by Chris Ryan
75
The Hit List
the Iranian newspaper Kayhan that over 500 Iranians had pledged to sell their kidneys to raise money for the writer's murder. According to intelligence sources the plan was devised by Islamic militia members in the Iranian holy city of Mashad.
Slater, for whom anonymity was the very breath of life sympathised with Rushdie. He had seen photographs smuggled out of Iran of mass public hangings from the arms of cranes, and from Algeria of the mobile guillotines driven from village to village by Islamic fundamentalist death-squads. And in Iraq, of
course ...
'Do you mind', said Rushdie, 'if we just look in
here?'
It was the book department. Shoppers were browsing among the shelves and standing in line at the till, but no one made any sign of having registered Rushdie's entrance. In fact, Slater was certain, they had all noticed him. They just weren't so uncool as to stare. On a small, circular table close to the aisle was a display of a new John le Carre novel. On the far side of the table, facing the interior of the room rather than the aisle, was a similar display of Rushdie's new book. A visitor passing through the department would certainly see the Le Carre display, but probably not the Rushdie. Deftly, the author revolved the table through 180 degrees.
'What's the book about?' asked Slater, amused. 'Rock 'n' roll,' Rushdie answered. 'Would you like a copy?'
76
Chris Ryan
'Very much,' said Slater. 'Help yourself, then. Steal one.' 'You're kidding!'
.'I dare you,' said Rushdie, with the ghost of a smile. 'I'm not in the daring business any more,' said Slater, alone the getting-arrested business. Apart from ling else we're on closed circuit TV. And that guy there in the blazer is a store detective.' s'How can you tell?' Slater shrugged. 'The way he stands. The way he
: actually looking at the books.' |l see what you mean. Do you think he knows what j're doing here?' feah, definitely he does.'
assistant approached them.
lave you got Geri Halliwell's autobiography?' idie asked.
i minutes later they were in the Armani shop on the iipton Road.
lat do you think?' asked Rushdie, holding up a l in heavy olive-green wool.
. not a good person to ask about clothes,' replied f, his eyes scanning the store. 'But it looks OK to
ashdie held up the same shirt in grey. 'And this
lat looks OK too.'
ich would you buy for yourself?' lie grey. I've spent half my life in dark green.'
77
The Hit List
As Rushdie signed the credit-card slip, Slater held out a copy of his novel. 'While you've got your pen out,' he said, 'would you mind signing this?'
Rushdie stared at him in amazement. 'Now how the hell. . .'
'I never could resist a good book.'
With the clothes-shopping completed they had lunch in a pub in Beauchamp Place, where Rushdie questioned Slater about the Gulf War. 'What was your worst moment?' he asked.
Slater considered. 'Well, the most frightening moment was probably during an anti-Scud mission.'
'Go on,' said the novelist, forking Branston pickle on to his cheese roll.
Slater sipped at his Coke. 'Well, we'd got satellite pictures in, showing activity near a place called al Anbar, west of Baghdad. The theory from the intelligence people was that a number of missiles were being grouped there before moving them on to their mobile launchers. They didn't know how long they'd all be in one place, so the word was we had to check them out fast and if possible help knock them out.
Tour of us went in. They dropped us off by helicopter at night and got out as quickly as possible. Al-Anbar was surrounded by anti-aircraft batteries, there were tanks in the area, and there were rumours of a concealed airbase. It was also fantastically cold. We'd been expecting the Costa del Sol, but we found
78
Chris Ryan
: coldest January for thirty years. Snow was expected
the wind-chill was murderous. I'We moved up on the target. Air-reconnaissance Etures had shown there was a small berm -- a kind of ked-up dugout - a couple of hundred yards from There we thought the Scuds were, and the theory was this was for the ground-crew to shelter behind Jien the missiles were fired. It was a risk, but we ided to make the berm our observation post. ^*It took a lot longer than we thought. We knew prisoners we'd interrogated that all the sentries Uuld have night sights, so we couldn't take any ices. The trouble was there was no cover, just bare t, and we were like flies on a table-top. In the end made it to the berm about an hour before dawn, at that point it began to pour with rain. By then, jugh, we'd been able to confirm via our own night its that there were definitely Scuds on the base. key were well concealed, but they were there. |'I radioed through the confirmation to the base in and we were ordered to sit tight. The air attack juld come after dark that night. Between now and en we were to dig in and observe any movement. |>'It got light. The Scuds and the trucks had been ted up for the day and were pretty much invisible. be only sign of life was two low, camouflaged tents ich we guessed housed the missile and antiaircraft 6ws. So we just hunkered down in the berm with ie man on stag and the rest trying to sleep. There was ling else to do. If any sentries had come along we'd
79
The Hit List
have been dead, but none did, and gradually we got a bit of warmth back in our bones. By eleven o'clock we were beginning to think we might even make it through to nightfall. And then everything changed.
'I was on stag. There had been no movement for an hour. And then, on the horizon, I saw a dust-trail. It was moving towards us, and soon I could make out a pair of Panhard landcruisers. Landcruisers usually meant someone important, and twenty-four hours earlier the intelligence people in Saudi had intercepted a message announcing that the al-Anbar base was due to be visited by some high-up code-named Marwan. No one was quite sure of Marwan's identity, but the popular theory was that he was an Iranian scientist who had defected during the Iran-Iraq war and was now running the missile research plant at Sa'd 16, up in the north. If this theory was right then he was a real prize: it was the Sa'd 16 team who had designed the al Husayn -- the long-range version of the Soviet Scud that you could fit with chemical and biological weapons.
'And then I saw that the dust-trail was more than a couple of visiting high-ups in landcruisers. Behind them, over the horizon came this vast convoy of T-55 tanks. They were heading straight for us, and there wasn't a thing we could do about it except cover ourselves with stones and dirt and camouflage netting and hope they didn't notice us. I was the last to get under cover and I've never seen anything more terrifying than those T-55s. They looked like monsters
80
Chris Ryan
jld and black and pitted with shell-scars. The whole ert was roaring and grinding, and all that we could was lie there - I had my head jammed up against : of the other guys' arses - and hope that they kept Dving. But they didn't. They clanked to a halt, in nation, all around us. We could hear them opening ir turrets and we could hear their radios, and itually we could hear their voices. And then a (juple of them came over and I thought well, that's it. g're dead. And then they pissed on us. I felt it ling down my neck. They must have thought the was some kind of rubbish tip where they threw old cam-netting. We were there, not moving a r, for four hours, and I can't even begin to describe you what that was like, or what that kind of fear 3es to you.'
Slater returned to the present to find Rushdie patching him.
'You see, you're looking at me right now - you low how the story ends. In that berm we didn't low how the story was going to end. There had been sries about spies being stoned to death, castrated, ing from wire nooses . . . you name it.' 'So what happened?'
'They went away. They started up their engines, >cked down their hatches and went away. I radioed in i report about the tanks on my handset and we stayed lere, not moving, for another three hours. The air ike came in just before midnight, an
d boy, was it aod to see that Scud jet-propellant blow!'
81
The Hit List
'And Marwan?' asked Rushdie. 'Did you ever identify him?'
'No one survived the attack,' said Slater. 'That was one of the things my team had been tasked to ensure.'
There was a long silence.
'How is it to know that you've killed someone?' asked the novelist. 'If you don't mind my asking.'
'How's that ploughman's lunch?' asked Slater.
The football went well. The stands tickets gave a good view of Tottenham beating West Ham two-nil, and Rushdie took notes assiduously throughout in a small, leather-covered book.
After the game, rather than look for a taxi, Rushdie suggested they might walk down the High Road to Seven Sisters tube station, as most of the fans did whenever Spurs played at home. To begin with they were swept along by a crowd of cheering, chanting Spurs fans. The air was heavy with fried food and beery good humour. The grey skies promised snow.
At intervals Rushdie stopped to note his impressions, glancing around him as he did so. This began to worry Slater: the writer was less likely to be recognised in Haringey than in Knightsbridge but his actions closely resembled those of a policeman and might easily be construed as hostile. He seemed impervious, however, to the stares he prompted.
'I think it might be an idea to keep going,' Slater said, when Rushdie indicated that, yet again, they should stop for a moment. The faces around them
82
Chris Ryan
those of West Ham supporters now, and their was visibly less benevolent than that of the jrious Spurs crowd. 3'm a writer,' said Rushdie simply. 'And right now
re to write.' |jCan you wait until we get to that bus stop?' Slater
s|ut as they sat down, they found themselves ?unded.
aow me again, would you?' asked an acned fatboy ; Hammers shirt.
ashdie said nothing, but watched with detached st as the group solidified around him. Slater, that the situation would defuse of its own i, remained silent. fou deaf or sump'ink?' asked the fatboy. ater flickered a glance at the group. There were s talkers, he reckoned, and three fighters. The one atch was the heavy guy at the back, who was even flexing and curling his fingers.
what's your fuckin' problem, wanker?' ided the fatboy, sniffing.
we go, thought Slater. On the seat beside him idie patiently studied his hands, i'm talking to you, cunt!'
you going to let us carry on our way?' asked mildly.
fou don't get it, do you pal?' It was the heavy guy back. His naturally ugly appearance had not been 3ved by the spider's-web tattoo across his neck.
83
The Hit List
Like the fatboy, his eyes were puffy and his nose ran.
They were all, Slater guessed, completely hot-wired on coke. They weren't about to walk away - they wanted a positive result to counterbalance the defeat at White Hart Lane.
'Is this a money thing?' asked Rushdie, speaking for the first time. 'Or just a football thing?'
His voice was steady. Slater was amazed at his composure.
'It's basically a stupidity thing,' answered Slater evenly. 'What we have here is a bunch of not-very clever boys who've taken too many drugs.'
The taunt had the desired effect. Spider's-web, his eyes narrowing, took an angry step forward and drew back his fist.
But Slater was already rising to his feet. His first punch hammered into his attacker's lower ribcage, his second -- as the thug doubled up -- flattened his nose. Each blow was accompanied by the crack of fracturing bone.
Bloody drool running down his chin, Spider's-web sank to his knees.
'How about you?' Slater addressed the fatboy reasonably. 'Ready to put your money where your mouth is?'
The fatboy stared open-mouthed at the twitching figure at his feet. The other four took a step backwards.
'There's a hospital back there,' Slater continued. 'You'll probably want to get this ape to the casualty entrance. He'll have a broken nose and two fractured
84
Chris Ryan
s. We'll be on our way.'
'Was there any other possible conclusion to that juence?' Rushdie asked five minutes later as they scended the steps of Seven Sisters tube station.
i 'Not really,' said Slater. 'There comes a point from ich, for certain people like that guy with the aoed neck, retreat becomes physically impossible. |ou can see them flooding with adrenaline before
sur eyes. And at that point you have to fight or flee, sonally I'd rather flee, given the choice, but I
tspect on that occasion we wouldn't have made it.' 'My four-minute mile days are behind me,'
itted Rushdie. 'Are you all right?' 'I could use a cup of tea,' admitted Slater. 'And I sect you'd like to write the whole thing up.'
85
FOUR
'Neil, be a darling and carry the bags, would you?'
'Certainly,' said Neil Slater. So far there were nine of them: two from Versace, three from Donna Karan, and four from Miu-Miu. Grace Litvinoff- and she was the first to admit it - liked to shop.
'Chanel, Neil!'
'Certainly, Mrs LitvinofF.'
'I don't need to tell you the way there do I?'
'Not any more, Mrs LitvinofF.'
And she didn't. He knew all her favourite places. And what was more, they all knew him. Grace LitvinofFhad been in London for ten days now, and for most of those he had trailed her up and down Bond Street, Sloane Street, Mount Street, Brook Street, and all the other Streets where it was possible to spend a thousand pounds on a hallmarked scrap of silken or cashmere nothingness.
Now, when he followed her into one of those cool, perfumed establishments the impeccably groomed male and female stafF nodded to him, smiled hello to him, and in a couple of cases stared with open and amused longing at his groin.
86
Chris Ryan
$ot Slater was not the raw provincial he had been months earlier. He now looked as if he belonged ada or Fendi or Gucci or wherever whimsy and I led his mostly female clients. His haircut had cost ce the price of a tank of petrol, the labels on his |thes were Italian, and he knew the menus at the ; Bar and Le Caprice off by heart. )n the down-side was the question of his own as. They knew him at all the metropolitan ering-holes, but they knew what he did too. They ew that he was being paid to fetch and carry and ^>k out for trouble. And while it was one thing ing a beautiful and glamorous woman like Grace loff round the West End, it was quite another ig errands for some loudmouthed gangster's wife worse, some loudmouthed gangster's children, as |d been called on to do once or twice. Andreas had
t right - bodyguarding was a service industry. Jut having said that, he was good at it. Since the lident with Salman Rushdie there had not been a : of trouble. He had learnt an operating style which ttbined social deference with professional authority !-had managed to retain most - if not quite all -- of Nelf-respect in the process. Duckworth was pleased
him, and had said so. |t was a clear spring day, and the starlings were in the plane trees as Slater followed Grace loff into Chanel. According to her passport, iich he had seen in the LitvinofS' Mayfair lent, Grace was thirty-four and had been born in
87
FOUR
'Neil, be a darling and carry the bags, would you?'
'Certainly,' said Neil Slater. So far there were nine of them: two from Versace, three from Donna Karan, and four from Miu-Miu. Grace Litvinoff- and she was the first to admit it - liked to shop.
'Chanel, Neil!'
'Certainly, Mrs LitvinofF.'
'I don't need to tell you the way there do I?'
'Not any more, Mrs Litvinoff.'
And she didn't. He knew all her favourite places. And what was more, they all knew him. Grace Litvinoff had been in London for ten days now, and for most of those he had trailed her up and down Bond Street, Sloane Street, Mount Street, Brook Street, and all the other Streets where it was possible to spend a thousand pounds on a ha
llmarked scrap of silken or cashmere nothingness.
Now, when he followed her into one of those cool, perfumed establishments the impeccably groomed male and female staff nodded to him, smiled hello to him, and in a couple of cases stared with open and amused longing at his groin.
86
Chris Ryan
ar Slater was not the raw provincial he had been months earlier. He now looked as if he belonged ada or Fendi or Gucci or wherever whimsy and I led his mostly female clients. His haircut had cost the price of a tank of petrol, the labels on his les were Italian, and he knew the menus at the : Bar and Le Caprice off by heart. )n the down-side was the question of his own They knew him at all the metropolitan ering-holes, but they knew what he did too. They that he was being paid to fetch and carry and out for trouble. And while it was one thing ig a beautiful and glamorous woman like Grace inoff round the West End, it was quite another ig errands for some loudmouthed gangster's wife worse, some loudmouthed gangster's children, as |B been called on to do once or twice. Andreas had right - bodyguarding was a service industry.
having said that, he was good at it. Since the ident with Salman Rushdie there had not been a : of trouble. He had learnt an operating style which bined social deference with professional authority [had managed to retain most - if not quite all -- of Iself-respect in the process. Duckworth was pleased
him, and had said so. ft was a clear spring day, and the starlings were in the plane trees as Slater followed Grace loff into Chanel. According to her passport, ach he had seen in the Litvinoffs' Mayfair lent, Grace was thirty-four and had been born in
87
The Hit List
Singapore. Her husband, whom Duckworth approvingly described as 'stupendously rich', bought and sold communications companies.
David Litvinoff was some fifteen years his wife's senior, and the story went that he had been making a business stopover in Singapore in the mid-eighties when a colleague had persuaded him to visit one of the island's shirtmakers. The fitting had taken place in the morning in one of the myriad 'shop-houses' behind Raffles Hotel, and the half-dozen completed garments were delivered to Litvinoff s room at the end of the afternoon.