Tracers

by Adrian Magson

  ‘In a loose kind of way,’ Harry supplied vaguely.

  Karen stopped at another door and waved her lapel near the black box. ‘Don’t worry, I wasn’t asking. I trust Sandra not to send me a couple of potential terrorists. She’s very good like that. Anyway, what you see here wouldn’t help much if you were up to no good, believe me.’

  ‘Unless we wanted to erase something,’ suggested Rik.

  She looked at him with a raised eyebrow. ‘Why? Is that a giant magnet in your pocket?’ She turned and stepped inside, leaving Rik flushed and confused.

  The room was suffused with a dull light from discreet overhead panels, and smaller than they had expected. Four desks were crammed in the centre, each one bearing a large monitor and keyboard. The walls were lined with racks, one holding a bewildering array of DVD and CD machines, with the others holding editing equipment and printers, files, folders and tapes. A twisted spaghetti of wires bridged by rubber ramps curled across the floor between the various racks, and the immediate impression was of chaos threatening to spill over into a jungle. Yet the atmosphere was oddly calm, aided by rows of flickering display lights and a soothing electronic hum from an air-conditioning unit in one corner.

  ‘Cool,’ said Rik, but his face suggested he wasn’t that impressed. Harry had half expected him to be like a kid in a toy shop, with all manner of equipment to play with.

  ‘It’s a mess, I know,’ Karen said defensively. ‘But we can’t dig into the fabric, so we have to live with wires everywhere until somebody stumps up a decent budget for a purpose-built unit.’ She nodded at a couple of monitors and a stack of boxes piled on a side table. ‘Those are a mix of discs and hard drives from Terminal Two. Some of the areas still have old technology, but most have gone over to wireless.’ She shrugged. ‘It takes time and money, so they’re using a variety of systems depending on priorities.’ She pulled a face. ‘Pretty soon, they won’t need us any more; they’ll be able to feed and retrieve whatever they need. We’re setting up archives for retrieval and image management, but we’re the last of the steam age. I still think of this stuff as tape, but it isn’t.’

  ‘What’s the coverage of these cameras?’ asked Harry. He was wondering how they were going to get the information before anyone turned up and blew the whistle.

  ‘The entry points from airside, the various lounges and walkways, the routes down to the Arrivals door, where the meeters and greeters stand, and the concourse to the main exits. They’re all different, but if you tell me what you’re looking for, I’ll call up what I need. You’re after a passenger arriving off a flight, right?’

  ‘Yes. What about stairways and lifts?’

  ‘Stairways, lifts, side corridors and all links to the other terminals are covered. I’ve selected the recordings which run from the confirmed landing time of LH4736, to an hour after the last passengers should have come through.’ She went on, ‘Some passengers get taken short as soon as they land and head for the toilets. It’s not unknown for some to take their time coming out. If your man came through, you’ll see him sooner or later.’

  Rik said, ‘There’s no way he could have avoided the cameras?’

  ‘Not unless he knew the location of every unit or changed his appearance between cameras.’

  ‘Could he have slipped out the back way?’

  Karen gave him a doubtful look, but didn’t automatically dismiss the idea. ‘If he did,’ she said carefully, ‘he had inside help.’

  ‘Is that possible?’

  ‘In a place that size, anything’s possible, I suppose. Anyway, after September the eleventh, they resited a lot of the camera positions in the terminals and ran security exercises to double-check the coverage. They also increased the optical zooms and scope for clarity and control. So far nobody has managed to bypass them.’

  She went over to the nearest machine and sat down, indicating that they should drag up two chairs and join her. She tapped a few keys and hit a button. Seconds later, an image flickered on to the monitor. It showed an interior shot of a terminal building, with a jumble of people standing around, apparently waiting.

  ‘LH4736 landed at 13.15 hours,’ Karen explained. ‘This is the Arrivals exit. I’ve prepared what we have in chronological order. It’s probably the best place to start because eventually everyone funnels through this door. Unless your man did have help, which God forbid, he’d have to pass this point.’ She looked to see if they understood, and they both nodded. ‘OK, from here, he could go anywhere in this or the other terminals. If you spot him, just shout, then we’ll switch to other cameras to follow his progress. If we don’t spot him, we’ll go back and check everywhere up to the Arrivals exit.’

  The screen showed a trickle of arriving passengers coming into view through a gap in the wall. Some carried hand luggage, while others were struggling with trolleys or bags on wheels. It was a commonplace scene yet, from this perspective, oddly compelling. Like ants.

  ‘Christ,’ Rik breathed. ‘It’s like watching Big Brother.’

  Karen chuckled. ‘It’s a bit more interesting than that.’

  The minutes passed, the arrivals growing and receding tide-like as each planeload moved through the Arrivals chain. It would have helped if they could have identified which flight they were seeing, but there was no way the screen could pick out such details, nor if some of the figures passing through the exit had arrived on a much earlier flight and had been delayed along the way.

  At the lower edge of the screen was the ever-present crowd of meeters and greeters. Some held scraps of cardboard showing the names of arriving passengers, while others betrayed the anxious foot-hopping of family and friends awaiting someone who had probably got logjammed at Immigration.

  Harry or Rik occasionally asked Karen to freeze or go back over the recording, convinced they had spotted a familiar face. Each time, closer inspection showed they were mistaken. As each possible target was dismissed and the line of passengers disappeared from view, they felt the clutch of disappointment beginning to grow stronger.

  A flash of movement made Harry lean forward. It was on the lowest edge of the screen and showed two men bumping into one another. One was a new arrival, the other a uniformed airport worker. A brief flurry ensued, with both figures executing the step-sideways, zigzag dance of convergence, before moving on with nods and muttered apologies. Harry began to look away, subconsciously dismissing it, then froze as something about the traveller made him look again.

  ‘Wait.’ He jabbed a finger at the screen. ‘Back a few clicks.’

  Karen did so and played it again. This time they all leaned forward, willing to exchange hours of searching for something, no matter how small. When the airport worker walked off screen and the other turned briefly towards the camera, Harry snapped his fingers in triumph.

  ‘Houston,’ he hissed softly. ‘We have contact.’

  A hundred yards away, Dog was watching the building with stony patience. He had no idea what function Transit Support Services performed, or how many people were inside. No doubt Jennings would have a way of finding out.

  After following the two former MI5 men down from Paddington, he’d run a check of the surrounding area. At one point in the journey, he thought he’d detected a presence nearby. After years in the field, he’d developed an inbuilt radar sensitive to possible threat which he’d learned never to ignore. But whatever it was had remained invisible, and he’d slowly relaxed, aware that night-time and moving traffic often combined to play tricks on the mind.

  Thirty minutes into his vigil, he’d finally found the twin needs of exercise and refreshment something he could no longer ignore. But before making a move, he needed a delaying tactic in case the two men left before he returned. Blending into the shadows and keeping well back from the glare of the overhead lights, he’d made a careful circuit of the building on foot first, checking for other exits. There were a few lights on, but with the reflective sheeting covering the windows, there was no way of telling what was going
on inside.

  He’d located the security guard almost immediately, latching on to the smell of cigarette smoke drifting from a rear door. Satisfied that the man was busy for a few minutes, he’d slipped into the front car park and bent down briefly by the side of Ferris’s car. As he walked away, he could hear the soft hiss as one of the front tyres deflated from a puncture in the sidewall.

  When he’d returned later with a drink and sandwich from a nearby corner shop, the car was still there.

  FOURTEEN

  Harry waited nervously as Karen froze the picture and then re-ran it so they could see the man again in slow motion. ‘It looks like him,’ he said. ‘Let it run.’

  The replay showed the man walking away across the bottom of the screen, easing through the crowd. He wore heavy glasses and was holding a dark coat, slung over his right shoulder, with a dark sports bag in his other hand. For a split second his face was clearly in view.

  Rik nodded in agreement. ‘It’s him. Check his right hand, holding the coat.’ The hand clearly showed a bandage, bearing out the briefing reference to his injury.

  ‘And the face,’ Harry added. ‘Right cheekbone.’

  ‘Is that a bruise?’ Karen froze the screen again and zoomed in, but the clarity was lacking. ‘Sorry – the light’s not good just there.’

  ‘Birthmark. Either way, it’s a match.’

  He let Karen run the recording a little longer, but he knew they had found their man. All they had to do now was track him through the terminal and see where he went.

  ‘Easy,’ said Karen, suddenly galvanized by the discovery. She ran her eyes over a schematic layout of the terminal and hummed quietly to herself. ‘This chart shows me the camera location and number,’ she explained, bringing up a new set of recordings. ‘Unless he dodges back and forth, which would be pointless, because he’d never leave the building, he has to go past one of them sooner or later. It’s just a question of finding which one, then passing on to the next in line.’

  ‘Are you sure you have time for this?’ Harry glanced at his watch. They had been there nearly two hours. He didn’t want to outstay their welcome, but without Karen’s help, they wouldn’t stand a chance of following Silverman’s course through the terminal.

  She smiled excitedly. ‘Are you kidding? I haven’t had this much fun in weeks. Usually it’s humourless plods in suits doing their own searching and keeping us at arm’s length. I never to get to do this stuff unless they fuck up the machine.’ She glanced at them. ‘Sorry.’ She checked the chart and selected another recording. ‘I think I know where he’d have gone next. Let me run it and see. If I tell you where the makings are, I don’t suppose one of you boys would care to make some coffee, would you?’ She smiled disarmingly at Rik, who stood up and stretched.

  ‘I thought you’d never ask.’

  Thirty minutes later, coffee cups discarded, they were watching the flickering images of the inside of Terminal Two. After Silverman’s little dance earlier, they hadn’t been able to pick him up again. It was eye-watering work, with nobody daring to blink in case they missed something. Time after time they told Karen to stop the film, but each one proved to be a mistake. There were momentary distractions, too, in the unfolding story of the stick figures bustling about before them; brief meetings, mild collisions and near misses; the body language of the stressed, portrayed by waving arms, covered mouths and bursts of frantic activity; the tumble of luggage from a careering trolley, followed by the scrabble to regain possessions and dignity in the face of the unrelenting advance of another flush of travellers bearing down like a tidal wave.

  They were nearing the last batch of recordings when Karen tapped the screen. ‘Is that him?’

  Sure enough, Silverman’s figure appeared in the background, partly obscured by a group of Japanese businessmen in dark suits. He was standing still, head down and apparently relaxed, by the entrance to a pharmacy. He seemed to be alone, the sports bag lying at his feet.

  ‘He’s waiting for a pick-up,’ said Harry, recognizing the man’s body language. Impatience, anticipation and wariness all bound together.

  They sat frozen, waiting to see what would happen next. It was clear from Silverman’s increasing shift of position that he was growing nervous, throwing regular glances around with sharp movements of his head, the light flashing off his spectacles. After following his progress through the terminal, it was almost an anti-climax to know that this part of the chase was over, that in the next few seconds or minutes they would either learn the next stage of his journey or lose him altogether.

  ‘How about this one?’ said Karen.

  A younger man had appeared on the opposite side of the picture, filtering slowly through the crowd. He carried no hand luggage, and was dressed in jeans and a dark windcheater, another greeter killing time while awaiting an incoming passenger. There was nothing overt to suggest he was connected with Silverman, and he could have been on his way to the pharmacy, except that, from their commanding position overlooking the scene, he seemed to be on a collision course with the waiting professor and kept looking towards him each time he was forced off-course by the flow and press of the crowd.

  ‘Ten quid says it’s him,’ breathed Rik, but there were no takers.

  The man was in his late twenties or early thirties, solidly built with the springy walk of someone very fit. He was clean-shaven, with glossy, swept-back hair and a Mediterranean appearance, but they couldn’t see enough of his face to get a clear picture.

  At the last second, rather than entering the pharmacy, the newcomer skirted a family group huddled together around a trolley. He stopped at one side of the entrance, idly flicking through a carousel of travel items. Then he ducked his head, as if spotting something of interest nearer the ground. The movement brought him closer to Silverman but shielded his face from the camera.

  Then they saw the professor’s body tense. He began to turn his head, but stopped suddenly, before looking back down at his feet. The newcomer, now less than a foot away, must have said something.

  ‘Got you,’ breathed Harry. He clapped a hand on Karen’s shoulder, drawing a triumphant giggle.

  Suddenly, as if galvanized by decision, the younger man turned and walked away, disappearing into the crowd. Moments later, after hopping from foot to foot, Silverman followed, scurrying through the flow of people like an erratic missile bearing down on its target.

  Karen turned to her chart. ‘I don’t need to follow this any more,’ she said confidently, ‘but just in case . . .’ She called up another recording and hit the PLAY button.

  ‘Where’s he going?’ said Harry.

  The new picture showed a panoramic view of the terminal building shot from one end. The foreground was a bustling mass of people, while further back, the screen seemed flooded with a greyish aura of light. There was no sign of the young man.

  Karen pointed at a figure which might have been him, but he was too far away for a clear view. Then she tapped the edge of the screen as Silverman hurried into view, pushing his way with difficulty through a knot of schoolchildren. ‘He’s heading for the main exits.’

  She reached across and grabbed a hard drive from a box. ‘This is from an auxiliary camera outside the main exit.’ They waited to see if Silverman would deviate from his course. He didn’t.

  ‘Some bloody professor he is,’ Harry murmured cynically, and Rik nodded in agreement. They were both thinking the same thing: whatever Jennings’ briefing paper might have said, Silverman was no simple academic fleeing under the burden of emotional trauma.

  This bore all the hallmarks of something far more professional.

  FIFTEEN

  ‘Still no sign of a Mini,’ said Harry. It was nearly twenty hours later and he and Rik were walking along a quiet back street in Harrow.

  It was after six and the light was fading, the predominantly residential area morphing into shadows and yellow lights, and the homeward rumble of through traffic. The houses on each side were part of a small
redevelopment, neatly terraced and upmarket, with a variety of large potted plants flanking the doors to give an illusion of greenery. Glossy vehicles were parked on hard standings immediately in front of each house, although none looked as if they were used much.

  Only one house showed a vacant space, and had done since their first drive-by earlier that day.

  ‘She might have dumped it,’ said Rik. ‘If she’s in with Param, they’d know it would be too hot to keep for long.’

  They had left Karen and her banks of screens late the previous evening, hopeful possessors of a tenuous lead to Silverman’s whereabouts after he left Heathrow’s Terminal Two. A private cab had arrived minutes after they had watched a tape of the area immediately outside the main exit. It followed a brief period of doubt, during which they thought Silverman must have ducked into a waiting vehicle. But then the younger man had appeared, prowling along the pavement and gesturing animatedly with a mobile phone pressed to his ear.

  ‘Can we get a print of that?’ Harry had asked, tapping the screen. It was the first full-face view they’d had of Silverman’s greeter, and would be useful when they caught up with the two men. He was convinced that the way the man had kept his face carefully averted from the cameras until now was too deliberate to be accidental.

  ‘Of course.’ Karen’s fingers danced across the keyboard. The screen blinked and a printer hummed into life. She continued to run the recording and they watched the younger man gesticulating, shoulders hunched and a finger stabbing the air excitedly. In the entrance behind him, Silverman was glancing anxiously around, the bandaged hand a small white flag in the gloom. Although the two men had still not spoken openly, it was clear they were together.

  It was even clearer that Silverman, if that was his real name, was under the control of someone who knew his tradecraft.

  Two minutes later, a white people-carrier cab nosed in to the kerb, and the younger man leapt forward to open the rear door. Gesturing at Silverman, who scuttled across the pavement and into the car, he jumped in after him and slammed the door. A lurch of the vehicle and they were gone.