There was a cry in the night from a man at the centre of the line. He thought, he believed, he was certain, he had seen shadows on the slope, climbing. Shouts of excitement went up, and the line broke into a pandemonium of running, yelling, and baying for blood.
Through the binoculars, Corrie saw Belcher and Henry coming.
They were both slowing, and he did not think they had latched on to a particular path. They were on the slope where a scree surface meant they’d slip and lose their grip and then slide back and have to come again. Sometimes it was Belcher who had a foothold good enough to take his weight when she floundered. But he also saw Belcher trip, and then Henry, the woman he’d dreamed of being in his own life, would grab a handhold and cling to it and drag him up.
He felt calm, no panic in him. He had armed the rifle.
It seemed as if those at the heart of the line had lost them. When he focused the binoculars, he reckoned that the men were turning on the one who had announced a sighting of the fugitives, arguing with him. Easy to read: What had he seen, where? Then, Corrie’s blood would be found again and the surge would start anew. A myriad of small lights defined the line. Sometimes he watched the line, and sometimes he swung his viewpoint and tried to pick up the woman and Belcher. Each time they found his blood, there was another shout – he had not lost the thought of the hunt, and a trail hooked on to by the hounds, and the huntsman’s horn alerting all the pursuers that the scent had not gone.
Corrie Rankin could have described – in detail – where he had imagined living with Henry Wilson, how they would spend their days, and how it would be in the long evenings when the light still clung to the tips of the hills, in front of a fire, and her against him, body to body, and a sort of love building. Bread and cheese, and a bottle of something, and the crannog would have been in view, and the eagle might make a last low pass over the pines, seeking its nest and its young and . . . it had been a good dream.
Corrie Rankin – middle-ranking officer of the Secret Intelligence Service of the United Kingdom – thought of himself as a survivor, and did not know why it was important for him to carry on with his life while denying others the same chance. He was no longer agitated; he didn’t any longer feel the anger that had made him confront Rat about a missed shot and a wasted mission. He had time, and there was quiet around him, and the shouts from the line were now faint and distant and rarer. Wasted Mission? In a pocket in his trousers, unread, were the folded pieces of paper he had ripped from the Ghost’s pocket. The bombmaker was probably more influential than the Emir. He might walk along the road from his flat in the side street and around past the geraniums and the park, and over the big junction, threading through the traffic to the gate and a greeting: Hello, sir, good to see you again, been away, have we? Bit of colour in your cheeks, somewhere nice I hope, and a PA waiting for him in the atrium. She would tell him that the DG, Deputy God, had cleared his diary for an hour in order to meet him and hear the story, and they’d want ‘warts and all’. Good show, Corrie, like something from the old days. Shows that a few of the flames that lit this organisation in the last century still burn brightly. Well done. He’d like that. If that was said, then he’d have thought he’d done well and he’d be magnanimous about the missed shot. And he wouldn’t mention the archaeologist, who had not chosen him.
His shoulder was aching, and his legs had stiffened from the kicking; he was in poor shape and knew it. Corrie could not have said how long it was – how many minutes – before Belcher and Henry broke the cover of the slope. He saw the flicker of their movements, and whistled softly. He pushed himself up, using the rifle butt on the ground as a support.
He went to catch up with them, and damn obvious what he had to do.
Chapter 18
Corrie saw them to his right, silhouetted against cloud at the moment when they turned in response to his call. There might have been a trace of the moon where the cover had thinned, but it passed quickly, and the wind bit at him as he stood. He went forward, after them. He thought they were unwilling to slow down – where the hell did they believe they were going? They had no co-ordinate for a helicopter landing place and no navigation gear. It seemed like blind flight to Corrie.
They might have heard him once. The wind now was gale force, and his face felt raw, as if a scourer had cleaned it. The various pains he felt were aggravated when he tried to go full pelt to catch them. They would not stop or slow, and the pack behind them would very soon be up and on to the plateau, would follow them, a pack of hunting dogs, and not be called off. The rifle was his crutch. He could not have said whether his voice had a sob in it, or whether the choke came from lack of air in his lungs, but he chased on after them, as if reining them in. At last they slowed their stride. He lurched the last pace, and was caught, and did not dare fall.
Belcher demanded, ‘Where are they, the others?’
From Henry, ‘Which direction should we head in?’
Corrie tried to answer, but couldn’t, the words dying in his throat.
‘Where are they?’
‘Which way do we go? For God’s sake, man, which way?’
He managed the message. They had gone ahead, had the satnav, also had the communications and had called up the helicopter. Corrie took the first step in what he thought was the right direction; they hung on to his arms – they had not yet realised that the rifle was supporting him.
Corrie said, ‘We argued, went toe to toe. The sniper, Rat, has a big mouth. He fired and missed. Lorded it over me, but he missed.’
Belcher hissed it, ‘Missed? What do you mean? The Emir . . .? He’s dead.’
Henry snapped at him, ‘Or will be in the next twenty breaths.’
Belcher again, ‘On a fast train to Paradise . . . It was an epic shot. Not in the head, but into the chest by an armpit, through the lungs, blood sources cut and breathing buggered, and out.’
‘I saw him.’ A defiance from Corrie.
‘All you saw – as I did at the start – was the game they played. They shoved pipes up his back to keep him upright. They didn’t want the faithful to know the score, so they paraded him. They brought him to Henry, last chance to save him. But he was too far gone, way beyond her skills.’
Corrie pondered. They moved slowly, still holding him. The reality gained weight, and it would have been easy then for Corrie Rankin to throw a towel high, watch it hit the canvas, admit it.
Corrie said, ‘I thought he missed. I told him he had missed.’
Henry said, ‘What you told Rat was wrong. He’s hammering at death’s door, the target is.’
And Belcher chipped in, ‘Where will the chopper land?’
There was little that Corrie could do. The enormity of the fight with Rat seemed to cow him. He could not run, could not run after Rat and Slime and spatter out a message of regret at what had been said. He felt unable to retrieve his words. He thought he knew which direction, approximately, they had come from when they had flown in, though there were no trees, no particular landmarks to remember. He shook off their hands and went forward, following his instincts, but his knees buckled. Belcher caught him, but his grip put pressure on his shoulder area, where the undressed wound was, where the bullet might still be lodged. He lashed out with his arm and caught Belcher on the chin, but it was a feeble blow and the man would have had enough warning of it to duck away anyway.
‘What happened to you?’
‘Took a bullet. Not a drama. I went out past where we’d dumped the bombmaker, the girl was there too. I took his papers, not his gun. Not a crisis. I’m good.’
He pushed them forward; pushed hard first on Henry Wilson, then on Belcher. There was no time for argument. They had a small chance of finding Rat and Slime ahead of them, if they hurried and if the helicopter had not been in and hoisted the rifle team out. Henry and Belcher were out of his sight now, but he heard a scrape of boots on the ground and he called into the wind, filling his lungs and yelling towards them, ‘I’ll be behind you. Keep goi
ng. Don’t look back.’
They did not answer. He couldn’t say whether they’d heard or whether the wind had taken his shout. Little matter. He had seen them together, he’d sensed the bond. Corrie fell, went right down, hard against loose rocks; his own weight smashed on to the binoculars. He felt the loose glass of the lenses beneath him. It was the image intensifier, the eye that could see in darkness, and it lay shattered and useless. It should have been protected by the covering against a fall, but what was done could not be undone. He unhooked it from his neck and laid it carefully down, covering it with earth. He headed on. He had thought earlier that evening, contemplating the run, that the image of her would be in his mind, locked there – as Maggie’s image had been when he had crossed open ground and blundered, crippled, in the darkness. But she was not there: not her face, not the shape of her as she washed in a bowl, not the swing of her hips as she moved. Gone.
He had a purpose. He was no longer thinking about fractures and troughs and basins. He had a new purpose, an unexpected one, but he had seen them together, and Corrie knew what now mattered to him. It carried him into the wind and the dust, scratching at him, and his eyes were narrowed, almost closed.
Because he was following them, Corrie was their back-marker, would mind them.
The flying was not easy. It was usual, when going off base and into a target area, to have the bird on automatic pilot and let it cruise at a speed that was most fuel-efficient. It was fine and sunny outside their building – a good afternoon for using a pool, as Bart said. It was close to midnight where they were headed, and the forecast was foul, only the chance that the cloud cover might have broken in places, and a possibility – not confirmed – that wind speeds might slacken.
The stick was in his hands and he gripped it firmly. It was strange to think he was linked to the Predator as it battered its way south from the Saudi border, across the empty spaces of the desert, the mountains close to the mother-base far behind them. Casper imagined he felt the jolting that she took. She was a fragile bird, designed to fly in optimum conditions, to steer away from adverse weather. There would be air pockets where the craft fell and then it’d hit an updraught and be lifted, and the airframe would be shaken and the pods under the wide wings, where the Hellfires were, would be rocked. He would not have flown today if he hadn’t thought it mattered.
They crested the hill, and were soon splayed out in a line that stretched across a part of the plateau. Their torches found the scrape, and blood.
They did not use mobile phones. The security men led; there was no consultation with the young Egyptian. They were charged with bringing back the killer of the Ghost and the violator of a young girl and, if they failed, then they would face accusations of lack of effort, even of betrayal. They had lost their man, were humiliated, and knew it. Few among this group would have drifted back to the villages to preside at funerals and admit that incompetence – or worse. They had lost the most influential individuals in the movement operating in the Marib Governorate. It would be a long search. After finding the scrape, identified as the place from where the attackers had watched, the line looked for the direction of their flight. They made slower progress now, with only torchlight to work from; the blood drips had dried. There was a shout for attention.
And another.
Men crowded close, their torches lighting the ground, showing disturbed earth, as if a boot had dragged on soft soil. A few of the villagers might have been up and on to the plateau but the security men never had; they’d had no reason to. They had slowed. One of the security men asked a villager where, if they followed the line given them, it would take them. He was told that they were heading towards the sands, the Ramlat Dahm desert, which would later merge into the greater wilderness that was Rub’ al Khali. Another question: What was there? Nothing, he was told: no airfield, no grazing, no villages, no water. It was a place that God, in His wisdom, forgot. But they followed the few clues left for them and searched the ground for any signs of flight and endured the force of the wind. Some cursed about it but none of them would dare to fail. The line stayed intact, and moved on, and some of them had a sense – without evidence to support it – that they were closing in on their prey.
Belcher said to Henry, ‘If you drop, I’ll carry you.’
‘Thank you.’
They hurried on, Belcher holding Henry Wilson’s arm, fingers tight on her elbow. There had been moments when the force of the wind had seemed to blow them back and they nearly tripped over. Belcher’s other hand gripped the business part of his rifle; its strap flapped on his shoulder. They went at pace, tried to clock up distance. He did not say to her that he thought the Sixer was in poor shape; it would be obvious to her too. Belcher had lived the lie for so many months, and done it in the shadow of executions by crucifixion and beheading and firing squad, that he was good at reading minds and seeing what people looked to hide. It was bold talk to assure her she’d be carried – he did very little exercise; he was more likely to be found at a political lecture than training with weights. He wasn’t flabby because the food was poor quality and in short supply. Chances were that he would end up dependent on her, though neither knew where the helicopter would put down. But he reckoned she would be sharper than him, have better-toned muscle from humping stones and moving wheelbarrows and swinging a pickaxe, and would have eaten decent cooked meals. But he had the sense to realise, however bad his own fitness levels were, the Sixer’s were worse. He held her arm and they trudged on.
‘And I don’t want any talk about the future, what’ll come afterwards.’
‘It’s the light at the tunnel’s end, what I’m looking for.’
‘What we’ll do when we’re clear, hear me, none of that.’
A small tinkle of her laughter, despite it being difficult for any spit of humour where they were, what they faced. Belcher wanted to talk and was desperate to explore a time when it would all be over, to have something to hold on to, her and him, to cling to if chaos returned. He might only have the image of a smile and her hair over her face. It diverted his mind a fraction from being hunted, tracked, and the knowledge that the end could well be as bad as it had been for the boy from Omdurman, and for those killed when accused, falsely, of helping a prisoner to escape. Good deaths and bad deaths, Belcher doubted a difference existed. He wanted to talk, but his breath was short, it was harder to get the air deep down into his lungs, and there was more sand than stone now under their feet.
He would have liked to say that he would be with her for the whole of his life. He didn’t tell her he was a kid from a shit part of a shit town with a prison record, and no qualifications beyond stripping an assault rifle and siting a vehicle ambush. He didn’t say he had no money, no education, no friends and no family who would want to give him the time of day, and no girl who had ever featured greatly in his life. He wanted to say but failed that he’d fetch and carry for her, do whatever she asked of him, and protect her. He did not remind her that they were going quickly, were not hurt, had each other, whereas he was behind them and not able to keep up. Did not point out that the pursuers had to come past him before they reached Henry and himself; that he would be the block, delay the pursuit, and it was the best hope they had.
He didn’t say, ‘I’m afraid we’re lost. There’s nothing to latch on to, no marker, and the daylight will make little difference because there are no features and we haven’t even the sun to guide us if the cloud stays low, and we could walk in circles.’
Their clothing was flat against their bodies. Where skin was exposed, the gritty sand scratched it. They had had no time to drink and nothing to eat. They ploughed on, one step in front of the other, and sometimes the bigger stride was hers and sometimes his, and sometimes she sagged on his arm and sometimes it was him needing her to heave him up, and there’d be muffled oaths and he’d be pulled forward.
The first shot was fired far behind him.
The sound had to compete with the wind and its singing, but h
e heard it. And Belcher gasped, and hesitated, and lost the rhythm of his stride, and listened but did not hear another one, and then dragged her forward and they almost ran. He thought they were going in the direction they should be taking, but it was more important to get distance between themselves and the following pack. Then a second shot rang out, far away.
They would have been on Corrie if he had not fired.
He fired over open sights. His targets – for the first two shots – were the lights of the torches and the lamps. Corrie had aimed the rifle at them, and the wind buffeted him and he could not be certain whether they were two hundred yards from him, or more than that, or less, but there had been a trail of lights and the shapes of men behind them, and he’d heard raised voices. He had collapsed the line.
He turned, hurried after Henry and Belcher, his back to the pursuers. There was a volley, ragged, of return fire.
He had no idea of how far he had come from the rim that overlooked the villages. He hadn’t glanced at his watch. It should have been a special one, befitting his role, a sniper’s watch with dials to tell him the time on every continent, and a built-in compass, an alarm. But his was ordinary – a gift from Clive Martin when he had achieved his grades for university, At that time, it was obvious now, his future had been mapped out, agreed with Bobby Carter. He’d worn the watch ever since, like a talisman – it was incredible, but it had not been taken from him, even when he’d been in the garage of the villa outside Aleppo. An ordinary watch that kept good time.
Corrie did not know how long he had been on the move, how far he had travelled; he was in a cocoon of darkness. Their torches were aimed at him, but did not reach him. They fired blind. His legs and shoulder hurt badly and his head ached, behind his eyes, and he could not remember when he had last slept, and for how long. The wound from the bullet the girl had fired was weeping, the fabric around the hole stuck hard to it. The bullets were high or low or either side of him, but he reckoned they did not yet know where he was, had not pinpointed him.
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