‘Do what you can, Ollie. I’ve every confidence in you. Where is he now?’ William asked.
‘He’s already gone up Goswell Road, through Islington and is now heading northwest. Speed is about forty, that’s four-zero. Probably on the A1 motorway heading towards the A406 ring road. It’s not that clear, but that’s my guess, for what it’s worth.’
‘Got that. I’ve got some time to make up then.’ William feared that his prey would be quickly lost in the crowd if he headed for somewhere in the London area. But if he headed out of town would William have a chance at getting his eyes on the target. Frustratingly, his options for catching up at this stage were limited. The average speed in central London was eleven miles per hour – the same speed as it was in the nineteenth-century when travelling by horse and carriage.
‘Right, he’s just gone past Highgate golf club.’ Ollie slurped from a large Starbucks coffee cup. Snacks, sweets and canned energy drinks were strewn all over his cluttered desk. He had prepared for a long evening.
In the car, the in-built sat-nav system set in the centre of the dashboard showed William’s current location on a map. He was nowhere near his prey, but at least he could see the shortcuts that would lead him out of town. It was also updated with live traffic speeds for many of the major roads. William easily picked the quickest routes.
‘Onto the A406. Wait out.’ Ollie waited and keenly watched his screen until he could clearly determine which road the target had taken. ‘A1 north, repeat, A1 north.’
William pressed his foot down on the accelerator, only to be stopped moments later at another set of traffic lights. Damn it, he cursed. He could have done with a surveillance team and a motorbike, but as Pinkerton ardently pointed out, such a last minute job left him with no option but to do it all himself. A high risk approach, but there was no choice.
At Mill Hill the M1 and A1 motorways converged, William’s hare could easily run up either one. The former led north to Birmingham then on to the M6 and Manchester, the latter to Newcastle and, eventually, Edinburgh. Ollie watched the screen closely and prayed that the battery would last and that the phone would remain switched on. On the screen the red circle moved northwards, it remained closer to one of the roads than the other. Ollie took a best guess.
‘He’s still on the A1. Definitely heading north,’ Ollie said as clearly as he could with a mouth full of blueberry muffin.
William had finally made it onto the A1, but he was still some way behind his target. To close the gap he weaved in and out of the traffic and raced up the track at a dangerous speed. Horns were blown, fists and insults were thrown at him. He ignored them, but kept a close look out for traffic police. Although he had a get-out-of-jail ID, he didn’t want to waste any time having to stop and explain the situation to a fresh faced, twelve year old copper who was pumped up with adrenaline and full of self importance.
Eventually, after a few miles, the road led out of the city and onwards into the Hertfordshire countryside. Ollie kept William updated with the general location of his target every thirty seconds.
*
After about three quarters of an hour, William and his target remained on the A1 and headed north. William was confident that he could catch up with and identify his target. They were well away from the city and the longer he spent on the motorway the better chance he had at getting a visual on his hare.
‘He’s just past the Hitchin turn-off, speed is seventy-five, that’s seven-five,’ Ollie observed.
William was gaining on him fast, he was only a mile or so behind. Ollie, getting a little bored, had worked out the time it would take William to close the gap based on the average speed of the two vehicles.
‘You know if you go five miles an hour faster, you’ll catch him in three minutes,’ Ollie keenly pointed out having scribbled the maths on his notepad.
Enjoying the power of the acceleration, William floored the pedal and quickly reached over one-hundred-thirty miles-per-hour. The road was full of vehicles. He sped past cars, HGVs and motorbikes alike. Woefully, his hare could be any one of them. There was no way of knowing.
‘You’re too close now, William,’ Ollie said, noticing that the dot on the screen that showed William’s own GPS location was almost at the centre of the target’s much wider circle. ‘Hang back. If he comes off the main, I’ll let you know in time. Trust me.’
‘Roger that, Ollie.’ He slowed as ordered to create a little distance and then matched the average speed of his target.
‘He’s approaching a roundabout. It’s almost a mile ahead of your location. He’s gone straight over, still on the A1, but there’s another roundabout a further mile ahead. You may want to close the gap a little, just in case.’ William accelerated.
‘He’s at the roundabout, wait out. Left, left, left. He’s off the A1 onto a minor road. You better catch up, it’s pretty rural out there.’
‘Game on,’ William said and accelerated. He weaved in and out of the traffic aggressively then screeched round to the left and drove down the minor road. Annoyingly, he immediately found himself stuck behind a white van. The road curved round to the left making it impossible to overtake.
‘How’s that signal Ollie?’ he asked. For a short distance the road straightened. William floored it and overtook the van with fearsome acceleration.
‘The circumference is widening but it’s still manageable. You’re about five-hundred metres behind. Speed is forty, that’s four-zero. Another roundabout ahead, go straight over. Try to get eyes on. We may lose it soon.’
The road narrowed, it was surrounded by woods on either side. Five hundred metres was a long way on a country road. William couldn’t see much further than a hundred metres or so ahead. Traffic was light, but not a clear road by any means.
At a junction up ahead, William saw an old, battered car pull out and travel up the road in the same direction as William – very slowly. William was stuck behind the old man and there were no immediate overtaking opportunities. Impatiently, and rudely, William moved closer up behind the car and tried to bully him into pulling over. He could see the unhappy driver in his mirror. Eventually the old man took the hint and pulled over. As William shot past he gave a thankful wave.
‘Approaching a crossroads,’ Ollie reported. ‘The circle is widening, it will take me a bit longer to figure out which direction he’s going in.’
‘I’m going in close, Ollie. I can’t risk losing him now.’
Risking being burned by the target, William sped ahead regardless trying to get to the target before the next junction. He saw only two cars up ahead, one was red, one silver. The red one looked like an ordinary family car, the silver one was much smaller, a soft-top sports car of some kind. At the junction the red car turned left while the sports car headed straight over. William strained to see the number plates but they were too far away. He had no choice but to stay at the junction and wait for Ollie’s word.
‘Where now Ollie?’
‘Wait out.’
Another car pulled up behind William, an overweight woman sat behind the wheel. Another car pulled behind her. One of them was on their horn.
‘Come on Ollie,’ William said.
‘Just a few seconds more.’ Ollie scrutinised the map, anxious for the large circle to move somewhere so he could work out the route. ‘Got it. Straight over, William, he’s gone straight ahead.’
Wheels screeching and spinning, William shot out across the junction leaving a trail of white smoke and the smell of burnt tyres, he narrowly missed another car and drove like a madman along the tiny farm road to catch up. On each side were fields and farms, he passed a thatched house, then a barn, a farmhouse, more fields. At least the winding road was empty, only occasionally did a car pass him on the other side. Tyres burned as he raced round the corners at dizzying speeds.
After a mile or so the road straightened out and he saw the silver sports car only a few hundred metres ahead of him. But as quickly as it appeared, it disappeared over
the brow of a hill. William was confident this was his hare. He slowed down slightly, not wanting to get too close. If the target was surveillance aware, William feared that he may try an anti-surveillance route at some point. It was easy to do in rural terrain, and if he did do one William’s car would be burned and the operation would be over.
‘I have eyes on, Ollie,’ William said. ‘The target is a silver sports car of some sort, but no details of the plate yet.’
‘Good, well done. The circle is about a mile in diameter now. Better keep your eyes on the ball from now on, the triangulation is not going to be much use. If you do lose him I’ll try to hack the GPS again, there should be enough battery life for a quick check.’
In the distance the silver car’s brake lights burned crimson for a few seconds. To the right of the road was a vast expanse of farmland and forest. Half way up the hill was what looked like an old mansion, some kind of stately hall, William guessed, or perhaps a boutique hotel.
‘Ollie, he’s slowing down, possibly about to take a turn, but it could be anti-surveillance.’
William had seen targets drive for dozens of miles on an anti-surveillance route before turning back on themselves and then driving miles to another location only to do the same thing again.
‘It’s a tiny road, Ollie. What’s on the map?’
Ahead of William the target took the right turn and sped off up the long private road that led to the mansion. Pulling up onto the grass verge a few hundred metres beyond the turn off, William stopped and watched. The sports car drove up the track road all the way to the building and stopped in front of it. A man dressed in a dark suit stepped out of the car with a briefcase and headed straight to the front door. He opened the door and vanished inside.
‘It’s not named on the map, but looks like a private estate from the satellite images. Pretty big place, there are several other smaller buildings behind the main one too,’ Ollie replied.
‘He’s parked up now and gone into the house. I’m going to hang around for a while. Can you do me a favour?’
‘Sure.’
‘Sarah Jackman is on the ops desk. Can you show her where this mansion is and ask her to work her magic for me? I’m going to be off-line for while.’
‘I’ll be here all night if you need me, William.’
‘Good job, Ollie. You’re a star.’
*
At his workstation, Ollie sighed and rubbed his eyes. He placed his hand on his desk phone, hesitated and withdrew it. He shut his eyes and shook his head. He glanced over his shoulder; there was no one else around, it was late. With some reluctance he picked up the phone and dialled quickly, the guilt welled up in him as he did so. The line barely rang twice before it was answered.
‘It’s me . . . Agent Temple has followed the target to an address . . . Yes, I’ll send you the details when I have them . . . Of course, I understand.’
*
Close to where he stopped, William found a farm track just off the main road. He drove up it for a short distance and stopped by a hedge. The sat-nav showed him that he was in the middle of nowhere, there was nothing but farms and a couple of small villages for miles around. Outside he saw nothing but fields and trees.
From the glove box he pulled out a black cylindrical object that looked not unlike a digital SLR camera. The LAD-21 was a neat device that William had used many times before on covert operations, it combined a high definition digital camera with a forty-times zoom lens and a passive night sight into one. He also took out a black balaclava and his P229 which he fitted with a silencer. From the back seat he grabbed a black rucksack that contained a few more tools that he thought might come in useful, then he jumped out of the car.
Wearing the balaclava as a hat, he ran across the road onto the farmland of the private estate. He made his way towards the mansion using the trees and hedges for cover. Keeping his distance from the long private road, he crept up the side of a ditch that divided the fields. At a high point with a view onto the impressive house, he lay down in the ditch and switched on the LAD-21. He scanned the area and took some close-up pictures.
Six stone Corinthian pillars held up the grand entrance of the mansion. Four storeys high with small square turrets on each corner, the building looked much like a small castle. There were three luxury cars parked in a large gravelled space in front of the building. A black BMW sports car, a yellow Lotus, and a silver Aston Martin. William took pictures of the cars and their number plates.
A loud noise from overhead startled him. Reacting instinctively he lay still in the ditch. A white commercial helicopter flew past at low level towards the mansion. It slowed and hovered over a large space of grass before descending to the ground. The power to the engine was cut and the rotors slowed to a stop.
With the LAD-21 at full zoom, William watched as a man dressed in a dinner jacket climbed out of the cockpit. His face was hidden by some kind of a mask; it was yellow with large black spots on the cheeks and had a long beaked nose. An opera mask, William guessed. The man walked up to the main entrance and was greeted by a taller unmasked man at the door. The unmasked man was dressed in a black suit and white shirt, no tie, he looked in his early forties and had short blond hair. His looks were Slavic, or possibly Russian, William thought. He welcomed the masked guest into the house. William snapped away until the pair vanished.
The ditch, it turned out, was a good vantage point. William remained there and watched patiently while a total of four men and five women arrived separately by car. Each car was a luxury model at the higher end of the market. Each man was dressed in a dinner jacket, the women wore ball gowns. All of them wore an opera mask of some sort.
Not long after the cars arrived another helicopter landed. There were two people on board, one was masked, but the other, the pilot, wasn’t. He looked to be in his mid-sixties, and had grey hair and tanned leathery skin. William thought he had the look of a wealthy playboy. William took several shots before he too put an opera mask on. The two men exited the cockpit and walked to the entrance. Again, they were welcomed in by the blond man.
Half an hour went by with no more visitors. William decided to move in for a closer look. But first, he called Ollie for an update.
‘Ollie,’ he said quietly. ‘I’m in the grounds of the mansion, there’s definitely something going on here. Some pretty wealthy looking people have turned up, all dressed for a dinner – and in masks. I’ll wire you the pictures now. Get Sarah to research the number plates and the helicopter IDs.’ He pressed the send button on the LAD-21, all the images would be securely emailed to the lab.
‘No problem. I’ll let her know. I’m with her now in the Greenfly,’ Ollie replied. He had found Sarah glued to her computer screen and had dragged her away for a chat with the promise of a coffee. ‘She’s found some information on the mansion, by the way. It’s an old stately home called Rockcliffe Hall, belongs to some aristocratic heir from a very w . . . t . . . do fam . . . Be c . . .eful . . . this one Will . . .m his fam . . . w . . . fr . . . his . . . na . . . a . . .’
The line went dead.
‘Ollie? Ollie?’ William checked his phone, there was no signal. He had experienced this type of thing before, a slow reduction in quality followed quickly by a total loss of signal. It was being jammed. But jamming devices had a fairly short range, a thousand metres or so. William guessed that by the lack of habitations around it was most likely to be emanating from somewhere inside the mansion.
Something was happening. A meeting that someone wanted kept secure. He had to get closer.
Chapter 11
2030hrs – Bedfordshire
Rockcliffe Hall was set in two-hundred acres of beautiful English countryside and was home to one of the oldest family lines in Christendom. Although the family names had changed down the centuries, two things for sure had stuck to the descendants of this noble line like a shadow: power and wealth.
The original Rockcliffe Castle had been built in the fifteenth-century to hous
e the extended family, their guards and their army of servants. The wreck of the old castle still sat on high ground within the estate, but it was derelict and uninhabitable having been abandoned and neglected for over three-hundred years.
Rockcliffe Hall had been built in the seventeenth-century by the then heir to the family fortune. No expense had been spared on its construction and for over two centuries it had been one of the grandest aristocratic mansions in England. Across the generations the wealthy owners had filled the opulent rooms with magnificent works of art and antiques from all across the globe. Unwavering, and often unexplained, wealth had clung to the family. Even in the early twentieth-century when most of the country’s stately homes were being sold or demolished due to financial hardships, war and crippling death duties, Rockcliffe Hall stood firm. A testament to the cunning of its owners.
As planned the guests arrived in the early evening. Many had travelled from abroad and chose to drive the picturesque route from the airport through the countryside in a luxury hire car. Three had come from remote parts of the UK and travelled in their own helicopter.
To conceal their faces from the nosy house staff, and to maintain the ruse for their meeting, they all wore opera masks and dressed for dinner. One man wore a pure white Phantom of the Opera mask that covered only half of his tanned face; another wore a fearsome white mask that had thin lines of reds and yellows that exploded out from a demented smile; a slender lady dressed in a revealing red ball gown wore the mask of a feminine cherub, it had long white feathers as hair; one had an extravagant mask made from long yellow and red Ostrich feathers; another wore a silver half-moon that covered the wearer’s entire face, two dark eyes peered out silently from behind it.
Each guest was welcomed into the great central hall by the blond man. A young servant girl stood with a tray of champagne flutes, she tried not to stare as the new arrivals plucked their glass from her.
The Secret of Hades' Eden Page 9