by Ian Andrew
Pascal and Dietmar got up to make their calls.
“She comes back here, so Peter, I want a security cordon set up around the interrogation centre and be prepped for her arrival. Get up top please and get a car out front. Also, can you get my sidearm out of the armoury locker?” Peter Vogel nodded and left the room.
As soon as Pascal and Dietmar had finished their calls, Heinrich rechecked the time. It was 17:46.
“Let’s go.”
Chapter 25
“I’m really sorry, I can’t.”
Carl Schern was kicking himself and as pissed off with his choice of career as he had been in some considerable time. Since waking that morning he’d managed to occupy himself for a few hours before finally making the call. He had tried not to appear too keen but in the end thought ‘Ah, fuck it!’ When she answered he had tried to sound as casual as he could. He attempted a little bit of small talk before she had laughed in a really sexy way and asked him if he was just going to talk about the weather or actually ask her out. They made plans to meet at a small restaurant he knew in Rickmansworth. She told him not to worry about picking her up, she would meet him there at 20:30. He had laughed and said that it was always good to make a date with someone who knew her 24-hour clock. Now here he was having to call her up again and tell her he couldn’t make it. “I’m really sorry, but we’ve just been given a tasking to pick a target up.”
“Sounds all very exciting. So you’re standing me up to go get yourself a man?” she laughed.
“Aww come on, I’m not standing you up. Look the job’s in Watford and I’ll probably be done by nine, ten at the latest. Seriously, I just need a delay. I could meet you for a late meal. What do you say?”
“Watford? They have fugitives from justice in Watford?” she kept her voice light.
“I don’t know; we were just put on standby. Some murder thing, but we haven’t even had the briefing yet. Anyway, what do you think?”
“I think it must be some murderer for the crème de la crème of the SS to be sent in to get them.”
“Nah, just some high-level crap from Berlin. Probably some Party member that knocked off his wife and they don’t want the Kripo to go in all ham-fisted. So, later?”
“I tell you what Carl, let’s take a rain check on tonight. I’d prefer to have an earlier meal so we could have more time to,” she paused for effect, “umm, get to know one another. How does tomorrow sound?” she asked in as seductive a voice as she could manage. She knew it was very effective.
“Seriously?” Carl asked, almost unbelieving that this woman would want him as forwardly as she had just said.
“Seriously Carl. I tell you what, why don’t you think about what I’m going to do with you after our meal. And now you get a whole day to think on it. So, tomorrow?”
“Okay, tomorrow. 20:30, same place, see you then.” Carl Schern hung up with a smile on his face.
Mary Reid hung up and checked around her office. She had been sat at her desk the whole day trying to come to terms with the emotions and the turmoil borne from the previous evening. Not Joyce’s murder, that was perfectly acceptable to her and had already been compartmented into its own little box in her mind. No, her emotions had been trying to come to terms with Thomas Dunhill and the numerous other prisoners she had been responsible for. Now with Schern’s call her conscience was being neatly tucked away again into its deep dungeon and her mind was reacting to the threat of arrest. She checked her watch.
It was 18:00 and she knew instinctively that Carl Schern and his team were coming for her later that night. The likelihood of another high-profile murder suspect living in Watford was much too remote for her to be comfortable. She could imagine that he would get the full details of his tasking at any time and then it was a fifty-fifty chance as to whether he would admit to tipping the target off. If he did it just meant they would come sooner rather than later. How had they tracked her so quickly?
She had never been seen by anyone in Joyce’s company since they had first met in Harrow. She was unobserved last night and had taken a cab to a random drop off before recovering her own car. How the fuck had they found her? She felt her heart racing and told herself that it didn’t matter a damn how they had found her. It was irrelevant. The only thing that mattered now was what she could do. She forced herself to think of the likely courses of action that her adversaries would take. The Special Forces had been put on standby. That meant they didn’t know what they were being asked to do. That meant someone had to tell them. No doubt a briefing team were en route to Northwood.
She sketched out the probable sequence of events. They were likely coming up from Whitehall, given it was a Reichsminister’s death. They would have put Northwood on standby and then left. She knew Carl wanted to fuck her, so he had probably rung her as soon as he could. She would allow him a fifteen minute window. So, how long did that leave for the briefing team to turn up? She decided she probably had half an hour at best. If they were any closer they would have gone for picking her up at work. What else? If they were going to take her at home they would put a Special-Reconnaissance screen in to her house. If they had left at the same time then they would be in place in twenty to thirty minutes. What else? She drummed her fingers on her desk lightly. What else? Fucking think Mary. What else? Eyes on the target as soon as possible. A surveillance team en route to her location. About twenty minutes until they would be in position, if she was lucky. There was only one gate in and out of the Harrow Holding Centre. Mary looked around at her two administration officers.
“Harold, would you go and get a car and bring it around the front? I’d like to go down to the holding cells and check on the repairs. I’ll meet you outside.”
Harold Spencer rose to his feet with no hesitation or questions. He had worked for this woman for long enough to realise that when she spoke you just did as you were bidden. “Yes Ma’am.”
As he left the office Mary got up from her desk and went through to the inner corridor of the administration centre. She stopped at the secure locker that held the small arms for the building. After dialling in the combination she opened the locker and reached under the second shelf. The wooden box that she withdrew held a foam insert, set into which was a metal cylinder that was actually longer than the Glock-46 service pistol it was designed to attach to. She slipped the suppressor into her pocket, replaced the box and secured the locker. Then she returned to her office and walked across to what was officially the Harrow document repository, but was just known as ‘The Vault’.
It was, in effect, a secure vault much like a bank’s with its single door set into the wall of Mary’s office. But instead of gold or silver this strongroom held the files of ghosts. Long before the days of the smart tablet computers being used by her administrators, the Reich had kept file records. Even now they still liked to make a hard copy print of each prisoner and ‘Process Event’. Each year the vault would be archived into long-term storage and each year it would fill again.
She swung open the heavy door and stepped inside. To her front was a small desk that sat in the middle aisle of seven rows of file storage racks, each having a clear walkway between them. She quickly attached the suppressor onto her service pistol and called out to her other administrator, “Fredrick, could you come in here?”
Fredrick Henly responded much as his colleague Harold had done for he too had worked for Reid for long enough. As he walked into the main walkway of the vault she came around behind him and blocked his path back to the door. He turned to face her and froze in position as he stared directly at the muzzle of her suppressed pistol.
“Slowly Fredrick, empty your pockets onto the desk. You know me too well to think that I wouldn’t pull the trigger and walk away, so do as I ask.”
He did exactly as she asked.
“Now, take off your ForeFone and earpiece and leave it on the desk as well.”
Fredrick’s hands were trembling and he had a frightened, pained expression on his face. He reac
hed up and removed his wireless earpiece but he couldn’t manage to undo the clasp to the Fone’s wristband.
She waited a moment before saying, “You need to calm down and concentrate. Believe me Fredrick, your future is going to be very short if you do not remove that Fone.”
He finally managed to release the clasp and the Fone fell onto the floor. He bent to retrieve it.
“Leave it there. It’s fine.” She waited for him to straighten up before continuing, “Now, I want you to walk to the rear wall of the vault and kneel down facing away from me.”
Fredrick managed to turn around but his gait was unsteady and she could see his hands were shaking. He walked the ten steps until he was at the rear wall and then knelt down. She could hear soft sobs coming from him as she raised the pistol and aimed it at the back of his slightly bowed head. As her finger began to apply pressure to the trigger she heard, as clear as if it had been spoken to her, ‘I love you for who you are.’ She paused and considered what she was about to do.
A long moment later, she relaxed her arm.
Taking his Fone with her she left the Vault. As she was closing the door she called out to him that she would tell Harold where he was. The look of relief on his face as he spun round and realised he was still alive made her feel a strange mix of happiness and relief.
After securing the door she slipped the pistol into her blouse and willed herself to walk normally through the building. When she got to the front doors she could see Harold waiting in a pool car. Although it was going to be traceable it was the best she could manage. A black Mercedes saloon with no obvious markings other than the Government plates. She got into the rear of the car and leant forward between the front seats. Harold looked down at his right side when he felt the metal pressing against his ribs.
“Harold, there’s been a little change of plans. You’re going to drive us out of the gates. If you falter for one moment I’m going to kill you. If you do as I ask, once we’re clear of here we shall pull over and I’ll let you out. Okay?”
Harold gave a small, scared nod of the head.
She knew he would do what she said without hesitation. He wasn’t armed and even if he had been he wasn’t the sort of man who was going to fight her. He was weak. The realisation made her feel a wave of regret at having to use him like this. She packaged the regret up and compartmentalised it. She needed to stay focused. “Take off your Fone and throw it on the passenger seat.”
He did as asked with a little less fumbling than Fredrick.
“Good, now drive straight to the main gates then head north. I want you to drive through Wealdstone and up to Harrow Weald. Know how to get there?”
Harold didn’t speak.
“Harold!” she shouted at him and he flinched, “Do you know how to get there?”
“Yes Ma’am.”
“Right then, let’s be on our way and Harold, drive like you have eggs in the back, smooth and safe.”
The car slowed to go over the speed bumps at the main gate and as it exited the facility Mary lay down on the back seat but with the pistol never leaving Harold’s side. They were headed north on Sheepcote Road and approaching Station Road before she sat back up. “Keep going Harold, you’re doing fine.”
“Ma’am, what’s this about?”
“You don’t need to know Harold. It’s best that way. Then I can just let you go and you know nothing. Okay?”
“Yes Ma’am, thank you.”
As they drove north through Harrow Weald she instructed him to take a left and head for Hatch End. They left the narrow streets of Harrow Weald with buildings on each side of the road and entered into more affluent surroundings. “Now Harold, go up through Oxhey Lane, you know the way?”
“Yes Ma’am.”
Soon there were no buildings at all on the right side of the car. Mary looked out over fields and golf courses. “When we go up over the hill we’re going to be on a section of road that passes a small wood that’s off to the left hand side. You know where I mean?”
“Yes Ma’am.”
“Good, when we get there pull over, leave the car running and step out. Okay?”
Harold nodded and Mary watched a single tear run down his cheek. She considered what she was going to do with him when she got to the wooded stretch of road. Initially her thought had been to kill both Fredrick and him as no witnesses and no trace of them would confuse whoever was coming for her. But the memory of Thomas Dunhill and what he had said to her had stopped her pulling the trigger in the Vault. She sat back and allowed her mind to consider what would be the better thing to do.
It took them another five minutes to reach the wooded stretch of the road. Harold pulled on to the right hand side verge and stopped the car.
“Okay Harold, handbrake on and leave the keys in it. When you get out, close the door and step around the front of the car to the side of the road. Be very calm. Do you understand me?”
He gave no response.
“Harold!” she shouted and he flinched again, “Do you understand me?”
“Yes Ma’am.”
“Good, carry on then.”
Harold fumbled with his seat belt before finally managing to release it. He partly stumbled out of the car, shut the door and walked a few steps off to the side of the road. Mary opened the rear door and stepped out. She used her left hand to flick the car door shut and held the Glock down by her right side. Motioning with her head for Harold to walk a few more steps away, she took the time to have a look around.
The evening was calm with a light breeze rustling the leaves of the oak, ash and poplar trees. There were a few clouds in the sky but otherwise it was a rather beautiful spring evening. She could smell the woody tones of the bark and the heavier notes of the copse’s undergrowth. The road was deserted and the trees of the small wood crowded down towards her like interested spectators.
“Harold, I need you to step inside the tree line and keep walking. That way you won’t see me drive off, you won’t know if I turn the car round, you won’t see anything and that will be for the best. Okay?”
Harold mumbled a soft, “Yes,” then crossed the road and stepped into the wood.
Mary followed him and as he glanced round she motioned with the pistol for him to continue. “Harold, if I see or hear of you coming out of these woods until this night is pitch black then I will come and find you and hurt you. Do you understand?”
“Yes Ma’am.”
“Excellent Harold. Well done.” She watched him walk a few steps further into the darkness, stumbling over the roots and uneven ground before she called out, “Oh Harold.”
He turned, tears visible in his eyes. She knew that he believed he was going to be shot. Again she had a physical, painful reaction to the regret she felt at having to bully and scare him.
“When you do get out, Fredrick is locked in the Vault. Make sure someone rescues him before he starves.”
Harold stared hard at her, sniffed and nodded.
“Well, on you go. Enjoy the walk,” she said and turned away.
Chapter 26
The Northwood briefing room had a lectern at the front right which Heinrich stood behind. The white screen suspended from the ceiling displayed the imagery Whitehall had provided via Pascal Debouchy and the Reich Security Network. In the audience were SS-Sturmbannführer Johan Lowther, his team leader SS-Hauptscharführer Carl Schern and the other three members of the SS-Kommando squad that were tasked as the point unit for the operation. In the second and third rows were the backup, outer cordon units that would provide the wide security for the house assault. Behind them was Dietmar Heysburgh and next to him Heinrich’s driver Sturmmann Wiehaden. Heinrich looked over the room and noted the clock on the wall showed 18:25.
“Gentlemen, I’m Standartenführer Steinmann. My thanks for your patience while we were en route to you. What I’m about to brief you on is not complete, in fact the whole thing has been put together rapidly and we’re still awaiting the assault photography for th
e target house. However, I’ll give you what we have and the rest we’ll fill in as it arrives. The mission is an arrest operation. I need to stress that. It’s an arrest operation. If we end up killing this target there are some gentlemen in Berlin who will not be happy. So, if you have to engage the target I strongly suggest you make your aim very good. Before we bring up the subject’s details I also have to advise you that your first impressions will not be correct. The target is a cold-blooded killer, is expected to resist and will use lethal force.” Heinrich nodded at Pascal who pulled up Mary Reid’s ID photograph onto the screen. Even though it was as anaemic a photograph as could be imagined, the woman was still exquisite looking. Heinrich thought he could guess the reactions that he would get from an audience of Special Forces soldiers.
“Fucking shit!”
“Yes, I know, calm down.” Heinrich was surprised at the intensity of the comment from the Kommando in the front row.
“No sir,” Carl Schern stood up, “I need you to stop this briefing now. Your plan’s compromised.”
“What?”
Carl remained on his feet and looked around at his colleagues. He had seen her image on the screen and processed his options immediately; stay quiet and risk his mates when they went in to an aware target or admit his phone call. It was likely to be career ending but he had no choice. He looked back at the briefing officer and knew he was going to be in deep shit with the SS-Standartenführer but he took a breath and told him and the rest of the room about meeting her last night, arranging a date and then how he had rung her about twenty-five minutes ago. Johan Lowther got to his feet and began to remonstrate with his team leader.
Heinrich brought them to order, “Enough! Hauptscharführer stay on your feet. Sturmbannführer, sit!”
