Bearings: The Compass Trilogy Part One

by Mr Iain F Johnston

  I woke Chris at 0630 to which I received an Anglo Saxon Geordie response until he saw what gifts this particular anti-social Greek was bearing. We agreed to leave Sarah and Norman until 0700…

  It was time, the two metal storage boxes were sitting invitingly on the desk nearest the boards. I began with the two box files. I then had a thought and reached for the telephone…

  “Duty Officer…”

  “Morning Phil…Do we have any maps of the south east of England…?”

  “I take it you’re talking about Essex and Kent, Chief…?” “Yeah that’s right.”

  “I’ll need to send someone to check, I think OC South has the coastal maps for that area…I’ll see if I can reach him.”

  “No bother, He’s in his office Phil.”

  “Oh right, yes sir… I’ll see what we have and have them up to you…Chief, if you haven’t heard anything by 0830, it might be an idea to send your runner down.”

  “Cheers Phil, will do”

  Chris had appeared at my shoulder… “Let’s start with the photos”

  We tipped the contents of the steel box onto the table and began to sift. We found six containing images of Catlin and his wife plus photos of their house illustrating both front and rear aspects, on the rear of each was hand written information such as address, timed movements, that sort of thing. We also discovered one of the A4 pads had detailed information regarding Catlin’s lifestyle and some interesting facts and figures about their finances, how they came to have these would be another task for SO12 but it was clear that Rod Catlin had been on their radar for some time… Understandably Chris and I kept these to one side; they would be submitted to Robin to add to Catlin’s file…

  We counted twenty images of bridges both close up shots and distant also drive through photographs of both London’s Blackwall tunnel and the Dartford crossing…Clearly these two were high on their agenda as possible, indeed, probable targets.

  Norman had joined us and was holding one of the blank Railtrack IDs whilst he thumbed through the images…

  “There’s none here of Folkestone or the channel tunnel…”

  “Yeah we noticed that, strange that such a juicy high profile target such as Eurotunnel is omitted from their plans…let’s have Puffin in today so we can have a chat about it Norm…”

  He nodded as he said…

  “There is of course the chance that when they put this plan together the tunnel wasn’t ready yet…? It didn’t open until November boss…”

  “Bloody hell…! Your right Norm, I bet your bloody right…”

  Chris agreed…

  “Keep looking Norm, you have good eyes for this…”

  By 0800 Sarah had re-joined the land of the living and was continuing to translate the Intel take from Thursday’s adventures in Düsseldorf, she was also speaking to Niklas Meier in reference to O’Keefe’s death…

  We kept Norman at it with the IMINT as Chris and now Charlie joined me in Robin’s office to go through what was discovered on Sunday. As we finished Janet put her head around the door…

  “Gents we need the TV on, yesterday’s adventure has broken on breakfast news…”

  The four of us walked into the office as my runner, Jamie was increasing the volume…

  “It’s understood that the house here in Seymer Road Romford was the rented accommodation of two of the men wanted in questioning of the unprovoked murder in Chelmsford of housewife Mary Catlin…I think we all remember the awful images the BBC brought to you last week of the terrible scene during rush hour in the city centre…”

  “Susan has the local Police mentioned yet why the area around the property was sealed off overnight or indeed why Special Branch and the Anti-Terrorist Squad were involved…?”

  “Not as yet Bill, however we have been told that there is to be a press conference at Essex Police Headquarters in Chelmsford either late this morning or early afternoon…When asked if the operation was anyway connected with the incident in the village of Brasted, twenty miles from Maidstone, the Police declined to comment…Bill…?”

  “Thanks for now Susan; we’ll come back to if there is more…”

  “So to recap the breaking news this morning… Essex police with the aid of Special branch and the Anti-Terrorist Squad have arrested four men in connection with the vicious murder last week of Mary Catlin in Chelmsford…We’ll have more after the local weather where you are…”

  “They haven’t put two and two together yet…Good…!”

  “They will Chris; it’s early yet…Once the notion of the snatch Landrover gets around it won’t be long before the media start asking the right questions…”

  I stood in the centre of the room indicating for the staff to gather round…

  “Ok people, this is what we need from today… Chase the DVLA, we are still in need of all vehicles which have been registered under these names, there will also be more added through the day…”

  I said this pointing to the football team squad names we had written on the boards…

  “Chase the vehicle auctions too, there may well be cars or vans still in the process…Let’s concentrate on the businesses which have good road links…SO12 are to poke the local forces to help with the legwork on this which has been flagged as most urgent…”

  “Where’s the property team…?

  Hands were raised…

  “You’re too slow. It’s been two weeks now since the instruction was given to chase rural Estate Agents…Speed it up…Brasted was established…Start going back two years…?

  Let’s move people, now…! What was discovered yesterday was just the beginning… We still have more work to do…”

  The staff filtered back to their work stations leaving the four of us staring at the IMINT. As expected it was Norman who spoke first…

  “The way I see it boss…? We can scratch Eurotunnel for now; I’d go as far to say the channel ports too… This is more to do with daily choke points; you know where rush hour backs up causing congestion…?

  Chris responded…

  “Show us what you mean Norm…”

  “Well, there are images of the Blackwall tunnel and Dartford crossing also the QEII Bridge. They seem to have scrubbed these, why…? Because we also see them as their usual targets so we monitor them closely…”

  “So you think they are targeting choke points which are a little more obscure but nevertheless vital to the general public being able to travel to and from work…?”

  “Yes boss, I do…”

  “Such as, Norm…?”

  “Firstly there were three SD cards amongst this little lot which I’ve given to Andy, Matt has also hung on to run through them too but what we have in photographs points me more in the direction of road links…”

  Norman began to lay out the images in separate groups; they were mostly of major motorway junctions…

  “Guys if we look closely we see a pattern…The M4 Corridor, The M25, the M20 and M11 hence the reason for the Highways agency vehicles. These have allowed their lilywhites to gather Intel without being chased…”

  We nodded in acceptance of the fundamental ease and logic to it all…

  “The only river crossing or similar I can see any images of that would have access for the Railtrack Escort van is the Isle of Sheppey link over the river Swale…If this was damaged it would affect the road link which runs in tandem to it and also seriously curtail river traffic movement. They get some quite large freighters along this route…”

  I looked closely at the image Norman had handed me then said…

  “These two areas, are they serviced by both the Railtrack and Highways Agency offices based in Sittingbourne Norm…?”

  “They are boss, yes…”

  “And you’ve deduced this in three hours…?”

  He replied hesitantly… “Yes boss…”

  “Don’t look so worried Norm, you’ve got me sold, Charlie and Chris too by the look of things…Well done, mate this is excellent work
…What do you need…?”

  “Another pair of eyes… I want to find out which target the horseboxes were for, chatting to the EOD Sergeant last night he thought they would be ideal for a major motorway junction…We need to know which one…Also the second Highways van, where was that going…?”

  “Ok…Finding which junction would go some way to pinpointing other vulnerable targets they may have their sights on…Puffin is coming in today, I’ll recall Snipe too…You want them both…?”

  “Yes please boss…”

  “Consider it done Norm…Carry on…”

  Chris walked back over with a satisfied look on his face… “Told you…!”

  “If he keeps this up Chris, we’ll be lucky to keep him…”

  “I don’t think so…It’s being here which has brought him out of his shell, the same can be said for Sarah too…”

  “I’m concerned about the eastern corridor… The manpower is severely stretched; Snipe is on his way in, how about him as OC East…?”

  “He’s intelligent enough, clean as a whistle too…Yeah I’d go for that Iain…As I see it we need three or four over there and there’s Starlings replacement for the Republic too…”

  “Shit, we’re too busy with all this; we can’t afford to take our eyes off the ball…”

  “We can’t afford to leave it either…It’s your job Iain…Norm is getting on with the thrust of the investigation, I’ll help him with it too…I would suggest that you and Charlie start sifting through packages as of now…”

  “OK…Charlie…?” “Yes laddie…?”

  “Come on, my office…You and I are on recruitment…We’ll have some for interview in today…Where are Sparrow and Blackbird…?”

  “Sparrow is at Waterloo today and Blackbird is in London too.” “Right I want them in here; pronto…They’re going on a trip…”

  Charlie looked at me a little puzzled…

  “I want one to monitor Hull and the other up at Harwich…Abby could you get Raven for me too please…”

  “What are you up to…?”

  “As I said, Hull and Harwich…I’m also about to instruct Raven to task Wren to Newcastle with all three loaded with as much surveillance gear they can carry…As far as we are aware Morris, Harraghy and Crown are still at large in Europe… The Dutch were a little late searching the safehouse, they had moved on…If this is the beginning of a multiple target campaign there is a good chance they will be heading this way…I want the ports covered… Steve has agreed to release five of his officers, including intelligence with the view to them supervising the local law enforcement. These guys will be monitoring the smaller marinas and aerodromes…”

  “What is your plan for Mark…?”

  “I want Mark to speak to Box and the Coastguard…I bet Garret came over by fishing boat or something similar…”

  Charlie nodded in agreement and added…

  “We could ask Fisheries…? They utilise Royal Navy Patrol boats for ad hoc boarding to weigh catches, check paperwork that sort of thing…We used them off the west coast of Ireland to great effect…”

  “Yes… They do, don’t they…? I would assume they are quite active around the Dover Strait and North Sea…”

  “Right laddie… Let me make a few things move and you get on with your calls…”

  Charlie strode off toward his own office…

  “Abby…? Raven, Blackbird then Sparrow followed by Mark Ward, in that order please…Thanks…”

  “Mark…? I’d like your take on one or two points…We are concerned that Morris, Crown and Harraghy are about to move west to the UK…We have three officers en route to cover the more high profile ports, however, we have no manpower to cover the smaller marinas and aerodromes… Steve Case has released a group of SO12 officers to us; these are to supervise the locals, they will also liaise with the Coastguard…What we really need is for Box to augment the surveillance with more manpower and Intel…”

  “I see Chief…You need me to walk over to Thames House and convince them to join the fun…?”

  “Something like that, yes…We don’t really want to get in to a slanging match with them…It usually defaults to dick measuring then me ringing the Home Sec’…”

  Mark thought briefly…

  “Yeah I can do that…After yesterday I’m sure they’ll be chomping at the bit…They won’t need the Home Sec’ dangled like a carrot sir…Do you want me to run it from here…?”

  “That would be ideal…”

  “Ok… I’ll head over there now…You’ll want Fisheries too, of course…? That area is pretty much Box territory too…”

  “Yes, but make sure they play nice with the Coastguard…” “Right…On my way…Two hours Chief…”

  “Thanks Mark.”

  So, what next…? Ah yes our continental friends…I walked across to Sarah’s office…

  “Do you need something Chief…?”

  I closed her door quietly…

  “Sarah, how is your relationship with the BND…?” “The BND in general or Niklas Meier in particular…?” “Both equally…”

  “I would say the cooperation between both services has never been as strong…”

  I nodded…

  “Yes that was my feeling too…”

  Sarah stopped writing, carefully replaced the lid on her fountain pen then closed the file…She sensed something was coming…

  “What…? Section Chief what are you up to…and how does it involve me…?”

  “Could you set up a meeting with him…Quietly like…?” “Unofficial you mean…?”

  “Well yeah, that’s exactly what I mean…”

  She looked at her planner then her desk diary…

  “I’ll ask him…I’ve got time…You do want me there I take it…? Or you would have contacted him yourself…?”

  “Yes…It would be three of us…You, me and Charlie…” “What’s it about Chief…?”

  “Verena Bezold…I also want his take on European terrorism and I also want it somewhere quiet so we can all speak freely…”

  “Ok…I’ll let you know when and where…”

  “Thanks…One last thing…We need the AIVD to check the ports, local marinas and aerodromes…We have reason to believe our three friends are on the move…separately, of course…”

  “Right…I’ll ask them to chase known sympathisers too…There are a couple of well-padded business men-I use that term loosely you understand-who are no strangers to them, having acted as go betweens and travel organisers for years…”

  “Mark Ward is across at Box setting up the same thing, including SO12, the Coastguard and hopefully Fisheries too…When he returns I’ll send him over, you two can work out something reciprocal with the Dutch…?”

  “That shouldn’t be a problem Chief…”

  I opened the door to leave… “Thanks Sarah…”

  Back in the quiet of my office I began to tick off all the points on my mental checklist…Charlie returned…

  “Snipe will be here by five at the latest…” “Excellent…Have I missed anything Charlie…?”

  “No, I don’t think so…We are as covered as we are ever likely to be…We have been playing catch-up since the start and don’t forget we had a massive result yesterday…”

  “Yeah I know, but still…” My desk phone rang… “Yes Abby…?”

  “Sir the DVLA have a hit…Three vehicles. A car and two vans…They were purchased at a motor auction in Birmingham under the name of Alan Brazil…SO12 have been given the details…”

  “Do we know what type of vans…?”

  “No not yet Chief…Inspector Case has asked if you would call him…”

  “Thanks Abby…I’ll ring him now.”

  As I dialled the number Charlie stood to leave…

  “Hang on Charlie, we may have something here…Yes, Inspector Steve Case please…Compass Section Chief…Thanks…”

  As I listened to Mozart on the telephone I said to Charlie…

 
“The DVLA have a hit on three vehicles…Two vans and a car bought under the name of Alan Brazil…”

  “I didn’t know we were looking at Scottish players too…?”

  I gave a shrug…

  “Neither did I…maybe the DVLA have a few bright sparks after all…Hello Steve, something urgent…?”

  I placed the call on speaker…

  “It is Chief…We can’t hold Garret, well not for long and only then on very little…A minor firearms offence which any brief he employs worth his salary will have him out in a jiffy…”