by Andrew Grant
For all the advantages, though, it’s not an idea that’s ever appealed to me. I like life at the sharp end. And I think I’d have trouble cooperating with the course assessors. Because in my experience, they’re not always looking for what’s important after you’ve left the classroom behind.
In training, what they look for is the ability to follow your brief.
In the field, the only thing that matters is getting the job done.
I didn’t care what Fothergill said. He’d been out of the field for far too long. He wasn’t anticipating how McIntyre would think. If the guy could make his way from Afghanistan to the United States with a canister of illegal military gas under his coat and not get caught, he must be halfway competent. There was no chance he’d be stupid enough to set foot anywhere near the clinic a second time. The best we could hope for was that he’d rely on the same doctor. So I changed London’s plan a little. I didn’t go inside and find a pretext to hang around there for hours, the next day, as they suggested. I only stayed long enough to verify that Rollins—the surgeon identified by the Chicago police—had showed up for work. I located his silver BMW in the basement garage. Made sure I had sight of where both fire exits emerged onto the street, as well as the main entrance. Then I dropped back out of sight. And waited.
The officer who’d delivered the Police Interceptor to my hotel that morning was refreshingly enthusiastic about his work. He briefed me at length about the vehicle’s V8 engine. Its heavy-duty transmission and brakes. Up-rated springs and shock absorbers. Special shielding around the fuel tank. Kevlar linings in the front doors. Stab plates in the front seats. But strangely, he didn’t mention the one feature I actually cared about. The exterior appearance. The car had been done up to look exactly like a taxi. And since ninety percent of the city’s cabs are also Crown Victorias, that gave it a critical advantage. Tucked into the mouth of an alley between the buildings opposite the clinic, it was effectively invisible.
I’d been dubious about whether McIntyre would risk using any kind of mainstream medical facility after his confrontation with Fothergill, but when I found the building I saw it did have a couple of points in its favor. For a start, its location. It was on the corner of Illinois and State. Less than four blocks from the consulate. Not too far for him to go, even carrying an injury. Then there was its clientele. A constant stream of people entering and leaving, offering him plenty of cover. Many of them were also covered in bandages, so he wouldn’t stand out. Add to that its layout, and I was prepared to change my mind. It had multiple exit points, to lessen the chances of being cornered. And if he could acquire a vehicle, there was easy access to escape routes north, south, east, or west.
I knew there was a chance that McIntyre would break the chain at that point. Skip the follow-up altogether, or find another medic to carry it out. And if he did summon Dr. Rollins, he could send a cab to fetch him. Or a car, with a professional driver. Neither of which would be the end of the world. They would just make it harder for me to follow without being spotted. But in the end, after two and a half hours—just before eleven o’clock—I saw the nose of the silver BMW edging out of the clinic’s garage. The doctor was at the wheel. Alone. He turned left, heading east, toward the lake. I let two other cars move between us, then eased out into the traffic behind him.
Rollins drove smoothly, making no late turns or unexpected maneuvers. He was making no attempt to disguise where he was heading, which made me think he didn’t know where his final destination would be. He was probably going to collect instructions from McIntyre along the way. Most likely several times. That’s the way I’d have done it in McIntyre’s shoes—injured, gone to ground, with no backup, in a strange city.
We continued down Illinois Street, followed underneath Michigan Avenue, swung right onto Columbus, and eventually merged with Lake Shore Drive. We passed the Field Museum and Soldier Field on our left. Then through the centre of McCormick Place, pale on the right, dark and mysterious on the left. Rollins cruised sedately in the middle lane. I stayed with him—sometimes two cars behind, sometimes three—until I was sure where he was headed. Midway Airport. Satisfied, I dropped back another six car lengths. Rollins was an amateur. There was nothing to suggest he was even looking for a tail, but it never hurts to be careful.
The main reason for McIntyre to send Rollins to an airport would be to neutralize any aerial surveillance the Chicago police might have put up. Even police helicopters aren’t allowed to operate near major commercial flight paths. But there were two other possibilities. One was to give Rollins a safe place to make his first call for directions. There were plenty of pay phones in the large, public concourses. McIntyre would know he couldn’t risk letting Rollins use a cell phone. Or even to e-mail from a BlackBerry. Anyone doing that is just asking to be tracked. I’d give a pound to a penny that Rollins had been told to leave them locked in his office, in case the temptation proved too much. The other explanation was to give him the chance to change cars. With time to prepare, McIntyre would have left a replacement vehicle, keys hidden nearby, in one of the parking lots. In these circumstances, though, he’d have to rely on a rental car. I knew from the notices I’d seen yesterday when I was passing through that eight rental companies operate from Midway. All have their collection points in the same parking garage. And that was the garage I saw Rollins pull into, twenty-one minutes after leaving the clinic.
The garage exit is relatively wide. There are seven tollbooths. Four were out of service that morning, so I found a spot behind a group of maintenance vehicles where I could keep an eye on the other three. One hundred and ninety-eight cars emerged during the next thirty-three minutes. Seven were silver BMWs. Four were the right age and model. But none belonged to Rollins. His must have been left inside. Because he had switched cars. To a white Ford Taurus. I saw him sneaking out through the center booth, crouched low in his seat, the light reflecting off his bulbous Rolex as he showed the rental company exit pass to the parking attendant.
Rollins stopped at four pay phones on his way back from the airport. One was at a gas station. One outside a McDonald’s. One near a Starbucks. And one inside a tattoo parlor, which clearly made him uncomfortable. After each phone call we looped back on ourselves, re-covering old ground and switching direction apparently on a whim. And each time he got back behind the wheel, his driving became a little jerkier and more erratic. He was clearly getting nervous, jumping a light on Clybourn and nearly colliding with a minivan at a weird six-way junction between Halsted, Fullerton, and Lincoln. Then finally, after we’d covered just short of forty-eight apparently aimless miles, Rollins slowed down. He took a right from Orchard onto Arlington Place. There was a gap in a line of cars parked outside an old, stone-fronted apartment building. Rollins spotted it late and swung the Taurus wildly into the space, stopping abruptly with his front wheel jammed up against the curb and the car rocking drunkenly on its springs. I dumped the Crown Vic half a block farther down and made my way back along the opposite side of the street, on foot. Rollins stayed in his car for exactly ten minutes. He was sitting bolt upright, his eyes alternating anxiously between his watch and his rearview mirror. I guessed he was following instructions. Probably McIntyre’s idea of Anti-Surveillance 101.
They both should have saved their time.
Rollins took one last anxious look behind him, then shuffled out awkwardly onto the sidewalk, dragging a battered black leather medical bag after him. He started walking slowly, almost inviting me to come after him. I watched him stroll halfway back to Orchard Street, then suddenly turn on his heel and head back quickly toward his car, blatantly staring at everyone who approached him. I smiled, and stayed in the lee of a UPS van until he was well past me, almost to the junction with Geneva Terrace. Then I followed. He turned right, still hurrying, spending so much time looking backward that he almost got run over by a blond woman in a white Toyota who was pulling out of a narrow driveway. He waved apologetically and immediately crossed the street, still headi
ng for Fullerton. But before he got to the intersection he turned left, into an alleyway. It was clean. Straight. About five hundred feet long. I could see the service entrance for a modern apartment building at the far end. And the alley was broad. There was enough space for two cars to pass, if they took it easy. Which made it wider than the streets in some cities I’d been to. Many of the houses it served had garages or spaces to park. But one thing it didn’t have was house numbers. Rollins slowed down, appearing to count the gates. He stopped outside the tenth from the end, took a moment to gather himself, then disappeared from sight.
I reached the gate in time to see Rollins standing at the side of a large building. It was built of red brick. Three stories high, with ornate stone set all around the deep bay windows that overlooked the rear yard. Originally a single residence I’d guess, but now converted into apartments, judging by the iron fire escape that ran its full height, filling the gap between it and its neighbor. Apartments that were now vacant, judging by the weeds that filled the yard and the empty rooms I could see through the grimy rear windows.
It was perfect. McIntyre was lucky to have found it.
The side door opened, and Rollins stepped inside. He moved stiffly, as if he were reluctant to enter. I waited a moment to make sure he didn’t reappear. Promising as things looked, there was always a chance he was only there to pick up more instructions. But the door stayed closed, so I called Fothergill and brought him up to date. I hadn’t given him a situation report all day. After my last conversation with Tanya in New York I was feeling pretty disinclined to use the phone, and he did nothing to encourage me to communicate more. He’d turned into a typical desk jockey, all questions and queries and worries and second guesses, so I fobbed him off with the bare minimum of information and got back to work. I switched my phone to vibrate. Then I slipped through next-door’s gate and made my way silently toward the buildings, hugging the fence for cover.
I’d guess that this house had also been divided into apartments, based on the size of the two Dumpsters that were lined up against its rear wall. The left-hand one was only a foot away from the fence so I tested its lid, then climbed on top. From there I could reach across the boundary and get a grip on the lowest horizontal platform of McIntyre’s fire escape. The fence looked too flimsy to take my weight so I braced one foot against the wall and vaulted over to the other side. I hung by my hands for a moment then dropped to the ground, making sure to avoid the lowest metal step. I didn’t know where in the building McIntyre would be holed up, so I couldn’t afford to make any sound.
Thick clods of dark red paint were peeling from the beams that supported the fire escape, and the whole structure was rusting badly, but when I tested the bottom step it didn’t creak or squeal. The next one up was the same. I crept up to the first platform without making a sound. It ran the whole width of the house. An emergency door served it from each end, and four windows overlooked it. I tried both doors. Both were locked. The windows were all closed. But two had frosted glass. That meant they would lead to bathrooms. Which was good. Bathrooms are less likely to be permanently occupied than bedrooms or kitchens or living rooms. And anyone who did happen to be inside would be in less of a position to resist.
I picked the window on the left, because it was closer. I worked my fingers between the casement and the soft, rotting wooden frame. Then forced them up toward the center, where I guessed the catch would be. And pulled.
The window gave way with no more than a soggy tearing sound, like ripping open a damp cardboard package, and I caught the remains of the lock before it hit the iron platform. But still I ducked down, out of sight. I waited for two minutes. Nothing stirred from inside, so I climbed into the room. I balanced on the end of the bathtub. Stepped down and crossed to the doorway. Checked the landing. And headed down the stairs.
Normally I would have expected McIntyre to favor one of the upstairs rooms. It would give him a better view of anyone approaching from outside. Separate him from any random trespassers, snooping around for anything easy to steal. And give him a tactical advantage, if it should become necessary to defend his position. But today I wasn’t interested in finding him straight away. It was more important to intercept Dr. Rollins on his way back out of the building. He could fill me in on McIntyre’s condition. Whether he was armed. The location and layout of his bolt-hole. And possibly provide a way to persuade McIntyre to open his door without me having to break it down.
At first I thought there were two apartments on the first floor, because there was an entrance at right angles on either side of the glass door that led to the large, square entrance lobby. One was locked. But the other door swung open as soon as I touched the handle. It led to a wide space with a tiled floor, fluorescent lights, and rough whitewashed walls. It was empty, but from the marks on the tiles and the remnants of pipe work strewn everywhere I’d say it had been a laundry room. No doubt useful for the people who’d lived in the building when it was still occupied. And certainly convenient for me, now.
I was still rooting around in the debris on the floor, looking for a length of abandoned pipe to use as a backup weapon, when I heard footsteps in the hallway above me. I moved quickly, sliding into place behind the open door and checking the view through the gap beneath the hinges. The footsteps moved to the stairs. They started to come down. There was only one set. The person was in a hurry. They reached the ground. Then I saw a figure reflected in the glass entrance door. It was Dr. Rollins. He scampered across the corridor and reached out, his hand shaking almost uncontrollably as he scrabbled for the latch. It wouldn’t turn. He wrestled with it, focusing entirely on the lock and paying no attention at all to his surroundings. A ten-year-old could have strolled up and tapped him on the back without him noticing. So it was no challenge at all to clamp my left hand over his mouth, grab his collar with my right, and march him back into the laundry, out of sight.
I closed the door behind me with my foot and led Rollins into the center of the room, under the light, where it was bright and spacious. His quivering was getting worse by the second, and I didn’t want him completely losing control. Not yet, anyway.
“Can you hear me?” I said. “Can you understand what I’m saying?”
I felt the muscles in his neck stiffen a little, but he didn’t answer.
“Dr. Rollins, can you hear me?” I said. “I don’t want you to worry. I’m here to help you. Now, if I let go, will you make a noise?”
His head twitched slightly. “This is important, Doctor,” I said. “I need to be sure. Personal safety is on the line here, for both of us. So, if I let go, will you scream?”
This time he went to the opposite extreme, jerking his head wildly from side to side.
I removed my left hand from his mouth, and when twenty seconds passed without him squealing, I let go of his collar.
“Excellent,” I said. “Thank you. Now, turn around. Let’s talk.”
Rollins didn’t move.
“What’s wrong with your feet?” I said.
He didn’t answer.
“Are they stuck to the floor?” I said.
He stayed silent.
“Did you tread in wet cement?” I said. “Shall I call the fire department?”
Still nothing.
“Let’s simplify this,” I said. “Turn around. Answer my questions. Or I walk out of here and let the Chicago police come in and collect you.”
Rollins groaned softly and started to sway, but he still didn’t turn.
“The guy upstairs—he’s no choirboy,” I said. “You’ve been aiding and abetting a wanted felon. You’ve been caught red-handed. The police want to throw you in jail. And you know what will happen to a guy like you in jail, don’t you, Doctor?”
Rollins was silent again.
“You know what they’ll do to you?” I said. “Let’s just agree, it won’t be you giving the injections.”
“You’re disgusting,” he said.
“Maybe,” I said. “But do
you want that, Doctor? Night after night?”
“No,” he said, eventually. “Of course not—but—please. I had no choice.”
“You have now,” I said. “Go to jail, or talk to me. Choose wisely. I’m the only one who can help you.”
“How? How can you help?”
“Turn around and we’ll talk.”
“Who are you? What can you do?”
“Turn around. Now.”
He stayed still.
“There are police officers outside,” I said. “Twelve. If you’re lucky, they might just shoot you. You could die in this room. In about thirty seconds. Unless you show me your face.”
Rollins shuffled around in a tight circle, taking tiny, slow steps like an arthritic old man. He was staring at the floor. I said nothing. His eyes crept up as far as my knees. I waited. They reached my waist. My chest. He faltered. Got a grip on himself. Wiped his eyes. And finally, awkwardly, managed to look me half in the face.
“My name is David Trevellyan,” I said. “I’m from the British Consulate. The man you’ve been helping is a friend of mine. Was a friend, anyway. That’s why I’m prepared to give you a break.”
“He’s your friend?” Rollins said. “He’s a psycho. He’s insane.”
“No, he’s a soldier. A veteran, from Afghanistan. He has PTSD. Very badly, I’m told.”
“So what’s he doing in Chicago? Running me all around the city? And threatening my family? He did that, you know. That’s why I helped him. There was no money involved.”
“It’s a long story. He doesn’t know what he’s doing. He may not even recognize me, he’s so far gone. But if I don’t talk him down, the police will shoot him. Half the officers they have out there are snipers. Six of them. All top-of-the-line experts. I have one chance to save him. Only one.”