Bolt Action (35 page)

By Lambeth Bridge

A hundred yards from MI5’s headquarters

T
he barrister Beveridge Clairmonte leans forward to tap his chauffeur on the shoulder. Pull off the road here. They’re on the London Eye side of Lambeth Bridge and the Bentley convertible eases like a hovercraft, up and on to the pavement, at this point a generous twelve feet wide. Clairmonte has a deep voice, Paul Robeson-like. ‘I am sure Ms Davane can waive normal parking rules on this occasion.’

‘Hhhhmph’ is all that Davane can manage.

They’d not done more than twenty miles per hour or covered five hundred yards since leaving MI5’s headquarters. So, as Davane looks around, she sees her two protectors from 14 Coy. easing out of a jog. Looking alert yet relaxed, scanning this way and that. Behind them the two vans, laundry and floral services, are jockeying for position, doing their best to be inconspicuous.

And as in a bad movie, Davane is aware of five or six young crew-cut males, granite jaws, thousand-yard stares, suddenly finding Lambeth Bridge an excellent place for playing musical statues. Pretty ordinary tradecraft from her colleagues in the Metropolitan Police. Public holidays mean no street vendors; she makes a mental note to pass that on too.

Clairmonte opens the door for Davane and offers her his hand. She declines. With a bow, he motions her towards the bridge’s balustrade, the railings, an intricate latticework of wrought iron, painted the same deep red as the leather benches
of the House of Lords. The downstream side of Lambeth Bridge.

Davane leans against the railing, flips up the lapels of her tweed jacket against the sudden chill coming off the river and tries to organise her hair, which, after a ride in an open-top car, is no longer as composed as she likes. She sees the tide coming in fast, and the Thames looking as mucky-brown as ever.

Clairmonte joins her, gazing way downriver at a distant object. A plane coming into land at City Airport. He is six-one, six-two, that sort of height. Strong shoulders, pale skin. Perhaps a bit of Botox around the mouth and eyes, because his skin is a touch too tight for his smile to look comfortable.

Between the two of them, there’s a well-worn groove of effortless animosity, such that they don’t have to rush into conversation. Small talk would be an insult to either party, and both of them understand the rules . . .

Davane and Clairmonte are standing beside a lamp standard that rises thirty feet above the railings. There are pairs of these lamps either side of the apex of each of the bridge’s arches. Five arches in total. Because she can’t see under the structure, Davane guesses they’re over the second arch. Not quite midpoint.

Having finished with her hair, she wants to get on. ‘How is this going to work, then, learned counsel?’

‘We wait for a call.’ And taking a Nokia phone from his coat pocket, a rather fine camel-hair number, he looks at it carefully. ‘Pre-paid, of course. Brand new. When the call comes I pass it to you.’ And the barrister’s own displacement activity is to part his dreadlocks from the back, so they fall equally down both shoulders.

Behind Davane, watching closely, are the two men from 14 Coy., one of them already on the cuff-mike, passing on the news that a call is expected, incoming. Unknown number. Confirmed. The MI5 surveillance camera and tracking audio had picked up the same information from their vantage point in the laundry service van.

In the flower delivery van, amid the hastily assembled CIA field team, also privy to MI5’s radio traffic, there’s a serious outbreak of swearing.

‘I don’t suppose the gentlemen on foot who’ve formed a discreet semicircle around us are your employees, contractors and/or agents thereof.’ Clairmonte doesn’t even bother to look, so obvious are the guys hiding behind their newspapers.

Davane juts out her jaw, in the vague direction of Parliament.

‘Most certainly, they are not.’

‘Whose, then?’

‘That would be only guesswork on my part.’

Clairmonte’s questioning eyebrows are flecked with grey.

‘You do have the amnesty document with you?’

Davane holds up the brown briefcase. ‘Everything the girl Merritt asked for.’

Reassured, his voice softens. ‘So why the big snatch squad?’

It’s the Ulsterwoman’s turn to brood over the skyline, some of the most recognisable landmarks in the world. She picks out the desolate flagpole atop the magnificent Gothic Victoria Tower, indicating that Parliament is not in session. Yes, of course, the Whitsun break. My, these parliamentarians work hard.

Another piece of local history that this blow-in from the colonies would not understand . . .

Georgie Porgie pudding and pie

Kissed the girls and made them cry.

George Villiers, first Duke of Buckingham. Murdered, 1628, on an earlier version of Lambeth Bridge. Just yards from where they now stand. King James was so enraptured by George’s boyish good looks, it made the business of marriage and royal offspring almost impossible. Hence the rhyme.

Davane is musing on the history and culture of this country. She herself has taken a faithful oath to defend her monarch’s realm. The most important commitment in Davane’s life, and something to which she has given her entire being.
This
monarch. Queen Elizabeth II. Descended by blood from the
very same James I . . . She is convinced of one thing. In real and unforgiving situations, if the state is to survive, it must act, must be prepared to do anything that is ‘necessary’ to ensure its durability, irrespective of the cost of ‘freedom’ . . . good people may have to suffer. Like the rise and fall of the Thames, statecraft has its own unstoppable rhythm. And Davane is about to cast a stone in that dark tideway.

The immediate question for Davane is whether or not to tell the truth. It boils down to this: Merritt is clearly the brains of the operation, and there’s no earthly way the barrister can contact her now.

Less than a quarter of an hour to go . . .

In words that are strangely difficult for her to form in her throat, Davane finally answers. ‘Your client will receive everything she asked for. But nothing more. She forgot extradition, to face appropriate charges in another jurisdiction . . . perhaps America. Maybe the excitement of the moment convinced her she knew what she was doing. But the law can be so treacherous . . .’ and she glares at Clairmonte before leaning once again on the balustrade ‘. . . so treacherous, once you’re out of your depth. Don’t you think, counsel?’

With great relish, Davane anticipates the look on the face of this elegant prick of a barrister. Merritt’s mistakes were undoubtedly based on
his
errors of advice. So she half-turns, expecting something delicious to savour.

Instead, Clairmonte rocks back on his heels, roaring with delight, Father Christmas and Falstaff rolled into one. ‘My. She surely read you like a book, Davane.’

It’s all a little disconcerting for Davane, at the centre of this encircling mantrap of police, MI5 and CIA officers. She thought she’d played her hand to perfection . . .

White House situation room

1048 Washington time, 1548 London time, 2048 Islamabad time. . . Twelve minutes to scheduled point of engagement

T
he round-table discussion is almost ended, the room dead quiet but for the single voice. A lot of lives at stake . . . either way. On the ground, or in the air.

The consensus is leaning heavily towards taking down Flight 412 in the next dozen minutes. President Hannah has required each of the National Security Council to keep their remarks to thirty seconds. This is no time for oratorical windiness.

In the ugly but brutal analysis, it boils down to this: off the Canadian coast, take down a few hundred foreigners (plus fifty-four US citizens at last count, including a former Peace Corps contingent), or condemn to death perhaps several thousand Americans somewhere in the Tri-State area when this behemoth of a plane and its passengers crash out of the sky. The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Jim Badgett, delivered grim news, backed up by the team in attendance from the Federal Aviation Administration. The query had been whether you could nudge the thing out to sea, like flipping the wings of the V1 Doodlebug rockets in the Second World War. Badgett shakes his head emphatically. No. There is no plane, civilian or military, that could safely tip the wing of a 777, such that it would change course permanently. Moreover, the flight management system would compensate and simply fly a slightly different bearing to its next programmed waypoint.

Only the Secretary of State had voiced a serious objection,
and when prodded, confirmed this could be taken as a ‘no’ vote. He predicted an avalanche of diplomatic nightmares, a tidal wave of disaster completely paralysing US interests around the world.

Last to speak, before the president, is the National Security Advisor, who’s in the middle of a history lesson.

‘. . . I know that a number of you are troubled by the fact that Canada is not by our side on this, that they’ve opted out. Perhaps you’re thinking somehow we should do the same, follow their lead.’ The NSA rolls his tongue over his buck teeth, which catch the light from the overhead spots. He savours the silence, the dramatic moment.

‘Nineteen sixty-two, same thing. Canada walked away from us, in the midst of the Cuban missile crisis, two gut-wrenching days in October,
the
pre-eminent crisis of the last sixty-plus years. Nuclear annihilation on the line. And the Canadians wouldn’t follow our lead, refused to upgrade their force status to DEFCON3. Why do I mention this? Because we’ve been here before, because in the end, Canadian shilly-shallying didn’t count for diddly-squat, and it won’t count today.’

The NSA frames his next words with a deliberate quaver of emotion. ‘The Evil Empire folded, we prevailed, and a young president by the name of Kennedy, striving to advance the same agenda of hope, outreach and tolerance as this administration, showed the world that more important even than this . . . is the security and peace of mind of the American people.’

No vote is called. Not needed. The Secretary of State’s concerns are noted, and he accepts this, along with the directive that his staff urgently work up some big ‘blue sky ideas’ that might knock the worst edges off global reaction.

‘Right, Jim . . .’ The president turns to the Chief of the Defense Staff. His face studded with steely grit. The hardest decisions take the most courage, he keeps reminding himself. ‘Tell those two boys up there. Let’s do what we have to do. Pass the word.’

Inside the Volkswagen van at the south end of Lambeth Bridge

T
here are three MI5 operatives seated in the rear of the van, flicking fingers across keyboards, talking into headsets, scrutinising a bank of monitors. Behind them, stooped as ever, the shift supervisor has his eyes on four different video feeds and can feel his blood pressure rising. All this information pulsing at him. ‘I don’t care what Vodafone says . . . we’re sweeping this bridge.’ The supervisor slams the phone down. The default screen shows a two-shot of his boss Sheila Davane, Noppy, and that arrogant prick Beveridge Clairmonte, QC.

The video camera and a directional mike for audio are housed within the overhead structure of the Volkswagen. Both work by remote control, with an operator adjusting the focus and zoom with a keyboard toggle.

The barrister’s sonorous voice is distinctive. ‘
Aren’t you interested to know how I came to meet Ms Merritt?
’

‘
Why do you think I care?
’ Davane absolutely does not like this man. ‘
Probably rescuing blind puppies from a glue factory.
’

The supervisor feels he needs to put a rocket under proceedings at his end. ‘I say this again . . . we don’t know the incoming number, OK . . . but how many mobile phones are powered up on this bridge? Come on, we are better than this, people.’

The very fact that the bridge is currently deserted offers a crucial advantage to MI5. In the area that their scanner is locked on to, there are so few mobile phones emitting signals that it should be relatively straightforward to isolate any radio
transmissions. The process of phone mast triangulation, but worked backwards. They had already eliminated Noppy’s number, and the two guys from 14 Coy. A little bit of fishing in various databases had produced the number for Clairmonte’s carphone and post-pay office mobile.

Now, they just need one more number . . . this new phone that the barrister holds in his hand.

The Nokia rings and Clairmonte’s reaction is clear on the video . . . ‘OK, people, where is that call coming from, give me the number?’ The supervisor leans over his three keyboard whizzes.

Five, ten seconds pass.

‘Almost . . . hang on . . .’ As one hammers on the keys like Jerry Lee Lewis, the others turn to watch the electronic net closing. ‘. . . coming up . . . now . . . and . . . got it!’ And the SIM card details and pre-assigned number flash on the screen in red. Clairmonte has the phone to his ear, out there, on Lambeth Bridge, just as the supervisor slams his fist into the Volkswagen panelling. ‘Lock it in, please. Let’s listen and learn. And tell me where the caller is . . .’

On the monitor, the barrister passes the handset to Noppy. The van now hears her voice twice over, from the intercepted call and from the directional mike.

Davane
:
‘
Can we get this over with, please?
’

Unknown male voice. Trace of a Geordie, possibly Wearside, accent. ‘
I just want to hear you say sorry.
’

‘
Sorry?
’

‘
No. Sorry, as in “I’m sorry for betraying the trust that Captain Tristie Merritt placed in me.”
’

Davane: ‘
What’re you talking about?
’

The supervisor starts to shake with frustration. ‘Please, a location . . . how much longer do I have to wait?’

Geordie: ‘
These muppets on the bridge pretending to read newspapers . . . you think we’ve just fallen out of a tree or something? What is it with you people, why is it that nobody we’ve been fighting for can do one damn decent, honourable thing and stick with it?
’

The youngest of the communication officers, to the supervisor’s left, is shaking his head. Index finger pointing at the screen. ‘This isn’t making sense . . .’

The supervisor clasps him by the shoulder, looks over at his display and the myriad of intersecting lines overlaid on a map of London. ‘What isn’t?’

Davane: ‘
I’m saying this under duress and it’s all
shite
to me . . . I’m sorry for betraying the trust that Captain Tristie Merritt placed in me.
’

‘I’ve checked this twice now . . . that call is coming from Lambeth Bridge. Right where they’re standing . . . I’ve trigged the air cells on Abingdon Street and Millbank on the north side of the river, and the roundabout on Lambeth Palace Road to the south. Same thing. They all intersect
there
,’ and he stubs his fingers on the soft plasma screen. ‘Somehow he’s with them right now,
on the bridge
.’

‘That’s impossible . . .’ The supervisor rechecks the data entries, then the live picture on the video monitor. A mistake now and he’d be counting penguins in the Falklands until retirement . . . The chauffeur had been given his taxi fare, told to get home. That left four people. Davane. Clairmonte. Two from 14 Coy. On another monitor, he checks that neither of the soldiers is talking. They’re just watching, looking all about.

Geordie: ‘
Thank you . . . now pass the attaché case to Clairmonte.
’

Davane snaps, ‘
Where’s the computer?
’

‘
About twenty feet from where you’re standing.
’

The supervisor sees a shape in this mass of bewildering information and tries to join up all the dots, with one simple explanation. ‘Bloody hell, is the caller in the boot of the Bentley?’

‘
Give the case and the phone to Clairmonte . . .’

The supervisor folds his arms, smiles, happy either way, that the triangulation is correct, and about how this is playing out. ‘Well, if he’s in the boot of the car, that’ll be the easiest arrest of the week.’

Watching the monitor, they see the barrister take the case, flick open the locks with one hand and take the phone with the other. He removes a clear plastic file, holding the attaché between his knees, then pulls out a document.

Everybody waits as Clairmonte reads and re-reads. Slowly.

He nods his dreadlocked head. ‘
This is good. Exactly what Ms Merritt would have wished. I’ll hand you back to Davane.
’

Davane’s harsh Ulster voice: ‘
Now my computer, the Trident stuff . . .’

‘
Take five paces back, Noppy.
’

‘
Noppy . . .?
’ Davane bites off the rest of the question.

‘
Tell Clairmonte, too.
’

Everyone in the Volkswagen laundry van is riveted to the main feed. The barrister on one side, and Davane and the two soldiers on the other, shuffle backwards. Glaring at each other, expecting the worst.

A flash of movement whips across the monitor, too sudden and unexpected to register in anybody’s mind. ‘What the crap was that?’ the supervisor screams, scanning all his feeds. Nothing, except that Davane has backed into one of her protectors and both have tumbled to the floor.

The second guy from 14 Coy. is barking into his cuff-mike. ‘
He’s under the bridge. Repeat. Contact under the bridge.
’ And he holds up high the grappling hook that had shot across the screen, hauling a thick mountaineering rope behind it. The reaction inside the Volkswagen is a very perplexed
Huh?

Davane struggles to her feet, barely supported by her bodyguard . . . Off screen, the directional mike picks up an altogether new sound, the roar of an engine, over which Davane’s voice can just be heard. ‘
Pull it up, come on,
’ and within seconds a thick padded case is hoisted over the railings and clunks on to the pavement. Nicely framed on camera, as Cuff-mike screeches, ‘
Jesus . . . look at him go.
’

The supervisor shouts back: ‘Look at who go? Where’s my bloody vision. I want pictures now.’

And, as he watches the wake streaking into the distance,
Cuff-mike files a police-standard report. ‘
White coupé cruiser. Sunroof. Approximately twenty-five feet long. Heading to sea, ex-Lambeth Bridge. Making perhaps thirty knots.’

‘Have you got that, India Ninety-nine?’ snaps the supervisor, and serenely, two thousand feet above, comes the response from the day crew flying one of the Metropolitan Police’s three Eurocopter EC145s.

‘
Affirmative. Have craft in sight. Will liaise with MPU . . . Thank you.
’

The supervisor grinds his jaw, conceding to himself the best he can hope for now is a share, a tiny slice, of the glory. The penguins are still a possibility . . .

‘
Marine Police Unit, this is airborne India Ninety-nine. Please intercept white coupé cruiser, travelling downstream, thirty knots, approaching Westminster Bridge . . .
’

The supervisor punches open the rear doors of the Volkswagen Crafter, getting a cigarette ready, and stalks around the rear of the truck, stewing. On the other side of the road, Davane is being protectively manhandled into a Metropolitan Police Volvo that has screeched to a halt, bathed in flashing emergency lights. Her two minders seem to be fighting off a posse that can only be from the CIA, trying to force their way to Dougal MacIntyre’s missing laptop.

Barrister Beveridge Clairmonte calmly watches the roof of his Bentley Azure T slowly unfurl, the briefcase and amnesty note safely locked in the boot. Mission very much accomplished. He has already given the small huddle of Metropolitan Police surveillance officers a warning shot about the absolute nature of legal privilege for barristers such as himself. ‘
Getty
v.
Getty
1985 . . . in case you care for some bedtime reading,’ and the wary policemen had duly backed off.

The supervisor flicks a match, lights up and sucks in a lungful of Lambert and Butler. They
would
catch this Geordie guy, the man in the white powerboat. Nothing on the Thames could outrun one of those Targa fast response units, and he laughs out loud: a ninja grapple hook! . . . his father, an
old-time beat copper, would say, you live long enough, you see everything.

The Weasel looks at his watch, decides ten minutes is enough. Half a thermos flask of creamy, sweet tea and a nice pork pie sit nicely in his tum.

Indeed, the sun is a touch lower in the west, hopefully right in the eyes of anybody looking upstream from Lambeth Bridge. He’s pretty certain there are no more coppers on the bridge –they’d gone after that white Sealine cruiser as though it were a one-man crime wave. He pities the driver. But not too much. Funny how easy it is to pull a bet with a bored rich kid. Must be that attention deficit disorder, or something.
Five thousand pounds says you can’t get your dad’s cruiser from Lambeth Bridge to the QE2 Bridge in . . .
You’re on, soldier boy, the rich kid had jeered, making the vilest imaginable upper-class snort of contentment.

Weasel looks up at the huge span of the second arch under which he’s been hiding. Designed for four lanes of traffic, and pavements on either side the width of two men lying head to head. All told, more than enough space for his little nine-foot inflatable Zodiac to make itself invisible while all hell was breaking loose upstairs.

He stands up carefully. Balances, and edges forward. Wouldn’t want to tip up into the Thames now. He uncouples the mooring hook from a steel piling extruding from one of the bridge’s granite supports and lets go. Balances again, shuffles back, and the modest eight-horsepower outboard bubbles into action with the push of a small black button.

Feeling like one of the waterborne warriors known as the Cockleshell Heroes, Weasel spins the boat in a tight circle and
put-puts
upstream, in the direction of Kew Bridge.

No big plans, except a few jars with Piglet . . . Piglet had been watching things go down with a spotter scope, and keeping the Weasel clued up by small marine walkie-talkie . . .

They’ll raise a glass to Tristie, and Button, and Whiffler. On
the one hand, £315 million locked away, banked, and an amnesty to boot. On the other, three good people dead . . . he feels the dread hollowness in his gut . . . more names for a list already way too long.