There was nothing she could have done. She had feebly tried to get out through the emergency exit window when Ralph Bell had got onto the bus. She should have released the latch when she’d first seen him as they entered the station. The pair of them were sitting on the bonnet of the Toyota. Bold as sodding brass. Waiting for her. Bell with his trademark can of diet Pepsi in his hand.
But she hadn’t. She couldn’t. She had been paralysed. There was something about him. His presence. His voice. It frightened her so much that no amount of disregard for her own safety could override the fear. And it was completely irrational. The Russian oligarch, Sokolov, had done her more damage. As had Bell’s previous sidekick, the German, Kurt Manning. They were all as equally evil as each other. So why did Bell incite such terror?
She didn’t know.
And there was nothing she could do about it.
Bump.
Pain.
Shit!
It hurt so much.
Austin made a noise. He groaned and writhed. Since they’d shot him he’d been out of it. Sam felt that was the best place for him, although she was worried about loss of blood - and any subsequent infection. Sam knew deep down that neither of those things actually mattered. They were both dead. It was the ‘when’ that was the missing factor.
At first it surprised her that Bell and the other thug could attack her in broad daylight. That one of them could whip out a handgun and shoot an innocent in a busy place - and then kidnap both of them. In the centre of a major city. All of this without anyone bothering.
But, when her brain had chance to disregard the pain, she knew that it wasn’t such a surprise. They owned the place. The Church of the White Cross had Venezuela in its pocket. They were the warlords and the government was on their payroll. They could shoot and kidnap who they liked, when they liked.
Thump.
Too much pain! Sam kicked out against the tailgate.
Fuck you! More pain. It was an unvirtuous circle.
When would it end?
Please make it end.
Some calm. Just the throbbing from her wounds. Queasiness from the concussion. More thoughts.
Why had Austin befriended her? Why had he got on the same bus? Why?
What is wrong with me? That people, just minding their own business, end up on the wrong side of a gun whenever she was about? Ginny. Now Austin.
More tears.
What the fuck is wrong with me?
Why hadn’t he just followed orders? Got off the bus and buggered off into the jungle to find his son’s crash site.
Idiot.
He groaned again. And started muttering something.
Poor guy. Poor old man.
They were top to tail in the back of the truck. Her face; his feet. With her hands tied behind her back. A CIA knot. There was no chance of escape.
More groans. More muttering. At least Austin was alive.
Another thump.
More pain.
And more tears.
He moaned.
She tried to say, ‘All right, all right.’ But the words were lost in the gag.
It wasn’t completely dark in the back. The gap between the tailgate and the metal roof was filled with a tight metal mesh. It was night outside and, from what Sam could see, they were driving through primary jungle. Tall, black-green trees puncturing a graphite-indigo sky.
There was a low half-moon which, every so often with a break in the trees, shone through the mesh. Intermittent light.
Her head was up against the cab. She pushed with her legs until her shoulders were pressing against metal - her chin on her chest.
Breathe. The pain was devastating. Her chest screamed out for mercy as she pushed some more, using her arms and shoulders as pivots to force her head upwards - into the sitting position.
Thump.
Chrissake! Her torso slipped and she fell, knocking into Austin’s leg - he yelped.
‘Sorry.’ But it didn’t sound like that.
Tears. Frustration mixed with the pain.
She tried again. This time she managed to sit up. The back of her head against the back of the cab. The fleeting moon casting a strobed shadow across the floor of the truck. Black - grey. Black - grey.
Breathe. Breathe.
She looked at Austin. He was in the foetal position, his wounded leg on top of his other one.
A flash of light from the moon. It only afforded a glimpse, but it was enough for Sam to take in Austin’s situation with her good eye.
She could only see the exit wound - at the back of his leg. She reckoned it was probably about the size of a saucer; the rip in his trousers a good six inches across. Sam assumed that the entry wound would be much smaller and on the side of the leg she couldn’t see.
Another flash - this time a little longer.
Blood. Lots of it. His trousers above the knee were soaked. It was all over the metal floor of the truck. It was all over her.
How much?
She imagined tipping a pint glass of blood onto the wound and seeing how far it would go. Not far enough. She tried another half a pint. Then another half - she’d now spilt two pints. That worked. There’d probably be another pint on the tarmac in the bus station.
Three pints. That’s a lot.
One more and he’s definitely dead.
More light. Sam was looking for a spare piece of cloth - or a rope.
Black. Then grey.
Gotcha.
A tow rope.
Then black.
A flash of grey.
The rope was red. At the other end of the truck. In the corner.
Breathe.
She moved. She slid back down onto the metal floor; she was facing Austin’s knees. She used her feet to find the rope, putting one foot through a loop and the second on top.
Bump. No! Pain. Worse than before.
I’m so tired.
Tired wasn’t good enough. She had to keep moving. She pulled her knees up, and then her calves to her bottom. She felt with her hands.
Gotcha! Tow rope in hand.
Now the difficult bit.
She rolled onto her back (more tears), her hands and the rope were in the way. She rolled again onto the side that had taken the biggest kicking.
No. No. No! The pain was washing over her.
Breathe.
She pushed her bottom towards Austin, letting go of the rope as felt for Austin’s legs.
Got them.
‘Excuse me.’ Muffled humour. She had no idea where that came from.
Sam squeezed the end of the rope between his legs, crying out in frustration.
Thump. Pain. Tears. Is there any fluid left in my head?
Breathe.
The rope was through. Done.
Sam bent her torso forward, pushing her bottom against Austin’s calves, allowing her tied hands the freedom to reach over his legs. The pain in her chest was monumental. She cried out. Shouted. Fuzziness. Dizziness. She was passing out?
No. Not yet.
She fished with her hands. And fished. And then found the end of the rope, pulling it back over his leg.
She had both ends.
Result.
Sam felt for his wound. He groaned some more. The rope was above the wound close to his crotch. Good.
Sam made a granny knot. It was difficult with tied hands; more difficult behind her back; almost impossible with the accompanying pain. But she did it.
Breathe.
She then put one end of the rope under her hip, and pulled as tightly as she could with her hands, rolling her body away from Austin to extend the rope. It wasn’t tight enough. She rolled back, moving her hands closer to the knot. Pushed down on her hip and pulled again. And again.
Breathe.
And again. If the rope were to cut off the blood supply to the wound it would need to be as tight as she could make it.
She pulled again.
And one last time.
She felt the knot. It was
digging into his leg - and it was holding.
Breathe.
Sam tied a second and a third knot. She pulled them tight.
She was out of breath. Pain, tiredness and despair. It was doing for her.
She closed her only good eye and took shallow breaths. Anything to stop the pain in her chest.
Bump! Pain. Oh, fuck, what the hell.
She’d done what she could for Austin. She hoped she had stopped the bleeding. If left unchecked, the wound would become gangrenous. If the tourniquet weren’t released, in less than a week he might lose his leg. But, if he got some fluid into him his body might just produce much needed replacement blood. Without that, he’d be dead in a matter of hours.
SIS Headquarters, Vauxhall, London
Jane couldn’t dial the Deputy Director’s number quickly enough. All she had was the screenshot from Frank. She’d tried to phone Frank straight back, but he didn’t pick up his phone. Her next call was to the DD.
As the call connected and the phone made its initial buzz, Jane tried to piece together why Frank had sent a screenshot of a message from GCHQ, and not email the original? She couldn’t reconcile it.
I must check with GCHQ!
It was 23.13. The Doughnut would be working with out-of-hours staff. That didn’t matter. She’d get someone to check - now. She looked over her screen and through the glass wall. The office was almost empty; just a couple of desks lit. One was Colin, a stand-by case officer. He was working on the Qatar dossier.
She was interrupted by the phone.
‘Deputy Director’s outer office. Captain Hughes.’ An East Coast accent. Smart. Efficient.
Jane did two things at once. She pushed the receiver of her second phone off its cradle and dialled Colin’s internal number. She heard it ring in the distance.
‘Deputy Director, please. It’s Jane Baker. London.’
‘Good evening Miss Baker. The DD is in a briefing at the moment. Can I get him to call you back?’
Jane spotted Colin looking in her direction. She signalled for him to come in.
‘What’s the briefing? Is it more information on Venezuela?’
Jane immediately got the impression that the captain was unsure whether or not she was cleared to discuss Venezuela. He dithered.
‘Captain Vince Hughes. I know where the satellite control centre is. I know the village name in Amazonas. And I have some idea what the delivery method is. So, unless he knows what I know, I suggest you get him to the phone - now.’
‘Well … I don’t know if ...’
‘Get the sodding Deputy Director on the phone! Now! We have ...’, she looked up at the clock on the wall, ‘fewer than three hours to stop what my intelligence is calling “Armageddon”.’
‘OK, Miss Baker.’ The captain was in a rush now. ‘I’ll drag him out. Give me 30 seconds.’
Jane realised she had her head in her free hand. And was equally surprised to see Colin standing in front of her. Her hand came off her head and grabbed a piece of paper in the middle of her desk. It was a copy of screenshot that she’d printed a few minutes earlier. She handed it to Colin. She watched the expression on his face change from a resigned ‘what am I doing in work this late’, to an alert and alive, ‘my God, this is unreal’.
She put her hand in front of the mouthpiece.
‘Get hold of GCHQ. I want this verified in 20 minutes. I’ll forward you the original from Frank’s now. And, at the same time, find out what the blooming hell’s happened to Frank.’
Colin nodded, and was off.
‘Jane. It’s Linden. What have you got?’
Hurrah.
‘I’ve just emailed you a screenshot from one of my team working in Germany. Why it’s a screenshot and not the original email, I’ve no idea. I’m working on that. I’m also working on verifying the intelligence that’s in the shot with GCHQ - who originated the email. But we have to work on what we have.’
‘Hang on …’
The line went silent.
‘I’ll be damned. OK. So - first - we have the village’s details. Have you looked for it?’
Jane had a detailed satellite map on her screen - with terrain overlay.
‘Yes. It’s ten klicks east of the Colombian border. Fifteen klicks south-southeast of Puerto Ayacucho. I reckon we’re looking at one route in. And it’s all primary jungle. Of course, this is only the village. The control centre will be at least a couple of klicks removed from the centre of the village. Who knows in which direction.’
‘Got it. Wait …’, and then in the distance, ‘Vince! Get the team in here. Now!’
His voice was loud again. ‘OK. The second line from the report: The Middle Eastern delivery method. I’ll get the Navy on the cruise missiles intelligence. But you Limeys don’t yet have a target?’
‘No. Nothing. But if your Navy could stop themselves from throwing missiles around for a couple of hours, that would do the trick.’
‘What about your Navy? Or the French? Or, indeed, the Russian? We’ve all got Tomahawks or equivalents.’ He paused for a couple of seconds. ‘Look, this is outside of my remit. But there’s a military op planned for this evening in the Middle East. It’s a preemptive attack against a Syrian target. An airbase with, apparently, a chemical weapon facility. I think we have a couple of ships and a sub involved. They’re in the Med. The last time we did something like this we fired 59 cruise missiles at the Shayrat airbase; in April, if I remember rightly. My understanding is that we’re talking about the same scale tonight. The Navy won’t want to pull out of this - not without way much better intelligence from us and a confirmed target. And tonight’s Syrian attack has got the President’s name all over it.’ Quieter now, ‘Come in fellas, come in.’
‘And, Jane?’
‘Yes?’
‘How would these people know about tonight’s Syrian attack? How do they tie their operation to a US military attack which may have only been planned a couple of days ago? Who are they?’
Jane thought they’d spent too long talking, and not enough time sending in the marines.
‘Have you got your people ready - the ones who can reach the village?’
‘Yes. I have a team on standby …’, the DD was now briefing his team, ‘John, look at the map I’ve just cast on the screen. We reckon that’s the village where the satellite control centre is - or very close by. How long to get your boys there?’
There was a pause.
Get your fingers out!
‘Thirty minutes to get them airborne. Sixty minutes to loitering above the target. And then you’re in the lap of the gods. Depends how easy it is to find.’ A distant answer.
‘Get them airborne. Now. They’ve got all they need?’
‘They have now.’
She heard some distant scurrying.
‘Jane?’
‘You’re on it?’
‘Yes. But, and this assumes we can find the place, we’re right up against the 6 pm Pacific Time Zone deadline. As for the delivery method, I’ll get onto the Navy now. But I think it’s very unlikely they will change tonight’s op on what you’ve given us. Let’s keep in touch?’
‘Sure, Linden. I’ll let you get on. I’ll brief the Chief and the JIC now. You know where to find me.’
The phone went dead. She put the receiver down. And took a breath. She looked over her shoulder. She hadn’t closed the blinds. It was pitch black outside. Rain ran diagonally down the window. The light from her office picked out drops and streams without discrimination. Across the Thames, the view looked as black and miserable as she felt. Jane didn’t have a good feeling about anything. The intelligence was poor - everything they had was uncorroborated. These people were clever. It would take nothing for one of them to leave a rogue message on Sam’s phone. Send them all running in the wrong direction. The Church’s version of Operation Mincemeat - a floating hobo off the southern coast of Spain helping deceive the Germans of the Allies’ invasion plans.
Deception. They wer
e more than capable of it.
And they were working on an operational time based on the thread of a call linked to the ‘kick-off’ of a North American football match. It was all crazy. Shreds of evidence cooked into a soufflé that would collapse as soon as it came out of the oven.
Her wistfulness was broken. Colin was back in her office.
‘I’ve found the operator who sent the email to Frank. It’s all above board. But still no sign of Frank. Except …’
‘Yes?’ Jane was tired. Her response didn’t hide it.
‘There’s been a major fire in a street called Flemingstraße in Munich. I’ve only been on the periphery of this, but wasn’t Munich where Frank was operating out of?’
Jane blew out through tight lips. She stood and closed her eyes.
A fire. In Flemingstraße.
That was Frank. And Wolfgang. That’s why she hadn’t had an email. Or a follow-up call. He was in the fire.
Oh my God.
Frank.
Her eyes were wide open now.
The Americans could send the marines into Venezuela - or whatever they had on call. They were running this now. Apart from briefing those who needed to know, there was little more she could do.
Much more important - she had a member of SIS in trouble.
‘Get hold of whoever you need to in Munich. Let’s find out what’s happened to Frank - and Wolfgang. Now!’
Colin didn’t wait for any further instructions. He was out of Jane’s office in no time.
Jane walked to the window. She placed a flat hand on the pane. It wasn’t cold. Triple glazing and bomb-proof glass put paid to the temperature differential. But it felt good to be almost in touch with the outside world.
She placed her second hand on the glass, joining the first. She leant against the window, her head dropping until her forehead rested on the pane. She closed her eyes again.
Frank was in trouble.
And where was Sam?
For Good Men to Do Nothing Page 34