by Tim Stevens
‘I’m going to rest my voice for a while,’ he told the man. ‘Thirsty work, this.’ He took a long, gulping swig, using his palm to splash some water onto his face and the back of his neck.
On the ground, the man swallowed, the dryness of his throat turning it into a prolonged, sticky action.
Progress, thought Purkiss.
After a few minutes he began the cycle of questions again. Still, the man remained silent; but this time, during one of the pauses, he snapped his head to one side and back, perhaps to shake sweat from his eyes, perhaps in irritation.
Purkiss took note of the man’s breathing. It was becoming shallower, the body trying to conserve moisture in the form of water vapour.
The sun peaked, an incandescent overlord gazing down on the world. The heat shivered across the sand mercilessly, the hazy waves like vibrating strings.
On the ground, the man was making faint snuffling noises.
‘What was that?’ asked Purkiss, stooping, his ear turned. The man gave a half-snarl, half-hiss.
‘Oh,’ said Purkiss, straightening. ‘I thought you were going to tell me something.’
He stood looking down at the man, as if debating with himself.
‘Look,’ he said at last, ‘I suppose I’d better give you a drink so that you don’t expire on me.’
He crouched, tilting the five-litre bottle so that its open neck approached the man’s lips.
‘Just a sip, mind.’
The man lunged, his mouth groping like a fish’s. He toppled forward onto his knees, righted himself awkwardly, ducked his head towards the bottle again.
‘On second thoughts,’ said Purkiss, lifting the bottle away, ‘I reckon you can probably hold out a bit longer.’
The man gnashed his teeth, white flecks crusting the corners of his mouth, in stark contrast to the deep red of his face. His eyes rolled yellowly.
Purkiss checked the temperature reading on his phone.
‘Forty-two degrees,’ he said. ‘Not a record temperature for August. But it’s only eleven thirty. Early yet. Wait till three o’clock. Then we’ll be talking hot.’
He gave it half an hour, then repeated the cycle of questions. This time the man groaned loudly.
Purkiss studied him for a long moment. Then he stood, sighed.
‘All right,’ he said. ‘I was wrong. I thought you’d crack, but you didn’t. Congratulations.’
He shook his head, went round to the front of the car, raised the bonnet and filled the radiator with water. Then he hefted the water bottle back into the car, climbed into the driver’s seat and pulled the door shut.
Purkiss didn’t glance in the mirror until he’d driven a hundred yards down the track.
The man had staggered to his feet and was weaving after the Audi, his hands still tied behind him, his bare feet stepping gingerly on the scorching sand. His head was thrown back as if in supplication to the sun.
Purkiss waited till he was almost at the car, then pulled away again, edging forward almost at the man’s pace.
The man was in a bad way, his lips cracked and blistering, his eyes swollen. But he’d had the presence of mind to come after the car, his only link to another human being in this bleak, angry landscape.
Purkiss crawled forwards, occasionally speeding up and putting distance between the man and the Audi, always dropping back eventually to allow him to catch up.
The jerky, dance-like routine continued for forty-five minutes, during which time Purkiss estimated they’d covered less than two miles. Without warning, the man stopped.
Purkiss watched him in the mirror. He dabbed the brake and kept the Audi idling.
The man dropped to his knees, his head bowed once more. As Purkiss watched, he toppled forwards, face down in the sand.
Purkiss reversed until he reached the prone figure. He climbed out and squatted down beside the man, took his shoulder and turned him on his back.
The bloodshot eyes stared past him between blistered lids. The man’s lips were ragged, bleeding flaps, the tongue a desiccated insect flopping behind them.
The man’s lower jaw moved.
Purkiss bent and put his ear to the man’s lips.
‘Water.’ It was no louder than a rustling of leaves.
‘You’ll talk?’ said Purkiss.
‘Yes.’
Forty-two
‘What’s your name?’
All Purkiss had to do was raise the bottle to catch the glittering sunlight, and the man would answer. It was like a classically conditioned, Pavlovian response.
‘Ericson.’ The man’s voice was still parched, still harsh, but no longer a mere whisper. Purkiss had let him drink half a litre, no more. It wasn’t purely tactical; too much and he was likely to vomit.
‘Who do you work for?’
‘Scipio Rand Security. Please give me some more water.’
‘In a minute.’ Purkiss held the bottle by the neck behind his back. The man, Ericson, was slumped against the wheel of the Audi. His hands were still tied.
‘What were your orders in regard to me?’
‘We were –’ The man broke off, swallowed. ‘Told to make sure you went from the airport to… to our headquarters, and to accost you if you… seemed to be going somewhere else. More water, please.’
Purkiss tipped the bottle. Ericson gulped like a dog at a trough. Purkiss splashed a little over the man’s face and shoulders.
‘How did you know I was coming to Riyadh?’
Ericson shook his head. ‘I don’t know. We were just given orders.’
Purkiss made to open the driver’s door. Ericson gave a strangled gasp.
‘It’s true. Oh, Christ, I swear to you. I don’t… know.’
‘All right.’ Purkiss swung the bottle idly. ‘Scipio Rand. What’s its business?’
‘Security.’
‘I know that’s what it calls itself. But what does it do that’s not above board? That would cause it to send armed men to the airport, potentially to kidnap a visitor?’
Ericson fell silent, and for a moment Purkiss thought he was going to clam up again, until he realised the man was struggling to find a way to convey his meaning in as few words as possible. He fed Ericson some more water, a little more generously this time.
‘Scipio Rand provides a halfway house,’ the man managed, after a few seconds’ choking.
‘Explain,’ said Purkiss.
‘Transit,’ said Ericson, then shook his head in frustration. ‘Governments, and intelligence agencies, use our facilities here in Riyadh, and... elsewhere, to keep prisoners. Usually... ones on their way to some destination in another country.’
‘Which agencies?’ Purkiss let a note of urgency creep into his voice.
‘CIA and SIS, mostly.’ Ericson ran a crackling tongue over his lips, winced. ‘But the German and French outfits as well. The Turks, sometimes, and the Kuwaitis. Even the Russians, from time to time. It’s a... business thing. The money’s what counts.’
‘What work are you doing for the British at the moment?’
Again Ericson shook his head. ‘Nothing. But there was...’
This time Purkiss knew he’d broken off not because of his physical discomfort, but because he was heading into dangerous territory. Purkiss shook the water bottle before the man’s face, saw the pathetic shine in his eyes as he stared at the plastic.
Ericson went on hastily: ‘There was a time, back in 2006, when we were at our busiest. Weekly consignments of prisoners coming through. I was working there already, back then, and I was involved in the process.’
‘Prisoners from where?’
‘Iraq.’
Purkiss gave him some more water, wanting to keep the words flowing.
Ericson went on: ‘For a while, we were receiving batches of prisoners from Basra and Baghdad on a weekly basis. Sometimes single prisoners, more often groups of them. Captured combatants, suspected orchestrators of terror attacks in the country. We received them, held them if necessar
y, and shipped them out.’
‘Where to?’
‘Sometimes to Guantanamo, under the CIA. Some of them went to places like Egypt or Morocco. Renditioning. And others we shipped to Britain.’
Purkiss felt his pulse quicken. ‘Dennis Arkwright,’ he said. ‘Do you know him?’
Ericson closed his puffy eyes, nodded. ‘Arkwright was the liaison man from Britain. He was nominally an employee of Scipio Rand, but that was a cover. We didn’t know who he really worked for. I assumed he was with SIS or Five, though he didn’t look like an intelligence agent. More like a thug. He used to turn up here when we had a new shipment of prisoners come in, interrogate them briefly, and pick a few to be escorted back with him to the UK.’
‘Did anyone accompany him on his trips here?’ asked Purkiss.
‘No. He always came alone.’
Purkiss gazed off across the desert. Damn it, he’d thought it sounded promising at first, but it wasn’t really much at all. He was learning very little that was actually new.
‘These prisoners,’ he said. ‘How did they get here? Did Scipio Rand send escorts to Iraq to pick them up?’
‘No,’ Ericson said. He grimaced as he tried to make his arms more comfortable, secured as they were still behind his back. ‘They came with escorts of their own. Military.’
‘Coalition troops?’
‘I suppose so,’ said Ericson. ‘Though they were always British. And it was always the same pool of people. Different combinations at different times, but the same basic ten or so men.’
Something flickered at the periphery of Purkiss’s consciousness, something that darted away before he could get a grasp of it. ‘British soldiers,’ he said.
‘Yeah,’ said Ericson, and coughed. ‘Paras, as it happened.’
Purkiss went still. ‘Paras. The Parachute Battalion.’
‘Right. I know that because a couple of our boys are ex-Paras, and got chatting with them. I think it was Two Para, but I can’t remember.’
Purkiss felt the excitement rising, crackling inside him.
He squatted down before Ericson, fed him water, allowing him to drink his fill this time.
‘Ericson,’ he said. ‘Do you remember any of these men? The escorts? Their names, what they looked like?’
Ericson’s head lolled back against the car, his eyes narrow slits against the sun. ‘God… I don’t know. I don’t think I can –’
Purkiss began to run through random names he made up as he went along.
‘Peter Tallis.’
‘I don’t think – no.’
‘Chris Major.’
‘No.’
‘Derek Thompson.’
‘No. I’m sorry, I really don’t –’
‘Tony Kendrick.’
Ericson’s lips moved silently, his eyes still almost closed.
After a second, he said, ‘Yeah. That name rings a bell.’
Purkiss stood up. He turned away from the sitting man, his eyes ranging across the broad, clear sky.
One by one, the pieces started to fall into place.
Forty-three
Purkiss thought about taking Ericson straight to one of the city’s hospitals, but decided he was more likely to be stopped and asked for an explanation if he did so.
Instead, once back within the city limits, he pulled in alongside a bus shelter on a quiet residential road where there was nobody about, hauled the man out of the back seat, dumped him in the shelter, and dialled the emergency number. After establishing that the operator spoke English, Purkiss gave the street address and asked for an ambulance for a man suffering from heat stroke.
He left Ericson propped in the shelter. His wrists were still tied, but his legs weren’t, and he could easily have walked away. It didn’t matter. He was no threat to Purkiss now. His employers at Scipio rand would already know Purkiss was at large, and would be looking for him. They’d have the airport staked out, and probably have a welcoming committee waiting for him there.
Purkiss drove until he found himself in a run-down part of town, where the Audi’s shattered rear window wouldn’t be as conspicuous. He stopped again, sat behind the wheel, and ran over the connections in his head yet again.
Yes. It added up. There were some missing details, but most of it fitted together.
And he’d been blind.
He picked up his phone. The second call he made was to Vale.
‘John. Are you –’
‘I’m operational.’ Purkiss took a moment to collect his thoughts. ‘Two things, Quentin. First, I need a chartered flight out of here. Preferably from a private airfield, if you can manage it, but if not, from one of the other commercial airports. I can’t go back to King Khalid. It’s being monitored, and this time I won’t get away.’
‘I can arrange that,’ said Vale.
‘The second thing is, tell Kasabian the person we’re looking for is Hannah Holley. She’s a Security Service agent I’ve been working with on this. She’s the person we need to apprehend. But she’ll have gone on the run.’
And Purkiss explained.
Forty-four
Monday morning came, and with it the increasingly pressing need for Emma to start getting things ready for the children’s return to school the following week. New uniforms, stationery, all the paraphernalia of a fresh school year.
She’d been planning to do it herself, but after Brian had left for work, she gave Ulyana the nanny a list and some money, and packed her off with the kids to get the necessary.
After finding the second bug, or whatever it was, in the lipstick tube yesterday, Emma’s instinct had been to turn the entire house upside down. But, mindful of her promise to meet Brian and the rest of the family in Hyde Park, she’d hurried away, her mind churning. She’d found them near the ponds, the children leaping and cartwheeling, Brian smiling and presenting her with a bouquet of flowers he’d bought. For a while, as they enjoyed the Sunday afternoon ambience, Emma had almost been able to put the other matter to one side. Almost.
But in the darkness of the bedroom that night, Brian snoring gently beside her, the fears had crowded in once more.
She had no doubt now that James had planted the tiny and strangely malevolent-looking objects in her lipstick and her handbag, and who knew where else. He’d done so during their trysts in the assorted hotel rooms they’d booked. But as for his reasons, Emma was utterly baffled. Didn’t he trust her in her role as personal physician to Sir Guy Strang? Was he listening to hear if she discussed Sir Guy’s health with her husband, her friends, her fellow doctors? She understood that as Sir Guy’s head of security, James had a responsibility to protect his boss; but this appeared to be taking the notion to ridiculous lengths.
Emma hardly slept, drifting off a couple of hours before dawn crept through the curtains. She was awoken abruptly, not by a noise but by a thought.
Was James spying on his own boss?
Befuddled by lack of sleep, Emma sat up, padded into the bathroom without waking Brian, and got in the shower. The cool water dragged her to full alertness. She returned to the thought.
Had James planted the objects – bugs, she supposed, though the word sounded silly – on her in order to eavesdrop on her conversations with Sir Guy? Again, it seemed ludicrous. James was closer to Sir Guy than almost anyone else she knew. Closer in many respects than Emma was. And surely James would have plenty of easier opportunities to listen in on his boss’s conversations than by going the convoluted route of planting bugs on Emma.
With Brian, Ulyana and the children gone, Emma set about systematically searching the rest of the house. She moved on to the garage, even the garden shed. Three hours later, sweaty, exhausted, she flopped down on a sofa.
Nothing.
She peered at the bug she’d found in the lipstick yesterday.
Should she confront James with it again? He’d shrugged off the one she’d shown him in the gallery yesterday; but then he would, wouldn’t he, if he’d planted it? He’d find it hard
er to deny the significance of a second such object, though.
But then what? Ought Emma to state her suspicions openly, to ask James directly if he’d been spying on her? He might open up, admit that it was a routine security procedure, and apologise. If that was the case, Emma might be able to understand, and forgive. But what if he continued to deny it? How could she carry on with him, with her doubts about his trustworthiness hanging between them?
A new thought flashed through her mind like a shock.
Sir Guy Strang was her employer. She had a responsibility to go straight to him with this.
But that would blow everything apart. She’d have to admit she was having an affair with his head of security. It would mean the end of her job, and possibly more than that. She might be prosecuted, for putting the security of the Service at risk in some way.
And it would cause irreparable harm to her marriage, and her family, f the truth about her and James came out.
Emma thought about James. Despite her intimacy with him, despite his warmth and his charm, there was something hidden, unknown about him. He had a tendency to clam up at the oddest times, which she’d always taken to be part of the necessarily cautious, secretive character a man in his position had to possess. Overall, she knew relatively little about him. He’d never been married, as far as she knew. He was a former soldier, a veteran of Iraq where he’d been injured, hence his scar. He’d been Sir Guy’s head of security since before Sir Guy assumed the top job three years earlier. And that was about it.
Emma felt unable to get up from the sofa, as though its fat leather embrace was pulling her down. She’d always hated passivity, indecision; hadn’t been able to afford either in her work as a doctor. But now she felt utterly helpless, trapped by her sunlit suburban surroundings, with no course of action open to her that wouldn’t lead to disaster one way or another.
The hell with it. She set her jaw.
If she didn’t bring the subject up with James again, she still wouldn’t be able to continue with him. Her mistrust of him would corrode what they had between them.