by Jack Higgins
'Excellent,' he said when Lancy was finished. 'You've done brilliantly. Is there anything to report on Malik?'
'I've had a word with a few of the Brotherhood with shops in the area.' He was speaking of the Army of God, on the face of it a Muslim charity. 'He seems harmless enough.'
'Then you can forget him from now on. I want you to drive out to this airfield and confirm their departure.'
'You've got it, boss. Ferguson said they'd be leaving in three hours, so I'll wait till nearer the time. I don't want to stand out or anything.'
'Just get it right.' After lunch, Holley stopped for a moment at the Dorchester to collect a couple of things before going on with Ferguson and Miller to the airfield. Just as he was going back out through the door, Malik phoned him from Algiers. 'How are you? I was speaking to Cousin Selim and he's worried about you.'
'No need,' Holley said. 'I'm taking it easy for the time being. It's Ferguson and Major Miller who are putting themselves in harm's way. They're going on a flying visit to Peshawar to nose around.'
'But why?'
'Just to get a feel for the situation. I gave them names of people who might be able to help. Dak Khan, Jose Fernandez and Jemal Hamid.'
'And have they agreed to help?'
'It seems that Jemal Hamid was killed in a convoy ambush the other week, but the other two have. Ferguson and Miller will be looked after by a Colonel Ahmed Atep – does he mean anything to you?'
'No, he's not familiar to me, though it's years since I was there. Wasn't he there when you visited five months ago?'
'No, he must be new.'
'So what happens now?' Malik asked.
'I haven't the slightest idea. I just had a meeting with all of Ferguson's people. I was able to put a face to everybody, something I couldn't do before. Roper, Ferguson, Miller, Dillon, and the two gangsters, the Salters.'
'Gangsters?' Malik said.
'Well, that's what they used to be. Young Billy is MI5 now and his uncle has millions in developments by the Thames. It pays better than robbing banks.'
'Everything is a joke to you, Daniel.'
'It's the only thing that got me through five years in the Lubyanka Prison, my friend. Take care, Malik, I'll be in touch.' He hung up.
Malik sighed, deeply troubled by the direction in which the whole affair was going. There was a step on the terrace and he turned to find Colonel Ali Hakim there.
'Forgive the intrusion; your gatekeeper let me into the garden. I was passing and wondered how you are.'
'Not good at all,' Malik said. 'I worry so much about Daniel. I just can't help it.'
Hakim managed a look of concern. 'My dear old friend, what's he been up to now?' Farley Field belonged to the Ministry of Defence and was restricted, but the public car park next to it was not, and was popular with plane-spotters due to the increase in military traffic. Lancy had out his binoculars along with the rest of them and found the Gulfstream, waiting to go, the steps down, two RAF officers beside it.
He could recognize Ferguson, Dillon and Daniel Holley standing together by a Daimler limousine, and then a Mercedes appeared. The man who got out was Miller. It was five-thirty. He waited. Finally, the Gulfstream started across the runway and rose into the air.
He got back into the Mercedes and called the Preacher. 'They've just left.'
'Excellent,' Shah said. 'Let's hope they enjoy themselves.'
'You're going to do the business on them, aren't you, Boss?'
'I would think Peshawar dangerous enough without my help,' Shah told him.
Lancy said, 'What do I do now?'
'Go back to making a living, Selim. I'm sure the ladies adore your manly good looks. You'll find, by the way, that your bank account has been inflated by five thousand pounds. I know your mother's cancer treatment means she can't work. Give her my blessing, but remember you belong to Osama.'
To which there could be no answer, and Selim Lancy switched off, shaking his head. What kind of geezer was he, the Preacher? One minute he was the lord of life and death, and the next he was the soul of kindness and charity. Lancy had punished people for him, wounding to keep Muslim wrongdoers in line, and he'd shot dead two Muslim men from Kosovo involved in a prostitution ring importing young girls. Death was all they deserved, the Preacher had said, and Lancy had obliged, dumping the bodies in the Thames.
It didn't bother him. After all, it was small beer after Afghanistan. On the other hand, the business with his mother was a debt that should be repaid. He sat there behind the wheel of the Mercedes, thinking about the situation. Ferguson and Miller were out of the way, which left Dillon, Holley and the Salters. He smiled. Thanks to the information the Preacher had supplied, he knew all about the Salters, and their history intrigued him. East End gangsters who'd made good, millionaires up there with the toffs. He admired that and felt no animosity. They were on the wrong side, that was all.
There was a restaurant called Harry's Place and a pub, the Dark Man, in Wapping. It was where Salter had started out, his favourite place, and he had a boat there called the Linda Jones tied up at the end of the jetty outside. That's where any aggravation would hurt him most. Lancy smiled and took out his mobile. Like many young and unemployed Muslim men, Kalid Hasim made a bare living on the fringes of the drug trade as a delivery boy. It was a great risk for a small return, but Hasim considered it only temporary. For him, boxing was the way out, and he was punching the bag in his gym in Camden when his mobile sounded; he'd put it with his towel on a bench.
'It's me, number one man,' Lancy said.
They had never met. Lancy was a voice on the phone since the first call, when he'd suggested that Hasim and a couple of his friends might like to smash up a shop selling anti-Muslim literature, promising five hundred pounds in the post. Hasim had taken a chance and had been delighted with the outcome. He'd repeated the exercise on many occasions.
'So what have you got?'
'Just listen.' He explained the situation. 'Just aggravation is what I'm after. Smash up a few motors in the car park… and there's a boat tied up at the jetty. Sinking that would be good.'
'When do you want it done?'
'Tonight, but I've got to warn you. The Salters are real hard men, so don't hang about. In and out before they know what's going on. There's a grand in it for you.'
'Consider it done.'
'Good lad,' Lancy told him. 'But remember that right hand. You're leaving yourself wide open when you punch.'
'Fuck off,' Hasim told him.
'Not nice, a decent young Muslim talking like that,' and then he surprised Hasim by speaking in Arabic for the first time. 'Allah is great and Osama is his prophet.'
He switched off and drove away. Meanwhile, the Preacher was contacting his most important Al Qaeda asset in Peshawar. He got an instant response.
'The day of wrath must come,' Shah said, establishing his credentials.
'Then only the believers will survive. It is good to hear you, Preacher. How can I help?' his asset answered.
'Not me, but the cause of Al Qaeda. You are to have two visitors. They have just left London by Gulfstream. They are important because they are on British government business, but they are a problem for us.'
'Who are they?'
'A General Charles Ferguson and Major Harry Miller. They are there on a fact-finding mission. There is alarm in London over reports of young British Muslims fighting for the Taliban.'
'Which is true.'
'Yes, but there is more to their trip. There is evidence of a mercenary commander operating with the Taliban who uses the code name Shamrock. Have you heard anything of such a man?'
'Not a whisper. Are you sure about this? Perhaps it's only rumour?'
'No. Shamrock is one of Al Qaeda's most important assets. His identity must be protected at all costs. As far as you are concerned, he doesn't exist. My information is that Ferguson and Miller have been promised the assistance of two men in Peshawar. Their names are Dak Khan and Jose Fernandez.'
'I kn
ow these men well. Illegal arms dealers, amongst other things. I can put my hand on them at any time. As regards the visitors from London, do I frighten them or kill them?'
'Both Ferguson and Miller have done great harm to Al Qaeda in the past. I think it is time that their debts were paid.'
'No problem. Leave it with me.'
'Osama's blessing on you.'
Shah hung up, and the man at his desk at Military Police Headquarters in Peshawar, Colonel Ahmed Atep, lit a cigarette and sat back, smiling. So, life could get interesting. The prospect pleased him very much.
N ORTHERN I RELAND
L ONDON
5
Earlier in the day, Justin Talbot's flight had taken him over North Wales and Anglesey, and now he was sweeping in towards the Mourne Mountains, a wonderful sight on a perfect day.
It had been an excellent flight, but he hadn't enjoyed it as much as usual. His dealings with the Preacher had been deeply disturbing. It wasn't just the shock of discovering that his mother'd had him baptized a Catholic as a baby. It was more that the Preacher knew about his exploits with the SAS, which were supposedly top secret. Where in the hell had all that come from? The power of these Al Qaeda people was frightening, and he cursed the day he'd ever got involved.
He wondered for a moment if he could buy his way out. On his grandfather's death, he would become fabulously rich, and he was cynical enough by nature to believe that most people in life had their price, particularly when you were talking in the millions. But on the other hand, Islamists like Al Qaeda, men who could kill and execute without a second's hesitation, had rigid moral and theological codes that Westerners found it difficult to understand. In the end, money meant little to them.
He doubted that was his escape.
He turned parallel to the Mourne Mountains as they swept down to the sea, and dropped on to the long grass runway of the Aero Club just outside the village of Drumgoole. There were three hangars, five small aircraft parked on the grass, a small terminal building with a cafe and a stub of a control tower above it. In front of the terminal was a maroon Shogun, his mother leaning against it, wearing sunglasses because of the glare, watching as an overalled mechanic waved him in to park in the right place. The club's chief pilot, Phil Regan, was standing with her, and they came towards him as he got out of the Beech Baron.
'Wonderful to see you, darling.' She flung her arms round him and hugged him fiercely. 'My God, but you're brown.'
'Good to see you, Justin.' Regan shook hands. 'If you wore the right clothes, people could mistake you for a Pathan.'
'It's fierce sun up there on the North-West Frontier,' Talbot said. 'I've never experienced anything like it. The plane did well, Phil. I hope I'm staying for a few days, but give it a full engine check, full everything, so that it's ready to go at a moment's notice.'
'We'll see to that, never fear.' Regan turned to consult the mechanic.
Jean said, 'Do you want to drive?'
'I've just clocked three hundred miles or more flying that plane, so I think I'll take a rain check.'
'Fine by me.'
They got in and she drove away, following the coast road. 'I was worried when I didn't hear from you on this trip. I always thought that's what mobiles were for.'
'Service can be difficult if you're in the wrong terrain. It's a hard, unforgiving landscape out there. It's defeated everybody who invaded that bloody country, even Alexander the Great.'
'But that's Afghanistan. I thought you never went over the Pakistan border.'
He'd made a mistake and struggled to make it right.
'Borders meant nothing to Alexander.'
'Of course, silly of me.' She concentrated on the road, but, glancing sideways at her face, he knew that she didn't believe him, just as she hadn't believed so much of his army life over the years. Secrets, always secrets between them, but also a love that was so deep it was never mentioned.
'How is he?' he asked, referring to his grandfather.
'Pretty bloody awful. Dr Ryan said he really did think he might go this time. That's why he phoned me to come. Dad insists sometimes on getting up with two sticks and lurching around and striking out at any servant within range. This time, he lost his balance and fell over, and that's what brought on the attack. We've got a local man with him now named Tod Murphy; he spent years at the Musgrave Park Hospital in Belfast. He's sixty, a hard man, and deaf as a post, so your grandfather's rantings pass right over him. He'll just sit reading in the conservatory, ignoring him, until Dad needs feeding or toileting or putting to bed. And, of course, there's Hannah Kelly,' mentioning the housekeeper. 'Couldn't manage without her, so I pay her a damn good salary, and thanks to her I don't have to be over here on a regular basis.' She shook her head. 'What's the solution? It drives me mad thinking about it.'
'He dies, I suppose,' Talbot said. 'He could stumble and fall at any time and break his bloody neck and do us all a favour.'
'You really hate him that much?' she asked.
He shrugged. 'I was his Protestant bastard for years, so what did that make you? How could you ever forgive him for that?'
'I know, love,' she said. 'Such behaviour goes beyond any hope of forgiveness.'
'Mind you, what would life have been like if I'd been a Catholic bastard? Imagine, Colonel Henry Talbot's grandson! What would the Orange Lodge have made of that?'
Because of the special bond that had always been between them, she could tell he wasn't quite ready to face the house, so she swerved to the side of the road by the sea wall, switched off and got out. She leaned on the wall, took out her cigarettes and lit one, and he joined her.
A narrow road dropped down to a hamlet called Lorn: seven small cottages if you counted them. Several fishing boats were drawn up on the narrow beach and there was a boat-house and jetty that belonged to the Talbot estate. A sport fisherman was tied up there, gleaming white with a blue stripe. It was called Mary Ellen.
Justin said, 'Have you taken the boat out since you've been back or been flying with Phil Regan? I thought you'd be airborne all the time after you got your licence.'
Instead of replying to his question she said, 'You know, don't you?'
'August the fifth, Nineteen sixty-odd, Father Alan Winkler, St Mary the Virgin Church, Dun Street, Mayfair. A good address.'
'He was a nice old man. Very understanding. He held my hand and prayed for me and you and your father, and said that, in the circumstances, it was God's will that you should be baptized.'
'The persuasion of the truly good,' Talbot said. 'How could you resist that?' He kissed her gently on the forehead. 'What a wonderful person you are. I expect that's why I can't take girls seriously, and never have. They're lucky if they can get a week out of me.'
'But you aren't going to tell me how you suddenly know? Oh, the secrets between us, darling.'
'I've an idea that Mary Ellen knew, am I right?'
'I had to tell her because I told her everything and she blessed me, for it was your father's dying wish. As far as telling you… she felt it should be left to the right moment.'
'I'm forty-five, Mum, if you remember. A long time waiting.'
'We all have our secrets, even from our loved ones.'
'And you think that applies to me?'
'More years ago than I care to remember, you were spending a week's leave at Marley Court when a dispatch rider delivered an order. You read it, told me you'd been recalled for some special operation, went upstairs to pack and left the order on the study table. I know I shouldn't have, but I read it and discovered my son was serving in Twenty-second SAS.'
'So you knew, all those years, and never told me?'
'I couldn't. It was a betrayal, you see, and I couldn't live with you knowing that. My punishment was that I've had to imagine supremely dangerous things happening to you every day. So, yes, my darling boy, I knew then, every time, just as I know now.' She stubbed out her cigarette. 'I've tried to give up these things, but I'm damned if I can. Let's move
on. You must be famished.'
'I'd like to call in and see Jack Kelly before we go up to the house,' he said. 'If you don't mind, that is.'
She glanced at her watch. 'A little early for the pub. It's only four-thirty.'
'I'm sorry, Mum.' He laughed, looking like a young boy again for a fleeting moment. 'I suppose I am putting off seeing Colonel Henry for as long as possible. And I do have letters for Jack from his extended family, relatives we have working out there in Pakistan.'
'Of course, love. I'll drop you off and get on up to the house and see how Hannah Kelly is coping.'
They continued in silence for a while and finally he said, 'I've been thinking about our secrets. If it leaked out that I'd operated in the SAS during my army service, I think it would finish me here.'
'I agree, but they'll never know from me. Answer me one question as your mother, though. Did you actually take part in SAS operations in Ulster during the Troubles?'
He had so much to lie about, particularly his present activities. Perhaps he could more easily avoid that by admitting a sort of truth.
'Yes, I did, and on many occasions.'
She kept on driving calmly. 'In view of the personal difficulties in your background, our situation in Kilmartin, couldn't you have avoided it? I understood that the Ministry of Defence allowed choice.'
'It was still left to the individual to make a personal decision.' He was getting into real trouble here. 'It's difficult when the regiment's going to war, for an individual to opt out.'
'I could see that with the Grenadier Guards,' Jean said. 'But you volunteered to join the SAS, am I right?' 'Yes, that's true.'
'So you knew what you were getting into. Covert operations, subterfuge, killing by stealth, action by night. You must have known that your enemy would be the IRA.' She shook her head. 'Why did you do it?'
He broke then. 'Because I loved it: every glorious moment of it. Couldn't get enough. Some psychiatrists might say I was seeking death, but if I was, it was only to beat him at his own game. I lived more in a day…' He broke off, shaking his head. 'Nothing can describe it; it was so real, so damned exciting. It was impossible to take ordinary life seriously ever again.'