by KJ Griffin
***
Leaving the others in the Central Lobby, Al-Ajnabi and Chentouf followed Driscoll as he led them past the statue of Northcote towards the Commons Library. There was only a solitary policeman in the Lower Waiting Hall and the PC seemed preoccupied, craning his neck to listen to his radio.
Al-Ajnabi put a hand inside his jacket and started fiddling with his shirt buttons, reaching inside and round to his back to work free the 9mm MP5K suspended in a concealment holster that was becoming a large uncomfortable welt below the shoulder muscles.
His nerves were steady and his mouth dry. Khalid Chentouf was lagging just behind, and from the rustle and grunts Al-Ajnabi guessed that Chentouf was also busy working his Heckler & Koch free.
‘Here we are, the old Smoking Room,’ Driscoll smiled awkwardly.
Al-Ajnabi stepped inside. Just as he had hoped, they were alone except for his own. Claire Ferris sat in a gilded backed armchair looking irritable and impatient with Magdalena Ortiz standing just behind, the long scar on her cheek angled towards Al-Ajnabi. Maria Vasquez sat hunched in an armchair opposite the MP, nervously fiddling with a necklace, while Hasan sat Sphinx-like in a high-backed armchair. When she saw Al-Ajnabi. Maria Vasquez sprang to her feet. Claire Ferris began to rise less enthusiastically, but Al-Ajnabi motioned for the Ipswich MP to sit down while Chentouf closed the door behind them.
‘Stay seated please, Ms Ferris, and you too Mr Driscoll, next to each other if you don't mind.’
‘I beg your pardon…’
‘Sit down, Mr Driscoll,’ Al-Ajnabi cut in with a sergeant-major’s bark, finally working free his MP5K so it hung limply from his shoulder.
‘But…?’
‘I said sit down!’
Driscoll instantly obeyed, almost leaping into the armchair Maria Vasquez had just vacated, his jaw quivering and his eyes nervously darting around the room, watching incredulously as Chentouf handed out Brownings to Hasan and the two women, now standing like guards in front of the MPs. They checked and loaded the weapons with 9mm clips. Magdalena Ortiz was the first to finish and she took out two sets of plastic handcuffs from her back pocket.
Al-Ajnabi checked his watch. 5:15.
Only Ferris remained impassive, sitting nonchalantly straight in front of him with her back to the river. Driscoll said nothing, his knees pressing so tightly together in the armchair it was plausible he had already wet himself.
‘There isn't time to explain now,’ Al-Ajnabi told the MPs, while Magdalena Ortiz pushed the two armchairs towards each other then cuffed Driscoll's limp wrist to Claire Ferris's hand, and her other to the radiator behind.
‘But your lives are not in immediate danger,’ Al-Ajnabi continued. ‘If all goes to plan we'll have you released and out of here within hours.’
Ferris' eyes were full of pent-up outrage.
‘Go to hell! I hope they kill you. All of you.’
‘Shut up or I’ll kill you here and now, you bitch,’ McLaughlin spoke for the first time, waving a Browning in the Ipswich MP’s face that Al-Ajnabi knew he was anxious to trade in for an Armalite just as soon as Neil Smedley’s tunnel team met up with them.
‘Easy Brendan,’ Al-Ajnabi soothed. ‘There’s a long way to go yet.’
‘Leave her, Brendan,’ Abu Fawaz added. ‘She is of no importance.’
Al-Ajnabi turned towards the little bomb maker and his own stare was met with something equally enigmatic from the Jordanian. So McLaughlin took his orders from Abu Fawaz now, did he? Al-Ajnabi would have to remember that when the time came.
‘Thank you, my friend,’ Al-Ajnabi murmured to his bomb maker in a tone he knew the Jordanian would understand. ‘And now we’re all calm, Maria, do your work, please.’
Maria Vasquez pulled out a couple of gags and set to work on Driscoll while Al-Ajnabi made a last call to Yokochi.
‘We’re going in now, Toshi. All the rest is up to you now.’
Al-Ajnabi thought he heard a grunt before Yokochi rang off. Then again, he might not have done. In any case, Al-Ajnabi felt that the co-ordination of events outside the Palace of Westminster was one thing he didn’t have to worry about from here on. Yokochi would pull all the levers he had at his disposal as smoothly and effortlessly as God; and to almost everyone else in the word, his very existence would be just as doubtful as the Lord of Creation’s.
They had to wait momentarily for Maria. Claire Ferris had grown awkward again and was trying to resist.
Magdalena Ortiz joined her friend and held Ferris’ head still while Maria fitted the gag.
‘Jus’ try to relax,’ she spoke softly. ‘It will hurt you less that way.’
Ferris writhed and squirmed with eyes that blazed hatred till she realized she was causing Driscoll intense discomfort. Was it that which stopped her, or was it the stare from McLaughlin?
‘Leave these two now, Magdalena,’ Al-Ajnabi frowned. ‘Are we ready everyone?’
‘OK,’ said Khalid.
‘Ready,’ said Magdalena Ortiz, rechecking her weapon.
‘Lessgo,’ said Maria, patting Ferris on the head and winking.
McLaughlin simply glowered again at Al-Ajnabi; the ghost of a smile escaped Abu Fawaz’s lips.
‘Hasan?’ Al-Ajnabi checked and was met with an enigmatic nod.
‘And the bankers, Hasan?
‘Locked up in Mr Driscoll’s office.’
‘Good, then go straight from here and bring them to me in the Commons.’
‘Yes Hadratak,’ Hasan nodded like a marionette as Al-Ajnabi looked around the room.
‘This is it then,’ said Al-Ajnabi. ‘Good luck everybody.’
‘Good luck!’ came a chorus of grunts.