Eagle Strike

by Anthony Horowitz

  The two men walked off into the hospital grounds as if nothing had taken place. The fake doctor removed his white coat and stuffed it into one of the bins. He was wearing an ordinary suit underneath and he saw that there was blood on the front of his shirt. His nose was bleeding, but that was good. When he went back into the hospital, he would simply look like one of the patients.

  The ambulance drove slowly away. If anyone had bothered to look, they would have seen that the driver was dressed in exactly the same clothes as the other crews. Liz Pleasure actually noticed it leave, sitting in her VW in the car park. She was still there half an hour later, wondering what had happened to Sabina. But it would be a while yet before she realized that her daughter had disappeared.

  UNFAIR EXCHANGE

  It was five o’clock when Alex arrived at London’s City Airport, the end of a long, frustrating day that had seen him travelling by road and by air across three countries. He and Jack had taken the bus from Amsterdam to Antwerp, arriving just too late for the lunchtime flight. They had killed three hours at the airport, finally boarding an old-fashioned Fokker 50 that seemed to take for ever crossing over to England. Alex wondered now if he had wasted too much time avoiding Damian Cray. A whole day had gone. But at least the airport was on the right side of London, not too far from Liverpool Street and the offices of MI6.

  Alex intended to take the flash drive straight to Alan Blunt. He would have telephoned ahead but he couldn’t be sure that Blunt would even take the call. One thing was certain. He wouldn’t feel safe until he had handed over the device. Once MI6 had it in their hands, he would be able to relax.

  That was his plan – but everything changed as he stepped into the arrivals hall. There was a woman sitting at a coffee bar reading the evening newspaper. The front page was open. It was almost as if it had been put there for Alex to see. A photograph of Sabina. And a headline:

  SCHOOLGIRL DISAPPEARS FROM HOSPITAL

  “This way,” Jack was saying. “We can get a cab.”

  “Jack!”

  Jack saw the look on his face and followed his eyes to the newspaper. Without saying another word, she hurried into the airport’s only shop and bought a copy for herself.

  There wasn’t very much to the story – but at this stage there wasn’t a lot to tell. A fifteen-year-old schoolgirl from south London had been visiting her father at Whitchurch Hospital that morning. He had recently been injured in a terrorist incident in the South of France. Inexplicably she had never reached the ward, but instead had vanished into thin air. The police were urging any witnesses to come forward. Her mother had already made a television appeal for Sabina to come home.

  “It’s Cray,” Alex said. His voice was empty. “He’s got her.”

  “Oh God, Alex.” Jack sounded as wretched as he felt. “He’s done this to get the flash drive. We should have thought…”

  “There was no way we could have expected this. How did he even know she was my friend?” Alex thought for a moment. “Yassen.” He answered his own question. “He must have told Cray.”

  “You have to go to MI6 straight away. It’s the only thing you can do.”

  “No. I want to go home first.”

  “Alex – why?”

  Alex looked down at the picture one last time, then crumpled the page in his hands. “Cray may have left a message for me,” he said.

  There was a message. But it came in a form that Alex hadn’t quite expected.

  Jack had gone into the house first, checking to make sure there was no one waiting for them. Then she called Alex. She looked grim as she stood at the front door.

  “It’s in the sitting room,” she said.

  “It” was a brand-new widescreen television. Someone had been into the house. They had brought the television and left it in the middle of the room. There was a webcam perched on top; a brand-new red cable snaked into a junction box in the wall.

  “A present from Cray,” Jack murmured.

  “I don’t think it’s a present,” Alex said.

  There was a remote control next to the webcam. Reluctantly Alex picked it up. He knew he wasn’t going to like what he was about to see, but there was no way he could ignore it. He turned the television on.

  The screen flickered and cleared and suddenly he found himself face to face with Damian Cray. Somehow he wasn’t surprised. He wondered if Cray had returned to England or if he was transmitting from Amsterdam. He knew that this was a live image and that his own picture would be sent back via the webcam. Slowly he sat down in front of the screen. He showed no emotion at all.

  “Alex!” Cray looked relaxed and cheerful. His voice was so clear he could have been in the room with them. “I’m so glad you got back safely. I’ve been waiting to speak to you.”

  “Where’s Sabina?” Alex asked.

  “Where’s Sabina? Where’s Sabina? How very sweet! Young love!”

  The image changed. Alex heard Jack gasp. Sabina was lying on a bunk in a bare room. Her hair was dishevelled but otherwise she seemed unhurt. She looked up at the camera and Alex could see the fear and confusion in her eyes.

  Then the picture switched back to Cray. “We haven’t damaged her … yet,” he said. “But that could change at any time.”

  “I’m not giving you the flash drive,” Alex said.

  “Hear me out, Alex.” Cray leant forward so that he seemed to come closer to the screen. “Young people these days are so hot-headed! I’ve gone to a great deal of trouble and expense on account of you. And the thing is, you are going to give me the flash drive because if you don’t your girlfriend is going to die, and you are going to see it on video.”

  “Don’t listen to him, Alex!” Jack exclaimed.

  “He is listening to me and I’d ask you not to interrupt!” Cray smiled. He seemed totally confident, as if this were nothing more than another celebrity interview. “I can imagine what’s going through your mind,” he went on, speaking again to Alex. “You’re thinking of going to your friends at MI6. I would seriously advise against it.”

  “How do you know we haven’t been to them already?” Jack asked.

  “I very much hope you haven’t,” Cray replied. “Because I am a very nervous man. If I think anyone is making enquiries about me, I will kill the girl. If I find myself being watched by people I don’t know, I will kill the girl. If a policeman so much as glances at me in the street, I may well kill the girl. And this I promise you. If you do not bring me the flash drive, personally, before ten o’clock tomorrow morning, I will certainly kill the girl.”

  “No!” Alex was defiant.

  “You can lie to me, Alex, but you can’t lie to yourself. You don’t work for MI6. They mean nothing to you. But the girl does. If you abandon her, you’ll regret it for the rest of your life. And it won’t end with her. I will hunt down the rest of your friends. Don’t underestimate my power! I will destroy everything and everyone you know. And then I will come after you. So don’t kid yourself. Get it over with now. Give me what I want.”

  There was a long silence.

  “Where can I find you?” Alex asked. The words tasted sour in his mouth. They tasted of defeat.

  “I am at my house in Wiltshire. You can get a taxi from Bath station. All the drivers know where I live.”

  “If I bring it to you…” Alex found himself struggling to find the right words. “How do I know that you’ll let her go? How do I know you’ll let either of us go?”

  “Exactly!” Jack had chipped in again. “How do we know we can trust you?”

  “I’m a knight of the realm!” Cray exclaimed. “The Queen trusts me; you can too!”

  The screen went blank.

  Alex turned to Jack. For once he was helpless. “What do I do?” he asked.

  “Ignore him, Alex. Go to MI6.”

  “I can’t, Jack. You heard what he said. Before ten o’clock tomorrow morning. MI6 won’t be able to do anything before then, and if they try something, Cray will kill Sab.” He rested his head
in his hands. “I couldn’t allow that to happen. She’s only in this mess because of me. I couldn’t live with myself afterwards.”

  “But, Alex… A lot more people could get hurt if Eagle Strike – whatever it is – goes ahead.”

  “We don’t know that.”

  “You think Cray would do all this if he was just going to rob a bank or something?”

  Alex said nothing.

  “Cray is a killer, Alex. I’m sorry. I wish I could be more helpful. But I don’t think you can just walk into his house.”

  Alex thought about it. He thought for a long time. As long as Cray had Sabina, he held all the cards. But perhaps there was a way he could get her out of there. It would mean giving himself up. Once again he would become Cray’s prisoner. But with Sabina free, Jack would be able to contact MI6. And perhaps – just perhaps – Alex might come out of this alive.

  Quickly he outlined his idea to Jack. She listened – but the more she heard, the unhappier she looked.

  “It’s terribly dangerous, Alex,” she said.

  “But it might work.”

  “You can’t give him the flash drive.”

  “I won’t give him the flash drive, Jack.”

  “And if it all goes wrong?”

  Alex shrugged. “Then Cray wins. Eagle Strike happens.” He tried to smile, but there was no humour in his voice. “But at least we’ll finally find out what it is.”

  * * *

  The house was on the edge of the Bath valley, a twenty-minute drive from the station. Cray had been right about one thing. The taxi driver knew where it was without needing a map or an address – and as the car rolled down the private lane towards the main entrance, Alex understood why.

  Damian Cray lived in an Italian convent. According to the newspapers, he had seen it in Umbria, fallen in love with it and shipped it over, brick by brick. The building really was extraordinary. It seemed to have taken over much of the surrounding countryside, cut off from public view by a tall, honey-coloured brick wall with two carved wooden gates at least ten metres high. Beyond the wall Alex could see a slanting roof of terracotta tiles, and beyond it an elaborate tower with pillars, arched windows and miniature battlements. Much of the garden had been imported from Italy too, with dark green, twisting cypresses and olive trees. Even the weather didn’t seem quite English. The sun had come out and the sky was a radiant blue. It had to be the hottest day of the year.

  Alex paid the driver and got out. He was wearing a pale grey, short-sleeved Trailrider cycling jersey without the elbow pads. As he walked down to the gates, he loosened the zip that ran up to the neck, allowing the breeze to play against his skin. There was a rope coming out of a hole in the wall and he pulled it. A bell rang out. Alex reflected that once this same bell might have called the nuns from their prayers. It seemed somehow wicked that a holy place should have been uprooted and brought here to be a madman’s lair.

  The gates opened electronically. Alex walked through and found himself in a cloister: a rectangle of perfectly mown grass surrounded by statues of saints. Ahead there was a fourteenth-century chapel with a villa attached, the two somehow existing in perfect harmony. He smelt lemons in the air. Pop music drifted from somewhere in the house. Alex recognized the song. White Lines: Cray was playing his own CD.

  The front door of the house stood open. There was still nobody in sight, so Alex walked inside. The door led directly into a wide airy space with beautiful furniture arranged over a quarry-tiled floor. There was a grand piano made of rosewood, and a number of paintings, medieval altar pieces, were hanging on plain white walls. A row of six windows looked out onto a terrace with a garden beyond. White muslin curtains, hanging ceiling to floor, swayed gently in the breeze.

  Damian Cray was sitting on an ornately carved wooden seat with a white poodle curled up in his lap. He glanced up as Alex came into the room. “Ah, there you are, Alex.” He stroked the dog. “This is Bubbles. Isn’t he beautiful?”

  “Where’s Sabina?” Alex asked.

  Cray scowled. “I’m not going to be dictated to, if you don’t mind,” he said. “Especially not in my own home.”

  “Where is she?”

  “All right!” The moment of anger had passed. Cray stood up and the dog jumped off his lap and ran out of the room. He crossed over to the desk and pressed a button. A few seconds later a door opened and Yassen Gregorovich came in. Sabina was with him. Her eyes widened when she saw Alex but she was unable to speak. Her hands were tied and there was a piece of tape across her mouth. Yassen forced her into a chair and stood over her. His eyes avoided Alex.

  “You see, Alex, here she is,” Cray said. “A little scared, perhaps, but otherwise unhurt.”

  “Why have you tied her up?” Alex demanded. “Why won’t you let her talk?”

  “Because she said some very hurtful things to me,” Cray replied. “She also tried to assault me. In fact, frankly she has behaved in a very unladylike way.” He scowled. “Now – you have something for me.”

  This was the moment that Alex had dreaded. He had a plan. Sitting on the train from London to Bath, in the taxi, and even walking into the house, he had been certain it would work. Now, facing Damian Cray, he suddenly wasn’t so sure.

  He reached into his pocket and took out the flash drive. The silver capsule had a lid, which Alex had opened, revealing a maze of circuitry inside. He had taped a brightly coloured tube in place, the nozzle pointing into the device. He held it up so that Cray could see.

  “What is that?” Cray demanded.

  “It’s superglue,” Alex replied. “I don’t know what’s inside your precious flash drive, but I doubt it’ll work if it’s gummed up with this stuff. I just have to squeeze my hand and you can forget Eagle Strike. You can forget the whole thing.”

  “How very ingenious!” Cray giggled. “But I don’t actually see the point.”

  “It’s simple,” Alex said. “You let Sabina go; she walks out of here. She goes to a pub or a house and she telephones me here. You can give her the number. Once I know she’s safe, I’ll give you the flash drive.”

  Alex was lying.

  As soon as Sabina had gone, he would squeeze the tube anyway. The flash drive would be filled with superglue, which would harden almost immediately. Alex was fairly sure it would make the device inoperable. He had no qualms about double-crossing Cray. It had been his plan all along. He didn’t like to think what would happen to him, but that didn’t matter. Sabina would be free. And as soon as Jack knew she was safe, she would be able to act. Jack would call MI6. Somehow Alex would have to stay alive until they arrived.

  “Was this your idea?” Cray asked. Alex said nothing so he went on. “It’s very clever. Very cute. But the question is…” He raised a finger on each hand. “Will it work?”

  “I mean what I say.” Alex held out the flash drive. “Let her go.”

  “But what if she goes straight to the police?”

  “She won’t.”

  Sabina tried to shout her disagreement from behind the gag. Alex took a breath.

  “You’ll still have me,” he explained. “If Sabina goes to the police, you can do whatever you want to me. So that’ll stop her. Anyway, she doesn’t know what you’re planning. There’s nothing she can do.”

  Cray shook his head. “I’m sorry,” he said.

  “What?”

  “No deal!”

  “Are you serious?” Alex closed his hand around the tube.

  “Entirely.”

  “What about Eagle Strike?”

  “What about your girlfriend?” There was a heavy pair of kitchen scissors on the desk. Before Alex could say anything, Cray picked them up and threw them to Yassen. Sabina began to struggle furiously, but the Russian held her down. “You’ve made a simple miscalculation, Alex,” Cray continued. “You’re very brave. You would do almost anything to have the girl released. But I will do anything to keep her. And I wonder how much you’ll be prepared to watch, how far I’ll have to go, before
you decide that you might as well give me the flash drive anyway. A finger, maybe? Two fingers?”

  Yassen opened the scissors. Sabina had suddenly gone very quiet and still. Her eyes pleaded with Alex.

  “No!” Alex yelled. With a wave of despair he knew that Cray had won. He had gambled on at least getting Sabina out of here. But it wasn’t to be.

  Cray saw the defeat in his eyes. “Give it to me!” he demanded.

  “No.”

  “Start with the little finger, Yassen. Then we’ll work one at a time towards her thumb.”

  Tears formed in Sabina’s eyes. She couldn’t hide her terror.

  Alex felt sick. Sweat trickled down the sides of his body under his shirt. There was nothing more he could do. He wished now that he had listened to Jack. He wished he had never come.

  He threw the flash drive onto the desk.

  Cray picked it up.

  “Well, that’s got that sorted,” he said with a smile. “Now, why don’t we forget all this unpleasantness and go and have a cup of tea?”

  INSANITY AND BISCUITS

  Tea was served outside on the lawn – but it was a lawn the size of a field in a garden like nothing Alex had ever seen before. Cray had built himself a fantasy land in the English countryside, with dozens of pools, fountains, miniature temples and grottoes. There was a rose garden and a statue garden, a garden filled entirely with white flowers, and another given over to herbs, which had been laid out like sections in a clock. And all around him he had constructed replicas of buildings that Alex recognized. The Eiffel Tower, the Colosseum in Rome, the Taj Mahal, the Tower of London: each one was exactly one hundredth the scale of the original and all of them were jumbled together like picture postcards scattered on the floor. It was the garden of a man who wanted to rule the world but couldn’t, and so had cut the world down to his own size.

  “What do you think of it?” Cray asked as he joined Alex at the table.