Cut to the Chase (45 page)

The story was that Wallace was to give the facts regarding that night up to the point where he came around and found himself in the room with Ravindran. After that, he was to say that he panicked because of the situation and contacted McKay. So far so good, all was as it occurred. McKay (ostensibly) told him to report to the police, but Wallace was frightened that Kalim and his men could still reach him and decided to disappear into the country. He purchased a second hand back pack and headed for Devonshire and Cornwall. This Wallace allegedly did, not being aware that the police wanted him for murder as he stayed on the road and at hostels and didn't read any newspapers nor see any television. Only when he saw the same newspaper that Fred Hackett and Liz had seen, did he realise he was in the picture for murder. Consequently he gave himself up to the High Commission and was now reporting to the police. Wallace was accompanied by a lawyer of a firm often used by the High Commission.

Kelsey made him go through the story several times and acted as a Devil's Advocate, picking holes that were too obvious. Whether the police would believe the story or not depended on Wallace making as good a meal of it as he could. He wasn't sure whether he would believe it himself had anyone told it to him, but it would have to do. Kelsey was very thorough and showed him photographs of various hostels where he could have stayed, always paying cash, and only staying one night. They spent much time on the Internet and mapped out a likely rambling and meandering route that he could have taken. The one big advantage that Wallace had was that he was innocent of the murder of the unfortunate Ravindran and this fact would surely shine through.

Wallace attended at a police station near to the High Commission with Jason Singleton, the lawyer, and completed the written statement. The interview was conducted by a Detective Sergeant and a policewoman, he stated the facts as they had rehearsed them and it all went into the statement. He thought their main interest were the facts leading up to the murder of Ravindran which cleared him of any complicity in the killing, and not so much any subsequent escapades. The policewoman asked a question about ASIO and ASIS but Singleton blocked that, declaring it to be irrelevant and inaccurate. They emerged some time later into the street, Wallace wasn't sure whether they had finished with him or not, nor was Singleton.

‘That's all for now, if they want you I've no doubt they'll send for you. If they do, then someone from the High Commission will let me know,' Singleton said as they clambered back into his vehicle.

He drove Wallace back to the High Commission and left him at the gate. He walked back in and into the main entrance. He felt exhausted, maybe the effect of telling a pack of lies.

Kelsey arrived next morning when Wallace was just finishing breakfast in the canteen.

‘Time to go to Kensington,' he announced. ‘There are people to see. Ready?'

Wallace finished his coffee, was taken below to the garage and entered the rear of a motor car. It was driven out through the gates and after a quick tour of the city, when it went around some traffic islands a couple of times to check they weren't being followed, and struck off westwards.

They entered the driveway of a house and the car was driven around the side. Wallace was admitted into the rear door of the house.

‘You'll have to stay here for a few days,' said Kelsey. ‘But you won't be alone. This is Chris Anthony,' he indicated a man with close cropped hair, who appeared to Wallace to be a military type. He was wearing a gun in a shoulder holster and looked as if he knew how to use it. ‘He'll stay with you but you should be safe here.'

Kelsey nodded briefly to Anthony then he left. The car backed out and drove off.

Kelsey arrived next morning when Wallace was tackling his breakfast in the kitchen.

‘Someone else to see you, and me,' he said. ‘You'll have to go through the story again but this time give the true facts, if you can remember them after the grilling and rehearsals you had yesterday. Finish your coffee, he's waiting for you in the living room.'

Wallace swigged down his coffee and entered the living room of the house and a man sitting in one of the chairs rose to greet him.

‘This is Sir William Wainwright,' said Kelsey, as he walked around the table and sat down. Wainwright extended his hand and Wallace shook it, wondering what he was in for this time. ‘Bill is one of our opposite numbers, he represents M.I.5. He knows all about Kalim and of course our friend Murray Craddock.'

Wainwright eyed Wallace keenly as he shook hands and they sat down. His age was difficult to place, probably late 40s or early 50s. He had some heavy lines on his face, which indicated that he had lived life at a fast pace. His hairline had receded, his hair was greying, and he had a close cropped hair cut. His eyes were alert, and Wallace had the feeling he didn't miss much.

‘You've had a chequered career in the last few weeks, Mr Wallace,' he remarked as they all sat down.

‘It certainly hasn't been boring,' Wallace responded.

‘Inventive too,' Wainwright went on. ‘I'm not saying that the police necessarily believed what you told them yesterday, but I don't and I have to know what really happened. I can understand, Alan…' he turned to Kelsey: ‘…why you were anxious for any connection to Australia to be suppressed while Canberra is conducting delicate negotiations with regard to oil exploration rights in the Arafura and Timor Seas and the Torres Straits, but we also have a fundamentalist problem here and we now know this is a factor in your escapade.'

Wallace looked at Kelsey and he nodded.

‘Go ahead, tell Bill everything,' Kelsey said. ‘I'd start at Jakarta if I were you, give the full picture. Bill knows Bramble and he also knows Dave McKay very well. He is aware that McKay is involved, so go ahead.'

Wallace went over the story again; he was adept at it by now, having recently been through it for the benefit of McKay, Fred Hackett and latterly Kelsey. Wainwright didn't interrupt, he set a small tape recorder going and he also had a small pad in front of him on which he made the occasional note. Wallace hesitated at one point, he wasn't sure whether to name Fred Hackett, not that he had done anything wrong, if anything he would have done ASIS or M.I.5 a service by enabling McKay and Wallace to escape together with the precious computer drives, but he feared bringing him to the notice of intelligence services generally. In the end he just referred to him as Fred, and said that he had not particularly noticed the company's name on the side of his barge.

Wallace finished the story and Wainwright grunted as he scanned over his pad at what he had written.

‘What gives with Murray Craddock?' Wallace asked.

‘What gives?' Wainwright raised one eyebrow. ‘I assume you're asking for information. I guess you have some right to know after what you've been through.'

He sat back and pressed the tips of his fingers together.

‘In his younger days he was a well thought of Public servant, who later became an employee of the Defence Ministry in Canberra. For years the Australian Government was plagued by leakage of confidential information and they had no idea where the leak was,' said Wainwright.

‘I still don't see where I came in,' Wallace said.

‘Well, both Britain and Australia were alarmed at this leakage, with our close links to Canberra much of our data was going out of the back door as well. We had a stroke of luck when a Russian defector who had been previously involved with their Australian or British Commonwealth desk in Moscow defected and amongst information he brought with him were pointers to the leakage in Canberra.'

‘Why wasn't he arrested there?'

‘Because somebody tipped him off,' Kelsey took up the story. ‘He departed from his desk one Friday afternoon and disappeared, we never saw him again. We checked all the air line departures and never tracked him. He was obviously well prepared and travelled under a false passport.'

‘How did you find him?'

‘We had information from a source that he was in England, a point that hadn't been considered, we all assumed he had managed to get to Mother Russia,' said Kelsey. ‘This source gave us enough information for it to be narrowed down to about three or four possibilities. We eliminated two of them, yours was the third and, as it happened, you found him.'

‘It was known from information received that he was in the Midlands, that much we did know, and working in a Left wing book shop operated privately by a high up in the Communist Party,' said Wainwright and he gave a cynical smile. ‘Bit of a contradiction in terms when you think of it, a Party member being involved in small business!'

‘But why was I involved with him?' Wallace asked and at this juncture Kelsey broke in.

‘We had lost touch with him and had no idea where he was. When we obtained this lead, we wanted to ascertain whether this individual was in fact Murray Craddock Our first step was to obtain pictures of him, that was where you came in. Someone he wouldn't recognise, he knew McKay and he knew me from his days in the Australian Defence Ministry.'

‘So I was handy,' Wallace said bitterly.

‘Guess you were,' said Kelsey.

‘Why didn't the British agencies do it?'

‘It wasn't high on our list of priorities,' said Wainwright brusquely. ‘But we would have got around to it.'

‘In the fullness of time,' Kelsey said somewhat pointedly. ‘This would probably have meant bloody never! We had to know soon and it was Bramble's idea for us to ask you to do it. Craddock wouldn't know you and it was a stroke of luck for us that you were coming here on business.'

‘That figures,' Wallace snorted. ‘Any damned thing Bramble thinks about with regard to me is bloody bad news!'

‘Now it's possible that Craddock is turning to other means for causing trouble, fundamentalism,' Kelsey said, he grimaced and looked surprised. ‘Not his scene I'd have thought.'

‘It isn't. I don't think he is,' Wallace replied.

‘But you said that Craddock led Kalim to you when you were at his house?'

‘Yes he did, but I'm not so sure he knew what he'd done, various comments were made at the time by the bookshop owner, Briscoe, and Craddock himself that make me wonder.'

‘Like what?'

‘She said that these people had been in touch with him and told him that he would be contacted by a visiting Comrade, someone who was hiding from the police but wanted to make contact. She assumed that was who I was, and obviously Craddock did too. When I let it drop that I had tended to be a swinging voter and wasn't affiliated to any political party it seemed to cause surprise, and when I told Craddock that I wasn't a member of any political party he was quite startled. Then I heard him talking to Kalim and Juan when they first arrived and were outside the porch, he was asking them if they were sure about me being a visiting comrade, was I who they'd said I was.'

‘How did they know you were going to be at Stourbridge and calling on Craddock?' asked Wainwright.

‘The tapped telephone,' Kelsey cut in. ‘When Harry phoned from Ben Wakefield's he mentioned to David McKay that he was going on to make contact with Craddock at the bookshop in Stourbridge. When we debriefed McKay he told me that he made some comments about Craddock, referring to his political leanings, and the Briscoe shop where Craddock was working was obviously Left wing. All Kalim had to do was post somebody outside or near the shop and wait.'

‘How many people have they got in this organisation?' Wallace asked. ‘If they can post people all over England on the off chance…'

‘Not quite all over England, as you put it,' said Wainwright. ‘But this is a feature which is causing considerable alarm in the UK at present. Unlimited immigration from the 1960s onwards, with precious little controls, has brought about a vast Muslim population in this country. Unfortunately some of them, a very small minority but with the numbers now living here that could mean several thousands, are very fundamentalist in their approach. They are appealing to the young, extremist messages are being propagated in some mosques. If Kalim wanted to post listeners or watchers, he'd find many fanatical young men who could be persuaded to carry out surveillance tasks.'

‘And Kalim would have already known Craddock's background from what Harry and McKay said over the telephone,' added Kelsey. ‘All he had to do was give Craddock what he expected to hear, a message from above and a visit from upper echelons.'

‘But are there Communist agitators around these days?' Wallace asked.

‘Some die hards never give up, Adele Briscoe for one and Craddock naturally turned to her, perhaps the Party machine put him onto her,' grunted Wainwright and he turned to Kelsey. ‘So after the telephone call to David McKay they knew where Harry was going to appear, they contacted Craddock and gave him this cock and bull story. But it's still not clear to me why you sent Harry on this Craddock jaunt. We had plenty of blokes who could have done it.'

‘For us it was priority,' Kelsey said. ‘We are still experiencing leaks from our Defence agencies in Canberra. We believe that either Craddock is still operating his spy ring from arms length, or else it has been taken over by someone else.'

‘Could Craddock operate it from 12,000 miles away?' Wallace was startled.

‘With aids like radio communications and the internet, yes he could.' Kelsey replied. ‘We needed to isolate Craddock urgently.'

‘And you decided to use me?'

‘Yes, when we had this lead it was Bramble's idea. He had this small job lined up for Harry to undertake when he came to England, but things got complicated,' said Kelsey. ‘Then when matters blew up we decided to press on with it to get Harry out of London. We thought it would blow over – how wrong could we be – but we considered the police wouldn't search the canal system.'