Exit wound, p.21
Exit Wound, page 21
Snatches of waffle and banter filtered through from the far side of the tall plywood sheets that encircled the building site. I looked through the gap where two sheets didn’t quite meet. Blankets were spread out round a fire, with pots and pans rigged over the flickering flames. The wood spat and split, completing the western campfire effect. It could have been a scene from a John Wayne movie – except that these boys, truck drivers, I guessed, were in dishdashes and had a TV perched on top of a pile of concrete blocks, next to a fat extension reel. The other end of the lead disappeared in the direction of a genny I could hear ticking away in the distance.
A couple of students walked hand in hand across the far side of the square, giving the odd giggle along the way. I stayed in the shadows and thought about Ali. I wondered what he was going to do. Tell the police? Tell his sister, and she’d tell the police? She was going to be really pissed off with me. I didn’t know, and I tried not to care. Whatever, it was out of my hands. All I could do was what I was doing now – keeping eyes on the target and trying to identify whoever was in there.
I’d had no choice in my treatment of Ali, but that didn’t stop me feeling sorry for him. First his dad’s illness had screwed up his university plans, and now I’d done the same with his dreams of a journalistic career.
Fuck it, there was nothing I could do but cut away from all that and get on with the job.
I needed to get a trigger on the target and find out who was in there. Altun had to be somewhere with the Pakistan delivery. Whether he was sitting under that ceiling fan or not, I still needed to find a way of making entry on target tonight. Short of bursting straight into M3C’s airport HQ, I had nowhere else to go.
I needed to find a good OP, ideally high up in an unoccupied building that was still under construction and looked right down on the target. The closer of the two minarets fitted the bill. My only problem would be getting into it. I couldn’t just sashay past the lads round the campfire – it wasn’t that kind of party. Nor could I get over the fence. I’d checked. It wouldn’t happen. The only way was to head for the uni and see how I could make my way from there.
Before I did anything, I had to finish getting some more bread and water down my neck – instead of down my burqa. I didn’t know how long I was going to have to be up there, or the next time I’d get a chance to eat or drink.
I was finally done. I brushed the crumbs off the black material and moved onto the pavement, day-sack over one shoulder. I blended in pretty well, I thought, apart from being a foot taller than the rest of the girls. I just hoped my size-ten Timberlands wouldn’t stick out too much, and that nobody stopped me to sympathize about how badly the diet was going.
I went back into the square and followed the other students down to the right of the target, trying to avoid taking long paces or looking like I was about to enter a boxing ring. Paralleling the road that led to the university via the construction site, I lost eyes on target. I wouldn’t have it again until I got into my OP, but it was worth the risk. If I stayed at ground level I wouldn’t see jack.
A hundred metres or so past the square, the students were starting to bunch. By two hundred, they were crossing the road and coming in from all directions, bottlenecking at what I assumed must be the entrance. I joined the mob.
We surged through the gates into a big, brightly lit open space with marble flooring. A mosque reared up on the far side, another couple of hundred metres away. Its huge square façade and minarets towered above us, floodlit from the ground like something from Cape Canaveral. The spotlights were harsh enough to make God blink.
The square was humming with chat and ring tones. The girls laughed, glanced at their homework and munched peanuts or other stuff out of bags. It could have been almost any university campus, almost anywhere in the world.
I worked my way to the right of the mosque, where a tree-lined border had been planted to give the square some shade. I kept moving, making sure I didn’t bump into anybody or anything and draw attention to myself. It was easier said than done, when the hole I had to look through was smaller than a Warrior’s letterbox. I wanted to move through this lot like oil, not giving a single person cause to stop, stare and wonder what class the big bird was in.
I headed beyond the trees and into the stretch of shadow where the floodlights between the old and the new part of the campus didn’t meet. I picked my way over mounds of earth and rubble for about twenty metres until I was in total darkness. I took off the burqa, folded it up and shoved it into my day-sack. I’d need it again to get out.
82
As my eyes adjusted to the ambient light, blurred shapes slowly took on recognizable outlines. I picked my way past a cement mixer, and piles of wood, concrete blocks and steel. Soon I could see the bubble of orange light from the campfire and hear the mush of the TV they were shouting at.
As I moved closer to the carcass of the new mosque I could see the drivers from earlier quite clearly. The TV was side-on to me but I caught the odd bit of frenzy. ‘Rooney . . . Giggs . . . Rooney, Rooney . . .’ They suddenly roared at the screen, rose as one from their blankets, then sank back, disappointed. I knew that feeling all too well.
The old man in the hat offered round cigarettes to console them. Then they got back to the job in hand. Tin plates glinted in the firelight as they scooped more rice and sauce from pots over the fire.
I half crept, half crawled to the opening that would one day house the tall white mosque doors. I slipped inside as the truckers threw down their plates and sparked up again about something involving Ronaldo.
Windows had already been fitted into the walls, but the stars shone through a big empty hole in the central dome forty metres above me. I picked my way carefully around endless piles of cement bags, wheelbarrows and scaffold towers that reached skywards towards nothing in particular. I headed for the far left-hand corner, the minaret closest to the target.
A cool breeze blew down the spiral stairwell as I started to climb. Twenty steps up, I passed a narrow slit window – the kind Robin Hood’s mates fired arrows from in Crusader castles. It looked out over the back of the mosque. I had a bird’s-eye view of the lads and Man U. The noise from the TV gradually faded. When I reached the muezzin’s chamber, it was like entering the Tardis. The room was wider than I’d expected – the concrete floor was eight to ten metres across – and perfectly circular.
The smell of cement filled my nostrils. On the far side, just visible in the half-light, were stacks of boxes, concrete blocks and a pile of sand. Stark white light flooded in from four narrow, dust-coated windows that extended from waist-level to the roof. A door led out to the muezzin’s balcony. It would bristle with loudspeakers by the time the thing was finished.
I tried the handle, but it was locked. No problem. I still had a good field of view down into the target from the window to its left. It was a bit fuzzy because of the shit on the glass but I could see the lights were still on. I checked my watch. It was coming up to nine.
The panoramic view was even better than my hotel room’s. The square directly below was a big dark patch, but to my right, the floodlighting around the university mosque picked out hundreds of ant-like students milling about in the courtyard. I was prepared to bet that every one of them would be sporting a green wristband. A few blocks away to the left, traffic streamed along the main.
I moved closer to the window overlooking the target and wiped a bit of cement dust off the glass with my shirt-sleeve. Binos are an excellent night viewing-aid when there’s ambient light. I raised one of Ali’s lenses to it, scanned along the second storey, then focused on the still-lit window.
I could now see a wooden floor, a white leather settee and, next to it, a small rectangular glass side-table holding a tray of half-eaten meat and rice. Only one plate, one glass and a half-empty water jug. The room on the ground floor to the left of the building’s entrance was clearly a kitchen. The arched gateway was the only way in or out of the courtyard. The double glass doors at the front opened into a reception area. The target was some kind of business premises.
Movement at the top window caught my eye.
I swept the binos upwards with one hand and tried to undo the flap on my day-sack to get at my Nikon with the other. A picture would make Julian a happy boy.
Tattoo was in mid-bend. As he picked up a tray, his heavily inked biceps slid out of his short-sleeved white shirt. He stood with his back to the window, treating me to a grandstand view of the artwork on his neck as he talked in the direction of the dead ground on the other side of the room. His body language was respectful. He was almost standing to attention, tray held out in front of him. He nodded, turned and disappeared.
Whoever was also in there would move at some stage. I didn’t know if I’d get a picture from here in this light but, fuck it, I’d try. Why not? I had the kit.
As I straightened up with the Nikon, I spotted another freshly cleared patch of window, directly under mine. I couldn’t believe I hadn’t seen it before.
I put the camera down slowly on the day-sack and stood up, my full attention still on the window. Then I turned and launched myself into the dead ground behind the building shit on the other side of the room.
83
The shadowy figure shifted on its hands and knees, trying to scuttle for cover. I kicked hard into the centre of the mass. There was a dull scream. The figure surged towards me, arms straight out like battering rams, and thrust me back against the wall. Then it kicked and punched like a mad thing before breaking away and running for the stairs.
I followed and jabbed my Timberland against a running leg. The body crashed to the floor. There was a moan, and hands started to flail. I pinned an arm to the ground with one foot then kicked hard with the other, two, three times into the centre mass, then reached down and found the back of a neck. I jammed my hand around a throat, squeezing the windpipe, and rammed the head against the concrete blocks. Fingers scrabbled their way upwards and gripped my wrist. I heard lungs fighting for air. I ran my free hand down the body for a weapon and brushed against a woman’s breast.
Keeping a firm grip on the girl’s throat, I shifted my free hand to the base of her skull, raised both my arms and started to lift her back across the chamber. She was level with me, but facing away. All she could do was stumble backwards, trying to keep up with me, trying to keep on tiptoe to minimize the pressure on her throat.
I reached my porthole and jammed her face against the wall to its right. I still had a job to do. I still had to keep trigger on the target.
Nothing was happening. Light but no movement.
I scanned down, trying to see into the kitchen. Again, nothing.
Then I turned my attention back to the girl. ‘What the fuck are you doing here?’
Her blonde hair hung limply over her face as she begged for oxygen. She didn’t look too much like Agnetha from Abba right now.
84
The call to prayer kicked off big-time in the mega-mosque over the way. I checked the drivers, hoping that Ronaldo and his mates would have covered any noise that might have worked its way down there. But they were otherwise engaged. The TV had been turned off and they were shifting their blankets to face east.
I kept my hand tight around her windpipe.
I couldn’t see her face clearly in the gloom but I knew it would be bright red by now. She’d be dizzy soon from lack of oxygen and that was good. It would control her.
I looked back towards the target. A man had begun to pray below the fan. He was on his knees, pointing in the same direction as the truckers. His forehead was pressed against the floor.
Agnetha’s hands worked their way up to my wrist again, but she didn’t struggle. She couldn’t: she was starting to die.
I let go of her throat, pushed her to the floor and kicked her up against the wall. She gave a gut-wrenching gasp. ‘Get your face down! Face down!’ I stuck my boot on the back of her neck. She could breathe, but she wasn’t going anywhere fast. I picked up the camera and fired it up, checked the flash wasn’t on, pointed and shot. I clicked the shutter three times in quick succession and checked the screen. All I’d got was a burst of light from the window that turned everything around it dark.
There was a choke and a mumble from under my boot. ‘There’s not enough light . . . I’ve already tried . . .’
I rotated the ball of my foot, like I was stubbing out a cigarette. ‘Shut it!’
A sermon of some kind was being banged out over the speakers at the top of the uni mosque. Using my camera zoom, I watched the body beneath the fan continue to pray. He was in his early thirties with neatly cut, side-parted hair and a well-trimmed beard, and dressed in a plain dark suit, white buttoned-up shirt, no collar. He looked like he’d just stepped out of a Bollywood movie poster.
I put the camera down on my day-sack and grabbed a serious handful of hair. ‘Get up! Up!’ I needed her to know who was in control here. That way she had no choice, no power, no voice. I slid her up the wall, my knee pressed between her shoulder-blades, until her face was level with the bit of window she’d cleaned. I rammed her face against the glass. ‘Can you see him? Who is he?’
‘Taliban,’ she rasped.
‘He got a name?’
‘I don’t know it.’ There was no fear in her voice. She was angry, a bit like she’d sounded at the press conference. ‘Please let go. I’m not going to run. I’m not going to shout. I’m not going to do anything. I’ll do what you say.’
‘Why is he here?’ I shoved her face back against the glass.
‘To buy ground-to-air missiles. SA-16s.’
‘Who from?’ I wanted to know everything she knew.
‘M3C, of course. That’s why he’s in the Neptun building. Look, I can help you. Tell me what you want to know. Just fucking let me go.’
‘What’s Neptun?’ I stood directly behind her, forcing her back against the wall. I twisted my hand further into her hair. Her skin tightened like a bad facelift. ‘What’s Neptun?’
‘The building – the office. The company’s called Neptun. It’s one of the companies M3C absorbed when it went multinational. It produces handheld surface-to-air missiles. That’s what you’re here for, isn’t it? That’s what we’re both here for.’
‘The Taliban buying 16s?’
‘Well, you’re British, aren’t you? You’re here about the missiles, trying to stop them getting into Taliban hands, yes? Look, I can help you. Just let me go. I’m not going to do anything. We’re both here for the same reasons, for God’s sake. What do you think I’m going to do?’
‘Spark up like yesterday. How are they being paid for? Is there a middleman? They dealing direct?’
‘Heroin cash – and direct, of course. Why would he be at Neptun if not? Either drugs direct or cash from the sales – I don’t know exactly which and I don’t really care. All I want to do is expose the deal – maybe even stop it in its tracks. Why don’t you let me help you? We want the same things, don’t we?’
The Taliban had stopped praying and was back on his feet. He started rolling up his mat, then stopped and dug a cell phone out of his jacket. Headlights rolled into the square and the Neptun gates swung open. The Taliban put the phone to his ear as the Merc pulled in.
I let go of her hair. ‘Pick up the binos. Tell me who you recognize.’
She nodded and did as she was told. The reception lights were now on. I zoomed the Nikon in on the white-marble-floored hallway. A large French-style three-seater settee with mahogany arms stood on the right-hand side of the foyer, opposite an ornate desk complete with repro Bakelite telephone and a couple of high-backed chairs. Tattoo and the Taliban waited just inside the glass entrance.
‘You know the guy with the Taliban?’
She took a couple of seconds to check him out. ‘No.’
The Merc swept round the forecourt. The rear door opened before it had come to a standstill. Out jumped Altun, arms at full stretch. He and the Taliban embraced and lavished multiple kisses on each other’s cheeks. Tattoo skirted round them and kept eyes on the square.
‘Do you know him? You know the lad who’s just got out?’
She scoped him for another few seconds and shook her head. I could feel her disappointment. ‘He was at the press conference, but I don’t know him, no. Who is he?’
‘That’s one of the things I aim to find out. Who were you expecting?’
‘Brin.’
The name didn’t register with me.
‘He owns M3C. That’s why I’m here. If I can prove the deal is going ahead, I can shine a light on some high-level corruption. I may also help prevent your planes and helicopters, and America’s and Pakistan’s, getting blown out of the sky by my country’s missiles . . .’ She took a deep breath. ‘I keep telling you, I can help you. Isn’t it about time you started to believe me?’
The three of them piled into the Merc and they drove back out of the gate.
Agnetha rested her head against the window, her eyes closed as the headlights disappeared towards the main. Either she didn’t know as much about what was happening as she’d claimed or she was bullshitting. It didn’t really matter which. We probably did want some of the same things, but I doubted she had the solutions in mind that I did.
There were plenty of people like her out there who were bent on saving the world, and a conscience was a good thing, I supposed – except that in situations like this it could easily get you killed. Crusaders for truth look great under the studio lights. But in the real world they get swatted like flies.
85
I thought about pushing her back down onto the floor and giving her the Timberland treatment while I packed my day-sack, in case she made the mistake of thinking we were new best mates.
‘M3C are trying to hide the SA-16 deal by using Iran as the broker. That probably explains the guy in the Mercedes.’ She gestured towards the Neptun building. ‘Look, I can’t prove it yet, but Brin is where all this shit begins. The Taliban may fire the guns and Iran may think it’s pulling their strings, but M3C loads the bullets. If we can close Brin down, that’s where it ends.’
