As Dog turned out of the hostel and headed along the street towards the station, he noticed a figure in a car parked on a yellow line fifty yards away. Nothing unusual in that; just another motorist among many in a busy street.
Yet a deep-seated instinct made him stop, his heart picking up a beat.
The vehicle was facing away from him, dusty and unremarkable, a couple of years old. The driver was staring at a blonde girl legging it along the opposite pavement. He was young and looked as if he was waiting for someone.
But Dog didn’t think so. He took three steps and slid into a doorway that put him in the man’s blind spot, and waited. Two minutes later, after the driver made a brief, one-sided phone call, he knew he’d been right: the driver wasn’t waiting – he was a watcher.
Dog stepped out of the doorway and walked towards the car. He slipped his hand into his pocket. He hugged the shadows, head down but watching the car’s wing mirror, where he could see the pale oval of the driver’s face. The man was still eyeing the blonde. Silly sod. The lack of professionalism made Dog angry. Not that he gave a stuff about the man himself, but the sheer disregard for the rules of the game was an insult.
He gripped the knife against his leg.
He’d been told to expect this, that sooner or later he’d pop up on someone’s radar. He’d been doing this job a long time, and that made him noticeable. But that wasn’t what annoyed him. Was this what they really thought of him – sending some junior, pasty-faced prick fresh out of the training centre to watch his every move?
Well, for that, he’d have to teach them a lesson.
He snicked open the blade. Stopped by the driver’s window and tapped lightly on the glass. Glanced each way to check the immediate area. There was nobody close by, which gave him a small window of opportunity. He’d had worse.
The driver lowered the window instinctively and looked up just as Dog stepped in close and took his hand out of his pocket. The knife had a narrow blade, a souvenir of his last tour in Kosovo, and clearly had one purpose: it was a killing tool.
The driver’s eyes fastened on it instantly, his face draining of colour as he realized his mistake. Hardly more than mid-twenties, thought Dog. Probably a university intake on his first observation. He smiled, pleased that his instincts were still sound.
‘Should have kept your eyes off the girls, kid,’ Dog said softly. ‘That’s sloppy tradecraft.’
He inserted the point of the knife into the man’s ear, and with a sharp pump of his arm, rammed it all the way home.
He smiled.
The day hadn’t been a complete waste.
FORTY-THREE
Rik led the way to a sandwich bar just off Victoria Street. On the way, the wail of emergency vehicles echoed over the rooftops from the direction of Victoria Station. Hopefully it was nothing to do with them, but they stayed close to the buildings, anyway. There was no sense in taking chances, even though they had no reason to think they were yet on anyone’s ‘watch’ list.
It reminded Harry to try Jennings’ number again. They hadn’t heard from the lawyer, and instinct told him they weren’t likely to. But he was their only point of contact to this business.
There was no answer.
Rik scooped up a selection of rolls, cakes, coffee and fruit juice all round, while Harry kept an eye on the street, less interested in eating than trying to figure out what to do next. Joanne stood silently nearby, wrapped in her own thoughts.
When they were sitting around a table and eating, Rik leaned forward and said around a mouthful of French stick, ‘OK, so what’s the plan? We need to get this thing moving, right? I can’t stand this waiting around.’
Harry said, ‘I’ve been thinking about that.’ He peeled off a chunk of bread and chewed on it thoughtfully. Planning was something he was good at, but it only worked if you got it right and didn’t trip over your own feet. Trouble was, they were all stumbling in the dark here, and there were no clear rules to follow.
‘We can’t make contact with Rafa’i until ten tomorrow,’ he reminded them. ‘Not unless we get lucky and bump into him in the street – and that’s not going to happen.’ He tore off another piece of bread, his appetite returning. Even Joanne was chewing dutifully, following the soldier’s maxim of eating when you had the chance, because you never know when the next meal will come. ‘In fact, there’s more of a risk that we’ll get marked by the killer before then.’
‘You think he’ll hang around?’ Joanne paused in her eating.
‘Wouldn’t you? He didn’t finish the job. Yes, he’s still around.’
‘OK. So what do we do until tomorrow?’
‘We could go looking for him.’ He smiled to show he was joking. ‘But that wouldn’t be a good idea. We need to find Humphries’ contact, Marshall. He’s the key to this. His sister said he was either Five or Six. Logic says Six, since Humphries was, too. But we need to make sure.’
Rik looked up. ‘What if he’s one of the bad guys?’
‘It’s a risk we have to take. Do you have an alternative?’
Rik threw a look at Joanne with a pained expression. ‘He does this. Whenever we’re at a sticky point and need a plan, he comes up with something and asks if I’ve got anything better.’
‘What about you?’ Joanne replied, turning to Harry. ‘You were both with Five. Surely you’ve got contacts who might know him?’
‘It doesn’t work like that. Any friends we had have moved on. Those that haven’t won’t help.’ It wasn’t strictly true, and for two reasons: he’d already thought of calling Bill Maloney, his operational partner on several jobs. If anyone could get him a hearing, it would be Bill. But it might be at the expense of his job and Harry couldn’t do that to him. Compromising his former colleague was not an option – not unless they were right up against the wire.
The second reason highlighted a dilemma. He did have a route into the security world – a legitimate one. But it was one he didn’t want to use unless he was forced to. Any information from carded personnel would be treated as high priority until checked out. It would open up a major response over which he would have no little or no control, because the moment he made contact, the system would light up like a Christmas tree.
He pushed that idea aside. It needed to be much more focussed, to reach a man with real decision-making powers. ‘So,’ he said, ‘Vauxhall Cross or Thames House?’ The headquarters of MI6 and MI5 were both situated on the Embankment a few hundred yards from where they were sitting. But going anywhere near either of them would be like sticking their heads into the lion’s mouth. The question was, which lion and which mouth?
Joanne reacted with surprise. ‘Are you nuts? They’d slap us in a cell the moment we stepped through the door.’
‘I’m not saying we actually go there. But if we can get a message to Marshall, one he can’t ignore, he might respond.’
‘It’d have to be a good one.’ Rik balled up a napkin and dumped it in his empty mug. ‘Something that lit a bomb under his arse, otherwise, we’ll be waiting for ever. That’s if he even gets it.’
‘Oh, he’ll get it all right.’ Harry spread out his own napkin and reached for a pen. ‘What do these guys live by?’ he asked. ‘What governs their every action?’
They both looked blank. He wrote in block letters on the soft tissue, then spun it round so they could see what he’d written.
The words read: OPERATION PAMPER, followed by a row of numbers.
‘Dude,’ Rik drawled, feigning hero-worship. ‘You’re like, so out there, man.’
Harry smiled in appreciation. ‘I have my moments, sunshine. I have my moments.’
Joanne stared at them in wonder. ‘Would you two tell me what’s going on or is this strictly a boys-only moment?’
‘He’s giving Marshall your operation code name,’ Rik told her, ‘and a mobile where he can call us. Marshall won’t be able to resist it.’ Then he added without apparent irony, ‘These spooky-dooky types love all that stuff, lik
e codes and numbers. If Marshall’s still around, it’ll draw him out.’
‘But they’ll trace us through the phone number,’ she pointed out.
‘I bet they won’t.’ Rik stared at Harry. ‘It’s nicked, isn’t it?’
Harry shrugged modestly. ‘It’s a spare I picked up. And we won’t be on long enough for him to get a fix. You two ready?’
He led them outside and along the street until they reached a small post office. Inside, he went to a rack of envelopes and selected two large, white A4-size envelopes and a plain white notepad. He paid for them and went to the writing counter near the window, and scrawled in large block letters the operational code name PAMPER followed by the stolen mobile phone number. He did this on two separate pieces of paper, then inserted one in each envelope and wrote on the outside. One was addressed to Major Andrew Marshall at Thames House, the headquarters of MI5, the other to Marshall at Vauxhall Cross, which housed MI6.
‘We don’t know for sure where he works or who for,’ Harry admitted, sealing the envelopes, ‘but it’s a fair guess it’s one of them. This gives us two bites at the cherry. Now we need a delivery method.’
‘How about him?’ Rik nodded towards a motorcycle courier outside. He was dressed in an orange tabard and grungy leather trousers, and lounging on his machine, chewing an apple. A stream of chatter was pouring from a radio clipped to his jacket.
‘He’ll do,’ said Harry.
Rik took some money from his wallet and reached for the envelopes. But Joanne intercepted him.
‘Let me.’ She took the money and envelopes and walked out the door. Moments later she was in conversation with the courier, who stopped chewing his apple and sat up. Seconds later, he was stuffing the two envelopes in his pouch.
‘She’s good,’ Rik said approvingly. ‘Better than me.’
‘Prettier, too. He’d have told you to get stuffed.’
They left the sandwich bar the moment the courier was out of sight and walked to Victoria Station, where they found a corner table at a café close to one of the exits. Then they settled down to wait. The crush of travellers was an added barrier against being spotted, or being overheard by anyone if Marshall should ring. Leaving the sandwich bar had been a simple precaution; if the courier were detained and asked where he had picked up the envelopes, it wouldn’t take long for an active unit to be out trawling the streets.
‘What if he doesn’t call?’ Joanne asked. ‘He might be away.’
‘He’ll call,’ said Harry. ‘Somehow, it’ll get through to him.’
‘You sound very sure of yourself.’ Her tone was less hostile now, as if she was warming to him after their earlier fall-out.
‘Actually, I’m not,’ he admitted frankly. ‘But when you’ve nothing else to go for, you have to follow your instincts.’
‘Is that how you work when you’re finding people – by instincts?’
‘Sometimes. Planning works, too.’
‘What he means,’ Rik interjected, setting his chair back on its rear legs, ‘is that he does the planning and I have the instinctive flashes of brilliance. It’s the flashes that work best.’ He reached out and scooped up a discarded newspaper from the next table and flicked through it.
Seconds later, he sat forward with a thump. ‘Christ, look at this.’ He dropped the newspaper flat on the table so that Harry could see the headline.
Libyan Bank Official ‘Executed’, Claims Brother
In a plot worthy of a thriller writer, Libyan bank official, Abuzeid Matuq, 42, who disappeared from his London office recently, allegedly taking with him somewhere between £100,000 and £800,000 of his employers’ money, has been found dead on a beach near Dunwich, in Suffolk. His brother, Muhammed, speaking from Paris, where he claims he is in hiding, says Matuq was set up by high-ranking enemies within the Libyan government and that he was innocent of any theft. This is their way, he claims, of dealing with people they disapprove of, and his brother Abuzeid has paid the price for running foul of somebody jealous of his success. Muhammed Matuq does not go so far as to implicate the country’s ruler, Colonel Muammar Gaddafi, who is currently working hard to gain rapprochement with the West following 9/11, but points the finger at ‘elements within his inner circle of ministers’. So far, police are not commenting on whether the death is suspicious, but have confirmed that none of the missing money has yet been recovered.
‘One of the men you were looking for?’ asked Joanne.
‘Not just looking – we found him,’ said Rik. ‘Or Harry did. Trouble is, so did someone else.’
‘But why dump him in the open? It would have been easier to bury him.’
‘Someone must have decided it was better to have him surface.’ Harry shook his head, exchanging a look with Rik.
Joanne caught the silent exchange. ‘What?’
‘It felt like a pro job at the time, but there was no proof, no motive.’ Harry nodded at the newspaper. ‘But if we’re right and it was the same man who tried to kill Rafa’i, then we were used to trace Matuq so the killer could slip in and finish him off.’
‘If this killer works for the British government, why would they want to kill a Libyan banker?’
‘I’m not sure they do. The government wouldn’t sanction killing someone on behalf of the Libyans . . . but someone with a vested interest might.’
‘Jennings,’ Rik muttered sourly.
Joanne looked at Harry. ‘Hang on. If the killer has been the same one all along, and he was in Iraq with Humphries and Marshall, he might know what I look like. How could he have mistaken Cath for me?’
Harry had only one answer for that. ‘He’s a loose cannon; he’s killing without thought. Maybe he’s been at it too long.’ He stopped as the phone on the table began to ring. He checked the caller display. It was a withheld number.
‘Yes?’
‘My name’s Marshall,’ said a man’s voice. ‘I believe we have something to discuss.’
FORTY-FOUR
‘Give me a description,’ Harry replied. He signalled to the other two to be ready to move. They had discussed tactics earlier, and were comfortable with what they had to do. Rik had warned them that if the call came from Marshall, he would already have his technical bods running down the signal. They wouldn’t have much time.
‘I don’t follow. A description of what?’ Marshall, if it was indeed he, spoke slowly, without any sign of tension. It meant he was stretching out the call for as long as he could to allow his people to do their work and get a fix on their location.
‘Of yourself. A thumbnail sketch.’
There was a momentary silence. Then Marshall said, ‘As you wish. I’m slim, clean-shaven, of medium height with fair hair. That enough for you, Mr—?’
‘Not nearly close enough,’ said Harry. ‘Try again.’ He cut the connection and waited.
Seconds later, the phone rang again. It was Marshall sounding mildly contrite. ‘I apologize. That was stupid of me. You know what I look like, don’t you?’
‘Correct.’ Harry hoped the implied humility lasted long enough for him to convince the man that the three of them shouldn’t be shot on sight. ‘You recognized the code I sent you.’ It wasn’t a question.
‘It rang a bell. How did you find out about it, Mr—?’
Harry ignored the baited hook. ‘I have my sources. I also know about the subject of the operation.’
‘What about him?’
Him. Not her. Not it. It was a small slip, but significant. ‘I know where he is.’
‘Really.’ There was another slight delay and Harry decided he’d been on long enough. Then Marshall spoke again. ‘Are you a journalist?’
‘If I were, you’d have read about this over your cornflakes.’
A dry chuckle echoed down the line. ‘Good point. Very well, where do we go from here? Are you suggesting a meeting?’
‘Give me a number I can call tomorrow. A mobile, not a landline.’
‘Actually, I’d rather we had a face-t
o—’
‘You’ve got ten seconds, then I’m gone.’
Marshall read out a number.
Harry disconnected and walked across the concourse after Rik and Joanne.
They split up and left separately, each merging into the crowd. Harry had already checked for security cameras and told the others where they were. There were probably others they were unaware of, but they wouldn’t be able to avoid them all. They regrouped along Victoria Street and walked north towards Green Park and Buckingham Palace, sheltering among clutches of tourists and office workers.
‘What did he say?’ asked Rik.
‘Not much. He’s trying to figure out whether his day just got bad or even worse.’
‘Did you mention Jennings?’
‘No. I didn’t want to be on too long. I’ll ask him later.’
Rik raised his eyebrows. ‘Later?’
‘I told him I’d call tomorrow. He gave me a mobile number.’ He recited it from memory and Joanne and Rik each made a note. It was a simple precaution; if anything happened to him, they’d have a means to contact Marshall. Whether it made any difference to their situation was debatable, but at least they wouldn’t be left in the dark. He glanced at his watch. They all needed a change of clothes and toiletries in case they had to stay on the move. ‘We need to pick up some stuff. Joanne, can you buy some skivvies from a shop?’
‘Sure. Won’t your places be risky, though? If Marshall’s working with Jennings, he’ll have men on the way there now.’
‘If he’s working with Jennings, we’re stuffed anyway,’ Rik muttered.
‘We need some transport,’ said Harry. ‘Rik?’
Tracers Page 21
