The Silk Road

by Mark Leggatt

  “Yeah?”

  “The Turkey aid flight was delayed by an hour. The flight ready to take off was a C-130 carrying over two hundred Rangers on their way back home from a combat zone.”

  “That was the target?”

  “They’re not sure. But it seems more likely. If they knew.”

  “If they knew?” Napier sat on his desk. “The soldiers and their families will have it all over Facebook. They can track civilian radar on the internet. It’s not hard to find the movement of troops these days. So, who fired the missile?”

  “Two men found dead at the scene. Gunshot wounds. Fingerprints establish that they fired the missile. They were the men we were tracking.”

  “But our team got there too late, yet they still end up dead.”

  “This report says that the two men had wiped down their car so they didn’t plan on using it to escape. Our team found another way out of the village, a track leading off the mountain, down into the valley. We found a car well hidden, probably a means of escape.”

  “But they didn’t escape. They ended up dead. So, who pulled the trigger?”

  Faber turned over one of the documents. “Connor Montrose.”

  “Who?”

  “It doesn’t say. They tracked him by fingerprints in blood left at the scene. They checked the prints on the system and his name came up a 100% match. The technician tried to access his records, but it was blocked.”

  “You told me your guy had pretty high authority.”

  “He does. I made sure of it. Still a blank.” He nodded to the laptop on Napier’s desk. “Want me to try?”

  “Later. What I want to know is how a C-130 that’s just back from a combat zone, that has all the latest technology to combat missile attacks, that has pilots who get shot at on a daily basis, still manages to be taken out of the sky on the first shot?”

  Faber rifled through the report. “The CIA team were on the road to the village and saw the missile pass straight over them, heading away from the valley. Then it changed direction back towards the plane. Eye witnesses at the airport says that the plane deployed all the flares and chaff, and we can be pretty sure they used all the latest jamming techniques. But the missile went straight through all the defenses. Which means it isn’t heat-seeking, or someone just got very lucky, or very clever. But we’ve never seen this before. This is something new.”

  “If that’s true, then there’s no plane safe in the sky.”

  The phone rang on the desk and Faber grabbed it. “Director Napier’s office.” He listened for a moment, then held out the receiver. “It’s Langley, sir.”

  “Speakerphone.”

  Faber hit a button and the voice came through the speaker.

  “This is Director Campbell from Langley. You are aware of who I am?”

  “Yes, sir,” said Napier.

  “A technician tried to access the online record of Connor Montrose. Why?”

  “He has been identified as being present at the scene of the attack, sir. Two men dead, but no sign of Montrose.”

  “Napier, you may take it from me, that Montrose is a traitor to this country and a terrorist. I want you to find him, and I want no evidence left that Connor Montrose ever existed. Do not apprehend him, just shoot him on sight. Do I make myself clear?”

  “Director Campbell, he may be crucial in finding out where…”

  “You’re not listening to me, Mr. Napier. Montrose is not part of your investigation. I have direct experience of Montrose, and you do not. I want you to find him, right now, and I want you to execute him as a traitor. Do not let him talk to anyone. Is that clear?”

  Napier looked sideways at Faber, who held out his hands. “That is clear, Director Campbell.”

  “I have received an update on the progress of your team,” said Campbell.

  Napier turned to face Faber, who threw out his hands.

  “When you have dealt with Montrose, Mr. Napier, the focus of your investigation is that a new type of Russian surface-to-air missile has just shot down an American service plane in the heart of NATO. I will take care of the political fallout, but you will find who carried out the attack. The Press have already been briefed that initial investigations indicate there was a technical issue with a plane on a NATO exercise in Italy. All the witnesses are service personnel at the airbase and will do what they are told. Now, listen to me. You may use any method, you will have access to every resource, and you may use my personal authority to find out who did this, but Montrose must be dealt with immediately. Get to work, Napier. Fast. We will be watching your progress with great interest. I expect updates every hour.” The call ended.

  Faber shook his head. “What the hell was that all about?”

  “I have no idea, though I do know that Campbell is the biggest shit-weasel in Langley. If he wants Montrose dead, it’s probably to cover his ass. And I want to know why.”

  “But we shoot him, no?”

  “Shoot him in the legs. Then tape his mouth and bring him to me. I want to know what he was doing in that village. After that, Campbell can have his corpse.”

  Chapter 6

  Dirty flecks of grey water burst around the wide stone supports below the arches. Montrose looked up to the three stories of medieval buildings that stretched across the bridge, some hanging over the water. A stone tower stood thirty feet above the roof on the south side of the bridge, its windows open wide. Montrose wondered if Pilgrim was watching, then ducked into a line of arches bordering the river and leading to the bridge. Cameras lined the route, fixed to buildings and old iron street lamps. He kept his eye on one as he approached, but it didn’t move and he stopped at the corner to the bridge. He knew he was walking into a bottleneck. “Why here?” he muttered. “This is a crazy place for a safe house.”

  Crowds stood jammed together at the end of the bridge and he shoved his way past tightly-packed groups of teenagers with bulging daypacks, milling back and forth across the street, then backed into a doorway opposite the bridge.

  One way in and one way out, he thought, or so it looks. Check the secondary exit. Pilgrim said a courtyard. It should be right here. At least I’ll know if I’ve got a tail. If I take them anywhere near the tower, the game is over.

  To his right he spotted the entrance to a courtyard in between a cigar shop and a gelato vendor. He weaved past students, avoiding the ice creams in their hands, and into a wide space filled with tables crammed with tourists. He scanned every table but they all seemed to be full of families. At the far end of the courtyard was a small café and he kept his eye on his reflection in its window as he moved between the tables. Everyone ignored him. Next to the café was a door and he opened it to reveal an unlit corridor, lined with refuse sacks and vegetable boxes. He pulled the door behind him, lifted a rotten apple from one of the boxes and placed it on the door handle, then shuffled along the corridor, his back scraping the wall. In front he saw a sliver of light at the foot of another door. Pilgrim had told him to give it a hard kick. He grabbed the handle and booted the door. It sprang open and he stepped into a garage, stinking of old oil and gas. In front of him stood the modified SUV, facing a battered metal shutter to the street.

  Over his shoulder, the door to the courtyard remained closed. Okay, he thought, if it all goes to shit then this is my way out. He tugged the garage door closed then stepped sideways, back down the corridor. The apple was still on the handle. He knocked it to the floor and pulled the door open. No one looked up.

  Pushing past the tables, he stopped at the entrance to the courtyard. Twenty feet in front of him was the narrow entrance to the bridge and the high-end jewelry shops that lined each side. Above them lay a row of cramped medieval apartments, fronted with stained, warped wood that seemed squashed under the weight of the gallery above, which stretched all the way to the tower, then over the roofs of Florence.

  No one l
ooked his way. He stepped out and crossed the road, standing in front of a shop window, watching his reflection. Behind him, tourists moved slowly past. He glanced right. The door was so narrow it seemed to be part of the window frame. Without looking, he ran his finger up the door frame and found a small hinged panel. He slipped his fingers underneath, felt the keypad, then ran his finger across the buttons. Three along, and four down, he thought, then tapped in the code. The door clicked and he stepped sideways, pushing the door open with his shoulder. He nudged the door closed and stood in the darkness, feeling his breath bounce off the wall in front of his face.

  His eyes began to adjust and a chink of light came from below the door, but there was nothing from outside, save the chatter of tourists. Holding his hands out to the side, he felt his way down the corridor. The sour smell of the river drifted past his face and his foot banged against a wooden step. His outstretched hand found the smooth rungs, and he started to climb, ascending only a few feet before his knuckles smacked into the roof. He placed his head against the roof and pushed. The hatch creaked open and light flooded into the stairwell.

  Clambering upwards, he peered out of a porthole-sized window, crossed with iron bars. The river flowed directly below, slow and dark. In front of him, an iron-studded door to the apartments above was padlocked shut, beside a staircase of narrow, warped steps. The wood groaned under his weight and he pulled himself up fast then stood in front of the iron door. Behind and to his right were more porthole windows and he looked out to the rear of the bridge, along to the tower, where the window lay open.

  Okay, he thought, look like you know what you’re doing. He pushed down the door handle and stepped into a bright, narrow corridor.

  Both walls were lined with portraits. He began to walk. Voices came from behind him as a group of tourists emerged into the corridor, led by a guide. Just make it to the tower, he thought.

  The faces on the wall seemed to watch him, a weird mix of oil paintings, hundreds of years old, and stark black and white photographs. In the middle of the corridor stood three wide windows, and he looked out across the Florence skyline then focused on the corner where the corridor turned left at the tower.

  The cameras in the ceiling didn’t move. He stopped at the corner and stood before a door. He was about to try the handle when the door clicked and opened an inch. They’ve seen me, he thought.

  He pushed it open and stepped into a waiting elevator, ignoring the staircase to the side. He watched the door to the corridor swing shut and heard it lock. The elevator door closed and the car moved swiftly upwards for a few seconds then opened into a sunlit wood-paneled room.

  Mr. Pilgrim sat up in his wheelchair and slowly lifted a hand. “Welcome.”

  “Yeah.”

  A young woman in a bright sari came into the room. The hazelnut skin of her face creased into a frown when she saw Montrose and her dark eyes seemed to bore into his soul as she walked towards him. “Do you have your phone?” she said.

  “Yeah.” He pulled it from his jeans.

  She took the phone from him, turned and tossed it out the window into the river below, then pulled a small metal rod from the folds of her sari and ran it over his body. “Lift your arms.”

  He stuck his hands into the air.

  “Okay,” she said to Pilgrim.

  “I have a gun,” said Montrose.

  “I know.” She smacked the detector against his pocket. “It was either that or you are very pleased to see me.”

  Montrose looked at a laptop on a desk showing a CIA login screen. Knowing Mr. Pilgrim, he guessed that the chick wasn’t on Langley’s payroll. “Okay, what do we know?”

  “Wait.” The young woman checked a monitor on the side of Pilgrim’s wheelchair. “Okay,” she said, “you can talk.” She turned and left the room.

  Montrose watched her go, then faced Pilgrim. “Glad to see your nurse is taking care of you.”

  Her voice came through the doorway. “I am not a bloody nurse!”

  “That is Priti,” said Mr. Pilgrim.

  Priti entered the room again, a gun in her hand.

  “Okay, I get it, you’re not the nurse,” said Montrose.

  “Give me your gun and take this.”

  He handed over his Glock. “Missing a magazine, I’m afraid.”

  She shook her head. “Then what use is it? Or you?” She held out a pistol and two magazines. “Nine millimeter Beretta. Thirteen round magazine. No safety catch. It is unloaded.”

  Mr. Pilgrim shifted in his wheelchair.

  Montrose could see where the strapping bulged beneath his shirt. “How is it?”

  Pilgrim shrugged. “Painful and complex. If it wasn’t for this current situation, I would be in a delightful Swiss hospital. But, no matter. Tell me what you know.”

  “Well, I didn’t know about the village. That was a surprise. I thought I was only supposed to tail those guys.”

  “So did I.”

  “That shit went down so fast, I couldn’t…”

  “I know. I have the CIA reports.”

  Montrose loaded a magazine and shoved the Beretta into his jeans. “I saw that missile go straight over my head away from the valley, then turn 180° in the air and come straight back. It went through the chaff and flares as if they didn’t exist. That’s like no missile we know.”

  “I understand,” said Pilgrim.

  “Yeah, I’m sure you’re gonna hear all about it,” Montrose drawled, glancing down at the laptop screen. “But, here’s the news. The British don’t think the CIA are entirely blameless.”

  “The British?”

  “What the hell have they got to do with it?” said Priti.

  “There’s an MI6 guy called George Linden. He stopped me in the valley when I ran out of the village, down the hillside. He saved my skin. If the CIA had caught me, they’d have ripped me apart. Then he brought me here to Florence.”

  “He brought you?” said Priti.

  “I had no choice. It was at gunpoint. He wasn’t taking any chances.”

  “Is he aware…?”

  “Of course not. He took me to his place.”

  “Where is he now?” she said.

  “I have no idea. He left to make a report and I came here. I made sure I wasn’t followed.”

  “You had better…”

  Pilgrim’s eyes closed and he gritted his teeth.

  Priti pushed past Montrose and peered at the monitor. “Do I give you a shot?”

  Pilgrim let out a slow breath. “Give me a moment, it will pass. I need to keep a clear head.”

  She turned to Montrose. Her face tightened, “You better not have been followed. This is Italy. They have a tradition here of defenestration.”

  “Of what?”

  She jerked a thumb towards the river. “Throwing people out of the window.”

  “Yeah, about that. Why are we on a bridge with only two exits?”

  She tapped her head. “Think. Don’t see the bridge. See the corridor. Built by Duke Cosimo de Medici nearly five hundred years ago for his personal security. He could get from his palace to his offices without going through the filthy streets and risking assassination. The whole corridor is lined with priceless art and covered by guards and cameras, and thanks to the European Union it must have wheelchair access. I can get Mr. Pilgrim a quarter of a mile away in thirty seconds. What’s good enough for Cosimo de Medici, a man who spent his entire life avoiding being killed by his own people, is good enough for me.”

  Pilgrim looked up and his eyes came into focus. “Tell me what happened.”

  “I followed them to the top of the hill. I had to leave the car and climb up the rock or they would have spotted me. I got into the village and found their BMW which they’d wiped clean, and then I knew they were going to take another way out of the village. But why would they do that
? Then I saw them pulling suitcases towards the village square. From the church tower, I could see they had a view of the whole valley floor, and I worked out from the blurred map that there was a clandestine airport further up the valley. I thought they were going to set up a monitoring station. Next thing I know, I hear a plane and they’re pulling out a missile from a suitcase. Did you know there was an airport there?”

  “No, that airfield disappeared from the maps in 1945, but we have since discovered the Italians only recently reopened it for a staging post for flights to the Middle East, presumably at the request of Langley. These two men in the village, did you kill them?”

  “I dropped one and hit the other just as he fired the missile. He fell backwards and next thing I know there’s a freaking missile going over my head.” He looked out across the river. “I thought I’d done it. I really thought… Then it looped and came straight back, heading for the valley.”

  “And the plane?”

  “They tried. There was nothing they could do. They fired everything they had at the missile. The sky was lit up like the fourth of July, but it was no good.”

  Pilgrim looked down.

  “How many?” said Montrose.

  “I’m sorry?”

  “How many people?”

  “Fifteen,” said Pilgrim. “Crew and medics heading for Turkey on an aid flight. But behind them was a C-130 full of troops heading back to the US.”

  “You think that was the target?” said Priti.

  “That flight was delayed. It’s possible. Tell me about the Brit.”

  She typed quickly on the keyboard. “George Linden. MI6 operative for twelve years, currently on holiday in Italy. Ex-Guards officer. Impoverished aristocracy. Spotless record, fluent in Italian and Russian.” She turned the laptop so Montrose could see a face on the screen.

  “Yeah, that’s him.”

  “And he is skeptical of the CIA’s motives, you say?”

  “He said that London isn’t being kept in the loop. They want to know why.”