Critical Threat

by Nick Oldham

  Henry shook his hand. ‘I’m Chief Inspector Christie. I believe you’ve had an unwelcome guest this morning?’

  Although Iqbal’s ethnic origin may well have differed significantly from Henry’s, his Lancashire accent was even broader.

  ‘I’ll bloody say,’ Iqbal said angrily. ‘I were asleep in t’ front room an’ I heard this noise in t’ loft. I thawt it were burds or summat. I turns over in bed – me wife’s nexta me, by the way, snorin’ her fat ’ead off – an’ I looks up an’ t’ bloody loft door’s opening. This guy appears, drops down, an’ before I can say boo to a goose, he’s gone, done a runner.’

  ‘Must’ve been scary,’ Henry empathized, realizing time was of the essence. ‘Which is your house?’

  ‘End one – down there,’ Iqbal pointed.

  ‘Right.’ Henry’s mind raced. ‘Would you recognize him again?’

  ‘Oh, aye, cheeky little get!’

  ‘And can you describe him?’

  ‘For definite.’

  ‘And would you be prepared to jump into a police car with me and have a scout round, see if we can spot him?’

  ‘Course I would … you think he’s connected wi’ this?’ He gestured to the police activity.

  Henry just gave him a knowing look, then turned to the officer who had brought him out to meet Iqbal. ‘We need a car. I’ll drive. Mr Iqbal can jump into the front seat, and you get in the back. We’ll have a drive around to see if we can spot our interloper. You can get a description and circulate it for patrols.’ Henry saw the female sergeant come into the back alley. ‘Everything OK?’

  She gave him a thumbs up.

  Henry told the drivers of the vans who had come to pick up the prisoners to take them both to Leyland Police Station, which was about fifteen miles away, because it was the only station in the county properly equipped to deal with terror suspects. During its time it had seen quite a few come through its doors.

  He then commandeered the first patrol car that turned up, hoiked out the driver and set off with Iqbal and the Support Unit officer to do a quick search of the surrounding streets. About twenty minutes had passed since the raid had kicked off and Henry knew that the realistic chances of bagging the third member of the team were pretty remote, because if there was an escape route prepared through the lofts of the terrace, then there would be a vehicle waiting somewhere too. But, he reasoned, you had to be in it to win it and if there was the possibility of striking lucky, then he was prepared to have a go.

  Iqbal was a good witness. He had got a fairly lengthy look at the mystery man and, it transpired, had even jumped out of bed to challenge him and been pushed out of the way by the man as he ran out of the bedroom.

  ‘I woulda gone after him, but me pyjama bottoms fell down,’ he explained. He went on to describe him in good detail, including his clothes.

  It had been a long time since Henry had cruised the mean streets of Accrington in a police car; a long time since he had driven a witness around, too, searching for an offender. It was always a heart-pounding time.

  Henry was now fully awake, the complete antithesis of the dopey-eyed old man he’d been half an hour before.

  Much had happened in that short space of time, which was why he liked sharp-end policing so much. One minute you can be half-asleep; the next tackling gun-toting, explosive-clad kids. As he drove, he had time to reflect for a moment or two.

  Which was when the backlash struck him full-on and he was forced to take a few steadying breaths whilst he gave thanks that he wasn’t in the queue to meet his Maker, maybe alongside two young and foolish Asian boys, to see whether he was going to be allocated heaven or hell. That is if the ultimate ‘Maker’ was the same for everyone.

  He drove down on to Blackburn Road, then turned towards the town centre. A few citizens were knocking about now, the town slowly stretching and yawning into life.

  Iqbal’s description of the man was circulated by the constable, though Henry knew that at five in the morning, the area would hardly be flooded with uniforms. In fact he recalled that at the briefing he had been told that there were only three officers on duty in Accrington after 4 a.m. – and he had snaffled one car for him and two vans for the prisoners, which meant, frustratingly, there was no one else to assist with the search until the reinforcements arrived.

  He settled behind the wheel of the Astra and drove through the drizzle, whilst thinking about Operation Enid, the highly suspect intelligence they’d had to swallow, and putting officers in unnecessary danger. He smiled grimly, anticipating the carefully chosen words he would later be machine-gunning at Detective Superintendent Greek, the SB boss. When he did it, he hoped that a few of the spooks would be in earshot too.

  He drove up to the railway station, saw no one fitting the description, then did a slow tour of the town. Mr Iqbal did not spot the intruder. Henry decided to call it off and get back to the scene.

  They had circled the town centre and were on Blackburn Road, an ASDA superstore on their right and a new-ish complex of retail outlets, car dealers and a cinema. The traffic lights outside ASDA were on red. Henry pulled into the nearside lane, signalling (to no one in particular) his intention to turn left. He checked his mirror and actually saw there was a car behind, a BMW, approaching slowly in the offside lane, obviously going straight on towards the M65, about two miles ahead.

  The lights turned green.

  Henry selected first and – the habit of a lifetime drilled into him by a succession of police driving courses – before moving checked his mirror and noticed that the BMW, instead of setting off, had stopped completely some twenty metres behind.

  ‘What’s this guy up to?’ Henry said, his eyes still in the mirror.

  The PC in the back looked over his shoulder. Mr Iqbal had a look, too.

  Suddenly the BMW did a spectacular reverse U-turn, the whole car rocking, tyres squealing, even on the damp tarmac, and shot off back towards the town.

  Henry fumbled with his gear and tried to execute the same manoeuvre, which he succeeded in doing with much less panache than whoever was driving the BMW. As he did this, the PC in the back radioed in.

  In the seat next to Henry, Mr Iqbal grabbed the elbow rest on his door with both hands and said, ‘Fuckin’ hell!’

  ‘Just hold tight, you’ll be OK, I’m a safe driver.’ He rammed his foot on to the accelerator, flicked on the blues, and pushed the Astra hard, making the underpowered engine scream in protest. It did, however, respond well and he was still in sight of the BMW when he reached the roundabout underneath the old railway viaduct where several roads converged just on the edge of town. The driver of the BMW switched off the lights on the German car as he gunned the vehicle up the steep incline that was Milnshaw Lane and, without even the hint of a pause, did a left on to Whalley Road, also quite a steep hill, and sped out of town.

  Henry was a skilled driver. He had done all the courses and more, and on top of that he’d had many car chases – even survived them – but even he had a shiver of dread when he too pulled out of Milnshaw Lane and caused a law abiding member of the public, tootling along in his Nissan, minding his own business, to brake hard, swerve, mount the kerb and just miss a lamp post.

  ‘I’ll say sorry later,’ Henry promised.

  In the seat behind him, the PC had started a running commentary: ‘Now on Whalley Road in the direction of Clayton-le-Moors; speeds in excess of fifty and accelerating … didn’t get the registration number … yeah, blue BMW …’

  Mr Iqbal, even in the greyness of dawn, had clearly lost his colour, his face having drained of blood. ‘Fuckin’ hell!’ he said again.

  The Astra’s engine was ear-splittingly loud, but Henry did not let up on it. He pushed it to its limits and as he shot a red light at the junction of Queens Road – on the corner, by the hospital – he was travelling at sixty, which was fast for the conditions in this built-up area. The BMW had dipped out of sight beyond a slight rise. Henry knew the road ahead was fairly straight, thoug
h it was narrow for a main road, and because of the time of day and the lack of other traffic, the BMW had the capacity to leave the Astra standing.

  ‘Just had a report of a stolen BMW from Accrington town centre in the last ten minutes,’ the comms operator said from the control room at Blackburn, which covered this area. He gave details and asked if this could be the one they were chasing.

  ‘Affirmative,’ the PC replied as he sat back and, intelligently, put a seat belt on.

  ‘Present location?’ comms asked.

  ‘Whalley Road heading towards Clayton … just passing the Fraser Eagle Stadium’ – Accrington Stanley’s football ground – ‘but we’ve lost sight of the car.’

  Henry was grimly undeterred. It was unlikely now that he would catch the BMW, but he always liked to go the extra mile and though he reduced speed, much to Mr Iqbal’s obvious relief, he decided to go as far as Clayton-le-Moors, then turn back. It was the thought that the BMW could be being driven by the third member of a terrorist cell that made him want to keep looking. Whilst he might be wrong on that score, he hated coincidence.

  ‘All patrols,’ came the now urgent voice of the radio operator, ‘treble-nine just received from a driver on Whalley Road, Clayton-le-Moors … reporting a BMW has just collided with two parked cars and flipped over on to its roof, just after the junction with Burnley Road … will give further details …’

  ‘We’re one minute away,’ the PC shouted up. ‘Sounds like our man.’

  ‘Thank you, God,’ Henry intoned and, once more, stuck his right foot down, bringing a further expletive from Mr Iqbal, who sank down into his seat and gripped his seat belt with two hands.

  The BMW driver had run the red light at the Burnley Road junction, but had been unlucky in that at that precise moment another car was legitimately crossing its bows to the green light. It had been travelling at about eighty mph and with the avoiding swerve on the greasy road, the driver had lost control. The BMW had fish-tailed out of the junction, crashed into one car parked on the left-hand side of the road, catapulted across to one on the opposite side and had then been flipped on to its roof, careering dramatically down the road, sparks flying until it pounded into another car, bounced off it and came to a crunching stop, spinning like a top on its roof and blocking the road in both directions, just on the Accrington side of a canal bridge.

  Henry stopped in the middle of the road twenty metres short of the BMW, flicked on all the Astra’s emergency lights. He and the constable bundled out of the car and trotted to the scene, the constable – efficient as ever – radioing through that they were off at the scene. Iqbal stayed in the Astra, still clutching the seat belt.

  The BMW had stopped spinning at ninety degrees to the road. It was a scrunched up mess. The roof was battered down, had damage all around it. Henry thought the driver would have been lucky to survive this in one piece as he reached the car and bent to peer inside, expecting blood and brains and broken bits of body everywhere.

  ‘Shit!’ he breathed.

  The car was empty.

  Henry stood up, looking around, and worked out how the car had arrived at its current location, amazed that, following such a crash, the driver had managed to crawl out and leg it.

  ‘Where the …?’ he started to say.

  ‘What, boss?’ the constable said, then took a look. ‘Christ, he’s got out!’

  ‘He’s gone down there,’ came a voice, which made both officers look up to a bedroom window of a roadside terraced house. It was a middle-aged woman, clutching a dressing gown around her bosom, leaning out and pointing. ‘Canal,’ she added helpfully.

  Henry gave her the thumbs-up. ‘I’ll have a quick look-see and if I don’t spot him, we’ll get a dog handler down here. You look after the scene.’ Without waiting for a response, the charged-up Henry Christie trotted to the canal bridge, then cut down a steep set of steps which led on to the canal towpath. It was the Leeds–Liverpool canal, meandering through the once heavily industrialized towns of East Lancashire. As he reached the towpath, he seemed to immediately enter a more serene world, even though he was only a matter of metres away from a main road and maybe a couple of hundred from the M65 motorway.

  In the fast clearing dawn light, and even the misty rain, the canal looked wonderful, very peaceful. Two moorhens squawked off as his heavy boots landed, flapping away and launching themselves into the reeds on the opposite bank.

  He stopped, listened to the silence, the sound of traffic merely a vague drone.

  To his right was the canal bridge, over which the main road ran, and to his left the canal threaded its way towards Accrington. He walked in this direction for a few metres.

  There was no sign of anyone.

  He tutted as he realized this was definitely a job for a dog. If he started to search by himself, he would either cock things up for the dog or just waste his time. With reluctance he decided to take a step back and let the experts get on with their jobs when they arrived. And anyway, the search would need armed backup if the suspect was indeed one of the terrorists.

  He took one last look and his eyes caught something in the darkness under the arch of the bridge. A shape on the floor in the shadow. The hairs on his neck prickled. He did not move, but allowed his eyes to adjust properly.

  It was the shape of a body. Someone trying to hide?

  His steps were slow and quiet until he was sure what he was seeing, then he did not hesitate, but ran and crouched down beside the body of a male lying face down, spread-eagled, in a dirty puddle of blood and rainwater.

  Five

  9 a.m.: Henry Christie, feeling grimy and dishevelled, still dressed in the overalls and boots he had worn all night, sat glumly on a chair in the office occupied by the chief constable’s staff officer and other associated staff. He was leaning forwards, elbows on knees, staring blankly at the floor, trying to keep his grit-filled eyes open. He stifled a big yawn, which took some doing and almost broke his jaw, sat up and rubbed his weary face, taking in a deep, slow breath. His eyes flickered around the room. All the desks were occupied: two secretaries, the deputy chief constable’s staff officer and Chief Inspector Laker, the chief’s bag-carrier, last seen by Henry several months before when Henry had been demanding to have an audience with FB. He was pretty sure Laker had not forgiven him for that day, but to be honest, he didn’t give a monkey’s something.

  He swallowed. God, his throat was dry. He smiled in the direction of the chief’s secretary, a young lady by the name of Erica, in an effort to catch her eye. She was engrossed in word processing. Henry coughed. ‘Excuse me, any chance of a cup of coffee?’ As there was a kettle, milk and a jar of instant coffee on a table behind her, Henry assumed there was every chance.

  ‘Yes, certainly.’ She saved her work, smiled at him in a sad way, and spun around in her chair.

  Henry noticed Laker looking at him, a scowl of disapproval on his mush. He said, ‘Been up all night – operational stuff, y’know?’

  ‘So I’ve heard,’ said the bagman.

  Henry stiffened. ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

  ‘You’ll find out soon enough.’ Laker refocused on his computer. A surge of trepidation rushed through Henry.

  The kettle boiled.

  ‘Here we go.’ Erica handed him a cup of coffee, the colour of which reminded Henry of the tidal water in the Wyre Estuary, a sort of murky red-brown.

  ‘Thanks.’ He sipped it. Laker’s little off-the-cuff remark had just knocked him off kilter for some reason. He had been summoned to the chief’s office following the less than smooth raid in Accrington, he assumed for a pat on the back, but Laker’s jibe had made him think differently – or was Laker just being a bastard, wanting to wind Henry up? If that was the case, it had worked.

  The coffee tasted as bad as it looked and Henry winced, but managed to transform it into a smile for Erica.

  Yes, Laker’s remark made Henry wonder, but not for very long because the chief constable’s door opened and FB
beckoned Henry in.

  There was a polished oak conference table in the centre of the chief’s office and every seat round it, bar one, was taken. The table itself was an untidy mess of paper cups, mineral-water bottles, catering flasks of coffee and tea and lots of documents.

  There was silence as Henry was ushered by FB to the vacant space at the far end of the table. He sat, uncomfortably aware of the looks, and nodded to the assembled dignitaries, several of whom he knew; others he didn’t and had never seen before. He wasn’t over the moon to see Dave Anger’s cruel face amongst them.

  ‘Ladies and gentlemen,’ FB said with the same breath he exhaled as he settled his rump back into his chair, ‘may I introduce Chief Inspector Henry Christie …’ Henry did note that FB hadn’t used the term ‘detective’ on the front of the introduction. ‘And just for his benefit, could we go round the table as a matter of courtesy? I’m Bob Fanshaw-Bayley, chief constable of Lancashire Constabulary,’ he announced, then looked to his right.

  ‘Dave Anger, FMIT commander … I think you know me.’ He gave Henry a slitty sideways look.

  Next along said, ‘Percy Greek, detective superintendent, Lancashire Special Branch.’ He gave Henry much the same sort of look as Anger had.

  ‘Mary Dearden, Security Services.’

  ‘John Threlfall, Security Services.’

  Henry had spotted those two skulking around at the briefing and had rightly tagged them instantly as spooks. They were both young, mid-twenties, and looked wet behind the ears, as though they’d come straight out of Oxbridge and gone into MI5 or 6 to protect the country without having even seen the place.

  Next along was Detective Superintendent Jerry Carruthers from the Metropolitan Anti-Terrorist Branch. Henry knew him by sight, having seen him on TV following the 7/7 atrocities in the capital, but had never met him. Carruthers had also been at the briefing.

  ‘I’m Angela Cranlow, deputy chief constable, Lancashire,’ the next person said. She was fairly recently appointed and as Henry had previously noted – when FB had been pushing him out into the corridor following his unannounced gatecrash a few months earlier – she did not look anything like the stereotypical high ranking woman cop. In her mid-forties, with soft features, quiet voice, but with an air of cool authority and, Henry guessed, a trim figure under that unflattering uniform. Based on what he had heard, he had nothing but respect for her. She had done her time on the streets, been a detective at several levels, seen some tough times and was nobody’s fool.