by Andy McNab
‘Tell me again what Ashton said.’
‘Truly, only what I’ve told you. He was very civil, concerned to know that you were happy in your new role. We just made polite noises back. It was all we could say since we haven’t a clue how it’s—’
‘All right, Mum.’
‘He seemed keen to see you again but I think he was a bit reticent about making a direct approach since your departure from the Regiment. Think he wanted us to drop you a hint.’
‘Well, consider it dropped. So where’s Dad today?’
‘He got called back to town. He’s got some big deal going on he’s rather excited about.’
‘What sort of big deal?’
‘He’s been rather cagey about it, which is most unlike him. In fact, he’s been like that for the past couple of weeks. I worry about him, sometimes even more than I worry about you.’
Hugh had been equally unforthcoming with him, but Tom wasn’t about to add to his mother’s worries. ‘He can look after himself – he’s never screwed up.’
She gave him a wry look. ‘There’s always a first time.’
After she had finished patching him up, he went into his father’s study. On the desk there was a big old-fashioned Rolodex. Like many of his generation Hugh was almost endearingly wary of the digital world and still laboriously copied out the names and addresses of all his contacts onto small cards. Mandler’s comment about Umarov building up a property portfolio had made Tom wonder if his father had come across him. He spun through the cards to U, but there was no Umarov. That was a relief. He put the Rolodex back in its place, then booted up the PC and had a few goes at the password. Horace worked: always the name of one of their dogs. He scrolled through his inbox and then his sent items until he started to feel grubby about what he was doing. Imagine if his father did the same to him. He shut the PC down and pushed the chair back from the desk. He was about to leave but something else caught his eye.
The box wasn’t as big as the one he’d found in Rolt’s office, and the Ordynka inside was less elaborately engraved. But the dedication said it all: To Hugh, from your friend, Oleg.
52
15.45
On the way to the pub, Tom tried not to think about what he had found in his father’s study. He needed to rehearse the story of his apparent motivation for the meeting with Ashton but the thought that Hugh was in any way involved with Umarov was deeply troubling. Previously separate parts of his life had now become entangled.
It was Ashton who had thrown down the gauntlet by dropping in on his folks. Rolt was now in government and Tom’s role as his right-hand man had been overtaken by events. It was coming up to time for him to move on; nothing more complicated than that. Oh, and an inclination, which Tom was not at all sure he was ready for, to put the past behind him.
He drew up outside the Flying Horse. It was closed for refurbishment. Ashton presumably didn’t know either. He was about to text him when a black Mercedes G-Wagen rumbled into view, the same vehicle he had seen in the Lakes, which had been used to cart away Evans, his men and their dead dog. At the sight of it his blood ran cold. It turned into the car park beside the pub. The windows were blacked out so it was impossible to see if Ashton had company.
Tom stepped out of his car and walked up to the Merc as Ashton emerged from the front passenger side. So, he wasn’t alone. Ashton was dressed much as he always was, thick sweater, chinos and boots. ‘Hello, Tom.’
‘Hello, boss.’ Old habits died hard.
Ashton cracked a rare smile, took his hand and gripped it firmly. ‘Good to see you.’
Two men, who might well have been the ones with him when he had murdered Evans, stepped out of the Merc.
‘It’s closed, by the way,’ Tom said.
‘I know,’ replied Ashton.
One of the men approached him and patted him down carefully.
‘Sorry about this, Tom. Can’t be too careful at the moment. Strange days, eh?’
Tom’s firearm was in the car. Carrying it would have looked odd. A warning bell sounded in his head. But then it was shut off, along with everything else, as he felt himself fall to the ground.
53
Something jolted him awake: something cold and wet on his face. He tried to reach up to remove it, but his arms were pinned to his sides. He was flat on his back, his feet higher than his head. He moved his head and realized with a jolt that it was wrapped in something.
‘Who’re you working with, Tom?’
Ashton’s voice. Tom pulled furiously against the bindings.
‘What the fuck is this?’
‘Just answer the question, Tom.’
Ashton sounded faintly bored.
‘You know who I’m working for. Vernon Rolt. Invicta.’
Ashton uttered something he couldn’t hear.
The cold spread across his face, saturating the cloth wrapped round it and blocking his airways. Okay, he told himself. I can deal with this. Concentrate on what you’re here for.
‘I’ll say it again. Who is it, Tom? Who’s put you up to this?’
How ironic. Ashton’s question was the very one Tom wanted to ask him.
The water saturated the cloth over his face. Try as he might, he could not stop his body going into convulsions, thinking it was drowning. He used all his concentration not to struggle. The more he tried to resist, the worse it would get.
You are not going to drown, he told himself. That’s not what they want.
He felt the vomit rising in him and spreading across into his blocked airways.
There was only one way to deal with this. To relax. Yeah, good idea. Very funny. The water seeped straight through the cloth, into his nostrils and straight into the sinuses. No amount of head-shaking or snorting could stop it. The only thing to do was try to block everything, but how to do that and answer? There is only so long a human being can hold their breath. In the end the body takes over and with that sudden gasp comes an intake of water. The one thing Tom tried to cling to was the thought that Ashton wanted him alive. But he had seen off Evans. And they were both part of Invicta. Was this a purge? Don’t be a fool, he told himself.
‘Come on, Tom. Just give us the truth. Let’s get this done.’
Who the hell else could he be working for? He could give up Mandler’s name – except he knew Mandler would deny all: he had told him as much. Anyway, he was on his own. The old spook had said as much. He told himself to cling to that thought. Rolt was his only employer.
His body had gone into spasm, struggling for all it was worth to expel the water.
Someone lifted him up and he vomited the water out.
‘Who are you working for?’ He coughed. ‘What’s all this about? I work for Rolt – I’ve barely left his side for the last four months.’
He repeated it over and over, all the time arguing with the bit of his brain shouting at him to say Mandler’s name and have done with it. There were moments when the names became confused in his mind as he fought to stay conscious.
He heard Ashton’s voice very close to his ear, almost a whisper. ‘This isn’t working, Tom. Give it up, be a good man.’
They repeated the same routine with the water until he felt himself losing his grip on consciousness. But he forced himself, against every sinew inside his body, to hold on.
‘Vernon Rolt, Vernon Rolt,’ he repeated the name over and over.
Then he felt himself falling onto a hard cold surface, his pinioned arms unable to break the fall as he came down on his side. There he curled up in a foetal position as he attempted to empty his lungs.
‘Okay, clean him up. Ochistite yego.’
54
Tom faced his former CO across a grey metal table. In front of him was a mug of coffee and an M&S sandwich still in its wrapper. Ashton had on a black parka now. The room was freezing cold.
‘Sorry about that. Just a precaution.’ Ashton gave him a wan smile.
Tom said nothing. His throat and lungs felt as though he had
just inhaled a volcano.
‘You know how it is.’
‘No, I fucking well don’t know how it is. For fuck’s sake!’ His outrage, even if not the result of innocence, was genuine.
‘We just had to be sure you were still kosher, okay?’
‘Who else could I have been working for? Al-Qaeda? ISIS?’ He reached for the sandwich and ripped open the wrapper. Chicken and avocado, his favourite. He used to be ribbed about this in the Regiment. Ashton must have remembered. He bit into it. He had every right to be furious about the waterboarding, but he reminded himself he had walked into this for a reason. Now he was a step closer to finding out what Ashton was up to.
Ashton cleared his throat, leaned forward and rubbed his hands. A bit of him wondered if his old CO was enjoying this. ‘What a difference six months makes, eh?’
‘What’s that mean?’ Tom spoke through a mouthful of chicken.
‘We’re living in desperate times, Tom. You can see that as well as I can – maybe we all should have seen it coming. And desperate times call for desperate measures. You of all people should know that.’
Tom frowned. He didn’t see why at all, but he said nothing and let Ashton talk.
‘I would have thought that, from your viewpoint, at the elbow of our new home secretary, you would be in a pretty good position to see the big picture.’
Tom wolfed the rest of the sandwich.
‘Let’s not fool ourselves. This country is sliding towards anarchy. People are going to have to choose sides. It’s already happening.’
‘Happening where?’
‘On the streets, in the corridors of power: people thinking the unthinkable.’
‘But Rolt’s got the right job to be able to sort it out, hasn’t he?’
‘And you think he will?’
‘He won the election for them, that’s for sure. He won’t like it if they try to get in his way.’
Ashton went silent for a moment, sifting Tom’s words. Then he started to shake his head. ‘You always did have a streak of idealism.’
Tom felt faintly indignant. But Ashton’s comment was an indication that his cover was still working. ‘So you really think they’re going to rush through his programme?’
Ashton prodded the table with a forefinger. ‘The PM will put the brakes on, try to water it down, slow the legislative process. Meanwhile the country slides into chaos. And who wants that?’ He leaned forward. ‘Look, Tom, I know we’ve had our differences but that’s all in the past. You and I, we’re both on the same side.’
Don’t make this too easy, Tom reminded himself. ‘And you had to waterboard me first to decide that, yeah?’
Ashton put his hands up. ‘As I said, just taking precautions. Your man Rolt, what do you think of him, honestly?’ He lowered his voice: ‘It’s all right. Whatever you say here stays in the room.’
Tom considered the question. He needed Ashton to open up. He needed to feed him enough to get him in the mood. ‘I think he’s a good man. He’s done great work for ex-services blokes who’ve been dumped on the street.’ He paused. ‘He speaks a language that a lot of people understand and he likes to cut to the chase where others beat around the bush.’
Ashton sat back in his chair. ‘Is there a “but”?’
‘But politics is another matter. He’s an entrepreneur, used to getting his way, running his own show and not having to justify himself.’
‘Go on.’
Ashton seemed to like what he was hearing, but Tom didn’t want him to get the impression he was being fed a line. The wall behind had a frosted window. There were people moving about behind it. ‘Who are the goons?’
Ashton waved the question away. ‘Contractors.’
‘Where are they from?’
‘Ukraine. Go on with your take on Rolt.’
‘He’s only where he is because of the votes he brought with him. You’re right to be asking whether the rest of the cabinet have got the balls to allow him to follow through.’
Ashton’s eyes were drilling into his. ‘And where does that leave you?’
‘I don’t know yet. We didn’t talk about what next. I’m not sure if he actually thought he’d make it.’
Ashton spread his hands on the table. ‘I think your analysis is correct. And, as we speak, I suspect the prime minister is probably going into overdrive trying to stall him on the runway.’
He was waiting for Tom to respond. Time for another tack. ‘There was an attempt on me. They got Jez instead.’
Ashton nodded. ‘I heard.’
‘It wasn’t meant to be public.’
‘I keep my ear to the ground. I heard you also stopped someone who was after Rolt.’
‘Invicta’s not the big happy family people think.’
Ashton shrugged. ‘Just a few bad apples left over from when it started. My impression is the rest are all right.’
‘You seem to know a lot about what goes on inside Invicta.’
Ashton studied him, evidently considering his reply. ‘I ran into some of them down on Dartmoor. Just this week.’
Dartmoor and the Lakes: he had been getting around. Tom hid his surprise. ‘And?’
‘Good blokes. Itching to make a difference, give something back to society. That’s the impression I got.’
Tom absorbed this as he balled up the sandwich wrapper. ‘I’m free to go, right? No more fucking around?’
Ashton raised his hands. ‘Of course, whenever you want.’
‘You are working for the government?’
Ashton winced at the question as if it was ridiculous. ‘People in the government.’
‘What’s that mean?’
Ashton leaned forward again. ‘The country’s breaking apart, Tom. Someone’s going to have to pick up the pieces and put it back together. That’s not going to be about building consensus, weighing up the pros and cons. We’re sleepwalking into chaos. The government’s authority is slipping. People are taking things into their own hands. We have to do something before mob rule takes hold.’
‘Some people think Rolt’s partly to blame for that, stoking the flames.’
‘Well, that’s as may be. But we are where we are.’
‘So what do you want with me? Why all this rendition-style bollocks?’
‘I may have a proposition for you.’
‘I’m still on the Invicta payroll, remember.’
‘All the better.’ Ashton got to his feet. ‘The question for you, Tom, is this. When the shit hits the fan, are you going to be upwind or downwind?’
‘So what is it, this proposition?’
Ashton was moving him towards the door. ‘Keep your phone on and wait out.’
55
14.00
Woolwich, South-east London
Adila waited for the bus outside Woolwich Arsenal station. She looked at the others in the shelter. Were any of them going to Belmarsh as well? There was a woman with white-blonde hair whose two toddlers were whining. She handed them each a bag of crisps and silence fell. Adila smiled at her, reminded of a couple of women she had encountered on her work experience as a midwife. But the woman just looked away. That was how it was now.
Another woman in a hijab came towards them, very pregnant, with a limp. She didn’t look old, but her face was haggard. Two men were with her. One steadied her. When she was safely perched on the narrow bench in the bus shelter they moved a few metres away from her and lit cigarettes. Adila smiled at her and the woman smiled back. She felt a little less alone.
When the bus arrived she helped the hijab woman on board. ‘Thank you so much – you are most kind.’
‘It’s a pleasure.’ Adila felt her heart warming and, for the first time in several days, allowed herself to think there was hope in the world after all. The two men put out their cigarettes and joined them on the bus.
She looked again at the instructions for visitors: Give yourself plenty of time to get to HMP Belmarsh; please aim to arrive at least 45 minutes before the visit
time. You must book in no more than 20 minutes after the start of the visits session, or you will not be allowed entry to the prison.
She checked the identification she had brought: her passport and her hospital intern’s ID card. She checked that she had remembered a pound coin for the locker. No change is provided at the visitor centre, the website had warned. She looked at what she was wearing and remembered the list of clothing that could ‘breach security guidelines’: hooded sweaters, ripped jeans, football shirts or anything with a national crest, low-cut tops or short skirts. How those could raise security concerns she couldn’t imagine, not that she owned any such clothes. She had been warned that there was a biometric ID system where visitors’ fingerprints and photos would be taken on the first visit, to be used as proof of ID for any later visits. She would also get an ultraviolet stamp on her hand to validate entry into the visits hall.
She had emptied out all the contents of her handbag that morning and removed anything that she thought might be a problem, even her pens, spiral notebook and makeup. She saw to her horror that she had left a nail file inside. She took it out and laid it on the seat. She would have to leave everything in the locker. She’d wanted so much to bring something from home, just a small memento, but because of her father’s behaviour that hadn’t been possible. She had had to spend last night with a friend. She believed she would be allowed home because her father usually relented with her. He favoured her over the boys – sometimes she resented it and wished he was as harsh with her as he was with them. Then they would be equal. But nothing was equal any more.
She noticed the blonde woman had a big transparent bag, containing nappies and bottles, and concluded she must also be a visitor. The few items that could be taken in included baby paraphernalia so long as it was all packed in a clear plastic bag.
She felt she knew what to expect. All visitors to HMP Belmarsh would be searched on their way to the visits hall with a metal detector, and what was ominously called a ‘rub-down’. Shoes and coats were X-rayed.
