Avenger

by Andy McNab

  Pointer had almost sent him packing. But something about the quietly spoken, polite but determined Mexican made him stop and listen. Herman explained that he was a good gardener, had trained as a mechanic in Mexico, was hardworking and trustworthy.

  Pointer believed him, and he remembered the Pointer family motto: initiative and determination. He took him on, part-time at first, but Herman soon made himself indispensable. For the first five years he travelled in every day from his tenement room in New York. Occasionally, when there was a lot to do, he would stay over in the small separate annexe.

  Eventually he just moved in. For good. Not just because he had become a loyal and trusted member of the Pointer household, but also because he'd become a firm friend and favourite of young Chuck.

  He was now one of the family. He had no family of his own – or none that he had ever mentioned – and he treated Chuck as if he were his own son. At Chuck's memorial service Pointer and Herman had stood side by side, weeping silently.

  Now they met when it was necessary. Pointer would summon him by mobile and Herman would use his key to the back door of the darkened house. Then he would wait until his master emerged from the gloom. They would discuss what was necessary, what was required, and then go back to their separate tasks. They never spoke about Chuck; there was nothing more they could say.

  From the outside, the house and grounds looked just as they always had. Neat, tidy, well-clipped hedges, fir trees and trimmed lawns.

  Inside, it was totally different. Changed completely, like its owner. Most of the rooms were no longer used; they simply gathered dust behind closed curtains and fixed shutters. The few rooms Pointer inhabited in the eastern wing of the grand building never saw daylight. The decorative chandeliers were never switched on. Pointer moved around and operated in nothing more than the light from a single small lamp. Darkness had enveloped his soul. His world was darkness too.

  Pointer's rage against the world was all-consuming. Families like his were the backbone of the country; they were the moneymakers, the employers, the sort of family that had made America great. But now it had ended; the last of the line was dead. And Pointer blamed not just Al Qaeda, Osama Bin Laden or Muslim extremists in general. He blamed the whole world. The warmongers, the arms sellers, the empire builders, the Americans, the British. Black, white, Muslim, Christian, Jew. The entire world and everyone in it was responsible for snatching away Pointer's beloved son, and the entire world would have to pay.

  However long it took, Charles Pointer III – Charlie Three, Chuck – would be avenged.

  4

  The brush-contact exercise needed to be repeated and perfected after the dismal showing Danny and Elena had put on the last time they had attempted it.

  The failure was mainly down to Elena, although Danny had blamed himself when Fergus gave them a hard time during the debrief back at the hotel. But Elena was having none of it: it was her cock-up; it was up to her to get it right.

  'It's up to both of you to get it right,' Fergus had told them. 'You're a team, we're a team, and a mistake by one could lead to the death of another. So, first and foremost, we're looking out for each other. Got it?'

  They both nodded. When he put it like that, the full realization of what they had agreed to be part of hit home. Hard.

  Fergus had lived by the seven Ps maxim – Prior Planning and Preparation Prevents Piss Poor Performance – during his years in the SAS, and nothing was going to change now.

  But the training had to be quick and intense – there was no knowing when Black Star would decide he had groomed Elena sufficiently for her to carry out an attack. Every effort was being made to trace the whereabouts of Black Star's lair, but so far they had found nothing.

  With each passing day it seemed more likely that Black Star would move Elena on to an attack phase. She hadn't been in regular contact with him for long, but she seemed to be convincing him that she was as disillusioned with life as the other teenagers he had picked to carry out his terrible revenge. When he decided to go ahead, Marcie Deveraux was convinced that he would have to reveal more information to her; information that would ultimately lead to his downfall.

  Elena had agreed to be in the front line of the battle to get Black Star, but only if Danny was there in support. And despite Deveraux's misgivings, she had to concede that in operational terms it made perfect sense. Elena would have to pass on information if the operation went into a second phase; it would be far less conspicuous if she were working with someone of her own age.

  So Danny and Elena both had to be trained and prepared, and both had insisted that Fergus handle that training. Again, Deveraux couldn't argue. There was no one better at preparing for covert work than Fergus Watts. It had been his entire life: his attention to detail was absolute; he was the expert.

  One of Fergus's first orders was that when and if they did move into the second phase, there would be no form of electronic communication between Elena and the others. Black Star was a proven master of technology: one slip-up with a mobile phone or e-mail could lead to disaster.

  So it was back to the old ways of tradecraft. There was a lot to learn, and Fergus was using the city of Oxford as Danny and Elena's training ground. Every test was carried out amongst the third party, and third party meant everyone not involved in the exercise: shoppers, shopkeepers, traffic wardens, even the police. If either of the teenagers made a mistake, the third party could easily notice. And if the third party could, Black Star most certainly would.

  For now, any mistakes could be rectified. Even if an exercise went badly wrong and Danny and Elena ended up being pulled by the police, it could be sorted by Deveraux. Her MI5 clearance was so high that even chief constables would jump at her command.

  But it wouldn't be like that with Black Star.

  Oxford city centre was less busy than Danny had hoped. It meant the W H Smith store would not be jam-packed with shoppers, and that would make the brush-contact test even more difficult.

  The test sounded simple, but it had done on the previous occasion too. As before, they were to carry out a brush contact in which Danny received a small plastic tub – the type usually containing 35mm camera film – from Elena without the operation being spotted by the third party.

  The last time they had tried the drill, Elena had dropped the canister at the very moment she was meant to pass it to Danny. It had bounced onto the floor and another shopper had picked it up and given it back to Elena while Danny walked on. That was it: there were no second attempts once the move had failed.

  This time they had to get it right.

  Elena was the sponsor of the operation; meaning she had planned the contact. It was likely that if this happened for real, she would be the one making decisions on the ground, passing on information she had gathered about the 'target'. Danny would never be in overt contact with her. As far as Black Star was concerned, Elena was on her own.

  She had left her brush-contact orders at a DLB she had chosen earlier: the gap behind a washbasin in Starbucks. Danny had collected the orders and was walking through the city centre shopping precinct. He kept his head down, but not too much – just enough to avoid the direct line of the CCTV cameras. The whole idea was to look natural and avoid arousing suspicion. He was feeling nervous: training was going far from perfectly, and his grandfather was never happy with anything less than perfection.

  Danny and Elena had set their watches to the time check on BBC Radio Four earlier that morning. It was vital that both watches were perfectly synchronized as the brush contact they were about to carry out depended on split-second timing. Danny checked his watch: it read 12:06 p.m.

  Four minutes to go. At precisely 12:10 Danny was due to brush past Elena in W H Smith and take from her right hand the small plastic tub. On this occasion the tub would be empty, but if they ever got to do this for real, it might contain vital information such as the real name of Black Star, or even his whereabouts.

  Danny checked his watch again as he pu
shed through the glass entrance doors of W H Smith. Less than three minutes to go and there were very few shoppers in the store, which was not good. The busier the better for cover.

  Elena had chosen the CD department for the contact. It was a good choice: teenagers blended in naturally there. But security was tight, with CCTV cameras and uniformed security guards. And the guards were not only on the lookout for shoplifters: since the suicide bombing campaign had begun, there was heightened security everywhere.

  The DLB instructions had told Danny to go to the rap section in the CD department and to check out the CDs beginning with the letter F. With a minute and a half to go Danny picked up a 50 Cent CD and tried to look as natural as possible as he read the track list. He put the CD back in the rack and flicked through a few more.

  A uniformed guard gave Danny no more than a glance as he passed by; Danny was experienced enough now to avoid obvious errors like wearing a bulky jacket or carrying a rucksack. He checked his watch again: fifteen seconds to go. He hadn't once looked for Elena; the instruction was that at exactly 12.10 p.m. she would be looking through the CDs at the end of the rack, to his right. He began to mentally count down the final seconds, adding a thousand to each digit – Fergus had told them many times that this was the way to slow down a count when you were nervous. Thousand and one, thousand and two, thousand and three . . .

  He reached one thousand and fifteen and looked to his right. Elena was there, just six metres away, and turning towards him. But three more CD browsers were now between them.

  It didn't matter; they both knew exactly what to do. They stepped away from the rack and began walking towards each other, not making eye contact. The rule was, never give the slightest clue that you know each other.

  Danny passed the first browser as Elena slipped round the girl closest to her. The brush contact was on, although at any stage, if either of them felt the operation was not secure, they could abort by turning back to the CD racks. The other would then walk straight on by.

  Two metres to go and Danny could see the film container in Elena's right hand. He slightly relaxed the fingers of his own right hand so that, as they passed each other, he would be ready to receive the small tub.

  He stepped around the final browser just as Elena brushed past. Their hands touched, and the canister passed smoothly from one to the other.

  But there was no time for celebration. On covert operations there always had to be a reason for being wherever you were, whether the operation had been a success or a failure.

  Danny remembered his instructions and went to the newspaper stands, where he picked up a copy of the Sun, and then joined the queue for the cash desk.

  As he stood waiting to pay, he saw Fergus being pushed in his wheelchair towards the desk by Marcie Deveraux. Neither of them looked at Danny, but he was aware that they knew exactly what had happened.

  He handed over the correct change and left the shop, clutching his newspaper and allowing himself the slightest of smiles.

  5

  Pointer's skin had become almost translucent, like a fish that hugs the inky darkness of the deepest ocean bed where no light ever penetrates.

  Only his cheeks and forehead showed any colour: they were a vivid, veiny red. But the redness was no early warning of high blood pressure or stress. Pointer was always calm now. His heartbeat was still normal, even though everything else about him had changed. The redness on his face came from the hours he spent sitting in the darkness in front of his computer screen. As Pointer stared at the screen, the screen stared back, gradually etching its imprint onto his face.

  Computer technology and the Internet had been Pointer's life, and he had chosen the Internet as his method of operation. And as his teenage son had been taken away, he chose other teenagers as the foot soldiers in his war of revenge.

  They were not easy to find, but he found them. He ventured into the Web, searching for the depressed, the disaffected, the disillusioned. He looked in on chat sites, learning the language of the young. Computer speak. Techno talk.

  He began his painstakingly slow and ultra-cautious search for potential collaborators, moving gradually to the most obscure Internet sites. Suicide chat rooms and suicide cults. He quickly identified and rejected the merely bored kids seeking some excitement, and those rebelling against over-protective parents, or the brokenhearted recently dumped by a girl- or boyfriend. And Pointer was far too skilled for any watchdog police officers posing online as teenagers. He knew exactly who to avoid. And who to target.

  And when he identified his targets, he struck. He went only for English speakers: if it was not their native tongue, they had to be fluent in the language. Black Star could not afford any misunderstandings. Slowly and carefully he entered into online communication, beginning by sending pop-ups onto their computer screens.

  Some, he helped, when there was a problem that could be solved by his special computer skills. And once he had helped, and they were in his debt, he took the next step, entering into actual online conversations, commiserating with the disaffected, cultivating the disillusioned and depressed, sowing the seeds of his plan. Only when he was completely sure did he introduce the theme of suicide. And one by one, Pointer – now calling himself Black Star – recruited his foot soldiers.

  The first bombings had taken place in England, partly because that was where the first and strongest contacts had been made. But it also seemed like justice to Black Star, because Chuck had been on his way to an interview with an English finance company when he was killed. England was Black Star's testing ground, but after the Newcastle bombing it was time to move on to other parts of the world.

  Black Star had followed the news reports of the British bombings on the Internet and the American television news. He was pleased to see that the British press had begun referring to his bombers as 'Angels of Death'.

  They were his 'Angels of Death' and there were more in waiting. His recruits were few in number; there could never be legions of young people committed enough to walk willingly to their deaths. But further recruits were being cultivated and were almost ready for the final order. They waited in many countries of the world. In Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Pakistan and Israel among others. And, of course, they waited in the USA But for the USA, Black Star was grooming one very special Angel of Death.

  6

  Elena was in the hotel garden, having just finished one of her regular sessions with psychiatrist Dr Ruth Jacobson.

  She didn't mind the sessions, and she knew precisely why she and the doctor were having these regular 'little chats'. Marcie Deveraux couldn't afford for her to crack up. One impulsive response to a provocative comment and Elena could easily give the game away and ruin the entire operation.

  And once out on the ground, if they ever got that far, it would be even more difficult as Elena would be beyond direct control.

  So she was being closely monitored.

  Elena liked Dr Jacobson. In some ways she reminded her of Jane Brooker, the woman who ran Foxcroft residential home with her husband Dave. Jane loved a good old chat over a cup of tea, especially with some of the older girls.

  Jane was straight and honest, and Elena instinctively knew that Dr Jacobson was too. Unlike Deveraux. Elena would never trust Deveraux.

  During the session Elena had spoken a lot about how she missed her dad. He had disappeared again just when she thought they were, at last, beginning to understand each other and forge a proper relationship.

  'The trouble is,' she said to Dr Jacobson, 'even if he is trying to contact me now, there's no way he can find me. They made up this story for the people at Foxcroft and social services. So Dad wouldn't know how to reach me.' Her usually bright face suddenly became hard and distant. 'But knowing Dad, he's probably not given me a single thought since he walked out again.'

  The session wound up and Elena went out into the garden to think through everything they had spoken about. She was sitting on a bench, watching a gang of sparrows noisily fighting
over some breadcrumbs thrown onto the grass by the hotel chef, when Danny emerged from the side door and came strolling over.