by John Day
The receptionist had not heard of Comrade Kay and presumed he was a distinguished visitor. She scanned her phone list and rang his number. Directing Carla to a phone behind her, the woman transferred the call. Carla calmly said her piece, and tensed for the response. “Farr sent me! Meet me in the lobby, now!”
There was a shocked pause, then he said in a sharp questioning voice “who are you?” Carla just replaced the phone and walked to a vantage point in a clear part of the lobby.
A minute later Kay rushed into the lobby towards the receptionist who put Carla through. Carla intercepted him. “Comrade Kay! Thanks for coming.”
He looked at her in surprise and demanded to know who she was. “I cannot talk here,” she whispered conspiratorially “it's about the exchange,” she mouthed knowingly. “Just come with me, now! You don't need to bring the envelope.”
Aghast, he watched her walk slowly away to the entrance. He needed to check with his superiors first, but she was not waiting. She must be from Farr or else how would she know about the exchange and the envelope. He decided to follow, she was only a slip of a girl, no threat to him and the envelope was safe anyway, so he could see no appreciable risk.
He caught up and when clear of the other people in the street demanded to know what was happening. “Paul Farr sent me, he said he was being pursued, and security had been compromised. Paul is in hiding nearby, he trusts no one, except me. I must take you to a safe place, there he will contact you, himself, when I have gone, and the area is secured. Don't ask me anything else, I can say nothing more.”
He persisted with questions, but to his frustration, she ignored him.
Carla took Kay to a small cafe and sat him down by the window. Stay here she said, looking around furtively. I must go outside, or Paul won’t come. Awkwardly, she paced up and down three times, looked in at Kay, mouthed, “he's coming,” and walked slowly away back the way she had come.
Kay waited patiently for five minutes, lost his temper and stormed out of the cafe. He had not brought his mobile phone with him in a rush, so it took several more minutes to find a phone box and call the embassy. He told one of the staff to check the safe for a specific envelope and got them to describe it back to him. Satisfied it was still there he walked briskly back to his office.
When Carla and Kay had gone past the side road where Max waited in disguise, he retraced the route back to the embassy and waited inside until 4pm, then came out fiddling with a document in his inside jacket pocket.
Barclay had taken a convoluted route and parked near the embassy, so he could watch the comings and goings at the embassy entrance. He spotted Kay immediately as he chased after Carla and grew suspicious. When he saw Kay return on his own and go back in, he decided to carry on with the exchange, but be extra cautious.
At 4pm, he saw Kay come out and turn left up the street as instructed, so he followed on the far side of the road, watching for anyone following Kay or him.
Max's insides churned over as he walked away from the embassy, he was not the right person for this job, his brain was not wired to think on his feet like a con man, but screwing up was not an option. He pulled himself together and focused on the character he was about to play.
Once Max was clear of people, Barclay caught up with him.
Max said, “take me to your car now, we must make the exchange at once, or we will be caught.” My car is over there said Barclay, the silver Mercedes.
Max strode briskly ahead as Barclay checked around for a trap. In spite of the rushed meeting, Barclay had planned a number of escape routes, at the moment, the traffic was flowing freely, and the crowd cover was good. If he could use the car, he could zip through the traffic, if that was not possible he could lose himself in the crowd.
The two men got into the car, but Barclay looked searchingly at Max's face. It was like the face in the photo he had seen. If the man was a double, he was damned good. His searching eyes checked for make-up, false or dyed hair. The hair follicles tended to hold dye for several days, even if the scalp is well washed, after treatment. Rupert had allowed for this in his hair dye preparation. Barclay reached for his mobile phone, opened it and started to dial. Without consciously thinking, Max grabbed the phone and ripped the flip cover off to disable it. In an instant, like a magician, Barclay reached down between his seat and the door with his left hand and produced a small menacing automatic. It was pointing at Max’s heart. Barclay's eyes had not moved from Max’s face during the manoeuvre, the gun fitting neatly in the man's fist and firmly across his belly.
Max slowly lowered his eyes and studied the instrument of death. The small black metal object was both menacing and beautiful. The firmness of Barclays' grip on it made the normal pink skin of his hand whiten. Max could see the trigger finger drawing tighter and whiter. “Sorry about the phone Max heard himself say, you are not taking your security seriously.” “I thought you were from the Ukraine,” said Barclay, his eyes boring into Max looking for the slightest hint of body-language indicating a lie. I was born there, but moved to England soon after, never seriously used any other language than English. Probably the reason why I have been used on this job. Barclay said something to Max in Russian. Max hadn't the faintest idea what it meant. What could he say in response? Barclay was obviously testing him, so it was probably a question.
Put your gun away, there is a man approaching said Max focusing his eyes on a passer-by behind Barclay. Barclay was sure Max was unarmed because of the metal detectors at the embassy entrance, but even so, he could attempt to jump him. Without taking his eyes off Max or moving the aim of his gun, Barclay moved his rear view mirror to show a man approaching the door of his car. In an instant, Barclay started the car, first gear was already selected, and he steered the revving car into the traffic all with his free right hand. The aimed gun hardly wavered from Max's heart.
“Are you going to do business or not,” demanded Max as though the gun threat was normal behaviour? Max then reached into the manila envelope to pull out the valuable contents. Barclay glanced down, pulled over and examined the stamped envelope closely. It was the genuine article. Barclay put his gun away and said I will get the papers now, and we can get this over with.
Max held open the empty manila envelope and let Barclay drop his stamped envelope in. Barclay watched as Max sealed the flap. 10 minutes later after checking carefully for anyone following Barclay pulled into an abandoned warehouse.
Gal's team were not quite in place when the silver Mercedes shot out from the parking space into the fast-flowing traffic. It was all so quick, they could not catch up. Max was now on his own.
“I'll just go and get the papers,” said Barclay “they are hidden in the warehouse.” He then grabbed the sealed manila envelope. Max snatched it back.
“Yes, you do that,” he said, “and in the meantime, I will hang on to this, it's worth more to me than this Mercedes.” Max smiled defiantly as Barclay glowered back.
Three minutes later, Barclay returned with a large crumpled white envelope. Max took out the papers inside and looked through them. Satisfied they were OK, he handed Barclay the manila envelope. He looked at it carefully paused and then looked menacingly at Max. To Max's horror he slowly ripped the sealed end open. It would be just seconds now before the switch would be discovered. Barclay peered in and pulled out the document. Max lashed out at the killer with a potentially stunning blow to Barclays chin and clutching his own papers leapt out of the car. Because of the confines of the car, Max's punch only slightly stunned Barclay. Running towards the gloomy interior of the warehouse and keeping the massive support columns between himself and Barclay it was several seconds before four shots rang out. Stopping and looking back, Max saw Barclay reached into the car, take out the contents of the manila envelope again and examine them. Several seconds later, Barclay became wildly animated. He slammed the car door shut so hard to car rocked then he tore off through the warehouse after Max. No doubt about it, Barclay spotted the fake and was after
him with revenge in mind.
Barclay knew the building, Max didn't and was cornered. There was a staircase ahead, so he ran for it and climbed two steps at the time. Several shots splintered wood either side of Max and one hit the heel of his shoe knocking him off balance. He fell up the flight on all fours and scrabbled up out of sight. There was no cover apart from the thick columns, or place to hide on this floor, so up he went again. The top-floor was the same as all the others, apart from leaping to his death from a window; the roof was the only other possibility.
Barclay knew Max was trapped and proceeded with caution, checking he wasn't behind the columns as he went up each floor. The horizontal members of the steel roof trusses were about 2.4m from the floor, too high up to grasp. Max ran at the wall and up it is grasping the thin, rusty horizontal metal, hauled himself up, under the corrugated iron roof covering. It would be only seconds before Barclay reached this floor and see him in the open framework of the roof. Pushing up hard he dislodged part of a badly rusted through metal sheet and crawled through onto the surface of the roof. Several more shots rang out around him firing blind near the hole, Barclay hoped to get lucky and wing or kill Max, but fortunately, he missed. Max looked around. On this side was a sheer drop to the yard below, so he scrambled up the slope to see what was on the other side. More shots, one clipped the inside of his thigh. “Christ, he nearly shot my bollocks off,” hissed Max in pain. Over the apex he went, and slid down the other side to the next roof of the adjacent building. Barclay had some difficulty getting up on the roof with his gun in his hand, but resumed the chase, confident he would soon catch up. The metal roof sheets were treacherous, paper-thin in most places, often just holes where they were rusted through. Max carefully picked his way until he reached the last slope. Cornered again! There was a sheer drop this time.
Max went back over the apex and pulled up at the edges of a sheet until loose all around. He waited, keeping low, and when he saw Barclay, noisily, but quickly, Max slid over the apex again, confident Barclay would follow. And he did. At the last moment Max stood up in full view startling Barclay and ducked back down before he fired, Barclay rushed forward up the slope. Halfway up the loosened sheet, it gave way and Barclay fell through and hit a rotten area of the floor below. His weight caused it to give way and he continued down another two floors before impaling himself on scrap metal. Max peered down and watched Barclay slowly die.
Max carefully made his way back to the car and drove back to the embassy. Carla was pacing up and down anxiously outside. Tears of joy welled up in her blue eyes when she saw the shabby, blood stained figure approaching, she ran to him. Later, Max explained to Tony Gal, what had happened and handed The Organisations papers to him.
Gal took the papers from Max and asked for the stamped envelope. Max reached into his pocket for it and discovered it was no longer there. Furiously he searched himself and then red-faced be admitted that he must have lost it when scrabbling over the roof. Gal shrugged, “well, it was not ours to keep so thank you everyone for all your help, let’s go home.”
Gal phoned the embassy agent to warn him of the missing original. The Agent said “I think I can avoid any internal inquiry, but I doubt Kay will be so lucky. Seems he went off with some girl without authorisation and then suspiciously got one of the staff to check on the document. When it turns out to be fake, the question will be, did the member of staff take the original or more likely did Kay take it. The member of staff will probably confirm it was the fake when he looked so Kay will take the fall because he was the only person to leave the embassy. When it gets out to the Russian Mafia that Barclay was found dead with a fake and no papers either, Kay will be dead within hours.”
Carla seemed to be the only one fully satisfied with the outcome. On the way back to their room, Max gently caressed her bottom. Through the thick material of her short skirt, her bottom felt less soft and yielding than usual. Smiling to himself, he said, “You have the cutest and most expensive little ass in the whole world. I bet it even has a stamp of approval on it somewhere.” She gave her cheekiest grin, skipped away a few paces like an excited little girl and said, “Well, I know how much you like to lick it, why not lick a few stamps as well.”
Chapter - New missions.
The nine-o-clock morning sun was streaming through the glass roof of the Atrium over Carla’s hideaway. Max and Carla meandered through the garden below, idly talking, drinking freshly ground Columbian coffee and enjoying the exotic scent from the many plants, stimulated by the sun.
Their peace and tranquillity was suddenly shattered by the shrill tone of the telephone. Carla ran to take the call, they were invariably for her. The week had been very quiet for both of them and secretly she was getting bored, she needed her fix of excitement.
“Good morning Carla” said Sam Leighton, at the other end, “I have two assignments, one for each of you and they are both urgent. Can you come at once?”
“Yes, of course Sam, see you in half an hour.” Carla knew the question was a polite way of issuing a command. Neither of them actually had a choice if they wanted to continue to work for The Organisation.
“Max!” She called from the entrance hall, “we have to go! Maria! Got to dash I’m afraid, can you tidy up please, I won’t have time to do it.”
“Of course, Miss Carla.”
There was deep mutual respect between the women. Maria loved to look after Carla and Max as much as she knew Carla needed her.
As usual, Carla drove to the mountain home of her late employer and mentor, The Duke. She had sold off her old Honda Prelude and bought the Dukes silver Porsche for old time’s sake. She still missed him and sometimes when she was not under pressure, she would pretend to herself that he was there in the car with her. That was easy to do when Max was with her, although nothing like the Duke, he had a tremendous calming effect on her, he was now her rock.
With a minute to spare, they both knocked on Sam’s office door and entered, as it instantly swung open. Sam motioned for them to be seated, and launched into the briefing.
Chapter - Max’s mission.
“Max, you first. We have a revolutionary new submarine called US1. Short for Universal Submarine 1, ready for its final trials, and I need you to go along as an observer for The Organisation. You will need some training as technical supervisor, but it is, I assure you, just a watching brief. You will be away for about a month.”
Sam proceeded to outline the unique aspects of the new vessel and The Organisations involvement in its development.
“The vessel is modular apart from the two ends and the engine and control section, generally the middle part. Special hull sections can be added or removed, to make it longer or shorter, or to deal with research or military applications, as necessary.
The propulsion system is unbelievably simple, yet can drive the vessel at about 60 knots underwater.
Imagine a water filled, horizontal tube with a disc inside it, like a piston. As the disc is forced along the tube, water is forced out one end and sucked in at the other. As it returns back along the tube, segments open, a bit like venetian blinds opening and closing, allowing the water to pass the open disc unimpeded. The segments close and the cycle repeats. This would produce a jerky, pulse of water at the outlet. By introducing a second disc, it can be returned as the first is propelling and then the second starts propelling as the first returns. The jet of water becomes smooth and continuous. The discs are driven by linear electric motors so apart from the discs and their segments; there are no other moving parts.
There are novel modifications to the original hull design to make it virtually silent, even at full speed. It is coated with a thick plastic material that mimics the skin of a shark. The fine indentations on it are rough to the touch, but at speed, the water has no time to flow back into them and effectively, barely touches the coating at all. The very low drag and sleek shape, reduce turbulence and therefore, noise. Another first is the incredible depth the vessel can go down too f
or its size.
Although US1 could theoretically operate un-manned, it is under manual control most of the time, and the results are compared with the automated system. So far the automatic system has behaved perfectly.
One of our associate companies developed a 3D vision system that detects the abundant, but low level natural background radiation. It sees the emitted energy like a soft glow of light from the object's surface. The result is a 360 degree display for the pilot, of everything around the submarine, just like the hull is glass and the water is crystal clear. It’s truly awesome!”
Max asked, “What am I particularly looking out for?”
“The contributors to the vessel have a vested interest in hiding any defects or shortfall in the design; we need to know about them. With a good understanding of the broad technical capability and its systems, you will know if something is failing to perform. You will be our eyes and ears.”
“Fine, ” said Max.
“Here are your detailed instructions and air tickets.”
Chapter - Carla’s Mission.
“Carla, your assignment is quite different. Senator Goodwin has asked me to find his daughter, Ingrid. She is about your age, and inexplicably left her job, as assistant to the head of geology, in Washington. It appears she has become emotionally involved with a young man, who was running a drilling operation in South America.”
“Girls do that sort of thing all the time,” stated Carla rather indignantly. She didn’t like Sam’s mission already, she was not the private detective type and even worse, objected to his inference of being like Ingrid, able to understand a silly emotional girl.
“There is more to this than meets the eye,” replied Sam firmly. “Through normal government channels, the Senator has discovered the drilling operation is both odd and cloaked in mystery. It’s odd because it has only drilled in one location, the depth is shallow, but an extremely large diameter hole. There appears to be no purpose for the procedure, no minerals are known to exist there, and none has been found. Further investigation has revealed the equipment is being leased, and no material or identifiable person or company, is funding the project.