‘Bilderberg,’ Jarvis echoed. ‘You think that MJ–12 are involved with it?’
‘I’ve come to believe that Bilderberg is to some degree the vessel through which Majestic Twelve coordinate their activities.’
Jarvis was aware that few people knew of the existence, let alone the relevance, of the Bilderberg Group. Members of the Bilderberg, together with their sister organisations — the Trilateral Commission and the Council on Foreign Relations, were charged with the post — war take over of the democratic process. The measures implemented by the group provided general control of the world economy through indirect political means.
Bilderberg was originally conceived by Joseph H. Retinger and Prince Bernhard of the Netherlands. Prince Bernhard, at the time, was an important figure in the oil industry and held a major position in Royal Dutch Petroleum, also trading as Shell Oil, as well as Societe Generale de Belgique, an influential global corporation.
In 1952 Retinger approached Bernhard with a proposal for a covert conference to involve NATO leaders in general discussion on international affairs. The meeting would allow each participant to speak his mind freely because no media representative would be permitted inside; nor would there be any news bulletin about the meeting or the topics discussed. If any leaks occurred, the journalists responsible would be “discouraged” from reporting it.
In 1952 Bernhard approached the Truman Administration and briefed them about the proposed conference. However it was not until the Eisenhower Administration when the first American counterpart group was formed. From the outset the American group was influenced by the Rockefeller family, the owners of Standard Oil. From then on, the Bilderberg meetings reflected the concerns of the oil industry in its meetings.
Bilderberg took its name from the Bilderberg Hotel in Oosterbeek, Holland, where the first meeting took place in May, 1954. The concept of Bilderberg was not new, although none attracted and provoked global myths in the way that Bilderberg did. Groups such as Bohemian Grove, established in 1872 by San Franciscans, played a significant role in shaping post — war politics in the US. The Ditchley Park Foundation was established in 1953 in Britain with a similar aim.
Around a hundred and fifteen individuals attended each conference, each chosen based on their knowledge, standing and experience — just like the members of the rumoured Majestic Twelve, a cabal of shadowy, powerful figures whom Nellis was trying to expose.
‘What does Bilderberg have to do with Clearwater, Missouri?’ Jarvis asked.
‘The president’s briefing of this morning,’ Nellis replied. ‘It includes reference to major projects ongoing in the area, requested directly by the president himself. If what I’m sensing here is true, whatever happened in Clearwater is of interest to those attending this years’ Bilderberg Conference in Holland, and I want to know why. I need you to send your best two agents into Missouri and find out what the hell is behind those disappearances, and you need to be extra careful with this one Doug.’
‘How so?’
‘Three hundred people cannot just disappear in the United States without the involvement of at least one major government agency. Even if Majestic Twelve does have the influence to initiate such an event, they won’t have access to the kind of manpower required to complete the task.’
Jarvis nodded cautiously.
‘CIA, or maybe FBI,’ he replied.
‘They’ll be watching you,’ Nellis agreed as he stood up. ‘Watch your backs.’
III
‘I’m just saying that it doesn’t have the same kind of ring to it, you know?’
‘No I don’t know, and besides it’s not up to you any more is it?’
Ethan Warner folded his arms and shrugged as he looked up at the new sign his partner, Nicola Lopez, had installed above the door to their office. Lopez was beaming as she surveyed her work, her dark and exotic eyes sparkling with delight as she set an electric drill down on the sidewalk and pulled a band out of her pony tail to release a fall of dense black hair that reached half way down her back.
The original faded paint of Warner & Lopez Inc had been replaced with a brand new Lopez & Warner Inc in polished aluminium plate that shone in the dawn sunlight as Ethan surveyed it. The change of name had been Lopez’s idea — her insistence, when they had agreed to reform their partnership. After Ethan’s prolonged absence from the business, during which Lopez had struggled on alone, he had found it difficult to justify denying her the indulgence.
‘We’re going to have to buy new paperwork, business cards and register the new business name change with the IRS,’ Ethan pointed out.
‘Already done,’ Lopez replied, still admiring her handiwork.
‘You’re enjoying this.’
‘Yes I am,’ she said. ‘Things get done when I’m in charge.’
‘Speaking of which, what’s next on the list of jobs? Do we have much work coming in to this brave new empire of yours?’
Lopez’s studied delight deflated somewhat and her shoulders slumped as she led him into the office.
Ethan Warner pulled off his leather jacket and tossed it onto a couch beside the door. The small office contained little more than two desks, some filing cabinets, a security safe, a cooler and a small television. Posters on the walls portrayed numerous bail — jumpers in the Chicago area, right out as far as the border with Michigan. Bail bondsmen wasn’t a glamorous part of their work, and nor was being hired as private detectives, but it paid the bills.
‘Seventeen cases as of this morning,’ Lopez informed him as she surveyed their current case — load. ‘All bail jumpers, none of them high value and all likely in the Chicago metropolitan area or within easy reach of it.’
Ethan nodded as he gave the walls a cursory glance. ‘Not quite what was here before I left. Have you cleaned up Chicago’s streets single handed?’
‘It’s tough trying to do a two — person job on your own, case you hadn’t noticed,’ Lopez shot back with a dirty look. ‘Our reputation for speed and success took a hit for the year you were hiding out in the middle of nowhere, and the competition picked up the slack.’
Ethan raised his hands, not wanting to provoke Lopez into an argument.
‘I know,’ he said. ‘Let’s just get onto the best — paying case we’ve got and go from there, okay? Any word from the DIA?’
In recent years Ethan and Lopez had been fortunate enough, or unfortunate enough depending on how he looked at it, to have been contracted by the Defense Intelligence Agency to investigate cases the rest of the intelligence community had rejected as unworkable. The connection to a high level agency like the DIA had come from a former colleague of Ethan’s named Douglas Jarvis. The old man had once been captain of a United States Rifle Platoon and Ethan’s senior officer from his time with the Corps in Iraq and Afghanistan. Their friendship, cemented during Operation Iraqi Freedom and later, when Ethan had resigned his commission and been embedded with Jarvis’s men as a journalist, had continued into their unusual and discreet accord with the DIA where Jarvis continued to serve his country.
‘Nothing,’ Lopez admitted. ‘They’ve been quiet since Argentina.’
Ethan thought back briefly to their last investigation that had reached its conclusion high in the mountains of South America, when they had first encountered armed forces deployed by an unknown but extremely well equipped organisation that seemed to operate entirely outside the US Government. The discovery that he and Lopez had sought to protect, the remains of an alien species excavated from ancient Incan tombs high in the Andes, had been confiscated by the mysterious group in return for them escaping with their lives.