Dreams to Die For

by Alan G Boyes

  “It went fantastically well, Fadyar. Sharid even climbed half way up the mountain opposite and there was no problem at all. We should be able to talk to each other most of the time, there’s a good signal along the entire road.”

  56

  Dean and Gordon had spent a thoroughly enjoyable and relaxing day fishing the loch. They had caught only three fish between them, but were not disappointed. For a start, they had profited from the private wager made with their protectors of five pounds per fish caught and landed, and they greatly enjoyed taunting the CIA men that had it not been for the other boat fishing close to the shore – which was a known ‘hot’ spot – they might have relieved them of an even larger sum. More importantly, the day had allowed Assiter and Truscott to discuss a host of topics, some seriously political, others merely flippant, but some very personal. It became clear early on in the day that Assiter greatly yearned to enjoy a more routine domestic life and that many years of dedication in Washington, plus the social engagements and functions he and Paulette had to attend as a necessary part of the job, had left him feeling weary and tired.

  “You know, Gordon, I wish I could have more days like this one. Free of work, feeling the fresh air on my cheeks and just the exhilaration of being in the wild, open spaces.”

  “Then do it Dean. You’ve served your country so well for many years; you deserve some time of your own with Paulette.”

  “She thinks like you, Gordon. Paulette wants me to give up and retire and is always suggesting places to move to, like San Diego or even Aspen. Perhaps I will because I have never seen her as happy as the last two days here at Mealag. She seems to worry about me in Washington and, of course, I never get to see her enough. Also, Washington is one of those places where you are forever meeting people, but make few friends. Paulette misses not having a close friend. You must have noticed how Cindy and Paulette have found an immediate rapport and already are not just friends, but confidants and soul mates?

  “I have” said Gordon, “and I’m particularly pleased for Cindy. It hasn’t been easy for her in many ways. The split with her husband caused some of her friends to shun her a bit, or at least she felt that they did even if they were actually only allowing her some space. She has really enjoyed the fact that you both have accepted her so readily.”

  “You two seem to be getting along just real fine,” remarked Assiter. He paused. “Very fine indeed, I should say.”

  The comment was not lost on Gordon who turned to Assiter and said, “Dean. Please not a word, not even to Paulette, but I am going to propose to Cindy at the end of the month with a view to a Christmas wedding.”

  “My, my! Good for you. You both, I mean. Oh, shucks, I don’t know what I’m saying ‘cept congratulations buddy boy. Paulette and I wouldn’t miss that for the world. We’ll be over, or go wherever. That is, if we’re invited”.

  For once Assiter’s normally calm and reserved manner had deserted him, and he slapped Truscott hard on the back before pouring them both a stiff measure of the malt from his hip flask.

  “Here’s to you both, Gordon. I know you will both be so happy. I’d call it a perfect match. It’s clear just how much Cindy loves you. In fact, Paulette says Cindy talks in such glowing terms about you that she is wondering if she hasn’t married the wrong man!”

  As Gordon and Assiter were confiding in each other, Paulette and Cindy were enjoying the luxury of the heated indoor pool, also talking of their respective partners. Paulette had answered Cindy’s oblique question regarding the age difference that existed between Assiter and his young wife by saying that she had never known such a kind and thoughtful man. Certainly there were times when Assiter was tired, but that was more because of the long hours and stress of his job than any physical weakness. Paulette asked Cindy about her marriage to Alan and wondered why they broke up.

  “I really don’t know, but I blame myself not Alan. There was no one else in either of our lives at the time when I simply found life was not fulfilling any more. I needed a change of direction, something different but I didn’t know what. Then there was the bomb on the underground. I met Gordon and I was deeply attracted. I think it was as simple as that, but I feel guilty as it hurt Alan at the time.”

  “Do you think you will marry Gordon?” Paulette asked.

  “He has to ask first!” Cindy laughed. “Then I will think about it for… I don’t know how long, but probably will keep him guessing for at least a minute before I say yes.”

  The two laughed and chatted a little while longer before Cindy suggested that as it was still warm outside, they should make the most of the remainder of the afternoon and have a drink down by the jetty.

  “I’ll ask the policemen if they want something too,” said Cindy.

  * * *

  It was early afternoon and Donaldson was driving along the Arkaig road, looking for any telltale vehicle tracks that might indicate access to Mealag Lodge. A forestry track appeared on his right and he turned into it. He did not think he could take his car over the bumpy and rough ground, so parked it just out sight of the road and started to walk. After about a mile, realising the track had started to go away from Mealag and towards Loch Lochy, he retraced his steps back to the car. Making sure he was not observed, he drove slowly along the road until he saw another track. He was certain that this was the other way into Mealag he had been searching for, simply by the number of tyre marks and deep ruts which, hardened by the recent dry weather, had been sculpted into the ground by numerous 4x4 vehicles and other heavier, mechanised machinery. Once again, he found a convenient place to park his car and set off to find Mealag Lodge. Donaldson was fit, always had been, and the walk of several miles was no effort and he was not even out of breath when he sighted the steel fence and large gate. Donaldson worked his way forward slowly using the trees as cover. He noticed a guard nearby was carrying a semi-automatic weapon, but this only instilled in the mercenary a greater curiosity. What was going on here that merited armed police to guard all the entrances? Had Crossland lost his bottle and warned them of his plot to have his ex-wife killed? The thought seemed ludicrous and Donaldson quickly dismissed it, but it was certainly a fact that something strange was going on in the house only a few metres from him, and he was now desperately keen to find out what it was. He also needed confirmation that Cindy was here. Donaldson waited. The police radio bleeped and a few moments later the guard turned and walked towards the lodge, permitting Donaldson to break cover. He carefully moved right up to the gate, where he had a clear view of the guard walking briskly over the large area of lawn that sloped away toward Loch Quoich before disappearing into the distance.

  Donaldson wasted no time. This was his opportunity to quickly skirt around the sides of the fence and view what he could of the buildings and the lodge itself. Crouching low, he crept back into the trees but stayed close to the fence which had been erected within the forest, about thirty metres behind the nearest buildings. He passed by the rear of the MacLean’s bungalow and peered through the large, open squares created by the interlocking wires of the mesh. The woodland continued into the distance and it was difficult for him to get a clear view of anything except the lodge itself. He made a few mental notes of salient details that might come in useful before continuing to work his way along the perimeter. Once he was past the rear of Mealag, the trees suddenly thinned and a large, modern, single storey building adjoined to the Lodge came into view. Two small stainless-steel chimneys protruded from the roof of the brick extension which Donaldson immediately recognised were designed to carry away steam and air, not smoke. He estimated the building to be at least fifty feet long and forty feet wide. Clever design and siting had allowed it to have been built into the forest such that it was totally concealed from anyone approaching the front entrance to the main house. Jutting deep into the forest to the rear of Mealag had necessitated the boundary fence being only a matter of few feet away from the building, and Donaldson had to withdraw slightly and shelter behind a large tr
ee trunk in order to be certain of remaining hidden. The swimming pool had several floor to ceiling large glass sliding panel windows, with blinds at either side that been left open. There was no reason to close them. The windows faced the tall trees of the forest which itself obscured any dazzling rays of the sun. The pool was not overlooked, its occupants never expecting anyone to make their way surreptitiously through the forest – but even if some lost ramblers did come innocently by, the thick wire fence would stop them from straying into the grounds.

  Donaldson wasn’t a lost hiker and neither were his intentions harmless. The lights were on in the pool area and he could just make out the two silhouetted figures of Cindy and Paulette, at the far end of the pool, sitting talking to each other. He stared, transfixed. Cindy was wearing a scarlet red bikini and Paulette, a pale lemon coloured all-in-one swimsuit.

  After a few minutes the two women stood up and ambled along the side of the pool directly opposite Donaldson. His lecherous eyes followed them, his head gradually turning from right to left much as it would had he been watching a slow motion tennis match, his excitement and anticipation growing as he visualised himself waiting for them in the changing area. He remained at the fence, thinking and trying to work out who Cindy’s friend might be. She was clearly an attractive woman, perhaps a famous film star, which might explain the police crawling everywhere. He continued his idle speculation whilst he waited, hoping that Cindy might return to the pool, but it was cut short a few minutes later when the pool lights were switched off.

  With no reason to linger he very slowly edged his way back, listening and looking. Donaldson had long passed the visible protection offered by the swimming pool and was once more crawling through the forest several feet behind the fence when he heard faint female voices some distance from the house. He neared the wire. There was some activity at the jetty, but he couldn’t quite make out what was going on. He saw two men together with Cindy and another woman – her pool companion – seated at the table near the loch. He studied Cindy Crossland for several moments. She was dressed in faded blue denim jeans and wore a cream-coloured lightweight jacket. The clothes were hardly flattering but to Donaldson Cindy looked as ravishing as ever, his thoughts still very much on what he had just seen in the pool. The woman beside her was also very good-looking too, and he thought that with a little luck and opportunism on his part he might be able to include her in his plans.

  The other aspects of interest at the water’s edge were the two officers. Both carried a sub-machine gun hung from a shoulder strap and he assumed that the same would be true of the one at the dam gate. The fact that armed security was present at Mealag would have deterred most men, but not Donaldson. He had faced worse odds and succeeded. Only wimps overestimated the opposition’s strength and under played the value of surprise – he, like the four terrorists who unknown to him were also nearby, did neither. He pondered over whether the guards were really firearms trained police or specialised protection officers. Neither made much sense to him. Why would armed police be present to guard Truscott? Or for that matter the woman at the pool? Yet he knew of no private security organisation that would openly flout the ban on them using automatic weapons, so the police had to be genuine. Then there was the DO NOT CROSS tape at the gate. That was clearly visible and would be seen by passing police vehicles, so if that was fake it would surely have been removed. Satisfied the men must be part of a police protection squad Donaldson realised that they added a huge level of risk to what he wanted to do, but he loved a challenge. This assignment was beginning to get his adrenalin running fast and high, just as it used to do in Iraq and Africa. He had missed that excitement. The sweet smell of danger and the euphoria of overcoming the odds exhilarated him and he was glad to have the chance to experience it all once more, but he would first need to modify his plans a little. He rapidly completed his survey of Mealag, worked his way back through the forest and drove to Fort William. Two hours later, he had signed a rental agreement for three days hire of a four wheel drive, all-terrain vehicle and, at a specialised outdoor adventure shop, purchased some more appropriately coloured camouflage clothing as he had felt a little too conspicuous at times dressed in simple dark clothes and jeans. The multi green, black and dark browns of his new jacket and trousers would blend better with the shrubbery and forest that surrounded Mealag.

  57

  “Come on! Come on! I need some answers.” Ritson’s impatience at his team’s lack of progress had become exasperation, and he was walking around the ATU office exhorting his men to even greater effort. He had arrived at 7:30am to find that his request to GCHQ to decode the message had been refused on the same grounds of ‘Low Priority’ as had earned it that dubious status previously – namely GCHQ needed more intercept material or other corroborative intelligence before they would set about deciphering the message. His MI5 liaison man, Kingsley, had provided all the information held by the ATU and Manders had counter-signed the request, but precious hours during the night had been lost. As the day passed bits and pieces of information had come into the ATU office but nothing of any great substance. There was little that would provide Ritson with sufficient cause to trigger a full scale alert or even that could justify making another approach to Manders. The Unifone number had been discontinued by the network provider through lack of usage and they did not have details of any subscriber by the names of Chalthoum, Masri or Hasan. The military were looking into the Hasan family and the parents death, but had said in an email that it would be unlikely that any separate file would be kept as deaths from bomb blasts were so numerous that only some of the names of the victims were known and recorded ‘when circumstances permitted it’ – whatever that meant. Hundreds, probably thousands, of civilian casualties had simply not been counted, or identified and therefore not included in any official figures. To the outside world they never existed, let alone died. Only their relatives knew the truth and they had no one they could tell.

  The University of Birmingham had been quite helpful. They had traced Yasmin Hasan and confirmed that she left in May 2003 having completed her post graduate course and had a forwarding address of a shop in Haifa Street, Baghdad. The university did however have a photograph of Yasmin Hasan, plus various documents relating to her Visa, and a facsimile of each had been sent to the ATU and were currently being verified. A computer analysis of the photograph was not required to confirm that Fadyar Masri was definitely the same person and Ritson was even more certain that Halima Chalthoum was also Hasan and Masri, despite not having a photograph, nor Crossland’s statement, to prove it.

  Two officers had spent all day trying to retrieve as much footage as they could from numerous CCTV cameras from Dover and trying to ascertain which direction Masri had travelled. By 5:30pm all they had was that she had driven out of Dover and taken the A2 and then the M2 towards London. It was tiring work, looking at countless tapes for the foreign Peugeot 205 and progress was slow. They were also still interrogating the data from the very latest surveillance cameras deployed on the motorway network leading from London, but so far these had not assisted the ATU enquiries. The new digital cameras, with optical character recognition of vehicle registration plates, represented a considerable advance over the old analogue ones, but as their number increased, so did their downside. The cameras collect data like a vacuum cleaner collects dust. Every day, the huge amount of data is automatically searched for non-taxed, stolen or other vehicles of interest to the police, before it is offloaded and stored onto optical disks. The ATU officers had discovered this permitted the data to be searched extremely easily, but not necessarily quickly, given the massive volumes. Additionally, they were searching motorway by motorway without any certainty of the general direction in which the suspect’s vehicle had headed or even which road it was on. If they were required to include non-motorway roads in their search, they would need a lot more time – examining every optical disk in the database would be an enormous undertaking.

  The French National
Police had been in touch with Ritson again. Pierre Dervisais told him that Fadyar Masri had been very clever in that she had removed the entire hard drive from the computer, but made it look as though it was still in situ. That subterfuge had been discovered relatively quickly. It was, however, embarrassing that his team had not realised the disk was physically absent until they had taken the computer back to their office for detailed testing. This dispirited them, but later they had become prematurely encouraged when the forensic search team returned jubilantly brandishing what was assumed to be the missing and vital piece of hardware. The disk was apparently nearly full with thousands of separate files each individually password protected. The police diligently set about unlocking the encryption of each file or, in many cases, tried to simply by-pass it with sophisticated software of their own in order to view the documents and images. It was a laborious and extremely slow process. Every file was discovered to contain nothing more sinister than copies of publicly available material from the internet. When the French officers realised what Masri had done they were furious. One was so enraged he threw his chair onto the floor; another banged on his desk several times; and several shouts of “merde!” filled the air for nearly an hour.

  “There can be only one conclusion, my friend. The suspect made a deliberate and professional attempt to slow us down which I regret to say succeeded.”

  It was evident Dervisais was still angry at the waste of time and resources of his team.

  “As I told you previously the property agency to which Masri paid the rent is quite legitimate, so we also made investigations to ascertain more information about the actual owners of the flat,” he continued. ”The main leaseholder paid a standing order each month to a Cayman Islands corporation which was no more than a shell subsidiary of a Panamanian Trust. This had been set up using names taken from stolen passports. As soon as any money was received into the Cayman Islands company, it was immediately transferred to a bank in Yemen. There is nothing on any documentation, if you can call scraps of paper that, about our suspect, nor on the ultimate owner’s identity. Masri’s own bank account showed nothing that wasn’t already known. We have made enquiries of the service suppliers at the flat – the electricity supply company along with the other suppliers also received their money via a monthly standing order. I am sorry we could not get more.”