Deep Water by Peter Corris Page B

resort and a wetland for wildlife. I couldn’t figure where exploration came into it, but it did occur to me that the lobby would be a good setting for Robert Hawkins’s boats.
    Hank and I were a little early and we studied the models with interest.
    â€˜Pretty green oriented, this stuff,’ Hank said. ‘I’m seeing that everywhere these days.’
    â€˜Hadn’t noticed,’ I said. ‘Tell you what though, withthese lights and the air conditioning, the building’s laying down a fair carbon fingerprint.’
    â€˜Footprint, Cliff, footprint. Time to go.’
    We checked in at a high-tech reception desk, were given security passes, and took the lift to the second level. A good-looking woman in a suit and blouse that stopped just short of being a uniform met us and we were escorted down a corridor. Discreet lighting through the tinted glass, framed blueprints on the wall, a rock garden with fountain at a bend.
    She opened a door with ‘Personnel’ on a nameplate and nodded to the man and the woman working at computer desks. She knocked on a door that carried the name Ashley Guy.
    â€˜Come,’ a voice within said.
    I glanced at Hank, who was fighting off a grin.
    She opened the door and waved us in.
    Ashley Guy was sitting behind a big desk studying a printed sheet. He stood when we came in and held out a hand to shake. We shook. He sat down and gestured towards two chairs. The room was spick and span, as if some brain work might go on there, but nothing as mundane as filing or keyboarding or signing things. Guy wore the unbuttoned waistcoat of a three-piece suit with a light blue shirt and dark blue tie. He looked to be in his mid-thirties, with his fair hair thinning and his waistline thickening.
    â€˜I can’t give you a lot of time, Mr Bachelor and Mr …?’
    â€˜Clifford,’ I said.
    â€˜â€¦ Mr Clifford, but I’ll do whatever I can to help in the time available. Of course, we’re very concerned about Henry.’
    â€˜Likewise his daughter, likewise the police pretty soon,’ Hank said. ‘Our enquiries have turned up grounds for more than just concern, but I thought to come to you before bringing in the police with … all guns blazing, as you might say.’
    â€˜These grounds are …?’
    Hank shrugged. ‘Kind of circumstantial, but it’d help a whole lot if you could tell us precisely what Henry McKinley was working on.’
    Guy shook his head. ‘That’s precisely what I
cannot
do. That information falls under the heading of commercial confidentiality. Every research project here involves us in the outlay of a great deal of money, sometimes for no return. Competition in our field is intense. Perhaps you understand, being in the business you’re in.’
    â€˜Maybe I do,’ Hank said, playing him a little.
    Guy hesitated, glancing uncertainly left and right, before taking a slim file from a desk drawer. ‘Anything else—his medical record, qualifications, references, salary, in general terms, contractual provisions, in outline—I’ll be happy to give you.’
    â€˜Healthy, was he?’ Hank said.
    â€˜Very.’
    â€˜Solvent?’
    â€˜Yes.’
    â€˜With time to run on his contract?’
    Guy wasn’t stupid. ‘You know this already, don’t you?’
    â€˜That’s confidential,’ Hank said. He nodded to me. I took a folded-up high quality photocopy of McKinley’s drawing and put it on the desk.
    â€˜Someone,’ Hank said, ‘don’t know who just at present but we’re working on it, missed this when he bought up awhole set of McKinley’s drawings. This is a copy, naturally. Mean anything to you, Mr Guy?’
    Some say watch the eyes, others watch the mouth; some say look for a frown or hand movements. I know you’d be flat out doing all those things at once and a good liar probably didn’t show anything. Guy