Retribution

by Adrian Magson

  In this place, speed was essential and taken as read.

  His footsteps echoed along the corridor. Each room had specialist monitors bleeping quietly or displaying figures Harry didn’t pretend to understand, each linked to a person who had suffered gunshot or similar trauma. Each room was its own small universe, but one where survival was not a given.

  He stopped outside the second door from the end just as a nurse came out carrying a tray covered by a cloth. She smiled sympathetically and closed the door behind her. It was a signal to him to wait.

  ‘Any change?’ he asked. The last time he’d been here a few days ago, there had been no reaction, just the steady breathing of sedated sleep.

  ‘Some,’ she replied. ‘She speaks occasionally, when it suits her. Mostly she doesn’t. But she’s on the mend . . . if she wants to be, anyway.’

  Harry knew that this nurse, like her colleagues in the unit, was a specialist in treating the Centre’s patients. Part of their remit was to take more than a strictly post-operative and clinical interest in their charges. For most of the inmates, coming round after severe wounds and surgery was to encounter a set of circumstances they could never have envisaged. They were awaking to face a lifestyle that would bear no resemblance to anything they had known so far, a future that was at best uncertain. It required a certain specialized approach by the staff.

  ‘You think she doesn’t want to?’

  The nurse tilted her head to one side. ‘Hard to say. She doesn’t give any indication one way or another. She knows she’s got a fight on her hands, though. The instinct is there in everyone, so we can only hope.’

  ‘Any other visitors?’ He asked the same question each time.

  ‘No. A couple of men dropped by after your last visit, but I wouldn’t classify them as sympathy callers.’ A lift of an eyebrow showed she knew official visitors when she saw them.

  Probably Ballatyne’s men, he thought, checking that the patient wasn’t stealing the cutlery.

  ‘Can I go in?’

  She nodded. ‘Of course. Don’t stay long, though. She needs lots of rest.’

  Harry hesitated, a question forming that he hadn’t wanted to ask before. ‘Is my coming here helping or hindering?’

  The nurse looked at him for a moment, then nodded. ‘I know you’re not her boyfriend or anything,’ she said shrewdly. ‘But I’m guessing you have a . . . connection?’

  ‘She saved my life,’ he said simply. And got shot in the process, he wanted to add. Her last words then had been to ask for his help. Would anyone have asked that if they didn’t have the instinct to live?

  ‘In that case,’ the nurse said, ‘I think it helps.’

  He nodded his thanks and opened the door. As he stepped inside, the woman on the bed shifted slightly, sensing his presence. Her head swivelled on the pillow.

  He still wasn’t sure whether Clare Jardine hated him or not. Maybe she just hated everyone. He walked over and stood looking down at her.

  ‘I didn’t bring any grapes or stuff,’ he said. ‘And flowers aren’t your thing, are they?’

  Clare licked her lips, which were dry, and flicked a glance towards the bedside cabinet holding a jug of water and a pad of cotton wool. It was a mute request for a drink. There was nothing of a personal nature from outside: no flowers, no magazines, no cards. Just the water.

  Harry dipped the cotton wool in the jug and touched it to her lips. She nudged forward, trying to get more of the liquid, but he pulled it away. He’d had instructions before about what was permissible, and drinking wasn’t.

  ‘Bastard,’ she whispered. But there was a flicker of something in her eyes that had not been there for a while.

  She was tough, he knew that. And dangerous, with a predilection for cold steel. A former member of MI6, she had shared the Red Station posting with him and Rik Ferris after being embroiled on the wrong side of a honey trap with a foreign agent. Rik had been caught hacking into highly sensitive security and political files. Nobody had thought to mention that they were not meant to come back alive.

  He pulled up a chair and sat down, his eyes coming level with the shelf of the cabinet. Inside was a bright pink powder compact. Harry smiled. An ironic gift from Rik Ferris. They weren’t friends, but it had been significant because Clare had helped save Rik’s life, too.

  At least she hadn’t had it thrown out yet.

  ‘I called by,’ he began casually, as if they were old friends, ‘because I might not be in for a bit. It looks as if I’m being drawn into something I can’t get out of.’

  No reaction. She wasn’t even looking at him. Her breathing was low and measured.

  ‘I know how much you value these scintillating chats of ours,’ he continued, ‘and I wouldn’t want you to think I was ignoring you if I don’t pop by for a while.’

  ‘Don’t let me keep you, then,’ she whispered, the sound raw, like sandpaper.

  ‘Great,’ he said cheerfully. ‘So we are talking. That’s nice. Shall I tell you about this new job? Well, it’s not really a job yet, but I’ve got a feeling it’s about to be.’ No reaction, so he ploughed on. ‘You know you get an instinct about some things? Of course you do – you’re ex-Six: you get injected with instincts when you join, don’t you? Well, I’ve got a feeling this one’s going to be nasty.’ He was rambling deliberately, hoping for a response. Anything was better than none, even insults. She didn’t disappoint.

  She moved her head slowly and looked at him. Her eyes were cold, dark, empty. ‘Fuck off, Tate.’

  TWELVE

  The Swedish Embassy was on the Avenue Louise, a main artery into Brussels constantly full of speeding traffic. On either side of the route were exotic and attractively lit shops, nudging shoulders with elegant houses and faceless office blocks, many behind ornate iron gates and security systems.

  A notice on the embassy wall said the building was closed. Kassim saw a policeman standing just inside the doors, and a camera peering down at him. He walked another two hundred paces, then turned back, unfolding the street map in the manner of a bemused tourist. The play-acting took him no more than two minutes, by which time he had seen no sign of visitors and absorbed all there was to see of the building.

  He turned into a side street and consulted the binder. Arne Broms was a big man, pasty and rounded, eyes dull and uninterested. He would have little problem in recognizing him. Soldiers attached to the embassy, the binder told him, were billeted in a section house nearby. He checked the address. It was no more than three streets away.

  He followed the map and found that the section house was just that – a house. He couldn’t tell how secure it was, but a camera over the front door made a direct entry too risky. He walked on, stuffing the map in his pocket, formulating a plan. He could not spend too much time here; it was too open. He had to move before he got noticed. As he turned the next corner, which was a deserted building site behind boards of marine ply, he found himself face to face with a man coming the other way. Kassim almost gasped with the shock of recognition.

  It was his target: Broms.

  The Swede was wearing a nylon windcheater and carrying a plastic shopping bag. He looked bored and unprepared, ripe for what Kassim had to do.

  Kassim reached for the knife, every instinct telling him do it – now! But then the moment had passed, the opportunity for surprise lost. He continued down the street, the muscles in his back twitching, and a feeling of failure eating at him. If only he had been more alert! He could have been away before the Swede had stopped breathing.

  Except that would not have been the right way to do it.

  The man had to know.

  Later that afternoon, Kassim returned to the street and ducked into the building site. After two hours, he saw the Swede emerge from the section house. He was now in uniform, shoulders back and head up, a man transformed by duty.

  Kassim was feeling the strain. It had to be now. There was a flight the following morning, if luck favoured him. But that depended on
completing what he had come here for, and in this city environment, opportunities in broad daylight were rare.

  Then he saw his chance. Broms was heading towards him. Kassim began to breathe faster, his heart thumping in his chest. He had already worked out what to do, and now the opportunity was here.

  He checked the street both ways. It was deserted. Broms was coming down this side, striding confidently, big arms swinging. He wouldn’t be an easy man to simply grab hold of as he went past.

  Kassim stepped out of the building site and walked diagonally across the street, his back to Broms. As the Swede came abreast of the empty plot, Kassim spun on his heel and slid the rucksack from his shoulder. The knife was resting point down on one side, next to the Makarov wrapped in the towel. But the gun would be too noisy. It had to be the knife.

  He ran the last few paces, silent even in the western shoes. At the last second Broms heard him. The man turned, his mouth open, but too late. Kassim hit him full on and plunged the knife with all his strength into the Swede’s ribs. There was a popping sound followed by a groan, then the momentum of Kassim’s attack carried both men tumbling through the nearest section of boarding on to the building site. The knife was wrenched aside by the Swede’s body falling away from him, but Kassim followed him down, landing on top of the other man with a grunt, dropping his rucksack to the ground nearby. He drove his knees either side of Broms’ chest, pinning him down, then thrust a hand in his pocket and took out the piece of blue cloth he had shown to Orti.

  The Swede was still alive, stunned, a faint spot of pink froth bubbling at his mouth. His eyes rolling in pain and shock, he focussed on Kassim. ‘What—?’ he muttered, uncomprehending. He flapped his arms, trying to dislodge his attacker, but his strength was fading quickly. ‘What?’

  Suddenly Kassim wanted done with it. He shoved the piece of cloth under Broms’ nose, waiting until the man’s eyes rolled round to look at it. Just for a second, there was a sign of something, a dim light deep in the pupils. Then nothing.

  ‘I don’t . . .’ Broms sighed and tried one more time to lift himself off the ground. Then the life force drained out of him in a rush.

  Kassim twisted his wrist and pulled the blade from the dead Swede’s side. A small gout of blood leaked on to the soil beneath. He slid the knife point under the edge of the windcheater and sliced open the man’s clothing, exposing his chest.

  When he was finished he jumped up and wiped the blade on the dead man’s uniform, before stuffing it into his rucksack. As he turned to leave, he saw an old woman standing across the street. She was staring at him, then at the body of Broms on the ground.

  For an old woman she had a scream like a banshee, the noise echoing off the buildings and raising the hairs on the back of Kassim’s neck. It was too late to stop her, so he stepped through the broken boarding and walked away quickly down the street.

  Two minutes later, he was among shoppers and homeward-bound workers, just one face among many.

  THIRTEEN

  ‘Harry?’ It was Ken Deane, later that evening. Harry had his television on with the sound off, thinking about what he had to do. Deane sounded angry. ‘I’m on a secure line. Another man’s down.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Arne Broms. He was stabbed in Brussels this afternoon, near the Swedish Embassy. Word just came through.’

  Harry felt a tightening in his stomach. Broms the driver. Big, solid, careful. Not an easy man to take down.

  ‘What are the locals saying?’ He was sure Deane’s office would already have been in touch with the Belgian police, no doubt pushing as discreetly but as firmly as possible for the basic details.

  ‘They’re playing wise monkeys. They think it must have been a political act. Do you believe that? I mean, who the hell gets snitty with the Swedes, for Chrissakes?’

  ‘You think it was the same as Orti?’

  A long sigh filtered down the line. ‘Yeah, pretty much. There was a witness to the killing: an old lady who freaked out with the shock. Kept shouting about “a man with dark eyes . . . a man with dark eyes”. They haven’t got a useful word out of her since.’ He coughed. ‘It chimes with something the Paris police said. A couple of barflies where Orti had his last drink said there was a man with dark eyes in the café.’

  ‘What was Broms doing in Brussels?’

  ‘He was on secondment to the embassy, Two I/C of their security section. The embassy’s closed down but they had a skeleton staff packing up and needed a security presence. Broms rotated shifts with two other guards, and lived in a section house nearby. He died of a single stab to the side. The cops say his chest had been mutilated. I asked for pictures, but they haven’t sent them through yet.’

  Harry thought about what kind of man could kill two experienced soldiers with such apparent ease. First Orti, who would know every possible move of rough-house fighting going, then Broms, big enough to shrug off most men with little effort. Whoever the killer was, he had used the element of surprise backed up with lethal skill.

  Deane said, ‘You remember Anton Kleeman?’

  ‘How could I forget?’ Harry almost had, until now. He vaguely recalled a handsome man in his early forties, smooth and urbane, with the healthy glow of the outdoors common to many Americans; a professional politician but not one you would necessarily like unless he wanted it.

  ‘Well, he’s moved up the UN totem pole since Kosovo. He’s now a Special Envoy and nobody’s taking bets that he doesn’t try for one of the top jobs one day. He’s got the clout and influence to get his hat in the ring; he just needs something to propel him the last few rungs of the ladder.’

  Harry wondered where this was leading. He soon found out.

  ‘He called a press conference earlier today in New York. It was supposed to be a follow-up briefing dealing with reports about brutalities committed by UN forces in Africa. Word is, he was using it to beef himself up prior to a number of Security Council meetings. There was certainly no need for any briefing on the subject today. Unfortunately, he got sandbagged about the alleged rape and murder in Kosovo.’

  ‘Which he discounted?’

  ‘Which he did not. He actually said the matter would be fully investigated and the guilty trooper, even if no longer serving, would be charged and punished.’

  ‘But it was twelve years ago.’

  ‘Some other allegations are even older – the accusations against the British in Kenya . . . against the US in Vietnam and Cambodia, the UN in Haiti and Somalia. Memories are long when it comes to injustices.’

  It wasn’t what Harry had meant; he’d been thinking of the time span compared with more recent allegations. But Deane was right: there was no statute of limitations for accusations against nation states. ‘What happened?’

  ‘You can imagine. When he said “trooper”, the Times reporter nearly had an orgasm.’ Deane huffed down the line. ‘Man, what an asshole.’

  ‘What do you want me to do?’ said Harry, sensing it was his turn.

  Deane didn’t even express surprise. ‘Ideally, find the rest of the team. Go talk to them . . . Koslov, Bikovsky, Pendry . . . see if they’ve got anything to hide. Oh, and the compound guard, too. See what they say, did they have any scams going on the side involving girls in the compounds – that kind of thing.’

  ‘Why should they tell me anything?’

  ‘You’re one of them. They’ll talk to you. They won’t give me Jack shit.’

  ‘They’ll know what I’m doing, though – who I’m reporting to.’

  Deane came straight back. ‘Listen, we’ve got two ex-KFOR guys who’ve been hit and I need to find out why. We wouldn’t want this to become a habit.’

  ‘You still think the killings are connected with the rumours about the girl?’

  ‘Maybe. I don’t know.’ Deane sounded exasperated. ‘You know how it works: make enough noise and people start to believe you, no matter how wild or how far back it goes. Piggyback on the shoulders of fresh reports about the same organiz
ation doing stuff it shouldn’t, and it gets easier to take at face value.’

  ‘Have the two murders been reported?’

  ‘Only locally. But not the full details – and nothing about the links to the UN. So far we’re managing to keep a lid on it. Just two soldiers murdered. It happens all the time.’

  Harry felt a momentary doubt. He was still adjusting to life after leaving MI5, building up contacts and getting himself known. In a crowded security field, with a lot of Special Forces people also out there looking for work, he couldn’t afford to get sidetracked.

  Yet a part of him was intrigued by the possibilities Deane had to offer. Working undercover was dangerous, lonely and in the end no guarantee of good health if you stuck at it too long. But this wasn’t strictly undercover. And it wasn’t for ever.

  ‘What about the other KFOR units over there?’ he asked. ‘We weren’t the only ones.’

  ‘No incident reports have come in – I checked.’ Deane had a smile in his voice, like a dog suddenly presented with a juicy bone. ‘Not one single death among ex-UN or KFOR personnel that wasn’t a certified accident.’

  Harry relented, as he’d known he would. This wasn’t going away, and he’d rather face up to the situation than let it come and find him. ‘All right.’

  ‘Good man. I’ve booked you a seat on board a US Coast Guard flight out of Northolt tomorrow. It took some doing, but it’ll save a lot of hassle.’

  ‘That was a hell of an assumption.’

  ‘Yeah, well, I don’t have time to hang around. We need to find the source of this rumour and whether it’s connected with Orti or Broms. And to safeguard the other men you need to track them down and talk to them – hard if needs be.’