Killer Elite (previously published as the Feather Men)

by Ranulph Fiennes

  “How many people did you send to Davenham’s?” Bletchley asked. He always laid great emphasis on the need for minimal force.

  “Three,” said Spike. “All on the large side.”

  “Are you happy, Michael?”

  Bletchley addressed the former lawyer Panny, who nodded. “August knows the Davenham brothers well. They’re too small to need to make a point merely to save their egos and they can hardly complain to the police of intimidation used to force them to return stolen property to its rightful owners. No, I think Spike handled the whole thing with the right amount of pressure.”

  Spike, never one to hog the limelight, thanked the twins, who had advised him on the level of fear likely to get the car back. In the same breath he switched to his Bristol report, hoping to bathe it in the glow of goodwill generated by the success in Islington.

  “Bristol,” he announced. “The operation the committee sanctioned at the September meeting last year. This was completed in November and I can now safely state there has been no comeback to or from the police, nor any media publicity. Our Local has good contacts in the City and confirms that Symins, the man directly responsible for the death of our friend’s daughter, has moved from Bristol.”

  Spike tapped the blue folder in front of him. “Jane has given everyone copies of my detailed report.”

  The don looked up. “Not exactly detailed,” he murmured. “Two pages only and all of that deals with the target. I, for one, would like to know more of our own activities. I fully understand that they obtained the required result, but what form did they take? Since they were effected in our name, we must be sure we would approve of the methods used by your Locals, don’t you think?”

  There was a murmur of agreement from most of the others, as Spike had expected. “I took the advice of committee members as to the best means of forcing this issue.” He did not look their way but both of the twins became heavily preoccupied with their folders at this point. “Anything less persuasive, they assured me, would have been a waste of time with this man. There were only two Locals involved and both knew precisely how far to go. There will have been virtually no signs of physical damage to Symins.”

  The don’s face was grave. “You had this man tortured, then?”

  Spike explained the means used by Hallett and Mason. He did not mention their names, since Mantell, who had laid the ground rules, stressed that only Spike must know Locals’ identities. Then, should any Local turn sour, he or she would be able to recognize Spike but none of the other committee members. No Local knew Spike’s real name, nor his address—only the number of his answering machine and a postbox number. Should Spike die, his trustees would send Bletchley and Macpherson sealed envelopes containing the contact details of the Locals.

  “Never mind the lack of scars,” the don persisted. “To all intents and purposes we, the committee, have condoned the use of torture. Yes or no?”

  “Hang on, mate.” It was August, with a reddish tinge to his cheeks. “Spike was tasked to get rid of this bastard, this child-killer, without injuring him. Well, he has and I say congratulations to Spike and his lads in the West Country. Blimey, what d’you expect, Don?” He hit the table with his folder. “You don’t crack a nut with a pair of scissors, do you?”

  The don remained calm. “Nobody’s talking of scissors. But hook-hanging is a favorite with the world’s most unpleasant regimes. The Nazis used it and today it is popular throughout the Middle East. Just read through any Amnesty International report. The hook-hang can drive a person insane overnight. It is an inhumanity that I would not condone for my worst enemy.”

  The fatter of the two twins muttered, “Your worst bloody enemy, Don, is probably your tax inspector. Your head’s in the sand, man. The heavy stuff is the only thing these druggies understand. If Spikey hadn’t scared him rigid, he’d not have turned a hair and he’d be latching himself back onto the Bristol kiddies as though nothing had ever happened.” He subsided, having made the longest speech any committee member remembered ever coming from either twin.

  “We exist to deal with men of this ilk,” the don countered, “but not by trading violence for violence. We could, I am sure, have scared him off equally well with a heavy dose of fear. I’m not advocating cracking nuts with scissors, August, but I am recommending that we shatter glasses by emitting the right frequency. Ours should be a game of chess, of emotion and timing. First we obtain up-to-date, accurate information, then we strike by guile not force. That way we stay legal and we retain our decency.”

  “Perhaps,” Bletchley suggested smoothly, “Spike could not obtain sufficient information and had to overreact as a result?” Macpherson noticed that Bletchley’s eyes were performing disconcerting saccades.

  “My information was detailed and sufficient for our purposes,” Spike replied. “Our sources in Bristol are first-class. They confirmed that our target would not respond to verbal warnings and threats alone.”

  “In that case,” Bletchley snapped, “should you not have come back to the committee at once? We could have looked at the operation again. Chosen a different path or even aborted.”

  The chairman raised his arms in an abrupt gesture and spilled his coffee. Jane was at once on her feet to fetch paper from the nearby lavatory.

  “You are raising the issue of our general policy, are you not?” Macpherson’s voice was cold. “Can we take it you have moved on from the specific subject of Bristol?”

  Spike listened with interest. He made a point of not participating in the intermittent heated exchanges between committee members, but he never missed a nuance. Over the past three years he felt that Bletchley had become increasingly dogmatic. Only Macpherson, in Spike’s opinion, had the influence to prevent Bletchley from dampening the spirits of the committee to the point of emasculation.

  Bletchley could normally count on the support of Mantell and Panny where a matter of law and order was concerned, but Macpherson, as a last resort, could fall back on the casting vote of the founder, absent but still the éminence grise.

  Mantell had recruited and run the first few Locals in the early seventies, but then an operation on his hips had partially failed. Spike was taken on at Mantell’s suggestion and became the only salaried member of the team. Macpherson alone knew the identity of the sponsor who provided Spike’s pay. Spike had grown to dislike Mantell and his rigid toeing of the line laid down by Bletchley. As far as Spike was concerned, strict adherence to the law could and often did hamper their efficiency. It could also endanger his Locals. That they should never carry firearms, even if as individuals they possessed licenses, was a major bugbear and one that Spike rigidly, if unwillingly, enforced. Even the least important of his operations was always recorded and, after discussion by the committee, filed and logged at Jane’s home.

  Bletchley was not to be diverted by Macpherson on this occasion. Bristol should never have happened. “The ethics of the committee and the disgraceful goings-on in Bristol are inextricably entwined,” he growled at the meeting in general and Macpherson in particular. “We have enough high-level contacts between us to manipulate events of this nature. A word in the ear of the Bristol constabulary would probably have been every bit as effective.” He turned to Spike. “Was any approach made to the police?”

  The committee, according to Bletchley, were so blessed with prestigious acquaintances that they could steamroller their way almost anywhere by a series of strategic string pulls. To him all criminals could be outwitted by cunning, by disinformation and checkmates. The right pressure at the right time could achieve the committee’s every aim.

  Spike knew that this had been the original concept of the founder and of Macpherson too, but unlike Bletchley and his disciples, they had adapted to the demands of reality when the concept proved largely a pipe dream.

  “No. We did not tip off the police,” Spike replied. “You may remember that my report last October made it clear that the police knew our target was involved in drugs long before we became
involved. But they had nothing at all to hang on him, so they were powerless to move against him.”

  “Chairman.” Macpherson sounded irritated. He was a man of action and could not stand time wasted in dithering. “This matter comes down yet again to the simple question of whether we as a committee are prepared to be flexible and move with the times. Of course, I do not mean we should lower our basic moral tenets to those of the unpleasant people we attempt to frustrate. But we should look to the likes of Churchill and Kennedy, both leaders of democracy who clearly believed that some ends justify some means. The nastiness that can threaten our ex-SAS people is becoming more varied and our enemies are more sophisticated at finding loopholes in the law. If and where the police cannot provide adequate protection, we have to try to find an appropriate way to do so.”

  There was silence but for the strains of a bagpipe lesson mingled with the muted screams of Hill House School children playing football on the grass outside.

  Macpherson spoke again. “In the last war our best Special Forces leaders were those who studied Lenin, whose saying included ‘the need for “all-sidedness” is a safeguard against rigidity.’ And Chairman Mao echoed this theme with ‘We must learn to see the reverse side of things. In given conditions a bad thing can lead to good results.’ This Committee will get nowhere if we remain hidebound by rules we ourselves set nearly a decade ago.”

  For thirty minutes the matter of Bristol was thrashed out. Bletchley’s final recommendation did not include censure of the methods used. He merely suggested a periodic check to ensure the target did not return to Bristol and that the time was ripe to notify their friend in Chippenham that his daughter’s killer had been hounded from the city and would trouble no more youngsters there in the future.

  The committee moved on to other matters. However, when the time came, Macpherson would trace the subsequent trouble with Bletchley back to that day.

  9

  With time on his hands de Villiers walked along the creek to the boat-building yard by Al Maktoum Bridge. He sat on a bale of cotton and watched the abra ferry crews below.

  Dubai, he knew, had, long before the days of oil production, achieved an initial layer of wealth from a highly efficient pearling fleet. It was an operation that was cost-effective because of the evil treatment of the divers by their nakhoudas (skippers). The pearling dhows spent the diving season out on a glass-calm sea at the hottest time of the year. Daily diving rations consisted of a little water, a few dates and some rice, since underfed divers were able to stay underwater for longer.

  There were seldom lemons to halt scurvy—too costly—and no spare fresh water to wash off the salt, so sores erupted and deep ulcers suppurated. For some the end came from blood poisoning, while many died from the agonizing sting of red jellyfish, the whip of stingrays or a sudden shark attack.

  Japanese cultured pearls ruined the market in the 1950s and deprived the divers of their thankless livelihood. The Maktoum boat-builders then turned their hands to motorized dhows, many fast enough to outrun pirate sloops and Indian Coast Guard patrol launches. These boats became the basis of Dubai’s great wealth through the reexport of gold, mainly to India.

  De Villiers returned to his hotel to change his shirt, for even in winter Dubai can be uncomfortably hot. He took a battered Mercedes cab to the Djera side of the creek and was quickly caught up in a honking line of jammed Toyotas. It was January 12, 1977, the day of his appointment.

  He knew nothing of the client but presumed he was local and wealthy. Eight weeks earlier he had arrived in Dubai only to be told that the man was ill. The meeting was postponed and de Villiers was well compensated for his wasted time. He had worked for Arabs before, both in North Africa and the Gulf. Two years previously he had drowned an Egyptian fundamentalist leader at Zamalek in Cairo, and Meier had lethally rigged the stereo gear of one Saudi prince at the behest of another. De Villiers wondered if this time the target might be an Israeli. If so he would have to wage war with his principles. He respected the Israelis and might well turn down a contract to kill one. He had in the past rejected work for supporters of Pol Pot and Colombian drug kings. He had murdered many innocents for money from dubious sources but he saw no reason why he should not indulge his personal foibles from time to time.

  Thanks to the carefully nurtured reputation of the Clinic, de Villiers had no shortage of jobs and could afford to be selective. Often he would split the Clinic in two, and sometimes the three of them were simultaneously at work on separate contracts. Meier and Davies operated well on their own, but it was as a threesome that the Clinic was most devastatingly effective. Even the most carefully protected target was doomed once his or her details, and the up-front payment from the client, had entered the Clinic’s ledger via one of de Villiers’s three international booking agents, the largest of which was Tadnams of Earls Court, London.

  Of the many contract killers for hire in Europe and the Americas, de Villiers had an unrivaled reputation for successful, “no foul play suspected” results. In the increasingly competitive market of the mid-seventies, this specialization began to pay off. There were too many killers chasing too few jobs, and it reached the point where in Birmingham, England, one amateur advertised, with the thinnest veneer of subtlety, in the local yellow pages. In 1976, in Chicago, over a quarter of the contract killings recorded by the police involved the deaths of contract killers taken out by one another. For all but a few specialists—the “scum de la scum,” to use Davies’s term—it had become a buyers’ market with operators accepting fees of less than half pre-1976 rates.

  There was no lessening in demand. Far from it—rather a flood of amateur killers, mostly unemployed and often unemployable by reason of their emotional state, Vietnam veterans, washed up by the U.S. withdrawal the previous year. Many were charging $500 for a straight killing which, after allowing for their expenses and the agent’s percentage, often worked out at a profit of around $100. Such low prices soon stimulated increased activity at the bottom end of the market. Frustrated citizens were now finding the local contract agency a financially viable method of ridding themselves of noisy neighbors or irritating mothers-in-law.

  The cab driver, a locally employed Palestinian, turned to de Villiers. “Abu Daoud is free,” he said, his eyes aglow with pride.

  They were inching through a crowd of chanting, laughing Arabs—all Palestinians, de Villiers presumed—who brandished old rifles or camel sticks and had all but paralyzed the traffic. The cause of the rejoicing was the abject surrender that morning of the French government to terrorist coercion. Over the weekend the Paris police had arrested Abu Daoud, the notorious founder of Black September, who stood accused of organizing the Munich Olympics terror attack of 1976, which killed eleven Israeli athletes. Now, after a hastily convened court hearing, the French deported him to Algiers—a free man and the cause of great joy among all Palestinians.

  Perhaps the client would turn out to be a Palestinian. But no, there were plenty of ex-PLO killers about. More likely, de Villiers felt, a Gulf oil sheikh with a personal grudge. There was every likelihood that de Villiers would be met by a mere representative of the client. Or even the representative of a representative. That was why he never sent Meier or Davies to meet a client. You needed to be razor-sharp on these occasions. He remembered the time he had rendezvoused with a Dutch representative who had actually tried to redirect him, boomeranglike, toward his own boss, the real client. Instinct, rather than any identifiable slip on the part of the Dutchman, had alerted de Villiers, who decided to have Tadnams send him a photograph of their original client, the Dutchman’s employer. Embarrassment was avoided and the outcome had been a double fee for the removal of the originally intended target and the disloyal representative.

  De Villiers paid off his joyful cabbie in a deserted side street and walked for five minutes through the shuttered gold market. The hotel was plush and discreet. Following the written instructions received via Tadnams, de Villiers nodded politely at the
reception desk, avoiding eye contact with its occupant, and crossed to the hairdresser’s salon at the far end of the entrance hall. No hair was being cut, no beards trimmed. Like everyone else, around noon the barber was hors de combat.

  The salon’s inner door was labeled “Staff Only” and hung with a planner chart of bookings. De Villiers closed this door behind him. He was now inside a walnut-paneled elevator that responded to only two buttons, an up and a down. Ascending to an indeterminate level, he emerged into a corridor hung with Persian and Baluchi rugs, where he was met by a girl of eleven or so with a shy smile. He followed her down the passageway admiring the intricate sewing of her patterned jellaba. Her neck, ears and wrists jangled with beaten silver ornaments of South Arabian style, probably Yemeni.

  The girl entered a long and richly furnished drawing room. The subtle scent of burnt leban (frankincense) was pleasing and in keeping with the general air of Arab high living that the room exuded. An elaborate brass lamp stood in each of the four corners, their bulbs hidden within giant crystal geodes, so that each cabbagelike rock gave forth an orange luminescence that glimmered back from the tapestries and the tasseled cushions.

  “Come, help me rise, my little love.” The voice was gentle. As de Villiers’s vision grew accustomed to his low-lit surroundings he saw the girl take the hand of an old man slumped in a leather armchair.

  He exchanged greetings. The man introduced himself as Sheikh Amr bin Issa in the passable English of most Gulf Arab businessmen. His was a once strong face creased and prematurely aged by suffering and rendered ashen by illness.

  “Sit close, sir, for my voice is weak.” The girl helped the sheikh without difficulty, for he was painfully thin, even emaciated. He bade her bring coffee.