Crossfire ns-10

by Andy McNab

  Nothing stood out at first glance. The laptop looked steam-driven, and the GameBoy wasn't even from this century.

  Then something caught my eye. A Vodafone USB modem. They'd only come out a few months ago, but you couldn't move for the adverts.

  By the time I rejoined Siobhan, there was a blank index card and a pen waiting for me on the coffee-table. I sat down with a big smile. I could smell the soap on my hands as I wrote out my number.

  I got to my feet and handed her the card.

  She looked at it as we headed towards the front door. I kept my eyes busy. The alarm-system keypad was midway up the wall. Another little blue light flickered below the picture rail.

  I hooked my holdall over my shoulder.

  She glanced past me at the dark wet street. 'Don't you want me to call you a cab?'

  'It's OK. I'm going to walk for a while.'

  We shared a nod. 'Thanks again for the coffee.'

  I headed down the steps, and when I hit the street, I turned right. My mobile was out the moment I heard the door shut.

  I hit the new number I'd burnt into my brain. It was fine to talk in clear. These mobiles were secure. Calls were masked by white noise, courtesy of the Firm's version of the Brahms secure speech system, developed by GCHQ. Not even the NSA could eavesdrop.

  It gave four rings.

  I pulled up my collar against the damp. 'You're sure the house only has their two registered mobiles and the landline?'

  I heard the rustle of paper at the other end. 'Only three numbers registered. Why?'

  'And just a PC desktop on broadband, yeah?'

  'Correct.'

  'I need to check something out tonight. I'll call you.'

  There was no reply. The telephone went dead. Not much of a one for small-talk, the Yes Man.

  I didn't give a fuck. I was in control, and I planned to keep it that way.

  36

  I must have looked a complete dickhead as I checked into the Conrad with my holdall and the world's supply of cheap shopping bags. The other guests' bags said Gucci and Hugo Boss, but mine were from Spar, a corner chemist's, an electronics shack and a charity shop. The receptionist had raised an eyebrow at the half-drunk two-litre bottle of own-brand cola sticking out of one of the carriers.

  It was just as well she hadn't seen the rest of the stuff now spread out on the bed in my very swanky room. There were a couple of shower caps, floral-patterned with some frilly stuff round the sides, a notebook and pencil, a box of forty pairs of surgical gloves, a pair of scissors, a little keyring torch, and a SIM-card reader that I'd have to work out how to use before I left.

  I also had some fishing-line. I hadn't been able to find an angling shop, so I'd bought a reel of four-pound breaking-strain stuff off one of the guys on the banks of the Liffey. Twenty-pound would have been ideal, but this would have to do.

  There'd been an amazing number of druggies down by the river. Even at this time of night, young guys looking like ghosts shivered under blankets beneath a bridge not a stone's throw from Bertie's Pole. I tried to talk to one to ask where the fishermen hung out, but he just stared back, too out of it to string an answer together. This city really did have a problem. But then again, show me one that didn't.

  I had also bought new boxers and socks and a couple of long-sleeved T-shirts. I might be spending the Firm's money on this posh room but even I wouldn't squander it on hotel laundry when it was cheaper to buy new.

  Especially for tonight, I'd bought some grey trousers in a charity shop and yet another shitty brown fleece. I'd also picked up a black balaclava I'd found on a shelf of odd gloves and woolly hats. In the old days, the housing-trust shop would have made a few bob selling them in this part of the world. I'd given the old dear at the till a big grin when I'd handed it over. 'Let the good times roll.'

  None of the stuff needed much doing to it, apart from a bit of remodelling to the cola bottle. I poured myself another glass before tipping the rest away and giving it a rinse. Then I took off the wrapper, and cut off the top and bottom to leave an open cylinder. It was Blue Peter time. I cut up the side of the cylinder and flattened out the rectangle I'd created on the floor, then cut the biggest circle I could from its centre. It curled into a tight brandy snap as soon as I let it go and that was it, I was almost done.

  All I had to do now was shove everything in the cupboard, jump on the bed, get my boots off and check out the room-service menu while I read the instructions for the SIM-card reader. I wouldn't be leaving until dark o'clock.

  I finished off the glass of flat cola. It was just like old times. I remembered being pissed off as a nine-year-old when my mum wouldn't buy real Coke because it was too expensive. I wondered if it had been the same for Pete over Brockwell Park way. I shoved a couple of antibiotics down my neck and ordered up a steak sandwich and chips.

  Siobhan's compassion for Pete had been convincing, I supposed. And she clearly missed Dom terribly. But she'd avoided eye contact on every other subject. She had to be the only mother on earth who wouldn't open up about her little boy when given half a chance. Well, tonight we'd be finding out what she was hiding.

  After my sandwich, it was downstairs to the business suite to get online and see if I could find Finbar on the electoral register. I'd trawl Facebook and MySpace too. I had a few hours to kill.

  37

  Wednesday, 7 March 0326 hrs I heard someone come out of a back gate and the sound of a garbage bag landing in a wheelie-bin. A dog got a bollocking for something or other.

  I was standing outside the toilet window. I'd been playing Peeping Tom since about midnight. I'd had to wait more than two hours for Siobhan to go to bed, and then another hour or so to give her time to nod off. It was really unusual for someone to be up as late as two during the week. My brain worked overtime. Could she have been waiting for a call from Dom on that second mobile of hers? I'd find out soon enough.

  I had one last feel about in my grey trousers and shitty brown fleece pockets to make sure I hadn't overlooked any coins or anything that was going to rattle or fall out. ID-wise I was sterile – no wallet, no credit cards. It wasn't about what would happen if the police caught me. With luck, that was when the Yes Man would come into his own. It was to do with leaving nothing behind. Why take stuff on target you don't need? All I had was forty euros shoved down my socks in case there was a flap and I had to run for a taxi.

  I checked that the fishing-line I'd looped round my wrist hadn't unravelled.

  I could feel my mobile in the inside pocket of my fleece and checked again that it was turned off before rezipping. You can never tell when the bad fairy might pay you a visit and sprinkle the fuck-you-up dust.

  Finally, I checked that all the other bits and pieces for the close target recce were good and secure in their pockets. Everything I was taking in was tied to my clothes with fishing-line.

  As a car rumbled along the street I pulled the curled-up cola-bottle disc from the front of my fleece. I shoved it up through the narrow gap between the two sash window frames and watched it curl round the other side.

  'Lottie, you bollix!' Wheelie-bin man was getting pissed off with his little furry friend. 'Come here!'

  I wiggled the plastic circle until it rested against the brass latch, then turned and pulled it along the frame. The latch started to swivel open under the pressure of the coiled plastic.

  The device was also magic for opening Yale locks on doors. Credit cards don't work like they do in Hollywood because there are two right-angles to negotiate before getting to the deadlock. As long as you keep on turning and pushing, the curly stuff will get round them and push the bolt open. But it wasn't so easy, these days, to find nice thick plastic bottles. This going-green business was fucking up the method-of-entry trade for sure, but luckily the cheap stores' own brands were still up to spec.

  Within seconds the window was unlocked. I pulled the plastic back through and put it down at my feet.

  The bottom of the frame was stuck, but it
didn't take much effort to budge it. I pushed up, just a couple of centimetres at a time. When it was open as far as it would go, I heaved myself up on my stomach. Once inside, I made sure I kept on my knees instead of my feet.

  I was sitting on the varnished wooden floorboards. I cocked my head and listened, tuning in to my new environment. I'd just been making a lot of movement and wanted to be sure nobody had heard it and was reacting. I'd also opened a window. Even when people are asleep, their eardrums can be sensitive to minute changes in air pressure. It was probably caveman survival stuff – you needed a little advance warning if a brontosaurus was coming into the cave to eat you.

  I waited a little longer. There was no rush. The hard part was done. This toilet area was the buffer zone between the outside and the in.

  There was still no movement, no late-night snackers raiding the fridge in the kitchen above me. No sound from a radio or TV.

  I pulled the two plastic shower caps from my jeans and put them over my boots, tucking them in at the sides for extra grip. I didn't want to mark the tiles or drag in any of the wet, grimy shit from the street. Siobhan was probably not out there with the Hoover every day, but people notice these things. And while she didn't look like the kind of girl who pulled on the Marigolds, staff have eyes too.

  The next problem was going to be the motion detectors. Was the house zoned? Did she put the alarm on when she went to bed? Chances were she didn't, but I had no way of telling. All I knew was that when she had finally thrown her hand in, there wasn't a long delay between her coming out of the kitchen and the hallway light turning off. She'd not had time to stop and tap in a code, just turned off the light and walked straight up the stairs. I didn't think she'd gone to the pad I'd spotted in the hallway. But for all I knew there might be another upstairs.

  I took the black balaclava from the front of the fleece and pulled it over my head. I had cut out two holes for my ears. In the dark they're more important than eyes so there was no sense in keeping them covered.

  Easing down the handle a fraction at a time, I opened the door a couple of inches. The hinges didn't squeak. I opened it some more and slipped out of the buffer zone.

  The first thing I looked at was the blue light on the motion detector. It flickered as it sensed me. I held my breath, waiting for the initial warning tone that normally kicks in after about twenty seconds.

  Nothing happened.

  I rocked backwards and forwards. The motion detector kicked off again and the blue light flickered – but again, no response.

  I went back into the toilet, pulled the window closed and eased the latch back into place. Everything had to look normal while I was inside the building. It wasn't very likely she was going to come all the way downstairs to use the plumbing, but if she did, that was the job fucked.

  Back in the hallway, I stopped, looked and listened. The wool of the balaclava was warm and wet around my mouth. I let my jaw drop open so that all the internal noises like breathing and swallowing didn't intrude. The house was almost completely silent: no ticking clocks, not even the common night creaks as bits of the building settled after the day.

  First stop was the boy's bedroom. I eased myself in and pulled the keyring torch from my pocket. The fishing-line attaching it to my jeans belt loop had to unravel before I was able to get the beam shining where I wanted it.

  The laptop and modem were still in place. I'd deal with them later if I could. The mobile was the priority. The laptop would take some fiddling. If I was compromised I'd deck whoever it was, then leg it with the laptop and maybe her handbag or something so it looked like a burglary.

  I closed the door and took a few careful paces to the spiral staircase. I put my foot on the first step, right against the wall. It took my weight without protest.

  I headed up, taking each step gingerly.

  Slowly, slowly, my head came level with the kitchen floor. No lights were on. A little ambient glow from the end of the street washed through the rear window, and a little more from the adjoining door from the front room. The only other source was the standby lights on the microwave, cooker and all the other gadgets.

  The smell of cigarettes and pizza got stronger as I moved up the stairs.

  The empty delivery box sat with its lid open on the wooden island, alongside an empty bottle and a glass with only a drop left in it. The mail had been opened and lay next to the now overflowing ashtray.

  Slowly and deliberately I made my way through the double doors and into the front room. The neck of yet another bottle stuck out of the bin.

  The drawer had been pushed right in. I made a mental note. That was exactly how I had to leave it. She would know every detail of this house and its contents, whether she realized it or not. Maybe the drawer was really hard to close, and had to be given a bit of extra force that took it less than flush with the front of the desk. If I didn't do exactly the same, her alarm bells might ring.

  I eased my left hand under the drawer, lifted the handle with my right and pulled, slowly but firmly.

  The drawer opened six inches, enough to expose the grey plastic mobile sitting in the bottom-right corner. I studied its exact position in relation to the biros and bits of paper, then lifted it out.

  I took off the back. No way was I going to switch it on and let it blurt some happy tune. A quick sniff of the SIM card was all I needed.

  The stairs creaked.

  And then the hall lights came on.

  38

  I pushed the drawer shut and dropped behind the blue velvet two-seater. The mobile phone was still in my hand.

  The slap of flip-flops approached along the tiled hall floor. They came at normal walking pace, not agitated, not tentative, and padded into the kitchen.

  The spotlights went on.

  The movement in the kitchen would cover my noise. I half turned, reached up, opened the drawer and pushed the phone as far back as I could. Siobhan or whoever it was might come for it. Perhaps I'd find out where Dom was just by listening. If not, I'd wait, as planned, until I could copy the SIM card.

  The feet slapped their way down the kitchen stairs. There was nothing to tell me whether they were Dom's, Siobhan's, Finbar's, or someone else's altogether.

  I was waiting to hear the toilet door close but it didn't. Soon the feet were heading back up the stairs.

  There were a few noises I couldn't make out, and then the unmistakable pop of a cork. Seconds later came the glug of pouring, then the click of a cigarette lighter. I could smell smoke.

  Fingers began clicking at a keyboard. I heard a couple of sighs and sniffs.

  I was pretty sure it was her now. She carried on typing.

  I inched my way to the corner of the settee. It was in shadow, but I wanted to make sure I wasn't in her line of sight.

  I moved my head until I could just see her with one eye, keeping my mouth open to control my breathing.

  She was sitting on a stool at the island, sideways on to the open door. She was wearing mule-type slippers and a towelling dressing-gown. Her hair fell forward as she looked down at the screen. She wasn't reading. She was waiting.

  She reached for the wine bottle, poured herself a second glass, and wiped her nose on her dressing-gown. Halfway through the second mouthful, she slammed the glass on to the worktop. She needed both hands to work the keys.

  Whatever she was reading wasn't good news. Her face contorted and a gasp turned into a sob. Tears ran down her cheeks. She refilled the glass with trembling hands and tried to compose herself, drink and smoke at the same time.

  She sniffed some more as she placed her cigarette on a corner of the ashtray, the only vacant spot left for it. Then she got up, walked away from me and disappeared down the stairs.

  I was out from behind the sofa and heading for the kitchen.

  I heard the toilet door close.

  Cigarette smoke worked its way through the wool and into my nostrils as I looked at the screen. The Sony laptop was a few years old, but had USB ports. The whit
e Vodafone modem dangling from one was about half the size of a pack of playing cards. It would contain a SIM card, but there was no time to extract it.

  I read the screen. She was replying to a Hotmail. The sender had had plenty to say but I didn't have time to read it. The important stuff was in the header. The message was timed at 8.37 a.m. GMT today. The laptop told me it was now 04:10, so the email had come from the east.

  The toilet flushed.

  I pulled the notebook and pencil from my pocket and scribbled the IMEI and SN numbers from the back. They'd mean something to somebody who knew about that shit. I wrote down both Hotmail addresses.

  I moved quickly and was back behind the settee before she settled down at the island again. A few seconds later, she was pounding the keys.

  She kept it up for another twenty minutes before I heard another glug followed by a click. The stool grated on the floor and her mules clacked back down the stairs accompanied by a few more sniffs and sobs. Seconds later they came back up, and towards the front room. She carried on past and up the stairs. I looked out. Her glass had gone but not the cigarettes.

  I moved down the hall to the kitchen.

  She'd left the mail. Only a couple of letters were open. One had a green motif and was headed Dublin Drug Outreach. It was addressed to Finbar in St Stephen's Green. Maybe he did live here and his mail was forwarded. Maybe she was picking it up for him. I read the letter quickly. He hadn't attended any sessions for the last four weeks and had made no contact with his mentor. They were worried about him.

  The letter underneath was from an estate agent. He was jumping for joy that she'd accepted an offer for €6.5 million for 88 Herbert Park.

  There was a noise upstairs. Probably her going to the bathroom again, but maybe not. I wasn't going to risk going back for the mobile in the drawer. Fuck it, it was time to go.

  Back in the toilet, I unwound the fishing-line from my left wrist. I'd already prepared the loose end into a three- or four-strand loop. Four-pounds breaking strain was a little weak. I put the loop over the end of the latch, fed the free end through the gap between the frames and opened the bottom window. Then I grabbed the free end of the line and pulled it through.