by Andy McNab
'He might be famous for taking his army and elephants across the Alps, but he gets more cred from me for leading a successful campaign for fifteen years, far from home, and only by surviving off the land and his tactical wits.
'He was a soldier's soldier. He shared the same hardship and dangers as his men. Even his enemies said he never asked others to do what he couldn't or wouldn't do himself. No army's ever held its own so long, against such odds.'
'You're saying we do nothing?'
'I'm saying let's wait and see. Hannibal showed war can be won by avoiding battle instead of seeking it. He got results by attacking the enemy's communications and by flanking manoeuvres. So we don't have to carry the battle to them. Not yet, at least. We're in a safe house, let's draw breath and do some thinking.'
'That's all well and good, but we could have a window here that's not going to be open long. There must be deals to be made – there always are. I can catch one of my friends at home—'
'Not while I'm still about. You can call if you want, but I won't be staying. You'll be on your own when they stuff you in a bin-liner.' I shook my head. 'There's something else Hannibal once said: "When you make friends with the elephant keeper, expect the elephant." '
I looked along the walls for phone points. Nothing. Lynn knew his stuff. This really was a safe house. 'I'm going out to recce a few things. Give me the keys. If I'm not back in one hour thirty you're on your own. They'll have me.'
55
The first thing you do when you arrive somewhere is work out how to get away again in a hurry. If we had to do a runner and got split up, I wanted to know where to run to. I wanted to be able to nominate RVs.
I was mugged by sunshine the moment I stepped out of the main door. I pulled on my sun-gigs; they were hanging on a string I'd bought in the London ski shop.
I kept the harbour on my right for about 200 metres, then turned and came back inland on parallel, narrow streets between elegant old buildings. Was nothing ugly in this town?
I mapped it all in my head as I climbed the low hill dominating the waterfront. Behind the castle Lynn had pointed out was a maze of overgrown passageways prowled by semi-wild cats. Further up the slope was a church with a spookily illuminated Madonna in a rocky grotto, and a public park made up of a series of terraced gardens. All good RVs: Lynn would know them.
I found a Co-op mini-market on Corso Giacomo Matteotti and went in and bought one of yesterday's English broadsheets for the price of a paperback, and a couple of baguettes to take back to the apartment. I couldn't find anything resembling cheese and Branston so I settled for a couple filled with, well, Italian stuff.
I followed the road down into Piazza Caprera, which contained the Basilica. The area was pedestrianized. There was a big Christmas tree in one corner, and strings of unlit white bulbs were draped between shops and the church, waiting for last light.
Everybody was wrapped up, though it didn't feel very cold to me. I went into a café and ordered a cappuccino. The place mat had a history of the town in three languages. Maybe that was where Lynn had hoovered up all his knowledge.
'Santa Margherita has a long history,' it told me proudly, 'dating back to the Roman town of Pescino, which was razed first by the Lombards in 641 and then the Saracens in the 1100s. In 1229 it became part of the Republic of Genoa, was raided by Venice in 1432, and by the Turks in 1549. It fell to Napoleon, who renamed it Porto Napoleone, then to Sardinia and in 1861 it joined the new Kingdom of Italy.'
Fine, but the only marauders I needed news of were whoever jumped us in Norfolk.
I got to grips with the front page of the newspaper. Pakistani former prime minister Benazir Bhutto had been assassinated in a suicide attack. She was leaving an election rally in Rawalpindi when a gunman shot her in the neck and then detonated himself. At least twenty other people died in the attack and several more were injured.
I couldn't be arsed to read on. I put the paper on the table and stretched my legs and arms as I looked out over the piazza. Two immaculately dressed Italian women walked past arm in arm, yabbering away to each other. It seemed impossible to speak Italian without sounding as if you were either having an argument or trying to talk someone into bed. There had to be worse places on earth to sit and pass the time of day. For a moment I almost forgot I was being chased by men in leather jackets who wanted to kill me.
A plan started to form in my head. After my coffee, I'd walk back to Lynn's apartment and we'd have a long discussion about his career since our last contact in 1998. Somewhere in there lay the answer to what bound us together and why someone wanted us both dead.
My cappuccino arrived and I took a sip and went back to the paper.
I scanned the inside pages. Jack and Katie were the most popular first names given to children whose births were registered in Northern Ireland in 2007. Time magazine's Person of the Year was Vladimir Putin. In Britain, the Foreign Secretary was about to visit Libya to tie off some loose ends in the Lockerbie agreement. I could imagine the chaos on the ground as British and local security tried to keep him safe from fundamentalists. Glad it was their problem; I had enough of my own.
I folded it up, paid the bill and started back towards the apartment.
56
Lynn was sitting at the table. His laptop was open as wide as the smile across his face.
'Good news, Nick. It's not the Firm.'
'You've spoken to them?'
'It's the internet, Nick! Don't worry, I surf off my neigh-bour's wi-fi – silly boy doesn't even have a password. We're safe, it's OK!'
I shoved my face into his. 'You pissed? Do they know where we are?'
'They just know it's Italy. Nick, it's OK – they can't trace Skype. It's VOIP traffic, there are no fixed lines. The packets are routed around the network on any one of a number of different routes. We're safe here.'
'They know it's Italy, or you told them?'
'I told them. Listen, the question's been bugging me ever since those cars turned up at the farm: why would the Firm use you to lead them to me when they knew all along where I lived? I know you think this will end in bin-liners, but you'll have to trust me – the same as I trust my old friends.'
'Friends? Are you paying their mortgages?'
'No.'
'So why trust them?'
'That's not how it works in my world, Nick – one of them is godfather to my son.'
I turned to the window. The sun glittered on the sea.
'OK, it's done. Damage-limitation time. What did they say?'
'Just that it isn't them. They said we should come in from the cold, get their help.'
It would be great if this shit didn't belong to them. They might even be able to help, if only because Lynn was involved. It would have nothing to do with the low life following in his wake.
Lynn joined me at the window. 'I told them we could meet at the Autogrill. It's a public area, Nick.'
'When?'
'They suggested six thirty tonight.'
I looked at my watch. It was already four o'clock. 'So they're not coming from Rome?'
'They were at the consulate in Genoa.'
'Is that the first call you've made to them?'
'Yes. I didn't just say we'd come to them. I arranged an RV . . . and they do not know about the flat.'
'Did you say what car we'd be in?'
'No.'
'What direction we'd be coming from?'
'No.'
57
The apartment keys were back under the confessional seat, and the Fiat was stuck in a line of traffic. It was still hot and humid outside, but the sun was getting lower. We were heading for the Rapallo toll to get back on the A12, where we'd turn north towards Genoa, spin round at the exit just beyond it, and then to the Autogrill.
The queue we were in wasn't anything to do with the toll plaza yet. We were still way back in the town. It was the sheer volume of traffic clogging the maze of narrow streets that had been built for horses and carts. There wer
e traffic lights at every junction, and only about fifty metres between them. That didn't faze the mopeds and motorbikes that buzzed around us like flies. They all managed to keep moving; we managed about twenty metres at a time before the lights changed.
I'd been checking the mirrors, doing all my normal anti-surveillance stuff: not looking, but at the same time looking. The unconscious absorbs everything like a sponge. If you come home and the doormat has been disturbed, you'll know it – even though you've never paid it any special attention. You don't know why you know it, you just do. Or when you get to your desk at work in the morning and your pen isn't at the exact angle you left it, little alarm bells ring in your unconscious. Everything is registered.
And what had registered with me was a particular motorbike. I couldn't even make out the exact make and model just yet, but the bells had rung and I'd listened.
It was behind us, maybe four or five cars back, and it had been behind us for the last three or four sets of lights. Why wasn't it cutting through like the rest of them? It wasn't as if it was a big old bike like a Honda Goldwing with panniers and fairings, so bulky it couldn't manoeuvre. It wasn't an old guy's bike either, the sort of big menopausal BMW that retired dentists buy without really knowing how to ride, and don't risk in traffic in case it gets scratched. This was just a slim road bike. The rider had a shaded visor over his plain black helmet, a black bike jacket and jeans. He looked local, but wasn't acting it. There was something wrong.
Lynn was in a world of his own. He kept looking at his watch and willing the traffic to part like the Red Sea. That was just fine. I wasn't going to tell him what was behind us. I didn't want him sparked up and turning in his seat to see for himself. The rider would be straight onto his radio to tell the rest of the team that we were aware, and that wouldn't be good. Whatever they had planned, they might bring it forward. They certainly weren't going to lift off and come back another day. If they knew that we knew, they were going to take action. We were following the river that ran through from the high ground beyond the motorway down to the sea. We limped towards the next set of lights.
We inched forward another thirty metres, our best bound so far. The bike stayed behind us as the rest of the two-wheeled traffic weaved its way as far as it could get.
'How many more turns before we hit the tolls?'
Lynn sighed as he checked his watch.
'Don't worry about it – we've got lots of time before the RV. We take a right up here, and then round the corner there's another set, and then we turn left. Then it's straight up to the toll plaza, about a kilometre.'
I nodded and played it casual, checked the wing mirror. I could see the top of the helmet behind the line of cars.
We rolled another twenty metres and the bike pulled out a fraction to make sure he still had eyes on target. It was a blue Yamaha VFR. The rider's helmet was down, as if he was checking the machine. There was fuck-all wrong with that machine. It moved when it had to.
I indicated right and the dash clicked away while we waited. It looked like I'd get through on the next green.
If the Yamaha was part of a surveillance team – or a hit team – there would be cars ahead of us by now, trying to pre-empt so the surveillance wasn't so obvious, trying to get ahead of the junctions so they could take us once the bike had told them what direction we'd committed to.
Other cars might be behind us, caught in the traffic, trying to close in, but it didn't matter too much. The stark fact was, there wouldn't just be a lone bike following us. They'd be all over the place. If I was heading the team, I'd send a car or bike straight to the tollbooths.
The lights turned to green. We went right and onto another junction about seventy metres further on. The lights were at red. A green sign pointed left to the autostrada. I hit the indicator while a dozen or so bikes and mopeds pushed past. The VFR went with them. I checked my wing mirror. He'd had no choice: I'd been the last car through.
Lynn checked his watch again and tutted.
58
The lights changed and I followed the traffic left. As I drove, I swivelled my eyes to check a filling station and shop car parks. Less than fifteen metres from the junction, there he was. The VFR was static between two parked cars. The rider was going through the motions of sorting himself out, but I knew from where he'd positioned the bike that he would have eyes on the junction.
And I knew what he'd be saying into his radio: that I was now heading towards the tollbooths and not turning right and going back into town. In other words, I wasn't doing anti-surveillance.
I pointed ahead. 'We're definitely on the straight now for the toll road, are we?'
'Yep, not far – thank God.' He checked his watch again.
The bike hadn't come with us. There were others ahead, for sure.
The road widened after one K into the toll plaza, as Lynn had said it would. Cafés and shops lined the route to the six or seven booths. So did parked cars and trucks. One in particular caught my attention. It was a dark blue Golf. If you'd jumped out to grab a coffee or a paper, you would have nosy-parked. This one had reversed in, ready to go.
As I drew level, I could see it was two-up. Both sat well back; no conversation, no movement. The side windows were tinted but the windscreen had a direct view of the tollgates. Both guys had black hair, days of growth, black leather jackets. I'd know that look anywhere.
I checked the rear-view as I got to the booth. The Golf cut out into the traffic at the same time as the VFR appeared in the distance.
I took my ticket and the barrier went up. We had two choices: left towards Genoa and the RV, right to head south, further down the coast.
I took the right.
'No, Nick, we want left, towards—'
I put my hand on his to stop him pointing. 'Shut the fuck up.'
The Golf was coming with me.
The Yamaha reappeared as we spiralled up to the autostrada. Good, just the bike and the Golf to contend with so far. With luck, everyone else would have been staking out the RV. Now that we were committed, they would be gunning it down to the next junction.
'We're going the wrong way. We're going to be late.'
'Listen in. Do not look back. Just look at me or ahead.'
He shuffled around in his seat, trying to decide what to do.
'We're being followed, got that? I thought you said Skype was safe . . .'
'It is, Nick. I don't know what's going on.'
'Well I fucking do.'
A sign said the next exit was a K away. I moved over to the right-hand lane, making it easier for them.
'This can't be them. I trust them—'
'Trust them or not, they've stitched us up.'
The Golf had followed us into the right-hand lane.
'We're going to try and lose them, dump the car and then do a runner.'
The slip road curled steeply to the right. The surface was canted; our wheels juddered on the rumble strips that lined the concrete drainage ditch.
Lynn turned to see what I kept checking in the mirror.
'For fuck's sake! Don't let them know!'
It wouldn't have mattered. The Golf came up close, with the Yamaha following. They were coming for us now we were out of view of the autostrada anyway. It was the best time and the only place to do it.
The Golf was going to ram us into the ditch. The rider would then pull up and drop us with a weapon.
