by Andy McNab
‘Mr Antonov, you ask a lot that I alone am in no position to guarantee. A demonstration of your good intentions might improve your situation, though. Perhaps the traditional release of the old, the infirm, the women and the children?’
‘Demonstration of good intentions?’ Laszlo kept his voice dangerously even. ‘You seem to be under the illusion that this is a negotiation, Chief Constable. Let me assure you that it is not.’
‘Quite so.’ Alderson knew he wasn’t going to get anywhere with that ploy. ‘After all, it is the stated policy of Her Majesty’s government never to negotiate with terrorists.’
‘But I am not a terrorist. The ICC have decided that I am a war criminal. There is a difference, which I would ask you to respect. Some call me a freedom fighter, but the truth is, Chief Constable, I’m just a soldier, who carried out his duty, fighting for his country. If necessary, however, I’m quite prepared to kill every man, woman and child on this train.’
‘Mr Antonov . . . My name is Michael. May I call you Laszlo?’
‘Of course you may, Michael.’
Laszlo liked the tone of this man. He knew that their time together would be short, however. Even before control was handed over, the chief constable would be out of the picture. The Security Service would install their own case officer; someone who did not need any notes or files. That was a shame – but it might mean he got to encounter the man who’d been tracking him for so long.
‘Perhaps so. Perhaps you are a soldier. But that is for others to decide. What concerns me are the hundreds of lives you are putting at risk. I want to make sure that you get what you need so they stay alive.’
Laszlo was pleased with what Alderson had said. ‘Thank you, Michael. And I, of course, will help you – if you provide me with the safe passage I require to a country with no extradition treaties in place with Great Britain.’
‘No doubt you already have somewhere in mind.’
‘Indeed I do,’ Laszlo said. ‘I’ve spent a pleasant few years in London, but now I think somewhere warmer, with less stringent banking regulations, would be much more suitable. I’ll need to be sure of that before I deposit the hundred and fifty kilograms of gold that you’re going to pay me.’
‘Gold?’
‘Correct. And I will require a Chinook helicopter. Both main fuel tanks full, and a full cabin fuel bladder to feed the main tanks.’
The chief constable couldn’t square what he had read about this man with what he was saying. It was as if Laszlo had taken his plan of action from a 1970s B movie.
‘More details will follow, Michael. Now you have thirty minutes to—’
The line went dead.
‘Hello . . . Hello?’ He jiggled the switch a few times, then swore and banged down the radio mic.
Alderson checked the signal on his mobile. ‘Hello? Laszlo?’
He checked the screen again before throwing it onto the seat.
The driver cut the four-ways and started to check for a break in the traffic. He had been with the chief constable long enough to know it was time to get his foot down even before his employer did.
‘Right, fuck it, get moving.’
Laszlo kicked the driver. ‘Where is the radio control? Where do we check?’
‘Under us.’ He didn’t even give Laszlo time to take a breath. He just wanted to do what he was told, when he was told, and live to tell the tale. ‘The control box is marked “TTR”.’
54
CROUCHED ON THE track now, but still under the train, Tom drew back into the shadows, hidden behind one of the giant wheels of the locomotive. A few moments later, he heard a scuffling sound and saw a man clamber down and begin to inch his way along the darkened track towards the front of the engine.
The man knelt down, lit his torch and leaned forward, squinting at the undercarriage in the bluish light of its beam. He spotted something – a glint of metal, perhaps – at the end of a dangling cable. He reached towards it.
Tom seized the outstretched arm and wrenched it so vigorously that the South Ossetian’s forehead cracked against the steel box housing the radio gear. Tom grabbed his neck before he had time to recover and pounded his skull into the steel railway line.
Now crouched above him, Tom straightened his arms to maximize the pressure around his opponent’s throat and squeezed. He felt no emotion. The equation was simple: ‘Him or me.’ The quicker Tom killed him, the quicker the threat would be removed.
The man died without making a sound.
Tom took hold of the body and dragged it towards him until it was completely hidden beneath the train. He’d just finished when he heard more footsteps – and the unmistakable clink of belt-linked ammunition dangling from the top cover of a machine-gun.
The bodies split into two groups. One headed to the rear of the train, towards the UK, the other towards France, and Tom.
He had no choice but to stay as still as the dead man beside him. He held his breath and tensed every muscle in his body as the two sets of legs made their way up the side of the train towards him.
The link continued to swing back and forth against the Russian-made PKM general-purpose machine-gun as the legs drew level. His eyes swivelled as they passed where he lay and moved on towards the front of the train. That link wasn’t 9mm ceramic, designed to minimize the ricochet risk. It was heavy 7.62mm ball ammo: lumps of lead encased in brass, designed to rip humans apart in vast numbers, as well as any vehicles or cover they might be trying to hide behind.
Tom inched forward, flattening himself against the track bed, and peered out from under the engine. The two insurgents were now in the gloom and out of sight, but he could hear what they were doing. The faint metallic sound of ammunition boxes being opened and link being laid out ready to load told him everything he needed to know.
They were setting up the gun position to cover approach routes to the train from this end of the southbound track and the entrance to the service tunnel. They’d hold up any attack, and give Laszlo enough warning and opportunity to kill a serious number of the assault team before they reached the train. If Tom had been in Laszlo’s shoes, he’d have done the same. Except that Tom wasn’t in the martyrdom game, and he had a feeling that Laszlo might almost be welcoming it. Which made him a very dangerous enemy indeed.
He was about to move back when he heard the side window of the driver’s cabin slide open above him, then voices speaking Russian.
‘This place still stinks . . .’
He edged towards the sound and flattened himself against the side of the train, straining to hear what was being said.
‘Both guns are now operational.’
‘Good. Get the engineers to work.’
He heard a flurry of movement, then silence, followed by a shout: ‘And what’s happening with the radio?’
Shit. Tom quickly retreated to where the dead man lay and took his suppressed sub-machine-gun. As he started towards the rear of the train, two figures with heavy packs on their backs clambered down the steps and moved towards the door to the service tunnel.
55
‘HOW MUCH TIME before they take action?’ Sambor asked. Laszlo had followed him down the aisle.
‘Maybe an hour, once the radio is working. When we kill another of these sheep, they will have no choice but to send in our friends.’
‘You never give me enough time . . .’
‘There is not enough time in this life for you, little brother, whatever the task. You would spend all day deciding what to have for breakfast if I let you.’
Sambor laughed. ‘And why not? Breakfast is the most important meal of the day.’
Laszlo sniffed the air again and directed a ferocious glare towards the two children huddled together in the corner of the carriage. They watched him with terrified eyes.
‘What’s the matter with you, brother? Are you going soft on me? Those brats still smell worse than a Georgian.’ Laszlo addressed the nearest cluster of passengers. ‘I want someone to clean them up a
nd find them fresh clothes.’
Nobody moved.
‘Who knows where they were sitting? Where their luggage is?’
Still nothing.
‘I’ll make this easier for you,’ Laszlo growled. ‘If there are no volunteers, the kids will be killed and thrown off the train.’
He looked slowly around the carriage. Their eyes were cast down, but he saw fear etched on every face. His lip curled with disdain.
‘It is as I thought. The lives of these children are in your hands, but you do nothing. If you survive, I hope you will remember this moment of shame. You people disgust me.’
Tom had tracked the progress of the two men from the safety of the shadows.
Shielded momentarily from Laszlo and his huge sidekick by a bulkhead, he stepped forward into the light from the window closest to Delphine.
Attuned now to his presence, she caught sight of him almost immediately out of the corner of her eye, and turned her head slowly towards him.
Tom gestured at her, but she had no idea what he meant.
‘I’ll do it.’ Delphine stood and raised her hand. ‘I have some clothes that I think might fit them.’
Laszlo turned on his heel. ‘Clothes? Where are these clothes?’
‘They’re in a shopping bag in Coach Eight.’
His eyes narrowed. ‘So tell me, why are you so eager to volunteer?’
‘Because they’re only children. Because they’ve just lost their mother, they’re very frightened, and I don’t want any harm to come to them.’
‘And are you a mother?’ Laszlo’s expression was still sceptical.
Delphine felt her mouth go dry. She shook her head.
Laszlo continued the interrogation as Sambor grabbed her arm. ‘Then why do you travel with children’s clothes?’
‘Because I am—’ She corrected herself. ‘Because I was going to Paris to see my sister. They are gifts for my niece and nephew.’
He continued to study her face. A vein began to throb in her temple.
He took an agonizingly long time to reply. ‘Very well, then. You have more courage than the rest of these cattle.’ He gestured at the people around her.
Sambor’s hand tightened on her elbow as he pushed her towards one of the armed guards stationed at the end of the carriage. ‘Go with her.’ His breath smelt of overcooked cabbage. ‘And don’t let her out of your sight.’
As she passed the next window, Delphine risked another glance outside, but Tom had already disappeared back into the darkness.
56
AS THE DAUPHIN swept him, the Slime and the signals group in towards Folkestone, Gavin could see that the slow lane of the M20 had already turned into a car park. The line of static trucks and artics stretched back towards Ashford.
Operation Stack had been initiated, closing a fourteen-mile coast-bound section of the Kent motorway between junctions eight and nine. Gavin imagined the HGV drivers, seasoned campaigners in the field, switching off their engines, making themselves a brew and settling down to watch sport or porn movies on the TVs in their cabs, or stretching out in their bunks for a few hours’ kip.
The other lanes were jammed with cars, the moon faces of some drivers visible through their windscreens, staring up as the heli flashed overhead, maybe praying for divine intervention. ‘Poor bastards,’ Gavin muttered, into his headset mic. ‘They’re probably thinking they’ll be on the move again any minute, in France by this afternoon.’
Private motorists with Eurotunnel tickets would eventually be given ferry vouchers. Gavin always found himself grinning at that. It was a bit like being handed a ticket to Fight Night and spending the evening in the ring.
The moment they’d closed the tunnel, the propaganda machine had swung into action. The powers-that-be wanted to keep the situation as covert as possible for as long as possible. The news channels were saying that the whole complex had been paralysed by yet another power failure. Daytime TV producers were hoping to discover a Hollywood star aboard or a woman in premature labour; if they could tick both boxes at once, so much the better.
The French and UK governments couldn’t have cared less, as long as they steered clear of the truth: they both knew that the public loved a bad news story; the media on each side of the Channel could have a field day pointing the finger at the old enemy.
The Dauphin circled over the intricate pattern of bridges, access roads, loading ramps and platforms. Hard over to his right, Gavin could see the point where the gleaming tracks converged and then disappeared into the twin black holes set into the chalk cliff face. Figures in hi-vis vests scurried this way and that between police vans, ambulances and fire appliances.
They skimmed the rooftops of the administration buildings and went into a hover as the pilot made his approach to the helipad in the emergency staging area.
Gavin could see Woolf staring back up at them, hands on hips and a sour expression on his face, wanting to get on with the job.
57
THICKETS OF STEEL crowd barriers had taken root outside the entrance to the terminal. Police in riot gear held back a mob of reporters and photographers, crowds of angry motorists and foot passengers, and a few spectators unable to resist the attraction of crowds and commotion.
The heli landed out of their sight, and Gavin and his signallers gathered their equipment. As Woolf strode over, Gavin wasted no time on preliminaries. ‘You got comms with COBRA yet?’
Woolf shrugged. ‘Only on mobile. And there are still none with the train. COBRA’s faffing about. I got here from London quicker than they can get their bloody act together in Westminster. The French are already set up and, as far as I know, the situation hasn’t moved on from bi-national status.’
Gavin nodded. Each would be doing what they could to sort things out from their end of the tunnel, but at some stage, the earlier the better, one of them would have to grip the situation. Which was where the whole process got complicated. As far as Gavin was concerned, the problem wasn’t just too many chiefs and not enough Indians: it was the chiefs spending too much time admiring their headdresses and not enough leading the braves into battle.
As the rotors closed down and the signallers and Slime unloaded, the two men headed for the steel-shuttered entrance to the hangar.
The holding area was completely self-contained. One of the rectangular, green-powder-coated low-level buildings that dotted the site, it provided the Blue and Red teams and their vehicles with the perfect location – beyond prying eyes – for preparation and rehearsal.
Apart from a washroom block and enough power points to fire up the Blackpool illuminations, the interior was bare. Three men in hi-vis jackets stood beside a lot of trestle tables and cheap fold-up chairs stacked along one wall. Arms laden with ring binders and long cardboard tubes, they looked as nervous as schoolboys.
For some reason that Gavin never understood, people got star-struck when the Regiment turned up. He always did his best to put them immediately at their ease. Apart from anything else, he could get more information out of them that way.
‘All right, lads?’ He dumped his ready-bag by his feet. ‘Why don’t you get some of those tables out and we can have a look at what we’ve got, yeah?’
The signallers began to wire their satellite comms into the roof dishes, to hang flat-screens on the wall and network a series of laptop computers. The hi-vis lads fished the plans out of the tubes and laid them out while the Slime anchored their corners with whatever they could find. Gavin settled himself in a chair and glanced across at Woolf, who was continuing his mobile love affair with the Cabinet Office Briefing Room.
58
CLEMENTS WAS IN his usual seat, behind and just to the right of the home secretary. His job was to keep her supplied with files and briefing notes, to restrain her if she embarked upon any flights of rhetoric, and to intervene if her eagerness to do the right thing looked likely to result in promises his underlings could not fulfil.
Most of the committee was now present,
and there were more bodies than yesterday. There was even a junior minister from the Department of Transport, attending his first COBRA meeting. Judging by the look on his face, he was excited and worried in equal measure. What if he had to make a decision?
Clements had got there well before anyone else, and felt even more superior when each new arrival came in not wearing a suit. The rest were in their weekend clothes: jeans, cords or, in Alderson’s case, a blue Pringle sweater and the kind of patterned trousers golfers used to wear in 1970. Clements never really thought these people might have normal lives. He simply didn’t care. Politicians, like hamburger flippers, were transient; he amused himself by calling them shits who passed in the night. They would move on; he would still be here looking after the country.
There was a commotion outside as Sarah Garvey arrived, accompanied by her staff and Home Office advisers. The committee rose. She had been at home when she’d got the call and immediately changed into work clothes, a blue suit – skirt and jacket. Like Clements, she understood the meaning of right dress, right time.
Peter Brookdale, a member of the prime minister’s advisory team, was among her retinue. The former tabloid hack, now head of communications, held the home secretary back as she was about to enter the room and muttered urgently into her ear.
The committee remained in stand-up-and-wait-for-her-to-enter-or-sit-down-and-do-it-again mode. Clements watched Sarah and Brookdale. The spin doctor was in jeans and green sweatshirt, and anyone unaware of their respective roles would have had difficulty in deciding from their body language which was the minister and which the paid employee.
The home secretary read from a briefing sheet as she listened. Whatever was being said clearly didn’t sit well with her. She jabbed her index finger at him to underline her reply, then turned back towards the committee room and entered.
‘Gentlemen, please sit.’