Bearings: The Compass Trilogy Part One
Page 38
I nodded,
“Fair enough Sergei…”
He nodded in our direction then was gone.
Neither of us spoke a word, we collected what Kutsarov had left behind, re-secured the basement then returned to the fourth floor.
Collectively we needed to speak to Robin and it was now more imperative than ever to have a quiet meeting with Niklas Meier…
Chapter Thirty-four
As suspected, the responses from the field search teams looking for the Mercedes truck were negative. In conjunction with the Navy Lynx, we had four air support assets tasked, each equipped with an HSL 600 searchlight, made by Swiss company Revue Thommen AG in their German factory in Waldenburg…
As Norman had been tasked with the INTEL supplied by Colonel March, it was he who had the daunting job of disseminating the two packages given to us by Kutsarov. The Audio tapes had been given to the fifth floor were Matt would be in for a long night…
I wandered quietly over to Robin’s office, Janet had finished for the day so I knew we both wouldn’t be disturbed, I tapped on his door…
“Yes…? Oh come in…! “Is it not a good time…?”
“When has it been that lately…? Come, sit…” “Do you know where we are…?”
“In terms of Harraghy and the truck…? Yes…”
“Ok, something else has cropped up which correlates somewhat with what your friend the Colonel gave us…”
He closed the file, secured it then placed the lid on his fountain pen…
“I’m listening…” “Sergei Kutsarov…?”
“Ah yes…The Russians have him officially down as an Envoy but in reality he’s a very accomplished and experienced intelligence Officer. Old School, of course, he and I were quite the adversaries in days of yore, when the climate was a little chillier shall we say… Why mention him…?”
“I had a chat with him in the basement thirty minutes ago…” “You did…?”
“Well, he and I had the chat, Charlie and Chris listened… Intently…”
“How much things change and how they stay the same…! He’s done it before, you know, twice…”
“Robin… Why haven’t you asked me what he wanted and why haven’t you gone off on one because a foreign intelligence officer was in this building uninvited…?”
“What did he have for us…?”
“No, not yet… You need to answer my question first. I need to know whether he’s yanking my chain or not…”
Robin glanced over my shoulder, I assumed to check the door… Quietly he said…
“Tazi… His codename is Tazi. He’s not an agent as such. He’s never given us anything his Master deemed worthy of compromising their national security but he does lend a hand, so to speak…”
“So the HUMINT he’s passed to us is probably genuine…?”
“It will be, yes… We’ll just have to reciprocate with something that helps them…”
“Cosy…”
“No, not cosy, useful… Very useful infact… So…?”
“Two files which he says will give us firm INTEL on the PIRA hardliners who have set up this campaign plus the name of the overseas sponsor. There are also two audio recordings of telephone conversations to back up the literature…”
“Really…? They must be worried, especially if they’ve handed over part of their intelligence file which gives us members of PIRA who were collaborating with the KGB. I take it their old Soviet codenames and case officers have been blanked or removed…?”
“I really couldn’t tell you… Norm’ is reading them now and Matt is working his magic with the recordings…”
“What…! You haven’t passed them on to the third floor…?” “Er no…? He knocked on our door not theirs…”
“Ha ha…! Classic… Section Chief…? I like your style…!”
He lifted his telephone and pushed four numbers,
“Matt…? For our eyes and ears only. If anyone begins to sniff, send them to me, understood…?”
“Yes sir… I actually don’t think it’ll be too long before I have something. There have been two near misses up to now…”
“Thank you… So Iain what else…?”
“Recorded conversations, I believe, between our friend Bezold and a Middle Eastern with the codename Nergal. The Russians think he’s the backer…”
“You know the Germans are with us in the Yemen, don’t you…?”
“Yes sir I do, it’s another reason I’m here. I want to brief Niklas Meier. This may give them what they need to convict Bezold for good and the ability to move McQueen from remand to somewhere a little more secure…”
“Let’s see what we have, and then I’ll speak to the Foreign Sec’- He’ll want to go to the PM with this…”
“Yes sir…”
*****
Harraghy had been making steady progress. Secretly he’d thought the two would not have made it this far. The media coverage on the radio had been constant, however no description of the truck had been given. Occasionally he had noticed aerial spotlights but none as yet had ventured close enough to identify them. He and McCauley had been travelling for over six hours now and were actively seeking another stopover point. Their overall plan was to have the device in place by 0630. This would allow them enough time to flee the scene and head to North Walsham prior to their departure to the safehouse in Dordrecht.
On the southern outskirts of the small Leicestershire market town of Hinckley, Harraghy noticed a fuel station ahead; he reached for his cellphone…
“Jim we’ll stop here, if I don’t piss soon I’ll need flippers…”
“Right Gerry… There’s nothing around so when you’re ready son…”
“There’s a fuel stop up ahead, I’ll fill up and we can grab a bite while we’re here…”
Harraghy indicated to the left then turned in onto the stations forecourt, stopping next to the Diesel pumps. McCauley pulled the big Rover coupe over and parked in front of the station’s building.
Ten minutes later Harraghy left the store and headed to the parked car.
“The guy in the night booth said there’s an overnight truckstop two miles down the road, we’ll wait there until 0545…”
McCauley nodded then gunned the engine. Again no problems. So far so good Harraghy thought as he pulled the heavily laden Mercedes back on to the A5, we may actually get this one right… He was stunned that all the other devices had been neutralized in one way or the other, He was also stunned by the fact that Crown and Marward were both dead and that Garret was missing too. Was it the over use of fresh recruits or had the Brits just been lucky…? No, that wasn’t it. He didn’t believe in luck, he believed in constructive planning and application… He was determined that this campaign wouldn’t be a total failure.
*****
I returned from the mess to the sound of my office telephone ringing…
“Section Chief…”
“Chief, Robin said to only speak to you…?” “Yes Matt, what’ve you found…?”
“I’ve got a positive on a voice match, 98%...” “Excellent…!”
“I’m having his file pulled now. I’ll bring it with the recording… You may want to speak to Box too, he’s known to us…”
“Right I’ll get Mark on to it…” “See you in five minutes…”
I walked across to Robin’s office and tapped on the old storeroom door before opening it…
“Sir we have a positive on the recording. Matt is bringing the INTEL down with him…”
“Ok have our usual people in, say fifteen minutes…?
When Robin emerged we were ready. Matt had prepared two recordings, he played the first: This was a European female speaking curtly to an Eastern accented male discussing financial dealings. It left us no doubt as to what these dealings concerned…
Our voice recognition had nothing on the male and only a 62 % return on the female; not enough. I looked across to Robin, his body language agreed… We’d need BND and GSG9
assistance…
The second recording was far more revealing. Lasting less than 120 seconds, maybe but it was 120 seconds of guilt-edged stuff… We again had confirmation of the codename Nergal but also another, Busby; a clear indication and connection to the football team codenames used by the ASU’s…
Charlie was to brief us,
“Right… Voice recognition identifies “Busby” as one Conall Regan Morris, a sixty three year old Irishman, born January 27th 1932…
In 1954, as a 22 year old, he was involved in the attack on Gough Barracks, Armagh. This was part of the push to re-arm the IRA…
From 1956 he was involved in the border campaign: Operation Harvest. In the same year, it’s believed he was involved with the group who blew up a BBC relay transmitter in Derry and thought to be a leader of one of the flying columns.”
I interrupted…
“Flying column, Charlie…?”
“Aye laddie, the name given to their guerrilla cells…”
I responded with thumbs up, allowing him to continue,
“Later in 1957, it was thought at one point he had been killed as one of four members preparing a bomb in a farmhouse in Edentubber, County Louth. It detonated prematurely, killing the civilian owner…”
He glanced at his paperwork before continuing…
“Morris was interned in 1958, a year later he was released as the internment of many of the members led to more or less a ceasing of hostilities…
After that, he was mainly involved in sabotage missions for PIRA, cratering roads that sort of thing… There have only been rumours and superstitions since, nothing positive…
Oh… One last point… He’s the father of Robert Morris…” This made everyone stop and sit up…
“That’s all… Iain…?”
“I think it’s fair to say his liking for the flying columns is reflected in this campaign…”
“I think so, the cell construction and nature of attacks is very similar…”
Robin leafed through the brief before making a decision,
“We have what we need. I’ll pass this over to Seamus. The RUC can have him; it’ll be a high profile feather in their caps, re- strengthening their position nicely after last year’s crash…”
I had to agree… Seamus and his Special Branch officers had worked hard on this, with little in the way of support from Martin Wright- Stevens… It would be a fair reward which wouldn’t go unnoticed. I could see Charlie was pleased too.
My focus was now shifting, I needed Sarah. I needed a quiet word with the BND…
*****
Police officers Chris Baldwin and Denise Harper had spent the previous two hours dealing with a complaint regarding off road motorcycle joyriders. The former RAF Lindley, now the site of the Motor Industry Research Association, MIRA, was a particular attraction for them. On rejoining the A5 they had three more calls to make, these were to local fuel stops along the route in the search for the Mercedes truck… There next call was approaching on the left…
Baldwin reached for the RT to relay their location to Hinckley Road station control,
“Papa Charlie 4, control… Currently calling at Dodwells Service Station, over…”
“Roger Papa Charlie 4…”
“Come on Denise, just two more after this one…”
The service station was a regular stop for the two officers; they knew the staff well. This was a busy section of the A5 due to its close proximity to the M69 motorway link between the two cities of Leicester and Coventry. They had also seen a rise in the number of “drive offs”, members of the public fleeing without paying. This had now led to the fuel supplier investing in technology which registered a customer’s index number. A competing service station three miles further, the officer’s next stop, had done the same.
“Evening Suresh, how’s it been this today…?”
“Steady, Officer Baldwin, steady… A couple of duff debit cards, genuine by the looks of things and the odd out-of-date fuel card from the HGV’s, the usual… Hello Officer Harper… Am I putting the kettle on…?”
“No not tonight, this visit is business. We have a few photos’ we need you to look at plus some literature for you to put up for your staff, if that’s ok…?”
“Fine, fine…”
“How is Rachana…?”
“She’s ok… Our sons and I think it is better for her now not to work the evenings…”
Officer Harper was alluding to an incident of serious theft which left Suresh Bhandari’s wife, Rachana, quite traumatized. He or his sons now worked the late evening shifts until closing at 2300… The garage owner showed Officer Baldwin to the rear of the counter, unzipping his case, Baldwin removed the images…
“Take your time Suresh…”
He looked at the images one by one carefully. He could sense the police officers urgency. Finally he placed two on one side and kept another in his hand…
“This one definitely. He was driving a truck similar to this: red I think…? He bought £40 worth of fuel plus snacks and sandwiches… This man…? I’m not so sure. He didn’t come to the counter… He got into a separate car outside…”
“Any idea of the make…?”
“No, sorry… It was a large family saloon, that’s all I saw…”
“But this man is a positive and you’re fairly certain of the truck…?” “I am, yes…”
“You have CCTV…?”
“Only for the counter area, but we record the pumps on the forecourt too…”
“How long ago…?”
“Two hours, maybe two-and-a-half…? He asked if there was an area he could rest. I showed him were the truckstop was behind the pub on the AtoZ…”
“Denise, stay put… I’m going to the car…”
Baldwin raced across the forecourt to the patrol car, “Papa Charlie 4 to control…”
“Control”
“Positive sighting of Target Subjects and Target Vehicle… Now believed to be stationary at the truckstop adjacent to the Three Pots public house, over…”
“Roger Papa Charlie 4…Wait for instruction, out…”
*****
I answered my cellphone to a very breathless Steve Case, “We’ve a positive on the target vehicle in Leicestershire…!” “Where are you now…?”
“I was about to book in to the Holiday Inn, the one in the centre of Bristol…”
“Ok, hold on…”
I pressed the intercom on my deskphone,
“Chris, get in here now and grab Charlie on the way…”
Holding my phone between my neck and shoulder, I leaned over my coffetable which was covered in small-scale Ordinance Survey maps,
“Iain, are you still there…?”
“Yes…! Hold on… I’m trying to locate a map…”
Chris and Charlie entered, “What gaffer…?”
“Steve’s lot have found the truck in Leicestershire… Chris, find Robin, we need Harris to airlift him…”
Without a word he dashed to a telephone, “What do you need from me laddie…?”
“Look at those maps for the closest airfield to Bristol…”
Charlie was about to speak,
“Not the big civvy one, something small or military, RAF if poss’…”
He began sorting the O.S maps,
“Steve, start moving east, I’ll call you back. Cormorant is close; the Lynx is refuelling in Cambridgeshire…”
Charlie was looking at me,
“I don’t need to look… Hullavington and Lyneham are within forty minutes, faster with his blues on…”
“Ok… What’s at each…?”
“Hullavington is home to 4626 Squadron. They’re aeromedical evac, part of Operation Granby in the Gulf… They’re moving to Lyneham later this year plus we used them for Kestrel…”
“What’s at Lyneham…?”
“Mainly Hercules transport. They fly to Iraq most days… We use it for flights too: the Expeditionary Wing is there…”
&n
bsp; “Lyneham it is then…”
Chris’s head appeared around the door, “Colonel Harris, line one…”
“Thanks Chris…”
“Section Chief, what do you need…?”
“Rapid air transport for Inspector Case to Leicestershire…”
“Chris tells me he’s at Bristol now so we’ll need to rendezvous at Lyneham then…?”
“That’s our guess, yes…”
“Right… We have a flight-ready Puma on standby… I’ll have her airborne to LYE… Call me back with the destination…”