Confessor (35 page)

“I liked the color.” She smiled. “This blue will suit you, Walid. I also buy you a pair of very fine driving gloves. Feel the soft leather.”

“Where am I going to drive, my peach?”

“Probably nowhere, but the sensation of soft leather against my skin is very appealing.”

He wanted what he called an undress parade straightaway, and they were just getting started when the telephone rang.

Walid made a dive for the phone and answered with a curt “Yes.”

“This is Yussif. I’m downstairs. I wonder if I can come up to see you. It’s most important.”

Walid made shooing motions to Khami, signaling that she should get into the bedroom and put more clothes on. “Please, yes. Come straight up. We were hoping you would visit us today. In fact, we’ve been lost without you.”

The man who called himself Yussif was tall and distinguished-looking, with a striking hawklike nose and brilliant pale blue eyes. He was very formal to both of them and they called room service for coffee and some cakes.

It was not until the food had been delivered that Yussif began to talk in earnest.

“It is a miracle that you have been spared,” he began. “The police still stick to their story that your comrades were dead when they arrived, when the police arrived.”

“That cannot be true.” Khami now wore a modest dress, which covered her shoulders and reached almost to her ankles. “They were all alive when we left. On our return, the police were swarming all over the place.”

“We know they tried to fight back. In their press statements the NYPD say that some had weapons in their hands.”

“It is a catastrophe.” Walid made a motion meant to convey horror and grief.

“No. We have the pair of you, and I think you will be able to do all that is necessary. Two people can, at a stretch, carry out
Magic Lightning
, but we have to plan now. See, I have brought the necessary information. The tools you will need for the work will be made available when you get to Washington.”

“
Magic Lightning
is to take place in Washington?”

The man from
Yussif
smiled, nodded and then did something incredibly stupid. As he spoke, he realized that he was giving away information not meant for their ears. “Washington,” he said. “Washington, London, Paris and Rome. It is all being coordinated. This must all happen within the next four days. See.” He brought out a map of the center of Washington, D.C., and the plan of a building.

There were to be two major bombs, he told them. Two in very high-profile places. Many would die as a result. He showed them on the map that one bomb would have to explode at the Lincoln Memorial and the other at the recently refurbished Union Station.

“It is possible,” he said, “that we may require another pair of smaller devices. If so, they will be timed to go off within minutes of the two major explosions.” His finger traced the map. “One here and one here.” He pointed to the Executive Office Building, close to the White House, and the National Museum of American History on Constitution Avenue. Then he turned to the chart. It was a plan of the United States Capitol, the building with the large dome that dominated the city.

The plan was simple, though traced around with red lines. “These,” he said, pointing to the red lines, “are the ducts for both heating and air-conditioning. You will see that they have small access doors, which for some odd reason are not locked. Any person finding himself alone in any of these ten areas”—again his finger stabbed at ten different points on the plan—“could easily slip something within the ducts, and you see where they lead. All of these small roads lead into the House and Senate chambers. Think in terms of tear gas—and you will have something far more lethal—and consider what even tear gas would do. It would seep along the ducts and finally spill out into the two seats of government. They are far apart, at opposite ends of the building, but if these ducts are used”—he pointed again to the ten specific access points—“if a gas, or some other such, is placed into any of these areas, it will fill the two chambers very quickly. In a matter of minutes.”

“So, what will we be putting into the AC units?” Walid’s eyes had a fearful look deep in their irises.

“When the time comes, you will know, and the timing is of great importance.”

He looked from Walid to Khami and back again. “After you have set
Magic Lightning
in place, and after it begins to take effect, there will be other matters for you to attend to.” He smiled affably, as a devoted father might smile at his children.

Earlier on that day, in the Kensington house, a man from the British end of
Yussif
was explaining similar things to Hisham, complete with similar plans. The plans in this case were of the London Houses of Parliament, plus the seats of government in Paris and Rome. Hisham had already been told where their bombs had to be placed. One close to the Foreign Office in London’s Whitehall; another directly opposite Buckingham Palace. This latter would rip apart the great fussy and ornate Queen Victoria Memorial, which stood in the center of the circle joined by The Mall, Constitution Hill and the short twin roads leading from Birdcage Walk and Buckingham Gate.

The sites of the explosions in Paris and Rome were also chosen with daring, and meant to give the people of France and Italy cause for deep anxiety.

Hisham was also extremely worried. With his team depleted, he had no idea how he would be able to carry out the attacks as planned. Apart from himself, there were only Ahmad, Dinah and Samira to call upon, and even at this moment Samira was out of London.

After Ahmad and Dinah had so brilliantly assassinated the man called Blount-Wilson, Samira had volunteered—even demanded—to carry out the killing that Hisham and Dinah had botched a couple of days before. Not that it was their fault, but Hisham felt ashamed that it had not been done properly. He prayed that Samira would deal with the matter.

Later that same evening, Big Herbie Kruger would feel the brush of the Angel of Death’s wings.

S
AMIRA WORE A WIG
similar to the one Dinah had used for the assassination of Archie Blount-Wilson, though Samira’s wig transformed her into a brownish-redhead. She also put on granny glasses and a long summer dress of flimsy material. The American passport she showed at the car rental agency gave her name as Cronin. Delphina S. Cronin, the same name she had on the international driver’s license and the American Express credit card that she used to pay for the rental.

She filled in the papers in a neat round hand that bore no relation to her own writing. It was one of the skills they had all learned from the
Biwãba
during the long training period.

Hisham had given her an accurate map, so she set out from London heading for Salisbury, pulling in at the first service area to get a sandwich and change into jeans, a black T-shirt and a dark denim jacket. It would be ironic, she felt, to hit the target Kruger near where the man Keene had died. She knew there was plenty of time, because their contact at the place they called Warminster had said Kruger would not be back until early evening. At the service area she had called the Kensington safe house and Hisham gave her the code which meant Kruger had yet to leave London. She called again, from a public booth in Salisbury, and the word was that he had just left, with some firepower in a chase car. Hisham said that Kruger would be in the second car.

She did not even bother to think about how Hisham got the information. All she knew was that he had someone on the inside who passed him stuff—inconsequential information as far as his contact was concerned, but life or death matters to a leader like Hisham. He had once told her that his person within the British Intelligence was an unwitting agent, and there had been plenty of those around during what the West called the Cold War.

Throughout her journey Samira kept repeating to herself, “I am the Angel of Death. I am the Angel of Death.” Hisham had reminded her that chanting something which described your operation was a way of fixing the mind, keeping focus. It was almost hypnotic.

It was dusk when she reached a stretch of open road with no houses in sight and flat country on either side. Flat unless you looked hard and had a soldier’s knowledge of cover. There were two little rock-strewn hillocks, bumps really, about a foot high. They were close to the road around fifty yards from where she had pulled off onto rather soggy ground.

Samira worked quickly, changing the car’s number plates, putting her duffel bag into the trunk and opening the zip to uncover the grenades and the Polish-made PM-63—not the ideal weapon for the job, as it was known to have an erratic muzzle movement and required a shooter to hold it in a tight two-handed grip to fire a complete magazine of eighteen 9mm rounds in one burst. Samira was really relying on the grenades. If she timed things correctly, she could get both cars. She had personally set the grenade fuses to five seconds. It all depended on her judgment. Samira was good with weapons and was confident that she could handle the timing. From where she now lay, it would be possible, even in near darkness, to roll two grenades, one after the other, so that both cars would get the full impact. “I am the Angel of Death,” she repeated again, knowing that as soon as the grenades had left her hands she would have to flatten out, as though digging herself into the earth, for she would be lying in the lethal zone when the grenades exploded. When that was over, she could finish the job by moving up and using the PM-63.

Now she only had to wait and hope that no passing motorist, or thief, took it into his head to give her car the onceover.

“I am the Angel of Death …I am the Angel of Death …I am the Angel of Death …”

Big Herbie Kruger stayed behind for a few minutes, talking alone with Worboys in his office. They had been joined by Martin Brook, who waited with Bex and the muscle outside in an anteroom. God in heaven, Herbie thought, Young Worboys even rated an anteroom these days. Only a handful of years ago he was Herbie’s gofer, running errands and playing around with the female staff. How times had changed. Nowadays if you complimented one of the female staff on her appearance, like as not she would scream sexual harassment. Maybe he could have Bitsy Williams on sexual harassment charges. Should work both ways, but this politically correct business had taken so much harmless fun out of life. What everyone needed was a good dose of male liberation, Herb reckoned.

He talked with Tony Worboys about Ramsi. “He being cooperative?”

“Ramsi? Yes. Yes, very cooperative. You’ll have to go in at the back door, search his subconscious a bit, meddle with his mind. He’s in a kind of denial over the whos, whys and whats, but it shouldn’t be difficult.”

Herbie switched subjects. “You pinpoint the locations in New York? The map references given in the phone numbers to
Jasmine
?”

“Yes, as a matter of fact, we did.”

“And?”

“Passed them on to the anti-terrorist boys. Too late if they were for real.”

“Where were they?”

“The locations? One was a bookshop—Barnes and Noble—on Fifth Avenue. The other was outside St. Pat’s Cathedral. They put watchers on, but came up with zero. As I said, too late.”

“Or maybe the watchers got spotted and they called off the meet.”

“Whoever they were, yes, could be.”

“Also the meets could have had double meaning. Like we used to do with times on open telephone lines. Subtract four hours, or add six. Stuff like that.”

“Yes, but who was playing
Claudius
to
Jasmine
? Maybe we’ll never know. Your job is Ramsi now …”

“And Carole. We haven’t cleaned out Carole yet. Not completely.”

“You’ll have Martin Brook giving you a hand.”

“Sure, how do I stand with
him
?”

“You mean, can he outrank you?”

“Outrank, yes.”

“No way. He knows the score. He’s taking over Gus’s old job on a permanent basis, but he knows you’re running this op.”

“Good. He gets out of line, I call you.” Herb grinned, raised a hand and headed towards the door. “Watch your back, Tony. We’re both targets now, so watch your back.”

“Don’t worry. I’m going to earth. Wife and kids’re already in this building. We’re using the Infirmary. The kids think it’s a great lark; always asking to see the minders’ guns. Wrap these buggers up tight, Herb. Get Gus’s killer and close the thing down as quickly as you can.”

The journey back was noisy and a shade cramped. The Fat Boy, as they used to call Martin Brook, had slimmed down greatly. Bex sat between him and Herbie in the back of the Rover, while the chase car constantly switched positions. Sometimes it would be behind them; at other moments—if its crew didn’t like the look of a car overtaking—it would pick up speed and get behind the vehicle, riding in front of Herbie’s car while the observer in the back of the chase car would punch registration numbers into a laptop secured to the back of the shotgun’s seat. The laptop’s modem ran through the car’s radio telephone and details of the owner of any queried car would ribbon out on its screen within seconds.

The two-way radios between the cars were on constant chatter:

“Hardy One. There’s an old Jag coming up fast and overtaking. We will follow.”

“Roger, Hardy.”

“Hardy One. We’re coming up in front of you now. Ease back.”

“Wilco, Hardy.”

“Think they’re bloody fighter aces,” Herbie muttered. He did not like it, because it made them more visible. The technical advances had brought drawbacks with them. Kruger was not always happy with advances in technology.

They skirted Salisbury and prepared for the final leg, down the Wylye Valley. Inevitably, Herbie thought of Gus’s last journey to Warminster. He wondered again what had really happened? Thought of the man seen talking with Gus beside the car. Or was it Gus? he asked himself. Was Gus already out of it, unconscious in the driver’s seat? Had there been other people, unseen by the witness, crouched beside the car, waiting out the headlights raking them? Men who joined Gus and read him the death sentence before they fixed things up, ran the car off the road and blew it, melting into the night once it was done.