The Walking Dead

  It was about trust, and the Scorpion was short of it. He trailed the girl across the square, and at his shoulder was the youngest of them, Jamal. Her hips swung in front of him but he cut his glance from them and stared around him as he walked. His eyes raked over the signs for the sale that would start at nine in the morning on the next Saturday in the shopping centre. But he did not trust enough to show his interest. She walked to the steps and turned.

  She said softly, 'On Saturday morning, before nine o'clock, there will be a queue here. There will be many people.'

  At his grandfather's side he had learned not to trust the father who had abandoned his pregnant mother. Walking in orange groves with his grandmother he had learned not to trust the mother who had discarded him to find escape in death. Sitting in a classroom at school he had learned not to trust fellow students who sneered that he was a bastard and without parents. As a paratroop recruit he had learned not to trust the 'chutes' packers because a man in front of him had fallen to his death when the canopy hadn't opened. As a qualified paratrooper in the Jordanian army, trained in warfare against the Zionist enemy, he had learned not to trust when the frontier was opened to Jewish diplomats and a craven deal was done. After he had disappeared from the barracks in Amman and travelled to Baghdad to volunteer for the fledgling guerrilla militia, he had learned not to trust when, two months later, the Republican Guard units had disintegrated when attacked. In the ranks of the mujahidin, operating from the supposed safe haven of the Triangle, he had learned not to trust when captured colleagues informed.

  He did not fully trust any of the cell that had been assembled for him. His trust for the girl who stood on the steps was at best incomplete, but he could live with that.

  He spun on his heel and walked away through the square. He saw the confusion on the youth's face and heard the clatter, of the girl's shoes as she ran to catch him. He walked briskly to the car park.

  At the car, she asked, blurted, 'Is the place not right?'

  His survival was based on .a culture of mistrust.

  He said to Khalid, in a firm voice, decisive, 'I want to go to the city of Birmingham. It is the second city, yes? This is a shit place, too' small and not worth his sacrifice. I am going to Birmingham to do a reconnaissance for a target of importance.'

  The faces of the girl and the youth fell, as he had intended. He told them they should take a bus back to the village, that only he would go, with Khalid to drive, him. He thought the youth was near tears, and that the girl's mouth–below the scar–quivered in anger at the slight. He said he would be in Birmingham for the rest of that day, the night, and that he would return to the cottage on the following day.

  Deceit, lies, evasions fashioned a protective web behind which the Scorpion, Muhammad Ajaq, existed.

  Through the gates, past the dense rhododendrons, the grounds opened out, and beyond the flat grasslands–big enough for half a dozen soccer pitches–was the old edifice of the building. David Banks, detective constable, barely noticed the brick and stone façade, or the folly towers high over the main entrance. He hadn't seen the lake, the ducks and geese on the water. He was in no mood for sightseeing, no mood for a bloody tourist expedition to Snaresbrook Crown Court. He parked in a bay that was supposedly restricted to the disabled.

  'Don't blame me, Banksy . You've made a rod for your own back…Yes, I did approach both Golf and Kilo, but a bad word is like a bad smell. It spreads, got me? Neither of them wanted you. I'm sorry, but I've done what I can for you. Maybe in the next few days you should reflect on where you've put yourself, then sort yourself out…In the situation we have in London right now, I don't have any more time to devote to your personal situation, Banksy. My final word on all this is that the guys you should be working with have lost confidence in you. As Protection Officers, at a time of maximum threat, they have the right to expect total loyalty from all members of their teams. Sadly, they've got it in their heads that if push comes to shove you'll blink and won't pull the trigger. Don't worry, you won't be sitting around twiddling your thumbs, your feet up, while the guys are doing their stuff. No, in answer to a request for manpower, you're going to leafy Snaresbrook to do valuable work in the field of jury protection. You made your own bed, Banksy, so go and lie on it.'

  He'd left his inspector's door open behind him, had heard the REMF's shout for him to close it. Had ignored him and kept on walking.

  Down in the basement armoury, he had drawn his Glock, ammunition, a ballistic blanket, a sack of gas canisters and stun grenades, and a first-aid box. For once, Daff had not helped. The armourer had told him cheerfully that every man and woman authorized to carry a firearm was out on the streets of London, that his shelves were stripped 'damn near bare'…but had added, with a widening grin, that 'Protecting a jury is pretty important work, don't you know?' He'd rammed the pistol into the belt holster, heaved the rest of the kit into his bag and the final rejoinder from Daff had been, 'And don't shoot the bloody judge, Banksy…' He'd gone to his car, slammed it into gear and driven east of the city where lock-down had settled.

  He went into the building, used the main door at the side of the bloody useless and decrepit façade; showed his warrant card and asked for court eighteen. It was years since he had been in a Crown Court. One of the precious few advantages of being a Protection Officer and fawning over Principals was that the days of hanging around court corridors waiting to give evidence were finished. God, and it came back to him fast, the smell of those places. Banks saw the sign and stamped towards it.

  Three uniformed men were by the double doors. He did not acknowledge them, strode past them and heaved on the doors' handles. They were locked and he couldn't shift them. He heard a titter – like it was good to see a pompous sod, without the time of day for colleagues, put down.

  Banks barked first the statement, then his question. 'I'm with the protection outfit. Where are they?'

  An usher was called. He was told he would be taken to the room where the rest of his people were gathered.

  The usher, disabled and dragging his foot, led him, and chattered: 'Grand place, isn't it? I suppose it's your first time down here, you not knowing where to go…Biggest Crown Court in the country, does more than two thousand five hundred cases a year in twenty court rooms, a proper mass-production line. Wonderful building. Started off as an orphanage and was completed–money no object–in 1843. The main supply of stone was from Yorkshire, but the facings were from Bath and France. Fell into disrepair and was turned into a court in the middle 1970s, but they had a heck of a problem with the foundations and had to put three thousand tons of concrete under the main building so it didn't collapse. We see it all here…What's going on in court eighteen, anyway?'

  'Haven't any idea,' Banks said. 'As you reckoned, it's my first time here.'

  He hesitated at the door, listened for a moment to the rumble of voices inside. The rest of Delta, and the guys from Golf and Kilo, would be preening themselves as they made concentric circles of protection round the best and the brightest on the high ladders of achievement. Each last one would be imagining the plaudits–coming in wheelbarrow loads–if they managed a double tap on a suicide-bomber, a foreign suicide-bomber, a foreign fighter. His career was on the floor. Banks was assigned to a sodding jury out in the back end of nowhere. He opened the door and went inside. The talk stopped. Eyes were on him. He saw that a coffee mug, lifted towards a mouth, was held in mid-air. The hush closed on him.

  Then, a voice boomed cheerily, 'Is that David Banks? Yes? Brilliant. You're the last bit of our jigsaw. You're very welcome.'

  A hand was thrust towards his. He took it and his fingers were crushed with enthusiasm. 'Thank you,' he said limply.

  'Hey, let's have a smile. I'm DO Brian Walton, Wally to you. The way I run a ship we don't stand on ceremony. I'm the case officer, but also the threat-assessment bloke. I tell you, we've all fallen on our feet. This is a real fridge-freezer job, and could get even better–could get to be a conservatory job,
know what I mean?'

  He did, and a smile slipped on to his face. It was an overtime payer: unsocial hours at time and a half, and extra days at double time. Big overtime paid for fridges, freezers and cookers in the kitchen, new carpets in the living room and hall, concert-standard sound on home-cinema systems–and the biggest overtime dollops could mean funding for a conservatory at the back of the house. He hadn't expected to be welcomed, greeted as a new friend.

  Almost shyly, 'Good to meet you all. I'm Banksy.'

  The voice progressed, boom to bellow: 'You treat this man with respect, hear me, guys? He's the proper thing, not one of you yokels rounded up in the backwoods of Thames Valley, Essex and Norfolk. He does the Prime Minister, royalty, all the toffs, but he's been given to us, and he'll show us how to do the job. When Banksy speaks, you lot listen–me too.'

  Banks had to grin, then grimace, and probably he blushed, but he felt the warmth of those around him. Perhaps his jacket, weighted by the notebook, the pebbles and coins, had ridden back, but all eyes were now on his waist, his belt. He looked down and saw the smear of gun oil on his shirt, the edge of the dark leather holster. He understood. It was a team, perhaps twenty in all, put together in a spasm of panic. Not specialists, not high-flyers, but the men and women whose absence from their normal day-in and day-out duties would go unnoticed. They were what was available. He moved fast among them, took each hand and shook it, then cursed himself for not initially giving them what they offered him, warmth.

  Wally clapped his hands. 'Right, your attention, please. This is my case and I'm not willingly going to lose it. I've bitched to the judge, Mr Justice Herbert, about the cost of it all and been given a flea in my ear, but at the end of the day I'm not arguing with him. To do this job properly would have taken three times as many of you as I've been given, but you're what I have and we'll cut our cloth accordingly. We're down to the essentials and we'll make it work. The case before our judge is the Queen versus Ozzie and Ollie Curtis and they are two old, unreconstructed blaggers. They do armed robbery successfully–that is, up to the time they knocked over a jewellery shop in the south-east. We found a witness, put her under the protection scheme, and she was a star in the firmament when she came to court. They're going down, the Curtis brothers are, and it's about as far down as fifteen years minimum. For them it's desperate, so they pushed for a nobble. A juror was approached and given big money. This jury, with another week or so to do, is reduced to ten, so if one more had pulled out or voted not guilty, then we have a mistrial. With a mistrial, we get another hearing in–if I'm lucky–a year's time, and I don't reckon I'll hold my witness for all those months. I need a guilty verdict next week…One juror had the guts to report the approach and the cash payment to the court. A very brave man, as courageous as it gets where the Curtis thugs are concerned. He deserves our protection and full support, and I aim to give them to him. Have other jurors been approached and caught in the web? I don't know. Are other jurors more vulnerable to corruption? Don't know. But I'm going to throw a net round them that puts them in a bubble: no mobiles, no contact with the outside. The court is adjourned for the day. You're going home with them. You'll watch them like bloody hawks. They'll each pack a bag and make what arrangements they have to, and you will escort them here in the morning. Tomorrow evening they'll be bussed to secure accommodation. That's where we are, and I'll take questions at the end. By the by, this is going to be a good little earner, and it won't end with the verdict. Health and Safety legislation requires duty of care, and that can run for a fair few weeks. Finally, I emphasize to you all, these jurors are not going to become your long-lost friends. You treat them with politeness and firmness. Their safety must be ensured, and the chance of a nobbler getting near them is removed, but my priority is the conviction of those low-life brothers. That's it.'

  Barks thought he'd done well, couldn't fault it. Wally had a list, names and addresses, moved among them and allocated them.

  Banks thought, passing, that he might have been blessed, that–at last–he was drummed into some police work that was valuable, worthwhile.

  He went to pour himself a coffee from the dispenser, sipped it and watched the detective chief inspector meander across the room He realized that he had been kept for last.

  He wondered, if time was available, where he would next find Cecil Darke, and what misery he would meet.

  'You gone somewhere else, Banksy? I'm relying on you for the big one.'

  'That's not a problem.'

  'You're going to do the prime target–that OK? The juror who coughed up and did the decent, he's for you.'

  'When we do threat assessment, we have a scale. E5 is the bottom level, and Al is at the top. Where on the scale are you putting him?'

  'His name is Julian Wright. What I've seen of him, he's a dreamy blighter, beard and sandals, a teacher. Last nine weeks I've watched him in court, and I never rated him as being anything other than a guy who'll go with the flow. But I was wrong…Now he's shoved a stick into a wasps' nest and twisted it. It's the Curtis brothers' nest and they'll be powerfully angry. Not only has he taken their money but he's also grassed on them. Given the chance, they'll kill him and all those dear to him. It's why I'm grateful to have a man of your pedigree alongside him. On the threat-assessment scale, Julian Wright is at Al. Is that enough?'

  Banks said simply, 'I'll do the best I can.'

  Wally said he was going now to talk to the jurors, fill in their picture books, that he'd be back in a half-hour. Banks found a chair in a corner, and even in a crowded room he was alone with his notebook.

  5 March 1937

  I feel it tonight, so strongly that it is hard to describe–I have not shared it with Ralph but I do not doubt he has the same emotions as me–but I will try to express it.

  There is around us an atmosphere of evil. It is suspicion and fear. The commissars tell us that treachery is all around us. We are infiltrated by Fascist spies and Trotskyist agents. Ralph has heard that some of the brigadiers speak of this obsession with betrayal as 'Russian Syphilis'.

  I am hesitant of writing where I could be seen. Only Ralph knows that I have my diary. There are many English lads in our unit but I would not let them know that I have the notebook and my thoughts.

  It has rained very heavily in the Jarama valley and our trenches are flooded. We have three inches of water in our bunker. We try to bail the water out each night before we sleep but it is useless because the water comes in faster than we can clear it. It is a place of misery.

  The British company is now attached to the French battalion, and alongside us were the Americans from the Lincoln brigade…I think they started the Jarama campaign with a force of 500 men. Ralph says that they have lost 120 dead and 175 wounded. They have a song that they sing, and the commissars permit it because they are Russians and do not understand the words: 'There's a valley in Spain called Jarama, It's a place that we all know too well, For 'tis there that we wasted our manhood, And most of our old age as well. ' It is two days now since the Americans–they are younger than us, mostly students and very naïve, but honest–were pulled out of the line. They had mutinied.

  They had refused to go forward.

  Their officers said they would not advance because they had poor kit and were only given impossible targets to capture.

  They refused the order from the staff. We could not see this, but word of it had spread by the evening. They formed up, their backs to the enemy, and set off for the rear, marching in step. Within a mile they were blocked. Machine-guns and an armoured car were across their road. They were told that if they took another step forward they would all be killed. They retreated: they had no choice.

  What sort of war is this? Machine-guns at your front and at your back.

  Commissars at the rear order us forward for offensives and tell us not to retreat, 'not a metre', when we are attacked by aircraft and tanks and the Moors. But they always stay safe and are distant from the battles. Their skins are not risked
.

  What sort of war is this?

  Last week the commanding officer of the French battalion–they call it the 'Marseillaise'–was arrested and accused of incompetence and cowardice, and of being a Fascist spy. He was put before a court martial and found guilty. On the same day as his arrest and trial, he was executed. He knelt, and showed no fear, and was shot in the back of the head.

  It is that sort of war.

  I do not know whether it is better to die facing the enemy, or facing those who are supposed to be colleagues, comrades in arms.

  Tomorrow we are told that the film star, Errol Flynn, will visit us. Maybe he will come far enough forward to get mud on his shoes, and then he will be able to return to his hotel in Madrid and tell people that he has shared our hardships.

  There is no retreat. A volunteer in the German battalion shot himself in the foot and thought it would be sufficient to have him sent to the rear. A self-inflicted wound is an offence and he was shot by a firing squad. There is no way out of this hell.

  I thank God each day that Ralph is beside me.

  It is raining again, heavier, and I must bale some more.

  The call was answered. Dickie Naylor held the telephone close to his ear and mouth. Mary Reakes was at her desk in the outer office and he thought she strained to learn who he called, why, and with what message. He whispered, 'Is that Xavier Boniface or Donald Clydesdale? It's so long, I can't remember your voices–what, five years?…Ah, Xavier. It's Mr Naylor.…Yes, I'm well, I'm fine. Xavier, there might be work to be done, for both of you…Not certain, but if you were willing I'd like to put you both on stand-by. Can't say more, not on this phone…It'll be this week if it happens. So grateful. Regards to you both.'