Tracers

by Adrian Magson

  When they dispersed and moved away, Rafa’i had gone.

  ‘Damn – where is he?’ Rik muttered. ‘Something must have spooked him.’ He scanned the grass and pathway around the area, sweeping beyond Joanne’s position and focussing on the people in the background for signs of a figure hurrying away from the park. But his view was blocked by the tourists as they swung after their guide and approached his position between the parade ground and Birdcage Walk.

  ‘I’m unsighted,’ Harry told him. ‘The memorial’s in the way.’

  ‘It’s OK, I’ve got him.’ Rik gave a sigh of relief. ‘He’s approaching Joanne’s position now.’

  They were both tense, checking the area for signs of watchers, knowing this was the time of maximum threat. If the killer knew Rafa’i was here, he could make an approach from almost any direction. If he was determined enough, he might even make his play now, rather than waiting for a more convenient opportunity.

  Rafa’i approached to within a few feet of Joanne. He looked nervous, but must have spoken, because Joanne looked up and smiled, then gestured to the grass alongside her.

  But Rafa’i shook his head and pointed towards the Mall. He wanted to move away from the lake, and into the illusory safety of the trees. For once, Joanne seemed unsure. She hesitated, almost glancing at Rik, which would have been a mistake, then shook her head. Rafa’i responded with an emphatic jerk of his hand.

  He was too scared of the open. He wanted to find cover.

  From his position on the open parade ground, Harry was watching the people nearby, scanning faces and checking body language.

  He had discounted a car attack as impractical; it was too easy to get snarled up in this area, with no guaranteed way out. Similarly, another motorbike, although ideal as an attack vehicle with its speed and manoeuvrability, would stand out too much in this environment.

  That left someone on foot. Although still early for the bulk of tourists, there was an alarming number of them moving through the area, any one of which could be a potential threat.

  He concentrated on single walkers, dismissing the elderly or infirm, anyone who didn’t fit the bill of an agile and capable assassin. Pinstripe suits abounded, briefcases in hand, and smart office workers hurried across the open expanse of the parade ground. Nobody stopping, nobody loitering suspiciously. It was all very normal.

  He swung back to Joanne. She seemed to be in urgent discussion with Rafa’i, leaning forward as if to emphasize a point. The Iraqi was shaking his head, casting glances around him as if looking for someone. Joanne must have broached the matter of Harry and Rik, as they had planned. He evidently wasn’t impressed.

  Then Joanne gave another prearranged signal. She waved her hand in a lazy motion around her head as if brushing away flies. It was the signal to move in, but slowly. If they could talk to him, they might manage to convince him of their desire to help. If not, he would keep on running until the killer caught him.

  Harry began walking across the parade ground towards them, skirting a group of American ladies. He saw Rik break cover to his left and move across the grassy area around the lake. In the background was the gingerbread-like building that was Duck Island Cottage. They each had over two hundred metres to cover before they reached Joanne and Rafa’i.

  The gap had narrowed to fifty metres when a flock of pigeons burst noisily into the air by the lake. It was on the perimeter path where Rafa’i had first appeared. Simultaneously, a group of tourists separated in a flurry of squeals and laughter, driven apart by the sudden noisy take-off of the birds. It left a gap showing the perimeter path and the stretch of park beyond.

  A lone figure was walking towards them.

  He was of medium height, slim and lithe, dressed in dark jeans and a black anorak, and had one hand tucked into a side pocket. Something about the man’s appearance set alarm bells ringing in Harry’s head. Then he realized what it was: unlike everyone else in the immediate vicinity, the man had shown no reaction to the flurry of birds moving off. He was focussed solely on a point in front of him, face pinched in concentration.

  He was looking directly at Joanne and Rafa’i.

  ‘We’ve got company!’ Harry said urgently, and saw Rik lift his hand in acknowledgement.

  They both started running.

  Joanne, her attention drawn by the birds, had spotted him, too, because in the same instant, she rose to her feet. Reaching out and grabbing Rafa’i’s hand, she began dragging him away towards the south side of the park and Birdcage Walk. He resisted slightly, but she spoke to him and pointed with her camera at the man in the anorak. Whatever she said was clearly enough to persuade Rafa’i to go with her.

  The man in the anorak broke into a fast jog, scattering tourists and more birds. He disappeared behind the bushes for a few moments, then came back into view, covering the ground with surprising speed. It was obvious that he was fit and agile and would soon run down the Iraqi, who was having trouble moving quickly, his movements stiff and awkward.

  Harry veered to intercept the newcomer. He shouted a warning, causing a few nearby tourists to spin round. Someone laughed, as if unsure whether this wasn’t some unusual tourist event for their benefit. A burst of Japanese echoed after the attacker as he elbowed aside a short, squat lady festooned with cameras.

  At that moment, the man spotted Harry. He increased his pace, jumping over a couple sitting on the grass, one hand still in his pocket.

  Harry knew he wasn’t going to make it in time. He wasn’t a fast enough runner and the angle was all against him. The attacker’s line of approach meant he was drawing ahead and was now within striking distance of Rafa’i, who was still struggling to keep up with Joanne in spite of her hold on his arm.

  Then Rik appeared. He was on a collision course with the attacker. Before the man realized he was vulnerable, Rik had hurdled the metal fencing around the grass and struck him with his shoulder, driving the attacker off his feet and sending him spinning away across the ground with a savage whoosh of expelled breath.

  ‘Keep going!’ Rik yelled to Joanne. He was wincing and holding his shoulder, but was able to stay on his feet. He turned to face the attacker, who had rolled away and was getting to his feet, struggling for breath. When he took his hand out of his pocket, he was holding a foldaway knife.

  He flicked it open, the blade glinting in the sun.

  FORTY

  Harry drove on, his breathing becoming harsh. His knees were hurting and he had a pain building in his chest, and he wondered why he hadn’t kept up a better level of fitness. He swore loudly in frustration.

  It was enough to make the knife man turn his head. When he saw how close Harry was, he stopped and thrust out the knife, gesturing at them with a short stabbing motion, his face empty of emotion. Then, before either of them could get any closer, he turned and raced away and was soon lost among the walkers around the south side of the lake.

  ‘Rik . . . you all right?’ Harry skidded to a halt alongside him. He saw a flash of colour in the background as a police patrol car turned into Horse Guards Road. ‘Heads up – police.’ If the police stopped them, they could be tied up for hours answering pointless questions.

  Rik bent and rubbed his side. ‘I’m fine. Just winded.’

  ‘Same here. If they stop us, it was a mugging that went wrong, OK? The victims ran off, too. We can’t let them take Rafa’i or Joanne in for questioning.’

  ‘Fair enough.’ Rik took a whooping breath of air and winced. ‘Shit . . . I think I did a rib in. That bastard was as hard as nails. It was like running into a tree. I wonder why he backed off.’

  Harry shrugged. ‘Maybe he didn’t like the odds. We were lucky he didn’t have anything more lethal than a blade.’

  The police car drifted to a stop alongside them, the passenger window dropping.

  ‘Everything all right, sir?’ The officer in the passenger seat studied them coolly. His driver was using his radio, but didn’t appear unduly concerned. In the background, a wo
man officer was watching from a wooden police box behind one of the government buildings.

  Harry wondered how much she had seen. ‘No problem,’ he replied. ‘A bloke ran towards a couple and my friend thought he was after a handbag. It was a mistake.’ He gestured towards Rik, who was still looking winded. ‘He got a stitch trying to play Superman.’

  ‘If you say so, sir.’ The policeman considered it for a moment, then said something to his driver. The car surged away, leaving them alone.

  ‘Close,’ said Rik, and took a series of deep breaths.

  ‘Yeah. Come on.’ Harry turned towards Birdcage Walk. ‘Let’s catch up with our runaway Iraqi.’

  They followed the direction in which Joanne had hustled Rafa’i, and found her standing alone on the edge of Parliament Square. She looked annoyed and confused, but far from frightened.

  ‘He bloody pulled away from me,’ she explained angrily, gesturing towards the square, ‘and jumped in a cab.’ She rolled her eyes towards two policemen walking along the pavement fifty yards away. ‘If they hadn’t shown up, I’d have dragged his arse back out and sat on him until you got here.’

  ‘Don’t worry about it,’ Harry said, glancing back towards the park. He was worried that the man with the knife would show up again. Given his past performance in dealing with his targets, he was unlikely to give up merely because they had inconveniently got in the way. ‘Come on, let’s find somewhere to talk.’

  He led them across the square and down the steps by the Embankment to Westminster Pier. A number of Thames excursion cruisers were loading passengers nearby, but where they were standing, in the shadow of a statue of Boadicea, they were as good as alone.

  He stopped and turned to Joanne. ‘Did you call anyone and tell them where you were meeting Rafa’i?’

  ‘Call who? I don’t know anyone.’ She looked angry at the suggestion, her jaw clenched tight under the skin.

  He ignored her anger and pointed to her rucksack. ‘Empty that out.’

  ‘Why? What the hell are you saying?’ She snatched the bag away as if daring him to take it from her. She was standing squarely, balanced and ready, and it was easy to see why she had stood out to the recruiter for the operation in Iraq.

  ‘He’s saying you might have a bug,’ Rik suggested calmly, leaning on the wall with his back to the river. ‘Either that or Rafa’i told somebody where he was meeting you. My bet’s on a bug.’

  With obvious reluctance, Joanne opened her rucksack and allowed Harry to go through it. He checked the side pockets and the few items of clothing inside, then examined the straps and fabric, feeling for anything unusual in the structure of the bag.

  There was nothing. He handed it back.

  ‘Finished?’ Joanne muttered with a withering scorn. ‘Jesus – no wonder you’re single. You’re paranoid, you know that?’

  Harry ignored the comment. He nodded at her camera, which she was still clutching. ‘Where did you get that?’

  Joanne frowned. ‘I bought it a few days ago. I had to leave the issue one behind. Why?’

  ‘What about your mobile?’

  She dug into her pocket and held it out. It looked scratched and well used. ‘This? It was part of my original kit, along with the sat phone. I was supposed to surrender everything personal before I left for Iraq, but I held on to it.’

  ‘What about the phone? Where’s that?’

  ‘In a sewage ditch. I dumped it the day I flew out. They searched us at the airport – I couldn’t exactly pretend I was an aid worker with that kind of kit on me, could I?’

  Harry took the phone from her and stripped off the back. He took out the battery and studied the SIM card, then turned and tossed everything over the wall into the swirling brown water below.

  ‘Hey – what did you do that for?’ Joanne turned on him. ‘Are you nuts?’

  Rik placed a gentle hand on her shoulder. ‘They must have placed a tracker in the phone,’ he explained. ‘It’s the only way that guy could have turned up just like that. He wasn’t following Rafa’i. He was following you.’

  She batted his hand away. ‘How the hell do you know that? Anyway, if they’d bugged the phone, they’d have known days ago that I was still alive and come looking for me before.’

  ‘They probably did,’ he replied. ‘Only they hadn’t any leads until you switched it on and made a call. Right up until then, they must have thought you’d got caught in the blast and were no longer active.’ He moved away a couple of paces to prevent anyone getting too close and overhearing their conversation.

  ‘He’s right,’ Harry said. ‘They’d hardly have sent someone to Baghdad to check it out after the explosion. But once they realized you’d made it out, there was every reason to start tracking you through the signal.’ He gestured around them. ‘They already had your number and it’s easier here with all the transmitters. The moment you made a call, they had you pinpointed.’

  Joanne looked unconvinced. ‘Then how come Humphries didn’t say anything?’

  ‘Why should he? The whole point of operational security is that they don’t tell people what they don’t need to. It gets in the way.’

  ‘That’s ridiculous. He’d have told me.’

  ‘There is another explanation,’ Harry spoke reasonably, trying to take the heat out of the situation. ‘The phone might have been bugged as a rescue option. If anything went wrong and you got isolated in hostile territory, they could send in a team to find you. That would have been the good guys.’

  Joanne chewed her lip but said nothing, still too angry with him. But at least she was listening.

  ‘Then along come the bad guys,’ he continued. ‘The ones trying to kill Rafa’i. They worked out that you were both alive and running, and decided to use the phone for different reasons. Where you and your phone went, so did the man in the anorak. Trace you, catch a lead on Rafa’i at the same time and finish the job all nice and neat.’

  The silence ticked away, interrupted by the rattle and clang of a gangplank being wheeled away from one of the pleasure cruisers. A man shouted and the water around the stern began to boil as the boat moved away.

  Joanne took a deep breath. ‘That would be saying somebody never meant for me to come out again. Or if I got out, they could silence me. I don’t believe it. They wouldn’t do that – Christ, they don’t kill their own people!’

  Harry didn’t deny it and didn’t look at Rik. How do you tell someone that you know different, that you were once marked down for death by people on your own side?

  ‘They might not have planned it that way. They might have hoped you’d get out in time and it could all be explained away. Maybe they got Humphries to call the meeting to get you out of harm’s way. When the bad guys realized you’d made it out and had dropped off the radar, you became a loose cannon – a liability. Because one day you’d work out what had happened and you’d want to talk about it. And with what you knew about the operation, you were dangerous.’

  ‘What about the good guys? They wouldn’t just consign me to the dustbin, would they?’ Joanne’s face flushed red at the idea that she had been so casually dismissed as expendable by the people who had selected, recruited and trained her.

  ‘Think about it,’ Harry pointed out. ‘You didn’t surface after the explosion, neither were you at the safe house, which is where they’d have expected you to turn up. The logical assumption after a while would have been that you’d been killed. Without a thorough forensics check of the compound, they wouldn’t have been able to prove otherwise. Frankly, I can’t see anyone risking a forensics team for a non-attributable operation over there, anyway.’ His tone was sympathetic but matter-of-fact. ‘You said it yourself; you had no family, nothing to tie you down. There was nobody to tell . . . and nobody to press for an inquest. Sorry to be brutal, but it’s why they chose you in the first place. You were expendable.’

  Her expression said she knew he was right, but her words said different. ‘I don’t believe it.’

 
‘Don’t let it get to you,’ said Rik, moving closer. ‘If you were abandoned, it was through a balls-up, not callousness.’

  Joanne hugged herself, absorbing the information and looking at them in turn. Bit by bit she appeared to relax. ‘Bastards,’ she muttered softly, although it wasn’t clear to whom she was referring. ‘How do we contact Rafa’i now? My mobile number was all he had. He doesn’t know anybody else.’

  ‘We wait,’ said Harry. ‘To be precise, you wait – back in the park.’

  ‘You think he’ll come back?’ Rik asked. ‘He might’ve been spooked for good.’

  ‘I doubt it.’ Harry looked at Joanne. ‘He doesn’t know anyone else, and you saved him from Anorak Man, so he’ll trust you. Did you notice he wasn’t carrying anything?’

  The realization of what Harry was saying gave Joanne’s voice an edge of excitement. ‘He’s staying nearby. I never gave it a thought.’

  ‘At least somewhere close enough to leave his stuff.’ Harry gestured back towards the park. ‘Come on. Let’s see if he’s still around. In the meantime, you can help us understand why somebody’s so intent on killing him.’

  ‘What about the man with the knife? He might be hanging around as well.’ Joanne looked unsure, but they knew it was not about her own safety. She didn’t want to expose Rafa’i to another attack.

  ‘This time we stick together,’ Rik murmured. ‘If he tries again, he’ll come unstuck. Pity we didn’t get a good look at him, though. I was too busy running to focus clearly. All I saw was a blur.’

  Joanne held up the camera. ‘No problem. I took a shot of him as he ran towards us. It should be clear enough to give us a face to watch out for.’