False Friends ss-9

by Stephen Leather

  ‘Yeah? I’m DI Jimmy Sharpe with the Covert Operations Group.’

  ‘Very funny, Razor.’

  ‘This job you’re on, terrorism-related?’

  ‘Pretty much everything Five does at the moment is,’ said Shepherd.

  ‘The world’s gone mad,’ said Sharpe. ‘You know that, right? The number of people killed in acts of terror in the UK is a small fraction of the number stabbed and shot every year on our streets. Yet how often do you see cops walking the beat?’

  ‘Flashing back to your days in Glasgow, huh?’

  ‘Take the piss all you want, Spider. At least we could still give a teenager a clip round the ear without being hauled up on charges. I don’t know why anyone joins the police these days. It’s all PC bullshit and paperwork, and you’re as likely to be grassed up by a colleague as you are to be dropped in the shit by a member of the public.’

  ‘Sounds like you’re ready to quit.’

  ‘Retire, you mean? I’ve thought about it. But what would I do? Too young for a pipe and slippers.’ He took a long pull on his pint. ‘So Button isn’t worried that Hargrove is going to poach you?’

  ‘Why would she think that? Hargrove was looking for someone and she figured I’d be the best bet because I’ve worked with Hargrove before.’

  Sharpe grinned. ‘Is that what she said? Naughty Charlie. Hargrove asked for you specifically. Because you’ve worked with him before, but also because of your experience with guns. I figure she didn’t have any choice because the request was made at the top. Just like her to take the credit.’ He shook his head and took another pull on his pint. ‘Women, huh?’

  ‘I don’t think her sex has anything to do with it, Razor. Anyway, doesn’t really matter whose idea it was. The important thing is that we pull it off.’

  ‘Piece of piss,’ said Sharpe. ‘How many times have we done this before?’ He took a deep breath and stretched out his arms. ‘I feel like a curry,’ he said. ‘Any good Indians in this neck of the woods?’

  Shepherd got back to his flat just after eleven-thirty. He’d taken Sharpe to the Meghna Tandoori in Heath Street, a short walk from the pub they’d been drinking in. The restaurant was much more upmarket than Sharpe was used to, with minimalist white decor and white high-backed chairs. But the food was terrific and they’d washed the meal down with several bottles of Kingfisher. After Shepherd’s cracks about their relative salaries Sharpe had insisted that Shepherd paid, and then he’d left in a minicab.

  Shepherd made himself a coffee before sitting down in front of the television and calling Major Allan Gannon, his former commanding officer in the SAS and a long-time friend.

  ‘Spider, how the hell are you?’ said the Major.

  ‘All good, Boss. Can you talk?’

  ‘The hind legs off a donkey. Where are you?’

  ‘London. You?’

  ‘Locked up in Stirling Lines,’ said the Major, referring to the SAS headquarters at Credenhill in Herefordshire.

  ‘I need a favour,’ said Shepherd, and he ran through the undercover operation that Hargrove was planning.

  ‘AK-47s aren’t a problem; we’ve stacks of them here. But if you’re playing at arms dealer why not go for the Yugo AK?’

  ‘You’ve got some?’

  The Yugo AK was manufactured by Zastava Arms, a Serbian company, and was the Yugoslavian People’s Army’s assault rifle of choice before the country was ripped apart by civil war. It was a good weapon and many soldiers thought it superior to the Russian Kalashnikov.

  ‘Loads,’ said the Major. ‘We use it all the time in exercises. I’m pretty sure we’ve even got a few of the crates they came in.’

  ‘That would work,’ said Shepherd. ‘I’ll run it by Hargrove, see if we can just use them. It’ll make our cover seem more authentic.’

  ‘Damn right. There’s a fair number of Yugos knocking around the UK. Former Serbian military types have been selling them to gang bangers. I tell you what, Spider, I’ve got some Zastava M88 pistols too.’

  ‘Better and better,’ said Shepherd. ‘And there’s no problem you loaning them to us?’

  ‘I’ll sign it off as an exercise,’ said the Major. ‘You can pick them up from here, can you?’

  ‘Sounds like a plan,’ said Shepherd.

  ‘Let me know when you want them,’ said the Major. ‘Be good to have a chat. I’ve been hearing some very interesting stories about you.’

  ‘My ears are burning.’

  ‘They should be.’

  ‘So how are your studies, Manraj?’ asked Chaudhry’s father as he dropped down on to the sofa and stretched out his legs. His fiftieth birthday was fast approaching but he looked a good ten years younger, with not a single grey hair and only a few laughter lines at the corners of his eyes. He was a keen squash player, had been for more than thirty years, and it showed in his lean physique. On more than a few occasions people had assumed that he was Chaudhry’s elder brother rather than his father.

  It was Saturday afternoon and Chaudhry had cycled from Stoke Newington to his parents’ house, a neat four-bedroom detached house in Stanmore. It was the house that he’d been brought up in and as he looked around it he felt as if he’d never left. At the far end of the room was the piano on which he and his brother had practised for half an hour every night; through the French windows he could see the garden where his father had taught him the finer points of spin bowling; he knew that at the top of the stairs was his bedroom, pretty much exactly as it was the day he’d left to go to university three years earlier. Leaving home had been symbolic rather than a necessity. He could have commuted back and forth from Stanmore but Chaudhry had wanted to be independent; plus, he’d become bored with life in the suburbs. His elder brother had studied for his degree at Exeter so it hadn’t been too much of a struggle to persuade his parents to allow him to rent a place in Stoke Newington.

  ‘It’s getting harder, but you know what med school is like,’ said Chaudhry. His father was an oncologist at Watford General Hospital, and had been since before Chaudhry was born. ‘Third year was much better because we had the attachments, so you actually got to deal with patients. The fourth year is all bookwork and the supervised research project. It’s a grind.’

  His father nodded sympathetically. ‘It’s a grind all right, but we all go through it. Just take it one day at a time. Once it’s done and you’ve passed the exams you get your degree and then you can really start to learn about medicine.’

  ‘Fourth year’s the worst, right?’

  ‘Every year’s tough, Manraj; they’re just tough in different ways. But it’s when you start working as a junior doctor that the pressure really starts.’

  ‘The killing season, they call it at King’s.’

  ‘They call it that everywhere,’ said his father. ‘Just don’t ever let the patients hear you say that.’ He smiled over at his son. ‘I’m really proud of you, Manraj. I hope you know that.’

  Chaudhry nodded. He knew. And he could see it in his father’s eyes.

  ‘So, are you seeing anyone?’

  Chaudhry frowned, not understanding what his father meant, then realisation dawned and he groaned. ‘Dad. . Please. .’

  ‘I’m your father and you’re my only unmarried son, so I’m entitled to ask.’

  ‘You have only two sons and Akram got married last year.’

  ‘I’m not getting any younger and I’d like to be able-bodied enough to play cricket with my grandchildren.’

  Chaudhry laughed and slapped his own thigh. ‘You’re crazy. Now you want me to be a father and I haven’t even graduated. What’s the rush?’

  ‘There’s no rush, it’s just that I’ve found what I think might be the perfect girl for you.’

  ‘Say what?’

  His father looked at him over the top of his spectacles. ‘What’s the problem? I thought you’d be pleased.’

  ‘You thought I’d be happy because you’re fixing up an arranged marriage for me?’

  �
��Who said anything about marriage? I was at an NHS conference last week and I met up with an old friend who works as a cardiologist in Glasgow. He was talking about his daughter — she’s a second-year microbiology student at UCL — and I mentioned you were at King’s. .’

  ‘And the next thing you know you’ve got us married off. Dad, I’m more than capable of finding my own girlfriend.’

  ‘Which is why I asked you if you were seeing anyone.’ He pushed his spectacles higher up his nose. ‘Her name’s Jamila, and she’s from a very good family. According to her father, she hasn’t had a steady boyfriend. He was very impressed to hear that you’re at King’s.’

  ‘You didn’t show him my CV, did you?’

  ‘I might have mentioned a few of the highlights, yes. Look, no pressure, but why don’t you at least get in touch, maybe ask her out?’

  ‘It’s not going to be one of those chaperoned things, is it? With half the family tagging along?’

  His father laughed. ‘What century do you think you’re living in?’ he said. ‘She’s on Facebook. She’s been told to expect you to ask to be a Facebook friend, to chat online for a while and see if you get on.’

  ‘You’ve already told her about me?’

  ‘Her father has, yes.’

  ‘How long have you been planning this?’

  ‘We’re not planning anything. I told you, I met her father at a conference and we got talking. You can at least get in touch on Facebook, can’t you? I don’t want her father to think that we’re snubbing her.’

  Chaudhry sighed. ‘Okay, I suppose I can do that.’

  ‘Manraj, there’s no pressure here, really. There’s no need to make a big thing about it. It’s not like when your mum and I were introduced. Back then they almost put a gun to my head.’

  ‘Seriously?’

  His father laughed again. ‘Of course not seriously,’ he said. ‘But I was left in no doubt that I’d need a pretty good reason to turn her down. Things were very different back then and most marriages were arranged.’

  ‘And you were okay with that?’

  ‘Your grandfather is a pussycat these days, but thirty years ago he was as tough as they come. He was born in Pakistan, remember. Or British India, as it was then. He came over with nothing and it wasn’t like it is now, with benefits and handouts. The people in his village paid for him to come to the UK and when I was old enough to marry it was time for him to pay the piper.’

  Chaudhry leaned forward. ‘You never told me this before.’

  His father shrugged. ‘That’s the way it worked. Your mother’s grandparents helped pay for my father to come to this country. I had citizenship so if I married her then her parents and her grandparents could come too. Which is what happened, of course. Our marriage helped their family, and that was only fair because they’d helped my father.’

  ‘And what if you hadn’t liked her?’

  His father laughed out loud. ‘We’ll never know,’ he said. ‘But I did have a few tense moments, I can tell you. They sent over a photograph but it was a group photograph and her face wasn’t clear because she was wearing a headscarf. There was no Skype back then and no Facebook. We managed a few phone calls but she was shy and she didn’t speak any English.’ He shrugged. ‘I tell you, I was bloody shaking when I got off the plane.’

  ‘You flew to Pakistan to meet her?’

  ‘To marry her, Manraj. It was a done deal by the time I arrived in Pakistan.’

  Chaudhry’s jaw dropped. ‘And that didn’t worry you?’

  ‘I understood that I had an obligation to my father. How could I have refused? It would have been a slap in the face for him and for everyone who had helped him get to England.’ He sat back on the sofa. ‘Anyway, all’s well that ends well. We were met at the airport by her parents and they drove me to their village in this rickety old truck that seemed to be held together with string. The first time we met her whole family was there, so were my parents, and she had her face covered. The minutes before she took down her veil were the scariest in my life. Then she did and. .’ He grinned. ‘Wow. That’s what I said. Wow. I remember how everyone laughed. She was a lovely girl, Manraj. Like a supermodel. Her hair was just amazing; it came down to her waist and was so soft and shiny. And her skin. . I tell you, the first time I touched her arm I-’

  ‘Dad, please,’ said Chaudhry, holding up his hands. ‘Enough. I get it.’

  ‘Get what?’ said his mother, arriving with a tray of tea things and a plate of chocolate cake that she had baked specially for him. She put the tray down on the coffee table and sat next to her husband.

  ‘I was just telling him about Jamila,’ said his father.

  ‘Oh, isn’t she lovely?’ said his mother, picking up the teapot.

  His mother wasn’t supermodel fit any more, thought Chaudhry, but she was still a lovely woman. The woman he’d known had always been cuddly rather than fit but as he looked at her pouring tea he could see what had attracted his father. She had high cheekbones and flawless skin the colour of the milky tea that she handed him. Her eyes were wide, with impossibly long lashes, and her hair was still as lustrous as a model’s in a shampoo advertisement. It was hard to imagine her as a simple village girl unable to speak English. His mother was always immaculately dressed, either in a traditional sari or in a western designer outfit, and she was always well made-up, even if she was just popping down to the local shops.

  ‘How would I know? I haven’t seen her,’ said Chaudhry.

  Mrs Chaudhry looked over at her husband. ‘Didn’t you show him the picture?’

  ‘I haven’t had the chance,’ said his father. He grunted as he pushed himself up off the sofa and walked over to a sideboard that was loaded with framed family photographs. He pulled open a drawer and rooted through the contents.

  ‘She is gorgeous,’ said his mother. ‘And smart.’

  ‘Yeah, Dad said she was a microbiologist.’

  ‘And she’s got such a good heart. She took a gap year to work in an orphanage in Pakistan. Like you did last year. You’ll have so much to talk about.’

  ‘It wasn’t an orphanage Manraj worked at, it was a hospital,’ said his father.

  ‘It’s the same thing, giving up your time to help others less fortunate.’ She smiled at Chaudhry in the way that only a proud mother can and Chaudhry’s stomach lurched. He tried to cover his discomfort by sipping his tea.

  He’d never lied to his parents before he started working for MI5 but there was no way he could have told them that he had gone to Pakistan to attend an al-Qaeda training camp, where he learned to strip and fire a whole range of weapons, construct explosive devices and manipulate biochemical agents. He’d told his parents that he was volunteering at a country medical centre during his Christmas break and he’d never felt more guilty than when his father had offered to pay for his ticket. The people at MI5 had told him that under no circumstances could he ever tell his parents what he was doing, that to do so would risk his life and theirs. So he had lied, and he hated himself for doing it.

  ‘Are you okay, honey?’ asked his mother.

  Chaudhry forced a smile. ‘I’ve been studying too hard and not sleeping enough,’ he said.

  ‘Why don’t you stay for the weekend? I’ll feed you up, you can lie in tomorrow and if you need to get some work done you can use your father’s study.’

  ‘We’ve only just kicked him out of the nest. Don’t say you want him back already,’ said his father. He held up a photograph. ‘Here it is.’ He walked back to the sofa and gave the picture to Chaudhry.

  Chaudhry took it. He looked at it for several seconds and then looked back at his father, his eyebrows raised. ‘Wow,’ he said.

  Shepherd woke up early on Monday morning, half an hour before his alarm was due to go off. He’d spent the weekend in Hereford and had arrived back in London late on Sunday night. His back was aching, probably from the long drive, so he did a few stretches before heading to the bathroom to clean his teeth. His back w
as still sore so he decided to go for a run to see if that would loosen it up. He pulled on an old sweatshirt and a pair of tracksuit bottoms and went through to the kitchen, where he kept his army boots and weighted rucksack. He figured it best to forgo the rucksack and he went downstairs. He jogged to the Heath, then set off on his regular route: up North End Way and round the Hampstead Heath extension, a large open space to the north-west of the main Heath. In the past it had been farmland and while it wasn’t as pretty as the rest of the Heath it was generally quieter and Shepherd always preferred to run alone. He did two circuits of the extension then cut around West Meadow and down to Parliament Hill Fields. Several running clubs used the Heath and as he got closer to the Parliament Hill athletics track he was overtaken by a group of serious runners, all in hi-tech trainers and Lycra shorts and vests. Several grinned as they overtook Shepherd and he heard one mutter something about Shepherd’s choice of footwear. Shepherd always ran in boots. Running was a survival skill as well as a way of keeping fit and the heavy boots meant that he was able to push himself to his limits faster and more efficiently. He headed east to Dukes Field, skirted the secret garden and then headed north to Cohen’s Fields, increasing the pace until he felt his calf muscles burn.

  He reached Kenwood House, the spectacular white-stucco mansion built on the ridge that linked the villages of Hampstead and Highgate. Stopping at the duelling ground where grievances were settled with pistols during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, he dropped to the ground and did a hundred press-ups in four sets of twenty-five. Then he carried on running for another thirty minutes. He slowed to a jog as he headed back to his flat, picking up a copy of the Daily Telegraph and the Daily Mail and a carton of milk on the way.

  Back in the flat he showered and shaved, changed into a clean shirt and chinos, then made himself a mug of coffee and flopped down on to the sofa. He sipped his coffee as he scanned the front page of the Telegraph, then turned to page two. His jaw tensed when he saw the headline of the lead story, then he began to curse as he read it. He was only halfway through when he picked up his BlackBerry and called Button.

  ‘Have you seen the Telegraph?’ he said as soon as she answered.