Exocet (1983)

by Jack Higgins

  'Good, I'd like a word with him before he goes.' As Lami Dozo moved towards the door, Galtieri called, 'You know what the day after tomorrow is?'

  'Of course.' It was Tuesday, 25th May and Argentina's national day.

  'You've something special planned, I trust?'

  'We'll do our best.'

  Lami Dozo went out, the President sighed, sat down at his desk and resumed work.

  * * *

  In London, Gabrielle Legrand, shopping in Harrods, found herself walking through the television department. A small crowd had gathered before a television set and the ITV news was on. The screen was showing a series of pictures of San Carlos Water, ships scattered at anchor in a cloud of smoke. Television film, as yet, was not available. An anonymous commentator was describing a raid as it took place, presumably that morning, Argentinian Skyhawks racing in to drop their bombs.

  His voice lifted in excitement as he followed the track of a Rapier missile, there was the sound of a violent explosion as a Skyhawk was destroyed.

  Several people in the crowd applauded and one man said, 'Got the bastard!' It was understandable. This was the enemy they were looking at. Planes dedicated to destroying their own boys. One of those boys was her half-brother, Richard. She knew he was on the aircraft carriers two hundred miles to the west of San Carlos Water but that was not safety. Helicopter pilots like Richard flew towards danger every day and their carriers were the constant targets of the Argentine missiles. Gabrielle prayed that God would protect twenty-two-year-olds.

  She turned away, physically sick, Raul in her mind.

  Thank God he's too old to fly those things, she thought, and hurried out.

  * * *

  Raul Montera, at that moment, was fifty miles off the southern tip of Argentina, five hundred feet above the sea, trying to nurse home a Skyhawk to port that had most of its tail missing, a plume of smoke drifting gently behind it.

  The boy in the cockpit was badly wounded; Montera knew that and had long since abandoned any attempt at proper procedure.

  'Hang on, Jose, not long now.'

  'No use, colonel.' The boy's voice was very tired. 'She's going down. I can't hold her any longer.'

  As the Skyhawk's nose dipped, Montera said, 'Eject boy.'

  'And freeze to death?' The boy laughed faintly. 'Why bother.'

  'Lieutenant Ortega,' Montera cried. 'Eject now. That's an order.'

  A second later the canopy flew into space, the boy was catapulted out. Montera followed him down, already giving base the position, watching the parachutes drift, hoping that the air sea rescue launch would be in time.

  He made a quick pass as Ortega hit the water, saw him break free of the chute. The small yellow dinghy inflated and, as he watched, the boy tried to climb in.

  There was a sudden warning buzz from the instrument panel that told him how low he was on fuel. He made one more pass, waggled his wings and curled away towards the coast.

  * * *

  When Montera got out of the cockpit of the Skyhawk at the Gallegos base, Sergeant Santerra, the technical crew chief, was already examining the plane and shaking his head.

  'Look at the tail, for Christ's sake, colonel. Cannon shell, at least four. Holes all over the place.'

  'I know. We had a couple of Harriers on our tails on the way out of San Carlos. They got Santini. Young Ortega almost made it and ditched about fifty miles out.'

  'Your luck is good, colonel. Amazing. I can't understand it. You should have been dead days ago.'

  'I put it all down to the love of a good woman myself.' Raul Montera reached up and touched the legend Gabrielle which was painted on the side of the cockpit. 'Thank you, my love.'

  * * *

  When he went into the Intelligence Room in the Operations building, it was empty except for Major Pedro Munro, an Argentinian of Scots extraction, the senior intelligence officer.

  'Ah, there are you, Raul. One of these days you won't walk through that door,' he said cheerfuly.

  'Thanks very much,' Montera answered. 'Any word on Ortega?'

  'Not yet. What have you got to tell me?'

  Montera helped himself to a cigarette from the pack on the desk. 'That it was hell out there, just like an old war movie on television, only this was real. Men died.'

  Munro said, 'Very funny. Now, could I possibly have something concrete? Did you sink anything?'

  'I don't think so,' Montera told him, 'for the excellent reason that my bombs didn't explode again. Could you possibly arrange for ordnance to get the blasted timing right on those fuses?'

  Munro stopped trying to be amusing. 'I'm damn sorry, Raul. Truly.'

  'So am I.' Montera told him, and went out.

  He walked towards the officers' mess wearily, his flying boots drumming on the tarmac. He felt depressed, stale, at the end of things. He was too old to be doing this sort of thing, and that was a fact; then he remembered what Gabrielle had said to him about age being a state of mind and smiled.

  He thought a lot about her these days. In fact, all the time. She filled his heart and head, flew with him, slept with him. He spoke aloud to her last thing each night.

  He walked into the ante-room. The first person he saw was Lami Dozo, standing by the fire, a circle of young officers about him.

  The General excused himself and came to meet Montera, genuine pleasure on his face. He gave him the abrazo, the formal hug.

  'I saw your mother yesterday at a charity affair. Fundraising for the army. She looked splendid.'

  'Was Linda with her?'

  'No, she was at school. As I say, your mother looked splendid. You, on the other hand, look dreadful. It must stop, this foolishness, Raul. Eleven missions in a week.'

  'Twelve,' Montera said. 'You forget today. And could you kindly get them to do something about the bombs? They will persist in not going off a lot of the time. Very annoying, when one has gone to such a great deal of trouble to deliver them.'

  'Have a drink,' Lami Dozo said.

  'An excellent idea.' Montera called a mess waiter over. 'Tea. My usual.' He turned to the General. 'Will you join me?'

  'Tea?' Lami Dozo said. 'Good God, what's got into you?'

  Montera nodded to the waiter who departed. 'Nothing. It's just that a friend of mine when I was in London persuaded me that coffee wasn't good for me.'

  'Who is this Gabrielle whose name they tell me is painted on the nose of your Skyhawk?'

  'The woman I love,' Raul Montera said simply.

  'Have I had the pleasure of meeting her?'

  'No. When she isn't living in London, she lives in Paris. Next question.'

  'Paris? How interesting. If you had time, you could look her up.'

  'I don't understand?'

  'You're flying to Paris tomorrow. I'm taking you back to Buenos Aires with me now. Oh, and Galtieri would like a word before you leave.'

  'I think perhaps you'd better explain,' Montera said.

  Which Lami Dozo did as briefly as possible. When he was finished he said, 'Well, what do you think?'

  'I think the world has gone mad,' Raul Montera told him. 'But who am I to argue.'

  'It could win us the war, Raul.'

  'Win us the war?' Montera laughed harshly. 'We're back with old movies on television, General. We've lost this war already. It should never have started. But by all means send me off to Paris to play games while these boys here continue to die.'

  The waiter returned with the tray at that moment and Montera poured himself a cup of tea with hands that shook slightly.

  He raised the cup to his lips and drank. 'Much better for you than coffee,' he said and smiled, remembering that morning in Kensington, a thousand years ago, in the bath with Gabrielle.

  Lami Dozo looked concerned. 'You've done too much, old friend. You need a rest. Come on, let's go.'

  'You think I'm going over the edge.' Montera swallowed the rest of his tea. 'You're quite wrong. I'm already there.'

  As they stood up, Major Munro came in.
He glanced about the mess, saw Montera and smiled. 'Good news, Raul. Young Ortega - they've picked him up. Badly shot up, but he'll survive. They say it was the coldness of the sea that saved him. Stopped him bleeding to death.'

  He recognised the General in the same moment and saluted.

  'His luck is good,' Lami Dozo commented.

  'Let's hope mine is,' said Raul Montera.

  * * *

  A little under four hours later, he was following Lami Dozo into Galtieri's private study at the Residencia del Presidente.

  Galtieri came round the desk to greet him warmly, hand outstretched. 'My dear Montera, a great pleasure. Your efforts on behalf of the cause have been heroic.'

  'I've done no more than any other pilot in my command, General.'

  'Very commendable, but not quite true. However, General Dozo has briefed you, I'm sure, on the importance of this new mission. We're all counting on you.'

  'I'll do my best, General. May I have permission to visit my mother before I leave?'

  'But of course. Give Donna Elena my humble duty. And now, I'll detain you no longer.'

  He shook hands again and Montera and Lami Dozo departed. When they had gone, Galtieri flicked the intercom and told Martinez to come in.

  The young captain presented himself and Galtieri passed across the report from Garcia in Paris. 'This one is highly sensitive, Martinez. Get your book and I'll dictate a brief account of the affair so far, my discussion with General Dozo and the action we have taken.'

  'Copies for General Dozo and Admiral Anaya, General, as usual?'

  Galtieri shook his head. 'General Dozo knows already and the Admiral doesn't deserve to know. One copy for my personal file.'

  'Very well, General.'

  * * *

  Carmela Balbuena was a formidable lady in her fifties. Her husband, an army captain, had been killed seven years previously during the so-called dirty war waged between the government and the back-country guerrillas. She had been on the staff at the Presidential Palace ever since and was now senior secretary.

  The report on the Exocet affair was handed over to her by Martinez personally. 'I think you'd better do this one yourself, then straight into his personal file, no copy,' he said.

  She took a pride in her work, typing it out meticulously on three sheets of paper, making one carbon copy in spite of what Martinez had said. She took the report and showed it to him.

  'Excellent, senora, you've excelled yourself. You can file it later when he's out.'

  'I'll put it into the office safe until morning,' she said. 'May I go now? I don't think there's anything else.'

  'Of course. See you tomorrow.'

  She went back into the other room, tidied her desk, took the copies of the three sheets she had made, folded them neatly and put them into her handbag. Then she left, closing the door behind her.

  * * *

  Carmela Balbuena had never been able to have children and had lavished all her affection on her nephew, son of her only brother. A socialist in her ideas, but no communist, she disliked Galtieri and the military regime that kept him in power, disliked a government that had caused so much repression and had been instrumental in bringing about the disappearance of so many thousands of ordinary people. Like her nephew, for example, who appeared to have been wiped off the face of the earth since his arrest at a student rally three years previously.

  And then she'd gone to a cultural evening at the French Embassy and had met Jack Daley, a fresh-faced young American who reminded her so much of her nephew. Daley had been more than attentive, taking her to concerts, the theatre, gradually drawing her out, encouraging her to talk of her work at the Palace.

  By the time she discovered he was a Commercial Attache at the American Embassy and probably much more, she didn't really care. Anything he wanted she gave him, which included any information of value from the office.

  She phoned him at the Embassy from the first public phone box she came to on her way home and met him an hour later in the Plaza de Mayo where Juan Peron had been so fond of speech making in the old days.

  They sat on a bench in one of the gardens and she passed him a newspaper containing the copy of the report.

  'I won't hold you,' she said. 'I've read that thing and it's dynamite. I'll see you again.'

  Jack Daley, who was in reality an agent of the CIA, hurried back to the Embassy to read the report in peace. Having read it, he didn't waste any time. Twenty minutes later it was being encoded and forwarded to Washington. Within two hours of being received there, it was passed on to Brigadier Charles Ferguson in London by order of the Director of the CIA himself.

  7

  Raul Montera moved out on to the terrace of the house at Vicente Lopez Floreda and took in the gardens below with a conscious pleasure. Palm trees waved in the slight breeze, water gurgled in the conduits and fountains, and the scent of mimosa was heavy on the air. Beyond the perimeter wall the River Plate sparkled like silver in the evening sun.

  His mother and Linda were sitting at a table beside a fountain on the lower terrace and it was the child who saw him first. She cried out in delight and came running towards him, arms outstretched, dressed for riding in jodhpurs and a yellow sweater, hair tied back in a ponytail.

  'Papa, we didn't know! We didn't know.'

  She clutched him and he held her tightly and she smiled up at him, fierce and proud. 'You were on the television at Rio Gallegos with General Dozo. I saw you. So did all the girls at school.'

  'Is that so?'

  'And the Skyhawks at Death Valley, we saw that too and I knew you must be flying one of them.'

  'Death Valley?' He stopped short. 'How did you know about that?'

  'Isn't that what the pilots call it, the place where they make their run on the British fleet? Two girls in my class at school have lost brothers.' She hugged him again. 'Oh, I'm so pleased you're safe. Will you be going back?'

  'No, not to Gallegos, but I'm going to France in the morning.'

  They reached the table. His mother sat watching him calmly, cool, elegant, perfectly groomed as usual, looking fifteen years younger than her seventy years.

  'I'm supposed to be going riding,' Linda said. 'I'll cancel it.'

  'Nonsense,' Donna Elena told her. 'Run along now. Your father will be here when you get back.'

  Linda turned to him. 'Promise?'

  'On my honour.'

  She hurried up the steps and Montera turned and reached for Donna Elena's hands. 'Mother,' he said formally as he kissed them. 'It's good to see you.'

  Her eyes took in every aspect of the face, so finely drawn, the haunted eyes. 'Oh God,' she whispered. 'My dearest boy, what have they done to you?'

  She was, by nature, self-sufficient, controlled, had learned many years before never to give too much of herself away. The result was that they had always enjoyed a highly formalised relationship.

  She tossed all that out of the window now, jumped to her feet and flung her arms around him. 'It's so good to have you back safe and well, Raul. So good.'

  'Mama.' He hadn't used that term since he was a little boy and felt hot tears of emotion cloud his eyes.

  'Come, sit down. Talk to me.'

  He lit a cigarette and sprawled back, letting everything go. 'This is wonderful.'

  'So, you're not going back?'

  'No.'

  'I must thank the Virgin for that in some suitable way. A man of your age flying jet planes. What nonsense, Raul. A miracle you are here.'

  'Yes, it is, when you come to think of it,' Montera said. 'I'd better light a few candles to someone myself.'

  'To the Virgin or to Gabrielle?' He frowned warily, and she said, 'Here, give me a cigarette. I'm not a fool, you know. I've seen you on television three times now in that Skyhawk of yours. One can hardly miss the inscription just below the cockpit. Who is she, Raul?'

  'The woman I love,' he said simply, repeating the words he had used to Lami Dozo.

  'Tell me about her.'

&n
bsp; So he did, pacing up and down the terrace beside her restlessly. When he was finished, she said, 'She sounds a remarkable young woman.'

  'An understatement,' Montera told her. 'The most extraordinary human being I have ever met. Extraordinary for me, that is. I plunged head first in love with her the very first moment. It isn't just her quite astonishing beauty; there's a joy to her that goes way beyond physical passion.' He suddenly laughed out loud and the lines seemed to vanish from his face and he no longer looked tired. 'She's so bloody marvellous in every way, Mama. I always had faith that there was something special about life and she's it.'

  Donna Elena Llorca de Montera took a deep breath. 'There's no more to be said then, is there? I presume I'll be introduced in your own good time. Now, tell me why you're going to France.'

  'Sorry,' he told her. 'Top secret. All I can say is that it's for what our President is pleased to call the cause. He also believes that if I'm successful, it could win us the war.'

  'And will it?'

  'If he believes that, he'll believe anything. The cause.' He walked to the edge of the terrace and looked out across the river. 'We've lost half our pilots so far, Mama. Half. That's what the newspapers don't tell you. The crowds cry out, wave flags; Galtieri makes speeches; but the reality is the butchery at San Carlos Water.'

  She stood up and took his arm. 'Come on, Raul, let's go inside now,' and together they went up the steps.

  * * *

  At Cavendish Place, Ferguson was seated at the desk, working his way through the CIA signal for the umpteenth time, when Harry Fox came in carrying a couple of files.

  'All here, sir. Everything on Felix Donner.'

  'Tell me, is Gabrielle still in town or has she gone back to Paris?'

  'Still at Kensington Palace Gardens. I was having dinner at Langans last night and she was there with some friends. Why?'

  'I should have thought it obvious, Harry. She was considerably smitten by Raul Montera's charms and he with her. We can put that to good use.' He looked at Fox's face and raised a hand. 'Don't start getting moral on me, Harry. This is war we're playing at now, not patty fingers.'

  'Yes, well there are days when I definitely would rather be doing something else.'