Zero Hour

by Andy McNab

  The bay was immediately to my right. On the other side of it was the Amsterdam I remembered. Spires were silhouetted in the neon glow. Navigation lights glided up and down the waterway between us as tonight’s passengers tucked into a romantic canal-cruise dinner.

  ‘Describe the building for me.’

  ‘It has concrete floors. The door we went in through is on the right-hand side of the building. Inside is a hallway with four doors into offices, two on each side. The first on the right is where the girls are kept. They’re in sleeping bags on mattresses.’

  ‘Did you see inside the other three rooms?’

  She shook her head. ‘We went straight into the first on the right. There is a staircase on the left. I could hear voices coming from the first floor. Dutch voices. I didn’t see them. There were definitely two captors, maybe three or four.’

  We crossed the canal and found ourselves in another estate – narrow roads and prefab houses, painted white.

  ‘Did they open the main door for you, or did the bald guy have a key?’

  ‘It was locked. He made a call and they unlocked it from the inside. They locked themselves in again when we left.’

  ‘What about the gate? Was it open when you got there?’

  ‘I couldn’t tell. The driver got out, but I don’t know if it was locked. They might have unlocked it after the call. I just don’t know.’

  ‘Anything else?’

  She climbed back alongside me and thought for a while. ‘It all happened so fast and I didn’t want to be obvious. When we met at the café, I told him I wanted to see what condition the girls were in. If they were good, we could do business. These guys are greedy, they always are.’

  ‘Well done, mate. Brilliant.’

  She laughed. ‘But . . . ?’ She knew what was coming.

  ‘Anna, you’re a nightmare.’ I looked at her. ‘Don’t do that sort of shit again.’ I stopped the car. ‘You drive back.’

  We swapped seats and I checked the BlackBerry footage I’d taken earlier to make sure Anna wasn’t visible. The quality was OK – a bit dark, but they’d be able to get a few decent sightings of the face.

  Anna followed signs to the A10.

  I hit the secure button and waited for the app to do its stuff. I pressed send, then dialled Jules’s number. ‘I’ve found a possible.’

  He sounded surprised. ‘Is she OK?’

  ‘I’ve uploaded a video for you. He has the possible. I’ve got three days max before she’s being moved on. The lad’s got a Lexus, a crimson four-by-four hybrid thing. I don’t know if it’s his. I don’t even know the plate. All I know is that face. Can you find out who he is? The quality ain’t great, but the Tefalheads should be able to sort something out. If not, fire them.’

  ‘How difficult will it be to get to her?’

  ‘Hard to tell. The girls are protected.’ I repeated Anna’s description of the target. ‘All I know is, there are twelve of them, and one’s a possible. I’m going to get in there and confirm.’

  Tresillian jumped in from nowhere. ‘Well done, Mr Stone. I’ll organize a safe-house and a contact. Call back in two hours. In the meantime, start planning to get in there, find the possible, and if she is our target, get her out. We need this to be done as quickly as you can. Do you understand me?’

  ‘Loud and clear.’

  ‘Stand by.’

  He cut us off.

  We reached the slip road onto the A10, southbound to Schiphol.

  ‘We’ll drop you off at the Radisson and I’ll take the car.’

  ‘Drop me off?’

  ‘I’ve got to go on and do the job. You’re not going to come to the safe-house, are you? They can’t know you’re here. So wait out in the hotel. It’ll be safer for both of us. If the shit hits the fan, it means I’ve got somewhere to go, a safe RV. And if I’ve got Lilian, it means she’s got somewhere to go as well.’

  ‘But can’t I drive for you or something like that?’

  ‘No.’ I squeezed her hand. ‘You have to be on the safe side of the fence. For both of our sakes.’

  6

  22.35 hrs

  Back on the A10 from the airport, I ignored the city centre turnoff. I crossed the North Sea canal. The smoking-chimneys sign warned me to turn off in one K. I downed a couple more Smarties and a swig of Coke.

  Anna was pissed off with me. She didn’t want to sit in a hotel room until I’d finished the job. But there was no alternative. The less my contact – and therefore Tresillian – knew about what I had up my sleeve, the better. In any case, the job would be done and dusted within a couple of days. Then we could sample some R-and-R, Moscow-style. And find a way of not talking about how long I might have to go.

  I’d follow Tresillian’s most recent set of instructions, then get back on target tonight. Who knows? I might even have her out of there by first light.

  It wasn’t long before I was paralleling the market. The place was closed but a lot of the kebab joints and corner shops in the vicinity were still open. Brightly coloured lights glistened in the rain slick that coated the Panda’s side windows.

  It had been good spending time with Anna. And I wouldn’t have got here so quickly if it wasn’t for her. But now I had to perform, and when push came to shove, I preferred to work alone. I was in control of just one person. If anything went wrong, I only had one person to blame.

  I ignored the first two exits on the small roundabout, including Distelweg, and took the last option. I hit the road that doubled back on itself, eventually turning left onto the street I’d been given. Papaverhoek was narrow, and paved with concrete cobblestones.

  Down at the far end, maybe two hundred metres away, sat a baby cargo ship looking like a road-block. I slowed right down. Cars parked both sides. A long blue wooden building with yellow awnings on my right. Blinds – also yellow – closed, but a sign hinting at the pleasures within: ‘FilmNoord XXX’. Foyer open, but no customers in sight.

  I passed a run of concrete prefab garages with corrugated-asbestos roofs. Some didn’t have doors, just the arse of a rusty car sticking out. To my left, and stretching for sixty to seventy metres, was a two-storey office block: brick with white metal windows; precise, uncluttered, well-kept, Germanic. Numbered ‘1–3’, it wasn’t the one I wanted.

  The next building along was connected to it, with its far end overlooking a patch of wasteground. A large wooden door that might once have been varnished stood to the left of a metal shutter. ‘Dickinson (NL)’ was stamped on a faded white plastic nameplate.

  I parked nose-in to the shutter and left the engine running. The windows above me on the first floor were barred and grimy. There was no movement or light.

  I retrieved my day sack from the passenger seat and got out. There was nothing in it I’d particularly need if I had to do a runner: it was just good drills to keep all your gear with you.

  I looked for cameras as I walked towards the entrance but couldn’t see any. A couple of street-lamps further back towards the main cast an intermittent glow, but that was about it. Nothing much happened down here. The only reason for anyone to venture this way after hours would be to work late for the Germans or stock up on some porn. I wondered if FilmNoord XXX had contributed to Slobo’s collection.

  My head was clear. I realized I’d forgotten about the pain as soon as Anna had gone missing. I decided to ease back on the Smarties and see if I could start to grip this thing on my own.

  The door had three locks. I rang the bell. The intercom crackled alongside it.

  ‘It’s Nick.’

  ‘Bradley.’ His tone was crisp.

  ‘OK, Bradley. Fifty-five.’

  He was silent for a moment. ‘Subtract forty-six.’

  ‘OK. Let me in?’

  The intercom closed down and an electric motor to my right began to whirr. The shutter groaned and shrieked its way upwards. I went and sat in the Panda while it finished torturing itself.

  Only two of the four fluorescent tubes hanging f
rom its ceiling were working but they were enough to show that the Volkswagen Golf to the right of the loading bay was disguised as a compost heap. Its wiper blade had somehow managed to cut an arc through the shit on the rear windscreen but reversing was still going to be a challenge.

  I pulled in beside it as soon as there was enough clearance, then got out and hit the green down button. The floor was covered with dust and the kind of tyre prints they get very excited about on CSI: Miami. Beyond the cars there was an empty space where whatever came into or out of this building was stored, and a set of steps that led up to a gallery.

  ‘Mr Smith . . .’

  A man in jeans and a leather jacket came down them to greet me. His voice was accentless but educated and his smile was ironic. He thrust out a hand, allowing me a glimpse of cufflinks in the shape of miniature shotgun cartridges, and we shook.

  Bradley’s hair was short and blond, and casual dress wasn’t his thing. He reminded me of my estate agent, and the kind of officer I’d done my best to forget about since leaving the Regiment. He had a blue plastic folder tucked under his arm. ‘Shall we go inside? I have your briefing pack.’

  He led me back up to the gallery and through a thick wooden fire door. A narrow concrete stairway went up the centre of the building, past a landing with a push-bar fire escape, to a corridor which ran the length of the top floor. Three doors, all of them open, led into empty offices that overlooked the road. A couple of old wooden filing cabinets was all that remained of the furniture, but indentations in the carpet marked where desks had once stood, and worn areas traced the most popular routes between them.

  ‘What is this place? Who does it belong to?’

  He checked his stride, as if he couldn’t walk and talk at the same time. ‘It was built just before the Germans invaded. The Resistance used it as a hide for downed Brit air crews.’

  ‘Who else knows I’m here?’

  He looked disappointed that I’d needed to ask. ‘No one apart from Mr T and Julian. Did Julian tell you he and I knew each other at Marlborough? I joined the army and he . . . Well, he’s done all right for himself, hasn’t he?’

  ‘Don’t know, mate. Never set eyes on him. Where do the Dickinsons fit in? Do they know what’s going on?’

  ‘My mother’s family. They were the ones with the money. Her grandfather started in paper packaging in 1936. He ended up with businesses all over Europe. My father took over the group when my mother inherited, and they both died just over ten years ago. A boating accident . . .’ The blood rushed to his cheeks. ‘It was only then that I discovered he was bankrupt. I managed to keep a little of the empire, and this is part of it.’

  ‘Are you in the service?’

  He smiled. ‘I like to think so. The company has had links with HMG since those Resistance days. During the Cold War, my father gave the Firm any titbits he picked up while on business in the East. I’m more a sort of roving ambassador myself – one foot in the import/export world, the other with you guys, whoever you are. I don’t need to know. We’re not exactly a new breed, I suppose. Private enterprise doing its bit to defend democracy.’

  He gave me a smile that didn’t go anywhere near his eyes.

  ‘What about the road? Any movement?’

  ‘Virtually none. The office block next door had less than tenper-cent occupation even before the recession. Now everyone has gone. The whole area is due to be redeveloped.’

  ‘What about the porno shop?’

  ‘They don’t get out much. Must be allergic to sunlight. They’ll be forced out eventually, though. The natives are getting restless.’

  I followed him into a narrow, box-like room at the back of the building. He turned on the light. Varnished wooden pigeonholes with rusting metal card-holders covered one wall, and a galvanized steel ladder led up to a hatch in the roof.

  ‘What about the Dutch? They know anything about the job?’

  However much you’ve been told, the guys on the ground always know a little bit more.

  ‘Nothing. The police are really only here to liaise with the Muslim community. They keep an eye on the drug situation, of course. Ironic, really, given what you can get your hands on legally in a bog-standard Amsterdam coffee shop – but they’re trying to keep a handle on it. The violence, the people smuggling, the prostitution all follow in its wake.’

  Fluorescent lights flickered into life above us as we moved into the room at the end. Bicycle hooks protruded from the wall opposite another push-bar fire escape.

  A brand new kettle, a box of tea bags and a couple of cartons of milk were spread out on the work surface beside a stainless-steel sink with exposed pipe-work beneath it. A large cardboard box sat on the floor with a sleeping bag and one or two other bits and pieces bundled inside.

  ‘I bought you a few essentials. I didn’t know what you were bringing. There’s an airbed in there and some toiletries, pens, paper, that sort of thing.’ He opened the milk. ‘UHT, I’m afraid. There isn’t a fridge. And of course the tea bags aren’t as good as English.’

  He flicked on the kettle and pointed towards an archway in the partition wall. ‘Shower and the like. All the plumbing works.’

  I poked my head round the corner and made admiring noises about the unopened multi-pack of toilet paper. He’d thought of everything.

  Bradley unwrapped a couple of mugs.

  I ran a finger along the push-bar on the door. ‘Do the alarms kick off if I open it?’

  ‘I don’t think so.’

  I shoved against it and emerged onto a cast-iron staircase that led past the door from the landing below us and down to the wasteground. No alarm sounded. I couldn’t see any contact points on the doorframe; no sign of a circuit.

  ‘I’ll check downstairs. Can you do the roof?’

  The other door was the same.

  I returned to see Bradley giving the roof-hatch bolts the good news with a rubber mallet.

  I fixed the brews while he finished the job.

  7

  Bradley reached for the blue plastic folder and tipped its contents onto the brown carpet between us. I shuffled through a printout of Slobo’s Facebook picture and a couple of A4 Google Earth images. One was a straight satellite view of the target, the other a hybrid with street names superimposed. We were less than two K from where the possible and her companions were being held.

  I held up the shot of the square, flat-roofed building. The image was fuzzy, but the tower was identifiable from the shadow it cast across the ground. ‘Any idea what’s inside?’

  He hadn’t.

  ‘What about the outside? Cameras?’

  Bradley looked like he was having a tough time in the Mastermind chair. ‘I don’t know, sorry.’

  ‘Do you know what this job is all about?’ I jabbed at the picture, pressing the paper into the carpet. ‘You know about these two?’

  He flashed another of his special smiles. ‘No. And I don’t want to know.’

  There are lots of people like Bradley. They range from retired civil servants to company CEOs, all of them out in what they like to think of as the real world. Some help with information. Some are in it a lot deeper, and I had the feeling he was one of them, despite his attempts to distance himself. Maybe he was on the Firm’s payroll. Maybe they had something on him and he had no choice but to play ball. Maybe he was one of the weirdos who liked doing this shit because it fulfilled some fantasy.

  ‘Do you have secure comms? How do we talk?’

  Bradley looked sheepish. ‘I’m afraid people like me aren’t trusted with that sort of thing. I’m not complaining. I’d be at their beck and call, wouldn’t I?’

  ‘Tell you what, Brad. I have to stay here and crack on. Come back, on foot, tomorrow morning at ten?’

  He took a final sip of his brew and put it on the drainer. ‘Ten it is, Mr Smith.’ He dusted down his jeans and threw me some keys.

  ‘Who else has a set?’

  ‘Just me.’

  That probably wasn’t
true. The locks weren’t new. There would have been quite a few sets in circulation over the years.

  ‘Good. Tomorrow, be precisely on time and use your keys as if the place was empty. Just let yourself in, then stay right there. I’ll come and get you.’

  ‘OK. Whatever you need me to do . . .’

  I could tell by his expression that he wasn’t thrilled to be given chapter and verse.

  ‘And don’t ever come into the building with no warning. If there’s an uninvited body in here I’m going to react first and ask questions later. That make sense?’

  ‘Perfect sense.’ He fingered his miniature shotgun cartridges.

  ‘So can you see yourself out now, mate? Make sure you close up after you.’

  I packed everything back into the folder, and added my credit card and ID. As the shutter gave its final squeak I moved to one of the front windows and watched the shit-covered Golf head towards the main.

  8

  I leant against the wall and slid down onto my arse to finish the brew. It was nearly half eleven and I was knackered. The last few days were catching up with me.

  My body told me to get my head down, but years of training told me to cover my back first. I made my way through to the mailroom and climbed the ladder.

  The hatch lifted. It was still miserable outside. There were puddles everywhere on the flat roof, and the clouds still hung heavily in the sky. From my vantage-point I had a panoramic view of the area I’d been looking at on the map. To the south, across the bay, was the distant neon glow of the city. A set of navigation lights lifted from Schiphol to the south-west and almost instantly disappeared.

  I scanned the road below me. The dark silhouette of the ship was still visible at the water’s edge about two hundred metres away to my left. A couple of cars were parked outside the porn shop to my right, which showed no sign of closing for business. Two women hung around under the canopies, on the look-out for customers who fancied some live action.