by Andy McNab
It was an E-class, straight from the showroom. I scanned it quickly for a VDM (visual distinguishing mark). The plate meant nothing to me: it was in Farsi. I needed something to pull it from a sea of other vehicles. It had four doors, tinted windows and five-pointed, star-shaped aluminium wheel hubs; all bog-standard, which was how Altun would have liked it. The only thing that distinguished it from any other brand-new black E-class 350 was a mobile phone antenna mounted on the roof with its left-hand blade bent slightly upwards. A set of chintzy green curtains was drawn across the rear window to provide that extra little touch of anonymity.
Every now and again the driver encouraged pedestrians to move out of the way with a blast of the horn. As the crowd parted, the car surged forward ten metres or so. It reached the Zam Zam barrier. I kept on fighting my way through the crowd.
The barrier lifted and the Merc rolled forward. It manoeuvred its way around the petal-strewn tank and the fighter, still heading for the exit. Maybe if I ran through one of the exhibition halls I could get to the head of the taxi line and intercept the wagon as it drove off-site. It picked up speed as the crowd thinned. Fuck it, I was going to lose him. I fired off about six or seven shots of the rear of the Merc. I’d learn the plate script.
But Altun wasn’t leaving after all. The driver turned down an alley to the side of the conference hall, the entrance to which was blocked by an armed sentry.
The two BG stepped out of the car and did their job, covering their principal against a shoot from both ends of the alley.
He darted into the building.
I ran across the road and muscled my way to the front of the crowd surging through the large glass doors.
A cordon of men clutching AKs to their chests directed us towards a huge staircase that curved up to the first floor. As I climbed, I spotted some of the journalists who’d been in the press centre and slipped in behind them. A Brit and a French guy were speculating on trade-fair gossip. I overtook them at the entrance to the conference room. There was another logjam. A phalanx of flustered media-relations people, some Iranian, some Russian, staffed a table to the right of the door. A woman in a headscarf was signing journalists in. The lad with the badges on his hat argued the toss with her in German. I could just hear her above the din. We all had to hand in our cameras. ‘The Ministry of Information will provide the pictures.’ She took his and gave him a numbered ticket.
Fair one. The Afghan warlord, Ahmad Shah Masood, had been assassinated two days before 9/11 by Al-Qaeda posing as journalists. They’d detonated a bomb rigged inside their TV camera.
More journalists milled around us and had a good honk. I was too busy deleting the Merc’s registration-plate pictures. I had to. If they had any sense they would check the cameras while they had the chance, and half a dozen hits of a VIP number-plate wouldn’t be good for business.
An extended hand almost hit my face. ‘Aha, James Manley, ADTM. We meet at last!’ The Brit I’d passed on the stairs looked up from my badge and we shook. ‘I’ve been reading your stuff for years. Some of us thought you didn’t exist, dear boy.’
I managed my best smile as the pissed-off German disappeared inside without his big lens.
He kept on shaking. ‘Collier. Military Systems and Components Quarterly.’ In his other hand, he was clutching a pipe.
This wasn’t the time for pleasantries. ‘Collier,’ I said. ‘Fuck off.’
He stood there trying to work out if he’d heard me right.
The woman was asking me to open my day-sack. She removed the Nikon and gave me a ticket. ‘If you have a mobile phone, Mr Manley, you need to keep it switched off while you are in the conference room. If you do not, it will be taken from you. You can collect your camera from here when the conference is concluded.’ She gave me a badge and waved me on.
58
The conference hall was built like a theatre. There were banked seats – around two hundred of them – leading down to a stage. Whole blocks near the front were filled with Iranians, all with the same red badges. The front row itself had been reserved.
The noise was deafening. Near the front, photographers jostled each other for a good view. The stage was bare except for a long table covered with a bright red cloth. Ten matching red chairs were ranged behind it. On the table there were two jugs of water, a glass for each seat, and three evenly spaced microphones. To keep the theme going, a single vase of flowers sat in the centre of the table.
Name-plates were arranged in front of each chair, but I was too far away to read them.
The only clue to the imminent announcement was a PowerPoint slide that erupted on a screen behind the table: Towards A New Era of Space Collaboration. It looked like Military Systems and his French mate had been right.
I flipped down one of the seats near the back and played about with my boot, trying to extract the mobile without looking like I was drawing a weapon. I got up again and made my way to the aisle, then down towards the melee of photographers. ‘’Scuse me, coming through, sorry, ’scuse me…’
The lights went down, leaving just the stage illuminated.
59
The auditorium fell silent as White Turban walked onto the stage. All the red badges jumped up and stood to attention. They stayed on their feet while more dignitaries filed in. Some went on to the stage, others to the VIP seats.
Then came my possible. He took the furthest seat on the right, not far from an emergency exit. His size, face shape and nose were all familiar. One of his BG kept the exit clear. The other stood behind his left shoulder.
I had to get much closer to make a positive ID and take a decent picture. I elbowed my way down towards him. I felt a tap on my shoulder and breath in my ear. ‘I have been looking for you everywhere,’ Majid whispered. He made it sound like an act of complete betrayal.
I turned to him as the waffle sparked up on stage. ‘Sorry, mate, I got lost trying to find you so I thought I’d just crack on.’
‘Please, James, do not get lost again. This will be a very important announcement. Something positive for you to write about. We listen now.’
Up at the table, White Turban leant closer to a microphone.
Majid nudged me. ‘This is Minister Kermanshahi, a very important man – a very powerful man.’
‘What’s he saying?’
‘One of my colleagues will provide a translation.’
On cue, someone at the end of the table started to interpret, first in Russian, then in English. The announcement concerned the teaming of Iran’s illustrious rocket industry with Russia’s foremost rocket-manufacturing company, M3C. Nobody was actually calling a spade a spade and mentioning the word ‘missile’. The purpose of the teaming arrangement between Shahid Hemmat and M3C, explained the interpreter, was to help establish Iran as a true presence in the commercial space launch business. Using its long-standing experience, M3C would help Iran adapt its existing two-stage rockets to launch micro-satellites into space. At this point, there was a loud ripple of applause from the red-badge brigade. White Turban subdued them with a wave of his hand.
The presentations from the stage went on for the best part of an hour. My eyes never left my target. I was just too far away for a picture, and with Majid at my elbow I had no chance anyway. That didn’t matter just now. What did was that I’d found him. His eyes confirmed it.
The interpreter announced that the formalities were over, but the minister would be happy to take some questions.
Altun turned in his seat and gestured towards the emergency exit. The BG stepped forward. As the lights came on for questions he bent down to take his instructions. On the back of his neck a tattoo linked his collar to his hairline. I couldn’t see the pattern. I didn’t need to.
Altun moved swiftly to the emergency exit with Tattoo and the other BG.
I started to get up. I’d catch them outside.
A hand grabbed me.
‘I’m sorry, Majid, I need the toilet.’
‘No, James, we have to wa
it until the important men leave. It is very impolite. You must stay.’
A woman’s voice, clear, loud and confident, fired the first question. Her accent was Russian. ‘Minister Kermanshahi… I would like you to tell us about the military implications of this deal…’
It was Agnetha from the press centre.
Kermanshahi looked like he’d been hit by a tank round. He raised his eyes, shielding them against the lights that shone down on the stage.
Everybody turned to look at her, including Altun and Tattoo.
On the stage, the interpreter whispered something into Kermanshahi’s ear. His face tightened with anger. The interpreter picked up the microphone. ‘There are no military implications. Now, if you please-’
‘In particular, Minister Kermanshahi, I would like you to explain why Iran is acting as a broker in the supply of weapons built by M3C to-’
There was a howl of indignation from the red badges but my eyes were on the emergency exit. It was closed. Altun had disappeared.
‘Sorry, mate, got to go.’
I jumped out of my seat and ran up the steps. Majid called my name, but I wasn’t stopping for anyone.
As I reached the back of the auditorium, I collided with Agnetha. Two plain-clothes security men were dragging her out, kicking and shouting. I pushed back at her. ‘Out the fucking way.’
The security men stumbled back a pace, and I was gone.
60
I burst outside and raced around to the alleyway.
The gate was padlocked and the sentry had gone.
No time to stop and think. I had two known locations for him. Locations where I knew he’d been.
The first was M3C’s chalet.
I ran back to the avenue. My throat was dry and sore as I pushed through the crowds. Sweat streamed down my face and stuck my shirt to my back under the day-sack.
I looked right. No Merc.
Gulping air, I showed my press pass to the heavies at the M3C door and told the girl I was there to interview Paul (not Pavel), the media guy.
She was ice-cold, unsmiling. ‘Everyone has gone for all day. You are Mr…?’
But I was already running again, back towards the auditorium. What now? Back to Majid to get a bollocking for not being able to control my bladder, and lose the target? Or just fuck him off and keep looking?
It was an easy choice. The target was more important than Majid’s annual report.
The second known location was the Falcon, and I’d need the Nikon if I was going to do my bit for Julian.
61
I rushed outside the exhibition centre and flagged down a knackered eighties Peugeot taxi, one of the yellow metered ones Majid had gone on about. ‘Airport, mate – the airport. You understand?’
The driver wore a dirty T-shirt and dragged on a cigarette as we crawled down the road. A curtain of brown haze hung across the city. I inhaled a lungful of diesel and chemicals the moment I wound down the grime-covered window to scan for the Merc’s VDM. At least Altun, wherever he was heading, would be stuck in the same mid-afternoon traffic. Limo or not, it didn’t matter – Tehran’s jams didn’t discriminate.
I tapped the driver on the shoulder and told him I’d pay double if he got me to IKIA fast.
He shrugged his shoulders and pushed his hands towards the nightmare outside.
He spoke basic English and was determined to tell me about Tehran’s night life. ‘You want plenty drink, my friend. You like to party, mister?’
I looked up and caught his expression in the mirror. I was a breath away from being offered his daughter. I got out my mobile and checked the pictures.
‘Signal very bad Tehran, my friend, very bad. Ahmadinejad very bad. Mullahs very bad.’ He drew a finger, knife-style, across his neck.
They were crap: too distant and too dark. The mobile went back into my sock and Majid’s went out of the window.
By the time we got out of the city and the traffic began to thin, I’d learnt more than I’d ever wanted to know about what this man got up to on his nights off. And still no Merc.
Anyone caught with alcohol was looking at a public flogging or a prison sentence so they drank at private parties. ‘You like come my house tonight, mister, for drinking and girls?’ By now, we were on a long, straight dual carriageway that cut through the sand-salt desert towards the airport.
I shielded my eyes against the glare, searching in vain for any sign of a black vehicle ahead. The surface reflected the sunlight like a mirror. The temperature in the back of the taxi was unbearable, even with the window open.
Fifteen minutes later, I caught sight of the control tower in the haze. Ten minutes after that, we entered the airport perimeter. I looked at my watch. It had taken two hours to get there. The Merc would have warp-speeded it as soon as it was out of the city, but there was still a chance – unless the aircraft had been on the pan, engines turning. Unless he’d gone somewhere else entirely.
I reached for my cash and prepared to hand over a ten-dollar bill. Then I remembered it wasn’t my money but Julian’s and doubled it. My friend, the pimp, thanked me over and over as I jumped out of the Peugeot and looked up to the sound of aircraft engines crackling in the late-afternoon sky.
A white Falcon was climbing like a rocket, banking towards Tehran and, half masked by its pollution, those fucking Alborz Mountains where it would disappear from sight.
62
I tracked the Dassault until I lost it in the heat haze. Part of me was thinking about the phone call I’d have to make to Julian; part of me was wondering what I’d tell Red Ken and Dex when we met up at the final RV.
‘You very late, my friend?’
I glanced down. The pimp was watching me in the rear-view mirror.
‘We go Tehran, yes?’ Having seen the colour of my money, he clearly thought he must be on to a good thing.
Going back to Tehran to regroup, get a bollocking from Majid and probably get binned from the country seemed like a good idea. I’d get Julian to task me to carry on with the job and find him the Falcon’s destination.
But then I saw something glint on the roof of the multi-storey ahead of us. Somebody was up there with a pair of binoculars. I shook my head. ‘Nah, I’ll wait here.’
The driver shrugged, giving me the universal sign for whatever, and drove off.
I slung my day-sack onto my back and headed for the multi-storey. The sun burnt my face and I had to squint. A gust of wind blew in from the airfield, bringing with it the smell of jet fuel. I was dripping with sweat and my shirt was soaked.
It was a lot cooler in the stairwell – and, like the rest of the airport, the multi-storey was over-specified and under-used. Only one in ten parking spaces on the ground floor of this polished concrete building were occupied.
I began climbing the stairs. The sound of my footsteps was drowned by the roar of another aircraft taking off. The smell of aviation fuel was rapidly replaced by the stink of urine from a men’s toilet on the second floor. Busy or not, car parks are the same the world over.
The stairs finally led to a door on the fifth level. I waited for the sound of the aircraft to recede, then put my ear against it. I heard the murmur of young voices on the other side. I turned the handle and pushed.
The roof level didn’t have a single car parked on it – at least, none that was visible from my viewpoint. Half a kilometre beyond a waist-high wall around the edge of the building, the metal-and-glass roof of the airport terminal shimmered in the heat. To the right of it, I could make out the control tower and a revolving radar dish.
I could also hear the male voices very clearly now.
I stepped out onto the roof and closed the door behind me. Pressing my back against the wall of the stairwell, I stuck my head slowly around the corner.
There were three of them leaning on the wall, their backs to me. One was pointing across the airfield. Another was listening to a radio. The third guy was using a pair of binoculars to track whatever the first lad was poi
nting at. They were dressed in jeans, T-shirts and, despite the heat, thin windcheaters from the Ahmadinejad spring collection.
What I’d taken yesterday to be a military-style hat on the head of the guy with the binos, I now realized was nothing more than a baseball cap. He gobbed off excitedly to his mates, giving a running commentary of what he could see.
I started towards them, a big smile on my face, one hand up in a wave and the other shielding my eyes. ‘Hello, any of you guys speak English?’
The one with the radio turned and stared dumbly, then nudged his two mates in the ribs.
63
Foreigners weren’t a common sight for these lads – even at what was supposed to pass for an international airport. The guy with the baseball cap was the only one who sparked up – he seemed generally more confident than his mates.
‘Hello, who are you?’ He spoke, of course, with a slight American accent. They were all around the same age; somewhere in their early twenties.
I told them the truth – well, sort of. I flashed my IranEx badge at them. ‘James Manley, British aerospace and defence journal – Aerospace and Defence Technology Monthly.’ They exchanged doubtful glances with each other until I handed over my business card.
The guy with the baseball cap studied it, then looked at me. ‘You work for ADTM?’
‘You know it?’
‘Sure.’ He took a step forward and shook my hand.
I missed the names of his mates, but I caught his loud and clear.
‘Ali.’
Under the peak were two very clear and excited brown eyes. He kept smiling, like he was waiting for something from me as he held onto my hand and kept shaking. ‘Iranianmetalbird.net, you know it, yes? That is why you are here?’
One of Ali’s mates, a beanpole around six-four, spoke to him in rapid-fire Farsi. He didn’t like me at all.
