Playing the Game Read Online Free PDF Page A

discussed within these walls was never repeated. There were certainly no minutes taken, and it was with the up-most care that each member ensured there was no record of them ever having being there.
                It was Chairman Paul McCrane who spoke first. ‘Gentlemen, once again here we are. I’d like to thank everybody for taking time out of their hectic schedules to find the time to attend, but as I’m sure you all agree, we have one or two pressing matters to attend to this time around’. There were various grumbles of agreement from the members around the room.
                ‘Not least of which, the activities of who the media’, he turned half-nodding to Farrington, ‘has dubbed The Chemist . Jameson, would you care to update us?’
                Jameson Burr cleared his throat and stood up. ‘Well we’ve all seen the news, haven’t we? It seems we might have a problem. As we discussed just over six months ago, Paul and I drew up a list of candidates of individuals that could, well, operate on our behalf. Individuals that would have no hesitation in assisting us with a problem in an upcoming trial. We settled on one person who we thought was right for the job. The person that the media, as Paul quite rightly pointed out, has since dubbed The Chemist ’.
                ‘So where did you dig this person up from?’ Thomas Brittles was keen to know more, ‘It’s not like you can randomly walk up to someone in the street for this line of work is it?’
                ‘Indeed not’, Jameson continued ‘and it’s funny you should say that Thomas. This person was convicted of a particularly nasty triple homicide seven years ago, you denied their appeal personally’. A look of surprise dawned on his face, as if he were fitting the last piece of a jigsaw into a particularly difficult puzzle.
                ‘You mean to say that that individual is free, roaming the streets of LA as we speak’, Brittles was almost incredulous.
                ‘That is exactly what I mean to say’, Jameson nodded in a sombre tone. ‘We had this individual covertly released from San Quentin six months ago, although you can be assured that there is no paper trail – as far as the system is concerned, this person has not, and never will be, a recorded inmate of San Quentin. The governor is a very close personal friend of ours. In fact, we have, at some considerable cost to ourselves, practically erased this person from existence. As far as we can tell, there is no record on any system, anywhere. This person was supposed to be at our service, to carry out several actions at our discretion, after which, we would have returned this person to San Quentin for life. Solitary confinement would have been the order of the day. However, as we now know, things didn't quite go according to plan’.
                'We should have used one of our existing contractors', Conway chastised, shaking his head. 'It's not as if we don't have several people we can reach out to for favours is it?'
                'Well that was an option that came up, Conrad', Burr responded. 'But as we know, this isn't one action, it's four; and four actions means that the manhunt for the perpetrator would be massively increased once the obvious link between the actions is established; and with that, the risk that the perpetrator could be linked with us increases also'.
                'Remind me again why we thought it pertinent to go down this avenue', Brindle wanted to know. He had been absent from the last meeting of the Animi six months ago when this plan was implemented, having to remain within easy reach of the president as the campaign trail intensified throughout the country. His attendance today had only been confirmed last night. Even though he had been sure he would be able to attend, his schedule was often subject to external factors beyond his control. He