The Constant Gardener Page #7

Nowhere. Nowhere safe. Nowhere?

Please. Just... a few questions.

Okay, let's talk here. With these people. All right.

Okay. My bike's across the street. Ask your questions before we get to it.

Is it a scam? Scam?

Dypraxa. Does it cure T.B.? Yes, it cures.

But it can also kill, you know, because they haven't got the formula right.

Right. So why don't they work on that?

It's cheaper to fix the trials.

Exclude the patients that have side effects, you know.

To go back to the lab would cost them time- two years-

millions of dollars, and other companies would have time to produce their own cures.

Okay, next question.

You said to Tessa in your e-mails that the Kenyan government had approved the trials.

Somebody bribed them. Who?

ThreeBees, Lorbeer. We don't know.

But $ in the right hands, and you can test battery acid as skin lotion.

My bike's there.

Stop! Stop!

- Stop!

Who is Lorbeer?

Birgit, is it a company?

A white coat. He invented Dypraxa.

When patients started to die, Lorbeerjumped clear.

Is that why Tessa went to Lokichogio? Is that where Lorbeer is?

Disappeared. Murdered?

Disappeared. We've gotta go. I'm sorry.

Where can I find him?

Birgit? Where?

Go back to Africa. Lorbeer's still there.

Tessa, why didn't you tell me?

I could have helped you.

It is my sad duty to inform you that Dr. Bluhm has been found.

I'll spare you the details.

Suffice to say, the poor fellow...

seems to have been tortured to death on the same day Tessa was killed.

Which would seem to exonerate him.

Seem? So what's the new theory?

That he tortured himself to death?

That'd save you looking for anyone else, wouldn't it?

Moving on.

What is the purpose of your visit?

I'm seeing a friend.

Welcome to Kenya, Mr. Black. Thank you.

Has anyone seen ThreeBees' share price lately?

Does that mean he won't be able to contribute to tombola?

Hardly Kenny's fault if someone put the word out on him.

Wish I'd know that's all it took. I'd have done it sooner.

I expect he'll land on his feet. Give him a life peerage.

Henceforth you shall be known as Lord f***ing Curtiss of f***ing Kenya.

Whoever you are, I don't take kindly to being blackmailed.

Christ. How did you get here?

Safari tour. Via Paris.

Hunting me now, Justin?

You're the one on the run.

I loved her. I'm not ashamed of it.

Nor should you be... if it were true.

It's not for you to tell me how I felt.

If you've read that, you'll see that I let her read something she shouldn't.

Yeah. A letter from Pellegrin.

She trusted you.

What do you want for that?

I want to know why Pellegrin suppressed Tessa's report.

It was him, wasn't it? Don't try and play detective.

ThreeBees, KDH, Dypraxa. What's the story on that axis of evil?

KDH is Swiss-Canadian. So why are we involved?

Curtiss is one of us. He's British.

Christ, Justin, stop bleeding for bloody Africa and show some loyalty.

That plant KDH built in Wales could have gone to France.

Fifteen hundred jobs in a depressed region.

We owed them.

They needed help with the Dypraxa trials.

KDH needed an investment partner here.

Curtiss and ThreeBees served us both.

And Tessa wanted what?

Pressure on Kenny...

to stop the tests, redesign the bloody drug.

Three years' delay, millions of dollars.

Or?

We're not paid to be bleeding hearts.

You know that, Justin.

We're not killing people who wouldn't be dead otherwise.

Look at the death rate. Not that anybody's counting.

But you were a bleeding heart, Sandy.

Tessa was your salvation, wasn't she, from all this?

You loved her. Remember?

Pellegrin said the report was too damaging...

and she had to be stopped.

Oh, yes. She was stopped.

I betrayed her.

We all did.

You did it by... growing flowers.

How did you betray her, Sandy?

They wanted to know what she was up to.

I'm the one who told them she was going to Loki.

- Who did you tell? - Pellegrin.

But God knows who he told.

Ghita, get in the car. Get in the car!

- Go!

Get in.

Listen, fuckhead, if I wanted you dead,

I would've brought Crick with me.

I wanna show you something.

Show me from there.

Don't mess me about. I'm doing you a favor.

How did you know where I'd be?

I've still got a friend or two, you know?

We're marked men, Quayle. They've called in my f***ing bank loans.

I'm finished. They want you silenced.

And they want another country's flag flying over my pharma division.

So, you've been asking about Wanza Kilulu.

She's under there, covered in quicklime.

Her and others who never officially existed.

Dypraxa?

Yeah.

Is that where I'm going? Not on my agenda.

Then why are you showing me this?

Let's just say if I'm going to the wall, I want a trophy.

That's what you lot do, isn't it? Heads on walls.

I think I'll have Pellegrin's f***ing head on mine.

So, now you know where it is. I'm not taking any f***ing questions.

What about Lorbeer?

That Bible-thumping bullshitter, he's doing his penance in the Sudan.

Jesus the healer.

You don't know where I'm going? You get one guess.

I'm gonna surprise you, Tess.

- I love this man. - Hello.

I wish you had shared just a few things.

I love you. I love you too.

Who did you think it was?

F*** you, Donohue. This is bandit country.

Did you tell Curtiss where I'd be?

Ghita's car?

Well, Ghita's my only friend here, Tim.

I wouldn't want her to get into trouble. She won't.

You do have another friend, believe it or not.

You won't find what you're looking for in Loki.

Let's be honest with each other, shall we?

That's a- a late career change for you, Tim.

There's something else we have in common, you and I.

We'll both be dead by Christmas.

There's a contract out on you.

Same people who did for Tessa, I shouldn't wonder.

Mine's cancer.

My pain is controllable.

I knew that you were ill. I'm sorry. I didn't realize.

Yeah. Sandy tell you?

He fingered Tessa.

He said he'd made a phone call.

He didn't know they'd kill her. Silly sod was besotted with her.

But that's the way it works with corporate murder.

Boss gets wind of something, calls in his head of security,

who talks to someone, who talks to a friend of someone.

Finishes up with an answering machine in a rented office,

a couple of sensitive gentlemen in a blue pickup truck.

They will never know who ordered the hit.

I can get you out of Kenya.

It's one of the few things we still do well.

Drop it now, and it's over.

I'll make sure word gets to the right people.

Go home... and live.

But I don't have a home, Tim.

Tessa was my home.

Know about Bluhm?

What about Bluhm?

Let me tell you what you're facing.

They dragged him into the desert, cut out his tongue,

chopped offhis manly apparatus and stuffed them where his tongue had been.

Then they crucified the poor bugger.

Pathologist's opinion is he was still alive when they nailed him up.

Of course, you might be lucky.

It might be in their interest to make yours look like suicide.

Which it is.

Balance of mind disturbed. No fuss, no inquiry.

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