The Killing Ground

by Jack Higgins

  “We finish eating, then we seem busy, just in case anyone is looking. Mess around with the diving equipment, stuff like that.”

  Hal Stone said, “The Uzis on the table in the saloon. I shouldn’t think Caspar and I would need them.”

  “Nice weapon-always liked them,” Dillon said. “If you drop one, it stops automatically.”

  “I remember very well,” the professor said. “It’s just that it’s been a long time. What about you, Caspar?”

  “My experience with any kind of firearms has been severely limited,” Rashid said.“So, if things go according to plan, the woman with Sara will be handcuffed, dragged below and locked in a cabin?”

  “Better than a bullet, which is what she’d get from some people. They’ll find her whenever they come looking for Sara and the others.”

  “A lot of places to look,” Hal Stone said.

  “I think you’ll find the women at the house have already heard about yesterday’s visit.” Dillon shrugged. “Hussein Rashid is a special kind of man. Every sense in him sharpened like some jungle animal. He’ll work out what’s happened here quickly. That’s why we’ve got to move very fast indeed.”

  There was silence. Billy went to the side table, got a bottle of Bush-mills whiskey, poured half a glass and brought it to Dillon.

  “Oh, if only I didn’t hate alcohol, but to us, here’s looking at you.”

  Dillon toasted them and emptied the glass, then got up. “Let’s look busy, Billy.”

  “I’m with you.”

  Caspar loaded the tray. “I’ll get rid of this.”

  Hal Stone said, “Better bring the weapons back with you,” and as Dillon went over the side, he picked up the glasses and focused them on the house on the bluff.

  * * * *

  THEY DIDN’T KNOW IT, but nobody at the house except Sara even wanted to go to South Port that morning. Sitting at a table on the terrace and reading an Arab newspaper, Hussein was enjoying a coffee after breakfast. His uncle had just been called away.

  Sara, with Jasmine, stood on the upper terrace looking down on him, Hamid and Hassim behind them, smoking and talking.

  Sara turned to them. “Do you know if he’s going to South Port this morning?”

  “Well, he doesn’t look like it,” Hamid replied. “He hasn’t said a word.”

  She tried to stay calm. “What a shame. I’d hoped to go and see them diving again.”

  “I don’t think so.”

  At that moment, relief came from an unexpected quarter. Jemal appeared on the upper terrace a few yards away from them, leaned over and shouted to Hussein, “We must leave at once. I’ve had a message from South Port. The loading of the Kandara has been disrupted.”

  Hussein rose and started up the steps. “What happened?” he called.

  “The train was coming down from Bacu with the last load two hours ago, when one of the freight cars was derailed on that bend by Stack Four.”

  “How bad is it?”

  “It could mean the Kandara’s departure being delayed for some days.”

  “That would be unfortunate. Our friends in Iraq need those weapons for the big push in Basra next month.”

  “We must go at once. See if anything can be done.”

  “Of course.” Hussein turned to Sara and the young men. “You heard that. Bad trouble. We must get moving. Behave yourself, Sara.”

  “Can we go out in the boat?”

  “All right-the harbor only, Hamid.” He took his uncle’s arm and helped him up to the entrance to the living room and they vanished inside.

  “So-the boat it is.” Hamid looked through the Zeiss glasses at the Sultan. “Yes, they’re on the deck, the Bedouin and the old professor and the two divers are getting ready to go down, from the looks of it.”

  “We’ll go and take a look.” Now that the moment had come, Sara was intensely nervous, her heart beating. If anything, she felt a little sick, but she tried to pull herself together. “Come on, Jasmine, let’s get going.” She picked up a parasol one of the women had left on a bench and led the way down to the inflatable tied up at the small jetty on the beach below.

  Hamid handed her in, then Jasmine. Hassim sat in the prow, his AK across his knees, and Hamid untied the line and stepped in and sat in the stern.

  Sara opened the parasol, Jasmine smiled, and Hamid pressed the starter on the huge outboard motor.

  * * * *

  ON THE SULTAN, Hal Stone said, “They’re coming. Sara’s the one with the parasol; her companion is the same one as yesterday. The boys are the same. How do we handle it?”

  Dillon and Billy had discussed it already and they came up from the diving platform. Dillon pulled the zip of his diving jacket down and slipped one of the Walthers inside. Billy did the same.

  “Caspar, you stand on the diving platform to take their line, Billy and I will jump into the sea on the other side when they’re closer, swim round underwater and deal with the boys. Hal, you just be ready for anything.”

  Caspar said desperately, “God forgive me, but it’s as good as murder.”

  “You want your daughter back, don’t you?” Dillon said harshly. “So pull yourself together. Come on, Billy.” He dodged round the mast to the other side of the deckhouse.

  The sound of the inflatable’s engine was somehow very loud and then it died. Sara’s voice sounded, “Good morning, Professor, here we are again.”

  Dillon and Billy dropped over the side, went four or five feet under the water and swam past the prow and toward the diving platform on its line, the inflatable beside it. Dillon gestured to the stern and went up and Billy made for the prow. Hassim was leaning over.“It’s so clear, I can see the ship,” and Billy’s hand clutching the silenced Walther emerged. The first round caught the boy in the throat, the second between the eyes, hurling him back against Jasmine, who pushed at him with a shrill cry, sending him over into the water.

  Hamid was quick, but not quick enough, for his AK was propped against the seat beside him. Realizing how hopeless it was, he flung himself over the stern as Dillon appeared, tearing at Dillon as he did so, leaving Dillon with no option but to pull the trigger several times.

  Jasmine cried out again and Hal Stone leaned down at the side of Caspar and pulled her up.

  “Oh, my God.” There was absolute horror in Sara’s voice.

  Caspar pulled the fold away, revealing his face. “Sara-it’s me.”

  Dillon and Billy hauled themselves out of the water. Hamid floated up, rolled over, but there was no sign of Hassim.

  “Daddy, it is you.”

  “We’ve come for you, my darling.” He got down beside her in the inflatable. “In a short while, we’ll be flying back to London in our own plane. Your mother’s waiting for you.”

  There was a vacant look on her face as Hal Stone appeared and piled into the boat. “Jasmine,” she asked. “Where is she?”

  “Quite safe in a cabin below, love,” Billy said.

  Dillon nodded. “When Hussein comes searching for you, they’ll find Jasmine.”

  He pressed the starter, the engine coughed into life and they raced toward the jetty.

  “But not Hamid or Hassim,” she said dully. “Was that necessary?”

  “I’m afraid it was, my dear.” Hal Stone took out a bottle, poured a couple of pills into his palm and offered them. “These will help to calm you, Sara.”

  She turned to her father. “Daddy?”

  “Take them, darling.” So she did and he put an arm around her and she nestled against him, and a few moments later they swerved into the jetty and disembarked.

  * * * *

  AS THEY DROVE OFF in the station wagon, Billy at the wheel, Dillon called Lacey. “On our way. Fifteen minutes, no more.”

  “Couldn’t be better. Said isn’t back yet and I got his permission to do a test flight. Drive straight in the hangar. Parry will stand outside to show you which one. We’ll load inside. Shall I notify Ferguson?”

  “No, I’m
superstitious. I’ll do that when we’re clear and on our way.”

  It was so strange that the end of something that had been so difficult and painful seemed so simple. Minutes later, they were loading the flight bags and boarding the Gulfstream. Parry closed the hatch and went and sat beside Lacey.

  A quick word with an English-speaking Arab in the control tower who knew all about the test flight, and they were taking off. Lacey climbed steadily to fifty thousand feet, then turned to Parry. “Done it again, old boy. You take over and I’ll go back and see how things are.”

  So high in the incredible blue of that sky, Parry felt extremely cheerful, and smiled as he veered to port, to pass over distant Egypt and into the Mediterranean beyond.

  * * * *

  CASPAR RASHID HAD TAKEN OFF his robe and wrapped his daughter in it. She was very sleepy now, the pills taking their effect. At one moment, nestling in his arms, she said, “What about Hussein? When he knows I’m gone, he’ll be terribly angry. Hamid and Hassim were his men. It’s a matter of honor.”

  “He can do nothing,” Caspar said. “Not now.”

  “Some people would say he can do anything. He is the Hammer of God and he has killed twenty-seven soldiers. He has his friend the Broker to help him.” And then she was asleep.

  They looked at each other. “You have to admit the man’s got an impressive track record,” Hal Stone said.

  “Especially for somebody who was training to be a doctor before the war,” Dillon said.

  Hal Stone frowned. “I wonder who the Broker is?”

  “A mystery man associated with Osama bin Laden,” Caspar said. “When I was first approached, he was the man. A voice on a satellite phone, the kind you’d expect to hear at High Table at any ancient Oxford college.”

  “I’ll let Ferguson know the good news.” Dillon went and closeted himself at the other end of the cabin with his Codex Four.

  * * * *

  TO SAY THAT FERGUSON was over the moon was an understatement. He demanded chapter and verse. “Come on, everything, Dillon. The child’s mother is going to be ecstatic, never mind Roper and Greta.”

  So Dillon told him, leaving nothing out. “It was a rough ride for Sara, especially being party to the shooting of the boys, but there was no other way.”

  “I agree. A hell of a shock for Hussein Rashid.”

  “You can say that again. Don’t forget you were going to see his face plastered in every paper in the UK.”

  “And every police station. By the time Blake Johnson’s finished with him, the States will be off-limits, too. I wouldn’t think his chances in Iraq would be very good. The girl hasn’t said anything special about him, has she?”

  “She was on pills, a bit woozy. She obviously thinks Hussein is hot stuff, and she mentioned his friend the Broker, then fell asleep.”

  “The Broker again, which means Osama. Roper will love the connection. So, ten or eleven hours. I’ll see you at Farley.”

  “Anything happened while we’ve been away?”

  “Nothing much, apart from the Russian Mafia trying to do a number on Harry last night.”

  “Good God. What happened?”

  Ferguson told him. “There’s life in the old dog yet. Naturally, he passed the whole thing to Roper for his intelligence pool and, believe it or not, the Broker came up again. And so did our old friend Chekov.”

  “Maybe something should be done about that.”

  “Taken care of. Harry sent an Express Delivery man round on his motorcycle with lilies.”

  “Oh, dear.”

  “Oh dear indeed. I’ll leave you now and spread the good word.”

  * * * *

  WHICH HE DID. He told Greta first because, as usual, Molly was in surgery. “I’d like you to pick her up and bring her back here. It’s going to be about midnight when they get in. She’ll want to see her daughter.”

  “Leave it to me.”

  Ferguson went into the computer room and found Roper. “I think we deserve a drink together.”

  “I agree with you.” Roper poured very large scotches. “To the team- great stuff once again.”

  “And Harry didn’t do too badly last night. He’s given a sad blow not only to the Russian Mafia in London, but to the Broker. That bastard is mixed up in everything.”

  “Trouble is, we all know that, but we don’t know who he is. Nobody seems to.”

  “Well, I’d say it’s about time we found out.”

  “By the way, I think you’ll approve of this. Watch the screen,” said Roper. The picture that appeared was of Hussein Rashid, a good photo of him holding a pair of sunglasses. The one next to it showed him wearing the glasses. Underneath it said: Hussein Rashid, known to be an associate of Osama bin Laden.

  There was more text beside it, the kind of stuff for sub-editors to sink their teeth into, especially regarding Rashid’s penchant for shooting soldiers. No mention of recent events.

  “What are you doing with it?”

  “It appears in most of the press in the morning, plus police stations, a certain amount of TV.”

  “Well, let’s hope the publicity kills off any hope of Hussein Rashid’s turning up in England. He can go back to the struggle in Iraq as far as I’m concerned and get his head blown off. Good work, Roper, I’m going to my office.”

  It was quiet, the faint pings from cyberspace, the sizzle of static. Roper poured a scotch and then he lit a cigarette and sat there looking at the man on the screen.

  “You bastard,” he said. “You’re probably already on the way. Well, I’ll be waiting.” He raised his glass and drank the whiskey in a single swallow.

  * * * *

  AT THE GREAT HOUSE in Kafkar, it had taken some time for anyone to realize that something was wrong. Khazid first became worried when the boating party failed to turn up for lunch at noon. When he had checked the Sultan through his glasses, there was no sign of anybody or of any kind of activity.

  He immediately called Hamid on his mobile phone. It didn’t ring. Slightly worried now, he shouldered his AK-47, went down to the jetty, took one of the Jet Skis and drove off across the harbor toward the Sultan. There was a fishing boat a few yards away from it, two fishermen leaning over the side of the boat, pulling at something in the water.

  When he got closer, he saw that it was a body. Closer still, switching off the Jet Ski motor as he coasted in, it turned over in the current and he saw, to his horror, that it was Hamid.

  He called the police, not that they had a reputation for efficiency. It took twenty minutes for the launch to appear because, on the way from the jetty, it came across the body of Hassim and stopped to pull it up out of the water, as well. The two police officers were simple men, so Khazid, very young but his skills honed in the killing grounds of Baghdad, took charge. Ordering them to follow him, he approached the Sultan on the Jet Ski. By the time the police joined him, he had searched the deserted ship, rescued Jasmine from the cabin and discovered from her the full horror. Not only that Sara had been abducted, but that the Bedouin in his robes on the boat had been her father. It was at that point he phoned Hussein Rashid on his mobile.

  Hussein was some little way out of South Port beside the track, supervising the recovery of the derailed wagon. Stunned by the enormity of what he was hearing, he found difficulty in taking it in, but the facts were clear: two dead bodies and no Sara.

  He pulled himself together. “Clear the line. I want to make a call. We’ll return as soon as possible.”

  He phoned the airport and asked for control. It was Said who took the call. “Hussein Rashid. Have you had a departure up there?”

  “Yes, I’m still trying to work it out. I’ve been in town all morning. A Gulfstream belonging to the United Nations Ocean Survey has been here a couple of days. They had some engine trouble. Asked me if they could do a flight test, but as I was going to town, I left them to it. They haven’t come back. I’m getting worried. Where in the hell could they be?”

  “Probably well
over the Horn of Africa by now,” Hussein said and went in search of his uncle.

  * * * *

  THE OLD MAN was so shocked, he required the attention of his physician, who was waiting for them when they got to the house. It required servants to help carry the old man upstairs to his bedroom, and Dr. Aziz accompanied him. He waved the servants away and checked the heart. Hussein waited for the bad news.

  Aziz turned, his face grave. “It is not good. He’s in a poor state of health anyway, much worse than you perhaps realized.” He opened his bag, took out a hypodermic and charged it. “Hold his arm.” Hussein did so and Aziz made the injection.

  The old man groaned. His vacant eyes traveled the room and settled on Hussein. There was a light there for a while.

  “Why did you trust her?”

  “Because she gave me her word,” Hussein said bleakly.

  “They could not have done this thing, those who did it, unless she was willing. Her father, right under our noses, and the man who accompanied him.”

  “The men from Baghdad, this Dillon and Salter. It must be.”

  “But her father, the apostate, the cursed one who turns his back on Allah. May every devil in hell wait for you, Caspar Rashid.” He shook his head. “That he bears the name of our family shames me beyond belief.” He began to weep.

  Aziz had retreated to the door to speak on the phone. Now he beckoned to Hussein. “I’ve sent for an ambulance.”

  “You think it’s that bad?”

  “Let me put it this way. It’s a good thing Rashid Shipping invested in the development of the hospital the past few years. We’ve got the equipment to at least give him a fighting chance.” He put an arm around Hussein’s shoulders. “It’s also good that your doctor is Indian and so are his nurses. There will be no Muslim stupidities to make things difficult.”

  “I think we’ve seen enough Muslim stupidities for one day,” Hussein said. “Two friends to bury, lads I soldiered with.” He shook his head. “Why did she betray me?”