‘What is it, Bob? You think that your Arab over there attacked the girl just to draw the police away from the door?’
‘Don’t ask me any questions, love. Not now. I have to keep this to myself.’
She was suddenly afraid. ‘Be careful, my darling.’
He kissed her softly and left the Hall.
He found Mackie and Allingham standing near the entrance. Sarah had been right: the man looked frightened.
‘I’ve done what you asked, Mr Skinner. By now the MOD will have put all forces in the Mid-East on the alert. Next, the Foreign Office will inform the Syrians. It’s always difficult to predict how these people will react.
‘Now I’d like to get away from this place!’
‘Shut up. You’re going nowhere till I say so.’
He turned towards Mackie, and gestured over his shoulder with his thumb. ‘Brian, tell me how friend Fuzzy got in here with a fucking Uzi. What’s this story about a girl?’
‘That’s how, sir. A girl was attacked just along the road there. She’s been taken to hospital, slashed on the face and body. Superficial though. She was walking home when she was grabbed from behind and pulled into a dark corner. The guy pulled a knife, but she said she got loose, and he cut her. She started screaming, and all the uniforms just ran over at the same time, even the sergeant in charge. You can’t blame them really.’
‘Who can’t! Where’s that sergeant? Brian, this was a fucking kid-on. Someone gets the soldiers sidetracked on their way here, then pulls this stunt so that the front door leading right in to Al-Saddi himself is left lying wide open. This is our man from the Royal Mile. Exactly his style. This guy kills and maims without a second thought, but there’s always a purpose.’
‘And that wee dead bastard Fuzzy did all that?’
‘That’s what us simple coppers are meant to think. But you and I know better, Allingham, don’t we? This is another fucking stitch-up!’
For a second, Allingham’s face was illuminated with pure terror, and in that instant Skinner knew with absolute certainty that he was right about it all.
Allingham fought for self-control. He blustered. ‘You’re crackers, Skinner! You’ve botched this whole affair. Last time you arrested an innocent Japanese diplomat. Now you’ve allowed the President of Syria to be shot, and you’re peddling some ridiculous conspiracy theory to divert attention from your own incompetence.’
Skinner smiled at him: it was a strange smile, a savage smile. ‘You knew, Allingham, didn’t you. “An innocent Japanese”, you just said. But when you and I first met, after Yobatu was arrested, I was convinced he was guilty and you couldn’t get him out of the way fast enough. Now I can prove he was innocent, but only a handful of people close to me know that. So how come you do, too? You knew all along, my son, didn’t you. And Hughie Fulton had me believing that you were too low down on the food chain to be let into secrets like that.’
Allingham was chalk white. ‘You’re mad.’
‘You’d better hope I’m not, mister. You and I are going somewher very quiet for a chat. No one else is coming. It’s going to be just you and me. And you’re going to tell me the whole story. I’ve got most of the bits of the jigsaw in my head, and I think I can fit them together. You’re going to help me with the last few pieces. Most of all you’re going to tell me about Maitland.’
‘You can’t make me go with you.’ The man turned despairingly to Mackie.
The Inspector shook his balding head. ‘I wouldn’t bet the house on that, Mr Allingham.
‘You’ll need a car, boss. Why don’t you take the one that Mario and I came in. It’s unmarked. I think the Merc would be a wee bit conspic uous.’
‘Fine, Brian. When I’m gone, nip along to the Royal and find Andy. Tell him that Mr Allingham and I have gone down to the coast to sort things out. And tell him this, too. If either one of you sees that man Maitland, disarm him and lock him up. Be very, very careful. Give him no opportunities. Just lock him up. And if he as much as looks at you the wrong way, don’t hesitate. Shoot him.’
He turned again to Allingham, who had backed away into a corner For a moment, Skinner thought the man was going to shout for help.
‘Let’s go. You’ve got some talking to do. The rules on your side of the street are new to me, but I’m learning fast. Move!’
He hustled the man outside, into the cold January night. The three cars were still parked in front of the Hall. Their drivers, two policemen and one civilian, stood talking together. The policemen stood to attention as Skinner approached.
‘Keys please, John.’ He held out a hand to the driver of Mackie’s car, a blue Sierra.
‘Sir!’ The constable handed over the keys without another word.
‘Get in, Allingham. Front seat.’ The man obeyed, his shoulders drooping in submission and a look of hopelessness on his face.
Skinner started the engine. But, before pulling away, he looked into the face of the man on his left.
‘I’ll tell you what I think, my friend. I think that you’re scared shit-less. You’re involved in something that’s just too big for you to cope with.
‘You leave the Met for what you think will be a nice cushy job as a sort of diplomats’ baby-sitter and general bum-wiper. Then all of a sudden it starts to get more than that. You’re involved in the dark side of international relations. People start getting killed. It’s all part of a serious Intelligence operation, and a state secret, but those nosy coppers up in Scotland won’t cooperate. You see, they’ve got this aversion to their people being chopped up and shoved under trains and stuff like that. And now the whole thing’s a mess. It’s out of control, and you find yourself up to your arse in hedgehogs. You know the truth and, as recent events tell you, that could be fatal.
‘ Well, chum, this is your way out. You’re going to point me at brother Maitland, and I’m going to see that he’s put away. I don’t care much whether it’s done in private or in public, but he’s got to be locked up.
‘We’re going for a drive to my place. It’ll take us about half an hour to get there. You’ve got that time to consider your position in all this. And you’ve got that time to make up your mind to tell me the whole story. You’re going to tell me anyway. I’m not pissing about here. There’s the easy way, and there’s the hard way. I don’t want to have to beat it out of you. That’s strictly against my rules. But as I said, I’m on your side of the street now, and if I have to, I will. Now I’ll shut up and let you think it over.’
He slipped the car into gear and moved off, out of Bristo Square, turning back towards George Square, past the open-air car-park, towards the main road. As the Sierra turned left into Potterow, a nondescript elderly Ford Escort, its locks worn smooth with age and easily picked, pulled gently out of the car-park.
It followed the Sierra’s turn into West Nicolson Street, past the Pear Tree pub, its customers overflowing into the beergarden as the Friday-night crescendo gathered momentum, and the student survivors of the MacEwan Hall massacre began to arrive.
It kept the Sierra’s tail lights in sight as it headed through Holyrood Park, towards Edinburgh’s eastern suburbs, and beyond, to East Lothian.
98
Skinner was as good as his word on the drive to Gullane. He was silent all through the journey, throwing only the occasional glance at Allingham. Once or twice, in the headlights of on-coming vehicles, he could read the despair written on the man’s face.
The drive in the dark took the half hour that Skinner had forecast. There was no street light near the cottage. After drawing to a halt, he allowed the Sierra’s headlights to illuminate the front door, while he unlocked it with Chubb and Yale keys.
He stepped into the entrance hall, switched on the light, and deactivated the burglar alarm. Then, leaving the Yale off the latch, went back to the car, switched off the lights, and motioned to Allingham to preced him back to the cottage. Inside, he pointed him towards the living room. As the man obeyed, Skinner closed the front doo
r behind them.
The house was chilly. Skinner turned on the gas fire at full power. He pulled the heavy, lined curtains across the windows and across the double patio doors, and stood for a minute in silence with his back to the heat, facing the door to the hall. Allingham had slumped on to the long green leather couch to his left; where he sat, staring at his knees.
‘Right, chum,’ Skinner said abruptly, rousing the man from his contemplation. ‘Your moment has arrived. I don’t really want to get blood and snot all over my upholstery, so save us both a lot of pointless grief and tell me the whole story.’
He walked over to his hi-fi stack, to his right on the wall facing Allingham, picked up a cassette and slipped it into the tape-deck. He pressed the RECORD button.
For a second or two, a last faint gleam of defiance showed in the Londoner’s eyes. Then it was gone. He sighed long and deep.
‘Okay, Skinner, okay. How much do you know?’
‘I know that Mortimer and Jameson were working together to develop a legal case to invalidate the Declaration which set up the State of Israel. I know that their paymaster was a man named Fazal Mahmoud, an old lover of Rachel Jameson from her student days. He was a Syrian then, but currently is — or was until tonight — trading as a Lebanese out of their Embassy in London.
‘He’s been missing for a while. Last weekend we tracked him down to a house in Fife, where he was being sheltered by two other old university chums. They were a couple named Harvey. We found the link and watched them. They led us right to him. My people were careful, but somehow Fazal discovered that the Harveys had been rumbled. When he did, he shot them dead on the spot and made a run for it. He’s been underground since then — until tonight.
‘He was the man with the Uzi. I believe that he was set up by your outfit as the assassin of Al-Saddi. The reason ties in somehow to the Mortimer-Jameson document. But I haven’t put that quite right. The real point is that he was set up to take the blame for the assassination. Poor old Fuzzy was your Lee Harvey Oswald, with us cast in the Jack Ruby role.
‘For Fuzzy had back-up - back-up from Maitland. Maitland wasn’t sent up here to protect Al-Saddi. He was sent up to make sure that he was killed; if necessary, to kill him. Just as he killed Mortimer and Jameson. Just as he killed three innocent people in Edinburgh to set us on the trail of a maniac. And just as, at the very start, he killed Shun Lee, a piece of advance planning to help us fit Yobatu into the frame when the time came.
‘His first job tonight was to get Fazal into that Hall with his Uzi. So he arranges an “accident” for his SAS unit, to keep them away from the very operation that he has planned. Then he attacks and cuts up a young girl, to lure the police away from the door of the debating chamber. Finally, he follows Fazal inside, unnoticed, through the open door. And when Fuzzy opens up with his Uzi, hitting everyone and everything but his target, he stands in the darkness behind him and puts Al-Saddi away with a single shot from a silenced pistol.
‘In concept and execution, it was awful and brilliant. But he made one huge mistake, although he couldn’t have known it at the time.’
Skinner produced one of the Betacam cartridges from the right-hand pocket of his jacket, and waved it in the air.
‘He allowed himself to be filmed. If he hadn’t done that, then neither nor anyone else would ever have cottoned on.’
He paused for a second, allowing Allingham to take in what he had said. He placed the cartridge on a long rosewood coffee table.
‘That’s what I know. But there’s a big piece missing, and that is: why?’ What was the brief to Mortimer and Jameson involved with that made it so lethal?
‘Tell me, Allingham. Tell me now.’
The white-faced man lifted dark, haunted eyes and looked into Skinner’ face.
‘Don’t make me. I warn you, there are some things that it’s safer not to know. Man, I’m police, like you. I lived in your world not so long ago. But now I’m part of another where, as you said, the game is played in a different way, where the stakes can be whole countries and millions of lives. In that game, rule number one is this simple: there are no rules.
‘When it’s a matter of protecting the state, even the planet, you do what is necessary. That’s why we have Maitland. There is no one better than him at doing what is necessary.
‘He isn’t SAS of course, not in the sense of being a regular officer. He was Special Boat Services once, at the time of the Falklands, when his unique talents were first noted during certain operations on the South American mainland. Now he works with the Special Forces on occasion, but on a consultancy basis.
‘Maitland isn’t his real name, by the way. He was Captain Lawrence in the SBS, but that may have been false too. But whatever his real name, he is, shall we say, the principal executive arm of the Security Services.’
‘You mean he kills people that the Government wants out of the way?’
‘Not the Government. The politicians don’t know about him, not even the Prime Minister. Although the Security Services report to the PM, there are some things that even he isn’t told. That he can’t be told. For example, the fact that he himself, the whole Cabinet, and the entire Opposition Front Bench are kept under permanent surveillance.’
Skinner whistled. ‘Holy Shit!’
‘It goes back to a standing order given by Macmillan after the Profum Affair. He told them to do it forever, as standard practice, and never to refer back to him or any of his successors on the matter.’
He paused. ‘But that’s got nothing to do with this business. As for Maitland, very few people know about him. Those who are aware of his existence sometimes refer to him as “The State Executioner”.’
Allingham looked into Skinner’s face. ‘Now that you know more about him, do you still want to know the rest of it?’
Skinner’s eyes were hard as flint. His voice was soft, but filled with power and a terrible menace. ‘Friend, it’s as simple as this. Your man Maitland recently killed seven people, of whom only one could possibly be described as an enemy of the State. He’s a cold, calculating murderer, without a thought for the sanctity of life. I recognise the fact of the existence of your secret set-up, but I don’t recognise its right to exist. There’s only one society in this country, not two. Your man Maitlan is an outlaw. I’m the posse.
‘Now. Tell me why.’
Allingham sank back into the big green couch, shaking his head.
‘Doomsday.’ The word seemed to crackle. ‘That’s what it’s all about. The brief which Mahmoud gave to your two Scots advocates was going to be used all right, but as a defence.
‘For over a year now, the Western Intelligence community has had whispers that Syria and Iraq had settled their blood feud in private, and had come to a secret understanding on cooperation against Israel. The CIA weren’t too worried at first. They thought that the UN and the coalition air forces had pretty well emasculated Iraq’s nuclear and chemical capac ity. But gradually doubts crept in. Recently the satellites have picked up some movements between Syria and Iraq that were highly suspicious. And some other odd things have been noticed in the mountains to the north of Iraq, where the intelligence community has always suspected that they had kept a top-secret store of goodies.
‘A few months ago, our friend Fazal Mahmoud contacted his old flame Rachel Jameson, and offered her a commission. Miss Jameson, as you will be aware, was a PLO sympathiser in her student days. It seems that she kept that allegiance. When Mahmoud telephoned her and asked her to meet him to discuss business, she told her fiance, Mortimer. She must have told him the whole story, because Mortimer didn’t fancy the idea of Ms Jameson having clandestine meetings with one of his predecessors, and so he took over the negotiation. It seems that he was pro-Palestinian, too , because he agreed to accept the instruction on a joint basis.
‘We knew about the meeting in advance of course. Mahmoud was under routine surveillance, and that involved a telephone tap. But we knew very little of what it was about. After
that first meeting, the trail went cold for a while. Naturally, the spooks kept a weather eye on the two advocates, but since they didn’t seem to be involved in any extra-curncular activ ity, it was concluded that the instruction from Mahmoud must have been purely academic in nature.’
Skinner held up a hand, interrupting the narrative. ‘Wait just a minute . They kept them under observation? On my patch? Without me knowing?’
Allingham looked at him nervously. ‘It was done through Fulton . There are resources outside the police force, Skinner.’
‘That’s being brought home to me. Were any ot my men involved?’
‘No one currently serving. That’s all I’ll tell you.’
‘We’ll go into that later. Go on.’
Allingham lit a cigarette and drew deeply. Skinner handed him a rarely used ashtray.
‘As I said, the trail went cold. But then, in October, Mahmoud contacted me.’
‘He contacted you?’ Skinner was surprised.
‘Yes. Most of the diplomats know me as someone to whom they can speak off the record as well as officially. They think of me as a chum. You think of me as a sort of escort. What they and you don’t know is that I’m also a part of the Intelligence services. I maintain my baggage-carrier cover rather well, don’t you think?’
He carried on without waiting for Skinner’s answer. ‘Anyway, Mahmoud was in a fearful state. He asked for a meet under total secrecy. I set it up. Mahmoud was an experienced intelligence operative, but he wasn’t the top man. The Syrians run quite an extensive undercover operation through the Lebanese Embassy. He showed me a signal from Damascus to his head of section. He had read it, although it was not for his eyes, and had taken a secret copy.
‘It was encoded, but he translated it for me, using a secret cipher that not even Langley can crack. It turned my blood cold.
‘It made it clear that the Iraq-Syria love-in story was true after all. The signal briefed Mahmoud’s head of section on a joint operation called Day of Deliverance, a plan jointly drawn up by Al-Saddi and the Iraqi leader.
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