True Colours ss-10

by Stephen Leather

  ‘I thought there was plenty of work out in Iraq, private security and that,’ said Shepherd.

  ‘Not any more,’ said McIntyre. ‘At least not for the likes of you and me. They do it on the cheap now, the days of a thousand dollars a day are long gone. Used to be you got great food and business-class flights back and forth and plenty of leeway to do what needed to be done, but that’s all gone. There are guys out there now earning a hundred and fifty bucks a day, Spider. That’s close to minimum wage. And it’s as dangerous as it ever was. More so. What they’ve done is to privatise casualties. Whereas it used to be the army that took the hits, now it’s the contractors. And when you do get hurt, you’re sent back home and left to your own devices. You have to take out your own insurance and that costs an arm and a leg.’ He laughed harshly, the sound of a wounded animal. ‘No pun intended. I wouldn’t go back to Iraq if they got down on bended knee and begged me.’ He raised his glass but his hand was unsteady and whisky slopped on to the carpet. ‘So what brings you to Reading? I’m guessing it’s not a social visit.’ He sipped his whisky and scrutinised Shepherd over the rim of his glass.

  Shepherd met McIntyre’s gaze and forced a smile. McIntyre was a mess, he looked as if he was close to a breakdown. There was a tenseness about his movements and a small twitch to the side of his right eye that made it look as if he was winking. His nails were bitten to the quick and his skin had a yellowish pallor, a sign that all the alcohol he was drinking was taking its toll on his liver. Shepherd had half a mind to walk out.

  ‘Come on, Spider. Spit it out. It’s got be something important to get you out here.’

  Shepherd nodded as he held his glass with both hands. ‘Remember Ahmad Khan?’

  ‘The muj that shot you and the captain? Like it was yesterday. One of the biggest regrets of my life is that we didn’t slot that bastard in Pakistan.’

  Shepherd reached inside his jacket and pulled out the newspaper cutting that Harper had given him. McIntyre put his glass on the table next to a Domino’s pizza box and walked unsteadily over to Shepherd. He took the cutting from him and peered at it, then walked back to the table and began rooting through the fast food boxes, muttering to himself. Eventually he found a pair of reading glasses and he perched them on the end of his nose and stared at the cutting again. ‘What the hell is he doing in the UK?’ he said.

  ‘You think it’s him?’

  ‘Of course I think it’s him. And so do you. You wouldn’t be here if you didn’t.’

  ‘I’m not sure,’ said Shepherd.

  ‘Come on, how many Afghans with straggly beards and one milky eye do you see in London?’

  ‘I don’t know, to be honest,’ said Shepherd. ‘There are thousands of Afghans in London, and a lot of them have beards. I don’t know how common that eye thing is.’

  ‘We were in Afghanistan and he was the only one I saw with an eye like that.’

  Shepherd nodded. That was true. It was a very distinctive blemish, one that Shepherd had never seen elsewhere.

  McIntyre paced up and down the tidy room as he reread the newspaper cutting. ‘How the hell does this happen?’ he muttered. ‘How does a Taliban murderer end up living here?’

  ‘That’s a good question,’ said Shepherd. ‘But a better question is what are we going to do about it?’

  McIntyre took off his glasses. ‘You know what we’re going to do about it. We’re going to slot him, like we should have done in Pakistan.’

  ‘One step at a time, Jock,’ said Shepherd. ‘First we’ve got to be sure it’s him.’

  McIntyre gave the cutting back to Shepherd. ‘Then we slot him, right?’

  Shepherd pocketed the cutting. ‘One bridge at a time,’ he said.

  McIntyre put his spectacles back on the table and picked up his glass of whisky. He raised it in salute. ‘We’re going to give that bastard what he deserves.’

  ‘No offence, Jock, but you need to lay off the booze.’

  ‘Sure, sure.’

  ‘I’m serious. We’re going to need clear heads to pull this off.’

  McIntyre nodded. ‘No worries. I can take it or leave it.’ He saw the look of disbelief on Shepherd’s face and he grinned. ‘Spider, I drink because I’m bored, end of.’

  ‘That’s good to hear,’ said Shepherd. ‘How about we start by pouring that in the sink?’

  McIntyre held up the glass. ‘Now that’d be a waste of perfectly good whisky, wouldn’t it?’

  ‘Clear heads,’ repeated Shepherd. ‘Starting now.’

  McIntyre sighed, then walked over to the sink and emptied the glass. Then he fetched the bottle and poured the contents away. ‘Happy now?’ he said, tossing the empty bottle.

  ‘Happier,’ said Shepherd.

  McIntyre gestured at the glass in Shepherd’s hand. ‘The no-drinking rule applies to you as well, right?’

  Shepherd laughed. ‘Fair comment,’ he said. ‘I’ll stay off the booze as long as you do.’ He looked at the whisky in his glass, then quickly drank it. He grinned at McIntyre. ‘Starting now.’

  AFGHANISTAN, 2002

  Ahmad Khan and Captain Todd flew to the Jalalabad base on a Blackhawk helicopter and then drove the final thirty miles to the SAS Forward Operating Base in a convoy of armoured Land Rovers as soon as it was light. It was ‘bandit country’ and all the occupants of the Land Rovers, including Khan, were armed. Khan had a scarf around his head and face, concealing his identity from any Taliban spies who might be watching from the shadows.

  He looked around him with interest as they approached the Forward Operating Base. The road that led up to the gates was studded with huge concrete blocks, forcing any vehicle to slow down and weave from side to side as it approached, preventing suicide bombers from driving a truck packed with explosives straight into the gates.

  The base was small, surrounded by razor-wire fences and berms bulldozed out of the stony soil, providing blast protection and cover for those inside. From what he could see, it looked much less well equipped than the American bases. Beyond the berms, Khan could just glimpse the tops of rows of shipping containers and tents and a heavily sandbagged, mud-brick building, the only permanent structure on the site. Around them were sandbagged emplacements from which protruded the barrels of General Purpose Machine Guns, and the much thicker firing tubes of mortars.

  Bulldozers had flattened everything within half a mile of the perimeter in all directions, removing any cover for insurgents and giving the defenders of the base a clear field of fire. The cleared ground included the flattened rubble of a series of buildings, and as they passed them, Khan wondered whether they had merely been sheds or barns, or had once been people’s houses.

  When they reached the gates, the British soldiers travelling with them were waved through after a brief check of their ID, but when Todd and Khan tried to follow them, the two armed guards blocked their way. Khan could see the looks of contempt aimed at his black dishdasha and AK-47, but he kept his expression neutral and looked away as Todd first talked and then argued with them, his voice rising as he became increasingly frustrated.

  As the captain argued with the guards, two soldiers walked over. They were not dressed like the other British soldiers he had seen, but wore shorts and sun-faded T-shirts. They were no taller than he was and did not appear particularly powerfully built, but from their lean, muscled physiques and air of relaxed self-confidence, Khan suspected they were special forces.

  He heard the bigger of the two men refer to the other as ‘Spider’, presumably a nickname. Spider looked at Khan’s weapon, and then nudged his colleague. ‘Clock that, Geordie?’ he said beneath his breath. The AK-74’s orange plastic stock and magazine made it very distinctive, and Khan could tell from their expressions that they knew that this newer, improved version of the AK-47 was rare enough in the Taliban’s armoury for it only to be issued to its commanders and its most elite troops.

  Todd was still arguing with the guards. ‘I’ll have you on a charge for this, I’m
warning you!’ he said.

  ‘What’s the problem, Captain?’ the one called Geordie said.

  ‘This guard is refusing to let us into the compound,’ Todd said, brushing his hair back from his eyes.

  Geordie’s face broke into a grin. ‘That’s probably because you’ve got an armed and unknown Afghan with you,’ he said. Khan noticed that he didn’t call the officer ‘Sir’, even though Todd was a captain and the other man was obviously from the ranks.

  ‘This man is Ahmad Khan, a Surrendered Enemy Personnel,’ Todd said.

  ‘Well, that doesn’t carry too much weight in these parts,’ Geordie said. ‘I can tell you from my own experience that SEPs are like junkies — they’re only with you long enough to get their next fix — cash, weapons, whatever — and then they’re gone again. With respect, Captain, no experienced guy would trust an SEP as far as he could throw him.’

  Todd glared at him. ‘This man has vital intelligence I need to put before the boss and I am not going to exclude him from the compound just because of your prejudice against SEPs and perhaps Afghans in general.’

  The soldier called Spider glanced from one to the other and then made a calming gesture to both of them with his hands. ‘It’s not about prejudice,’ he said. ‘It’s based on bitter experience. We’ve had more than our fair share of green on blue attacks out here.’ He pointed at Khan’s rifle. ‘One: He’s carrying a loaded AK-74. Only the top guys in the Taliban carry them. So he’s not some tribesman picking up a few extra dollars for fighting the faranji invaders, he’s one of their leaders. Two: This is a secure compound. Not even a Brit would get in here without being vetted or vouched for, and yet you’re trying to bring an armed Taliban fighter in here.’

  ‘The thing is, Captain,’ Geordie said, emphasising his point by jabbing his finger towards him, ‘you’re not only jeopardising the safety of everyone here, but you’d better watch your own back, because I’d take odds that he’d rub you out if he thought he could get away with it.’

  ‘Your comments are noted,’ Todd said, struggling to keep his anger under control. ‘Now step aside, the OC needs to hear what he has to say.’

  The two guards — both paratroopers — stood their ground, with their weapons ready to fire.

  ‘With the greatest of respect, Captain, they’re not going to let you in while your SEP has a loaded weapon,’ Spider said. ‘But if he unloads his weapon and leaves the magazine and his ammunition belt with the guards, he can probably be allowed into the compound. He can pick them up again on his way out.’

  Khan glanced at Todd, then shrugged and began unloading his rifle, but no Afghan man, let alone a warrior, would willingly be deprived of his weapon and he glared at the two SAS men as he did so.

  ‘Do you speak English?’ Geordie asked Khan as he handed his ammunition belt and magazine to one of the guards.

  ‘Enough,’ Khan said.

  ‘What’s your name?’

  ‘Ahmad Khan.’

  ‘Well, Ahmad Khan, you’d better be on your best behaviour while you’re here, because we’ll be watching you.’

  Khan smiled. He was on their ground, not his, but he was not going to be bullied or intimidated by them. ‘Do I scare you, soldier?’ he said. ‘Is that it? Yes, I can see the fear in your eyes.’ He smiled again as Geordie’s fists clenched despite himself.

  ‘You don’t scare me, mate,’ he said. ‘I’ve slotted more than my fair share of guys like you.’

  Khan’s smile did not waver. ‘Tread carefully, my friend. We Afghans are a proud people. We don’t give in to threats, nor tolerate insults to our honour.’

  ‘Leave it, Geordie,’ Spider said at last, breaking the growing silence and putting a hand on Geordie’s shoulder. ‘He can’t hurt anyone now.’ He nodded to Todd. ‘Morning prayers are about to start,’ he said, puzzling Khan, for he had seen no sign that any of the troops he had met were religious men.

  ‘He means our morning briefing,’ Todd said, seeing his baffled expression. ‘I’m afraid you won’t be able to accompany me — security, need to know, and all that stuff — but make yourself as comfortable as you can,’ he said with a rueful smile, gesturing at a makeshift waiting area near the gates consisting of tattered deckchairs and upturned ammunition boxes, ‘and I’ll be back as soon as possible.’

  Todd whistled to a soldier who’d been doing his morning run. ‘Corporal, look after our Afghan friend for a few minutes, would you?’ He caught Khan’s look and gave a sheepish grin. ‘Sorry, camp regulations: no unescorted visitors.’ He turned and hurried after Spider and Geordie into the mud-brick building.

  Ignoring the soldier, Khan squatted down in the dust in the pool of shade cast by a shipping container, and settled himself for a long wait. About an hour later he saw Todd emerge from the building with a face like thunder and stride off across the compound to a group of soldiers clustering around a tent as they prepared themselves for a patrol. Khan watched as Todd moved from group to group and had a long conversation with two of their sergeants, but when he at last turned and walked back towards Khan, he was accompanied by three of the soldiers and had a smile back on his face.

  ‘OK,’ he said to Khan. ‘It’s on, though I’ve had a hell of a job convincing them. I’m afraid that some of my colleagues just don’t trust you — I can’t entirely blame them, because there have been some unfortunate incidents in the past — but if this all goes smoothly, that should not be an issue in the future.’ He paused, checking Khan’s expression before he continued. ‘These three men will be your escort,’ he said, gesturing to the soldiers.

  ‘You are not coming with me?’ Khan said. He kept his voice even but Todd read the message in his eyes and flushed with embarrassment. ‘I’m afraid the boss has vetoed me going with you, but these Paras are good guys and can handle themselves if there’s any trouble. Though obviously I’m not expecting there to be any,’ he added hastily as he saw Khan’s expression. ‘The RV with your fighters is in an area that has been pacified by us and is peaceful, at least during daylight hours. So one vehicle and three men should be all we’ll need.’

  Khan looked at the faces of the Paras that Todd had assembled and was immediately struck by how young and fresh faced they looked, compared to his own battle-hardened men. ‘Insh’allah there will not be,’ he said. He wondered again whether the trust and loyalty his men felt for him personally and the dislike they felt for their other commanders would be enough to outweigh their tribal loyalty to the Taliban. He glanced at his wristwatch. Russian-made and taken from the wrist of a dead Soviet soldier many years before. It still kept perfect time. ‘The rendezvous is in four hours,’ he said. ‘And it is always wise to be the first to arrive, so we need to leave as soon as your men are ready.’

  Todd sent the three Paras off to collect their kit and then turned back to Khan. ‘You won’t let me down, will you?’ he said. ‘I’ve staked my own reputation, such as it is, on this.’

  ‘I have my own reasons — and, with respect, they are far more powerful than yours — for wanting this to succeed. My daughter’s future, perhaps even her life, depends on it.’ He held Todd’s gaze and the Englishman was the first to look away.

  The Paras loaded their gear into a Land Rover with a General Purpose Machine Gun mounted on the bonnet. Each of the three men was also armed with an M16 rifle. Khan’s AK-74 and his magazines and ammunition were given back to him and he cradled the weapon in his lap as he sat in the back alongside one of the Paras. As they drove out of the compound, Khan saw Spider and Geordie standing off to one side, watching him. The expressions on their faces showed that they did not trust him an inch.

  ‘It’s him,’ said McIntyre. ‘It’s definitely him. No question.’ Shepherd, McIntyre and Harper were sitting in Shepherd’s X5 in the street opposite the house occupied by the man they used to know as Ahmad Khan. McIntyre was in the back of the car, directly behind Shepherd.

  ‘What do you think, Lex?’ asked Shepherd, moving to the side to give him a b
etter view.

  ‘The eye’s the giveaway,’ said Harper. ‘The beard’s shorter and he’s older but then we’re all getting older, aren’t we?’

  ‘I’d be happier seeing him in Afghan dress,’ said Shepherd. ‘The Western clothing is throwing me off.’ Khan was wearing baggy brown corduroy trousers and what appeared to be carpet slippers, and a green quilted jerkin over a dark brown pullover. On his head was a knitted skullcap. ‘But the way he moves, the way he carries himself, it all feels right.’ Khan had left a terraced house in the Hammersmith street and was walking purposefully away from them, his arms swinging freely at his sides.

  ‘Yeah, if he had an AK-74 slung over his shoulder then we’d know for sure,’ said Harper. ‘Can we get closer?’

  ‘If he recognises any of us then we’ll blow it,’ said Shepherd.

  ‘Why would he recognise us?’ asked Harper. ‘It’s been more than ten years and we probably all look the same to him.’

  ‘He got up close and personal with me,’ said Shepherd. ‘And you tend to remember the people you’ve shot. I know I do.’

  ‘I don’t know why we’re even discussing this,’ said McIntyre. ‘It’s him. Even without the eye I’d know him anywhere.’

  ‘Yeah, I think you’re right,’ said Shepherd. He shook his head. ‘No, I don’t think. I know. It’s him.’

  ‘Yeah, that milky eye nails it,’ said Harper.

  ‘So what do we do?’ asked McIntyre.

  ‘We take it one step at a time,’ said Shepherd.

  ‘Sod that,’ said Harper. ‘Let’s just slot the bastard. He’s due, Spider. He’s overdue. After what he did to you and the captain.’

  ‘Have you got a gun on you, Lex?’ asked Shepherd. ‘This isn’t Afghanistan. Everything we do from now on has be planned out in advance and executed flawlessly otherwise we’ll all end up behind bars.’