The Killing Ground

by Jack Higgins

  “Most unfortunate. Happens all the time, I’m afraid. You won’t need anything like that this time. A Mr. Jack Savage is picking you up, I understand. We know him well.”

  “Is someone taking my name in vain?”

  They all turned and saw him standing in the mess doorway, medium height, roughly cut blond hair, a broken nose, a reefer coat over his arm.

  “Come in, you old bastard,” Robson said. “And that’s an order, Sergeant Major.”

  * * * *

  SOMEONE ONCE SAID that in Baghdad, all the streets seemed to be some sort of market, although many of them seemed to be lucky to have any buildings left at all. And the peasants were still there, their donkeys carrying not just produce from the countryside, but everything from lap-tops to televisions, the detritus of war.

  They moved through narrow streets down toward the river, finally turning into a courtyard outside an old colonial house, with a fountain that still worked. A sign over the door traced out “The River Room” with bulbs. They got out and Savage snapped his fingers for two boys to grab the luggage and take it inside.

  “The sign?” Billy asked. “Does it still light up?”

  “I’m missing half a dozen bulbs; they’re special but it reminds me of London, the Savoy, the old River Room.”

  “Why do you stay?” Dillon asked. “These days it must be the ultimate way of living on the knife edge.”

  “That’s what I like about it. You can make money here like nowhere else on earth. Let’s go in.”

  They followed. It was shadowy, a floor of Arabic tiles, tables and chairs of cane. Even the bar was cane, with a mirror and what looked like every kind of bottle in the world stacked against it. The bartender, who stood polishing glasses, was big and fat, wearing a white shirt and pants, a scarlet belt of some kind around his middle.

  “What’s your pleasure?” Savage asked.

  “For Billy, nothing. He doesn’t indulge. I’ll have Bushmills Irish whiskey.”

  “Two, Farouk. Takes me back to Northern Ireland in the Troubles. So you’re the great Sean Dillon.”

  “And you’re the bad Jack Savage.” Dillon turned to Billy. “He had a lovely racket going. Chasing down gun runners on the one hand, then selling the proceeds to the Provisional IRA on the other.”

  “But not while I was in the Royal Marines, not while wearing the badge. That wouldn’t have been honorable.”

  “He’s big on honor.” Rawan Savage moved into the room. “I’ll have a large vodka-very large. God, it’s hot in here.” She walked out onto a wooden balcony and they followed.

  A couple of minutes later, Farouk was distributing the drinks. “Cheers. To new friends.” Rawan raised her glass and in a way seemed to swallow it whole, but that was only an illusion. She held it out to Farouk. Without saying a word, he turned and went back inside.

  The river wasn’t particularly busy. Below them, tied to the jetty, was the motor launch Eagle. Rawan said, “Just up there, a quarter of a mile, is Abdul Rashid’s place. Do you want to have a look?”

  “Shut up, Rawan,” Savage told her.

  “Yes, sir,” She gave him a mock salute.

  “Look, I won’t tell you again,” Savage said. “Drink up or shut up. Take your choice.”

  “Is that so?” She turned to Dillon. “Well, I know why you’re here and I don’t admire it.”

  “Is that so?” Dillon said.

  “Snatching a thirteen-year-old girl from her grandfather.”

  “Let’s keep to the facts,” Billy put in. “The said thirteen-year-old girl was snatched from her parents in London in the first place.”

  But she didn’t want to listen and charged into the bar, where Farouk stood behind the counter, a strange threatening stillness to him. Customers, four of them, were there, one with an AK on the table close to his hand, another with one slung from his shoulder. The other two had a hand each in a pocket.

  A woman slipped through the door, her clothes held tightly around her. She looked terrified and glanced anxiously about her. Rawan said, “Ah, someone bearing ill news. Gentlemen, this is Bibi, one of Sara Rashid’s ladies of the bedchamber. What’s wrong, Bibi? Have they gone without you?”

  The woman cried bitterly, flung herself to her knees and a flood of Arabic ensued. Rawan said, “Excellent. Someone seems to have spoiled the party and warned Abdul Rashid. Several hours ago, he dispatched Sara with Hussein Rashid, her intended, in a small convoy to Kuwait by road. Once there, friends will forward them by private plane to Hazar, where the rest of the Rashids thrive. It is all true, Bibi heard it being discussed. You are dead men walking. Hussein will see to it.”

  There was a silence. Savage said, “But who told him?”

  “Who do you think? I’m sick of you, Jack, have been for a long time. You can rot in hell.”

  In the near distance, there was a huge explosion, and everybody instinctively ducked. The sound of the aftershock drifted like a wave. The telephone on the bar sounded.

  Farouk picked it up and listened, then held it out to Savage. “Omar, the boy you had watching the Rashid villa. He saw the convoy for Kuwait leave two hours ago.”

  “So?”

  “Old Rashid had just driven out in his Mercedes, accompanied by two guards. It exploded as it went through the gate.” His face said it all: Because of people like you, who come amongst us and destroy everything you touch.

  There must have been something about his expression that gave warning, a twitch, a glint of determination, because Dillon, who had been sitting down, pulled on the ankle holster, yanked out the.25 Colt and shot Farouk between the eyes, the hollow-point cartridge wreaking havoc. In almost the same moment, he pulled out the silenced Walther from his waistband under the jacket and shot the one who was reaching for the AK on a table.

  Billy produced his Walther as a third man was trying to get a Browning out of his right-hand pocket and snagged it. Billy shot him instantly and the man was hurled against his companion, who shot him inadvertently in the back.

  “Don’t shoot, for God’s sake,” the companion called in as Irish a voice as you could wish for, but as Billy hesitated, the Irishman’s hand swung up to fire, and it was Dillon who finished him off.

  “Don’t do that again, Billy. It never pays.”

  “Christ, I thought he was Irish.” Billy went down, felt in an inside pocket and produced a passport, brown, with the Gold Harp of Ireland on it and a few papers.

  “Bring them with you.” Dillon turned and Rawan said, “Damn you, damn you all and damn this stinking country, Jack.” She ran down the steps to the jetty, untied the line on the Eagle and cast off. Savage clattered down the steps after her and jumped for the Eagle as it drifted out. “Rawan,” he called. “Just listen.”

  “Not anymore,” she said and pressed the starter.

  It rattled a couple of times and then there was a huge explosion and the boat simply came apart.

  Billy was hurled backward over a cane chair. Dillon pulled him up. “Let’s get out of it and fast. The military will be here in no time. We’ll take that Land Rover Savage used to bring us from the airport. Our stuff is still on board.”

  They were out in seconds and into the Land Rover, Billy at the wheel, and moved into the main street as two Scimitars came the opposite way. A sizable crowd was already assembling, but the confusion of it helped them to make a rapid exit.

  Dillon called Roper, who answered at once. “Just listen,” Dillon said and gave him an account.

  “My God, you have been in action. Why does this sort of thing always reach out to touch you, Dillon?”

  “Just tell Robson to alert the boys to get us out of here. God knows where to. The mad side of me wants to pursue them to Hazar, but I don’t think the General would approve.”

  “No, he damn well wouldn’t,” Ferguson cut in. “Outrageous, finding my plane has been hijacked. Get yourselves back here immediately.”

  * * * *

  AT BAGHDAD AIRPORT, they were admitted through
a discreet security entrance, and found Lacey and Robson waiting in a Jeep.

  “Just follow,” Lacey called to Billy, which he did and found the Gulf-stream waiting.

  “Off you go,” Robson said. “We prefer to think of you as never having been here.”

  They went up the steps and Lacey locked the door. “Thanks a lot, you bastards. The General was not exactly thrilled when he tried to book his personal plane for the flight from Paris and found it elsewhere. What in the hell were you playing at?”

  “Didn’t I tell you?” Dillon said. “Trying to win the war.”

  * * * *

  DILLON GOT HIS FLASK OUT as they climbed, but it was empty. He waited until they leveled off at forty thousand feet and peered out the window.

  “Good-bye to Baghdad, city of romance, intrigue and adventure.”

  “Yes, everything you can do without,” Billy said. “I can’t figure it. So the Rawan bird is fed up with Jack and spills her guts to old Rashid-and he responds by having someone arrange to have the launch blown up?”

  “He was after the three of us-Savage, you and me. It was just too bad about her.”

  “And what about the car bomb?”

  “A daily risk. A man like him would have more enemies than he could count.”

  Dillon got up and went to the rear of the cockpit, opened the first-aid drawer and helped himself to the half bottle of brandy it contained.

  “Purely medicinal,” he told Parry, who had glanced over his shoulder.

  “Always is with you.”

  When Dillon returned to his seat, he found Billy examining the Irish passport taken from the man he had killed in the bar.

  “Terence O’Malley, age forty-two, an address in Bangor, Northern Ireland.”

  “A nice place.” Dillon opened the brandy and poured some into a plastic cup. “What else does it tell us?”

  “Apparently, he’s a schoolmaster.”

  “I’d bet he’s not been that for a long time.”

  “IRA?”

  “I’d say so. We know many old hands have moved into organized crime. It’s a very small step from what they were doing into the world of the mercenary, Billy. Wild Geese, that’s what they’ve always been called, in Ireland or out of it. If you’ve been a Provo for all those years, it’s difficult to turn your hand to something else when it’s all over. What have you got in there?”

  “A monthly rental bill from Dublin, a letter from a man named Tom, a please-come-home letter, signed ‘your loving mother, Rose.’ Address in Bangor. Cash, five one-hundred-dollar bills, American.” He looked up. “What do we do? About his mother, I mean?”

  “I’d let it go, Billy. If she knows nothing, then it leaves her hope. Now I’m going to catch a little sleep,” and he dropped his seat.

  * * * *

  ON THE ROAD SOUTH from Baghdad to Kuwait, it was a macabre situation, a landscape of burned-out tanks and trucks and civilian vehicles dating back to the original Gulf War. The Highway of Death they had called it, a landscape that also contained the remains of many thousands of refugees. And yet all the way along the highway at suitable intervals, there were gas stations open twenty-four hours, for that was the one thing they weren’t short of, and places you could get coffee and short-order cooking, and the telephones worked.

  In the first Land Rover were Hussein’s three henchmen, armed to the teeth, veterans of the streets, men who knew their business, which was proved by the fact that they were still here.

  In the rear was Hussein, Sara and Jasmine, another cousin of Sara’s, who was devoted to her. Fifty miles out of Baghdad, the little convoy had pulled up in the car park of a gas station. Hussein received a call on his satellite phone from the man he knew only as the Broker. He had been allocated to him by al-Qaeda for three years now. They spoke on occasion in Arabic, but in English when appropriate, and on those occasions the Broker sounded like an Oxford professor.

  Hussein answered at once. “Where are you?” said the voice. Hussein told him. “Good, you were in an impossible situation. Other contacts covered events for me. One of Rashid’s men placed the bomb in the Savage people’s boat.”

  “And Rashid himself?”

  “It was a local Sunni group who got him. An old score. How has Sara taken it?”

  He sounded strangely paternalistic and yet there was a certain concern in his voice.

  “I’m just about to tell her, but I’ve further information. The woman who told Rashid of the kidnap attempt said the men involved are called Dillon and Salter. Are they familiar to you?”

  “No, but they soon will be. I’ll call you when I know more. Take care of Sara. I’ve made all the arrangements in Kuwait. A Hawk. You’ll enjoy flying that.”

  * * * *

  WHEN HUSSEIN RETURNED to the group, they were waiting.

  “You could have gone for coffee and a bite to eat,” he said.

  “Not in my leg irons, cousin. Must I endure further humiliation?”

  And he didn’t hesitate, extracted no false promises. “Forgive me, cousin, so much has happened.” He produced a key and unlocked the chains, dropping them over the seat, then said, “I have grave news from Baghdad.”

  His words lingered, his people waited, so used to bad news they knew this must be special, and Hussein put an arm around Sara’s shoulders. “My uncle, Sara’s grandfather, has been taken from us at the villa. It was a car bomb, as he was leaving in his Mercedes.”

  Jasmine gave a short wail, then started to sob. One of the men, Hassim, said, “Sunnis?”

  “It would appear so.”

  “May they rot in hell,” Hamid joined in. “Cursed for a thousand years.”

  “Two thousand,” said Khazid.

  Sara stood there, saying nothing.“Come,” Hussein said. “We all agree, but we still have a long trip ahead of us. We must eat.”

  She nodded, torn in her heart between her feelings for her parents and a stubborn old man who had wronged her terribly yet loved her deeply.

  “Yes,” she said. “Yes.” She took Hussein’s arm and they walked to the café.

  LONDON

  DUBLIN

  KUWAIT

  Chapter 4

  AT FARLEY FIELD, AS THE GULFSTREAM TOUCHED DOWN, Dillon looked out and saw Ferguson standing under an umbrella smoking a cigarette.

  “What do you think, trouble?” Billy asked.

  “Oh, I don’t know. You might be surprised,” Dillon answered.

  Parry opened the door and they moved out, followed by Lacey, who said, “Dammit, Sean, we don’t like our time wasted.”

  “I’m not sure that’s a correct description. Savage and his wife were blown up in their boat on the Tigris.”

  “And four very unpleasant geezers tried to take us out in the bar at Savage’s club. When we left, it looked like the Last Chance Saloon in a bad movie,” Billy pointed out.

  “How many?” Lacey said slowly.

  “Four,” Dillon told him. “So your time wasn’t wasted-and I suspect we’re about to use your services again.”

  “Where to this time?” Lacey said.

  “You’ve been there before. Hazar.”

  “Christ Almighty,” Parry said.“You nearly left your bones there, Billy.”

  “Well, I didn’t, and I’ve no intention of leaving them there this time.” They reached Ferguson, who said, “All right, gentlemen, get in the back of the Daimler and explain yourselves. Your body count is beginning to rival Tombstone ’s.”

  After Dillon sketched in the events, he said, “After all, General, you did say we could use the Gulfstream in an emergency.”

  “Yes, but I hadn’t envisaged this.”

  “And it all started with you,” Billy said. “Last time you saw us, you suggested we go to Heathrow and haunt passport control.”

  “Which is where we came up with Caspar Rashid.” Dillon cut in.

  “All right, all right.” Ferguson was getting testy as they coasted through London toward Holland Park. “I’m the fir
st to admit he could be very useful for us.”

  “Have you told him we failed to get Sara?”

  “Not yet. I thought his wife should be considered, too. She’s operating now, but Major Novikova will tell her, and then bring her to us. Eleven o’clock should be about right.”

  “Great,” Billy said. “Time for a full English breakfast.”

  “We don’t have a cook,” Dillon reminded him.

  “Who says so?” Ferguson frowned. “All I had to do was telephone the Civil Service pool. A Mrs. Hall appeared almost straightaway, answers to Maggie. She’s from Jamaica, though-I’m not sure about the full English breakfast.”

  “For God’s sake, General, they probably invented it.” That was Billy.

  * * * *

  “SO THEY FAILED?” At the hospital, Molly Rashid was very pale, no color in her face at all, and weary suddenly in a way she hadn’t been before. Greta noticed that at once and the hands were shaking.

  “You need a drink,” she said.

  “No.” Molly ran a hand through her hair. “I’ve got another operation this afternoon.”

  “I don’t think so. Your right hand is shaking like a leaf. You couldn’t possibly operate in your present condition.”

  Molly covered her face with both hands. “What am I going to do?”

  Greta got a glass, took a bottle of vodka from the fridge. She almost filled the glass. “Come on, take it straight down. It numbs the brain.”

  Molly hesitated, then did as she was told. She gagged, staggered to the sink. For a moment, it was as if she was going to be sick, but she took a couple of deep breaths and pulled herself together.

  “My God, that hit the spot.” She turned and smiled wanly. “We’d better go and face it, I suppose.”

  “Yes,” Greta said, “I suppose we should.”

  * * * *

  “WHAT DO YOU MEAN you failed?” Rashid said, as he turned from the window to Dillon.