by Chris Ryan
Mike picked up a couple of sheets and scanned them briefly.
"They're about a shipment of goods from Valetta to Amsterdam."
"Drugs, I bet."
A telephone rang, right beside me.
"Pick it up," I told Mike.
"Answer it in Russian."
He lifted the receiver and said, "Da?" He listened briefly, went, "Khorosho. Spasibo," and put the phone down. Barrakuda was glaring.
"What did they say?" I demanded.
""Everything's in order. Precisely three hours from now."
I checked my watch and said, "Ten twenty-one. That gives us until thirteen twenty-one. Thirteen twenty."
Immediately the phone rang again.
Again Mike said "Da?" and listened, but this time nobody spoke.
"Keep grilling him," I told Mike.
"Back in a moment."
I went through the shattered door on to the landing, out of earshot. I knew the telephone line had been tapped that morning so the spooks could trace the calls. Now that the flat was secure, the SAS ought by rights to hand control over to the police and get out; but I'd had another idea.
I jabbed my press el and said, "Red leader. I need to speak to the CO."
"Here," said the boss immediately.
I reported the calls and said, "If they can trace the source, we need to hit it. But I've got another idea."
"Carry on.
"The Barrakuda guy's obviously trying to do a flit. He's got his flight out booked for this afternoon. But I'm sure he knows where the bomb is. He knows it's not far away, and that it's set to go off three hours from now. We could try beating hell out of him to get the information, but my hunch is that wouldn't work.
On the other hand, if we just keep him on site, he's soon going to start shitting himself."
"OK. I'll square it with the Director and the Police Commissioner that you remain on target. How many men do you need?"
"Red team will do fine."
"All right. Blue can pull out, then. The QRF will remain on standby outside."
"Roger."
The six guys from Blue team disappeared down the stairs. I put two of our own lads to guard the back door of the flat, two outside the front door, on the landing, leaving myself, Darren Barnes and Mike the interpreter to harass the prisoners.
"Tell him he's not going to Malta," I said.
"Tell him he's not going anywhere. He's staying here to enjoy his own little explosion."
Mike translated. Barrakuda remained impassive but the big guy immediately began to look sick.
"Go through the briefcase," I told Mike.
"Every bit of paper I turned to Darren and said, "Get a brew on, for fuck's sake. See what you can find in the kitchen."
He went out and rummaged in cupboards.
"There's tea," he called, 'but no milk."
"Black tea, then."
The big guy started trying to say something to his partner. I waved at him to shut up and asked Mike, "What was that?"
"Couldn't get it. Must have been Chechen."
We hustled the two men to opposite ends of the room and sat them on chairs facing away from each other so that they couldn't communicate even with a look.
"Sugar?" shouted Darren from the kitchen.
"Three," I called.
"Make it four."
The scene had started to seem surreal. There were these two guys sitting handcuffed, back to back. Outside, London was enjoying a peaceful Sunday. Overhead, the cloud was breaking up, with occasional blue sky showing though. The odd jet went over on its way into Heathrow. Down in the street, cars accelerated as they headed north along Seymour Place.
Somewhere not far off, a nuclear device was ticking its way towards detonation.
I began to feel light-headed, almost as if I was floating.
Darren brought the tea. It was black as pitch and tasted like syrup, but it helped bring me back to reality. I got half the cup down my neck, then noticed some keys on the table beside the briefcase. One of them fitted the suitcase in the hall, but the luggage turned out innocent spare suit and shirts, pyjamas,
shaving kit.
Looking round the living room, I saw that it had oldfashioned mouldings, like fake panelling, on the walls, but that in an attempt to make it look more modern, somebody had put up large, abstract prints of geometrical designs, mostly black and white. The furniture was modern too, and expensive, the centrepiece a three-seat sofa covered in white hide.
Time crawled. After what seemed like an hour I found that only eighteen minutes had passed. I'd put my radio on listening watch, to conserve the battery.
Then, at 10:45, I got a double hiss and switched on again.
"Red leader," I said.
"Your two calls." It was Joe Darwent, the ops officer.
"The first was from a mobile. Sweeper vans are out, but it was too short for them to get a fix. The second call came from a house in St. John's Wood, just north of you. Blue team are on their way there now.
"Roger. What else is happening?"
"The top brass are meeting in the COBR. The Director's there, with the Home Secretary and a few others."
"What about the police?"
"They've evacuated your block."
"Is that all?"
"They're searching suspect houses, but they can't start mass evacuation unless they know where the device is. They might find they were moving people into a danger area."
"Roger."
For twenty minutes I sat on the window-sill and let silence go to work. With my covert radio switched on, I heard Blue leader reporting the arrival of his team at the location in Elm Tree Road, behind Lord's cricket ground. Quickly they deployed on both sides of the house and blasted their way in, only to find the place deserted. A search revealed no sign of the bomb.
At 12:10 the big guy began to get restless, shifting his arse around on his chair. At last he said something, which Mike translated.
"He wants to have a shit."
"He can have a shit if he tells us where the bomb is." It sounded ridiculous, as though I was bargaining in an attempt to make some child behave well.
"Otherwise he can shit in his pants.
The man was in obvious physical discomfort, which my answer only increased.
"Tell both of them there's only one way they're getting out of here," I said to Mike.
"That's by giving us the information we want.
Mike translated. Suddenly Barrakuda began to talk in Chechen at the top of his voice.
"Shut up!" I shouted but he carried on regardless, even when I belted him across the side of the head. Soon he was yelling like a madman in a high, hoarse voice. The big guy began to bellow back, and all at once I felt glad, because I saw that stress was getting to the pair of them.
I left them to it, and from out on the landing I called Control.
"They've started arguing like lunatics," I reported.
"Their nerve's going."
"It had better break soon," snapped Joe.
"Things are getting bloody fraught around here."
"Same here," I told him.
At 12:25 the big guy shit himself. The smell was repulsive, so I opened a window. Cold air blasted in, but it was better than the stink.
Barrakuda went quiet again. At 12:40, when I stood in front of him, his face looked white as flour, and his eyes seemed to have sunk into his head. After I'd watched him for a few seconds, he said something.
"He wants to make a deal," Mike interpreted.
"Oh yes?"
"If he gives you the information, will you guarantee him free passage to Malta?"
"Fucking hell! Who does he think he is? Tell him not a chance. Not the remotest bloody chance."
I waited while the information was conveyed. Then I ostentatiously ripped the lead out of the telephone and said, in a series of short sentences, waiting for Mike to translate each one.
"What's going to happen is this… The police have already evacuated the city
… In ten minutes' time we're getting out too…
We're not going to wait for the explosion… We're going to cuff you to your shitty friend, tie you up and leave you here… Talk now, or it'll be too late."
That pushed him over the brink. He said something, and I saw Mike's eyes widen.
"What was that?" I snapped.
"He says the bomb is here."
"Where?"
"In the garage below."
"Jesus Christ! What garage? These flats don't have garages.
We checked that."
"In the small street behind."
"What number?"
"Three."
I hit my press el
"Red leader. What street is there immediately behind this block?"
"It's a mews," said Joe instantly.
"Markham Mews. Why?"
"The bomb's there, in the garage.
"Say that again."
"Our prisoner says the bomb's there. In Number Three's garage. I'm coming down."
I was already in the hall.
"Stay put!" I yelled to the rest of the team." At the last moment I stuck my head back round the sitting-room door and said, "Remember, nobody comes in here, and nobody's coming out of here alive."
I couldn't wait for the lift. I took the stairs four or five at a time, heaving myself round the corners with the hand-rail. By the time I hit the street police sirens were screaming towards the block. A car nearly knocked me down as it swung into the mews. I was aware of a cordon in the distance, with a crowd behind it, and other figures running close to me.
There were the garages, built into little houses opposite the apartment block. One, two, three, numbering from the left. The third had bright blue wooden doors, freshly painted, with a white figure high on the right-hand side. The doors were secured with an old-fashioned hasp and padlock.
"Bolt-cutters!" I shouted.
"For fuck's sake, bolt-cutters!"
There was someone in black beside me, one of the QRF. Boltshears appeared in his hands. Two seconds later he had chopped through the soft metal guards around the padlock. I slid the bolt back, padlock and all, and dragged the doors open. The little garage was occupied by a beige-coloured van with the logo WEST END ANTIQUES painted in an elegant rainbow shape across its back doors.
Shit! I thought. Either Barrakuda was lying or he boo bed on the number.
The guy from the QRF was more on the ball. He jumped forward, tried the doors, found they were locked, pushed his way between the right-hand side of the van and the brick wall, shone a torch through the driver's window and shouted, "It's here!"
I was alongside him in an instant. There, in the back of the van, glinted a single, big, black object: Orange, with its two components united. From one corner, wires led to a red box just inside the rear doors.
My breath had gone. I hit my press el and croaked, "Red leader, we've found it. In Number Three garage. Locked inside a van.
"DON'T TOUCH ANYTHING!" snapped a deep voice I didn't know.
"ATO here. We're on our way. Leave everything alone. Get clear of the site."
We pushed back along the side of the van, trying not to rock it. In the doorway I looked up at the back of Markham Court, convinced that someone must have eyes on the site. More black clad guys were hovering in the mews, hanging back from the target in uncharacteristic fashion. Their instincts were the same as mine to go in and smash the timing device immediately. My watch said 1:13: we were within eight minutes of detonation.
But they'd heard the ATO tell them to keep their distance, and they were wondering what the hell to do. It wasn't in our nature or training to run away and in any case, there didn't seem much point. If the thing was about to go off, we'd never get far enough to make any difference.
What we did was to hustle back as far as the main road and tuck ourselves round the front of the apartment block, out of line of sight from the open garage doors. I tried to say something to the QRF guy, but words didn't come, my heart was pumping that fast.
This is fucking ridiculous! I thought. You get round the corner when you're cracking off an ordinary explosion. If this thing goes, we'll all be vapour and the building will simply vanish.
There wasn't long to wait or worry. Within seconds a van came screaming down the street. Its tyres squealed as it scorched round the corner into the mews and slid to a halt in front of the garage. Out jumped two men clad in white over-suits from head to toe, like astronauts. Each carried a heavy-looking hold-all full of kit.
"ATO on target," the deep voice reported.
"Stand by."
The lock on the van's rear doors held them up for all of five seconds. They flung the doors open and both leant in, on top of the live device, backs to us, reaching forward with their gloved hands. Fifty yards off, in full view, I stood transfixed, holding my breath. If it goes, I kept thinking, will I see the flash in the final split-second of life, or will the shock wave be too fast even for that?
The suspense was excruciating. I felt the whole world must be standing still, that everyone on earth had stopped breathing, like me. Mentally, I took off my hat to the two guys at the back of the van. By God they've got balls, I thought.
Then, after an incredibly short space of time, one of them stood up, turned round and raised both arms in triumph, as if he'd scored a goal. At the same moment I heard the deep voice say, "Device made safe. Repeat: device made safe."
I suppose I felt relief I must have. But I don't remember it now. All I can recall is getting a sudden and intensely vivid mental image of the wretched sister device, Apple, sitting there in its hollowed-out niche beneath the Kremlin wall.
SEVENTEEN
On the plane to Moscow I had the unpleasant feeling that I'd gone back to the beginning and that the whole nightmare was about to start again. Flight number, departure time, type of aircraft, even the cabin crew all were the same as on our recce trip.
Only I had changed. Instead of looking forward to a new experience and a bit of a lark, I was being driven by a personal compulsion at least as powerful as the jet engines thrusting us through the sky.
The morning papers carried no hint of the previous day's events: the media, thank God, had apparently not had a sniff of the drama in Markham Court and Mews. If they'd picked it up, they'd have had one hell of a story:
LIVE NUCLEAR DEVICE DISCOVERED IN STOLEN VAN…
GUN-BATTLE LEAVES TWO CHECHENS DEAD IN FLAT…
SAS MAN LOSES FINGERS IN GROZNY TORTURE.
Wretched Toad! Word came up from the Services' hospital in London that surgeons had had to amputate the remains of both little fingers and the third finger on his left hand. When the Shark's men had realised that he was the one with knowledge of the bomb, they'd started in on him with bolt-shears, one joint at a time. But, tough little sod that he was, he'd given nothing away.
Pavarotti, who wasn't seriously hurt, confirmed that he'd shown outstanding courage.
According to the headlines, international tension had eased.
Even so, there were only about a dozen passengers on the 767.
Feeling the need to relax, I got two miniatures of Haig off the drinks trolley, along with a can of soda water, and downed the lot in a few minutes. The Scotch helped to lull my anxiety, and when I stretched out across three seats with a blanket over my head I soon fell asleep, and stayed unconscious for most of the flight.
The arrival hall at Sheremetyevo was as dim and dire as ever, but so few people were coming in that Immigration proved relatively painless. Beyond the Customs, in contrast, the taxi drivers swarmed even more voraciously than usual. Hardened to their methods, I stood still until I spotted a short man waiting at the back of the sc rum He had an open, friendly face, a neatly trimmed red beard, and was wearing a peaked, dark-blue cap.
Instead of screaming at me, he was smiling.
I pushed through the mob and said, "OK. Let's go.
Outside, the cold bit, and I was surprised to see a dusting of snow on the ground. My
guide led the way to a clean-looking grey Zhigudi and held one of the back doors open for me.
"Thanks," I said.
"But I'll come in front."
I settled in the passenger seat and asked, "What's your name?"
"Sergei."
"You speak English?"
"Some." He gave a deprecating grin.
"City centre?"
"No. I want to go to Balashika."
"Balashika!" He sounded amazed.
"Balashika first. Then city centre. Then back to Balashika.
How much will all that cost?"
"Dollars?"
I nodded. As he pulled out on to the highway, I could see his mind ticking up figures.
"One hundred fifty."
"I'll give you two hundred."
"Khorosho!"
He drove fast but well, not taking risks, but watching all the time for openings in the traffic, and taking short-cuts to avoid the blocks at major intersections. When I praised his navigation, he answered in quite fluent English. We chit-chatted about this and that, and when I asked how old he was, he suddenly, with a flourish and a big grin, whipped off his cap to reveal that he was almost completely bald.
"Feefty!" he exclaimed. I refrained from saying that without his hat he bore a strong resemblance to Lenin, but I felt that if I had, he wouldn't have given a damn.
He took the outer ring-road, round the north perimeter of the city. Out in the country there seemed to be more snow, and although the main road was clear, the ground was uniformly white.
As we approached Balashika I felt my anxiety building. I hadn't quite worked out how I was going to handle my re-entry into the camp. The time was 6:30 p.m." and the chances were that the team would be back indoors for the night.
Taxis weren't allowed inside the barracks, so I asked Sergei to wait outside the gate. Luckily the guy on the baffler recognised me, and even greeted me cheekily as Stank Old Man.
I ran up the steps of the barrack block in some trepidation, but again I was in luck. The guys had eaten supper early and gone out again to run a night exercise. Only the two scalies were in residence. I had a word with them, and said I'd be back later.
Then it was just a matter of collecting basic essentials from the caving kit: wire ladder, head-torch and bolt cutters, plus a towel, sweater and spare padlocks from my own locker.