?

It gave him a satisfying thrill to draw up outside his Jacobean mansion in the Veyron. The ancient house oozed mystery, its ornate façade stern yet welcoming. This house and his place in London’s Docklands were his anchors. How many dramas had gone on during those buildings’ long histories? How many adventures and tragedies had washed past as the tide of history had ebbed and flowed? Was his story any more outlandish than the lost histories of the rich men who had owned this mansion over the four centuries before he had bought it?

He got out, hearing the crows calling from the trees beyond the rose gardens as the wind blew light clouds across a blue sky. He surveyed the scene. This was all his. He had to start enjoying his luck a bit more, he thought. He had to start wanting the things he had but, compared to the abstraction of the markets, physical things left him cold.

Stafford was standing in the doorway. Jim wished he wouldn’t do that.

‘Welcome back, Jim.’

‘Hi, Stafford,’ he said, bounding up the steps.

‘Would you like tea, sir?’

‘No, thanks,’ said Jim, heading for the cloakroom and a toilet break. He pushed open the door, glimpsing himself in the large mirror over the basin. He stopped in his tracks. ‘Bloody hell!’ He leant close to the mirror. His eye was completely healed. Gone was the bloody red circle that had replaced the swollen black bruise and the skin didn’t even show the jaundiced tint of earlier. It was as if he had never had a black eye. He touched the skin, which was smooth – smoother than it was on the undamaged side. He bent closer. There wasn’t a mark where there had been a swollen mess just hours before.

‘Amazing,’ he muttered. He must call the professor and find out more. But first things first.

Cardini looked disappointed. ‘So, Bob, do you think the mosquito bit the subject or not?’

‘It’s hard to tell. Maybe it did, maybe not.’ Renton grimaced, bobbing up and down on the balls of his feet. ‘It landed, but that doesn’t mean it fed.’

‘In your opinion?’

‘It’s hard to have one.’

‘If you did, what would it be?’

Renton screwed up his face, his black beard jutting out.

The phone rang.

Cardini stared at it disapprovingly.

‘Shall I get it?’ suggested Renton.

Cardini thought for a moment. ‘No.’ He picked up the receiver. ‘Cardini,’ he said sharply, as if he was engaged in something vital.

‘It’s Jim Evans,’ said a young voice.

‘Jim,’ boomed Cardini, as if he was welcoming a long-lost friend, ‘good of you to call.’

‘That stuff you put on my face is amazing.’

‘Yes.’

‘I mean really amazing.’

‘Yes.’

‘My black eye’s completely better.’

‘Yes.’

‘That’s impossible, right?’

‘Apparently not.’

‘Can you tell me more about it?’

‘I could,’ said Cardini, smiling to himself.

‘Can it do more than just heal bruises?’

‘Yes, very much more.’

‘Like what?’

‘Jim, I’m not particularly happy to discuss my research over the phone.’

‘Right,’ said Jim. ‘I was wondering maybe if I could fund this line of research. I mean, it’s not like the other stuff you’re doing.’

‘You mean the animals?’

‘Yes.’

‘No,’ said Cardini. ‘I am my own guinea pig.’

‘Right,’ said Jim, sounding surprised.

‘I hope that’s sufficiently humane for you.’

‘You can’t say fairer than that,’ said Jim, who was pulling Cardini up on Wikipedia. ‘Can I—’ He coughed violently. He had caught sight of Cardini’s birthdate. The man was nearly eighty, not fifty. ‘Can I—’ More coughing.

‘Are you all right?’

Jim took a deep breath. ‘Can I come up and talk it over with you, then?’

‘Tomorrow morning,’ said Cardini. ‘I have to go to America, so my time is very short.’

‘No problem. Nine o’clock?’

‘Yes indeed.’

‘See you then.’

‘Good day.’ Cardini hung up and looked at Renton. ‘We must speed up our work,’ he said. ‘Bring the girl in and test her for the infection. If she isn’t infected, infect her. Examine the development, then terminate the test. Do it once I have left for America and make sure there is no trace by my return.’

‘Yes, Professor.’

‘Do your utmost, Bob. The first horseman’s entrance must soon be upon us.’

Kate stared at the message she had typed on her phone. She was filled with paralysing indecision: her mind was unable to command her hand to press the button. ‘Enjoyed lunch,’ seemed almost sendable but she had typed several versions and they’d all looked awful. What was wrong with her?

Her phone buzzed. She flipped to the message and almost dropped the phone. It was from Jim. ‘I’m back up in Cambridge tomorrow. Fancy another burger?’

‘Pizza?’

‘Sure. I’ll call when out of meeting.’

‘gr8.’ She regretted that one the moment she pressed send.

Jim looked at the message: ‘gr8’. She liked him. He smiled.

He opened his trading screen. The dollar was going up and the euro was going down. He jumped on the dollar and joined the ride.

‘Happy days,’ he said, as Stafford came in with a mug of tea.

‘Very good, sir.’

Jim shook Cardini’s hand and sat down in front of the professor’s desk. It was worn at the front where so many people had sat before, leaning themselves or their papers on its edge. The varnish had worn off to show the light-coloured wood below.

Cardini pushed a document towards him. ‘You will need to sign this, Jim,’ he said.

Jim picked it up. ‘Confidentiality Agreement,’ said the cover page. The date was written on it in flowing script. ‘OK,’ he said. ‘Let me give it a read.’ He turned back to the first page. It was typical legal bullshit, he thought, but if he talked in his sleep about what the professor was doing he’d be sued. He flicked through the pages to make sure there was nothing wildly odd in any of the paragraphs, then turned to the signature page. ‘Got something to write with?’

‘Of course.’ Cardini produced a black fountain pen with a large red crystal set in the top. He unscrewed it and pushed the cap on to the rear of the barrel, then offered it to Jim, who took it.

‘Don’t think I’ve ever used one of these before,’ said Jim. ‘Writing with a biro is crazy enough.’ He scratched his signature, which looked horribly childish. He liked the way the shiny wet ink dried into the paper. ‘There you go,’ he said, handing it back.

Cardini took the document. ‘I will send you a copy.’

‘So, what the hell is that stuff you put on my eye?’

Cardini was smiling. ‘Telomere eukaryotic retranscriptase.’

Jim nodded. ‘You said that before and I tried looking it up but I couldn’t find anything.’

‘You won’t find anything. I tend to call it TRT for short.’

‘I saw some stuff about telomeres, but it didn’t help me understand what made my face heal so quickly.’

‘As you may have picked up,’ Cardini began, ‘telomeres are areas of the chromosome that terminate them. Telomeres are a part of our DNA that protects our genetic fingerprint from corruption.’ He nodded, his expression suggesting he was reconsidering the subject and finding it very much to his satisfaction.

‘When your DNA replicates it comes unzipped, if you will.’ He made a motion with his hand as though something was being torn apart. ‘It then re-forms, pulling the other half of the genetic puzzle back together from the surrounding chemicals afloat in the cell. The telomeres enable this zipping and unzipping to take place without destroying the viable DNA at both ends. Without the telomere the DNA division process would cause catastrophic corruption in the chromosome. Without telomeres, as we understand them, the outcome of a cell dividing would be unsustainable.’

Jim was listening intently.

‘Without telomeres, cancerous mutations would soon destroy an organism. Your cells simply would not survive the many divisions required for your body to grow and survive. Without telomeres, life would remain primitive. Telomeres are crucial for complex organisms. Sadly, this protecting DNA terminating code wears away with each cycle, shortening with every round of regeneration. The telomeres are an inert buffer, which is eroded by each tick of our genetic clock.’ Cardini arched an eyebrow and looked grave.