‘Eh?’
‘I suppose there’s no possibility that we could recover the journal? Could you recognise the fellows who took it from you?’
Before Jack could answer, the waiter came and took their orders: Orme’s steak, Jack’s salad Niçoise, and both were silent as the waiter scribbled.
‘I’ve thought about the bastards wandering through the police station often enough,’ Jack said viciously when the man was gone. ‘But I can’t visualise them, no. I was swimming in and out of consciousness all the while, and I’m just lucky to be alive. If the beam had landed on me, I wouldn’t have stood a chance. But the ones who tried to get me at the hospital wing – those two I’d recognise anywhere. One, I think, I hope, is dead. He was a Hispanic. The other was a bigger guy, a ginger-haired man. It was cropped short, like a Marine, you know?’
‘What of this Frank Rand?’
‘He’s a bright FBI agent. I don’t think I should cross swords with him again. He suspected me, I know that much.’
‘Then we’d best get you home,’ Stephen said. He smiled and passed an envelope over the table. Jack took it thankfully and slipped it into his inside pocket. He knew that it would be a passport and tickets under a new name. Soon, with luck, he would be on a plane and on his way homewards by tomorrow night.
‘Are you listening?’
‘Sorry, Jack said. ‘I’m still jet-lagged.’
‘I said,’ Stephen repeated, ‘that you had best be careful. Keep your head down, so these fellows don’t shoot it off for you. They do not sound pleasant.’
‘No,’ Jack said, remembering the two in the hospital, the Hispanic he had shot in the tunnel. ‘At least one of them is down.’
‘You’re sure you injured him badly?’ Stephen asked.
‘There was blood all around, and the FBI reckoned he would be badly injured, but last I heard, there was no reports of a man like him turning up in a hospital. So yes, with luck the shit’s dead.’
*
13.12 Seattle; 21.12 London
Roy Sandford whistled as he put down the phone.
‘So, Mister Case, you’re a bad dude,’ he muttered, and grinned to himself.
He was not a field agent. He had no appreciation of the dangers of such a post, and all he knew was that the man he was hunting was listed as dangerous, even by his own peers in Britain. ‘Right, man, let’s get you sorted, eh?’
*
21.43 Devon
Claire dialled while holding the glass of gin in her hand so that the ice rattled with every button pressed. He had said she could call him by using his mobile, but what was the code to dial to America? There was some stupid set of… she took a long pull at the gin, wincing. It was much stronger than her usual drink at the weekends, but, although this was only Wednesday, she had needed it when Starck finally went. The house still reeked of his stale tobacco smoke smell. It made her feel sick, almost as sick as his comments had.
‘I need you talk to you,’ she said, sniffling. She gazed at the telephone book, reading off the sequence of code numbers for American international calls, but the figures made little sense to her. She tried pressing the buttons again, and sobbed to herself. Taking a deep breath, she set the glass down on the table and dialled with careful deliberation. It was ever so quiet. Like there was nothing there, just a void sucking her call into it. An electronic black hole. Obscurely she wanted to giggle at the thought, and then, as she picked up her glass again, she heard the soft click.
‘Jack?’
‘Hello. Leave a message after the tone and I’ll get back to you soon as I can.’
‘Jack,’ she said, and the weeping began again. ‘Starck was here – he was horrible, Jack. He said you might have been here on the day Jimmy died. Jack, I need you… to talk to you. Please, Jack, call me back. I don’t care what the time is. Just call me!’
*
15.20 Seattle; 23,20 London
Jack was back at the Pioneer Square hotel by mid-afternoon, and while there he ripped open the envelope. Inside was a passport, new wallet with credit cards made out to new identity, as well as a mixture of dollar notes that totalled two hundred and thirty-four bucks, all of them used.
He was happy, when he saw the plane tickets, as he would be leaving the next day. Only one more evening here, and then he’d be on a flight up to Vancouver to catch a connection. Then home, to England.
There was a sharp tone, and he frowned for a moment. It was familiar, but unexpected. Then he remembered it: it was the tone that his phone made when it received an answerphone message. He turned back to his passport, before the shock hit him. The phone should have been turned off!
*
15.21 Seattle; 23.21 London
‘Yes!’ Roy Sandford punched the air as the screen registered the phone. He grabbed his phone and punched the numbers for Amiss. ‘Sir? We’ve got him. Pioneer Square, the Best Western Hotel there on Yesler Avenue.’
‘Excellent, agent Sandford. I can see you will be soon required for other jobs I have. Thanks.’
Roy closed the line, and then phoned Rand, giving him the same details.
‘Good. Keep an eye on him.’
‘If he has a throwaway phone, he may use it shortly. I’ll keep monitoring the cells,’ Roy said gleefully. There were two other technicians in the office, and he called them next, instructing them in what they must do, before turning back to his own screen and cracking his knuckles. ‘OK, buddy! Let’s see how good you really are!’
*
15.22 Seattle; 23.22 London
Jack grabbed the phone and stared at it. The Blackberry’s small light winked at him to show that it was on a network and, for a moment, he was too surprised to react. He saw the little symbol showing a recorded voice message, and without thinking he pressed the button to view the message. He saw Claire’s name, but then he quickly turned off the phone, pressing and holding the power button until it came up with a shut down message. Even then he wasn’t sure he was safe. He wanted to remain off the radar, so he took off the back and pulled out the battery.
He was sure he had turned it off. But now it was on again. Perhaps he had missed the button. When he’d spent so much time drumming into his lads the fact that they had to be careful about technology – he felt as stupid as the British escapee from Stalag Luft 13 who responded ‘Thanks’ when the Gestapo wished him good luck, after he’d taught his comrades to be on their guard for exactly that trick.
Then his mind turned to his wife. What could Claire have phoned about? She knew never to try his number when he was abroad. They had a rule that he would call her when he could. This was weird. He would have to call her back. It may be important. But not now.
Sitting on the bed, he wondered whether the phone could have betrayed him. It shouldn’t have done. The thing was registered to his real name in England, and unless the Americans had been hugely fortunate, they would not have found that. Instead they would have had the name of ‘Hansen’, and he didn’t have a phone. Yes, he must be in the clear, he thought.
But there was no point taking risks. He packed his bag quickly, took up his rucksack, and made his way downstairs, leaving his suitcase in his room. In the foyer he stood in the entrance, looking up and down the road, searching for any signs of surveillance. There was nothing obvious. He checked out, and asked if he could leave his case to be collected later before pulling his rucksack onto his back and leaving the hotel.
He felt very alone. In Berlin and other postings the language had meant that he was always aware of his difference, but here it was worse, somehow. The very normality of the city, the logic of using English, all tended to make him feel still more endangered. Chattering passers-by made him feel he was under surveillance at every moment. The sight of a man with an ear bud in his ear made his heart stop for an instant before he recalled that this was America, not East Germany or Russia, and that half the population walked about with iPods or Bluetooth earphones inserted. There was no point worrying. He had seen nothing
to merit concern.
There was a car’s tyres screeching some distance away, and he snapped his head about, but there was no sign of a vehicle hurrying to him. No, just an ordinary noise from an ordinary street, he told himself as he continued along the roadway. He needed to find somewhere to sit and kill some time.
He found himself looking down into the Seattle Mystery Bookstore and, without a second thought, he plunged down the stairs into the shop. It was dedicated to crime writing, and he browsed among the shelves considering the irony that he was here while he suspected someone was searching for him. Someone who might well have murdered Danny Lewin – Danny, the sad boy with the horror in his eyes.
Jack saw nothing as his mind whirled. Every time he heard a car engine gunning up the hill outside, his attention was dragged to it, expecting at any moment to see a convoy of dark cars with agents spilling from them, but all appeared well.
‘Can I help you? You looking for a specific author?’ the shop keeper asked, a jovial looking man some years younger than Jack with a thin black beard.
‘No,’ Jack said with a smile. ‘I’m just wondering about a gift for a friend.’
‘Do you know what they read?’
Jack shook his head.
‘I’ll know it when I see it,’ he said.
There was a sudden harsh screech of brakes, and he saw a black sedan rocking outside as three men leaped from it and ran down the road towards Pioneer Square.
‘Wow! Someone’s in a hurry!’ the shopkeeper said, but he was already talking to himself.
Jack was at the window, staring out. Now, as the three disappeared down the road, he hefted his backpack, He selected a softcover by Zoe Sharp, and walked to the till.
‘She’d like this, I think.’
‘Ah, a good choice. I like her work. Really strong storylines and from a girl who knows how to write.’
‘Thanks,’ Jack said, shoving it into his bag as he waited for the change from his twenty, and then walked out of the store and turned up the hill away from Pioneer Square.
*
15.27 Seattle; 23.27 England
In his pocket was his new phone. He pulled it out as he strode up the hill, stopping before a plate-glass window and studying all the people nearby in case he was being watched.
He wouldn’t have called Stephen Orme again unless he had felt threatened, but those three guys looked too much like agents, and it was too much of a coincidence for them to appear just now, after his phone had turned on. Stephen might be able to give him a room, access to data comms, or even concealment in the Consulate, just for a day, until he could get out of the city. Reluctantly, Jack came to a decision. He studied the keyboard and dialled the Consulate.
Stephen’s calm voice answered. ‘Hello?’
‘It’s the tourist again. I think I need help.’
‘Where are you?’
‘Not far from my hotel.’
‘Give me your precise position. I’ll come and get you.’
There was something in his tone that grated.
‘Good.’
He had the street map out already, and Jack looked at it as he spoke. ‘I’ll be at Pier 50, waiting to get a ferry to Vashon or one of the islands. Can you meet me there?’
‘Sure. Look, how long till you’re there?’
‘I’ll be there in about forty-five,’ Jack said. He looked west from the road, and beyond the flyover he could see the straight line of lights lining the walkway and road to the ferry.
‘Good. You wait there at the entrance, yeah?’
‘There’s a kind of water fountain there. I’ll be beside that,’ Jack said, and closed the call. Then he called a cab.
*
15.28 Seattle; 23.28 England
As a means of tapping an individual’s phone calls or emails, Echelon was useless, but that wasn’t what the network was created for.
Echelon operated by searching all communications and listening out for specific keywords that it had stored in a suite of programmes called ‘Dictionary’. These watchwords were selected by the alliance of the UK/USA services, the ‘Yookoosa’, which comprised the larger Anglo-Saxon Commonwealth countries and the USA: so there were hubs in Leitrim in Canada, Waihopai in New Zealand, Kojarena in Western Australia, and Menwith Hill in England. Trawling through millions of messages constantly, Echelon sifted them for those messages that were of specific importance to certain teams.
Roy Sandford knew all this, just as he knew that millions of messages each half hour were being checked and discarded, and he knew that the Dictionary was all. It was the basis of the whole system. Without it, Echelon was so much expensive metalwork. But the Dictionary meant that all the agencies that had access to Echelon could seek information on specific areas of interest. So, for example, the Australians would be interested in Triad gangs and smugglers from Asia, while the English would be more keen to know about possible arms sales to Irish terrorists. Echelon had been designed to allow each nation to have their own Dictionaries, so that they could take responsibility for their own areas of influence.
Except although the design that was demonstrated to the UK/USA teams by the NSA provided the separation of interests, the NSA ensured that such separation did not exist for themselves. All the Dictionaries used by the junior members of the consortium, the Brits, Australians and others, were transparent to the US team; while the others could insert their own keywords and have searches conducted over their own spheres of influence, the US agents could see these too, and the results were copied to the NSA. While the other consortium members had access to only their own reports, American agents saw all of them. But there was another trap door, which the NSA had designed and implemented. All the US searches were transparently conducted over the entire international network, without the junior members seeing them.
And Roy had access to the entire network under the Order given by Amiss.
He had already inserted the relevant details known about the agent. The name he had used in Alaska: Hansen; his friend’s name: Danny Lewin aka Daniel Lewin aka Dan Lewin aka D Lewin; the town where Lewin died: Whittier… everything Roy had been told about the man they were hunting. Having done all that, there was nothing for him to do with Echelon, so he was working on the telephone systems, and it was while he was working on them that the screen on the right bleeped. He looked up and saw the red box flashing. And then he saw the Echelon signal.
In his hurry, he missed his phone and slid it across his desk, almost to fall on the floor.
‘This is Roy, yeah, I think we got something here!’
‘What?’
‘An English guy, one we’ve not had under surveillance, who’s supposed to be a tourist operator, has just called a UK number and mentioned our friend Case. Says he’s going to be at Pier 50 waiting for a ferry in about three quarters of an hour.’
‘Great: tell the team to meet me there,’ Frank said, glancing at his watch.
*
23.31 Devon
Claire was sitting on the floor. The spaniels were beside her, one with his chin resting on her thigh as she sniffed and wept. The bottle of Plymouth gin that had been half full when she poured the first drink was empty now.
She had no idea what was happening. Her head was fuzzy and light from sobbing and alcohol, and all she could see in her mind’s eye was Starck sitting there at her table, his yellowing features, his yellow-stained hair, the yellow stains on his fingers and hands, all equally repulsive to her.
When the noise assaulted her ears, she could scarcely recognise it at first. It sounded alien to her. But then she realised that her handset was ringing, and reluctantly picked it up. ‘Yes?’
‘Claire, it’s me. I was worried, love. I saw your…’
‘You did it, didn’t you, Jack? I can see it now. Starck told me you were here when Jimmy died. What did you do? Hit him with a stick? Throw a rock at him?’
‘Claire, no! Don’t start imagining things that didn’t happen. I couldn’t have hurt him �
�� I was in London.’
‘He showed me your telephone log. You know that? If you have a mobile phone, they can tell where you are at all hours of the day. And yours showed you were down here.’
‘That’s bloody impossible!’
‘You killed Jimmy. He was the only chance I had to get away from you… to escape. But you murdered him, didn’t you?’ She said, before choking with the sobs that took her over. ‘I loved him, Jack. I was prepared to try again with you when you begged me to, but I didn’t realise you’d killed him! You murdered my lover! What worse thing could you do to me?’
‘Claire, not only did I not do it, my phone was in London all that day. I was nowhere near Devon the day he died. Starck made it up!’
‘Why would he make it up?’ She sniffed and spat, ‘He’s not the one trying to lie to me to climb into my body, is he? It was you. It always was you. I don’t want anything more to do with you, Jack. Never! Nothing!’
*
23.57 London
Sara al Malik was in the kitchen sitting at the small pine table. Not drinking tea or coffee, not hunched over a plate, but sitting upright, staring at the far wall.
She had lost. There was nothing else. The blank-faced officials had won. They had taken poor Mo, and now she couldn’t even raise her voice to demand his return. The papers, the TV companies, all of them would ignore her. She could talk to friends, but nothing more. None of the media wanted to know.
And then she had a sudden thought. The BT engineer had mentioned the computer. Although Mo’s computer was taken by the police, and he wasn’t allowed one under the terms of his parole, Sara could get one for herself. Or use one.
On the internet, there were ways to make friends with many people, very quickly.
Thursday 22nd September
16.07 Seattle; 00.07 England
Act of Vengeance Page 20