Countdown, p.19
Countdown, page 19
A tap on his shoulder. He turns and Marcel Koussa is there, also dressed in black-and-white attire, and Marcel whispers in his ear, “Sir, your ride is waiting.”
“Very well.”
He pushes back his chair and the oldest man he knows—sitting slumped next to Rashad—clasps his arm and croaks out, “A delight, my dear friend, a true delight.” The man is shrunken, loose leathery skin wrinkled on his face, his dentures very white and his black-rimmed glasses very thick.
Rashad smiles at the old man with true affection. “I will see you next time, my dear friend.”
The old man hacks and coughs in what may pass for a laugh and says, “Don’t bet on it—God, don’t bet on it.”
He pats the thin shoulder, which feels like old sticks under parchment. Along the man’s left breast pocket is a line of miniature medals from his service in World War II.
“The two of us, we will beat the odds, as we always have,” Rashad says. “Always.”
One more loving smile, then Rashad Hussain strolls with confidence out of the hall, giving a cheery wave as well to Sir Mark Robathan, second-in-command of this old nation’s utterly useless armed forces.
Mike Patel is done, pleased with his work, pleased that he’ll be heading back to his flat in Queens in a little while. The day is hot, his water bottle is empty, and he’s sick of the smells of oil, diesel exhaust, and old trash and debris. Walking and stumbling among the freight cars and the tankers, checking their serial numbers, making sure the equipment is installed correctly and in the right position…grueling but necessary work.
The two satchels are folded into his knapsack, which feels light on his back, and—
“Hey! You! Stop right there!”
Mike freezes, then lets his hands rise a bit—not too much, not too far, you don’t want the man back there to know that you have experience in being arrested—and he calls out, “May I turn around? Please?”
“Slow,” says another voice, and Mike thinks, Damn, there are two of them.
He turns and two security guards, both white, are staring at him with flushed faces. Without their saying another word, Mike knows they must be ex-cops or ex-military, looking to bank another salary following their retirement. They have the same uniform as the man in the guardhouse, except these two are also wearing billed caps.
The one on the left is fat and sweating heavily, with crescents of moisture under the armpits of his light-blue uniform shirt. His pistol is out, held at his side.
“The hell you think you’re doing here, hunh?” he demands.
“What’s wrong?” Mike asks, trying to keep his voice gentle and nonthreatening.
The guard on the right is taller and skinnier, with thin brown hair. “What’s wrong is we’ve been getting a lot of junkies and homeless in here,” he says, “trying to steal anything that can be hocked for a buck.”
Mike shakes his head, “No, I’ve been working. That’s what I’ve been doing.”
“What kind of work?” the heavier one demands.
Mike says, “I’ve been installing instrumentation on some of the tankers and freight cars.”
“Instrumentation?” the fat one asks. “That’s some fancy shit you’re slinging, buddy.”
“You got a funny accent,” says the skinny one. “Where you from?”
“Manchester,” he says.
“What, the place in New Hampshire?” the fat one says. “That’s bullshit.”
“No, no,” Mike says. “Manchester, in England.”
“Give us some ID,” the other one says. Mike quickly complies, sourly thinking of how many times he had to do this back in Manchester. Sharp demands of Paki! Papers—now.
The two guards look at his papers and the skinny one says, “Well, it looks—”
His partner is having none of it. “I don’t like it, Carl,” he says. “Let’s bring him back to the office, get him checked out.”
Mike is still smiling but this won’t work. He can’t afford to be rousted by these two, and part of him starts planning how to handle them—a blitz punch to the guy on the right, then grab his pistol and shoot the slower one in the face—when he remembers something else.
“Please,” he says. “I have paperwork. Please.”
He goes back to his jacket, hands over a folded sheet of light-blue paper. The guard on the left tries to grab it but his companion is quicker, snatching it out of Mike’s fingers. He unfolds it, starts reading—silently mouthing the words—and says, “Ralph, I don’t know. Looks legit. It’s a work order from Albany about installing some…Christ, lots of numbers and abbreviations. Even identifies this guy: ‘M. Patel.’”
Ralph’s mood seems to lighten, and Mike—remembering all the awful American political talk shows he watches at night—thinks of something more.
“It’s busywork,” Mike says. “A waste of time. It’s instruments from…the environmental agency.”
“The EPA?” Ralph asks.
Mike nods with gratitude. “That’s right. Some sort of instruments to measure the air around the trains, check out global warming. That’s what they’re doing. Me? I just do my job, get paid shit, that’s all.”
Carl hands him back the phony work order. “Nutty tree huggers,” he says. “Always trying to save the world.”
Mike puts the paper back in his work jacket, picks up his near-empty backpack. “What fools, eh?”
“You said it, pal,” Ralph says, and then Mike just walks away, smiling with relief and delight, knowing that if they are still working in this very spot in just a few more days, they will both be dead men.
Chapter 61
THEIR EUROSTAR train is pulling into St Pancras Station in London when Jeremy gets out of his comfortable seat and starts to walk rapidly toward the nearest door, Amy Cornwall right on his heels, pushing through the high-priced passengers who think they’re the ones with important missions. He turns to Amy and says, “When we get to our transport, you should be able to make your call then.”
Amy looks tired and driven, but in her eyes Jeremy sees the need of a wife and mother to check in with her family. Earlier Jeremy had offered his own iPhone to make a call, but Amy had refused it. “It’s not like before back in the airfield when I made my last call,” she had explained. “Too much is now going on with my folks, your folks, and the French. I don’t want to get Tom entangled in this shit show. If you’ve got an encrypted system inside your magic bus that works better than what’s on your iPhone, I’ll wait.”
Now he has pushed his way to the closest door as the train sighs and finally slows to a stop. There’s a bell and a thump and the door opens up, and he joins the mass of passengers stepping out onto British soil.
Amy is at his side and she spares a glance at the steel arches and girders high overhead, sunlight streaming through the hundreds of windows up there, and says, “You guys sure knew how to build empires and train stations back in the day.”
“That’s what binds empires,” Jeremy says. “Trains. And we built the first ones. Come along, now.”
He strides forcefully through the crowds ebbing and flowing around him, thinking of what’s ahead, feeling like one of those fox hunters—“the unspeakable in pursuit of the inedible,” Oscar Wilde called them—and he knows that in certain polite circles his work and background do make him an unspeakable. But the fox he and Amy are chasing is one part sly and two parts evil.
But has the trail gone cold?
Where is Rashad?
And will they get to him in time?
Outside there’s a blast of noise—horns, car traffic, the rumble and roar of trucks and black taxis, white vans and buses. Parked near a brick building is a red van with yellow lettering that reads EXPRESS LONDON DISPATCH. Jeremy opens the passenger door and feels relieved to see who’s waiting for him behind the steering wheel.
It’s Winston Blake, squat and muscular, smooth fleshy face and bright yet hard blue eyes, wearing dark blue overalls with the fake Express London Dispatch logo over the left breast.
“Jer, let’s get a move on,” he calls out. “I’ve already been rousted by coppers a couple of times, wanting me to get going.”
Jeremy steps aside, says, “Winnie, Amy Cornwall, former American Army, late of Langley, Virginia. She’s with me.”
A woman’s voice from inside the rear of the van calls out: “Hurry up, will you? Winnie’s been singing to pass the time, and I’m about to crown him.”
Amy passes him by, crawls over the passenger seat, and goes to the rear of the van. Jeremy gets in and Winnie moves the van out into traffic.
“Update?” Jeremy asks.
“Our little bastard is here, in West London,” the woman says. Jeremy turns in his seat, peers into the van’s crowded rear interior. In the far right is a sealed chemical WC for those long surveillance ops, a hot plate and a small fridge. The rest of the van is choked with communications and surveillance equipment: computer terminals, encrypted radio transmitters and receivers, CCTV screens, and a mass of cables, wires, and two keyboards.
At one keyboard, her swivel chair right up against a counter, is Felicity Cooper, who in another time and place would have been one of the Bletchley Park girls. She’s wearing a black pantsuit and a mic-and-earphone combination over her short-styled blond hair.
“Where in West London?” Jeremy asks.
Felicity’s soft, pudgy fingers slap the keys as she gazes up at a CCTV screen displaying a real-time map of London. “Along the 600 stretch of Uxbridge Road, in Shepherd’s Bush.”
Jeremy feels his skin tighten and his breathing quicken—signs of being on the hunt, of knowing your prey is coming into view. “Felicity, could you set up a secure and encrypted phone line for Amy? She needs to make a phone call straightaway.”
“On it, Jer,” she says, as Winnie mutters something, a horn blares, and Jeremy wonders if it’s time to reach out to Horace. Felicity says, “All right, dear, here you go.”
Amy takes a small phone keyboard with mic and earplug. She shoves the plug into her right ear and asks, “Do I need to use the international code for the States?”
Felicity says, “No, just dial as if you were in the States, making a long-distance call.”
Jeremy turns in his chair, rubs his hands. What to do? Contact the locals, turn them out, make a show of it? Or just use himself, Winnie, and Amy to make a targeted attempt to grab Rashad?
He’s looking through the windshield as Winnie—a former taxi driver who spent years being schooled in “the knowledge,” learning every street and alley in London—expertly guides them onto the A40 highway, heading west.
About twenty minutes out.
And even though he’s rapidly sifting through options, plans, and possibilities, Jeremy can’t avoid listening in as Amy makes her call.
“Tom!” she says, her voice filled with relief and a tone Jeremy has never heard from her—that of a loving woman talking to her partner. “I’m fine…things are all right…I don’t have time for a lengthy talk, all right? All right, hon? Okay…Denise…how’s she doing? Oh…she met the mayor? Did she wash her hands afterward?”
For the first time since the mountains of Lebanon, Jeremy hears Amy laugh. It’s a sweet, delightful sound.
Then her voice switches instantly, like turning a channel on the telly.
“Tom…listen to me, okay? Our vacation trip’s been moved up, the one to Ticonderoga. You know what I’m saying. That’s right. Ticonderoga.”
A slight pause. “Yes, I know. But that’s what it’s going to be. Love you…give my love to Denise. I’ll talk to you as soon as I can. Bye now.”
Jeremy gives her a moment, then turns to see Amy staring blankly ahead.
“Bugger all!” Felicity yells, tearing off her headset. “He’s moved, the bastard’s moved, but my God, what a strong signal! He’s at Heathrow…”
“Winnie?”
“Thirty minutes, Jer!”
Jeremy goes to his jacket, takes out his pistol.
“Make it twenty, Winnie.”
“Got it.”
It looks like her call home shook up Amy, so Jeremy briefly wonders if she’ll be up to the job. That’s one thing he learned the hard way, serving in the regiment and then going over to the intelligence services: a married life was well nigh impossible, because you can never focus 100 percent on the mission when you have family responsibilities at home.
After that call to her husband, talking about their daughter, looking distracted, will Amy be a help or a burden if and when things go pear-shaped?
There’s the sound behind of metal hitting metal, and Jeremy swivels his head for a moment, sees Amy is checking over her own pistol.
He turns back, wondering why he ever had any doubts.
Chapter 62
IN HER room at the Hôtel Best Western Paris CDG Airport, Nadia Khadra is examining her luggage one last time before her flight tomorrow, from De Gaulle to JFK in America. Her silver case with the weaponized anthrax is on the blue-carpeted floor, which has several stains on it. Holding the simple black dress provided by her benefactor, Nadia takes out the leather belt with the ugly red-jeweled fastener.
She steps over to the poorly cleaned bathroom and holds the dress and belt up, looking in the mirror.
Ugly indeed—but if it gets the job done, so what? There is also a cell phone programmed with the number of her contact in Manhattan, and she appreciates the steps her sponsor has taken to make sure everything works.
She hears the roar of a jet taking off from the airport nearby. This hotel isn’t luxurious, but it’s reasonably priced and full of travelers, so there’s little chance she’ll run into anyone she knows. It also has the benefit of a free—and anonymous—shuttle service that will take her to Charles de Gaulle.
Nadia goes back and tosses the dress and belt on the bed, sits on its edge and reinspects her passport, her boarding pass, everything she needs to leave early tomorrow and fly to America.
America.
Something cool is at the back of her throat, and she imagines all of the agencies out there in America—all looking for her, perhaps: Homeland Security. FBI. CIA. New York Police Department. Can she do it? Can she?
Her hands start to tremble.
Does she have the strength?
Nadia reaches across the bed to her small brown purse, opens it, and takes out her wallet. From deep in its recesses she removes two black-and-white photos. One is of her papy and mémère back in Oran, smiling happily at the camera. She brushes the photo with her fingers, feeling a bond with them even though they were long gone before her birth.
And then there’s the other black-and-white photo, which she had gotten after years of research, nagging, and bribes. It’s been folded and refolded many times, and stamped on the border at the bottom edge of the photo is the word CLASSIFIÉ.
Nadia bites her lip as she looks at the photo, which shows two dead and bloated bodies being dragged out of the Seine like so much trash by French Army personnel.
Her papy and mémère.
She puts the photos back in her wallet and smiles as she realizes her hands aren’t shaking anymore.
In the departure lounge, waiting to be called, Rashad Hussain crosses his legs and sips his tonic water with lime, and lime only. The room is comfortable and quiet, with no blaring TVs dangling from the ceiling, broadcasting CNN International or some other nonsense.
He feels relaxed, fine, and filled with the sharp pleasure of knowing that his mission is succeeding, and that he’s ready for the next step: to go to the heart of the empire he despises most and oversee its collapse.
Another sip of the sharp, biting drink. His right arm feels stiff. Like his dear Nadia from l’Institut Pasteur, he, too, is a trusted traveler, heading out under another name.
Rashad looks around at the other first-class passengers waiting here—the “one percent of the one percent,” as some rabble-rousing newspaper writers and commentators have bitterly called them. It’s not their money or influence that should be critiqued, Rashad thinks, but their utter insulation from how the rest of the world lives.
The comfortable men and women reclining here—the bounties of the world instantly available with just the wave of a finger—have no idea that their lives are based upon a system of cruelty and oppression, with New York City its center.
A woman employee in a finely tailored suit approaches him quietly and says, “Monsieur Mohammed, it’s time.”
“It certainly is,” he says, responding quickly to his fake name. Rashad puts down his drink and rises from his chair.
Chapter 63
THIS LITTLE band of not-so-merry warriors is hurtling down the M4, and I’m seeing the signs for Heathrow flash by as my stomach clenches with both fear and anticipation.
“Jer!” Felicity calls out, not moving her head. “We need to let Mini-Spit out if we want better tracking.”
Jeremy turns to me from the left front seat while from his right Winnie brings us back into traffic. Hearing a thump and a buzz from the van’s roof, I tilt my head back.
“Not a flying car seat like 007, but our mini-Spitfire drone can give us close-in tracking and video surveillance when we close in on a target. Felicity?”
“Hah!” she cries out, clapping her hands in triumph. “The bastard’s in the Club Aspire lounge…Terminal Three. Thank you, Mini-Spit!”
I call out, “Heathrow? A lounge? Pretty goddamn public, don’t you think?”
Traffic starts to clog up and Jeremy says, “Arrogance is one of Rashad’s many faults. Felicity, call SO18 at Heathrow. Tell them we’re rolling in hot and to meet us at the first-floor departure area for Terminal Three.”
I unsnap the seat belt and harness and lean toward Jeremy’s seat. “Do you have a plan, or are we going in guns blazing?”
“We’re going in with guns,” he says, “but no blazing—not at the start.” Behind me I hear Felicity talking calmly and strongly to someone at Heathrow, using a lot of code phrases and number sequences. “We’re meeting up with the specialist aviation unit for the Metropolitan Police.”
