by Powell, Mark
Losing face in front of your boss is never a good thing. This Wells fellow would be the butt of all jokes back at Thames House.
The two old warriors sat and drank tea laced with Grouse whisky for what must have been two hours. For a while it was like the old days at Hereford. They talked about the missions they had been on together when fi rst assigned to D Squadron.
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‘So why did you leave the regiment?’ Stowe asked with a conciliatory tone.
‘You know bloody well why,’ McCabe spat.
The history behind McCabe’s anger was still fresh in his memory. He had taken a bunch of police offi cers on a personal protection course in Herefordshire back in late 1993, six months after he had returned from a mission in Asia. Stowe was one of the instructors that day. McCabe was at fi rst delighted to have his old buddy on the same course, but Stowe overplayed his role that day and, in McCabe’s opinion, caused the death of one of the police offi cers.
Live ammunition was being used in a particular Killing House scenario. Killing Houses were mock-up buildings, like movie sets, only more macabre. Often made of grey breeze block or thin wooden walls, they had rooms, stairs and windows. They were typically used to practise
‘Immediate Action’ hostage recovery plans. The smell of gun smoke and gas grenades was impregnated into every nook and cranny.
Terry Cole, an ex-Green Jacket turned police offi cer, had enrolled in the course, learning the art of close protection. After ten years in the police, Terry fancied his hand at being a bodyguard, though ‘close protection offi cer’ had become the more hip and trendy term for it these days.
The small arms session was an introduction for the candidates to shoot off a few rounds at strategically placed targets using a Browning semi-automatic 9mm pistol. Stowe took the fi rst session, a simple room entry, a hostage sitting in a chair. Terry was to act as the hostage.
Few knew what really happened that morning when the candidates all came running out of the Killing House screaming, ‘Someone get a fucking ambulance!’ Meanwhile, Terry lay there with a neat hole in the centre of his forehead. An ambulance would serve no purpose other than to remove his body. He was stone-cold dead. Terry’s brains were now a permanent feature of the room.
McCabe later heard that Stowe was showing off. Stowe loved to show his prowess with a 9mm. The rumour that later circulated around the regiment bar was that Terry had panicked and stood up from his quantum breach 290709.indd 32
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chair as the instructors stormed in hard and fast. Stowe had accidentally slotted him, aiming at what he thought was a safe distance above Terry’s now neatly punctured head. Depending on the amount of pints consumed at the bar, the story got translated a different way, this being that Stowe wanted some live-bait action and simply slotting Cole for the fun of it was his way of getting some kicks.
McCabe knew that Stowe had recently come back after a leave of absence from an injury. This meant he was hard-wired and very edgy.
Stowe had no place being on the course as an instructor so soon after coming back from sick leave. He should have taken some down time.
The truth is no one other than Stowe really knew what happened.
Subsequently, since McCabe was the offi cial person in charge of training that day, both he and Stowe were forced to undergo some very severe interrogation, almost being discharged from the regiment. Given Stowe’s record and the fact he was still recovering from his injuries, the powers-that-be pulled a cover-up and Stowe got off free of all charges. ‘Not enough evidence to convict.’ It was recorded as death by misadventure whilst training. The video tapes of the day’s event were nowhere to be found.
McCabe was not so lucky: he had his record marked. The fi nding was that McCabe had been careless and should have ensured that the candidates and instructors were properly managed during training.
Bitter at being dragged through such an ordeal and having his fl awless record marked, he left the regiment months later. Stowe stoked the fi re by accusing McCabe of being soft. That was the last time they had seen each other before Stowe’s surprise arrival by helicopter at McCabe’s French farmhouse.
What Stowe never knew was that in the fi rst half of 1993, it was McCabe who had saved his skin from the drug dealers in Myanmar.
Stowe had been captured and tortured along with another man whilst on a reconnaissance mission to expose an opium cartel. He had taken a bullet that day and passed out before he recognised McCabe. The irony was that Stowe had been a hostage in the exact same scenario Terry Cole quantum breach 290709.indd 33
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had portrayed that fateful day at the Hereford Killing House.
Stowe was now hoping the past was the past and was here to offer in his own non-sensitive style an olive branch. More, he wanted McCabe’s help. The mission, as Stowe started to explain, was to eliminate an active terrorist cell operating in London, part of an extremist group by the name of Afzal Jihad (The Superior Struggle). One of the cell leaders was a former member of the notorious Hezbollah Party of God. Their cause, which was once fi rmly rooted in the struggle to protect Islam, had now been tainted and diverted away by the smell of money, extortion, kidnapping and drugs to fund their cause. The members of Afzal Jihad were deadly and hell-bent on performing terrorist acts and senseless acts of violence for the highest bidder. Their employers were often not, as you would expect, Islamic fundamentalists, but governments and organised crime syndicates.
‘Why me?’ asked McCabe in a highly suspicious tone, his eyes now beckoning for a suitable reply. Before waiting for one, he followed up with, ‘You must have guys who like wet work. I’m careless and soft, remember?’ McCabe’s tone was cutting and bitter.
Stowe paused on hearing this. He was about to reply with something along the lines of ‘Come on, McCabe, that is all in the past,’ but he knew McCabe was still bitter. Instead, Stowe stared intently at McCabe and uttered one single word: ‘Kate.’
McCabe’s expression immediately changed, his eyes dilating, his face almost frozen. This one small word had, for a few moments, rendered him speechless. McCabe put his head down and stared into his mug of tea, his mind rocketing back to when he had fi rst met Kate.
He recalled that it was almost eight years ago now, not long after he had left the regiment: May 18, 1994, a few days after his own birthday, a birthday he had spent bored rigid on a plane from London to Kuwait sitting next to his latest client, the executive of a large oil conglomerate who snored incessantly, his breath smelling of stale beer quantum breach 290709.indd 34
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and crisps. McCabe had attended a dinner party held at the British ambassador’s residence in Kuwait. The guests were a mixture of oil and gas executives, ambassadors, corporate Yes-men and people like McCabe, bodyguards who were just grey men looking in. The guests were all sipping champagne and engaged in idle gossip that evening when Kate Marshall entered the room.
McCabe was nicely positioned in one corner of the large reception room where he could observe everyone. He spotted Kate immediately.
The chemistry was overwhelming as her eyes locked onto his. She broke a smile that warmed him down to his polished shoes as she walked on by, her arm gracefully linked through the shadow of a man who escorted her, a man that McCabe cared to not even remember.
McCabe spent the entire evening like a love-struck schoolboy, just looking at Kate. She was elegant and sophisticated with a grace he had rarely encountered before. Her smile beamed confi dence and intelligence, evident from the way she could engage in conversation and appear polite, yet extract herself when she wanted to move on, the other person not aware of her intent and the fact that they could not hold h
er attention.
Kate Marshall was a doctor working with the UN, having graduated from the Johns Hopkins medical school in the US with honours. Her family was rooted in nearby Bethesda, an affl uent enclave of high-octane professionals. Kate herself came from a long line of distinguished doctors and eminent surgeons. Her father and both of her older brothers were renowned in the fi eld of cardiology and now professors at respected medical schools.
McCabe had simply walked right up to her and informed her that he was the only man alive that could protect her. His bold approach had taken Kate somewhat by surprise, but it was an instant success.
His good looks obviously helped in this regard. Before long, they were embroiled in a torrid affair.
McCabe was technically still married, but had been separated from his wife Kelly for almost a year. Kate was also married—to a fellow doctor, a high-fl yer in plastic surgery with a very lucrative quantum breach 290709.indd 35
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practice in Harley Street, London. Kate described it as a marriage of society and convenience. McCabe didn’t care; to him Kate was the near perfect woman.
Most importantly, Kate seemed to understand him. She grew very close to McCabe over the nine months they were together. She could read his every thought, she could touch his heart. She often held him in her arms at night when he woke up from the nightmares, drenched in sweat and out of breath, the ghosts of his past life come to visit and torment his soul. She made him feel real, respected and loved. Kate had somehow found the key to his heart, which for so long was closed shut, and in those few months she had unlocked it and walked right in as if she had always belonged there.
Kate was on a mercy mission in Beirut. It was just after the New Year of 1995 in London when the news came via phone at 3:00 a.m.
McCabe was at home asleep, his clothes strewn at will around his bedroom, the result of having just ended a babysitting job for a movie star who was worried he would be crushed by the New Year revellers in London’s Leicester Square after his movie premiere. McCabe had needed a drink after that job; a few had in fact passed his lips. The smell of Irish whiskey was now prominent in the air.
As he awoke violently to the sound of the ringing phone, still half asleep, his head pounding as if the blood vessels were on protest, he reached over and grabbed hold of the receiver. Before he could ask who was calling, he heard, ‘McCabe, listen carefully. It’s your friend Kate.
She’s been abducted.’
The words slowly started spiralling around his semi-conscious mind, echoing in his head as if trying to jerk him awake. As it dawned on him what the voice had told him, his eyes started to open.
‘Abducted, by whom?’ McCabe instinctively enquired as if on autopilot.
‘Hezbollah,’ the voice said, knowing these words alone would be like an adrenaline shot to McCabe’s senses.
The Hezbollah, the self-styled ‘Party of God’, were a Lebanese Shiite quantum breach 290709.indd 36
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political party and militia founded in 1982 with Iranian help to oppose Israeli forces occupying southern Lebanon. McCabe struggled for a few more seconds in his half-asleep, badly hung-over state to grasp hold of the voice, a voice he had not heard in a long time. Then it came fl ooding back: it was the voice of Brian Stowe. Dismissing the signifi cance of who it was for a moment, hearing the name Hezbollah, McCabe knew Kate was in big trouble. He lay fl at on his back just staring up at the ceiling, squinting to get his eyes working. Then, as if a bolt of electricity had coursed through his veins, his mind clicked in.
‘When did this happen?’ asked McCabe. Stowe proceeded to tell him that she had been seized two days earlier when her car was stopped at a junction. The Hezbollah squad had shot her driver, then dragged Kate out of the car and bundled her into a van.
Still not happy he knew enough details, he shouted, ‘Tell me everything Stowe—and I mean everything.’ McCabe was now fully awake, naked as the day he was born and sitting on the edge of his bed.
Over the course of the next half hour, Stowe told him how MI6, with whom he had the pleasure of working from time to time, had received word from one of their top informers, a lady with high-level contacts who went by the name of ‘The Rain Angel’.
She had never been seen in person, always contacted via a ‘handler’.
The handler was used as a go-between by British Intelligence so as to protect her and add an extra layer of protection for both sides in the event either party was uncovered. MI5 and MI6 often collaborated, but had a tenuous relationship on certain matters regarding homeland and international security.
Stowe had kept diligent tabs on his old friend McCabe ever since they had parted company, with the remote hope that one day he could enlist McCabe into MI5. Stowe knew McCabe’s every move, including his relationship with Kate.
Her abduction had already caused quite a stir in London. Apparently Kate’s father had just completed a successful heart valve replacement on a senior MI6 offi cial and saved his life. One favour deserved another quantum breach 290709.indd 37
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in the eyes of the British secret service top brass and the machine was mobilised.
‘McCabe, listen to me, we have a team ready to go in. We are going to extract her in the next few hours. We have been given the precise details of where Kate is being held by our informer; we have every detail. We know Kate is still in Beirut and alive.’
McCabe listened, then said, ‘Why the fuck did you leave it so late to tell me? I could have been there by now and helped, even led the team in.’ It then suddenly dawned on him that Kate’s abduction explained why he had failed to reach her on his phone, just as midnight struck on Big Ben. He had sneaked off to a quiet spot to call her, leaving his client at the mercy of the New Year revellers. His stomach felt sick at the thought of now knowing why she had not taken the call.
Stowe came back fast. ‘Be realistic. For one thing, you are too close to her. You won’t be objective. You of all people should know that.
Second, we have only just been given the details of where she is and the clearance to go in, no negotiation. We didn’t even know if she was still alive until a few minutes ago. Not to mention you’re a civilian now. No way you would be allowed in.’
McCabe knew Stowe had a point. He hated the thought of being reminded he was a civilian and that he was too emotionally involved.
He would not have had a clear head to lead her extraction. His fi sts were now thumping down into his mattress, trying to vent his frustration.
He felt completely helpless.
‘I have to go. I want to be there when they go in. I promise I will call you back the moment I know more. Okay, got to go.’ With that, Stowe hung up.
McCabe spent the rest of the early morning and most of the day in living hell, playing over and over in his head the actions of the combined SAS and Delta Force team that were going in. He could imagine with such clarity the breach that would take place. He could almost smell the sweat and cordite in the air. His fi sts were swollen from thumping his wall and anything else he could vent his frustration on.
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He stared at the phone, willing it to ring, often picking it up just to prove the dial tone was okay. He desperately wanted to hear Kate on the other end letting him know she was safe.
His breath was now tainted with the distinctive smell of Irish whiskey, the only thing keeping him sane. He had even neglected to call his daughter, to say ‘Happy New Year’, a fact that made him feel really guilty and a bad father. Shit, what a screw-up, he thought. He was tearing himself up, falling apart and failing, it seemed, to protect those he loved.
He had paced like a caged tiger up and down
his bedroom countless times, sitting down and getting up. He had turned on the TV in the vain hope of getting news, as if it would be on the BBC.
Daft prick, he thought.
The hours that passed were agony. Even stepping outside and pounding the pavements, desperately trying to run off his stress, did little to abate his suffering. The love of his life was in trouble and he was powerless to help.
Later that evening as the phone rang and McCabe grabbed the receiver, his heart was almost on pause as he heard Stowe’s voice. ‘I’m sorry, mate, we did all we could. Kate … she didn’t make it.’ Stowe knew there was no way of honey-coating this news to McCabe.
McCabe instantly replied, ‘What do you mean she didn’t make it?
It was a simple extraction? Who the fuck did the job, school boys?’ The anger in his voice said it all.
Stowe let him rant on for a few minutes, knowing it would be pointless trying to reason with him. McCabe had just lost the love of his life. He also knew that McCabe would know every move the extraction team would have made. He of all men would know the planning and the risks involved, the routine.
After a few rounds of ranting, McCabe fi nally put the question Stowe was dreading: ‘Who planned the breach? I want his fucking head.
Who was it?’
‘I did, McCabe. I planned it. I issued the “Go”. There was nothing I could do. She was shot as the team breached. Ballistics confi rms it was quantum breach 290709.indd 39
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not a friendly bullet. Blame me if you wish.’ Stowe was trying to sound sincere, not an easy task for him. Silence greeted him on the other end of the phone for almost two minutes, and then the line went dead.
McCabe lay motionless on his bed, his eyes cold, his heart pounding in his chest. He was in shock and adrenaline was coursing through his body. His main thought was that Stowe must have botched the rescue attempt, not planned it correctly, and not selected the best team.
He would one day have to pay for that; it was just a matter of time.