by Andy McNab
Danny went back to his bag and continued wrapping the food in cling film. But there was something more he needed to ask. 'How many people have you killed?'
'Blimey, you don't want much, do you?' said Fergus. 'Look, that's… it's private… personal. Something I have to live with, and something I don't talk about, not even to you.'
'But how do you cope with seeing someone killed?' said Danny. 'I'm trying to understand.'
'You just deal with it,' answered Fergus as he gathered together the spare kit and clothes. 'You don't have a choice. You just deal with it.'
He hid the kit and clothes behind the pile of brick and rubble. 'We'll take only what we need, in the day sacks. We can pick up this stuff later, but I'll take the rest of the cash, just in case someone finds what we leave here. Now, let's go.'
They were still both soaked to the skin as they neared the driveway leading to Meacher's house. Danny's jeans were heavy and clung to his legs; his skin felt cold and clammy. Back at the barn he had been about to ask why they hadn't changed into dry kit, but had decided to keep his mouth shut. He knew he would find out soon enough.
The house wasn't visible from the road. The narrow, tree-lined drive bent away from the road, and thick hedgerows protected the property from prying eyes. Fergus and Danny avoided the drive and walked on further down the road.
There were no immediate neighbouring properties, and after about a hundred metres Fergus said they should push their way through the bushes and make their approach from one side of the house. They stepped over a grass verge and a small ditch and began to ease their way through brambles and thorns. Every step brought a fresh soaking as the foliage showered them with rainwater. Danny smiled to himself. Now he knew why they hadn't changed into dry kit.
Fergus wanted to carry out a three-hundred-and-sixty-degree recce of the target and find the best position for watching the front of the house. But once they broke through the scrubby stand of wild bushes and caught their first glimpse of the house and part of the gardens he realized there was a problem.
The large, double-fronted, red-brick house and its manicured gardens were entirely surrounded by a combination of tall brick wall and metre-and-a-half-high chain-link fence where the wall had crumbled away. The fence had obviously been standing there for years as thick ivy and climbing roses scrambled their way up to the top. There was no way they could get a full view of the front of the house without going into the garden itself.
Fergus whispered to Danny, 'When we approach a target we don't want any confusion over where we are, so we use colours for the different sides of the building. No matter which direction you see a building from, the colour system stays the same. The front is always white and the back is black. The right side, as you look at the front, is red and the left side is green. Understand?'
Danny nodded.
They moved along the fence, approaching the red side of the house. They reached a section where a row of evergreen shrubs on the other side screened the fence from the house.
'We'll go through here,' whispered Fergus, taking a pair of secateurs from his bag. 'Those bushes give us good cover. It's not perfect – the cut in the fence could be discovered while we're in the OP – but we'll have to chance it.'
'Can't we just climb the fence?'
'You could, but with this leg of mine I might never get over. And anyway, we'd make too much noise.'
Fergus pulled out some green fibre material, the sort normally used for putting under gravel paths to keep weeds down. He got Danny to wrap it around the bottom link, so that as he cut through the mild steel with the secateurs, the pinging sound of the steel snapping was hardly audible. When he'd finished cutting he stood up and pulled the fence apart to reveal an upside-down V shape. Rainwater from the storm-soaked plants came cascading down as the chain links gave, and they both got another drenching.
Fergus held up the cut section of fencing and told Danny to crawl through the gap with his kit. Then Danny pulled the cut fencing to his side so that Fergus could follow him through.
They pushed the cut section back into position and left it unsecured for a quick escape if necessary. They were ready to move towards the house but Fergus had one last instruction: 'We do this in bounds.'
'In what?'
'Stages. And we crawl – I can still do that. Stick to my route like glue. OK?'
They crawled on their stomachs back along the line of shrubs, with Danny following exactly as instructed. Fergus stopped behind the cover of a bush every few metres, and then looked and listened for two or three minutes before deciding on where to move to next.
After several bounds they got their first full look at the roof and brickwork of the red elevation of the house. To the right of the building itself was a moss-covered, high wall that looked even older than the one on the perimeter. Built into it was a wooden door that appeared to lead to a rear garden.
Fergus told Danny to stay with the kit and crawled further to his left. Soon he could see the gravel drive and a small Nissan that was parked in front of the house. He guessed he was looking at Mrs Meacher's run-around. Maybe the colonel wasn't at home.
Then Fergus spotted what he needed: a huge, thick bush sprawled over an area of lawn about thirty metres from the front of the house. He crawled over to the back of the bush and tuned in to the area. The field of view was perfect – he could easily see all of white, including the large front door, and there was also a good field of vision on red until the rear garden wall got in the way.
It was the perfect OP point, but before Fergus could beckon Danny over he heard a noise to his right. He froze, unable to see what was happening as the bushes were in the way.
But Danny could see. The door in the wall had creaked open and, as he watched, an old man in a flat cap and wellies walked through. He was pushing a wooden wheelbarrow that looked even older than he did. The wheelbarrow was loaded with plant cuttings, probably destined for a flowerbed somewhere at the front of the house. But not right at that moment. The effort of pushing the barrow through the gate seemed to be as much as the old boy could take. He parked the barrow close to the wall, slowly and carefully straightened up, and with a rub of his aching back, retreated through the gap in the wall and closed the door behind him.
Danny signalled to Fergus that the coast was clear and his grandfather beckoned him over.
'You never go in front of your OP because that's the area the enemy can see,' said Fergus when Danny reached him behind the bush. He motioned for Danny to look at the route they had taken. 'And on a day like this, they'd see all that.'
The marks in the wet grass were clearly visible. 'That's why you always have to think about the route you're taking and keep behind the OR'
'So how do we see through the bush if we have to stay behind it?'
'We don't need to see through it, we'll be in it.'
Twenty minutes later they were inside the bush with a clear view of the house. Using the secateurs, Fergus cut a small hole about half a metre in diameter at the bottom of the leafy shrub. He placed the small cut branches behind him and then told Danny how to make a bung from the offcuts.
While Danny worked, Fergus tunnelled his way into the centre, carefully cutting away inside the huge, old plant, and pushing the cut branches further into the bush, making the interior denser and gradually forming a cave.
When he'd finished they moved into the bush, taking their kit with them. The bung was ready to be pulled into position. Danny had tied the branches together with the garden string. It looked like a pagan bunch of flowers with a metre-long length of string dangling from the tie. Fergus pulled the bung by the string and it neatly plugged the gap in the bush. Then he took the remaining fibre material and snagged it on the branches so that it lined the inside of the OR
'Without the material, if the sun hit the bush, anyone outside would be able to see through to us,' he said. 'Our biggest weapon isn't the 9mm pistol, it's concealment.'
'What about the nails? You didn't use
them.'
'As a last resort, for climbing, we could have made dumars. But like I said, I'm not up to climbing any more.'
He explained how to make dumars while continually looking through the bush towards the front of the house.
After a while the wooden door in the wall opened again and the old man reappeared, pushing an ancient black bicycle. The flowers were going to have to wait. He carefully mounted the bike and pedalled slowly down the drive.
'One less person for us to worry about,' whispered Fergus as the old boy passed within a few metres of them. The crunch of the bicycle on the gravel faded but was replaced almost immediately by the sound of an approaching vehicle.
'Maybe it's Meacher,' said Danny.
But he was wrong. A police car passed them and came to a standstill outside the house.
Two uniformed officers got out, a man and a woman. They went to the front door and rang the bell. In less than a minute the door opened and a tall, upright, grey-haired woman appeared.
'Colonel's wife,' whispered Fergus. 'I remember her.'
Mrs Meacher spoke briefly to the officers and then led them into the house. They went into a room on red and were clearly visible to Fergus and Danny through a tall window. After a couple of minutes Mrs Meacher sat down on a high-backed chair. The female officer pulled up another chair and sat next to her. It didn't look like a routine visit.
31
The team were on their way to Meacher's. Fran checked her map and gave her orders over the net as she drove.
'Mick, it looks like a long driveway. I want you to get a trigger on where it meets the road. I want to know who drives in and out.'
'Mick, roger.'
'Roger that. Jimmy and Brian, I want you to get a trigger on the house itself. I want to know who's in there before the boss arrives. Roger so far?'
'Jimmy, roger.'
'Brian, roger.'
All four members of the team were taking different routes towards Meacher's house. Fran was in the area first. She pulled her VW Polo into a lay-by next to a small river and parked near where a couple of families were feeding the ducks.
That's Fran static about seven hundred metres south of the target. At the bridge over the river. I'll stay complete.'
Fran knew that Jimmy and Brian would have to go foxtrot to do their job. Mick might need to do the same, so someone had to be with their vehicle, ready to react if there was a drama. She opened the glove compartment and took out a sweaty cheese and onion sandwich bought from a garage the previous day for the journey to Norfolk. There had to be an innocent reason for stopping in the lay-by, so she walked towards the ducks, breaking off bits of the sandwich and throwing them onto the riverbank.
Some of the ducks came waddling towards her, squawking and flapping, but after a few half-hearted pecks at the bits of sandwich they turned away and went back to the other food on offer. Maybe they just didn't like onion.
Jimmy parked up about a hundred metres from the driveway, down a muddy track that led into a wooded area. The track was just wide enough for a vehicle and was deeply rutted with tyre marks. Where it petered out, flies buzzed around an overflowing bin surrounded by tied-up plastic bags. This was dog-walking territory.
Jimmy got on the net to organize an RV with Brian, who was parking up nearby.
'Jimmy's foxtrot.'
Fran went back to her car as the families drove away. She sat in the driver's seat with the door open. A few of the ducks waddled around nearby in the hope of picking up something more appetizing than cheese and onion. Fran got on the net.
'Mick, you there yet?'
He was working his way through the undergrowth opposite the entrance to the driveway. It wasn't ideal – Fran would have preferred two cars ready to react to any situation – but it was the only way he could get a trigger. His Gore-Tex gave him some protection from the wet foliage and leaf litter but it was hard going. Finally he could see the driveway.
'Mick has the trigger on the driveway. I can't see all the way up to the house but I can see in both directions along the road.'
Jimmy and Brian settled on a place to climb over the garden wall on the green side of the house. The wall was over three metres high at that point, but there were trees still in full leaf on the far side that broke the line of the top. They would give them cover as they crossed.
Jimmy got his back against the wall, bent his legs and cupped his hands between his thighs. Brian stepped back a little, jammed his right foot into Jimmy's hands and, using his partner's hands as a stepping stone, launched up at the wall. He grabbed the top and hooked his arms over to anchor himself. As Jimmy pushed Brian's foot upwards, he turned to face the wall.
It took a few seconds before Brian was bent over the wall. He stayed low, using the tree foliage for cover and turned round so that his legs were dangling down on the garden side and his top half was bent down towards Jimmy. Then he held his arms out. Jimmy jumped up and, like acrobats, they grabbed each other's wrists. Jimmy walked up the wall, almost turning upside down before he got one leg over the top so that Brian could let go of his wrists and grab his body to pull him up.
They dropped gently into the garden and then stopped, and listened, and tuned in to their new environment.
'That's Jimmy and Brian garden side. On green side of house.'
'Roger that.'
The two men began crawling forward, staying behind a row of shrubs that mirrored those on the opposite side of the garden. They decided on an OP at the end of the shrubs. It gave them an adequate view of the front of the house, the garden on the opposite side of the drive and the two parked vehicles.
'Jimmy and Brian have the trigger on the house. No sign of life. Two vehicles. Silver Nissan Micra, November Papa Charlie six-four-zero November. The other's a police patrol car.'
Jimmy could clearly see the wet gravel beneath the police car.
'It arrived after the rain; the Nissan hasn't moved all night.'
In Fincham's car Marcie Deveraux was also listening in on the net through her earpiece. She relayed the information to her boss.
Fincham shrugged. 'The local plod giving Mrs Meacher the news of her husband's unfortunate accident. I do hope she's not the hysterical type, I want to get this over quickly.'
Jimmy came on the net.
'Stand by. Stand by. That's the front door opening… two police, towards their car. A possible Mrs Meacher at the door. She's gone inside, door closed. That's the police complete… engine on… wait, now mobile towards the main. Now unsighted.'
Deveraux listened intently while checking the map on her lap. They were just a few miles away. 'The police have just left Meacher's house.'
Fincham nodded. 'Tell Fran that if the team give the all clear we'll go straight there.'
Deveraux had to wait while the police were taken out of the area by the team. Mick picked up the patrol car as it reached the end of the drive.
That's the police at the main. Wait. Wait. That's gone right towards you, Fran.'
He continued watching until the vehicle disappeared along the road.
That's now unsighted.'
In their OP, Fergus and Danny watched as Mrs Meacher went back to the side room, picked up the telephone and dialled a number.
'What's going on?' whispered Danny.
'Dunno. But I'd like to know what that call's about.'
Mrs Meacher spoke for about five minutes. Soon after she had put down the receiver, the Mercedes swept up the drive and came to a halt where the police car had been a little earlier. Fincham and Deveraux stepped out of the car and went to the front door.
'Him,' breathed Danny. 'How could he know we're here?'
'He doesn't. Maybe they've come to warn the colonel about us.'
Mrs Meacher came to the door. Fincham, looking solemn and concerned, shook hands and then introduced Deveraux. Mrs Meacher led them into the house and they entered the side room.
On the other side of the garden, Jimmy and Brian kept the rest of the team
informed of everything they were seeing.
'That's all three complete the house. Now unsighted.'
Caroline Meacher was old school, army officer's wife, born and bred to accept even the worst of news with the stiff upper lip of the ruling classes. If she was surprised at the swift and sudden arrival of Fincham and Deveraux, she didn't mention it. Her years of close contact with the Regiment had taught her to expect the unexpected.
She offered them tea, which they politely refused, and Fincham spent the next couple of minutes telling her what a great man and servant to his country her husband had been and how he would be missed by everyone who knew him.
Fincham oozed charm and concern but Mrs Meacher didn't appear to be impressed. 'Did you actually know my husband, Mr Fincham?'
Fincham smiled his most sympathetic smile. 'Sadly, only by reputation, Mrs Meacher, and I consider that to be my own personal loss.'
Deveraux cringed inwardly. 'Is there anything we can do for you, Mrs Meacher?'
'Thank you, but no. I've telephoned my son; he and his family live nearby. They were the reason we retired to Norfolk. We wanted to see more of our grandchildren.' She was silent for a moment and her eyes grew moist. 'My son and his wife will be here within the hour.'
Fincham glanced at Deveraux. He wanted the questioning over before the other mourners joined the party.
Fergus had to know what was going on inside the house. He started to push himself backwards towards the rear of the bush. 'I need to find out what they're talking about. Pull the bung back into position when I'm outside.'
'Wait,' said Danny. 'Let me do it. I can get there quicker than you.'
Fergus hesitated, reluctant to let his grandson move into more danger. But he knew what Danny said was true. 'Be quick, but don't rush.'
Danny pushed himself back, carefully kicked out the bung, and crawled out. As he moved away, Fergus pulled the bung back into position and watched as Danny used the tracks already made in the grass to go behind the line of shrubs and get closer to the window.