‘And your people are sitting down to negotiate with him?’ Portman’s disgust was evident.
‘Just recently, Musa’s been showing signs of mellowing, of wanting to put a stop to the conflict. These talks were thought to be a move towards some kind of normalization.’
‘Really? Looks like you got that one wrong.’
‘Clearly. What are your plans now?’
‘I haven’t decided. But you should know that those green boxes on the beach contain a supply of C-4 explosives and detonators with remote triggers.’
‘Jesus,’ Vale muttered. ‘You’ve seen them?’
‘Yes. That’s not all. The detonators have an integral power source. No wiring, no mess – just slap on and go.’ Portman described them and read out the manufacturer’s code numbers.
Vale scribbled down the numbers, his heart sinking. Somehow Musa had found a source of supply that put him a long way ahead of the usual pirate or extremist threat in the region. If these things were now on the open market, it wouldn’t be long before they began to turn up elsewhere. Like Afghanistan. Europe. He had to pass on the information as soon as he could.
‘I’ll be in touch when I can,’ Portman continued, breaking in on his thoughts. ‘I think you’ll know what I’m going to do soon enough.’
‘Wait. Portman.’ He made a rapid decision. It was based entirely on emotion, but it was all he had left. He couldn’t allow Angela Pryce to go through what Portman had outlined – it was too hideous to contemplate. That left only one way out.
‘What is it?’
The line crackled. It served to highlight how distant Vale felt right now, how remote he was physically from what he was about to suggest. ‘Is there anything you can do for … for Pryce and Tober?’
‘Like what?’ Portman sounded pragmatic, his voice flat, and Vale figured the man knew what was coming. He was a professional.
‘If you can’t get them out … don’t let them suffer.’ It was all he could think of to say.
‘I won’t. You have my word.’
There was a click and the line went dead.
Forty-Five
I sat and watched while everything went quiet. What Vale had just asked me to do was a hell of a thing. But I wasn’t surprised. Asking for his own people to be taken out by a friendly bullet rather than the blade of a terrorist group would not have come easy to him. No commanding officer likes to be in that position.
The fact was, I’d been thinking along the same lines. If I couldn’t get Pryce and Tober out in one piece, the least I could do was to take the initiative away from Musa; unable to get his sick piece of propaganda, it would at least snatch a part of his plans out of his reach.
I gathered together what I needed. Waiting for developments was no longer an option; I had to take the offensive while I still could. And from what Vale had said, help was too far off to do any good. Musa was firing up his men to a fever pitch, no doubt with tales of honour and revenge and a strike against the infidels, with great rewards in heaven awaiting those who assisted him. Once he got them to a certain point, there would be no going back.
I had no doubt now that this must have been his plan all along. The offer through Xasan of negotiations for the release of hostages had been an elaborate ploy. He might not have known that two of the hostages he was already holding were UN personnel, but he knew well enough the value of luring in two members of a top western intelligence agency, one of them a woman, to use as propaganda material. And the extreme nature of the demand had worked; it had played Moresby and his colleagues into thinking Musa was some kind of desperate paranoid, so who should be surprised?
With Musa and Xasan gone, the guards had soon got tired of patrolling and settled down together at the side of the villa. That was fine by me. Laziness was good. I slipped out of my hide, this time taking the AK and the Vektor, with the C-4 strips and triggers in my backpack and the detonators in my pocket. I was loaded down more than I liked, but I’d coped with heavier supplies before. Right now I needed firepower in case things got sticky and I got cut off from my hide.
I by-passed the building by a wide margin and headed for the boxes on the beach. I got to them without seeing any guards and set about helping myself to more supplies.
I assembled two of the explosive packs and placed them under the boxes, then moved out and placed two more halfway down the beach under some old netting and cork floats. The charges were bigger than I needed, but I was looking for as big a bang as I could get. I wasn’t aiming for wholesale slaughter, but to disorientate.
I still had the three packs I’d taken first time round, and these I’d reduced in size. I grabbed three more detonators and triggers and added them to my backpack for later.
Next I made my way to the skiffs. These were a problem; they offered a means of escape, but also a means for Musa and his men to move about – and I wanted to avoid that. But since I couldn’t use them immediately, I had to look on them as a liability.
I tested the direction of the breeze. It was light and heading offshore. I took a risk that it wouldn’t change and opened one of the fuel containers. I splashed some of the contents around the bottom of each skiff and over the engines. The aroma was powerful up this close, but I was hoping none of the guards around the house had a good sense of smell.
The skiffs were too far apart for me to light them all in one go; the moment I showed a flame the game would be up. So I placed a full-size explosive pack in the middle skiff and soaked the sand between it and its neighbours with fuel. I was trusting to luck that the flame from the explosion would move across each side and complete the job.
I threw the empty fuel container aside and jogged back up the beach, and found the track leading towards Dhalib and Kamboni. I picked a point two hundred metres from the villa and laid two more small charges, then made for higher ground above my hide from where I could watch the party. It was too dark to see much detail, but I knew my field of fire was clear, and I was only a short run from the front door of the house. I made sure I had sufficient cover in case of random intruders, then laid out the remote triggers in a row and waited.
I gave it an hour. The few men left in the house would have been left buzzing by Musa’s passionate rhetoric, and I needed them to get it out of their system and go to sleep. The last thing I needed right now was a revved-up sentry with heightened nerves and an itchy trigger finger.
When the time came I selected a remote from the row in front of me. Took a deep breath and pressed the button on the side.
Nothing happened.
Forty-Six
For a split second my gut went cold. Damn. What had I done wrong? Had I missed a safety switch somewhere?
Then it happened. The explosion down near the waterline was impressively big. It lit up the beach for a brief second, the flare of light bouncing away across the surface of the sea in the background. The central skiff took off, breaking in half as the bottom was blown out of it, the two ends folding in on themselves. I caught a snapshot glimpse of plastic containers going into the air, then one of the containers carrying fuel exploded in a ball of flame and orange smoke, showering down on everything within a thirty-metre radius. Everything went dark again for a nano-second before another flash came, this time as the fuel-soaked sand around the skiff on the left ignited and burst into flames, followed quickly by the third boat going up like a pyrotechnician’s dream.
The two guards outside the villa came awake and began running around and screaming at their colleagues inside. One of them let off a couple of rounds in the general direction of the water, then did the same off to one side, and I guessed the play of light and shadow had fooled him into thinking they were under concerted attack from the sea.
The men inside burst out of the door and raced towards the side of the property overlooking the beach, also firing off random shots into the darkness. I couldn’t see them all clearly, but I estimated there were four or five. No problem; them I could handle.
What I couldn’
t be sure of was how many remained on guard inside, nor what their reaction would be if they assumed they were under attack. Their orders might have been to kill the two prisoners.
I was going to have to move fast.
The men outside were doing what I had expected of them: heading down on to the beach to investigate. In the flickering light coming from the burning skiffs, I counted four, bunched together, rifles at the ready, moving cautiously and ready to jump at the first sound. I was glad I wasn’t part of their number; the last thing you need in a group under attack is for one of your colleagues to start shooting wildly.
They reached the burning boats and ran around excitedly, but there was little they could do to stop the destruction. The middle skiff was in pieces and the other two were already beyond help and burning fiercely.
After another fuel container exploded with the heat and shot into the night sky, one of the men seemed to take control and they backed off and hurried up the beach, chattering away angrily.
I waited for them to reach the point where I estimated the old netting to be, then picked up the next trigger and pressed the button.
This time there was no delay. The explosion lit up the villa and caught three of the men with the full blast, knocking the fourth on to his back.
I didn’t wait to see what happened next; I already had the AK to my shoulder and was sighting on the two guards who had stayed close to the villa. I fired twice, placing my shots carefully. Then a third.
Both men went down.
Another man appeared out of the shadows and ran around, searching desperately for the source of the shooting. With no sound from the suppressed AK to fasten on, and with the noise of the explosions still ringing in his ears, he must have been thoroughly disorientated. Then he turned and ran towards the building, screaming wildly at somebody inside.
I felt the hairs on my neck stand up. I didn’t understand a word he’d said, but the implication was as clear as crystal.
He was telling the man or men inside to kill the hostages.
I couldn’t allow him to get back inside; I waited until he entered the flare of light from the door of the villa and hit him with a head shot, knocking him off his feet. He sprawled close to the door, his rifle falling beside him.
Then I was up and off at a full run, my momentum carrying me down the slope past the hide at full speed.
This time I was carrying the Vektor. For what I was about to do, I needed speed and manoeuvrability in a tight space.
And I was no longer concerned about noise; with the explosions and the rifle fire, I doubted anybody within a five kilometre radius was going to dwell too much on the sounds of one automatic pistol.
Forty-Seven
Down in the basement, the percussive effects of the explosion jolted all three prisoners awake. A split second later the sound rumbled by overhead and a thin veil of debris rained down on them from the ceiling and walls as the building continued to vibrate.
‘Get ready,’ Tober said calmly. He turned on the flashlight again and beckoned Angela to follow him towards the steps. He gave Madar a warning tap on the leg as he passed by. ‘Stay close, kid.’
Edging up the steps, he waited, listening for the first sounds of anyone coming to open the trapdoor. The explosion had been some distance away, although he couldn’t tell by how much. He guessed it had been a diversionary tactic, to draw the men upstairs outside. He was pragmatic enough to know that if it worked, a rescuer would appear. If it had failed, there might be a brief flare of light as the trapdoor opened, followed by a burst of automatic fire pouring in on them from their angry or crazed captors.
Then lights out.
The men upstairs were shouting in a frenzied panic, and he heard the sound of running footsteps heading for the door to the outside. If anybody was coordinating their response to this surprise attack, they were being ineffective.
The shouting diminished as the men moved away. Two shots sounded close by. Then another explosion shook the structure and somebody began screaming.
The door slammed shut and footsteps sounded near the trapdoor.
A man’s voice called out. ‘Khaalid? Saalim?’
Silence.
Tober reached up and tested the trapdoor. He had already tried it shortly after being put down here. Now, as then, it was solid. He got his legs underneath him and put his back against the wood. If the gunman upstairs was watching the door, he might be able to take him by surprise. It was a risky thing to do, but better than waiting for the man to open the trapdoor and blast the basement with gunfire.
He heaved, testing the rigidity of the trapdoor, his leg muscles creaking from lack of exercise in the cramped conditions. The door shifted slightly, dust cascading down on his neck, but he couldn’t get sufficient power in his awkward position on the steps to really move it.
He had to try again. He handed the flashlight to Angela. ‘Take this and stand to one side.’
As he braced himself for another push, he heard a rush of approaching footsteps and a crash as the front door was kicked in. The man on the other side of the trapdoor cried out in alarm, then came a burst of automatic fire.
Silence. Then two shots in quick succession.
More silence.
Tober held his breath and waited, hoping against hope. Even muffled by the trapdoor, he was sure the last shots had come from a semi-automatic pistol. Yet none of the Somalis carried pistols.
Then the trapdoor was lifted, flooding the steps with light, and he prepared to launch himself forward.
Forty-Eight
‘You need to see this.’ Dale Wishaw hurried into Scheider’s office as the deputy station chief was finishing a call. They had both pulled a late-nighter, monitoring three ongoing operations across Europe and liaising closely with other CIA stations and the headquarters at Langley. Wishaw fought off a yawn as he walked over to a high-definition monitor on one wall and switched it on. Instantly the screen was flooded with a sequence of rapidly changing images bearing the unearthly glow of thermal imaging camera footage.
Scheider stood up and joined his assistant. The scene reminded Scheider of a Hamburg nightclub where one of his more lurid informants had arranged a meeting a couple of years ago. What little light there had been was of a nightmarish quality, not helped by the pounding bass and what passed for music. He’d got out of there darned quick but with a blinding headache.
This was no nightclub, however, and whatever was taking place was clearly far more deadly than a few strobing lights and loud music.
‘Sorry,’ Wishaw murmured, and fiddled with the remote control. ‘I’ll start again. This is footage taken by a drone camera coming in on a south-westerly heading over the Somali coast north of Kamboni.’
There was a scrolling pattern of dark and light, showing little in the way of ground detail at first. Then Scheider began to pick out the regular pattern of open water, quickly changing as the camera passed over land. Instantly, as if timed to perfection, the scene lit up with dazzling flares of light that bounced around the screen.
‘What the hell is that?’ said Scheider, although he was pretty sure he knew. See enough explosions at night and you only had a couple of choices to make: were they big bangs or small?
‘This is the area around the villa where the SIS people are meeting with Musa,’ said Wishaw. ‘The larger flares are explosions; my guess is C-4 or similar – the pattern is too spread out for landmines or grenades.’ He stopped the film and re-ran it, then pointed to an area at the top of the screen. ‘That blank area is open water – the ocean.’ Moving the film forward, he shifted his hand lower down, where two indistinct objects like cigars showed up briefly on either side of a flash of light like a giant flower opening out. ‘That’s the beach. We think two, possibly three fishermen’s boats have been destroyed or torched.’
‘Fishermen?’ Scheider looked sceptical, and Wishaw shrugged.
‘Make that pirates. From a mapping run earlier, they were beached close to the villa.’ The i
mages shifted and he pointed to a number of white shapes moving around the top of the beach, near what was clearly a building. ‘Armed men, some spilling out of the building.’ A series of small flashes occurred near each of the dots. ‘We can’t tell what they’re shooting at until we have a full analysis later today, but it looks like somebody engaged them by setting off explosives, then opening fire from higher ground inland as they came out.’
‘Do we know where?’
‘We do.’ Wishaw pointed at the screen again, this time further inland. ‘This is the guy right here.’
Scheider stared hard at the image, his heart beating faster. The shooter showed up as a white shape, partially concealed by ground cover.
Portman, he thought. It had to be.
He made an estimate at the distance between the shooter and the sharp dots of muzzle flashes coming from the other men. ‘But that’s what – about hundred, hundred and fifty metres? He’s almost down their throats!’
‘He’s a lot closer than I’d want to be.’ Wishaw pointed at two static white shapes close to the building. ‘See here, two men down. He’s got them running around like chickens and picking them off one by one. He knows what he’s doing.’
Scheider nodded. ‘I hope he can keep it up.’ He didn’t need to see any more and stepped over to his desk. But why had Portman gone on the offensive right now? What had set him off? Had he been discovered or was something else forcing his hand? And where the hell had he obtained the explosives?
‘Me, too. There are a lot more men in Kamboni, likely to be affiliated to Musa’s group, and they’re only a short drive away. If he doesn’t move fast he’s going to have them pouring in on top of him inside fifteen minutes.’
The Watchman Page 19
