by Jack Higgins
There was a Beretta, his preferred weapon, in the glove compartment. No border checks in these days of peace. He checked it, put it under his raincoat for easy access and drove away. The rain beat down, he turned on some music on BBC Radio, sat back and enjoyed the whole experience. There he was, born in the Ukraine, and yet he loved these crazy people.
An hour and a half later, and the Irish Sea stretched away to his left on the coast road, wind and rain driving in, and he was whistling along with the BBC when he saw Drumore Village in the distance, and the castle, Drumore Place, standing tall on the edge of the cliffs outside. It was an imposing sight, with towers and battlements and everything you would want a castle to have. There was only one problem. It wasn’t particularly ancient. It had been built by Anglo-Irish Lord Drumore, wealthy from the sugar trade in the West Indies, in the early nineteenth century, his homage to the romantic tradition, and none the worse for that.
Ashimov drove down through the small port, turned into the parking lot of the local pub, the Royal George, which sounded as Orange Loyalist as you would have liked and dated from Loyalist times. But the people locally liked their traditions, and in spite of being staunchly Republican, refused to have the name altered.
As Ashimov got out of his car, a van drew up alongside. There were two young men in it. The one opening the passenger door bumped into Ashimov as he was getting out.
The youth, longhaired and unshaven and wearing an old combat jacket, got out, full of aggression.
“You want to watch it.”
“I’m sorry,” Ashimov said.
“Stupid prick.”
Ashimov reached in the car, found the Beretta and put it in his pocket. “If you say so.”
He walked to the pub entrance, and the young man and his driver burst into laughter. “I said he was a prick.”
Inside, the bar was totally traditional, a beamed ceiling, dark oak booths, logs burning on the great stone hearth, an old marble-topped counter, the barman reading a newspaper, any bottle a man could fancy ranged behind him.
By one of the bow windows, a man of around fifty sat eating a meat-and-potato pie. He had red hair, a reckless look to him, and a slight smile. This was Dermot Kelly, a veteran since the age of seventeen of the Irish troubles. The man who sat in the window seat close to him, smoking and reading a book, was one Tod Murphy, who looked like some sort of intellectual, with his black hair flecked with gray, and steel spectacles. Once a student of theology intent on the priesthood, he had followed the same path as Kelly, although in his case it had included fifteen years in the Maze Prison for murdering five people. It was only the Peace Process that had released him. He looked up, saw Ashimov at the bar and smiled.
The barman, without being told, had taken a bottle of cold vodka from the bar fridge and poured a large one. Before Ashimov could touch it, the two youths who had followed him in ranged alongside him. The youth in the combat jacket picked up the glass.
“What in the hell would this be?” He drank some and made a face. “What kind of shite is that?”
“My kind, and as you’ve touched it, you can buy me another.”
“You what?” The youth grabbed for the front of Ashimov’s coat and the Russian head-butted him.
The youth went down, and his friend cried out in anger and reached for the bottle of vodka on the bar. Dermot said, “Tod.”
Murphy stood up, still holding his book. “Not in here, not without Dermot Kelly’s say-so. I don’t know where you’re from, but this is an IRA pub and this gentleman is a friend of ours.”
“Fuck you,” the youth said and smashed the bottle on the edge of the marble bar. Murphy kicked him under one knee and Ashimov grabbed him by the collar, screwed a short punch into his kidneys and ran him headfirst through the front door.
“Better clear the mess, Michael,” Murphy said to the barman. “The terrible times we live in, Major. Kids down over the border from Belfast, always high on something. If it’s not the drugs, it’s the booze. But not in Drumore. We like a bit of law and order here.”
“IRA law and order.”
“Children can walk to school safe here, old people rest easy in their homes, young women walk home from the village dance, and with Mr. Belov the squire now, most people are in work and grateful. Farms around here are prosperous, thanks to Mr. Belov. If you were hoping to see him, he left yesterday in the helicopter for Belfast and onwards to Moscow.”
“I knew.”
“He’s a close one, Mr. Belov.”
“Because he’s what you might call preoccupied with business on a worldwide scale. Anything else, he leaves to me. Now, what have you got for me?”
Tod Murphy, who as well as learning Irish in the Maze Prison had managed reasonable Russian, held up the book and said in that language, “The City of God, by St. Augustine. Serious reading for a serious man.”
“So you still believe in God in spite of having walked over corpses all these years.”
“Oh, yes,” Tod Murphy said gravely. “Hell and damnation exist, redemption is possible. Christ is risen.”
“As to walking over corpses, Major, we’ve all done that, as I understand it,” Kelly told him.
“Especially Josef Belov,” Ashimov said. “I think you’ll find his body count exceeds the two of you put together.”
“Very possibly, and I say the same of yours. But let’s go up to the castle and we’ll show you the ceiling they’ve refurbished in the Great Hall. Belov was pleased. Let’s see what you think.”
As they drove through the grounds, the vista was more than pleasing: the avenue of beech trees, the moat, the great entrance, the turrets, the towers. There was even a drawbridge that worked on an electronic system. The Great Hall was everything it ought to be: a huge staircase sweeping down, carpets scattered over the flagged floor, two enormous chandeliers hanging from the gilded ceiling, a log fire smoldering on the wide hearth, an oak table, twelve chairs around it, a couch on each side of the fire.
“You’ll have a drink?” Kelly asked. “The kitchen’s working on the lunch now.”
“Why not?”
“And you can tell us why you’ve come,” Murphy said.
“What do you know about a man named Sean Dillon?” Ashimov asked.
Tod Murphy simply stopped smiling and looked astonished. “Sean? What in the hell is he to you?”
Dermot Kelly laughed out loud, and Ashimov said, “What is this? It sounds as if he’s some kind of friend.”
“Ah, Major, you’ll never understand the Irish. Sean was more than a friend. He was the best, a true comrade,” Kelly said. “We were on the run from Brit paratroopers in the sewers of Derry on one famous occasion. I took a bullet in the shoulder, but I could keep going. Tod here got one in the leg and fell by the wayside. When Sean found out, he went back for him.”
“I’ll drink to him any day,” Murphy said.
Ashimov was bewildered. “This man works for Charles Ferguson, who heads the Prime Minister’s secret security service. So secret, it’s known in the trade-”
Kelly cut in, “ – as the Prime Minister’s private army, and they’d need the best, so they got Sean.”
“I don’t understand you.”
“You’d need to be Irish to understand us, Major, and it’s got nothing to do with religion. Sean Dillon is the best. They couldn’t touch his collar for years, not the RUC, not the British Army. D’you know how he ended up working for Ferguson? During the Serb War, he was flying medical supplies in for children, the Serbs caught him.”
“It’s what’s called a good deed in a naughty world,” Tod Murphy said. “He was faced with a firing squad – and Ferguson blackmailed him. He saved his skin, wiped his slate clean, and in return Sean became his enforcer. We all know the story.”
And Ashimov, in spite of his wealth of experience, was astonished. “And you don’t mind?”
Kelly said, “I told you. He was a comrade. The best. But if he got you in his sights, you were dead. Still would be
.”
“So why do you want to know about him?” Kelly asked, and Ashimov told them.
When he had finished, Murphy said, “So this Ali Selim bowser is on the run in Iraq and you’ve got what’s-her-name, Greta Novikova, on his tail?”
“ Ferguson will have Sean on that one like a dose of salts,” Kelly put in. He turned to Tod Murphy. “Put your priest’s intellect on this. What’s your conclusion?”
“Quite simple. Ferguson doesn’t want a trial at the Old Bailey. The Muslims wouldn’t like that. He’s sent Sean to bring Selim back. A nice, quiet inquisition in some safe house in London, and you and Mr. Belov wouldn’t like that.”
“Well, let’s hope it doesn’t come to that. But how would you two feel if I had trouble in London with Ferguson and his people? What would you say if I said I needed you? It would include taking on Dillon.”
They looked at each other and smiled.
“Ah, now,” said Murphy. “He was a comrade, to be sure. But that doesn’t mean there might not be a score or two to settle.”
“Things run well here, as you know,” Kelly said. “We do things our way and Belov’s money for the farmers keeps things sweet.”
Tod cut in. “But with the Peace Process, it gets awfully boring. What you suggest could be interesting.”
“But just so you realize,” Kelly added. “If there’s something Sean Dillon could give master classes in, it’s bloody mayhem.”
“So where would that leave you?”
“Oh, we’d give him a run for his money.” And Tod Murphy smiled.
It was later that day that President Jake Cazalet walked on the shore at Nantucket. He loved the old beach house with its seafront of beach and sand dunes, and came down whenever he could, certainly most weekends. The helicopter delivered him from Washington late on a Friday, picked him up again Sunday evening.
He had a cook and housekeeper in from the local town. No fuss and good plain cooking, he would say. He’d always insisted that only two Secret Service men accompany him and one always had to be Clancy Smith. The other usually handled communications.
Even with only two minders, however, the security around him was electronically state-of-the-art, especially since the assassination attempt on him three years before while running through the nearby marsh.
He was walking on the beach now with his beloved flat-coated retriever, Murchison, and with Clancy Smith. The surf boiled, the sky was slate gray, rain showering in so hard that the two men each carried an umbrella. They paused for Clancy to light the President’s cigarette.
“It feels good to get away from everything, Mr. President.”
“My God, but it does. The smell of that salt in the air is really something.”
“It sure is.”
In the distance came the unmistakable sound of a helicopter approaching. Clancy said, “That will be Blake coming in, sir.”
“And our English cousins,” Cazalet said. “It always gives me a strange feeling when I hear those things.” He looked along to where the helicopter was dropping in on the beach. “Takes me right back to Vietnam.” He flicked his cigarette away. “Okay, let’s go and greet our guests.”
Ferguson and Hannah Bernstein sat together on the other side of the coffee table by the fire, Cazalet facing them, Clancy leaning against the wall by the French windows behind. Murchison lay on the rug, watching.
Cazalet said, “I read Major Roper’s report on Josef Belov with interest, if that’s the right word. I’ve spoken to the Prime Minister only briefly, for obvious reasons.”
“Which is why he thought it a good idea that we talk, Mr. President.”
“Thank God we do, otherwise I could have been dead on that sidewalk in Manhattan. It could have succeeded so easily. I’ll never understand it, the drive to assassinate.”
“Actually, the Superintendent knows a bit about it,” said Ferguson. “She has a master’s degree in psychology.”
Cazalet said, “Superintendent?”
“Motive, sir, is the basic requirement.”
“And hate,” Cazalet said. “Deep conviction.”
“Not always,” she replied. “For one kind of assassin, professional, the motive is usually money, and a target like you would be a big payday. But the money is no good if he doesn’t survive. It’s often a Day of the Jackal kind of thing for them – meticulous planning and a guaranteed exit.”
Cazalet nodded. “And the other kind?”
“Usually the most successful. You’ll remember President Reagan, shot at close quarters by a man in the crowd who knew he would stand no chance of getting away.”
“So we’re back with what I said in the first place. The motive is hate, deep conviction.”
“And often a genuine religious belief. It’s interesting that the word assassin is derived from the Arabic. During the Middle Ages, members of various cults under the influence of hashish attempted to kill many leaders of the Crusades.”
“Jewish zealots in biblical times used the same tactics on the Romans,” Ferguson put in.
Hannah said, “It can derive from a feeling of deep frustration, Mr. President. It was Lenin who said the purpose of terrorism is to terrorize. It’s the only way a small country can fight against an empire.”
“That was one of Michael Collins’s favorite sayings when he led the IRA back in 1920 against the British,” Ferguson said.
Cazalet nodded. “All very interesting, but how does it explain Morgan?”
“I don’t know any religion on earth that doesn’t have its extremists,” Hannah said. “Right through history, and usually those extremists are the kind of people who are extremely good at brainwashing others, particularly young people.”
“Into becoming assassins, suicide bombers?” Cazalet shook his head.
“Of course, the religious leaders who spread the word are usually reluctant to put themselves on the line.”
“Understandably.” Cazalet got up. “I arranged a light lunch with cook and gave her the afternoon off. I wanted us to have privacy. It’s waiting for us in the kitchen. Lead the way, Clancy. You’ll join us, of course.”
The conversation over lunch was much more social and pleasant, ranging from what was worth seeing on the West End stage to Cazalet and Hannah comparing student days at Harvard and Cambridge.
Cazalet turned to Ferguson. “Did you go to university, General?”
“Too busy. I always intended to, but we had conscription then. After two years in the army, I got a taste for it, I suppose. I was eighteen and Communist Arabs were shooting at me, so when they offered me a commission…” He shrugged. “It seemed the natural thing to do.”
“All those rotten little wars,” Hannah couldn’t help saying. “You couldn’t get enough.”
“Ah, there speaks the psychologist,” Ferguson said cheerfully. “But not my rotten little wars, my dear. All the way through, and that includes Northern Ireland, Bosnia, Kosovo and the two Gulf Wars, I was a member of that happy band of brothers called soldiers who take care of those things from which the general public turns its face. I’ve always liked to think it an honorable profession.” He smiled at Cazalet and Clancy. “Of course, I do not include the marines in that sentiment.”
“We thank the General,” Clancy said, and they all laughed, but Hannah was uncomfortable and it showed. The trouble was that she was changing inside herself and her head and she didn’t know what to do about it.
Cazalet, sensing something wasn’t right, smiled at her reassuringly and stood up. “Okay, folks, to work,” and he led them back to the sitting room.
So, if I’m getting this right,” he said a while later, “this Dr. Ali Selim, sensing personal disaster, has fled to Iraq. We’re aware that he has been controlled by this Major Yuri Ashimov, who is head of security for the Belov organization. Which I assume means a plentiful source of financial support for Muslim extremist groups.”
“There’s no possibility of proving that in a court of law, Mr. President,” Hannah said.
“It’s just about impossible to touch Josef Belov,” Ferguson said. “He’s far too powerful, one of the richest men in the world, and a friend of Putin.”
“Even if it was revealed that he’d donated money to some of these Muslim organizations,” Hannah said, “it would be impossible to prove that he’d acted except in good faith.”
“So where does that leave us?” Cazalet asked.
“The most worrying aspect is the recruitment of young British Muslims to join militant groups in the Middle East,” Ferguson said. “To be trained in camps in Syria or Iraq, even in southern Arabia, and then returned to Britain and America, often as sleepers, to lead apparently normal lives until their special abilities are required. Cannon fodder for Al Qa’eda.”
“You think Wrath of Allah is part of that?”
“It wouldn’t surprise me. We know a great deal about them and a great deal about Belov, as you’ve read. Don’t forget that when he was with the KGB, he was totally dedicated to helping the downfall of all Western values. A kind of old-fashioned Bolshevik. He’s got all the money in the world, so money is only a means to an end.”
“But what’s the point?” Cazalet demanded. “Why behave as he does?”
“The game, Mr. President,” Hannah said. “The game is the thing. The ultimate power of being able to move his way around the chessboard and laugh at us all, be untouchable.”
“So what do we do about it?” Cazalet asked.
Ferguson said, “Sending that GRU major, Novikova, on Selim’s trail to Baghdad probably means the worst. That Selim’s served his purpose and knows too much. I imagine they’ll finish him off if they can, though I’m not completely sure of that.”
“Which is why you’ve sent Dillon. To save him?”