Crossfire

by Andy McNab

  It was only when I got level with the closing gates that I saw a small plaque. It was the Chinese embassy. The plywood huts outside were painted grey and red. I half expected to see Red Guards with flags sitting on the chairs instead of the local lot.

  I approached the first shed. The four guards glared at me from under their hats. Two got to their feet. They didn't look happy, but they were paid to look that way. This was Kabul.

  I smiled and gave them a wave as I got nearer, as if I was on a morale-boosting visit. 'Hello, mate, how are you?' I held out a hand, shook, and kept walking. I got a smile back from the smaller of the two. He touched his chest and gave me a nod. The next guy offered a hand. I did it on the move, not missing a step.

  There were still remnants of the Russian occupation here. In an open space between two walls lay the rusting hulk of an armoured personnel carrier, its tracks splayed out from the wheels and the mother of all big fuck-off holes ripped into its side by a HESH (high-explosive squash head) round.

  I pulled out the mobile and sparked it up. I went into Tools and made sure Number ID was off, then called Basma.

  Two armoured vehicles came down the street towards me and stopped. I couldn't tell whose army they belonged to. All I knew was they were green and had six wheels. Matching green uniforms sprang out, helmeted, body-armoured, all tooled up.

  Her mobile rang and rang. She probably ignored calls from numbers she didn't recognize just as much as the ones she did. But at least her mobile was still on, and if it stayed that way I'd locate her – once I'd found myself a fixer.

  I was nearly on top of the armour by the time I closed down. The arm flashes told me they were Turks. One wagonload ran across the street to cover from that side. Maybe one of the walls belonged to their embassy. Whatever, it looked routine. It wasn't me they were interested in.

  I turned the corner and immediately hit another set of guardhouses. I smiled, shook a hand or two. A sign said the steel double gates belonged to the Embassy of the Islamic Republic of Iran.

  Jadayi Sulh was signed on the junction opposite. Flower Street had to be close by.

  I turned back to the guards and gave them a smile. 'The hospital?' I pointed down the road. 'The war-victims hospital?'

  I gave them a peek under the Tubigrip.

  They had a quick discussion and a laugh, then showed me.

  I ran across the road in the direction they'd pointed.

  51

  The stone wall directly opposite me was ten feet high, and the sign that ran the whole length of it confirmed in red that I was at the Emergency Surgical Centre for War Victims.

  A corrugated-iron canopy shaded two long benches at either side of the entrance. It was guarded by a huddle of grey serge and AKs. Old guys occupied the benches, smoking, waffling, reading the paper. I couldn't tell if they were patients, visitors or just waiting for a bus.

  On my side of the junction, a couple of guys sold glasses of tea as black as boot polish. Above their heads, a small blue handpainted sign with an arrow said AM Net was round the corner.

  This was the sort of thing I needed to know about – what was happening during working hours when I'd be hanging about and waiting for someone who spelt in American English.

  Flower Street was narrow and the sun had stopped shining on it for the day. Every shop sold either flowers or cakes. There were pavements both sides. It was potholed, but there were still traces of tarmac. Large open concrete drains lined one side.

  AM Net was exactly where the Yes Man had said, two shops in from the junction. I walked under the rusty corrugated-iron awning and glanced through the grimy window. The room was small and dark. No one was using too much electricity here. I saw two rows of four grey monitors, maybe three or four people hunched over them. An old guy waited at the desk by the window to take their cash.

  I kept going without looking back. If I'd missed something, tough shit, I should have done a better job. Enough people were looking at the white face as it was and quite a few didn't like what they saw. I lengthened my stride.

  The smell of grilled meat reminded me I hadn't eaten since getting off the plane. I came to a steel trough, maybe three metres long. Lines of kebabs sizzled away over glowing embers in the half nearest me. Two kids up on boxes fanned the charcoal at the other end, keeping it sparked up. At least they gave me a cheery wave.

  I kept walking, past yet more flower and cake shops.

  My time with the muj had taught me they loved flowers – and not just poppies. Maybe it was something to do with the barren mountains they had to live among. The Taliban were the same, and a lot of the guys we trained and fought alongside were now with them. They liked to put them down the barrels of their AKs as well as in their waistcoats when they had the chance. But the idea of going to San Francisco never crossed their minds – unless it was to bomb the fuck out of the place.

  The deep ditch on the right was obviously a great place to park your bike. All I could see were seats and handlebars. The people milling round were doing exactly what anyone else on the planet would be doing right now, just getting on with their lives – picking up a birthday cake or some treats for the family on the way home. It always amazed me how people so fucked-up by war still managed to carry on. Maybe they had no choice.

  Word had definitely spread that there was a white guy in town. Kids materialized from doorways and held stuff up. 'Mister! You buy this!'

  No, thanks. I didn't need twelve boxes of matches wrapped in cellophane.

  'Boots dirty, Mister – I shine!' A ragged little boy thrust his shoe-cleaning kit and black brushes insistently at me. I pointed at my scuffed brown Timberlands and shrugged.

  I pushed on and most of them faded away within ten or fifteen paces. A group of pepper-pots headed my way and stepped out on to the road. I was careful to wait until they'd got back on the pavement and walked past.

  Flowers and cakes gave way to furs and leather. Skins of all shapes and colours hung from awnings or were stretched on frames. Large hides were being prepared as rugs. A couple of white spotted cats looked mildly surprised, thanks to their new glass eyes. When the Taliban weren't shooting ISAF, they killed anything else that moved on the mountains to make a few bob. Maybe my three new mates were in town to drop off pelts.

  I could see the crossroads maybe fifty ahead. Turning left would take me to a main drag. Then if I turned left again I'd get to the junction near the Gandamack.

  But that wasn't going to happen. There were too many cowpats with pissed-off faces gathering at the junction. Young men smoking, staring, waiting. I didn't know if it was the prospect of money, wanting to know what the fuck I was doing there, or just because I was white. I wasn't going to hang around long enough to find out.

  I crossed the road as casually as I could, heading towards the nearest alleyway. As soon as I was out of sight, I broke into a run. I took the first left, then a right down a rubbish-filled gap between two buildings. I wanted to put as many angles between them and me as I could. I jumped a low wall and landed in a small square. I was losing my bearings as I ran into another street, but at least it was quiet, just closed doors and growling dogs.

  Shouts bounced off the houses behind me.

  I charged down another alleyway, not looking back, just trying to make distance. The shouts seemed to follow me. My sun-gigs bounced even higher as I took a right between two mud buildings. I spotted a mountain of firewood and burrowed in behind it.

  My throat rasped as I lay there gulping air.

  Woodsmoke and the sound of Bollywood wafted from the house above me.

  I fought to control my breathing as I heard more shouts and the slap of sandals and boots on what was left of the tarmac.

  I moved my head very slowly and peered round my cover. Three or four were running, searching, sounding more and more pissed off at not gripping me.

  It was getting close to last light. I would have to sit it out and wait. This wasn't the time to get out my map and play tourist.


  52

  I wondered if it was the Indian guy with the beard who'd been singing and dancing on their television for the last thirty minutes.

  It was fully dark, and the crowd had dispersed. I pulled the mobile carefully from my jeans and powered it up, shielding the glow of the display with my hand.

  'Magreb, mate. It's Nick. The Gandamack – do you know where the Gandamack Lodge is? The hotel?'

  Pots and pans clanged in the background as the Serena's answer to Gordon Ramsay yelled orders at his sidekicks.

  'Yes, yes. You want me drive you there, maybe?'

  'No, I want you to meet me there after work. But right now I need you to tell me how to get there on foot.'

  His voice took on a strangulated tone. 'Not walk, Mr Nick. Very bad men there. Wait until I finish work, maybe—'

  'Too late, mate. Listen, if I describe where I am could you get me on the right road? I know I'm not that far away from it.'

  He didn't sound too happy. I wasn't sure if he was concerned for my safety or for lost income if I got lifted.

  I extricated myself from the woodpile. 'I'm looking at a big road just ahead. By the junction I see a sports shop – Gym Tonic. The windows are full of running machines, mate. You understand, multigyms? Punch bags?'

  It seemed so out of place. I'd have thought the last thing the locals would be worried about was toning up for the beach.

  'OK, OK.' He was thinking. 'Mr Nick, walk past sport shop and go right, then—'

  'I'll stop you there, mate. I need to keep on the side-roads. The bad men have already found me. I'm hiding from them. I don't want to be under those shops' lights, do I?'

  It took a few seconds to sink in. Either that or he couldn't hear me above the din of Gordon's latest wobbler.

  'OK. You walk away from sport shop, maybe, the other way, and tell me what you see.'

  I did what he said. I walked for the next ten minutes without hitting a landmark. At last I found a handpainted street name and spelt it out for him.

  We worked our way down streets where occasional slivers of light forced their way between shuttered windows. Traffic groaned incessantly on parallel roads. I imagined the pavements full of angry young men in cowpats.

  'What can you see now, Mr Nick?'

  I stood between two trucks. 'There's a crossroads. On the far side there's a high wall with razor wire, maybe an embassy. I might be at the start of the diplomatic area.'

  'Yes, Mr Nick. What is in the middle of road? Concrete, maybe?'

  The road had a central reservation of scabby bushes. 'Bushes, mate. Not concrete. To the right I can see the lights on TV Hill.'

  'Go left, Mr Nick. Left and you will come to the Gandamack.'

  I jumped the junction and headed left, hugging the wall. Headlights caught me in their glare but there was fuck-all I could do about it.

  'Go up the road, Mr Nick. Walk more. You see computer shop, maybe?'

  'Yes.'

  The little fucker was spot-on.

  'The Gandamack is on this road, on same side as computer shop.'

  There were shouts from behind me. I spun round to see cowpats, maybe five or six of the fuckers, running my way.

  'I'll call you later.'

  I closed down as I legged it, and within a few strides I could make out the shapes of guard huts sticking out from the line of buildings.

  The cowpats were gaining on me but I was getting closer to the huts.

  Bodies spilled out to investigate the commotion. They couldn't have been sure what the fuck was coming at them out of the dark.

  A couple had their weapons up. Another two were already checking their safety catches.

  I held up my hands as I ran. 'It's OK, it's OK! Gandamack!

  My hands stayed up. I got to within about fifteen metres of them. 'The Gandamack! Where's the Gandamack?'

  One pointed down a dark gap that loomed on my left. I couldn't tell if the building behind had been bombed or was being repaired, but these guys had to be guarding something.

  Their weapons lowered. I checked behind. The cowpats weren't that brave.

  My hands dropped to my knees as I fought for breath. 'No need to shoot me. I won't complain about the food, honest.' I held out my hand and they shook.

  I picked my way over rubble and bricks. Plastic buckets full of the stuff sat waiting to be moved.

  There was a pedestrian door to the right of the gates. Set into it was a sliding peephole.

  I gave the gate a couple of punches. The steel rattled. The slide was pulled back and a set of dark brown Afghan eyes wanted to know what the fuck I wanted.

  53

  I gave him a big smile as the door swung open and I got a big row of brown teeth back. He was dressed for winter warfare in a thick black polo-neck jumper beneath an even thicker stripy tank top. Me, I was wiping sweat off my face. On the floor of his plywood gatehouse were a bedroll, bottled-gas burner, kettle, teapot and glasses. He was set for the night.

  A dozen or so dusty 4x4s were jammed against each other in the courtyard. The house was large, with additions all over the place. I followed the gravel path across a patch of garden to a set of concrete steps that led up to the glass-fronted entrance.

  The first thing I saw in the hallway as I stepped inside was a long rack of old Martini-Henry rifles, probably relics from the last time we tried to control the area and got fucked off big-time. The Khyber Pass to Pakistan wasn't that far away.

  The reception desk wasn't manned. A card told me the name Gandamack had come from the fictional home of Harry Flashman, the nineteenth-century answer to James Bond. It was also the name of the village that had seen the slaughter of about sixteen thousand British troops by the Afghans in 1842. I wondered if some of the gear in the racks had seen action there.

  I wandered into the eating area. The tables were laid for dinner later tonight, with starched white cloths and china. All the breakfast stuff – jars of marmalade, jam, honey and Marmite – were stacked ready on a side-table, just like in a B and B. The walls were decorated with hunting and fishing prints. Stuffed parrots flew around in a glass-fronted cabinet. The only thing to remind you that you weren't in an old Surrey inn was the neatly stencilled sign on the door: Only side-arms allowed in the restaurant.

  I looked through the open windows and on to the grass. Two big, muscular guys had squeezed into a couple of wicker chairs under the external lighting. They sat with their tree-trunk legs splayed apart. With their dark skin and black leather jackets they could only have been from the Balkans. My money was on them being Serbs.

  They had been taking afternoon tea. A wicker table was set with china. Ducks waddled round their legs scavenging scraps of sandwiches.

  Neither looked the afternoon-tea type. One's head was shaved bald, and reflected the light like he'd been having a go with the Mr Sheen. The other had greasy brown hair down to his shoulders and a top lip like John Major's. He was talking into a mobile.

  I moved closer to the window. He wanted to know why they hadn't got the equipment they'd asked for. If it didn't come soon, someone was going to pay. That would have had the person at the other end sitting up and taking notice. To a Serb, payment didn't necessarily mean cash.

  A young lad in a white shirt appeared behind me. He was all smiles.

  'Hello, mate – where's the pub?'