“Stryker and Son,” Alex muttered. “Who are they?”
“Just people we use. We have budget restraints. We have to contract some of our work out. We hired them to clean things up. Mrs. Jones here is our head of operations. It was she who gave your uncle his last assignment.”
“We’re very sorry to have lost him, Alex.” The woman spoke for the first time. She didn’t sound very sorry at all.
“Do you know who killed him?”
“Yes .
“Are you going to tell me?”
“No. Not now.”
“Why not?”
“Because you don’t need to know. Not at this stage.”
“All right.” Alex considered what he
“This is one of our training centers,” Mrs. Jones said.
“You’ve brought me here because you don’t want me to tell anyone what I know. Is that what this is all about? Because if it is, I’ll sign the Official Secrets Act or whatever it is you want me to do, but then I’d like to go home. This is all crazy, anyway. And I’ve had enough. I’m out of here.”
Blunt coughed quietly. “It’s not quite as easy as that,” he said.
“Why not?”
“It’s certainly true that you did draw attention to yourself both at the junkyard and then at our offices on Liverpool Street. And it’s also true that what you know and what I’m about to tell you must go no further. But the fact of the matter is, Alex, that we need your help.”
“My help?”
“Yes.” He paused. “Have you heard of a man called Herod Sayle?”
Alex thought for a moment. “I’ve seen his name in the newspapers. He’s something to do with computers. And he owns racehorses. Doesn’t he come from somewhere in Egypt?”
“Yes. From Cairo.” Blunt took a sip of wine. “Let me tell you his story, Alex. I’m sure you’ll find it of interest.
“Herod Sayle was born in complete poverty in the backstreets of Cairo. His father was a failed oral hygienist. His mother took in washing. He had nine brothers and four sisters, all living together in three small rooms along with the family goat. Young Herod never went to school and he should have ended up unemployed, unable to read or write, like the rest of them.
“But when he was seven, something occurred that changed his life. He was walking down Fez Street—in the middle of Cairo—when he happened to see an upright piano fall out of a fourteenth-story window. Apparently it was being moved and it somehow overturned. Anyway, there were a couple of English tourists walking along the pavement underneath and they would both have been crushed—no doubt about it—except at the last minute Herod threw himself at them and pushed them out of the way. The piano missed them by an inch.
“Of course, the tourists were enormously grateful to the young Egyptian waif and it now turned out that they were very rich. They made inquiries about him and discovered how poor he was … the very clothes he was wearing had been passed down by all nine of his brothers. And so, out of gratitude, they more or less adopted him. Flew him out of Cairo and put him into a school over here, where he made astonishing progress. He got excellent exam results and—here’s an amazing coincidence—at the age of fifteen he actually found himself sitting next to a boy who would grow up to become prime minister of Great Britain. Our present prime minister, in fact. The two of them were at school together.
“I’ll move quickly forward. After school, Sayle went to Cambridge, where he got a degree in economics. He then set out on a career that went from success to success. His own radio station, computer software … and, yes, he even found time to buy a string of racehorses, although I believe they seldom win. But what drew him to our attention was his most recent invention. A quite revolutionary computer that he calls the Stormbreaker.”
Stormbreaker. Alex remembered the file he had found in Ian Rider’s office. Things were beginning to come together.
“The Stormbreaker is being manufactured by Sayle Enterprises,” Mrs. Jones said. “There’s been a lot of talk about the design. It has a black keyboard and black casing.”
“With a lightning bolt going down the side,” Alex said. He had seen a picture of it in
“It doesn’t only look different,” Blunt cut in. “It’s based on a completely new technology. It uses something called the round processor. I don’t suppose that will mean anything to you.”
“It’s an integrated circuit on a sphere of silicon about one millimeter in diameter,” Alex said. “It’s ninety percent cheaper to produce than an ordinary chip because the whole thing is sealed in so you don’t need clean rooms for production.”
“Oh. Yes…” Blunt coughed. “I’m surprised you know so much about it.”
“It must be my age,” Alex said.
“Well,” Blunt continued, “the point is, later today, Sayle Enterprises are going to make a quite remarkable announcement. They are planning to give away tens of thousands of these computers. In fact, it is their intention to ensure that every secondary school in England gets its own Stormbreaker. It’s an unparalleled act of generosity, Sayle’s way of thanking the country that gave him a home.”
“So the man’s a hero.”
