Читать книгу Sweet Talking Money - Harry Bingham - Страница 32

‘I heard him,’ said Cameron patiently. ‘He was talking about exit. He was talking about selling the company.’

‘Yes, it’s how venture capital works. Milne has to sell out to repay his investors.’

‘How long before he sells?’

‘Five years, maybe seven, maybe one. It’s his call.’

‘Who’ll control the company? You, or Milne and his cronies?’

‘The Board controls the company. The shareholders appoint the Board.’

‘That’s a bullshit answer.’

‘OK. It depends how much of the business I sell. Since all we’ve got at this stage is an idea, I’ll probably have to sell seventy or eighty per cent to raise enough money. But even if I could persuade Milne to take just forty-nine per cent, he’d still require a say in all major decisions.’

‘So Milne either controls the company or he has a veto?’

‘It’s not in his interest to screw things up.’

‘His interest, huh?’ There was another, longer pause. Cameron found a rubber band on the bench beside her and pinged it out into the dark, out on to the sleeping river. ‘And when his time’s up, who does Milne sell us to?’

Bryn spread his hands at an impossible question. ‘Maybe he floats us on the stockmarket. Maybe he sells us to a company in a related business, maybe … Well, anyone, whoever offers most.’

‘Such as a drugs company scared by our technology?’

‘Cameron, he can sell us to anyone he wants. He needs to make a profit. It’s the rules of the game.’

‘The rules of the game say he can sell us to Corinth?’

Bryn shook his head. ‘Yes, that’s possible, but really –’

‘Really what? Back in Boston, you said that – what’s-his-face – Hosanna –’

‘Huizinga.’

‘– saw this as a him or us situation, a game worth one hundred billion dollars to him. Why wouldn’t he buy us? Buy us, then drop the technology? That’s a crazy risk to take.’

‘It’s a risk you won’t be able to take, without funding.’

Cameron stared out into the black night. Across the water, streetlights shone orange through a screen of winter trees while upriver, moored in a line below Hammersmith Bridge, a group of houseboats stirred slowly in the breeze, red lamps warning where their sterns jutted out into the current. Her breath misted the window.

Bryn let her think. There was no option except to take Milne’s money, none at all. She was a smart woman and she would see that, she’d have to. When she turned on her heel to answer him, he was ready for anything except what she actually said.

‘Then we have a problem, because I am not going to put my ideas into hands that I don’t trust.’

‘Milne’s OK. Don’t worry about Milne.’

‘I don’t care if he’s Mother Teresa, he’ll still sell to the highest bidder. He has to. You just told me he does.’

‘Cameron.’ Bryn’s voice was hard-edged again, hard and desperate. ‘You need to be realistic.’

‘True.’

‘You’re killing this company. This is the only way.’

She brought her face to within a few inches of his. Close up, you no longer noticed its pallor, the brusque way in which its owner treated it, all you saw were its commanding grey eyes, ablaze with intensity and passion.

‘Listen, I have a chance to develop a technology which will save lives. Potentially hundreds of thousands of lives, millions, even. The Schoolroom doesn’t have to be expensive. Peptides don’t have to be expensive. This is a medicine which can wipe out some of the nastiest diseases in not just the rich countries, but the poor ones, too.

‘You’re asking me to take a chance on Milne. Fine. If it was just me, just my career, just this company, I’d be happy to bet everything on him. But the patients? The AIDS sufferers, the hepatitis victims, all those grannies who die just because their poor old immune systems can’t cope with a simple flu bug?’ She shook her head. ‘I can’t do it, Bryn. I won’t.’

Bryn pursed his lips. He felt small for thinking the thought, but it bothered him when he heard Cameron talking about selling their technology cheaply. Not that he wanted to rip people off – not that he wanted the Third World to suffer – just … Well, after all, he was a businessman and this was his business.

He sighed. ‘I know, Cameron. I understand, believe me. But we have to face facts. We need the money.’

Cameron dropped her eyes and picked up the offer letter from Milne which had prompted the whole conversation. Tearing it into shreds and leaning far out of the window, she threw it into the river, where the white fragments began to float away, caught by the silent midnight ripples.

‘I agree,’ she said, ‘we need the money. But not from Milne. Not now. Not ever.’