Spears of Defiance

by David Holman

  *

  It was two o’clock in the afternoon, when a nurse tapped her patient on the shoulder.

  Swan had also managed to rest. Not long after Gable had gone back to the hotel, another nurse had given him a pain-killing injection which had made him drowsy enough to sleep for hours.

  He was adjusting his eyes to the ward’s artificial lighting, when he noticed a figure at the end of the bed, and as he focused, saw it was a man in his mid-forties, wearing a dark sports-jacket over a pair of light-coloured slacks. Whoever he was, he looked official, his posture telling Swan he was someone of importance.

  At last, the stranger spoke to him. ‘Mr Swan, good afternoon. My name is Bancroft. I’m from Lion House. I was contacted by Doctor Cornwell.’

  Swan acknowledged him, recognising an educated Oxbridge brogue. ‘Does Mr Bancroft have a first name?’

  The man forced a smile. ‘It’s just Bancroft.’

  Swan sniggered. ‘What’s Lion House?’

  Bancroft explained it was attached to the British Embassy at Mount Pleasant. ‘Heard it was a road accident you were involved in. So, how are things?’ He listened as Swan informed Bancroft of his injuries. ‘Bad show,’ he replied, ‘So, you’ll be here for a few days, I expect?’

  Swan was still curious to where this man had come from. ‘And what goes on at Lion House?’

  Bancroft was suddenly elusive. ‘Well, it’s basically a little bit of intelligence gathering, I suppose.’

  Swan let out a laugh. ‘Intelligence gathering?’

  Bancroft scowled. ‘Well, not exactly, it’s more of a Foreign Office initiative, I would say.’

  Swan smiled as the man fumbled for what he thought would be the right words, this man with no first name and from the secretive Lion House. Why don’t he just say he is MI6? ‘So, what can I do for you, Mr Bancroft?’ Swan had already guessed that Bancroft, was a pseudonym.

  The man gestured to the empty chair. ‘May I?’

  Swan waved his good hand. ‘Be my guest.’ He watched as his fellow Englishman pulled the chair forward and sat down. ‘Firstly, seeing as you’re a British citizen, I wanted to see that you were okay.’

  ‘And secondly?’ Bancroft paused. ‘Well, Mr Swan. There really isn’t any kind way of asking this, so I’ll be blunt. I was wondering if you can tell me, what the bloody hell SID is doing here? Right now, this country is about to see the biggest change since Cecil Rhodes first walked across these lands, and here you are, obviously carrying out some cloak and dagger operation. I made enquiries to London as to what you could be doing here, and even Century House couldn’t throw any light on it.’

  Swan stared at the empty bed opposite and grinned. Bancroft was MI6. ‘I can see old Brimshaw’s face now when he suddenly heard SID was operating on one of his patches. He turned to him. ‘So, London sent you to find out?’

  Bancroft nodded. ‘Exactly that, Mr Swan. I’m hoping you are going to tell me, why all of a sudden, I find myself fending off the Rhodesian CIO from making official inquiries as to why British agents are on their soil? We have a good rapport with them right now, and C, wants answers.’

  Swan raised himself up in the bed, looking around the ward to check the other two patients. ‘Then you better pin back your ears, Mr Bancroft, because you just may not believe what I am about to tell you.’

  Swan began by informing of the incident on the train, followed by the discovery of the missing phials of Locust Rain at Porton Down. He noticed that Bancroft already looked astonished, and he hadn’t even got onto the stolen aircraft and the reasons SID had moved their investigation to Rhodesia. When he had finished, he saw a look on the MI6 agent’s face telling him Bancroft was either going to be sick or cry.

  Eventually, he spoke. ‘And you can prove that this plot to breach the Kariba Dam is genuine?’

  ‘From the taps on Henry Mallinson’s phone and our circumstantial evidence with the Locust Rain, the Buccaneer and the South African missiles, I’d say I’m ninety-nine percent certain.’

  ‘Dear God,’ sighed Bancroft. ‘And there is still no inkling into where this Buccaneer is?’

  Swan suddenly realised he had left this out of his terrifying monologue. ‘Well, this is not being helped by the fact that Gifford’s farm doesn’t seem to be on the register at Government House. Or, as my colleague and I suspect, has been removed.’

  Bancroft summed it all up. ‘So, until this farm can be found, nothing can prevent this from happening?’

  ‘It seems this band of brothers, are hell-bent in seeing this through to its bitter end,’ confirmed Swan.

  Bancroft quickly had a thought. ‘This must also mean there is someone involved in Government House, someone who has access to the records.’

  Swan nodded. ‘As a matter of fact, I already have my suspicions, and if I’m right, I’m expecting to be paid a visit by them very soon.’ He looked Bancroft directly in the eye. ‘You see, Mr Bancroft, my unfortunate encounter with a motor car was no accident.’

  Bancroft let out a gasp. ‘Sounds as though you’ve stirred up a hornet’s nest. So, who is this mystery person?’

  Swan smiled. ‘I’d rather not reveal that right now, but all will reveal itself, in good time, I assure you.’

  Bancroft had no more to say. He rose from the chair and shook Swan’s good hand. ‘Okay, Mr Swan. I’m going to leave things with you. I’m sure your colleague, what’s his name again?’

  ‘Andrew Gable.’

  The man nodded, ‘Gable, yes. Well, I’m sure he has things in hand, while you’re held up in here. Good day to you, Mr Swan.’

  ‘And to you, Mr Bancroft. Thank you for coming to see me, and do give my regards to Giles, when you report back to London.’

  The MI6 agent paused in recognition of C’s Christian name. This lame duck, obviously moved in high circles amongst the British intelligence community, he thought.

  ‘I will, Mr Swan. Have a speedy recovery, and good luck.’

  22

  At the Ambassador Hotel, Andrew Gable, fully refreshed from his late morning sleep, had met up with Cunningham and Munroe for lunch.

  The South African mercenary had recommended a restaurant on the east side of the city, popular with his old Selous Scout pals. A white-coated waiter came to their table to take their order, and perusing the menu, Gable decided on Dovi, a peanut-butter stew.

  Cunningham went for Bobotie, a lamb meatloaf, whereas Munroe chose his favourite dish, something he had always enjoyed when operating with the scouts, a meat dish with cubes of beef, rolled in suet casings and known as, boerewors.

  While they waited for their meals, the conversation had soon turned to the progress of Alex Swan. During the journey in the taxi, Gable had brought them up to date on his state and injuries. ‘Alex thinks Wyatt had something to do with it?’

  Cunningham scowled. ‘I think he’s up to his neck in this whole affair man. He’s betrayed people before, so he can easily betray again.’

  Gable agreed. ‘What do we do about it, then, gentlemen?’

  Cunningham slammed his fist on the table. ‘I know what I would like to do to the bastard!’

  To Gable’s relief, the waiter had returned with their meals.

  *

  In the hospital ward, Swan observed the doctor doing his rounds. His first patient was a heavily-built man, whose bed was situated on the far side near the other set of double doors leading out of the ward. Swan could only guess what this man was in hospital for. The man lay almost perfectly still under what looked like Mount Everest. Swan suspected it was for a hernia operation.

  The nurse then pulled the curtains around the bed in preparation for the doctor to examine him.

  A few seconds later, Swan then heard a few cries of pain, suggesting the doctor was being vigorous in his examination. Poor chap, he thought. He suddenly began to feel his own pain return, indicating it was about time for another injection of morphine.

  Later, just as it was beginning to get dark outside, Swan was a
woken by a female voice. He opened his eyes. It hadn’t been a dream, the familiar grey-green eyes of his wife were looking straight at him as she stood beside his bed. ‘Is that really you, darling, or is this pain killer really that good?’ Swan joked.

  Janet Swan leant over, her auburn hair falling on his cheek. She kissed him on the lips and smiled. ‘There, what does that tell you?’

  Swan raised himself up in the bed as Janet grabbed some pillows to support him. He shook his head in disbelief, staring lovingly at her. ‘What are you doing here?’

  She removed her brown suede coat and sat down on the big chair. ‘I was still in the office sorting through the files for the review, when Andrew called. After the call, I just froze. I must have been sitting there for a while, then I looked at the files and thought, no, these can all wait. My husband needs me right now. So, I phoned the airport and managed to make a reservation for the seven-twenty-five flight this morning, and here I am. I caught a taxi from the airport. Oh, before I boarded the plane, I phoned Diane to inform Soames of my intentions. SID is incapacitated at present, until you’re back on your feet again. If anything crops up, bound for our desks, Five can handle it, until we’re back in operation. I’m sure John will understand.’

  Swan sighed. What could he do? His wife had joined him after they had got married and had run the engine room for SID ever since. He wouldn’t be without her in the office. ‘Well, there’s really nothing else to say, is there, as far as that’s concerned? You’re here.’ He reached out his good arm to grab her hand. ‘And I’m so pleased you are.’ He then realised she had nowhere to stay, but after putting it to her, he smiled when she had said she wasn’t going anywhere.

  In the Meikles Hotel, Gable sat with Cunningham and Munroe on stools at the bar.

  It was getting late and although Gable had managed to rest earlier, he was now feeling extremely tired again. One night cap and he would head back to his hotel, leaving these two to play out their little charade a bit longer. From being with them for the afternoon, he felt Swan could be right about what he said. Munroe certainly had acted close with the NIS man. Almost as Swan suggested, like they were old pals. He said his goodbyes as the two men ordered more drinks.

  Outside, he jumped into a taxi. As he relaxed in the back being driven back, he looked at his watch; there was still enough time to say goodnight to Sandra when he would return to his room. He also planned to go back to the hospital in the morning.

  *

  The yellow Post Office Telecommunications van was parked once again outside the entrance to Mallinson’s mansion, and inside it, Sophie Lewis checked herself for the things she would need.

  Behind her, Luke Walsh, A-Section’s techno wizard, checked his kit.

  Lewis turned to the driver, a dark-haired man in his thirties with stubble. ‘Best if you drive away for a bit, give us about an hour then come back for us.’

  The driver nodded impatiently. He had done this kind of work many times, so really didn’t need to be told what to do, especially by a woman who had screwed up a surveillance operation.

  Lewis sensed his resentment to her and decided to remind him she wasn’t the only one to make a mistake. ‘Oh, if another old lady comes along to inform you her telephone isn’t working, you won’t just go telling her to phone the operator for an engineer, will you, Tristan?’

  Walsh let out a snigger as they climbed out of the vehicle and were left at the gates, as Tristan Glover, now in a huff from her embarrassing last remark, drove off to park further away from the house.

  Lewis gazed at the darkened building. They had been parked for a few hours, keeping the place under surveillance until just after midnight, the lights had been turned out. Both knew that Mallinson himself had boarded a plane at Heathrow, bound for Kenya and therefore assumed it was staff who remained inside.

  Having scanned the house for the last few nights, it had been established there was no burglar alarms. They had also confirmed this with the local police station, as no telephone link was evident.

  Lewis moved quickly with her partner towards the back entrance.

  Walsh inserted a pick it into the lock and after carefully jiggling inside, had soon opened the white wood-panelled door. This took them into a small room off the kitchen, where appliances such as a large twin tub washing machine and a long chest freezer were stored. He turned to her. ‘Okay, Sophie, you’re in. Go and do your stuff.’

  A few days earlier, posing as a British Telecommunications engineer, Walsh had been able to survey the interior of the house by needing to inspect the 11 telephones in various rooms. Before that, he had sabotaged the line to the house to warrant the visit. Then, on the way back to Thames House, he sat in the passenger seat of the distinctive yellow van to carefully draw out a rough plan of the house from memory. Their target for tonight, was Mallinson’s study situated on the ground floor.

  From the earlier observation of the top room light being extinguished, they assumed the house-sitter would be in this attic room.

  Sophie Lewis was a dab-hand at break-ins which stemmed back to her teenage days. Raised in foster care, she had often mixed with the wrong crowd finding herself in trouble with the police. One occasion had been when she had been caught in an office on an industrial estate trying to steal an electronic typewriter. The authorities wanted to press charges, although she would always remember what her social worker had said to her as she travelled with her in the police car to the station. ‘Sophie, you’re either going to end up as a burglar or a spy!’ At this moment, Lewis thought, old Dotty had been right on both accounts. She would always be grateful to the silver-haired old bat for what happened afterwards. In place of sending her to a girls’ borstal for her crime, Dotty had negotiated for leniency and she had been sent away to a boarding school in Kent. There, she had finally saw the error of her ways, and had attained good qualifications progressing to read Economics at Brighton University. Graduating with a first, she was recruited by MI5 as a research analyst, but being a girl of action, had soon become bored with being deskbound and had put in for field operations.

  Following the recent debrief on the surveillance on Ramir, she had been asked to remain behind, and by the time Stratton had finished with her, had left his office disheartened. ‘If there was a special place for all the officers who had made dreadful mistakes, such as this,’ he had hollered, ‘then I’d send you there!’ Instead, she had found herself back at a desk, sifting through names of illegals who had been placed on the watch list. This was it she thought, deskwork for the rest of her career at Thames House.

  Up to yesterday, she had even thought of quitting. It was only when she had received an internal call from Stratton requesting for her reputable burglary skills, she had instantly changed her mind.

  Using a pen light torch, she surveyed the small plan in her latex-gloved hand and moved herself through the hall to Mallinson’s study. Entering the room, she waved the light around it until she located the desk indicated on Walsh’s drawing. Reaching into her pocket, she slipped out a small black case of lockpicks.

  The drawer of the walnut desk had a lock she liked; a small pinned affair which opened easily after she had selected the appropriate tool for the job. Shining the light into the drawer, she shuffled around the contents, but had discovered nothing of interest. She closed the drawer and locked it again, then scanned the room for other furniture.

  The light fell onto a bureau near the window, half-hidden by a large curtain, which she grabbed and tucked behind it. Of course, the bureau was locked, but selecting the appropriate pick, soon made this obsolete. She pulled down the flap to a set of papers and a large red bound book which she discovered was a desk diary. Examining the papers, she noticed they were from a solicitor and concerned a divorce decree from a Mrs Tracey, Jayne, Mallinson.

  Although she was eager to know what the soon to be ex-wife was leaving her husband for, unless it was terrorism, this was not relevant to this operation. She turned to the back page, and realis
ing it hadn’t yet been signed, suggested to her it was still being contested. Below the desktop flap, were a set of three drawers, and Sophie noticed she would require the same pick to open them. Her attention went back to the diary. Thumbing through the pages, she took in a page of names, addresses and telephone numbers. She looked around for a table lamp and remembered there was one on the desk she had examined earlier.

  Taking the diary over to the desk, she placed it down and turned on the lamp. Thankfully. it was one with a shade designed for reading, so it only illuminated the area on the desk. The diary pages were lit under it enough for her next task.

  Her Minolta 16 MPG sub-miniature camera, was soon in her hands and focussing on the pages, she pulled back the cover of the device and clicked. Turning more pages, she repeated the process, then paused.

  Turning to pages for the last week in November, and this week, the first in December, she noticed these had been torn out. She went back over to the bureau and searched through the divorce papers, and not being successful in finding the missing diary pages, decided to search the drawers. The contents mainly consisted of things you expected to find among a man’s effects such as road maps, some old used golfing score cards, car keys and a pair of taupe leather driving gloves. She was about to resign her search and close the drawers, when she noticed not putting the maps back properly had caused them to catch on the roof of the top drawer. Placing her hand inside to free them, she felt they were caught on a protruding panel. Suddenly, her curiosity was raised and taking the maps out, she placed her hand back inside. Fumbling her fingers around the panel, she felt what appeared to be a small button. She pressed it and jolted as a flap came down to hit the floor of the drawer. A thin cardboard manila file slid towards her. ‘Bingo!’

  Sophie Lewis smiled triumphantly at her discovery and took it over to the desk. Under the light, she opened the file to a photograph of a dam. Then, sifting through, she found a map showing the location of this dam with pencilled annotations together with other photos, including a portrait of a smiling black man in military uniform. She had seen this face somewhere before, noting he had recently been on television. She had also found the missing diary pages. She continued through the file. Next, was a couple of pictures of a vehicle with two missiles on it, the words Strela-2 written in ink on the bottom border. She picked up her camera again to take pictures of all the items she had discovered.