Zero Option

by Chris Ryan

  It's not the place that's doing it, I told myself. It's you and your problems.

  The two coppers set out slowly, side by side, down the last hundred yards of track, scanning every inch. I followed close behind them.

  'What vehicles have been down here since last night?' Bates asked.

  'The Cavalier that dropped me,' I said, 'and the two P,.ange l.overs that came out when I phoned.

  Otherwise, there shouldn't have been any.'

  'I see.'

  The policemen's manner had altered. Both had suddenly become sharper, more concentrated.

  'What's this?' Bates stooped and picked up a piece of paper from the grass at the edge of the track. The scrap was blank, but he put it carefully into the folder he was carrying. In one muddy patch he bent down to examine some tire tracks, but several had been superimposed on each other so that no clear pattern was discernible.

  As we reached the gravel sweep in front of the cottage, a figure in DPMs popped out from behind the bushes to our right and advanced aggressively to challenge us. Although Les wasn't actually holding a weapon, his right hand was in the pocket of his smock.

  His face was pale from lack of sleep, his expression tense, but as soon as he saw me he relaxed.

  I walked towards him. 'Hi, Les. Everything OK?'

  'Fine. Your only caller's been a bloody great fox - came past the back of the house about an hour ago and left his calling card by that gatepost.'

  'I know him,' I said. 'He's always around. Listen, these guys are ClD and Special Branch.'

  Fraser stuck out a hand and introduced himself briefly. Then he said to me, 'R, ight. I want you to tell me exactly what you did when you came home.'

  'Got out of the car about here.' I pointed to a spot on the gravel in front of us. 'The whole house was dark.

  Then I went to the front door and in.'

  'It wasn't locked?'

  'No. I assumed Tracy had left it open for me.'

  'Wouldn't she have had it locked earlier?'

  'Probably not. We don't bother much out here until we go to bed.'

  'So you didn't walk round outside at all?'

  'Not a step.'

  'Let's have a look, then. Hang on here, please.'

  The two set off clockwise round the house: Fraser slim, sandy, lithe, like the fox reported by Les; Bates greyer, heavier, a badger. Foxy Fraser and Badger Bates, hunting in partnership. Until that moment I hadn't been particularly impressed with either of them, but now that I saw how much time they took, how carefully they moved, what attention they paid to every little detail, it was another matter.

  They kept a yard or two from the building and advanced a few feet at a time, constantly glancing from ground to house and back. While they disappeared round the back I looked about me and saw that Tracy had cut the grass during the last day or two: the tracks of the mower were still showing clearly. She'd also weeded the flowerbeds against the front wall, the earth now freshly turned over.

  'No sign of any attempted break-in,' Bates announced as the two came back into view.

  No need for one, I thought. They just walked in.

  Fraser looked back up the lane and waved at Karen to drive down. 'We got this,' he said, holding up a spent match. 'Ary of your lot smoke?'

  I shook my head.

  'One footprint, too.' Then he turned to Bates.

  'You'll need to take a cast of that. Looks like a trainer.'

  To me he added, 'It was on a bare patch in the grass, which makes me think they were here in the dark.

  Nobody would have put a foot down there in daylight.'

  I led them inside, trying to remember my every movement. In the hall I said, 'I put my kit down here,' and indicated a spot on the carpet.

  Bates took up the questioning. 'What was it?'

  'A bergen and a holdall.'

  'Made of?'

  'Something synthetic - nylon, I suppose. That's the stuff there.' I pointed at the drab olive bundle on a chair at the side of the room.

  'OK. And what did you do then?'

  'I switched on a light - there - and went upstairs. I tried our bedroom first, then Tim's.'

  'You had to open the doors?'

  'No - ours was open.'

  'Then what?'

  'I ran back down and into the kitchen, put the lights on in there. Nothing. So I went into the living room, switched on the light, and then I saw the photo on the floor in front of the stove.'

  'Yes?'

  'I picked it up, finger and thumb, and sat down on that chair.'

  'In that chair?'

  'No, on the arm nearest to us.'

  'What were you wearing?'

  'Same as now - these jeans and sweater. But a different T-shirt ' I broke off, hearing a vehicle draw up outside the open door.

  Bates stuck his head out and said, 'Good. The forensic lads. A squad from Birmingham.'

  As men began unloading gear from their van, Fraser said he'd seen enough and was heading back to the incident room. That left me and Bates with the forensic boys.

  There were four of them, and they kitted themselves up in white overalls, white hoods, white gloves and white overshoes. I knew that the job was going to take some time. All the same, it was a shock to hear their boss announce that it would last all day at least.

  To give us somewhere to base ourselves, they cleared

  the kitchen first. The care they took was amazing.

  Having carried in lamps and stands, they lit up each room in a blaze dazzling enough for a film production; then they crept and crawled and peered and prodded, dusting for fingerprints and examining every square inch of every surface through magnifying glasses.

  As they worked, I looked for a recent photograph of Tracy. The best likeness was a framed photo of her and Tim which stood on the kitchen window-sill. It had been taken just bbfore I'd gone to Colombia, and she must have had it mounted while I was away. It showed her standing behind Tim at the top of one of the big slides at AltonTowers, about to give him a push off.

  She'd been laughing and joking as I took it, and her coppery hair was cascading down the back of her neck, shown off by a white windcheater. It was a goodshot of Tim, too; you could see his fair hair, broad forehead and blue eyes, all picked up from his mother.

  'There's your photo,' I said to Bates.

  'Mind if I borrow it?'

  'Help yourself- but I'd like to have it back.'

  'Of course. I'll get it copied right away:'

  'I can dig out some more negatives of the kid as well.'

  'That would be grand.'

  After little more than an hour the forensic team declared the kitchen clean - it had yielded no evidence, and the indications were that the intruders bad never gone in there - and the search moved to the hall and sitting room, allowing us at least to get a brew on in the kitchen.

  The CID boss spent much of the time with the specialists, and every now and then I was needed to answer a question; but for the most part there was nothing I could do except sit around and feel anxiety eating into me. Where had Tracy and Tim been taken?

  Were they being fed properly? Had th'ey got enough clothes? My mind was filled by a horrible image of them stuck in a blacked-out cellar with only a bucket for a toilet, food being thrown down to them, and rats running about the floor. Anger boiled up inside. I'd just love to get my hands on the bastards who'd taken them.

  I'd never had any direct evidence that telepathy can work, but at that moment I exerted my will-power in an all-out attempt to send reassuring messages. Hang in there, I was telling them. Don't despair. We're on our way.

  It was six o'clock when the team called it a day. Their leader promised a full report in the morning, but for the moment he let on that they had found signs of a struggle on the landing. Fibres from Tracy's pullover suggested that someone had grabbed her there and sat on her to hold her down before hustling her down the stairs.

  Again I felt anger taking me over; the idea of other men getting their hands o
n her, bruising her fair skin, made me see red. I imagined Tim trying to scuttle away from the masked intruders but not getting far on his short legs, maybe yelling out as they seized him.

  Different fibres they'd found told a more important story. One of the raiders had sat down and leant back in the chair that I'd perched on, resting his elbows on the arms. As soon as this fact reached Bates he lit up, and said that he knew of one well-known IRA player, Danny Aherne, who had a habit of sitting back in chairs to gloat over victims. Immediately the name went back over a secure phone to London.

  With the search completed there was no reason why I shouldn't move back into the cottage. But did I want to? For a while I hesitated. It would make sense, obviously - if I was there I'd be able to take any message that came from the PIRA - but the idea of being there alone, with Tim and Tracy gone, seemed too depressing. On the other hand, the thought of spending another night in the mess pissed me offeven more. I had to drive back into camp in any case, because I'd left my bergen there, so I decided to have supper in the mess, then head back out.

  In the dining-room my luck took a turn for the better.

  There, eating on his own, sat Tony Lopez, the American SEAL Who'd joined D Squadron for a two- year tour. There was nobody I'd rather have fallen in with. Tony and I had been close ever since we'd been captured by the Iraqis during the Gulf War and spent six weeks together as guests ofSaddam Hussein. We hadn't been treated as badly as some other allied prisoners, but our spell in gaol had been tough enough, and it had forged a lasting friendship. On the operation in Colombia Tony had acted as our liaison officer and anchor-man. Being Puerto 1Kican by birth, and having Spanish as his first language, he'd proved an invaluable link with the natives.

  'Hi there, Geordie!' He raised a knife in greeting.

  'Any news?'

  I shook my head. 'Nothing yet. All right if I come and join you?'

  'Go right ahead.'

  Thinking of Tony and his penchant for Mexican food, I chose chilli con carne, with a green salad on a separate plate.

  'They've searched the house from top to bottom,' I told him as I sat down. 'A couple of small clues, but no fingerprints. They reckon the sods all wore gloves.'

  'How many of them?'

  'They think there were four. One to grab Tim, one for Tracy, one to take the picture, one to stand guard outside. Very brave of them - the twats.'

  'Anything on their vehicle?'

  'Nothing. Too many other tyre marks. One print of- a trainer in a mud patch behind the house. Otherwise, blank.'

  'Geordie, I'm sorry. I wish to hell there was something I could do.'

  'Thanks. Listen, why not come back and have a beer?

  What I need most is company.'

  'OK. I'd like that.'

  As soon as I'd eaten I checked in at the incident room to see if anything was moving, and found a depressing lack of progress. The place was full of computer terminals, fax machines and newly-installed telephones, but activity had died down for a day and, like me, everybody was waiting - waiting for the word from the other side, waiting for a tip-off from an SB tout.

  Tony picked up his car, an ancient red BMW that he had found going cheap in loss-on-Wye, and followed me out to the cottage. Driving down the lane, seeing the cottage's windows dark, I was hit by a wave of despair. All through our time in the jungle and during the marathon journey back, my expectations had built up: home, bed with Tracy, decent food, family life, picking up my relationship with Tim… now all this had turned to ashes.

  Once inside the house, we gravitated to the kitchen.

  For one thing, the Aga was ticking over and making the room warm; but somehow I didn't fancy being in the sitting room where the photo had been taken.

  I got a couple of cans of lager out of the fridge and we sat, one either side of the pine table. 'Cheers!' I said.

  'And God rot the PIRA.'

  'Amen to that.' Tony's dark chestnut eyes were watching me steadily. 'Geordie,' he said, 'you look pretty much washed up.'

  'I am. I didn't get my head down till after three.

  Then I was up at five-thirty. I'll try and get a proper kip tonight.'

  When the telephone rang, I jumped a mile. 'Jesus!' I exclaimed. 'This could be them.' I snatched the receiver up and snapped, 'Yes?'

  Silence. I was on the point of saying something more when I realised what was happening. I listened a moment longer. Nothing. Then the line clicked and went dead.

  'It was them,' I said. 'They just wanted to know if I was here. Nuisance calls - that's going to be their game.'

  I dialled the incident room in camp. 'I had a call,' I reported. 'I'm sure it was them.'

  'If it happens again, take the phone off the hook,' advised the SB officer on duty. 'In the morning we'll get the lines re-routed so that any calls they malce come in here.'

  'OK, then.'

  I sat down again and swallowed a mouthful of beer.

  'Couldn't they trace it back?' Tony asked.

  'Too brief. The line's tapped anyway, but what we need to do is keep them talking, to give the Special Branch a chance of DF-ing them. The trouble is, the fuckers are probably using a mobile and cruising around in a car.'

  We sat, in silence for a while. Then Tony said, 'Know what? This reminds me of the first time I came here.

  Remember? That was a low spot, too.'

  Tony knew better than anyone how, in the aftermath of the Gulf War, Kath and I had become estranged, how I'd hit the booze, and how, when she had gone back to her parents in Belfast for a trial separation, I was really bumping along on the bottom.

  For a few weeks he'd moved into the cottage, partly because it suited him, but also because he knew he could help me just by being around. Apart from any thing else he was an excellent cook, aiad with him in residence I'd started eating sensibly again. One way or another, I owed Tony a good deal.

  Now he said, 'You just gotta take it easy. I know it sounds stupid if I say “C'mon, relax”, but there's nothing else for it. Sooner or later they'll come back on the air with a demand. Or the SB guys will get a lead.'

  'Yeah, but what if they're maltreating Tim? He must be shit-scared, Tony. Poor little bugger - he's not even four and a half.'

  'I know.'

  'And what if somebody's molesting Tracy? Christ, I'd rip his bloody bollocks offwith my bare hands.'

  'It's tough,' Tony agreed. 'But you can't do anything about it.'

  'Why the luck didn't I drop Farrell while I had the chance? There's something about that guy, Tony. It's as if there's a superior force protecting him. I'm getting to think he's invincible.'

  'Aw, you're imagining things.'

  But Tony had never seen Farrell. He'd flown out to Colombia with our training team, but when everything had gone tits-up he'd had to stay behind in Bogotfi as our anchor-man, liaising with the British Embassy and the Americans. The result was that, to his great chagrin, he'd missed the fire-fight in the jungle. I'd already described the final showdown to him half a dozen times - how we'd blown up a pile of ether drums in the laboratory with a mega bang and fought our way back to the air-strip; how I'd slashed the tyres of the narcos'

  Twin Otter so that it couldn't take o and how, as Farrell had tried to slip away into the forest, I'd wounded him with an MP 5 before running out of ammunition. I'd told Tony about that moment, when I had Farrell on the deck in front of me, when a mate had run up and handed me another sub-machine gun with a full mag on it, shouting, 'Go on, finish him oflq.' But somehow the hatred had drained out of me, and I'd let my victim get captured…

  'All we needed to do was throw him in the river,' I said now. 'The crocodiles would have had him in a flash. The water was heaving with them. I didn't even have to kill him; the crocs would have done the job for me. He'd just have disappeared off the face of the earth.'

  'Too bad,' Tony agreed. 'But don't let the guy bug you. You'll get even with him in the end.'

  Neither of us wanted to make a night of it, so Tony went
back to camp soon after ten-thirty, and I locked up all round.

  Foxy Fraser and his SB team didn't seem to think that I was under any threat myself on the contrary, he'd said I was the fulcrum over which the PIRA would try to exert pressure with their lever. In other words, they positively needed me where I was, so I could initiate moves to have Farrell released. All the same, I didn't feel like taking any chances. That was why I'd badgered the store man in the armoury in camp into letting me take a Sig 226 pistol home overnight.