See Appendix for note on D. K. Crick.
SUMMARY OF MEETING
1. Apologies on behalf of Sir Kenneth K. Curtiss and Ms Y. Rampuri.
2. Expressions of regret by BBB (Crick) regarding death of Tessa Quayle and concern re fate of Dr Arnold Bluhm.
BBB (CRICK): This damn country gets hairier by the day. The Mrs Quayle thing, that’s just awful. She was a fine lady who’d earned herself a great reputation around town. How can we help you officers? Any way at all. The chief sends his personal greetings and instructs us to afford you every assistance. He has a great regard for the British police.
OFFICER: We gather Arnold Bluhm and Tessa Quayle made a variety of representations to ThreeBees regarding a new TB cure you’re marketing, name of Dypraxa.
BBB (CRICK): Did they though? We must look into that. You see, Ms Eber here is more on the PR side, and I’m sort of on secondment from other duties pending a major restructuring of the company. The chief has a theory that anyone sitting still is wasting money.
OFFICER: The representations resulted in a meeting between Quayle, Bluhm and members of your staff here and we’d like to ask you for a sight of any records that were kept of this meeting, and any other documents relevant to it.
BBB (CRICK): Right, Rob. No problem. We’re here to help. Only when you say she made representations to ThreeBees—do you happen to know which branch you have in mind at all? Only there are a hell of a lot of bees in this outfit, believe me!
OFFICER: Mrs Quayle addressed letters, e-mails and phone calls to Sir Kenneth personally, to his private office, to Ms Rampuri and to pretty well everyone on your Nairobi board. She faxed some of her letters and sent hard copies by mail. Others she hand-delivered.
BBB (CRICK): Well, great. That should give us something to go on. And you have copies of that correspondence, presumably?
OFFICER: Not at present.
BBB (CRICK): But you know who attended the meeting on our side, presumably?
OFFICER: We assumed you’d know that.
BBB (CRICK): Oh dear. So what do you have?
OFFICER: Written and verbal testimony by witnesses that such representations were made. Mrs Quayle went so far as to visit Sir Kenneth at his farm last time he was in Nairobi.
BBB (CRICK): Did she though? Well, that’s news to me, I must say. Did she have an appointment?
OFFICER: No.
BBB (CRICK): So who invited her?
OFFICER: No one. She just showed up.
BBB (CRICK): Wow. Brave girl. How far did she get?
OFFICER: Not far enough, apparently, because she afterwards attempted to confront Sir Kenneth here at his offices, but was unsuccessful.
BBB (CRICK): Well, I’m damned. Still the chief’s a busy bee. A lot of people want a lot of favours from him. Not many of them are lucky.
OFFICER: This wasn’t favours.
BBB (CRICK): What was it?
OFFICER: Answers. Our understanding is, Mrs Quayle also presented Sir Kenneth with a bunch of case histories describing the side-effects of the drug on identified patients.
BBB (CRICK): Did she, by Christ? Well, well. I didn’t know there were any side-effects. Is she a scientist, a doctor? Was, I should say?
OFFICER: She was a concerned member of the public, a lawyer, and a rights campaigner. And she was deeply involved in aid work.
BBB (CRICK): When you say presented, what are we talking here?
OFFICER: Delivered them by hand to this building, personal for Sir Kenneth.
BBB (CRICK): She get a receipt?
OFFICER: (shows it)
BBB (CRICK): Ah. Well. Received one package. Question of what’s in the package, isn’t it? Still, you’ve got copies, I’m sure. Bunch of case histories, You must have.
OFFICER: We expect to have them any day.
BBB (CRICK): Is that so? Well, we’d be really interested to have a sight of them, right, Viv? I mean Dypraxa’s our lead line right now, what the chief calls our flagship. Lot of happy mums and dads and kids out there, feeling a lot better for Dypraxa. So if Tessa had a grouse about it, that’s something we’d really need to know and act on. If the chief was here he’d be the first to say that. Just that he’s one of those guys who lives in a Gulfstream. I’m surprised he gave her the brush-off, all the same. That’s not like him at all. Still, I suppose if you’re as busy as he is—
BBB (EBER): We have a set procedure here for customer complaints regarding our pharmaceutical list, you see, Rob. We’re only the distributor here. We import, we distribute. Provided the Kenyan government has green-lighted a drug and the medical centres are comfortable with using it, we are just acting as the intermediary, you see. That’s pretty much where our responsibility ends. We take advice about storage, naturally, and make sure we are providing the right temperatures and humidity and so forth. But basically the buck stops with the manufacturer and the Kenyan government.
OFFICER: What about clinical trials? Aren’t you supposed to be conducting trials?
BBB (CRICK): No trials. I’m afraid you haven’t done your homework on that one, Rob. Not if you’re talking your structured, fully fledged type, double blind, put it that way.
OFFICER: So what are we talking?
BBB (CRICK): Not once a drug is out there in a given country like Kenya, being distributed, that wouldn’t be policy. A drug, once you’re distributing it in a country and you’ve got the local health boys behind you a hundred per cent, is what I call a done thing.
OFFICER: So what trials, tests, experiments are you conducting, if any?
BBB (CRICK): Look. Don’t do the words with me, all right? If you’re talking about adding to a drug’s track record, a real good drug like this one, if you’re gearing up for distribution in another very major country—right outside the African market—the US of A for instance—yes, all right, I grant you, in an indirect way we can call what we are doing here trials. In that sense only. The preparatory sense, for the situation ahead of us, which is the day when ThreeBees and KVH jointly enter the new exciting market I’m alluding to. With me?
OFFICER: Not yet. I’m waiting for the word guinea pig.
BBB (CRICK): All I’m saying is, that in the very best way for all parties, every patient is in some degree a test case for the benefit of the greater good. Nobody’s talking guinea pigs. Back off.
OFFICER: The greater good being the American market, you mean?
BBB (CRICK): For fuck’s sake. All I’m saying is, every result, every time we record a thing, a patient is recorded, those results are carefully stored and monitored at all times in Seattle and Vancouver and Basel for future reference. For the future validation of the product when we’re looking to register it elsewhere. So that we’re totally fail-safe at all times. Plus we’ve got the Kenyan health boys behind us at all times.
OFFICER: Doing what? Mopping up the bodies?
P. R. OAKEY, QC: You didn’t say that, Rob, I’m sure, and we didn’t hear it. Doug has been extremely forthright and generous with his information. Perhaps too generous. Yes, Lesley?
OFFICER: So what do you do with complaints meanwhile? Bin them?
BBB (CRICK): Mainly, Les, what we do, we shoot them straight back at the manufacturer, Messrs Karel Vita Hudson. Then we either reply to the complaining party under KVH’s guidance, or KVH may prefer to reply direct. Horses for courses. But that’s the shape and size of it, Rob. Anything else we can do for you? Maybe we should pencil in another meeting for when you’ve got your documentation to hand?
OFFICER: Just a minute, d’you mind? According to our information Tessa Quayle and Dr Arnold Bluhm came here in person last November at your invitation—ThreeBees’ invitation—to discuss the effects, positive or negative, of your product Dypraxa. They also presented members of your staff with copies of the case notes they had sent to Sir Kenneth Curtiss personally. Are you saying you have no record of that meeting, not even who attended it from ThreeBees?
BBB (CRICK): Got a date for it, Rob? OFFICER: We have a d
iary entry confirming that a meeting was set at ThreeBees’ suggestion for 11 a.m. on November 18. The appointment was made through the office of Ms Rampuri, your marketing manager, who we now hear is not available.
BBB (CRICK): News to me, I must say. How about you, Viv?
BBB (EBER): Me too, Doug.
BBB (CRICK): Listen, why don’t I look in Yvonne’s diary for you?
OFFICER: Good idea. We’ll help you.
BBB (CRICK): Hang on, hang on. I’ll have to get her OK on it first, obviously. Yvonne’s a lot of girl. I wouldn’t be going through her diary without her say-so, any more than I would yours, Lesley.
OFFICER: Ring her up. We’ll pay.
BBB (CRICK): No way, Rob.
OFFICER: Why not?
BBB (CRICK): You see, Rob, Yvonne and her boyfriend have gone to this mega-wedding in Mombasa. When we said ‘attending to family affairs,’ that was the affair, right? A pretty bloody red-hot one, believe you me. So I would guess Monday would be the absolute earliest we could contact her. I don’t know whether you’ve ever been to a wedding in Mombasa but believe you me—
OFFICER: Let’s not worry about the diary. What about the notes they left with her?
BBB (CRICK): You mean these so-called case histories you’re talking about?
OFFICER: Among other things.
BBB (CRICK): Well, if it’s your actual case histories and that— obviously, Rob—technical discussion of symptoms, indications, dosage—side-effects, Rob—then it’s like we said, it’s down to your manufacturer every time. We’re talking Basel, we’re talking Seattle and we’re talking Vancouver. I mean, fuck. We would be behaving with criminal irresponsibility, wouldn’t we, Viv, if we didn’t immediately turn to the experts for evaluation. That’s not just company policy. I’d say that was Holy Writ here at ThreeBees, wouldn’t you?
BBB (EBER): Absolutely. No question, Doug. The chief insists. The moment there’s a problem, it’s get KVH on the helpline.
OFFICER: What are you telling us? This is ridiculous. What happens to paper in this place, for Christ’s sake?
BBB (CRICK): I’m telling you that we’re hearing you and we’ll mount a search and see what we come up with. This isn’t the civil service, Rob. Or Scotland Yard. This is Africa. We don’t all march on our fucking files, right? We got better ways of spending our fucking time than—
P. R. OAKEY, QC: I think there are two points here. Perhaps three. Can I take them separately? The first is, how certain are you officers that the meeting between Mrs Quayle, Dr Bluhm and representatives of ThreeBees that you’re referring to actually took place?
OFFICER: As we already told you, we have documentary evidence in Bluhm’s handwriting, from Bluhm’s diary, that a meeting was arranged for November 18 through Ms Rampuri’s office.
P. R. OAKEY, QC: Arranged is one thing, Lesley. Consummated is quite another. Let’s hope Ms Rampuri has a good memory. She conducts an awful lot of meetings, you may be sure. My second point is tone. Insofar as you are able to say, would the alleged representations have been adversarial in tone? Might there, for instance, have been a whiff of litigation in the air? De mortuis and so on, but from all one hears about Mrs Quayle, she wasn’t exactly one to pull her punches, was she? She was also a lawyer, as you say. And Dr Bluhm is by way of being a professional watchdog in the pharmaceutical field, I understand. We’re not dealing with nobodies.
OFFICER: What if they were adversarial? If somebody’s died of a drug, people have got a right to be adversarial.
P. R. OAKEY, QC: Well, obviously, Rob, if Ms Rampuri smelled a claim in the air, or worse, or the chief did, assuming he did indeed receive the written materials, which is clearly open to question, then their very first instinct would be to send them on to the firm’s legal department. Which would be another place to look, wouldn’t it, Doug?
OFFICER: I thought you were their legal department.
P. R. OAKEY, QC: (humour) I’m a last resort, Rob. Not a first resort. I’m far too expensive.
BBB (CRICK): We’ll get back to you, Rob. It’s been our pleasure. Next time let’s make it lunch. But don’t expect the moon is my advice. It’s like I say. We don’t spend all day filing paper here. We have a lot of irons in the fire and as the chief likes to say, ThreeBees does business from the hip. That’s how this company became what it is today.
OFFICER: We’d like one more moment of your time, please, Mr Crick. We’re interested in speaking to a gentleman named Lorbeer, probably Doctor Lorbeer, of German, Swiss or perhaps Dutch origin. I’m afraid we don’t have a first name for him but we understand he’s been closely involved with the career of Dypraxa here in Africa.
BBB (CRICK): On which side, Lesley?
OFFICER: Does that matter?
BBB (CRICK): Well, it does, rather. If Lorbeer’s a doctor, which you seem to think he is, he’s more likely to be with the manufacturers than with us. ThreeBees don’t run to medics, you see. We’re laymen in the market place. Salesmen. So it’s try KVH again, I’m afraid, Les.
OFFICER: Look, do you know Lorbeer or not? We’re not in Vancouver or Basel or Seattle. We’re in Africa. It’s your drug, your territory. You import the stuff, you advertise it, distribute it and sell it. We’re telling you a Lorbeer has been involved with your drug here in Africa. Have you heard of Lorbeer or not?
P. R. OAKEY, QC: I think you’ve had your answer, haven’t you,
Rob? Try the manufacturers.
OFFICER: How about a woman called Kovacs, could be Hungarian?
BBB (EBER): A doctor too?
OFFICER: Do you know the name? Never mind her title. Has any of you heard the name Kovacs? Female? In the context of marketing this drug?
BBB (CRICK): Try the phone book, I should, Rob.
OFFICER: There’s also a Dr Emrich we’d like to talk to—
P. R. OAKEY, QC: Looks as though you’ve drawn a blank, officers. I’m awfully sorry we can’t be more use to you. We’ve pulled out all the stops for you, but it just doesn’t seem to be our day.
Note added one week after this meeting took place:
Despite assurances from ThreeBees that searches were under way, we are informed that no papers, letters, case histories, e-mails or faxes from Tessa Abbott or Quayle or Arnold Bluhm have so far come to light. KVH deny all knowledge of them, so does the ThreeBees’ legal department in Nairobi. Our attempts to recontact Eber and Crick have also proved unsuccessful. Crick is “attending a retraining course in South Africa,” Eber has been “moved to another department.” Replacements have not yet been appointed. Ms Rampuri remains unavailable, “pending the restructuring of the company.”
RECOMMENDED: That Scotland Yard make direct representations to Sir Kenneth K. Curtiss with a request for a full statement of his company’s dealings with the deceased and Dr Bluhm, that he instruct his staff to mount a strenuous search for Ms Rampuri’s diary and the missing documents, and that Ms Rampuri be produced immediately for interview.
[Initialled by Superintendent Gridley, but no action ordered or recorded.]
APPENDIX
Crick, Douglas (Doug) James, b. Gibraltar 10 Oct 1970 (ex Criminal Records Office, MOD and Judge Advocate General’s Dept.)
Subject is the illegitimate son of Crick, David Angus, Royal Navy (dishonourable discharge). Crick senior served eleven years in UK gaols for multiple offences including two of manslaughter. He now lives lavishly in Marbella, Spain.
Crick, Douglas James (Subject) himself arrived in UK from Gibraltar at age nine in the care of his father (see above) who was arrested on landing. Subject was given into care. While in care Subject came to notice in a succession of juvenile courts for varied offences including drug-peddling, grievous bodily harm, procuring and affray. He was also suspected of complicity in the gang murder of two black youths in Nottingham (1984) but not charged.
In 1989 Subject claimed to be a reformed character and volunteered for police service. He was rejected, but appears to have been retained as a part-time informant.
/>
In 1990 Subject successfully volunteered for service with the British Army, received special forces training and was attached to British Army Intelligence, Northern Ireland on plain clothes assignment with the rank and entitlements of sergeant. Subject served three years in Ireland before being reduced to the rank of private and dishonourably discharged. No other record of his service is available.
Although D.J. Crick (Subject) was presented to us as a public relations officer for House of ThreeBees, he was until recently better known as a leading light in their protection and security branch. He reportedly enjoys the personal confidence of Sir Kenneth K. Curtiss, for whom he has on many occasions acted as personal bodyguard, e.g., on Curtiss’s visits to the Gulf, Latin America, Nigeria and Angola, in the last twelve months alone.
Bearding him at his farm, poor fellow, Tim Donohue is saying across the Monopoly board in Gloria’s garden. Phone calls at unsociable hours. Rude letters left at his club. Sweep it under the carpet, our advice.
They kill, Lesley is saying in the darkness of the van in Chelsea. But you’ve noticed that.
With these memories still echoing in his head, Justin must have fallen asleep at the counting table because he woke to hear a dawn air battle of land birds versus seagulls, that turned out on closer inspection to be not dawn but dusk. And at some point not long after that, he was bereft. He had read everything there was to read and he knew, if he had ever doubted it, that without her laptop he was looking at only a corner of the canvas.
13
Guido was waiting on the cottage doorstep, sporting a black coat that was too long for him and a school satchel that couldn’t find anywhere on his shoulders to hang. In one spidery hand he clutched a tin box for his medicines and his sandwiches. It was six in the morning. The first rays of spring sun were gilding the cobwebs on the grass slope. Justin drove the jeep as close to the cottage as he could and Guido’s mother watched from a window as Guido, rejecting Justin’s hand, swung himself into the passenger seat, arms, knees, satchel, tin box and coat-tails, to crash at his side like a young bird at the end of his first flight.