Angel of Destruction

by Christopher Nicole

  ‘Billy . . . you don’t mind if I call you Billy, do you? I mean, since you retired me, you are no longer my boss or employer, and I feel, as you’re here on my island, we should drop both formality and, if you’ll pardon the expression, bullshit.’ She gazed at him from enormous eyes.

  He flushed, and endeavoured to regain his ground, trying to keep his eyes on her face. ‘I have always had the highest regard for you, Anna, and have always had your best interests at heart.’

  ‘Is that why you sent me on at least one suicide mission?’

  Again he flushed. ‘I . . . well . . . believe me, those weren’t my decisions. I was obeying orders. Under protest.’

  ‘Do you know, I do believe you. But then, I always was a soft touch for a sob story.’

  ‘I’d like to think that we could be friends.’

  ‘You mean after, and despite, what you are trying to work yourself up to say. Tell you what: why not say it, and then we can talk about being friends.’

  ‘You are a singularly direct young woman.’

  ‘It helps.’

  He drew a deep breath. ‘This Mexican business . . .’

  ‘Has absolutely nothing to do with you, or MI6.’

  ‘It could have, if you were ever to be arrested, or even connected, with the crime.’

  ‘I beg your pardon.’

  ‘All right, all right. I beg your pardon. An execution, was it? All five men were equally guilty.’

  ‘As a matter of fact, they were. But had they lived, they could have prevented my escape.’

  ‘The ultimate crime.’

  ‘Billy, you’re not doing too well in the friendship stakes. But just to put your mind at rest, there is absolutely no risk of the Mexican police tracing me to here.’ I hope and pray, she thought.

  ‘You’re probably right. But, suppose, that as the only thing they have on you is an Irish passport, they ask for help from both the Garda and Scotland Yard—’

  ‘Neither of whom are aware of my existence, so far as I know. And as my Irish passport is forged, they can’t carry that any further either. I simply do not exist.’

  ‘Again, you are probably right. But once an inquiry is made, they’re obliged to do all they can, look wherever they can for an answer. This was a highly professional and quite ruthless, ah, execution.’

  ‘Why, Billy, you say the sweetest things.’

  ‘So, they might well feel we could have some idea of whom this international assassin might be.’

  ‘Do I detect a touch of the iron fist inside the velvet glove? Don’t you protect your operatives, active or retired, no matter what?’

  ‘I certainly would like to do so. But I am, as I am sure you know, only a cog in a vast machine. We are loyal to our employees as long as they are loyal to us. But I am sure you would agree that if one of our people suddenly turned into a homicidal maniac, well, we would be duty bound to do something about it. Even if it meant ending this paradise you have here.’

  ‘I think you need to bear in mind that you are at this moment resident on the homicidal maniac’s island, where her word is law.’

  ‘The office knows where I am.’

  ‘Of course. But there isn’t a lot they could do if you were, for instance, to fall overboard from my boat while out fishing, and drowned.’

  ‘I’m a strong swimmer.’

  ‘Ah, but you see, you’d hit your head in going over, and before we could get you back on board . . . these things do happen, quite regularly. Especially with people who know nothing about boats and the sea.’

  He gazed at her. ‘You’re serious, aren’t you?’

  ‘I’m only as serious as you are, Billy. But we both have our duties in life. Yours is to King and Country. Mine is to me and mine. Threaten mine and you threaten me. You should remember that the Third Reich made that mistake.’

  ‘You, young lady, are suffering an extreme case of hubris.’

  ‘I know,’ she agreed. ‘It keeps me alive.’

  He licked his lips, leaned forward. ‘Anna, we’re on your side, believe me.’

  ‘Convince me.’

  ‘Anna, you may have no doubt of your ability to protect yourself, and your family, but you’re in an extremely vulnerable position. We know you are working with the Yanks. That is your decision, and I have no doubt that they will protect you as far as they can. But they can’t protect you on British soil, without risking an international incident. Only we can do that.’

  ‘Only you’re not prepared to.’

  ‘Yes, we are. If you’ll play ball with us.’

  ‘Sorry, Billy, I’m not prepared to stop working for the CIA. I can’t.’

  ‘We accept that. But I say again, on British soil, only we can protect you, when you are found out, as you must be eventually.’

  ‘Even if you have to contribute to the finding. So tell me the price tag. I am sure there is one.’

  ‘We would like you to come out of retirement, just once, to do a last job for us.’

  Anna burst out laughing. ‘You have got to be the most utter hypocrite who has ever walked the earth.’

  ‘That also goes with the job.’

  ‘And you felt it necessary to go through all of that blackmailing-type preamble about my dangers and your ability to help me, but only if I helped you?’

  ‘I was feeling my way. Do you accept?’

  ‘You will have to tell me what this job is.’

  ‘Before I do, I wish you to listen to me, very carefully. This will be the most secret mission you have ever undertaken, and we are turning to you because after due consideration we feel that you are the one, perhaps the only one, who can bring it off.’

  ‘It’s so pleasant to be loved.’

  ‘This job has been sanctioned at the very highest level, as its successful completion is regarded as essential not only for the safety of the nation, but for the safety of the world.’

  ‘Spare me the heroic rhetoric.’

  ‘There is, however,’ Baxter went on, ‘a caveat.’

  ‘Isn’t there always?’

  ‘The British Government, MI6, cannot possibly be involved. We will provide you with all the information at our disposal, and with as much back-up as we can, but if you were to be apprehended, either before or after the completion of your assignment, and chose, or were forced, to admit your guilt, we would utterly dissociate ourselves from you; your confession would be the ravings of a madwoman.’

  ‘Doesn’t that also go with the job?’

  ‘The same would apply if you accepted the assignment and then chose not to carry it through, but rather to treat it as, perhaps, a story to peddle. Then we would not only disown you, but make life very difficult for you, and yours, no matter where you fled to.’

  ‘It’s nearly breakfast time. Do you think you could get on?’

  ‘However,’ he continued, now unflappable, ‘should you be unable to return from the assignment, we will guarantee the safety and prosperity of your family, your pets and your island for the rest of their lives. And should you succeed in carrying out the assignment, and getting back home, we will also protect you from arrest by any foreign government, providing you with guaranteed alibis for all the time you were away.’

  ‘Tell me about this foreign government.’

  ‘Have you ever heard of a man called Jan Edel?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘He’s an atomic scientist. One of the best.’

  ‘And he’s been selling his stuff to Moscow? So why do you want him dead? You’ve locked Fuchs up, not hanged him.’

  ‘Edel has left England.’

  ‘And you think he’s in Moscow? Sorry, Billy, I’m going to have to pass. If I’m going to Moscow, I might as well blow my brains out, here and now.’

  ‘He isn’t in Moscow. He’s in Argentina.’

  Anna frowned in genuine confusion. ‘What’s important about that? Don’t tell me they’re thinking of building a bomb? Can they? Don’t they need enriched uranium?’

 
‘We don’t know whether they are capable of building a bomb or not, although there are reports of uranium being found down in the south.’

  ‘That still sounds like an hysterical overreaction to me,’ Anna remarked. ‘Haven’t they got to build all sorts of factories and laboratories, create test sites, et cetera? Not to mention a delivery system. It would take them years to get something like that off the ground. That is, supposing they wanted to, or could afford it.’

  ‘That’s another imponderable,’ Billy said. ‘We do know that this chap Peron is inclined to fascism, and we’re pretty sure his government is sheltering quite a few Nazis. Amongst them, Adolf Eichmann. Did you ever meet him?’

  ‘Yes. I thought he was a nasty piece of work. And that was before I knew that he was responsible for the implementation of the Final Solution.’

  ‘A plan, if I remember rightly, that you got hold of when it was first mooted, in 1941. And no one would believe you.’

  ‘And if I remember rightly, one of those who wouldn’t believe me was you.’

  ‘I know. It was simply too horrendous a concept for a reasonably civilized brain to take in.’

  ‘But you’re not sending me after Eichmann.’

  ‘Hunting fugitive war criminals is not in our remit.’ He grinned. ‘You don’t want to forget that in certain circles you are one of them. I just used Eichmann as an example to prove that the current Argentinian government is not averse to fascist ideas. Edel is the man we want. He’s not averse to fascist ideas himself. In fact, to get him on our side before the Nazis nabbed him for themselves, we had to kidnap him from Copenhagen; he thought Hitler was one of the best.’

  ‘And that’s a reason for wanting him dead? This sounds to me like a pre-emptive strike, Billy. Not my scene. You probably won’t believe this, but I have to live with myself. Show me a crime against humanity.’

  ‘You went to Moscow in 1940, to carry out a pre-emptive strike. On Stalin.’

  ‘There happened to be a war on, and in my circumstances, as I’m sure you can remember, I didn’t have any choice. Now I do. You’ll have to give me a better reason than this character’s politics.’

  ‘How about hate, for all mankind?’

  Anna blew a raspberry. ‘And he wound up working on the Manhattan Project? You people need your heads examined.’

  ‘Look, as far as we were concerned, time was running out. We had to get the bomb before anyone else did. However reluctantly, Edel played a vital part in that; he is the supreme pragmatist. But as his views became more extreme, he was sidelined. He was then caught trying to sell our atomic secrets to the Nazis. Fortunately, they entirely misunderstood its importance. As the war was still on, Edel was convicted of treason and sentenced to death.’

  ‘But you are saying he’s still alive.’

  ‘There were a lot of appeals, and the war ended before he could be hanged. So the sentence was commuted to life imprisonment.’

  ‘Again, you people need your heads examined.’

  ‘I know, we have this terrible weakness for letting bygones be bygones.’

  ‘And now he’s escaped, is that it?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘So what’s upsetting you? The only people he could possibly sell the bomb to are the Russians, and they already have it.’

  ‘What the judiciary forgot, or perhaps never knew, was that Edel had access to some very specialized info, which at that time was not considered practical, but which is now very much on the cards.’

  ‘What info?’ At last Anna was genuinely interested.

  ‘How much do you know about the atomic process?’

  ‘Not a lot. If, by bombarding it with neutrons or whatever, you manage to split an atom of uranium – the right sort of uranium – you can release an unbelievable amount of energy.’

  ‘Simplistic, but accurate enough. And then you have the ultimate explosive, right? A nuclear device.’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘Only you don’t. I mean, have the ultimate explosive.’

  ‘Say again?’

  ‘It is possible to use a controlled nuclear explosion to split an atom of hydrogen. In that case, you have a thermonuclear explosion, which is about a thousand times the magnitude of an atomic bomb.’

  Anna stared at him. ‘I hope you’re joking.’

  ‘The bomb dropped on Hiroshima,’ Baxter said, ‘as I am sure you know, completely obliterated roughly a square mile in the centre of the city. It has been calculated that one of the upgraded bombs, a hydrogen bomb, would be able completely to obliterate virtually all of London.’

  ‘I’m afraid that is a bit much to assimilate before breakfast. And you say this is practical, and not just somebody’s nightmare?’

  ‘President Truman has given the go-ahead for work to commence on manufacturing a hydrogen bomb. That will restore America’s lead in weapons of mass destruction. The Russians will get it eventually, of course, but the general feeling is that, barring some quite unforeseen catastrophe in international relations, neither side would ever use it, as a war fought with thermonuclear weapons would certainly extinguish civilization. The nightmare is that a rogue state, or a state controlled by a rogue dictator, might come into possession of such a weapon. There are quite a few countries in the world that are theoretically capable of developing atomic power.’

  ‘And Edel—’

  ‘Is one of the very few men in the world who know both the formula and the method required.’

  ‘And you say he’s a fascist? I can see why he hates your guts.’

  ‘I’m afraid he hates everybody’s guts, here in the West.’

  ‘As do a lot of people,’ Anna mused.

  ‘Yes. And you should know better than anyone that if Hitler had managed to obtain the bomb before we did he’d have used it.’

  ‘And you didn’t execute this Edel when you had the chance. Isn’t a government’s prime duty to protect the lives and property of its citizens, no matter what it takes? You people are really not fit to govern anything.’

  ‘You could have a point. Will you correct that mistake for us?’

  Anna considered, briefly. ‘You say he’s in Buenos Aires?’

  ‘He’s in Pont del Mar.’

  ‘Bridge of the Sea? What does that mean?’

  ‘It’s a fishing port a few miles farther south than Buenos Aires, but it’s being developed as a resort. Apparently it’s built on two sides of an inlet of the ocean, and has a rather elaborate bridge connecting them.’

  ‘How do you know that Edel is there?’

  ‘We have him under constant surveillance.’

  ‘But you can’t do anything about him yourselves.’

  ‘We have him under surveillance from an independent source. We, Great Britain, can’t afford to be involved in this. It could cause an international incident; as far as anyone knows, Edel is a world famous scientist who wishes to turn his back on the whole atomic business. There are a lot of ill-informed do-gooders around who would say, thank God for people like him. And with the Argentine government constantly muttering about the true ownership of the Falklands – they call them the Malvinas – it could be tricky.’

  ‘Because your government doesn’t want to go to war with anybody.’

  ‘Because our government simply cannot afford to go to war with anybody. It’s just about bankrupt.’

  ‘And of course, the arrest and execution, after suitable torture, of an obviously deranged Irishwoman could not possibly have anything to do with you. I’m not altogether unknown in South America, you know.’

  ‘You’re wanted for murder in Brazil. But Brazil and Argentina don’t have a lot in common. Not even the language. I assume that you do speak Spanish?’

  ‘I took a crash course in it, yes.’ She smiled at him. ‘When I retired.’

  ‘Are you prescient?’

  ‘Possibly. But I was told to do it.’

  ‘By your CIA bosses.’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘Because they emplo
y you chiefly in South America.’

  ‘That is something you will have to ask them.’

  ‘So will you do this job for us? We will provide you with a new identity . . .’

  ‘Irish, of course.’

  ‘Well, you are Irish, aren’t you?’

  ‘So tell me why you can’t involve the CIA?’

  He grimaced. ‘We’re not exactly flavour of the month in Washington, right now, as regards secrets. They think we’ve leaked too many of them to the wrong people. They were pretty fed up when Edel’s sentence was commuted, and they have no idea that he has escaped. If they were to find out before we can guarantee that he is no longer around, they’d never trust us with anything again.’

  ‘Including, of course, the necessary information on making one of these hydrogen bombs yourselves.’

  ‘I’m afraid you’re probably right. That’s why it has to be kept absolutely secret, even from your current employers. Will you do it?’

  ‘You haven’t mentioned the fee.’

  ‘Eh?’

  ‘Money, Billy. How much are you offering?’

  ‘When you worked for us during the war, you worked for nothing.’

  ‘The Nazis were paying my bills. But the war is over, Billy. And I’m a big girl now.’

  ‘Hm. I’m authorized to offer you ten thousand pounds in US dollars. This will be paid in cash, and there will be no documentation. That means you do not have to account for any of it. But it will have to cover all your expenses. Anything left on completion is yours to keep.’

  ‘Your generosity staggers me.’

  ‘So, do we have a contract?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I require something more.’

  ‘I am not authorized—’

  ‘Yes, you are. You are authorized to offer me the protection of the British Government, once I complete this assignment.’

  ‘Well, yes. That is what I said.’

  ‘I want the complete protection of the British Government no matter what.’

  ‘I’m not sure what you mean,’ he said, uneasily.

  ‘Simply that if any trigger-happy maniac turns up on my island, I am entitled to defend myself, and no questions asked.’

  ‘Is that likely to happen?’