Taking the Tunnel

by James Adams

  Julie had telephoned Jonny before dawn that morning to arrange breakfast at 10 Eton Avenue. He had stumbled out of bed, dressed and taken a cab from Sloane Avenue to Hampstead. As his taxi pulled up at the address, the Static across the road pressed the shutter on his Nikon and the autodrive started to pulse and whirr.

  Jonny pushed the bell and a moment later Julie opened the door. This was a different woman to the casual researcher he had known. She was wearing a severely cut two-piece suit with a skirt that stopped just below the knee. She had no make-up on and her hair was tied back with a clip in the shape of a dragon. Julie gestured with her right hand to draw him inside.

  “Good morning, Jonny. I’m sorry to drag you out so early but things seem to be developing at this end and Lin Yung thought you should be kept informed.”

  “Is he here?” Jonny asked.

  “Yes, indeed. He’s waiting in the dining room.” A brief smile flitted over her face. “If you haven’t eaten you’re in for a surprise,” she whispered. “British breakfast, Chinese-style.”

  He turned right off the hall and into the dining room. Lin Yung stood up from the cheap wooden table. In contrast to Julie’s formality, he was in grey trousers and an open-necked white shirt.

  “Jonny. How good of you to come at such short notice,” he exclaimed, shaking Jonny’s hand as he spoke. Turning to his left he brought Jonny forward to introduce him to a small Chinese dressed in a dark suit, white shirt and black tie. Must be going to a funeral, Jonny thought.

  “May I introduce Colonel Cheng Weiyong, the head of our military mission here?” The colonel bowed slightly and muttered a good morning in barely decipherable English. “The colonel is with my team and so I thought it best that we meet out here away from the prying eyes of the embassy.” He gestured with his right hand. “Do sit down. Some food will be along in a moment.”

  “When did you arrive?” Jonny asked.

  “I came in yesterday morning and have been fairly frantic ever since. Julie tells me that you had some difficulty in the north of England and she was able to help.”

  Jonny’s eyes met Julie’s. They smiled at each other, a brief acknowledgement of two friends bound by a common experience of danger.

  “If she hadn’t turned up both I and Lisu would be dead,” Jonny replied. “I’m very grateful to you. As Julie has probably told you, it was our old friend Dai Choi.”

  “Yes, I know. In fact, that is why I decided to come over. Events appear to be moving rather faster than we expected and in a direction neither of us might have guessed.”

  He paused as a white-jacketed servant began bringing in breakfast. From what Julie had muttered in the hall, Jonny was expecting a Chinese meal, but what appeared was indeed a Chinese version of a British breakfast. Instead of bacon and eggs there was fried spam, tinned beans and tinned tomatoes all served with great ceremony out of stainless steel chafing dishes. The food was cold, the coffee lukewarm and he could have sworn that the butter was actually margarine.

  Lin Yung laughed. “I am sorry about the quality of our food. We have tried to tell the kitchen people that they haven’t quite got it right. But they insist that in England this is what English people eat. God knows where they got the idea from but they refuse to change.” He pushed his plate aside and continued.

  “Shortly after you left, we picked up some intelligence that Stanley Kung was on his way to London. As you know, he rarely comes to Europe, so we thought there might be something more than the simple drugs deal you were talking about.

  “Then there was the attack on the British Customs boat which you were involved in.” Jonny nodded. “That’s not the White Lotus style at all. They would not jeopardize good business possibilities with such a brutal killing. Better to dump the drugs overboard and bring in another shipment. Their lawyers would have had Dai Choi and his team out on the streets within twenty-four hours.

  “Finally, we have been receiving reports for the last two months of considerable activity among the Chinese community here. At first there was nothing specific, just some rumours about an operation, talk of special training, teams being organized, that kind of thing.”

  “Well, if it’s not drugs then what is it?” Jonny asked. “Arms? A robbery?”

  “We don’t know what it is but we do know what White Lotus wants. As you know they have been worried about the collapse of their business empire after we take Hong Kong over in”97. What they have been trying to do for some time is find a way of relocating abroad.

  “From a business point of view they could just do what all the other big Hong Kong businesses have done, which is to move to the Bahamas or the Caymans or some other tax haven. And they expect us to show them respect when they behave like traitors,” Lin Yung exclaimed angrily. “Anyway, White Lotus has two other considerations that other, more legitimate businesses do not have. First their people are all local and they are their strongest asset. Without them, the business will fall apart. Second, very few of those people have British passports. Kung, Dai Choi and a few others have managed to buy their citizenship but the rest are stuck in Hong Kong.

  “So the word on the street in Hong Kong is that White Lotus have got an answer to the problem. Their people are being told not to worry; that the British will be giving them all passports.”

  “But that’s not going to happen. The government will never go back on such a public commitment and the Chinese government will never allow it,” said Jonny.

  “Precisely. So if the gossip is true then all this activity here must be designed to force the British to do what White Lotus wants — ”

  “That’s crazy,” Jonny interrupted. “The British are never going to concede to that kind of blackmail. What on earth could they do that will apply enough pressure? Kidnap the Queen?”

  “I really don’t know but we are doing our best to find out.” Lin Yung drew deeply on his fourth cigarette of the breakfast and took another sip of the awful coffee. He looked at the colonel who had been sitting silent throughout the conversation. The glance seemed to Jonny to be conspiratorial, as if the two men had a common secret which Lin Yung was now going to share.

  “We have other concerns. My government is not prepared to allow the citizens of Hong Kong to leave in advance of the handover. Hong Kong’s value is its people. We are not worried about the Europeans. We can always hire more mercenaries but the local people have a huge amount of experience of operating in a true capitalist system. We cannot afford to allow anything that will take away that resource. The future development of China is tied up with Hong Kong and we need those people.

  “At the same time, there are other, more political issues at stake here. As you know the current regime is coming to an end and for some years now different factions in Beijing have been lining up for the power struggle that will follow. There are some who believe that the old Communist ways must continue and they see Hong Kong as a capitalist stake aimed at the heart of China.

  “There are others, myself among them, who believe that some change is inevitable, even desirable, now that Communism is discredited everywhere else. China cannot afford to be isolated from the rest of the world and Hong Kong is a useful bridge.

  “My organization, the Guojia anquanbu, is in the reformist camp and wants to see Hong Kong work for us. The other intelligence service, the Gonganbu, is in the traditionalist camp. They want the Hong Kong experiment to fail. We have good intelligence that the Gonganbu have been helping White Lotus in their efforts in England and so whatever is planned will be certain to benefit the conservatives in Beijing. I am determined that will not happen.”

  “So what are you doing about it?” Jonny asked.

  “All our people have been activated. We’re calling in every favour, gathering every scrap of information we can and I expect some concrete intelligence in the next couple of days. Also, Stanley Kung is now here in London and we have him under observation. In the end, he may be the key to this. He must know what is happening. Perhaps he might be pr
epared to let us in on his little secret.”

  Colonel Cheng had sat impassively throughout the meal and Jonny assumed he had not understood much of the conversation. Now, he gave a small, grim smile.

  Sean knew that Waterloo Road had become a trap. Safety and sex, the twin sirens of all those on the run, had kept him in the house for too long. It was odd, he thought, how the rational side of his brain knew that Sally’s protestations of love were not for him but for the person she thought he was, but the irrational human being that still lurked beneath his hardened surface wanted to believe her. He wanted the goodness in her. He needed to be reminded of his other self, the person that had existed long ago before he took this path that he knew now led nowhere.

  “I love your body,” she had told him that morning as they lay in bed together. “I love the shape of your chest, the muscles in your arms and thighs,” she continued, her hand running lightly over his skin. “I love it that you’re a man. All the people I’ve been with before have been such boys.”

  “Sally, you don’t understand,” he protested. “There’s no future with me. I’m living on borrowed time here. Either I get out and go back home or they catch me. Whichever, there’s no place for you.”

  “It doesn’t matter,” she replied. “I just want our time together.”

  He knew it was all just childish rubbish. But then he hadn’t had anyone to say the right words to him for a long time. It was the innocence that he wasn’t used to, couldn’t really cope with. She was in love with him and his world without having any real understanding of what that meant. For him, that made their relationship special, a bridge from the darkness to the light. And he had so nearly lost himself in the killing.

  He had gone out that morning and made the call to the cutout in the Midlands. This time they had wanted to know his targets.

  “You have to understand they’re getting concerned at the reaction,” said the woman’s voice. “Condor himself needs to know. They’re also worried that you’re doing too much; that the Brits are closing in. One more and then you’re to come out.”

  He had given a name, the man who was next on his list. Since then he had not allowed himself to think of the possibility of getting out of England and going home. Instead he had begun to focus on the next operation, turning over in his mind all the intelligence he had committed to memory weeks ago. It would be easy enough, he thought. A quick kill and then off. But what about Sally?

  He looked across the dining table at her, his hands cupped around a coffee, and smiled. She returned his look hesitantly, as if she could read that he was planning their parting.

  The buzzing of the doorbell interrupted his thoughts.

  In all the time he had been staying in the house, there had been no visitors. Instantly, his senses were alert, instinct telling him that the noise was a threat.

  “Is your mother in?” he asked Sally.

  “No, she’s down the shops and Dad’s at work,” she replied.

  “Right. Let it ring again and I’ll go upstairs and take a look.”

  He got up from the table and took the stairs two at a time. He went into Sally’s room and stopped by the window. He flattened himself against the wall and eased forward so that he could get a narrow sideways look at the front door.

  He saw two men in rumpled suits, one muddy colour, the other dark blue; short hair, tall, big. He moved back from the window to widen his field of view and took in the Vauxhall Carlton parked in the street. He noticed the black plastic aerial on the rear right wing and instantly he knew: police.

  He ran back and in a hoarse whisper he shouted down the stairs. “Sally. It’s the law. Answer the door and stall. There’s only two of them so they must be fishing.”

  He ducked back and into Sally’s room, grabbing socks, shirts and driving licence from the dresser and stuffing them into a sports bag. He retrieved the automatic from under the pillow and pushed it into the waistband at the small of his back. He shrugged into a leather bomber jacket, picked up the bag and stood listening at the head of the stairs.

  He heard Sally open the door.

  “Good morning, miss,” a deep baritone voice began, the Hampshire burr distinct. “I’m Detective Constable Harris and this is Detective Constable Morrison.” There was a shuffling noise which Sean presumed was the men showing their identification cards. “We believe that you may have a gentleman staying with you. Is that correct? We are interested in talking to him about some inquiries we have underway.”

  “No, there’s no one here at all,” Sally replied, her voice clear and firm. “Dad’s out and my mum’s at work. I’d ask you in to look around but my mum and dad would kill me if they found I’d allowed strange men into the house.”

  There was a pause and then Sean heard the first man speak again.

  “Well, miss, I’m afraid our information is quite clear. You told your friend June Douglas, she told her mother and she told her husband who’s a part-timer down the station. And so here we are.”

  God, that stupid bitch told somebody, Sean screamed to himself. He wanted to leap over the banister and strangle her right now, but escape not revenge was paramount. He thought frantically. Clearly, the fourth-hand, story had not been believed; was being treated as a schoolgirl fantasy by lazy coppers who couldn’t credit that real drama might actually happen on their patch.

  A dash out the back would be pretty pointless. They might have someone there and anyway they’d be after him soon enough. He had to take them out, delay them, buy the time to put some distance between himself and this poxy house. Shoot them? No. That would provoke instant overreaction and anyway killing cops wasn’t his job. A tiny part of his mind imagined the effect that would have on Sally. Her illusions shattered, she would never see him again in the same light. Somehow, even though the little idiot had betrayed him, he wanted her to believe in him.

  The decision made, he looked around for a weapon, remembering Tony Peters saying to him that he always kept a stick by the side of his bed in case of burglars. He took four large strides into the main bedroom and saw it, a knobby dark brown wood and about three feet long. He picked it up and hefted it, measuring its weight and strength.

  The voices at the door were raised now, the policemen clearly dissatisfied with the answers they were getting from Sally. But he could not hear them any longer, his mind concentrating on the moves ahead, his breathing a rushing noise in his ears. The focus was in hands, feet and eyes. Everything now was coordination and action. There was no time to think, only to do.

  He took the stairs three at a time and was at the bottom, in the hallway and pushing past Sally, his arm upraised, while the first policeman was still speaking. As his arm came down in a crashing arc, the man suddenly registered his presence, his mouth open in an O of surprise, then the stick connected with his head.

  Sean had seen the arm of the man behind start to move to his jacket and he knew that, sloppy or not, these men were armed. Speed. Speed. He pivoted, not stopping in his headlong charge to measure the effect of the first blow. His arm reached the apex and came down again. This time, the stick hit the elbow of the second cop directly. There was a crack that was much louder than the pistol shots which had killed the commuters on Winchester station.

  Elbow joint broken, Sean thought with satisfaction.

  The fighter in him was still measuring, calculating the odds. Down but not out, he decided. He was past both men now. He turned back to face them and brought the stick around in a scything motion to connect with the kidneys of the first man, who gave out a choking scream as they were driven into his body. His eyes turned into the back of his head as he folded to the ground, his head cracking on the paving stone of the front path.

  His right hand hanging loosely by his side, the second detective knew that he was doomed but also knew that he had no choice but to fight. His left hand groped under his jacket to try and free the pistol that was holstered under his left shoulder. It was an intricate and lengthy manoeuvre that used up the f
ew seconds he had to spare.

  Sean brought the stick down again, hitting him along the side of the neck. For a brief moment, the blood supply flowing through the main artery to the brain was cut off. Starved of blood, the brain shut down and the man collapsed.

  He had a few minutes now, Sean thought. A neighbour — there was always a neighbour somewhere — would be phoning the cops right now. He dropped the stick, searched in the second detective’s jacket pocket and found the keys to the Ford. He picked up his bag and sprinted down the path to the car. The door was unlocked and he wrenched it open. There was an agonizing delay while he tried to fit the boot key into the ignition and then the engine caught and he drove the gear lever into first and pumped the accelerator.

  As the car moved off, the back door opened. He turned, sure that one of the policemen had recovered, and saw Sally, holding on to the door handle and running to keep pace with the accelerating car. Tears were streaming down her face. “Sean, Sean. Wait for me.”

  God, the silly bitch, he thought. I should have shot those bastards. That would have cured her.

  He saw her strides lengthen and then she was taking huge, leaping bounds as the car picked up speed.

  CHAPTER XV

  Dai Choi had long ago rationalized and then controlled his fear. He had understood that fear was a necessary prelude to action. It heightened his senses, sharpened his reactions and produced an awareness of the immediate environment that was not unlike taking a mind-expanding drug. The closer he had got to Cheriton, the more the fear had begun to control his body.

  He felt himself evolve through two very distinct phases. The first, shortly after they had left Model Cottages in a three-vehicle convoy, resulted in sweat gathering in pools in his armpits and crotch, so that he had turned the air conditioning in the Granada on to high. The drive gave him the luxury of time to project himself forward into the Tunnel and the action that lay ahead. He imagined not the doing, but the failure that could destroy the mission at every stage.