No Turning Back

by Freddie P Peters

  Mark moved his head sideways, trying to gauge what the weather was like outside.

  “It’s fine out there; you’ll be fine.” She had moved away from the table, calm. Mark finally stood up, gathered his small rucksack, now empty of the folder, USB keys and CDs he had brought with him the day before. Such lightness should have been a relief yet his hands gripped it tightly, wary. His stomach churned and the sour taste of bile rose to his throat. Marissa moved closer, ready to grab him if he fell.

  Mark managed a smile and pushed his chair against the table.

  “And you are telling me you can get help from someone who understands the City well? An ex-banker you said?”

  Marissa nodded.

  “Oh yes. And I also know the right person to make sure he co-operates.”

  * * *

  The taxi dropped him at the top of a small alleyway in St James’s. Brett paid and left a small tip. He could not be bothered to collect a few pennies. More importantly he was keen to hear what MI6-Steve had to say about Massimo Visconti. Brett was eager to meet his minder. That thought irritated him. Still, he had played his hand rather well so far with his latest assignment, and there was more, much more to come.

  He barely acknowledged the doorman, walked straight through the club to the smoking room and let himself drop without much ado into one of the armchairs. Steve was late.

  Did it mean anything?

  Could The Sheik have discovered he was with MI6? Could he have discovered Steve was his minder? Could he? Ridiculous.

  Brett steadied himself. He was a Brit and Brits did not succumb to absurd paranoia; now was not the time to lose one’s cool. He looked at his watch for the umpteenth time – 9.11am.

  One of the waiters he knew well offered him a selection of newspapers but he waved him off impatiently: 9.15am.

  Another five minutes and I am leaving, Brett muttered, fidgeting with one of his cufflinks – 9.19am.

  Brett stood up, hoping that his impatience would summon Steve. He looked in the direction of the door, hopeful.

  Nothing doing.

  A couple of members had stopped their conversation to give him a curious look. Brett ignored them and they quickly went back to their business. Brett sat down again abruptly. He was safe in the club and certainly less so outside. What would he do if Steve did not turn up? He had been given specific instructions to follow in this eventuality. He was trying to recall what the process was. But when Steve had spoken about the possibility, Brett had dismissed it.

  Arrogance today was not his best friend.

  His mobile buzzed.

  Delayed, wait at Club, must speak urgently.

  Brett shuddered, grateful that he had stayed. He waved at one of the waiters and ordered his usual breakfast: two eggs, boiled, two pieces of white toast, marmalade and the club’s special English Breakfast tea, with whole milk. (Brett did not believe in drinking milk that did not taste like milk).

  “Eggs runny, marmalade thick cut, toast slim cut. I do not like doorsteps.” The waiter didn’t hesitate, reassuring Brett that he was indeed among like-minded people and that his breakfast instructions would be, as ever, followed to the letter.

  Steve finally arrived, sinking into the armchair opposite Brett’s as Brett’s breakfast was served. He waved at the waiter. “The same,” he said not bothering to greet Brett nor acknowledge the man taking his order.

  “That bad, is it?” Brett enjoyed needling MI6-Steve and yet he had to admit he was relieved to see him this morning.

  Steve’s podgy face looked a little leaner than usual. His receding hair stood in small clumps sticking out in all directions. His expensive suit looked out of place on his body. No doubt MI6 had indulged him with a handmade, Savile Row suit. After all, he could not meet his contact Brett in one of the most exclusive London clubs dressed in a Marks & Spencer’s outfit, even a three-piece.

  “I have spent the best part of this morning – and it is only just after 9am – trying to find out about Visconti’s murder.” Steve bent forward, elbows on knees. “All this is on your account because —” He stopped to let the waiter serve him his breakfast. “Actually, could I also add bacon to my order?” Steve said, turning towards the gloved man; no need for please or thank you he had learned. “Not the streaky stuff but crisp.”

  Brett started tapping impatiently on the arm of his chair. Steve ignored him until the waiter had brought his bacon. “Where was I?” Steve added another spoonful of sugar to his tea. Brett remained silent. He ran a couple of fingers slowly over his slim moustache and waited.

  Unbearable, but being a well-bred English gentleman he knew how to endure pain.

  “Yes. I would not want to lose one of my best assets.”

  “And why would you lose me?” Brett asked, slowly moving his hand towards a fresh cup of tea. His fingers rested for a moment over the delicate handle of the bone-china cup.

  No, they were not shaking.

  Steve grinned, uncovering a surprisingly neat row of white teeth. “I am so glad you knew it was you I had in mind. Still, back to Visconti, we are now certain it was an execution, mujahideen style. So, some questions for you, old chap.” Steve cracked the top of his egg open; pieces of shell scattered over his plate. He ignored the mess he had just made.

  Brett inhaled deeply.

  How could Steve be British and not know how to open a boiled egg with civility?

  “You had some questions?”

  “One.” Steve carried on whilst buttering his toast. “Any inkling from your latest acquaintance?” Steve hesitated … cut his toast into two triangles and started munching.

  “And the other questions?” Brett asked, having not yet touched his own breakfast.

  “Do you feel exposed?” Steve had been concentrating on a perfectly crisp piece of bacon until then. He put down his knife and fork and looked at Brett with unusual graveness. Brett opened his mouth, closed it again. He pushed his lanky body into the back of the comfortable leather armchair.

  “Are you concerned? And for that matter should I be concerned?” His desire for humour at Steve’s expense had vanished.

  “Why don’t you answer my first question?”

  “Well, I have absolutely no idea. I might be of use to The Sheik but I don’t think he sees me as one of his buddies.”

  “Fair enough.” Steve moved on to a second piece of toast. “There was a third photograph when you met him to arrange for his sniper to enter the Royal Exchange in London.”

  The bluntness with which Steve had mentioned the Royal Exchange marksman, conjuring images that even Brett had found hard to stomach, unsettled him. “There was, but as I told you he never showed me who or what it was.”

  Steve finished the second piece of toast, chewing the last mouthful thoughtfully. “Did you know Visconti – well, I mean?”

  “You mean, rather, did I ever do business with him? Before …” Brett cleared his throat. The thought of how MI6 had managed to secure his services still rankled him. The name Henry Crowne surfaced; it was almost nauseating.

  “Yes, yes, before we got you to work for us.” Steve supplied with a small wave of his hand.

  “His business was a little different from mine. More paintings, some of a classical nature, old masters … then a lot of modern stuff.” Brett waved his hand away dismissively. “But his greatest successes were in the Middle-East. When he started in Iraq, he was the first to handle antique pieces looted from the main historical sites back in the early nineties, even the Baghdad museum – very daring and lucrative, but well before my time.”

  “Glad to know the thieving community benefits from its specialists too. What are you going to tell me next? You had business cards indicating that as well.”

  Brett ignored Steve. He was just an undiscerning East-End boy. “In short, I have not seen Visconti for years. His reputation in the market
had suffered since he was caught, of course. Then again, you are the guy in the intelligence service. I am surprised your various snooping operations have not been more effective.”

  Steve grumbled.

  “Park that question then. How about question two?”

  “If you had not called me in the middle of the night to tell me about Visconti, I would have said all is well. Then again, we are talking terrorists.”

  “Is there a but though?”

  Brett held his cup in mid-air.

  “The very question I have been asking myself since last night. I can’t think of any.”

  “So no, and zero contact since the Royal Exchange and the transfer of Clandestine X.”

  “None.”

  Steve finished his second egg. His plate was empty and he was eyeing Brett’s. Brett raised an eyebrow: don’t even think about it.

  “You want me to get in touch with The Sheik to offer my services again, don’t you?” Brett said calmly. He should have known that MI6 would not let the trail go cold so readily.

  “Yes.” Steve pushed his squeaky-clean plate aside. “We have an idea about what might draw The Sheik out.”

  Chapter Three

  The letter was half-finished, languishing on his small desk since he had abandoned it. It was the first time that words did not come easily when writing to Nancy. Had it been a mistake to be so truthful – at least as much as he could be with his feelings? He did not fear betrayal. That she would never do.

  Never.

  But she might guess; she might decide – despite him asking her not to – to interfere in order to save him. Henry shook his head, a slow soulful movement.

  “You’ve saved me already,” Henry murmured.

  He rolled his pen across his thumb and caught it back with his index finger before it fell off, repeating the move in a rhythmic fashion. The decision he had made had taken hold like a plant taking root and ensnaring a tree, spreading inexorably over the many months he had spent at Belmarsh. It had felt foolish, daring, stupid, the only way, impossible: a merry-go-round of emotions. But now he had decided he would apply his immensely skilled mind to the task. Redemption would never be found within the sterile walls of a prison cell, let alone in a unit like HSU Belmarsh in which the inmates were so well guarded that absolutely nothing could happen to them. Or so it seemed. The arrival of Ronnie Kray had changed the balance of this rarefied world. As crazy as it may sound, a certain Reginald Murphy had decided to change his name to Ronnie Kray by deed poll. His ambition to emulate or even surpass the deeds of his idol seemed well on track from what Henry had gathered. Henry had started to find out at his own expense that Kray was not a man to cross. A bad joke about what Henry considered a ridiculous tattoo on Kray’s back had almost cost him dear. Today Henry, the once ambitious banker, bent over backwards not to be noticed. He wanted to blend into the crowd of HSU inmates so as to further his master plan.

  Escape.

  No one had ever achieved this feat before, no one – from the most notorious gangster to the most wanted Russian spy. But Henry had a plan, the first building block of which he had laid securely.

  Henry pushed the letter away. He was not in the mood. He reached for his legal file and extracted from it a list he had been assembling since he had last visited Scotland Yard, the compilation of possible scandals financial or political or both, that the regulatory authorities or the Serious Fraud Office might want to investigate. Being allowed out once more was essential for the plan to work. He must find a way, through Nancy or perhaps Pole. Henry ran his hand over his short hair. Could he stomach using his friend to achieve his purpose?

  No, it would have to be Pole.

  What was the price he was prepared to pay to show he could rejoin the human race? And what was the point of showing there was goodness in him after all if it had to be done by exploiting Nancy? Henry stood up, irritated that the thought had entered his mind. He crossed his cell in one long stride, leaned against the wall, his back pressing against the cold surface. He needed to exercise, to burn the tension in his body, control the fire that raged in his belly. Only thirty minutes to go before gym time. Henry removed the top of his tracksuit. The heat of exasperation had spread to his entire body. He reached his desk again and looked at the list.

  – Manipulation of foreign exchange rates, also known as FX

  – Insider trading; Henry had spotted some interesting movements in the stock market

  – Circumvention of sanctions directed at countries on a restricted list: Iran, Iraq, North Korea

  – Bribery linked to sales of armaments in the Middle-East, most likely Saudi Arabia

  Henry dismissed the first two, perhaps too obvious and an overkill for the use of his remarkable mind and his knowledge of the financial markets as well as its players. The last two on the other hand were promising. Doing business in the Middle-East had always been a complex issue for Investment Banks. Most countries in the Middle-East that respected Sharia Law would never consider interest-bearing investments such as loans or bonds but instead purchased equities, without hesitation. The idea was to introduce an element of risk sharing between investor and client and remove the risk of punitive high interest rates. Not an entirely ridiculous idea after all: at least these investors had not been involved in the subprime market that so very nearly crashed the world markets in 2008.

  Henry was manning the HSU library for a couple of hours in the afternoon. Could he risk logging onto the computer there to access the Internet? He was allowed computer access but only to operate it as a word processor. The Internet was out of the question and so of course was email. The prison officers, however, had different log-ins that allowed them more freedom in order to fulfil some of their duties. Henry had never even asked about Internet access. He had simply observed the place the officers’ hands landed on the keyboard, the slight hesitation before entering their passwords. Henry had spent most of his career as a banker, almost twenty years, on the trading floor of large investment banks. He had not only memorised the very special keyboard that traders used, the Bloomberg keyboard, but he also operated the standard one effortlessly. A great advantage in deciphering the passwords of the guards.

  Fraternising with prisoners was discouraged within HSU Belmarsh and this suited Henry fine. The most innocent of questions might have aroused the suspicions of the highly trained officers. Courteous but distant was Henry’s motto. He had cracked the last two passwords, but he was under no illusions; one day he would hit the wall either by being discovered or by not being able to good guess the passwords.

  He stood up, stretched one long arm over his head, then the other and moved once more to the only part of the cell wall that was free. He stood with his back against the cool surface and let his body slowly slide down to the floor into a squat. Then he sat on the floor, crossed his legs and started breathing slowly and deeply, his latest discovery for relaxation. His well-exercised muscles released gradually, his mind rested in stillness, thoughts floated in and out, ephemeral. A new skill that eased the anger and harnessed it, this time perhaps for good. He emerged on the other side of this ocean of stillness, rested. His mind came to and started measuring the impact of what he would need to do next – the permutations, possible outcomes – discarding what would not work in the process. His mind’s focus was complete yet his body was relaxed. He would do what he needed to do to achieve his goal and the plan that he had honed looked solid.

  Henry’s mind now moved in another direction. Why had Kamal been sent to Belmarsh? Unquestionably for his terrorist’s activities, but why on the same spur? Kamal, the man who had masterminded the Paddington bombing, the very event that had almost cost Henry his life. His back tensed, his knees trembled. Henry could hear the sound of the bomb again – the barely human cries of the wounded ripping the silence of the cell apart.

  Breathe in. Breathe out.

  There was nowh
ere to go in his six-by-ten-foot box. Unlike even Paddington, there was no escape, no running away.

  Breathe.

  Henry slowly rolled his head around. His mind floated over a new question. One part of the equation had not revealed itself yet but his progress with Kamal meant it almost certainly would soon do.

  * * *

  A few drops fell on her head and Marissa cursed. She had started to walk towards Scotland Yard. She needed some fresh air after an exhausting night with her key witness; whistle-blowing was no small beer. No matter how much the law sought to protect him, Mark’s life would never be the same again. She accelerated her pace. Her umbrella was safely tucked away in one of the drawers of her desk; no chance it would get wet, unlike her. How many years since she had left Barbados? Twenty? No, twenty-one at the end of this month. A black student attempting the impossible – to become a barrister in London. She smiled at the picture forming in her mind: the tall, almost masculine frame of a young woman arriving at Heathrow Airport, uncomfortable in the heavy clothes she had purchased for a fresh life in London. One suitcase and one designer leather bag, brand new, purchased by the family as a farewell present. The brand was nothing too ostentatious, Mulberry, and yet instantly recognisable. It was by now well-worn but still she could not bring herself to discard it. The rain asserted itself and Marissa started to run – only a few yards to go. The pun almost made her laugh. She entered the offices of Scotland Yard, shook herself the way a wet dog might, releasing the beads of water that had formed on her cropped hair. She no longer tried to straighten an Afro mane. It was cut clean, close to her skull. The security guard gave her a disapproving look. She ignored it and presented her work badge.

  “I have an appointment with Inspector Pole.”

  The guard scrutinised her badge for longer than was necessary, switching between the photo and the face in front of him but there was nothing to be done about it – she was indeed Marissa Campbell.