A Sentimental Traitor

by Michael Dobbs

  Harry flinched. Dark memories spat at him. He and Sloppy had been fellow officers in the Life Guards serving in Northern Ireland during the bad days, colleagues who became close friends – too close, perhaps, because, one rain-pissing day in the hills of Armagh, Sloppy had taken a bullet meant for Harry. It had busted his knee so badly he’d been invalided out of the Army. Not that it had broken his spirit, for Sopwith-Dane was the sort who could charm a smile from a stone. People trusted him, warmed to his humour, and only the dullest failed to see the depth of talent and single-mindedness that lay behind the foppish facade. After he’d been kicked out of the Army he’d migrated to the City, where he now ran a private and very discreet wealth management service, just a few clients but with more than thirty million pounds of their money to play with. In fact, Harry had been his first client, had to be, Harry owed him, and perhaps owed him more than ever now, because it had become clear in recent months that Sloppy’s knee was breaking down. Made him just a tad unreliable with his timing. The smile that had been so free and wild seemed to have grown stiff, as though battling constant pain, but there was never a word of complaint, which made Harry feel worse.

  ‘See you started without me, as usual,’ Sloppy greeted as he came into the bar, waving, exposing a large measure of pink cuff and regimental cufflinks.

  ‘Testing it was up to your usual standard.’

  Without prompting, the steward poured another glass but Sloppy waved it away. ‘Need something a little stronger than that. Large Bushmills. On the rocks.’ He laughed, trying to turn it into a joke, but the furrows around his eyes ran deep. He levered himself stiffly onto the bar stool beside Harry.

  ‘You suffering?’

  ‘Not much,’ he lied. ‘But I’m thinking of swapping it for a new one.’

  ‘The knee?’

  ‘You know me, no half measures. The whole sodding leg.’ He swallowed the whiskey in one gulp and pushed the glass back across the counter for another. Harry sat silent, struggling to find words. He knew his friend wasn’t exaggerating, he could see it in the red-rimmed eyes and the flecks of grey that had suddenly crept into the hair.

  ‘Not to worry, you old tart,’ Sloppy reassured. ‘Off just above the knee, they reckon’ – he made a sawing gesture with his hand – ‘and I’ll be running marathons. Better than ever. Bouncing along like a bloody rabbit on one of those carbon-fibre blade thingies. Cost you a fortune in sponsorship.’ He began to laugh.

  ‘So stop whingeing and have another drink.’

  But already Sloppy was downing his second glass. They relaxed quickly, almost too quickly, the alcohol smoothing away some of the new creases in Sloppy’s face. In the end they didn’t bother with the dining room but spread themselves on a sofa, while the steward brought them more drink and plates of food.

  ‘She frowning in disapproval, d’you think?’ Sloppy asked, squinting at the portrait of the club’s formidable patron, the Princess Royal, which hung on the far wall.

  ‘Just disappointed she can’t join us, I expect.’

  ‘Or is it a smile? She has a lovely smile, you know. Never thought I’d ever lust after the Colonel of the Regiment. Any regiment, come to that. What do you say, Harry, you think I need counselling?’

  ‘Probably just another drink.’

  Private banter that betrayed not a hint of disrespect. They’d both put their lives on the line in the name of her mother, the Queen, and carried the scars like a crow carries its feathers. Yet they were in drink, which was often the case when they were together, and this evening they both had cause. But Sloppy, in particular, drank to forget.

  ‘I could get wrecked just watching you,’ Harry laughed as another whiskey disappeared down Sloppy.

  ‘Brilliant idea. But not before we remember our little bit of business. You know I only love you for your money.’ He dug inside his jacket pocket and pulled out an envelope containing three sheets of carefully folded paper. He pushed aside the wreckage of their meal that lay scattered across the low table in front and smoothed the creases from the sheets.

  Money. Never a problem for Harry, not since his businessman father had died with nothing but his socks on in the arms of a much younger woman, and left him a fortune that was large enough to have been seen by many as indelicate and some of which was almost certainly illicit. Harry had suddenly been catapulted from a life where he’d paid his own way through university by working night shifts at McDonald’s, to one in which he couldn’t be bought, bribed or bullied. He’d never forgotten his years of youthful poverty, didn’t take his financial comfort for granted, but he was happy to let Sloppy handle the details. It did them both a favour.

  ‘Need three signatures,’ Sloppy instructed. ‘Use your own pen. You can afford it.’

  ‘More bloody paper?’ Harry complained casually, rubbing his eyes.

  ‘You suggested we throw more of your money into the hands of those mercenary little bastards who run the economies in the Far East, remember?’

  ‘You said they were all sweat shops.’

  ‘I lied. You know I lie. Why dig up my old lies?’ Sloppy protested theatrically.

  ‘Get on with it,’ Harry said, leaning forward and trying to focus.

  ‘Right. The client is always right, even when he’s a small-minded prick like your good self.’

  ‘Tell me, do you abuse all your clients?’

  ‘Of course. Please don’t feel picked out for special treatment.’

  Harry chuckled and waved his hand for yet more alcohol.

  ‘Right, concentrate,’ Sloppy continued. ‘I’m delighted to tell you that Nissan, the Bank of China and Matsushita Electric turn out to be highly respectable. Not sweat shops at all, quite dreary, in fact. But the way the currencies are going they’ll probably make you a small fortune and me a much larger one in all the commission I’m going to skim. So before you and I drink the entire portfolio, we’re going to throw some of your money around the derivatives field and hedge some of the currency expectations so that—’

  But already Harry was waving his hands in surrender. ‘I don’t mind you kicking me to death, but boring me to death’s not part of the deal,’ he laughed, reaching for his Duofold.

  ‘But I haven’t even got to the small print,’ Sloppy protested.

  Harry’s relationship with Sloppy was one of the most solid and reassuring parts of his life, not simply because of the income it produced but the friendship it reinforced. These were men who had trusted each other with their lives, and always would. So he signed. Three times.

  It would be months before he realized he’d just lost two million pounds. And that it was only the start.

  Sloppy hobbled down the street. He’d ducked out of sharing a taxi with Harry, made up some excuse; he needed to be alone. The pain was blinding him. It followed him every step, of every day, and had done for years. He found what he was looking for, a late-night pharmacy. He wandered past the shelves, picked up a toothbrush he didn’t want, presented it to the pharmacist at the till, and while she was ringing it up asked for two packets of non-prescription painkillers.

  ‘I’m afraid I can only let you have the one,’ she said, apologetically. ‘Have you taken these before, sir?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘It’s just that they contain codeine and can be addictive. They’re for a maximum of three days. Is that OK?’

  ‘Sure.’

  ‘Please read the instructions on the label carefully.’ She dropped them into his bag along with the toothbrush.

  ‘Of course. Thanks.’ Silly bitch. How many times had he heard this prim little lecture? If only they’d done their job properly in the first place maybe he wouldn’t be staggering around London, his guts being ripped out with every step. He took the bag, snatched at it, clutched it perhaps too tight, trying to throttle it, and walked out, biting his lip.

  He wasn’t quite sure where he was, he’d lost his bearings in the dark. He found himself leaning on a lamp post, taking a deep breath; he grabbed for th
e painkillers, ripping off the cardboard cover in his haste.

  He popped two pills from their plastic coffins and threw them in his mouth, but it was parched, lined with sand, and he almost choked as he struggled to swallow. When at last he looked up he saw he was facing the battered gloss-black door of a pub. God was looking out for him, after all. He pushed his way through the door, dragging his foot behind him. It caught on the step and he almost stumbled, but no one looked up. Just another Christmas drunk. Silently he cursed their ignorance and ingratitude. He ordered a large whiskey, on the rocks, found a corner seat away from the other drinkers, and found the pills once again and popped out another four. He swallowed them in one mouthful, washed down with whiskey.

  The torn packet stared up at him from the sticky varnish of the tabletop, preaching.

  For short term use only. Swallow 1 or 2 tablets every 4 to 6 hours. WARNING: Do not exceed the stated dose. Do not take more than 6 tablets in 24 hours.

  Six? He was doing sixty of these a day. The entire packet would be gone by breakfast. In fact, they’d be his breakfast.

  He glanced around furtively, but no one was watching. No one gave a damn. Why, he was nothing more than yet another City dick in his expensive cashmere overcoat quietly popping a couple of pills, and who didn’t pop pills nowadays, for pain or pleasure? But with Sloppy it was always pain. Had been for years. The military surgeons could do extraordinary things, sometimes impossible things, but not miracles. The bullet that had smashed into his knee had shattered, scattering splinters of metal and bone, and some were still there, stuck inside, still trying to kill him, causing infection, tiny sinuses of pus and agony that had eaten away at the main nerve system to his foot and lower leg so that he couldn’t feel much of anything but pain, which meant he kept injuring himself, which caused even more pain, and now it had got to the point of so much pain that before long they would have to chop his leg off like a leper. Don’t worry, they had smiled, we’ll give you the latest Ferrari version. Well, fuck them.

  And fuck Harry, too. He loved the man, but why should he still be paying for him after all these years? He was going to lose his leg yet nothing seemed to muddy the course for Harry Jones, MP, Privy Councillor, George Cross, Military Cross, millionaire, lots of other bits, too. And all because Sloppy had taken that bullet for him. Harry owed him, they both knew it; why, wasn’t it the guilt that kept Harry knocking on his door, giving his business to a cripple?

  And that’s why Sloppy was in so much trouble. From doing his best for Harry. It was for Harry and his other clients that he’d jumped on board a hedge fund that had been rolling like an express train barely a year ago, with everybody kicking each other’s arses to get a seat. Now it was a train wreck, run out of track, total wipeout. And suddenly he was down a couple of million. Nothing Sloppy couldn’t manage, but he’d had a mauling and needed a break. Short-term funds that would keep the monthly statements looking fat. Until he could sort it all out.

  Which is precisely what the paperwork in his pocket would do. Smooth things over, just a few months, until the other investments came through and he’d be able to lose it all in the wash up. Sharing, just like they’d always done. Jones and Jimmy. He’d taken the bullet, now Harry would take a bit of a kicking. Only difference was, Harry would never know it.

  CHAPTER THREE

  Christmas got cancelled. No one made it official, but its spirit drained away with the dark water that seeped from every fragment of recovered wreckage. Every evening, as the light faded and night took hold, a crowd began to gather on the plaza of Trafalgar Square. Candles were placed around the rims of the fountains, drawing thousands, silent in their grief. Mourning was something their grandparents had hidden behind closed curtains, yet now they poured forth, clutching their own candles, like a meadow of brilliant daisies in a soft breeze. Then the singing began, hymns and folk songs, and the national anthems, forlornly. A shrine of flowers began to spread around the base of Nelson’s Column, while high above, through a blustery scattering of snow, the admiral seemed to be searching the skies for sight of the lost children.

  More candles. A memorial service was held at St Paul’s Cathedral, attended by many of the parents of the lost children and a congregation that overflowed down the steps before the west doors. The Bishop of London gave a sermon that talked of lights extinguished and sorrows which found homes and multiplied in the darkness. Then he tried to rekindle hope by telling of life reborn at Christmastime, which he pronounced Christi-mastime, like some medieval monk, yet it was a hope too far, beyond even his considerable rhetorical powers.

  The Queen’s Christmas message had already been recorded. Now it had to be hurriedly rewritten, a new script prepared. She decided she would deliver it live, something she hadn’t done since the death of Diana. Flags flew at half mast across the capital, even the Royal Standard above the Palace, although protocol suggested it should only be flown in that manner upon a royal death. The formalities were pushed aside; they seemed inadequate and irrelevant when so many coffins were involved.

  The Vice President of the United States flew from Washington on a military transport to collect the coffins, forty-one of them: all the children and four other American citizens who had been on board Speedbird 235. Each coffin was covered in a flag, and laid out with military precision, immaculate and endless rows of death that filled the hold of the C5-Galaxy.

  And after the sorrow and shock came anger. As two nations wept, the demand for answers grew more insistent, far outstripping the ability of the authorities to satisfy them. An engine had gone down, the hydraulics ripped apart, but that was already clear from the radio traffic between the cockpit and Air Traffic Control. The pilot was a hero, putting his stricken craft down with extraordinary skill on a spot where the only collateral damage was a tall ship’s mast, but what else had happened wasn’t yet clear. It was ironic that after the third day, his was the only body that had still not been recovered. The other bodies were taken to local hospitals where autopsies were conducted under the supervision of pathologists who specialized in aviation accidents.

  The pieces of wreckage were taken to the headquarters of the Air Accident Investigation Branch, set in secluded woods beside Farnborough airfield, south-west of London. Police had blocked off the long access road that ran from the public highway to the office block and hangars that hid the AAIB’s very private work from prying eyes. A large area beside the hangars was fenced off, but even the fencing couldn’t completely conceal the litter of shattered airframes and fragments of helicopter that filled it to overflowing, evidence of its most recent work. Three large shipping containers stood in one corner, the streaks of rust running down their sides testament to the fact that they had been there for many years. They held the most sensitive parts of the wreckage from the Lockerbie bomb. The last useful grains of forensic evidence had long since been squeezed and scraped from the scraps, but no one had yet had the political courage to allow them to be destroyed, so they festered, like bad memories.

  One of the hangars had been hurriedly cleared, and as the fragments of Speedbird 235 began to arrive on the back of the low-loaders they were laid out in sequence, like the pieces of a jigsaw. Even before the pieces had been unloaded the structural inspectors, systems analysts, flight recorder engineers and other teams of specialists started to pore over the remnants as they began the meticulous task of trying to determine how, and why, the aircraft had been torn apart. There was a problem, of course. Cuts. Like all government departments the AAIB was under pressure, less money, discarded personnel, their strength whittled away. And it was Christmas. Yet for this, and for so many dead, they did what budgets would not allow. The recorders arrived immersed in a tank of river water to guard against corrosion that would start once they were exposed to the air. They were lifted gently, almost with reverence, and placed in ovens to be baked at eighty degrees Centigrade, painstakingly drying them out. The process took almost two days. Only then could the harrowing information they contained b
e extracted and analysed.

  During the crash the engines had been ripped off, the belly of the aircraft hideously punctured, bulkheads ripped apart, the fuselage broken. All was gathered, washed down, set out, and examined. The inspectors were experts, they knew how to fly many different types of aircraft and did so on a regular basis for commercial airlines in order to keep themselves up to speed. They also knew how every seal, nut, switch, hatch, lamp, circuit board and piece of Velcro was supposed to be assembled. Just as a forensic pathologist takes apart the bodies of the victims to confirm how they had died, so these men did much the same, except they worked in the opposite direction, piecing the body back together once more.

  Their first break came on the second night, when the recorders had been dried out and their examination could begin. The cockpit voice recorder was harrowing. The cabin had four microphones, open regardless of the connection with Air Traffic Control, picking up every word, making it possible to triangulate the origin of every sound. That’s why they were able to tell it had been the first officer, Bryan, who had screamed so pathetically in the millisecond before the recording went dead. The power had been cut off. An inevitable consequence when your cockpit smashes into a river at a hundred and fifty miles an hour.

  It was on the same evening that an inspector watched a flat-bed bringing in the cowling from the failed engine. It had been ripped away and floated downriver, and had taken some time to be recovered. Even while the truck was reversing in order to unload, the inspector was up beside the cowling, taking a closer look. He had seen something that startled him, a hole punched through the outside of the skin that had created a characteristic petal effect of torn metal on the inside.