Failsafe Query

by Michael Jenkins

  He saw Melissa curled up on the bed with two dark figures just beyond the tall active-beam stanchions that had been placed around her. In a panic, he brought the wrong screen up to make the phone calls to the three detonating units he had set up in the house. He had placed two under the sofa in the lounge and one upstairs in a small cupboard on the landing. He hit the ‘Call’ button on the first unit downstairs to initiate the phones. Nothing. He then pulled up the second screen using his mouse and cursor and retyped the password. He cursed as he had failed to keep the screens open and on a single password and was losing vital time. He looked at the CCTV screen again and saw Phil moving towards Melissa. He clicked on the call button with his cursor. Again nothing. Phil had managed to rip out the wires. Gregory’s irritation grew as he repeated the same routine for the last unit upstairs. It took him another thirty-five seconds before the explosion finally occurred on the second floor.

  Gregory smashed the desk with his fist, raging as he watched the CCTV pictures disappear from his screen.

  The panic and delay had allowed the assaulters just enough time to disarm the downstairs phones that would have initiated all the explosives. The speed of the assault had defeated Gregory and his high-tech booby traps. Only the bomb around Melissa’s neck remained.

  *

  Phil decided he could not take the risk of moving Melissa and looked frantically for the power unit that would allow the time-delay initiation switch to work. He couldn’t find it.

  ‘Hurry up, Phil, this place is falling down,’ Sean shouted as he stood in the room with Phil and Chris.

  ‘I’m on it, give me a break,’ Phil snapped back without looking up. ‘Where’s the fucking detonator?’ he mumbled frustratedly as Sean watched him feel around the back of Melissa’s shoulders before turning her over to finally reveal a small pack on her back that held the power switch and wires. These were connected to the plastic explosive ring around her neck, all of which was held together with black masking tape. The lights went out in the room as the blaze caught hold. Smoke was billowing into the room under the door and began rising high into the dining room.

  ‘The fucking timer’s flashing, mate,’ Sean shouted to Phil, shining the torch on Melissa’s chest while Phil was looking at the power unit on her back. The explosions in the house had caused the electricity to fail along with the Wi-Fi router and the timer had now been initiated and was blinking rapidly.

  Phil quickly cut a number of wires. Sean heard Phil exhale loudly when nothing happened. His threat assessment was right – it wasn’t a collapsing circuit. ‘Safe!’ Phil shouted.

  ‘Everyone out!’ Sean ordered as Swartz burst into the room with Jim. They picked up Melissa’s lifeless body and passed her out of the window to Chris and Barky. The cottage was now fully ablaze. Sean coughed and spluttered as he scuttled out of the window before sprinting across the lawn to where Melissa was now lying. He took a quick look at the timer, now set to zero, and fell to the floor on his back, breathing heavily. He then heard the mellifluous sounds of the ‘Chorus of the Hebrew Slaves’ from Nabucco fill the smoky air as he turned to see Phil working through his motivational tunes.

  Sean finally caught his breath and crawled to Melissa. He stroked her hair before picking up her limp body and walked across the lawn to the gravel driveway to place her in the unmarked ambulance – Jack held the door open.

  Chapter 48

  Perpignan, 28 April 2016

  Sean had been quickly taken out of the hands of the French Special Forces team by Jack immediately after the arrest of Natalie. Both of them had been whisked off in a fast security car straight to the target site, whilst Natalie had been flown back to London and then to a safe house for interrogation by MI5. In a very short time, Samantha and her GCHQ operator had been able to incriminate Natalie with holding thousands of the nation’s secrets on her laptop, which would be analysed forensically and used as evidence for criminal charges or for horse-trading with the Russians.

  Sean had figured that she was a deep hidden sleeper of the Russian SVR and that her capture would allow Jack’s team to oil the wheels of international spy diplomacy for a suitable trade-off with Moscow.

  Melissa was taken in a traumatised condition to a private hospital near Perpignan, where she slowly began to recover. Jack arranged early next morning to have her transferred by plane to a secure hospital in Marylebone. Sean flew back with her and Jack having bidden farewell by phone to Billy Phish and Jugsy, who were still none the wiser as to the covert events of the last couple of days. He made a mental note to go and visit them both and let them know the final outcomes once the dust had settled. He wanted them both for the next job he had planned in his head – a big one. A reprisal.

  On the plane, Sean looked at Melissa strapped into a bed. He was content that his precision tactics had worked despite the horrific pain suffered by Melissa and the carnage that had ensued the night before. Sean admired how Jack had everything in hand and everyone on call to tidy up the mess, so that the aftermath could be dealt with quietly by MI5 and the French General Directorate for Internal Security without any fuss.

  Sean took Melissa’s hand and gently stroked her forehead. ‘It was a damn close thing you know, but you’ll be fine now,’ he whispered.

  Melissa smiled, still groggy but conscious of Sean’s presence. ‘I’ve no idea what happened but I bloody well hope you’ve sorted this out once and for all,’ she said tenaciously, before holding his hand and beckoning to him to kiss her. He didn’t resist this time.

  ‘Anyway, what on earth happened to your nose?’

  ‘Had a slight hiccup whilst playing Russian roulette,’ he said sarcastically.

  Chapter 49

  Knightsbridge, London, 1 May 2016

  Sean emerged from the Tube station into a glorious London evening. He felt revitalised and cheerful as he wandered past the grand old Georgian terraces of Knightsbridge. It was a time of calm contemplation that would bring finality to this case before he slipped away from the service, quietly knowing he had kept his values. His hair had grown back, and he’d blissfully asked the hairdresser to apply a light wax after he’d had it tidied up. He chose to wear a light grey suit, white shirt and club tie for his meeting with Jack, which he sensed would reveal the gaps in the operation.

  ‘Who was still alive on the list of moles?’ he wondered. ‘Why did Jack tell him that it was he who was FITZROY? Who bloody well killed Alfie? And what cover-ups would the establishment put in place now?’ he thought, taking his gentle stroll to the club.

  Jack had suggested to Sean that they should meet that evening at the Special Forces Club, which was discreetly located amongst the Knightsbridge mews and was a place where they both knew they could talk in confidence.

  Sean stopped for a moment on the street to send a message to Samantha. He needed to tee up the final job with the team, and punched out the text quickly.

  Thanks for all your help – can you drop those drugs running files onto Frazer’s company computers please? With the child abuse photos.

  Can you also get Jugsy to have his drone ready to go in the next few days. Stand up Swartz, Phil, and One-Eyed Damon too please. I’ll send dates and timings and RV shortly. Critical job.’

  Will grab a coffee with you to say Hi when I get back.

  He watched the screen indicate that she was online and responding. Consider it my pleasure – You’re a lovable, avoiding bastard, she replied seconds later.

  Sean walked up to the door of the club and pressed the buzzer. The door opened and Sean walked into the club, a place of mystery and intrigue where his old commanding officer, friend and mentor had previously joked over lunch, Our members have probably slit more throats and planted more explosives than Al Qaeda my boy.

  The Special Forces Club had been founded at the end of the Second World War by the surviving members of the Special Operations Executive and it had remained a meeting place for those who had served in the SOE and for members of the Special Forces and the
intelligence and security communities, along with others, such as experts from bomb-disposal and counter-terrorist units.

  It felt strange for Sean to step back into the club having spent so much time outside of the fold. He sensed that Jack wanted to bring him to a place that was evocative of the Special Operations family, but totally secure and discreet. He wondered what the meeting would reveal.

  He walked up the long winding steps from the hall to the bar, taking his time to look at the portraits on the wall of Special Forces legends who had accomplished deeds of derring-do. Sean caught a glimpse on the way up the stairs of a watercolour showing ‘Gentleman Jim’ Almonds in the North African desert standing next to his boss, David Stirling, both of whom were founding members of the SAS. He finally walked into the bar and saw Jack in the far corner. It was a quiet evening and there were only two unassuming elderly ladies sitting near the entrance. Two younger men, clad in jackets and ties, arrived and stood at the bar drinking ale.

  ‘Great to see you Sean. Take a seat and I’ll get you a drink. Red wine?’ Jack inquired. Sean agreed and stood for a while, looking at a small oil painting in memory of the massacre of a number of long-forgotten SAS heroes in France during World War Two. Thirty SAS soldiers had been captured and executed by the Germans during Op Loyton in October 1944 – a mission behind enemy lines to create havoc in the Vosges region. It was one of the greatest-ever losses of SAS soldiers and Sean was touched to see a small brass inscription from the family of Wallace Hall, one of the young troopers who was believed to have been tortured and killed in a German camp near the village of Moussey in the Vosges.

  ‘I expect you’re wondering what happens next then, after all the furore?’ Jack asked. Sean smiled and sat back in the corner of the soft bench seat below a large painting of a wartime SOE parachute drop in France.

  ‘Well, I thought we’d chat about how all this came about and about the history behind the operation Sean. It’s rather complex I’m afraid but a worthwhile story to tell in here, of all places.’ Sean smiled, allowing Jack to continue.

  ‘You remember the job you did in 2005 in Moscow which led to all this? You know, the one where you handed over the small cache?’

  ‘Yes, of course,’ Sean said knowingly. ‘It was a great job but it had some unusual historic complexities as I remember.’

  ‘Exactly,’ said Jack. ‘Well, this operation we have just unravelled was linked to that cache, the tin’s contents and the list of moles that you handed over to the spook in the van. It’s just sheer coincidence that it was you who undertook that job in Moscow. The tin contained, amongst other documents, a list of names of British sleeper agents who were being groomed by the Russians at UK universities at the time. The agent who buried that tin and knew of the list and its contents was a chap you have called WYNTHROP. The names on the list were from the ‘70s and those who are still alive are quite old now. The list was never seen again after WYNTHROP buried it, and not known about until you uncovered it in 2005.’

  Sean cast his mind back to the small civil servant, Edward, who had handed him the file to read in the FCO basement before Sean had undertaken the job in Moscow. Edward had occasionally been in touch with Sean over the years.

  Jack continued. ‘Well, the backdrop to all this is the deeply strained relations between America and Russia during the cold war crisis of 1980. Under President Carter, America deployed hundreds of Pershing nuclear missiles in Western Europe, causing a toxic stand-off between the two countries. Relations just plummeted and both nations pretty much had their fingers permanently on the nuclear trigger. You’ll recall this was a highly charged game of deception, with the Russian army fully mobilised for months. The stand-off between the Americans and Russians took the world to the brink of nuclear war, as you know. In March 1980, as it all flared up virulently, the staff at the British Embassy in Moscow made plans to evacuate the Embassy. This included plans to destroy tech systems, cassettes, videotapes and files.’

  Sean remembered the red file marked ‘TOP SECRET’ and how Edward, the mild-mannered civil servant, had recounted the story, all fully documented in the file, of how the Embassy staff had decided, in a state of angst, to bury and secrete a considerable quantity of tapes, files, secrets and weapons in numerous holes that they had dug in the basement of the Embassy.

  Sean revelled in the story as Jack filled in the gaps. ‘The man in charge of burying all the stuff was a double agent that you have now called WYNTHROP. He was an old-school, Eton-educated MI6 officer. WYNTHROP was gay and the Russians had recruited him in 1971 to provide secret information to his Russian handlers. WYNTHROP buried the cache you handed over – next to all the other stuff. And he drew a map of its location once he had concreted it over. WYNTHROP defected to the Russians shortly after that, comforted that the list was safe and that Russian interests had been safeguarded. But he made a mistake.’ Jack took a sip of his wine and showed Sean an old letter.

  ‘Before he defected, he told a close friend of his in MI6 that the list existed – and this is the letter he wrote. His close friend eventually became ‘C’, the Chief of Service for MI6, in the ‘90s. C decided not to pursue the list of moles, when it eventually surfaced, but passed the knowledge onto his successors. It was known as The QUERY.’

  Sean looked at the letter, which was now very stained and its handwritten ink hard to fully decipher.

  ‘So, this was why Alfie had used the word to title his files,’ he mentioned quizzically.

  ‘The story is something of an MI6 legend, especially regarding the frantic activity of evacuating the Embassy with lives at risk in 1980. They had to quickly destroy vital top-secret documents, prepare to destroy their key communication equipment, pack up their belongings, seal the British territory and put plans in place to evacuate the children, wives and support staff.’ Sean listened intently, before explaining to Jack his memories of the Moscow job in 2005.

  ‘I remember Edward saying the caches they had buried had been left untouched for nearly 25 years. I remember the precise drawings Edward gave me of the locations of the caches in the basement. Where did they come from?’

  Jack leant forward. ‘Well, no one except for one man actually knew that the secret list of British graduates being groomed actually existed. So, no one actually sought to dig them up. Until, that is, the map and letter were posted to C shortly after WYNTHROP died. Maybe it was his final act of loyalty to the Crown? And that is why C called it The QUERY.’

  ‘Fascinating,’ Sean said gleefully. ‘WYNTHROP clearly had a conscience. It’s an amazing tale worthy of being told within these historic walls. I do remember the map, finding and digging the stuff up and throwing all the bags of kit into the river before we handed the cache over to a bloke in a van.’

  Jack listened to Sean’s story and they enjoyed talking about the clandestine activities of cold war Russia that had now spilled over into both of their lives in 2016.

  ‘So, who arranged for me to dig them up, Jack? Who actually tasked that job?’

  ‘All I can say Sean is that FITZROY was sitting in the car when you were throwing stuff in the river and that he was operating for C in 2005.’

  Jack paused. And Sean sensed he was carefully crafting his words.

  ‘FITZROY left MI6 in 2012 but during that time he became the guardian of the QUERY list. Now that C had the list, the query was solved – and he was able to feed disinformation to the Russians. He ran those deception ops for many years until he passed it on to the next C. It was only later on that the Chief of MI6 found out that our man Alfie had somehow hacked into C’s account and found the list during his research. We needed to ensure it didn’t get into the wrong hands. The Russians clearly didn’t want that list to be exposed as it would have implicated them in grooming on a massive scale and given away the names of some of their most distinguished establishment sources in Britain. What’s more, if Alfie had released the list of names, it would have destroyed the careers of the people at the very top of the tree and s
topped C’s ability to deceive the Russians with high-grade counter-intelligence. We wanted to make sure only the bad apples on the list were destroyed and not the ones who were of use to us. We achieved that. The current C obviously knows I’m running this operation – and he’s looking forward to seeing Dominic suffer, if you get my meaning.’

  ‘Wow, that’s some piece of deception.’

  ‘The current C also managed to convert three of the four people still alive into double agents, and continues to run a highly secret disinformation operation by passing worthless information back to the Russians. So you can see we couldn’t have run this as a fully sanctioned operation as word would have got out across the agencies. The QUERY, as we now call the list, is exactly that. It is for C’s eyes only and, of course, for those of his most trusted of aides who exist within a special operations group. C is now ready to oust the Cabinet minister. He never converted him but we monitored him closely. We bided our time until he could become useful to us by being exposed as a spy – and that time will come very soon. We’ll start to leak a few snippets to the press to line it all up for when the time is right.’

  Jack paused and then leant forward. ‘The Minister and Dominic have no idea we are about to shaft them both. We have now managed to locate the rottenest of apples in our establishment – and the most disloyal – and Dominic is at the top of that list.’

  ‘Because Dominic is trying to protect the Cabinet minister?’ Sean asked. ‘The last of the Russian moles you mean?’

  ‘Exactly, Sean. Dominic had taken the bait, no doubt having been handsomely paid by the Minister so that he would protect him, and C managed to stitch this all together as a ruse, knowing full well Dominic was corrupt in many ways and had been for some considerable time. This also stops Dominic becoming the next C.’