Wings of Death

by David Holman

  ‘Steady on, Howard, I don’t think Heidi would want you saying things like that, would she?’ joked Brenda.

  Swan smiled at her. ‘A truly fine meal, Mrs Crumley.’

  ‘Ooh, Mrs Crumley? Nay be so formal sir, Brenda to everyone around ‘ere it is.’

  ‘Excellent, Brenda,’ said Gable, not wanting to further offend her with formalities.

  ‘So what brings you two fine gents in here with this old rogue then?’

  ‘These chaps are here to see if my new plane is worth all it’s cut out to be, Brenda. They’re part of a team of inspectors up at Brinton’s for a week.’

  ‘Then I can tell you now gents that Howard here always builds good planes. It’s probably all my good dinners that gives him the strength to do so.’

  ‘Thanks Brenda, I couldn’t have thought of a better guarantee myself, especially now these guys here have tasted your good food.’

  Brenda Crumley noticed that her husband had more customers than he could handle. ‘Well, it’s been very nice meeting you, gents. I better give Bob a hand, before he bellows a command at me.’

  She left the three men and walked over to the bar and Swan decided that it was a good time to get a little more serious.

  ‘I need to talk to the Yanks tomorrow about the Python Hawk. What do you think my chances are?’

  HB leaned across the table. ‘They cannot be trusted Alex, if you want my opinion.’

  ‘Swan knew he could pursue this further.’

  ‘How so?’

  ‘Well, as I said to you earlier, they’re a shifty lot and there’s something else I’m looking into about them.’

  Swan needed to probe more. ‘What’s that, old boy?’

  HB hesitated, then relaxed himself. ‘I take it we are now friends, and it would be good to get this off my chest. It is my belief that they are behind the accident at Shobdon and even more so, the fatal fall of my apprentice James McGregor.’

  The lounge bar of the inn was now busy with locals, and a young couple sat at the far table in view of the three men, now deep in conversation. This was the perfect view for Jody Zemke, as she used the typical CIA surveillance technique of keeping her head fixed forward on her partner, but kept her eyes trained on her target. As Zemke looked across, her eyes were focussed heavily on the lip movements of Brinton’s Chief Designer, and as if commentating on every move, spoke across the table to a man nursing a glass of stout. Like an interpreter reeling off the English translation of a foreign language, she translated each lip-read syllable with ease to her colleague and pretend partner for the evening, Nick Riley. He was a few years older than Jody, and the couple blended in well in their casual clothing, as if they were two young lovers out for the evening. Riley also had a talent, a photographic memory that was able to see spoken words and store them in his head. He was just as good with faces, and in the short time they had tailed their target he had every crevice and wrinkle of the three men logged and ready for recall.

  Across the room, Swan pursued the Chief Designer on his sabotage and murder theory. ‘What evidence do you have that you think this may be the case?’

  Barnett sat up in his chair and looked down at the small remaining amount of brown liquid in his tankard. ‘None, really. Just a hunch I suppose. Too many things have been happening around here, and it seems that it’s since those Yanks invaded the place.’ He stopped talking and changed the subject. ‘Anyway gents, I take it they’ve put you up in The Waverley in Maryport?’

  ‘That’s correct,’ Swan replied.

  ‘Well, how about I take you back to the hotel and we can have a nightcap in a pub I know just round the corner, before I leave you gents to your own devices?’

  ‘That sounds good to me,’ acknowledged Gable.

  Jody quickly told Riley that the three men were leaving. Riley decided that they wouldn’t pursue the tail, and would arrange to meet with Maitland in the morning and submit their report.

  As Swan waited in turn to shake hands with the landlord and his wife, he glanced around at the crowd of drinkers. Suddenly he noticed a young woman with straight black hair under a tweed cap staring at him, then quickly averting her gaze to look down at her lap. He saw that she was with a man of similar age, and for a moment he watched her. She looked up again at him, then as suddenly as before, looked away.

  Swan had been in the Security Services too long not to recognise clandestine surveillance tactics, and suddenly saw this occasion as such. He decided to test his theory and walked over to the table, keeping his gaze on the girl. As he approached, she looked up and smiled at him.

  Swan returned the smile. ‘Good evening. Sorry to bother you both, but I was just admiring your hat, madam. My daughter is of similar age to you and I was hoping to get her one for her birthday. I notice that it seems to be what every young lady is wearing at the moment.’

  Jody Zemke kept smiling and put a hand on her hat. ‘Oh, I err - got it from Oxford Street, in London.’

  Swan then raised an eyebrow to her Chicago toned accent. ‘You’re American, mid-west I would say, judging by the accent.’

  Zemke nodded. ‘Yeah, I’m from Chicago. Names Holly, and this is my fiancé Steve.

  Hi ya how ya doing,’ said Riley in his Virginian tone as he looked up at the dark suited man standing over the table.

  Swan studied him. ‘But you sound like you are from a bit further north,’ he added.

  Riley gazed at Swan, but did not say anything else. The SID man then addressed the both of them. ‘So, what brings you to these parts of our dear country then?’

  Zemke gave him another friendly smile. ‘We’re visiting the Lake District. We heard so many things about this beautiful part of England from friends back home, so we decided to include it on our vacation to England.’

  Swan admired the professionalism of their cover stories, but decided to leave it there. They were obviously good at what they were employed for. ‘Nice to meet you both, I’m Alex. So it was Oxford Street you say? Do you happen to know which shop?’

  Zemke snapped back quickly. ‘I think it was Harrods. Is that right Steve?’

  Riley gave a sharp nod. ‘Yeah, I think it was.’

  Swan shook Riley’s hand. ‘Thank you so much, enjoy your holiday.’ He turned, joining Barnett and Gable at the door.

  Outside he waited until they were all seated in the car. ‘Looks as though you might have a tail, old boy.’

  Barnett looked at Swan in a confused state.

  ‘I just spoke to a charming young American couple who are on holiday up here, but they’re not on holiday, as they both have the letters C-I-A marked all over them.’

  Gable looked at Swan in surprise. ‘How do you know that, sir?’

  ‘Quite simple, really. The girl was wearing a hat which clearly had a Bloomingdales label hanging down from it, and on my enquiry of where she had bought it, she said Oxford Street, in Harrods!’

  Barnett stared through the windscreen. ‘So what happens now? Looks as though that bourbon drinking bastard is on to me.’

  Swan gave a reassuring glance at the Yorkshireman. ‘Let them continue. I very much doubt they will be using those two again, now that I have compromised them. So we need to be on our guard. I wager that tomorrow’s little visit to The Pentagram, as you call it, will be an interesting one.’

  Barnett slammed his foot on the brake, causing the car to stop suddenly at the exit of the inn, and then turned to both men.

  ‘Just a minute gents. You’re not exactly who you claim to be either, are ya?’

  Swan put a friendly hand around Barnett’s arm. ‘No, but the difference is, we are the good guys.’

  As Barnett drove, Swan re-introduced himself and his colleague and explained the real reason why they were up at Brinton’s.

  ‘Oh that poor lass, how is she?’ Barnett enquired, referring to their client Kate Townsley.

  ‘Kate’s fine,’ Swan replied. ‘She’s a brave girl, and has provided me with some very useful information ab
out the incident, and given me enough to start putting a good case together.’

  Barnett shook his head. ‘So how did you guys get passes to be part of the inspection team then?’

  ‘From contacts high above.’ Swan touched the side of his nose. ‘Need to know only, I’m afraid.’

  Barnett nodded. ‘So Government knows about all this then?’

  ‘Well, not exactly,’ Swan corrected. ‘Let’s just keep it all to ourselves for now. My intentions here are to get to the bottom of what’s going on, then I will give my former colleagues at MI5 the heads up on the whole thing and leave them to wrap it all up.’

  Barnett shook his head in disbelief. ‘I don’t know. Bloody CIA and MI5. Right now chaps, I feel like a character in a Graham Greene novel.’

  Chapter 10

  The next morning Maitland looked across his desk at his two agents and listened to their report. ‘You say this Alex guy saw you and spoke to you about your hat?’

  Jody Zemke looked sheepishly down at her hands at the question put to her by her controller. ‘Yeah, he did. I goofed though, and he caught me. I had to think of something fast, this guy was quick. So I told him I got it from Harrods in Oxford Street. He also noticed my accent and we told him we were here on vacation. I think he fell for it.’

  Maitland turned his pen in his hands and looked at his female agent. ‘So this guy is an inspector and here this week for the Rapier evaluation, and Barnett told him and his buddy about suspecting that we are responsible for McGregor’s fall, and that we could have sabotaged the transporter?’

  ‘That’s exactly what he said. I read it easily from his lips.’

  ‘It was just like she said, sir,’ interrupted Nick Riley.

  Maitland looked at his twirling pen. ‘Would you say this Alex is not actually an inspector, from what you saw, from him recognising what part of the States you both came from?’

  Riley decided to answer for his partner. ‘The guys a spook, unless he has a hobby in people watching. No, he’s MI5 or a government agent. A real life James Bond. I’ll be god damned if I’m wrong.’

  Maitland rose from his desk and walked to his filing cabinet, opened the drawer and extracted a file with the label BR-101 Evaluation Team. He held it in one hand while pulling out the bottle of Old Kentucky Bourbon with the other, and placed the file on the top of the cabinet while he poured himself a glass. He then put the bottle back in the drawer and closed it, opened the file, and read while taking a sip from the glass.

  ‘Here he is. Alex Swan, and Arthur Gable is his buddy. According to this report, they are civilian avionics systems specialists from the Air Ministry. I’ve been asked if I can have a meeting with these guys this afternoon to answer questions on the Python Hawk.’

  Zemke stood up from her chair and pulled her skirt down over her knees. ‘Is there anything else sir?’

  Maitland stared out of the window at the other hangars. ‘I need your reports on my desk by sundown. One other thing, Miss Zemke? Take a look at page two of the newspaper on my desk. There’s an advert for Harrods Sale. Kindly read the address of the store to me will you?’

  She picked up the copy of The Times on her controller’s desk and turned over the front page. ‘Harrods, 87 to 135 Brompton Road, London, SW1X 7XL.’

  Zemke gave a bewildered look at the back of her controller then he spoke directly to her. ‘That’s in a place called Knightsbridge, about three miles from Oxford Street, Miss Zemke.’

  Maitland turned and stared straight into her blue green eyes.

  ‘You goofed alright, Jody! You played right into Swan’s hands. The son of a bitch read you like the god damned New York Times. After your report, go and pack. You’re now off Black Star. Get your ass back to Langley and report for a new assignment. You may be in luck, as the chief has just fired his last secretary, and I’m sure even you can’t screw up with typing a memo.’

  Riley just sat open mouthed and watched as his surveillance colleague put the newspaper back down on the desk and walked briskly, head bowed, out of the office. Tears began to well in her eyes. She knew that she would have to spend a long time on clerical duties before she would be let back in the field again.

  Maitland then looked at Riley. ‘You’ve been compromised, Nick. I’m sending you to Black Star Three in Alaska to spend the rest of the year in the Bearing Strait looking and listening to Soviet spy trawlers. Just think yourself lucky that you’re still with us.’

  Maitland then chose to ignore Riley as he made his way out of the office. He walked back to his desk and sat down with the file, picking up the photo of Alex Swan on the document.

  ‘Okay, Alex Swan or whoever you are. You just cost me two of my best agents. You wanna war? Then you’ve got one, pal.’

  Brannigan then walked into the office and Maitland addressed him. ‘Looks as though we do have a problem with Barnett. I was wondering if we could shut him up before he shuts us down.’

  Brannigan sneered to his boss from his desk. ‘Maybe a threat in the right direction may help. There’s his Swiss born wife and he also has a kid, a son at a boarding school.’

  Maitland glanced sharply at his colleague. ‘Is that so? Maybe it will be a good idea to get some guys to pay him a visit. It will give us a bit of leverage, should his old man start blabbing. But it’s not enough, Jake. He could open the can on the whole goddamn thing, and if that happens, all our work here will be for nothing.’

  Brannigan stood up from his desk. ‘Then we have to act, and right now Frank. Let’s use the kid, and maybe then have a word with Barnett to keep him quiet.’

  *

  Swan and Gable sat in the breakfast room of The Waverley Hotel. They had been well rewarded in being early risers, as they had secured the bay window table that overlooked the small harbour.

  Gable commented on it. Beautiful day. Shame that we have to spend it talking to some shady American spook.’

  Swan stared at a small fishing trawler heading out towards the harbour mouth. ‘Poor HB. He looked quite shaken by the news that he had been put under CIA surveillance.’

  The two men fell silent, watching the small sailing boats with their bright coloured sails floating just beyond the harbour wall.

  Gable then made a suggestion. ‘I think we should also be careful this afternoon when we go and talk with this Maitland chap.’

  I totally agree with you, Arthur. I suppose it depends on what his watchdogs have told him of our chat last night. I need you to observe his reactions, as I ask him questions about this Python Hawk drone thing of theirs. I’m going to also go a bit deeper and test some of those reactions. If he is CIA, then I will know by the end of our meeting.’

  Gable sniggered. ‘This should be something worth seeing, a Yank spook squirm in his seat.’

  ‘They’re not all bad, Arthur. Look at Howard Denning, the chap who helped us on the Bloomberg affair. He bent over backwards to accommodate us. Without him that case would not have been wrapped up so quickly. Trouble is that the CIA do not operate as one happy family. They are made up of different sections, dealing with such diverse things such as strategic spying to sabotage, foreign affair infiltration and even assassination. Just look at the Bay of Pigs fiasco, when one section blamed the other and vice versa for the mess. There are operatives who do not exist on paper and ‘sleeper’ agents placed in strategic positions all over the world, who only go into action when they receive a special code word by phone.’

  The two men finished their breakfast of poached eggs and coffee enjoying their view, then joined the other members of the inspection team outside to await the bus to take them to another gruelling day at Brinton Aviation.

  *

  The morning sun also shone on a small hut beside the hangar at RAF Hemingford. Sergeant Harry Woodger sat at his desk with a mug of tea in his hand as he chatted to Sergeant George Hamble, also armed with a mug of tea.

  ‘I still can’t believe them darts last night. When did you get time to learn a nine dart finish, you lucky
sod?’

  Hamble simulated throwing a dart with his free hand. ‘Just flew them nice and straight into the right beds, mate,’ he boasted.

  ‘Seriously though, it was a good game. Did you see everyone stop and watch when you went for it?’

  ‘I’ve got to confess, I did notice. So I thought to myself, George don’t fluff this up, my old son. Anyway, thanks for the tea. I’ve got a dodgy Aden cannon to strip down and fix if I can, and seeing it was the aircraft belonging to the CO of 1 Squadron that jammed over the range, I better make a good job of it, or he’ll be pinning me down on Aberforth and using me for target practice.’

  Woodger waved goodbye to his colleague and sat for a moment finishing his tea. Suddenly, he reached across his desk for a small cellophane package, then got up and called out.

  ‘George? Sorry mate, could you have a look at this. It was found by one of my lads working on the outrider’s bike. The one who got injured in the BR-101 trailer accident, down at Pembridge. He pulled it out of the bike, but swears to me it isn’t part of it.’

  Hamble walked back up to Woodger and took the package from him. ‘I’ll get it checked out. Any ideas?’

  Woodger shook his head in puzzlement. ‘Not a clue. It looks a bit weird to me, there’s some scorch marks on it, so I thought you would be the man with the answers.’

  Sergeant Hamble took the object out of the bag and examined the scorching. ‘Certainly been subjected to some heat. Look at the way this section has melted. Tell ya what, Charlie’s in and he’s good with pyrotechnics, so I’ll give it to him to look at.’

  Woodger returned to the hut and sat down to the mountain of paperwork that faced him while Hamble walked into the armoury hangar and looked at the Aden cannon on the workbench. Leading Aircraftsman Charles Ambrose walked up to him, cleaning a component of the long cannon barrel.

  ‘Morning Charlie. ‘Ere, could you have a look at this at some point? I’ve just been given it by Sergeant Woodger over in Maintenance.’ Hamble handed the package to Ambrose, who took the object out of the packaging, and looked at it closely. ‘I thought as you are good with the pyros that you could tell me what it is.’