Before the Dane could answer, there were murmurs of approval from the others and Guido said, ‘Jens, it is a question of security in our minds. The most important thing in a fire-fight is knowing what the rest of the team is doing. We’ll all be carrying mobile phones and once the action starts we need to have total confidence in the co-ordination. I know from experience that you’re the best man for the job and it’s the most important job on the team.’
There were more murmurs of assent from around the table. The Dane was mollified, but still he had another argument. He glanced at The Owl and then back at Creasy and said, ‘The Owl is not a mercenary. He has never fought a war. Perhaps he should be guarding Gloria instead of Rene.’
Creasy was beaten to an answer. The Owl looked at Jens and said, ‘I’ve fought in plenty of wars in the backstreets of Marseille and that’s a lot more dangerous than the Congo or Vietnam. I thank you for your concern, Jens, but I’m going to be at the front end on this thing.’
The Dane said, ‘Will you go into action with your Walkman on your belt and Chopin in your ears?’
‘No. Wagner is more appropriate. I’ll be listening to Götterdämmerung.’
Chapter 48
Lucy Kwok was surprised. He had told her that, once she arrived in Hong Kong, she was never to leave the hotel and the presence of Rene Callard. But half an hour earlier, he had phoned Rene and then spoken to Gloria and then to her. He had simply said, ‘In exactly half an hour, leave your hotel, cross Nathan Road to the Sheraton Hotel and go to Room 54. Don’t worry. A couple of our guys will be covering you.’
She did as instructed and, in spite of herself, was nervous. She knew that she was a prime target. As she crossed the busy road, her eyes darted back and forth. It was futile. She would not have recognised a Triad member if she saw one. She turned at the entrance to the hotel and studied the street, trying to spot her cover. It was no use. Nathan Road was busy twenty-four hours a day and teeming with people. She crossed the vast lobby to the lifts. Two minutes later, she was knocking on the door of Room 54. It opened and Creasy stood there with one of his rare smiles.
He said, ‘I thought it was time that we had a brief hour of leisure.’
Two minutes later they were making love on the huge bed. It amazed her that such a violent man could make love so gently. He seemed to know every spot of her body which wanted to be stroked and kissed. For such an obvious man of action, he was infinitely patient, building up desire until every nerve wanted him inside her. Even then, he was gentle, and she realised that on the few occasions they had made love, he had learned exactly what to do with her.
Afterwards, as they lay in each other’s arms, he talked about the operation. At that moment, Maxie MacDonald and Guido were watching the villa. In four hours, they would be relieved by Tom Sawyer and Do Huang, and four hours later, by Eric Laparte and The Owl. The surveillance would continue, twenty-four hours a day for at least four days, and then they would make their final plan for the assault. In the meantime, another two men had been added to the team. They were Tony Cope, an ex-British Naval Officer who had spent time in the elite Special Boat Service, and Damon Broad, also ex-Navy. They were in Manila, chartering a fast cruiser and within three days would be taking a holiday cruise in Hong Kong waters, not a million miles from Tommy Mo’s villa in Sai Kung.
Finally, Creasy clambered off the bed and went to the mini-bar and took out half a bottle of Moët et Chandon champagne. He poured her a glass.
‘You’re not having any?’ she asked.
He smiled.
‘It may not have seemed like it for the last hour, but actually, I’m working.’
She drained half the glass, smiled up at him and said, ‘You do your work very well . . . that was beautiful.’
Most of her mind and body was relaxed, but there was an edge of tension. She had decided not to talk about it until the operation was over, but suddenly she felt the total necessity of hearing some answers. She asked the first question.
‘What are your feelings for me?’
His answer came after a pause. ‘My feelings for you are very strong.’
‘Do you love me?’
‘I’m not very good with words or expressing myself. I never have been and never will be. You mean a great deal to me.’
‘What does that mean?’
He thought about it with obvious care, and then said, ‘I’ve always felt that I’m a twilight man.’
‘In what way?’
‘Well, ever since I was seventeen years old, I’ve been a soldier, and I’ve been in battles many times in different parts of the world. Understand that a foreign legionnaire or a mercenary is always the last line of defence. The French Foreign Legion never won a war. They were totally expendable. You get paid your money and you take the risk. So we were, and are, all twilight men. We always think of ourselves as being in the twilight of our lives. Because the night can come at any time. It makes it hard to fall in love — but of course, it does happen,’
‘Did you love your wife?’
‘Yes.’
‘Did you tell her?’
‘Yes. But it took a long time and I think she knew it before I did.’
‘Have you ever loved anybody else . . . I mean, a woman?’
‘Yes. One other. She’s also dead — maybe I carry that curse with me, which is why I shy away from that word.’
‘Did you tell her?’
‘Yes. And a few minutes later she was dead.’
‘How?’
‘Blown up in a car bomb, in London.’
She put down the glass of champagne and lay back on the bed and looked at the ceiling. She said, ‘Being in love with you sounds like a dangerous occupation.’
He stroked her raven hair.
‘I thought you’d have realised that by now.’
Chapter 49
Rene Callard looked like a slightly ageing playboy, but when it came to work, he was as intricate as a watchmaker.
The Presidential Suite lived up to its name. It had three bedrooms, its own kitchen, a vast lounge and an adjoining dining-room. The whole apartment was embellished with antique Chinese furniture and artefacts. Rene went over it inch by inch, checking for any bugs. Then he spoke to the hotel’s general manager, who sent up the security manager. Rene sat the small but intelligent-looking Chinese across the dining-room table with a notepad and pen in front of him, and they went through the procedures. He wanted eight by ten photographs of the room maids assigned to the Suite and the entire Penthouse floor, together with their names. Each floor had its own service area and kitchen, and so he wanted photographs and names of all the staff working on that floor. He wanted to see every single one of them personally. During Mrs Manners’ stay at the hotel, no other staff were to be allowed on to the top floor. He also wanted details of all the guests who came and went to the various other suites on the floor, their nationalities and their professions.
In effect, it was necessary that Mrs Manners’ security be rated on the same level as a Head of State, except for one important exception. There should be no security guards at all on the penthouse floor. Rene wanted to be the only one with a gun. He would know the face of anyone who had a legitimate reason to be on that floor. If a member of the staff became sick and had to be replaced, he must be informed immediately. If any member of staff needed to enter the room, they were to phone first and, once they had rung the doorbell, they should move back and away to the right by not less than five metres and never, under any circumstances, have a hand in a pocket or be wearing any other garment except the standard hotel uniform.
The security manager was impressed. Many Heads of State had stayed in the hotel since it was built in the late nineteen-twenties and they were used to an army of security men, all assuming that sheer numbers would protect their charges. But this quietly spoken Belgian was on his own, and his preparations were precise.
‘Are you expecting trouble?’
Rene shrugged.
‘I�
��m expecting everything from a leaking tap to World War Three.’
Finally, he said, ‘If either Mrs Manners or Miss Lucy Kwok leave the Suite, you or your deputy will be informed five minutes beforehand. Do you understand why?’
The Chinese smiled.
‘I think so. If I or my security staff spot either of the two ladies moving around the hotel, or entering or leaving it, then we know that, unless we’ve been pre-advised, there could be the possibility of impersonation.’
The Belgian nodded. He was also impressed.
I’m sure Mrs Manners will be both grateful and generous. Thank you for your time.’
After he had ushered out the security manager, Rene sat down with Gloria and Lucy and took them through the routine. They listened solemnly and then Gloria remarked, ‘It sounds like we’re living in a gilded prison.’
‘That’s exactly right, Mrs Manners,’ Rene said. ‘And this evening we’ll be joined by Jens Jensen and his computer. He tapped the tiny mobile phone in front of him. ‘All of us have one of these and when the action starts, we keep in touch that way. Please make no outgoing phone calls using the hotel system. It’s probably secure . . . but we can’t be sure.’
‘When will the action start?’ Gloria asked.
‘I’m not sure,’ he replied. ‘But my gut feeling is that things will begin to happen in the next forty-eight hours.’
Gloria asked. ‘Do you feel bad about being stuck here with us and not being in the front-line?’
‘Believe me, Mrs Manners . . . I am in the front line. So are both of you.’
Chapter 50
An eagle would not have spotted it. The hide had been built by Maxie MacDonald, and it blended into the countryside as cream into coffee. Tom Sawyer and Eric Laparte were concealed inside. Tom held very powerful binoculars and Eric held a notebook and a felt-tipped pen. The 14K villa and compound was situated about a kilometre away below them. The hide was comfortable. They lay on sleeping bags and they had a cooler beside them, containing soft drinks and foil-wrapped sandwiches. They would be there for another three hours before Maxie and The Owl replaced them.
The surveillance had started two days earlier, and already the notebook was showing a pattern. A black Mercedes was a frequent visitor, as was a truck containing live fish and a pump pushing oxygen through the tank. Another refrigerated truck also called frequently. Tommy Mo had at least fifty people inside that compound; they all had to eat. There were other casual visitors, almost always arriving in a Mercedes or a BMW, but there had been no pattern to their movements.
Suddenly, Tom Sawyer raised the binoculars and glanced at his watch. ‘Log it,’ he said. ‘The garbage truck is arriving.’
The Frenchman also glanced at his watch and made a note in the log-book. They watched as the garbage truck pulled up in front of the massive metal gates. The gates were opened and the truck went through. The two men were high enough to see inside the compound and the routine was normal. The truck passed around to the staff compound at the back, its rear lifted up, and three servants threw in black garbage bags. Ten minutes later, the garbage truck emerged through the gates and drove away towards Sai Kung village.
Eric Laparte flicked through the pages of the log-book and said, ‘They’re efficient. Seven p.m. on both nights, give or take fifteen minutes.’
Tom Sawyer was studying the villa compound through his binoculars. He said, ‘They make the mistake of routine. The supply trucks come at different times during the day, but the garbage truck always comes at the same time.’
Chapter 51
There was no moon. Creasy and Guido were sitting on their haunches among the rocks, looking out across the Black sea. They had been squatting there for half an hour without saying a word. Their friendship was of the kind that did not need many words. In fact, the enveloping silence itself gave them comfort.
They both saw it. The briefest flash of light from the sea, Guido reached down and picked up the rubber-encased torch beside him, pointed it and pressed the button twice.
Ten minutes later, they were scrambling aboard the silenced black rubber dinghy which had come in almost unseen. They were greeted without words, just a hand on their shoulders, from the sole occupant.
Half an hour later, they were sitting in the comfortable saloon of the MV Tempest, in deep discussion with Tony Cope and Damon Broad. Creasy and Guido drank mineral water. The two ex-Navy men were drinking pink gins and Creasy felt no need to admonish them; the British Navy had won most of their battles half-drunk. They all studied the chart on the table. It took about half an hour while Creasy pointed out the location of the villa and the possible embarkation sites. He then looked up at Tony Cope and said, ‘Brief me on the vessel.’
Tony Cope was a quintessential naval officer. Rank was everything. And since Creasy was his superior, he gave him the deference required and his tone of voice was respectful.
‘The Tempest is sixty-five feet over all, with a semi-planing hull. Twin turbo-charged diesels, with a total horsepower of nine hundred. Top speed: twenty-eight knots. Optimum speed: twenty-three. Normal range at optimum is four hundred and fifty sea miles, but we’ve bolted on deck tanks, which double that. We are provisioned for a dozen people for thirty days.’
Creasy glanced at Guido with a slight smile and then he himself assumed an officer’s tone. ‘You got the machinery?’
Tony Cope nodded.
‘Yes. We cleared immigration and customs at fourteen hundred hours yesterday. At sixteen hundred hours, the gentleman who calls himself Corkscrew Two asked permission to come aboard. He gave the correct passwords. A few minutes later, a truck arrived alongside with some cases of spare parts for our engines. They had been correctly passed through customs. Inside those cases were two heavy machine-guns. We took a small harbour cruise and Mr Corkscrew Two assembled the weapons and bolted them to the deck, fore and aft. They are now concealed by two upturned dinghys.’ He glanced at Damon Broad and for the first time smiled and said, ‘That man is quite a character. When he finished his work on the heavy MGs, he said, and I quote, “That’s it. In a couple of hours, I’m off home. Doesn’t the Royal Navy have a tradition of hospitality?” He then drank most of a bottle of Pusser’s rum and strolled down the gangplank as though he’d just had a glass of water.’
‘He’s like that,’ Creasy said. ‘Never drinks on the job, but when he’s finished large bars have to restock their cellars.’
The Police Commissioner was working late and, like every head of every police force world-wide, he had a million problems. But his main problem, on this night, was the 14K and his maverick Inspector Lau Ming Lan. There had been a message on the Commissioner’s Ansafone an hour and a half earlier, requesting a private meeting at nine-thirty. The Commissioner had mixed feelings about Inspector Lau and the 14K.
There was a glint of unusual excitement in Inspector Lau’s eyes as he walked in the door. He sat down and said, ‘There are at least ten of them.’
‘Ten of who?’
‘Creasy’s little army.’
‘How do you know?’
The Inspector reached into his pocket and pulled out a small mobile phone, measuring no more than three inches by two. He laid it on the Commissioner’s desk and said, ‘That’s the latest model from Sony. It’s being marketed by Hong Kong Telecom.’
The Commissioner picked it up, looked at it and said, ‘It’s amazing . . . but what about it?’
Inspector Lau pointed at it.
‘I assumed that this man Creasy would need communication between his people. We have excellent cellular communication in Hong Kong. I had the phone company submit reports to me on every mobile phone rented or purchased in the last seven days and by whom. The report showed that two days ago Mrs Gloria Manners rented ten of those mobile phones through the Peninsula Hotel.’
The Commissioner was impressed but he tried not to show it. He started to make a speech about law and order, but Inspector Lau was talking on enthusiastically.
‘And there’s more. I twisted a few arms at Hong Kong Telecom, and so now I know the frequencies used by those phones. I can listen in to every conversation — I’ve already started to do so. And there’s another advantage. Because of our radio listening beacons — to try to combat the smuggling to China — we’re able to pinpoint transmissions. The frequencies of the mobile phones of Creasy’s team have been programmed into our computer. Every call will be logged and the computer will show the area from which it’s made. We’re already getting results.’
‘Like what?’
Inspector Lau pulled a page of a computer readout from his pocket, studied it and said, ‘Of course, one location is the Peninsula Hotel. Incidentally, Mrs Manners and the people with her are no longer making outside calls on the hotel telephone system.’ He looked back at the paper. ‘Another location is between Kadoorie Avenue and Braga Circuit, another comes from about two miles off the coast of Sai Kung.’
The Commissioner raised his eyes.
‘Yes,’ Inspector Lau confirmed, ‘they have a boat. It’s a large and fast cabin cruiser, called the MV Tempest. It arrived from Manila yesterday and cleared immigration and customs routinely. It has a crew of two . . . both British. A couple of hours after it arrived, spare parts were delivered on board in two large cases.’
The Commissioner sighed theatrically, stood up and started to pace back and forth across his spacious office. Then he made his speech. It was stern and to the point and covered all legal and police principles.
Inspector Lau listened with humility, his head bowed. He looked up when the Commissioner had finished and said quietly, I have discovered another location from which one of those mobile phones is transmitting.’
‘Where?’
‘Less than one kilometre from Tommy Mo’s villa in Sai Kung,’ he said. ‘At this moment that villa is under observation.’
Black Horn (A Creasy novel Book 4) Page 22