by Damien Lewis
‘I suppose we could cut a deal with the Old Man of the Mountains. You know, fifty-fifty – they keep half and we keep half. What d’you reckon, Nick?’
‘I don’t think he’s the deal-doing kind.’
‘No, neither do I, somehow …’ Kilbride glanced out to sea. ‘If we agree to “take these people on”, what can you offer us, Nick?’
‘We can offer you complete intelligence back-up, so you will know everything we know, as soon as we know it. We can offer complete surveillance cover when you go in, both in terms of satellite coverage and communications monitoring. If the enemy are talking, you’ll know about it. Ditto if they’re on the move. We can offer you any weaponry you might wish for, delivered clandestinely to any location you want in the Lebanon. In short, you should think of this as a Project mission, only you’re a little more … freelance than usual.’
Kilbride threw out a question, the one that had been eating at him all night long. ‘How did the Old Man get our names, Nick?’
Nick paused for a second as he considered how to answer. ‘Well, we don’t actually know. We believe it was from one of the guards at the bank. There’s also a Lebanese fixer the SAS were using …’
‘Emile.’
‘Yes, Emile. They know about Emile. We think they haven’t got to him yet. We’re trying to find him first.’
‘Where is he?’
‘London somewhere. But it doesn’t make a lot of difference. He’s no safer there. These bastards have their people everywhere.’
Nick’s last words had been spoken with real vehemence, which surprised Kilbride. Whatever else Kilbride might think of Nick Coles, he knew that he was a consummate professional.
‘You don’t like these people, do you, Nick? I mean, you really don’t like them. It sounds like this has become unusually personal for you. Has it, Nick? Why?’
Before leaving London Nick’s bosses had warned him that on no account should The Searcher’s role be revealed to Kilbride. Having an ex-SAS man in bed with the Black Assassins could muddy the waters, London had argued. Nick had disagreed. It meant that there was a weak point in his story, and Kilbride was already probing.
‘I’m a year away from retirement, Kilbride. These people are my problem, and a blot on my copybook. So yes, it has become a little … personal.’
‘Not convincing, Nick. That makes it inconvenient. It doesn’t make it personal.’
Nick shrugged. ‘Sorry, that’s all I have for you.’
Kilbride knew that Nick Coles was holding back on him. It certainly wouldn’t be the first time with these people. He would just have to keep digging.
‘How do they think they’re going to hit these seven world leaders, Nick? They’ve got the best security money can buy, twenty-four/seven. That’s not going to be an easy target.’
‘To a certain extent they’re modelling themselves on the original Assassins. The originals trained for years, studied their targets for months on end, and then struck singly or in small groups. They were quite prepared to die, and in most cases knew that their mission was bound to end in their death. Add in some modern technology and explosives, and that’s what you’re up against. Plus they’ve developed one or two ideas all of their own. Take their “baby bombs” – I mean “baby” as in soiled nappies, rather than small. Hold up a live baby for the President to get a cutesy photo opportunity, only strapped around its middle is its own tiny explosives belt …’
Kilbride shuddered. ‘So what d’you expect a bunch of old geezers like us to do about it? How are the nine of us – eight, with Jock in a wheelchair – going to stop the Black Assassins?’
Nick smiled, weakly. ‘Ah, now that’s where we were rather expecting you to come up with something …’
‘Great. So, if we can’t find a way of hitting them then the deal is off?’
‘Well, there has to be a quid pro quo, doesn’t there? I mean, we can’t go backing you to go and recover your gold and that’s it, it’s purely a private job. There has to be a greater good, a spin-off.’
‘Why us? Why don’t you send in the boys to raid their Syrian camp? I’m sure they’re still pretty hot. Or put in a couple of Predator UAVs and bomb the fuck out of them from the air.’
‘Well, we did send in a UAV, actually.’
‘You did?’
‘Yes. The strike failed. The Black Assassins have some Iranian-made surface-to-air missiles. They tried to shoot down the UAV, and we can’t risk the same happening again. And if we send in ground forces just imagine the risk. You remember Eagle Claw, the US hostage-rescue mission? The Iranians ended up parading captured US aircraft on live TV. Imagine if the same were to happen here, and we don’t even have the excuse of a few hostages … It would inflame the Islamic world. In short, it’s just not doable.’
‘Why don’t I just wait it out, Nick? Sooner or later you’re going to have to do something – hit the Black Assassins, before they hit you. We can just wait for that to happen, then toddle off and get our gold.’
‘I don’t think you have the time. I’m being honest with you, Kilbride – I think the enemy are that close to finding it. That close. Trust me on this one.’
‘Somehow, I still don’t think you’re telling me everything, Nick.’
‘I’m telling you all that I can, Kilbride. Come up with a plan to hit them. There has to be a way. You and your men were true mavericks in your day. You’ll think of something …’
‘Okay, let’s say we go for this. At the end of the day we get to keep what’s ours, right? There’s not going to be any fucking around, is there?’
‘The gold is yours to keep, Kilbride. We would like to have our expenses covered at The Project, of course, as we’ll be helping to bankroll your mission. As you know we have to be more or less self-financing these days. Might I suggest our expenses plus a one hundred per cent uplift upon successful retrieval of the loot. How does that sound?’
Kilbride snorted. ‘Cheapskates … Fine, as long as we cap The Project’s expenses at a million dollars. With your uplift that’s two million repayable by us.’
‘Absolutely. Absolutely.’ Nick smiled. ‘So, I take it we have a deal.’
Something had woken him. Emile wasn’t quite certain what, but recently there had been a tom-cat prowling around at night, trying to get in through the living-room cat flap. Emile worked as a lecturer in a local college and he had been up late, preparing some lessons. He had chosen to sleep on the sofa so as not to disturb his wife and kids. Perhaps it was that cat again. Emile went to check.
Theirs was a small split-level flat in the Streatham Hill district of London, hardly the most salubrious of neighbourhoods. Ever since the Lebanon bank job Emile had chosen to play it softly-softly. He’d spent his money sparingly, and kept the bulk of his gold hidden where no one would ever find it. From what he had heard, some very dangerous people had had money stolen in the Beirut civil war, and they were still very much seeking its return.
As Emile went to check the cat flap, he felt a faint breeze on his face. That was odd – the door into the rear garden seemed to be ajar. He was sure he’d closed it. As he went to shut it, a faint shiver ran up his spine. A black shadow detached itself from the curtains, and before Emile could turn around the intruder had looped a garrotte around his neck.
Emile went down on his knees with a boot in the back, the life-breath being choked out of him. A second black-clad figure appeared. He stood over Emile as he writhed in panic, his hands clawing uselessly at his throat. The first Assassin tightened his grip on the garrotte. Emile tried to beg for mercy, his eyes bulging and the words strangled in his throat. He knew instinctively who these people were. For the last thirty years he had lived in dread of this moment. Finally, they had found him. They had come. Those from whom he had taken the gold had come to retrieve what was theirs.
The second figure signalled to the first to loosen his hold. He squatted down in front of Emile. His face was shrouded in a black scarf, only his eyes showing.
>
‘Listen to me, Emile, you traitorous pig,’ the man’s voice hissed in Arabic. ‘We will rape your wife and torture your children, very slowly in front of your eyes … We will gag them, so that no one will hear them scream, but we will leave their eyes free … They will watch you watching us do this to them, and you will witness their agony and terror. They will see that you do nothing to help, Emile, and they will despise you for it for ever … And then we will kill them all. Do you understand, Emile?’
Emile nodded, his eyes wide with fear.
‘So, Emile, if you don’t want this to happen you must tell me everything you know. Everything. The raid on the Imperial Bank … If you tell us everything, we will let your family live. And we just might let you live, Emile. But first you must tell us everything.’
Emile nodded. He felt the garrotte loosen and he gasped for breath. Once he’d recovered a little he began to talk. He told of the original SAS mission and the discovery of three times the expected amount of gold bullion, and the decision to steal the lot. He told of ferrying the gold across Beirut in the Red Cross convoy. And he told about the safe house and the boats that disappeared down the Beirut River into the night.
Where had the gold been hidden? the Black Assassin asked Emile. Where had it been hidden? Emile told him that he didn’t know. He didn’t even know that it had been hidden. Perhaps Kilbride’s men had ferried it out to a waiting British warship? Again and again Emile’s interrogator asked the same question. Tearfully, Emile begged him to believe him when he said that he didn’t know. And he begged him not to harm his family.
Finally, the interrogator went as if to waken Emile’s wife and children. Emile cracked. He blurted out a name – Enfeh – a coastal village in the north of Lebanon. They had hidden the gold at Enfeh, Emile said. They had hidden the gold in the ruins of a coastal chapel, the Church of Our Lady of the Wind, in among the derelict tombstones. It was the first thing that had come into his head and it was a complete lie, of course. But at least it might buy him some time.
The interrogator smiled. ‘We will search the infidel church at Enfeh … Pray that we find the gold, Emile. Pray to Almighty Allah that we do so – for your sake and that of your loved ones. If not, we’ll be back, Emile. Don’t try running. We’ll know where to find you.’
With that there was a final tug on the garrotte and then Emile was allowed to fall free of its terrible embrace. The two black figures flitted out the back door, and within seconds they were lost in the shadows of the garden.
Their scarves removed from their faces, the two Black Assassins made their way to the top of Emile’s street. As they went to get into their car a female voice called out to them from a side alley.
‘You gentlemen after some business?’
They glanced in the speaker’s direction. Two women in long plastic boots and skirts that ended at thigh level leaned against a street lamp. One was a black girl with peroxide-blonde hair, the other an older-looking redhead. The black girl lifted her skirt to reveal a pair of tiny pants.
‘You filthy infidel whores,’ the interrogator, Sajid, spat at them in Arabic. ‘You dirty, corrupt temptresses. Come the day that the black flag of Islam flies over this morally bankrupt country, we shall clean the streets of you scum …’
‘You couldn’t fucking afford us!’ the redhead jeered as their car drew away from the kerb.
Sajid ignored the remark and pulled a mobile phone from his pocket. It was time to report in to the Old Man of the Mountains. He had asked to be updated as soon as they had found Emile. He would be pleased, very pleased, to learn of the Enfeh discovery.
Back in his apartment Emile lay on the floor, his trousers soaking wet where he had pissed himself in terror. The family cat came from somewhere and nuzzled into his face, but Emile was sobbing into the carpet and was unreachable. His mind was already going into shock over what had just happened to him, trying to deny the terrible threat now facing his family.
Following his meeting with Nick Coles Kilbride had talked things over at length with Bill Berger. In one fell swoop their mission had gone from being something of a jolly in the Lebanon to a full-on showdown with one of the world’s most daunting terrorist outfits. It was some change. But Bill Berger seemed to take it all in his stride. In fact, Kilbride had a sneaking suspicion that his big American buddy relished the prospect of some action again.
Kilbride put a call through to Nick Coles telling him that they were signing up to his proposition, pending the agreement of the rest of Kilbride’s men. For now, neither he nor Bill Berger had the slightest idea how they were going to hit the Black Assassins, but at least they could spend the next few days working on their options. The other members of Kilbride’s team weren’t due to arrive for another four days, by which time Kilbride hoped to have the bare bones of a working plan in place. The two men divided their tasks: Kilbride would research the original Assassins, Bill Berger their modern namesakes.
Kilbride was an avid reader of the ancient Chinese warrior-philosopher Sun Tzu. In his book The Art of War Sun Tzu identified the first priority before going into any battle: ‘Know your enemy’. Kilbride wrote ‘KNOW YOUR ENEMY’ in black marker pen on a sheet of A4 paper and tacked it up above his computer. That was going to be the driving thrust of his next few days’ research. Bill Berger topped that by scribbling ‘BLOW YOUR ENEMY’ on a separate piece of paper, and tacking that up over his own screen.
On the evening of day three of their research, Kilbride and Berger got together for a heads-up on the patio out the back of the office. Tashana, the maid, brought out a tray of beers. Before leaving, she flashed Bill Berger a wide smile when she thought no one was looking.
He flipped the top off the first bottle. ‘Y’know what, buddy? You seen how Tashana’s lookin’? She’s gone all doe-eyed. Y’know why? It’s ’cause I’ve had my goddamn head stuck in your computer these last few days, rather than stuck up her skirts.’
‘Is that right? I thought you’d promised to keep your hands off her, and keep your mind on the job in hand.’
Berger flashed his gap-toothed smile. ‘I can’t help how the lady’s feeling … I’m tellin’ you, buddy, she’s got the hots for me. And what am I doin’ about it? Sweet fuck all, that’s what …’
‘Listen, mate, you’re no good to any woman if you’re dirt poor or dead. So tell me what you found out.’
‘All right. Well, the Black Assassins – estimated numbers three to four hundred strong. Their Syrian base is a goddamn mountain fortress and we don’t even wanna go there. Add into the picture their buddies in Hezbollah and all that lot, and this is what you’ve got: thousands of young men ready to die for a cause; a string of kidnappings, car bombings, suicide attacks and aircraft hijackings; enough weaponry to start a small war and the ability to operate just about anywhere in the world. So, we ain’t gonna outfight them on the ground, that’s for sure.’
Berger took a pull on his beer. ‘No surprises there. It’s this next bit that bugs the shit out of me. These people have run some seriously sophisticated ops, with some truly off-the-wall kinda ideas. And you know what struck me most? They’re the kinda ideas that you and I might’ve dreamed up, were we on the side of the bad guys …’
‘Like what?’
Berger picked up a sheet of paper and began reading. ‘October 1985, a four-man terrorist team used rigid inflatable boats to hijack the Achille Lauro, a cruise ship, and executed an American passenger. Bastards. November 1987, two hang-gliders were used to fly from Lebanon into Israel. Six Israeli soldiers were killed and eight wounded. August 1988, first of several sorties using hot-air balloons. I mean, who’d have thought it – goddamn hang-gliders and hot-air balloons. September 1990 … The list goes on and on … And get this, buddy: they’ve even started flying missions using Iranian-made Ababil UAVs …’
‘They’ve got their own UAVs?’
‘Sure they have. This is no tinpot outfit, buddy. So what I concluded from all this is that they’ve got someone pr
etty darn hot who’s training ’em … Now, if we ain’t gonna outfight ’em then we gotta outsmart ’em, and the trouble is they’re smart. You gotta admit they’ve got a certain sophistication, a certain style. Like old slant-eyes Sun Tzu there said, get to know your enemy. I just dunno what you do when you find out they’re a bunch of suicidal fanatics with brains to boot …’ Berger shrugged. ‘So what did you come up with?’
‘Terror,’ Kilbride said. ‘The original Assassins’ strength was rooted in their power to create raw fear. They were founded by Hassan-i-Sabbah, in 1090, the original Old Man of the Mountains. He recruited young men to go out and kill without regard for their life. The most popular version of the legend has it that they were stoned up to the eyeballs on hash. Hassan made it clear that this was their religious duty, and the promised reward was Paradise. Loads of women, wine, good nosh – you know the story. So far it sounds pretty familiar, doesn’t it?’
Bill Berger grunted an acknowledgement. He never had been much of a one for fairy tales.
‘But then it starts getting weird. The Assassins nearly always worked alone, spent months getting to know the victim’s daily routine, and then killed them in public with a dagger. So far, so normal. But get this: they nearly always killed them in a mosque and during Friday prayers.’
Bill Berger frowned. ‘What the hell?’
‘I know. I mean all this talk of a sacred Islamic hit squad, and yet they chose to kill on a Friday and in the mosque … It doesn’t make any sense. Now, there is another version of the legend. In that one their name derives from the Arabic word Assasseen, meaning “The Guardians”. The Guardians of the Secrets were a secret society, a bit like the Knights Templar. There was little that was strictly Islamic about them – they were taught the hidden powers of the ancients. They rarely targeted Christians and were hated by the Islamic world. At one stage they even tried to ally themselves with the Crusaders. It’s this second version of the story that I go for.’
