Читать книгу The Fund - Jeff Edwards - Страница 9

As soon as Mick Sloane logged on, he checked his computer for incoming emails and then returned to the current story he had been working on. The information from America that he had been waiting for had yet to arrive.

That news had nothing to do with the story before him, which was a fill-in piece on the antics of one of the local bad boys and his flashy girlfriend, but more importantly, could be the vital break he was seeking on his ‘special project’.

Ever since he first announced to the world that Jade Green was alive and still living among them, with her former colourful life and powerful secrets intact, he had devoted his spare time to finding out more about her.

In the years since his divorce he had lived alone in his dreary single bedroom flat. His life had become a continuing round of court reporting, and pubs, with the occasional visit from his only daughter Pamela. The only other bright spot in his life was an occasional appearance on a local radio station where his Irish brogue seduced many a lady listener with lurid tales from his courthouse rounds.

Pamela lived with his ex-wife and he had worked hard to make sure she had attended the best private school available and that her education had been rounded out by lessons in music and dancing.

However, it was with the re-emergence of Jade Green that Sloane’s life had taken on a new focus. There was a story here. Not just a few columns in a newspaper or an article in a news magazine. This was the stuff of a book and a bestseller at that. This was the answer to his current dreary existence. This was the project that would raise him above the level of the newspaper hack. For years he had concentrated on the news stories of the day, submerging his desire to write real literature in order that Pamela did not go without. Now here was the tale that he hoped would bring him fame as well as money.

Jade Green’s sudden death, far from ruining his plans, had added an entirely new dimension to his work. The mysterious circumstance of her demise was another aspect that added intrigue to the plot that had enthralled him.

She had been a very elderly lady and so it had not come as a complete surprise that she would die suddenly. However, the fact that Sloane had been totally unable to get any information as to where, and from what causes she died, had made his reporting instincts go into overdrive. There was a story here and Sloane was determined to find out what it was.

A few other reporters had also been intrigued by the Jade Green story, especially after she killed her former partner Walter Groom in self-defence. Then more questions had arisen when her house had been burned down in mysterious circumstances, followed soon after by some sort of military operation at the site during which her neighbour’s house had also been badly damaged.

These incidents had been followed closely by Jade Green’s death. Much too closely for Mick’s liking and Sloane was still trying desperately to find out why. However, all normal channels of information had been blocked by a wall of secrecy that was absolute. Sloane had no doubt it had been set in place by the government and from a high level of government at that. It had been enough to frustrate the other reporters who had not given up but simply put aside the story for the time being. Sloane had no doubt that they would return to the saga of Jade Green just as soon as they were able to find a way to pierce the wall of secrecy.

His own attempts to undertake what would under any other circumstances be normal inquiries had met with polite refusal. Not that they were unwilling to help Sloane. It was just that they, themselves, were unable to access the information he sought, even though they should have been able to do so.

All of which made Sloane more and more determined to unravel the mystery that was Jade Green.

If the direct route to the information is not available then I’ll just have to go by more devious ways, Sloane thought to himself as he set down to record what little information he had and to work out a plan for obtaining more. ‘Just one small lead is all I need. As soon as the right piece of information falls into place then the rest of the puzzle will solve itself.’

Finally, when the reply to his email did arrive, Sloane was disappointed. Yet again the information he sought was not going to be forthcoming. It was yet another dead end. Still, he had not expected that the information would just fall into his lap. It looked as though he was going to travel back in time. He needed to delve into the very early life of Jade Green and understand where she sprang from and hopefully that would lead him to where the vital clue was hidden.

* * *

That evening Sloane settled himself in his flat’s single battered lounge chair with a glass of whiskey at his side and he began to work his way through the information before him.

He recalled the number of times that he had tried to interview Jade Green. The very first time had been many years ago as a young reporter while she was still serving her prison sentence. He had called several times and been told that she refused to speak to anyone except her closest of friends and the prison authorities had ensured that her wishes had been complied with, no matter how many times he tried.

The next time was after a gap of many years when he had caught sight of her outside the court where her friend Toby Brown’s case was being heard, but she had ignored him and refused to answer whatever questions he had thrown at her.

He had followed after the woman and discovered that she resided in Walton Village. Sloane had then rung her at home to try to arrange an interview but had been very politely denied his request.

Then the matter of her slaying of Walter Groom arose and he had been among the pack of media clamouring for a word from her, but once again Jade Green had maintained a dignified silence, just as she had throughout her life. Sloane had not been able to find a single occasion when the woman had volunteered to speak publicly.

After the media frenzy died down, Sloane had returned to Walton Village where he managed to find her alone, working in Toby Brown’s gallery. He hadn’t attempted to harass the woman as he knew that the redoubtable Jade Green was not a person to be browbeaten. He had simply shown her his press credentials and asked to speak to her.

The old woman had studied Sloane over the top of her reading glasses and smiled.

‘You really are a most persistent man, Mr Sloane,’ she said kindly. ‘However, I have not in the past, I will not now, nor will I in the future agree to make my life the stuff of public scrutiny.’

Sloane had grinned. ‘I must disagree with you on that score, Mrs Green. Your very actions, such as owning the most famous bordello in the city, your most public trial and imprisonment and finally the unfortunate incident resulting in the death of Walter Groom, have all been the stuff of public scrutiny. It can only to be to your benefit to make the world aware of your side of the story in those matters.’

‘I disagree entirely, Mr Sloane. I have no wish to put my side, or any other side, forward. Much to my regret the matters occurred and I now wish to fade away. I choose to live my life in peace and quiet, just as I have done for years.’

‘And if I were to write a story about you anyway?’

‘I have had many stories written about me, Mr Sloane. Most have painted me in a bad light. I am an old lady and now quite immune to them. Yet another attempt to blacken my name will not get me to break my silence. So, Mr Sloane, go ahead and do your worst, but be assured, if you make the slightest error I will have my good friend Brian Reynolds and his firm of lawyers upstairs, sue both you and your publishers.’

‘Are you sure that you won’t change your mind and set the record straight?’

‘Goodbye, Mr Sloane!’ she pronounced with great finality.

Following the arson attack on her home, Sloane had again attempted to contact her, but so had numerous other reporters and all had been repulsed.

Suddenly she was dead.

The media frenzy at her funeral had been as much because of her former notoriety as from the mystery surrounding her death. Again, there were hundreds of question to be asked, but not one answer was forthcoming.

Now, even her closest friends were refusing to co-operate.

Not one of the people that she had been close to would speak to the press. Not even the inducement of money would sway them from their silence.

The next morning, Sloane finished his latest article for the paper and dropped it into his sub-editor who accepted it for filing. It would probably appear in the next few days. The article itself was not breaking news, so it would appear whenever there was sufficient spare space to match the size of his work. Sloane didn’t care. It was a very ordinary piece of work, even by his standards, and he was glad to see the end of it.

On the way back to his workstation, Sloane dropped by the news desk to see what was happening in the world, searching for a new story that needed his particular spin. As he quickly scanned through the items that would appear in the next edition his eyes were drawn to a name, Toby Brown, and then another, Grant & Associates.

Studying the article more closely, Sloane read that a fire the previous evening in the township of Walton Village had completely destroyed the recently renovated factory that had contained the workshop and gallery of the up-and-coming sculptor Toby Brown as well as the first floor offices of the legal firm Grant & Associates.

Sloane knew that this was the same Toby Brown that Jade Green had been with when she first reappeared in public. He had found out that Brown had even been living with her at the time her house was destroyed by fire, and now there had been another fire, this time not only destroying the place where Toby Brown worked but also the offices of Grant & Associates as well. That was the office of Brian Reynolds, Jade Green’s next-door neighbour whose home had suffered extensive damage under still more mysterious circumstances and who was also a close friend of Jade Green.

Sloane had a circumspect nature and did not subscribe easily to conspiracy theories, but this was all just too much!

Printing out the news item regarding the fire, Sloane strode into the chief editor’s office and spent the next half hour convincing the man to give him free rein on following up the story.

Unfortunately, the editor had just recently come from a budget meeting and was not in a position to give Sloane the sort of leeway he sought. ‘We can’t give you any more than a couple of weeks to work on this. If you can’t turn up enough in that time to make a decent story out of it then we’ll have to pull the plug and move on to other things.’

Disappointed, Sloane accepted the restrictions and made his way home to where his files on Jade Green were scattered throughout his cramped flat.

Settled once more on his battered lounge, Sloane reviewed his notes.

At one time he thought that her death would be the end of his story, but now it seemed the mystery continued through her friends.

Or had they been involved all along?

After much searching, Sloane had obtained a probated copy of the will of a Janice Patricia Symes (nee Green). He was totally stunned at the vast amount of money that she had bequeathed and made a note to contact each of the recipient organisations to see if they could shed any light upon the life of their benefactor.

However, the details of the main part of the bequest were missing and no amount of searching on behalf of court staff had been successful in locating those details. All that remained were the names of those receiving her legacy.

With no known relatives, four of the names came as no surprise to Sloane. They were Toby Brown and his wife Suzie as well as her former next-door neighbours Brian and Lana Reynolds.

However, it was the third couple, Ali and Nori Akuba, that shocked him. What was the connection between Jade Green of Walton Village and a married refugee couple from Nigeria who operated a taxi business in the city?

The more Sloane searched the more questions that remained unanswered.

He took a swig of the whiskey and contemplated his next move.

Sloane realised that he needed to find more information on the six people who inherited Green’s fortune. Who were they really and why did Green select them? What would they do with the money? So far as he could tell none of them had shown any sign of lavish spending. Why not? ‘If I inherited millions the first thing I would be doing would be to spend a bit of it on myself, and Pamela.’

Sloane decided that he would begin by talking to Toby Brown and his wife and arose early the following morning to drive out to Walton Village, hoping to catch the couple at home before they both left for work.

As he entered the street where they lived, he saw them both emerge from their building and climb into a battered truck parked at the kerb.

Deciding to follow and catch up with them when they parked, Sloane was in the middle of attempting to turn his car around when another car nearly slammed into him as it hurriedly pulled away from the kerb and tried to catch up with Toby Brown’s truck.

Sloane had slammed on the brakes to avoid the inevitable collision and was about to blast his horn at the retreating car when he thought better of it. He had noticed that there were two very heavily built men in the front seat and had no wish to become involved in a confrontation. Instead, he followed both cars from a distance as they made their way towards the city.

A short time later Sloane noticed a second car insert itself between the car containing the two large men and Brown’s truck. Then the now third car in line allowed Sloane to overtake them and settled in behind him.

Sloane was able to get a good look at the occupants in his rear-view mirror and it seemed to him that both men appeared to have been poured from the same mould. Wide shoulders and no neck, with close-cropped hair and wearing regulation grey suits.

Sloane’s gut told him they were police or something similar and he settled down to see what was about to happen, memorising everything for a future story.

Sure enough, the cars switched positions a short time later and true confirmation of their intent came not long after they reached the outskirts of the city.

As Toby Brown’s truck pulled up to a red light Suzie Brown opened the passenger door and stepped out. Much to the surprise of the chasers she broke into a sprint and sidestepped her way between oncoming traffic to the diagonally opposite side of the intersection.

Sloane watched with interest as the two chasing cars disgorged their passengers who rushed to catch up to their fleeing target.

But he couldn’t help but laugh as he saw Suzie Brown quickly purchase a newspaper and then run back past her pursuers, through the traffic, and hop back into the truck just as the light turned green which allowed Toby Brown to drive off.

The chasers now had to change direction in the middle of the intersection and rush back to their cars where their drivers waited while the traffic banked up and honked their horns at them.

Sloane couldn’t help himself and joined in the chorus of horns as the suited men clambered back into their cars and sped off to resume the chase while Sloane followed at the rear of the cavalcade.

Obviously the chasers knew where their quarry was going as they had no trouble in relocating Brown’s truck and resuming their positions.

Eventually Toby Brown found a parking spot and the chasers took up new vantage points further down the street where they could maintain a close eye on the building into which the couple had disappeared.

Sloane continued on past the building and parked around the corner. Taking out his notebook he started to write down as much information as he could recall about the chase before locking up his car and walking back around the corner.

He casually made his way past the cars occupied by the watchers and took down their registration numbers while getting a closer look at the occupants and fixing their faces in his mind. He then retraced his steps and made a casual examination of Brown’s building.

The outside of the premises still showed where the sign advertising itself as a bank had once hung. Now there appeared a much smaller brass plaque with just the words: ‘THE FUND’.

Curious, Sloane stepped inside and found himself in what had formerly been the main banking chamber and which now appeared to be divided down the middle. One side was fully occupied by some sort of business while the other half was vacant.

The side which Sloane presumed was occupied by The Fund consisted of a small gift shop selling goods of an environmental nature and many racks containing free information pamphlets. Beside the shop a receptionist sat behind a desk while on the wall behind her was a finely carved wooden plaque displaying the logo of The Fund. Beyond the reception desk were numerous work stations where enthusiastic young men and women were busy at tasks that Sloane could only guess at.

He was startled by a tap on his shoulder. Spinning around, he found himself looking into the deathly white face of a young Goth.

‘Can I help you, sir?’ she asked politely.

Taken aback by her appearance, Sloane was suddenly at a loss for words.

The girl behind the make-up fixed him with a cold stare: ‘Have you come to make a contribution to The Fund?’ she asked.

‘Uh no. Actually, I wanted to have a word with Mr Toby Brown and his wife.’

Disappointed, the girl replied, ‘They’ve got nothing to do with The Fund. They own the building and will be using that area,’ she said, indicating the vacant part of the building. ‘They’re in a meeting at the moment. You can wait, but I’ve got no idea how long they’ll be.’

‘If they’re busy I’ll catch them another time,’ said Sloane as he moved towards the door.

The Goth shrugged her shoulders and Sloane saw her return to a work station and commenced to assemble another computer.

Sloane was relieved to escape the girl’s piercing gaze and gladly made his way back to his car. He was unaware that his photo was being taken by one of the watchers.

Over the next few days he tried to make contact with the Browns by phone without success. He left numerous messages on their answering machine, but they were not returned. Either they had no intention of speaking to him or they had too many other things to worry about. The presence of the watchers had him believe that the latter was probably the case, so he tried harder to meet them in person.

Despite his failures in this regard he had been making progress in other directions.

Sloane had decided to trace Jade Green from her very beginnings and hoped to make a breakthrough along the way.

Here too he had come across many obstructions. He was initially unable to locate Jade Green’s birth certificate and it was not until he finally tracked down her wedding certificate that Sloane learned that Janice Patricia Green had been born in Shanghai and not England as he had assumed.

But it had been the wedding certificate itself that had given Sloane his first real breakthrough. The amount of information it contained had been small, but each clue had been vital.

Listed on the certificate were the witnesses Captain Daniel Clarke and a Dr Rani Smith. A female doctor? thought Sloane. If so, she should be easy to trace.

The marriage had taken place during the early years of World War II, so Sloane was not anticipating that any of these people would still be alive. However, he knew that he would be able to find out a great deal of information from military records about Green’s husband. Also Green’s witness was a female doctor and there would not have been a large number of those in London at that time.

The staff at military records had numerous listings for both Robert Symes and Daniel Clarke, but luckily Sloane was able to supply Robert Symes’s date of birth from the wedding certificate and acted upon the assumption that both men might have served in the same unit to narrow down the listings for Daniel Clarke.

It took some time for the research assistant to return and Sloane was beginning to wonder if he had struck yet another brick wall.

Finally she emerged. ‘You’re very lucky. The records of both these men had been placed under a secrecy blackout. The blackout period only ended a couple of years ago. If you had come before then their files would have been unavailable to you.’

‘Why the secrecy?’

‘You’ll be able to read it all for yourself. Both men were in military intelligence and their activities before and during the war have been classified,’ she explained, handing over to him two very thick files.

‘Can I make copies of these?’

‘You can now, but you would have been shot for attempting it a couple of years ago,’ she replied with a grin.

After photocopying the files Sloane spent all his spare time immersing himself in them and making extensive notes. At last he sat back with a very pleased look upon his face.

If he had thought the idea of a book on the life of Jade Green would make good reading then the true life adventures of these two men would be a blockbuster, especially that of the late Robert Symes, right up to and including his untimely death while blowing up a bridge in occupied France.

As much as he would have liked to have gone back to do further research on these brave men, it was not his main objective. That could wait till the current project was complete. Instead, he concentrated on what little information was available on Robert Symes’s life at home.

Ignoring the spectacular, he concentrated on the mundane.

He noted that Symes changed his home address just after his marriage to Janice Green, as well as making her his next of kin. However, after his death she had never bothered to apply for any of the privileges accorded war widows. True, she was wealthy enough not to need them, but she had not even applied for his medals.

One curious item that Sloane did uncover was that Symes had requisitioned the use of a tank and its crew for a period of one day whilst he was supposedly on leave. Sloane wondered what that was about.

There was also correspondence between himself and his superiors concerning the establishment of a secure facility to be set up outside the normal military precincts. His reason for doing so, he wrote, was so that he could interview escapees from Hitler’s wrath without them being compromised. He also had applied to set up a radio communications network to send messages to agents in occupied Europe. The date of the establishment of the secret base meant nothing to Sloane, but its address in the centre of London did.

Searching through old records, Sloane was amazed to discover that the address supplied was none other than the location of Jade Green’s Garden of Eros and the dates even coincided! The two of them had been working from the same establishment, at the very same time!

Shocked, Sloane began to consider the meaning of this information.

The military had known, and actually granted permission, for Symes to establish a secret base for intelligence gathering to be operated from a brothel.

Was the brothel also part of Symes’s intelligence gathering network?

Sloane’s mind was abuzz with the possibilities. He had to find out more about the early life of Jade Green.

Sloane decided that Daniel Clarke was the most obvious person to answer his questions, but he was disappointed to discover that Clarke had died some ten years before. He did, however, manage to track down Clarke’s only child, a son, and paid him a visit.

The man explained that his father had never spoken about his wartime activities even though he had asked him on many occasions.

‘He refused to talk about anything that took place during the war. I know he was an officer in the army, but that’s all. I think having to keep it all bottled up affected him deeply. He was always a very withdrawn person and shunned most personal contact.’

Sloane nodded. ‘I think you should get a copy of his military record.

It will explain a lot.’

‘Thank you. I will.’

As Sloane was about to leave, Clarke’s son had a sudden recollection. ‘The only time I heard my father mention anything to do with the war period was when he saw a woman on the television. I remember he sort of smiled and pointed her out to me. He said he knew her and that they had met during the war. It was as though it was one of the few happy memories he had of the period.’

‘Who was the woman?’ asked Sloane excitedly. ‘Was it a person named Jade Green?’

‘No. That name doesn’t ring any bells with me. If I can recall, I think it was something to do with a charity event. I remember thinking it was unusual that Dad would know someone like that. What I mean was that the woman was wearing a sari and I didn’t think Dad would ever associate himself with an Indian person. If you know what I mean.’

Sloane’s mind raced. A woman wearing a sari? ‘Could this woman have been a doctor? Possibly a doctor named Rani Smith?’

‘I’m sorry. It was so long ago I couldn’t possibly remember the name.’

Sloane could though. Clarke and Dr Rani Smith were both on Jade Green’s marriage certificate. It had to be her.

‘How long ago did this take place?’

‘He was here, living here with us. So it couldn’t have been too long before his death. After Mum died he lived alone for years, but at the end he couldn’t look after himself properly so we took him in.’

Sloane was ecstatic. He had a new lead and that meant he was still in the hunt for the elusive Jade Green.

As soon as he arrived home Sloane logged onto the Internet and searched for Dr Rani Smith. He was surprised at the number of hits raised and realised that he would be spending a long time going over such fertile ground.

However, his main priority was to ascertain if Dr Rani Smith was still alive.

A call to the Medical Association elicited the information that, although now retired, Dr Smith was still a member of the Association. They would not supply Dr Smith’s home address, but this did not trouble Sloane as he soon had that information from other sources often used by reporters.

Sloane debated calling Dr Smith immediately but decided that it would be better if he knew more about the woman, so he returned to the Internet, reading everything he could about the doctor and making many notes.