Hunter Killer (10 page)

Fletcher looked surprised. ‘No,’ he said. ‘Too high-risk for the great and the good in our little police station just at the moment. My instructions are to drive you out of town.’

‘Where to?’ Spud asked.

It looked almost as if Fletcher was trying to avoid eye contact. He moved from behind his desk.

‘Hammerstone,’ he said. ‘Shall we go?’

Fletcher’s police vehicle sliced through the chaos around Paddington just as he’d said it would, the windscreen wipers flapping furiously against the rain. Within minutes they were heading down the Westway.

‘Ever been to Hammerstone?’ Fletcher asked as he pulled on to the M25.

‘Never heard of it, pal,’ Spud said from the front passenger seat.

‘Lovely place. Georgian, I think. Kings and queens stayed in it, back in the day. I suppose that’s why these government types like it. Makes them feel at home.’ Fletcher’s moustache twitched with laughter at his own joke, then he glanced in the rear-view mirror to see if Danny was joining in. He smiled briefly, then stared at his nails. There was, he noticed, a stubborn smear of blood underneath his left thumbnail despite the hot shower he’d had in Hereford that morning. He picked it away then looked out of the window to watch the traffic passing. He counted three military vehicles in ten minutes. Just before junction 11 there were two mobile police camera units. Ostensibly they were checking the traffic with speed guns, but it looked more like surveillance to Danny. Fletcher didn’t comment.

At 13.30 they exited the M25. Fifteen minutes later they were in the heart of the Kent countryside, driving down winding lanes with thick hedgerows on either side. The car slowed down and Fletcher indicated right. They turned off the road and found themselves in front of a set of large iron gates. A brass plaque read ‘Hammerstone’, and on the opposite side stood an armed soldier in camouflage gear. Danny watched as he checked the registration number of the vehicle against something he’d written in a pocket-sized notebook. He gave a satisfied nod, then opened the gates and flagged the vehicle through. They drove up a long, winding, tree-lined driveway. Up ahead, they saw the house.

It was a large, austere stately home. It comprised one main house, three storeys high, flanked by two smaller wings on either side. All three buildings had an array of decorative chimney pots, and they were surrounded by substantial but somewhat overgrown formal gardens. A grey mist hung around them that wasn’t just to do with the rain, and which made the scene look like an old sepia photograph. Even from a distance Danny could tell that parts of it were falling into disrepair. There was a scaffold over part of the roof, and three of the top-floor windows were boarded up. This had been an impressive building in its day, but now it was just a shadow of what it had once been.

The police car pulled up on the weed-strewn gravel outside the main entrance. There were four other cars parked here. Two of them – both black Mercedes, one with diplomatic plates – had chauffeurs sitting behind the wheel. The third was a grey Audi TT, the fourth a BMW 5 Series. As they climbed out of the police car, Spud eyed up each of the vehicles in turn, the same way Danny had seen him eye up girls in the pubs of Hereford. ‘If I had those lot,’ he said, ‘I’d flog ’em and retire.’

Danny grunted his agreement, but his attention was on the net curtain of a ground-floor window. He saw it twitch, then fall still.

‘This way, gentlemen,’ Fletcher said. They followed him up the stone stairs that led to the front door, and entered the house. They found themselves in a large, chilly entrance hall, where their footsteps echoed. There were paintings hanging crookedly on the oak-panelled walls on either side, and a frayed, discoloured rug covered the scuffed floorboards that were riddled with the markings of woodworm. It smelled of neglect. Danny felt uncomfortable in here. He was used to barrack rooms and army bases. This stuffy, decaying, fading splendour was for other people, not him.

A door on the right-hand side opened, its hinges creaking. A figure appeared in the doorway. Danny recognised those absurdly handsome, maddeningly smug features immediately.

Hugo Buckingham strode forwards, hand outstretched. All his focus was on Danny, and for the moment he didn’t seem to notice Spud or Fletcher. He smiled broadly, a flash of white teeth, and held out his hand. ‘Danny, old sport,’ he said. ‘Bloody good of you to come along. Long time no see, eh?’

Danny didn’t allow any expression to cross his face. He looked down at Buckingham’s outstretched hand. The spook didn’t seem remotely perturbed as he allowed the hand to fall. ‘You’re looking bloody good, I must say.’ He turned to Danny’s colleague. ‘
Spud!
’ He sounded like he was greeting his best drinking buddy. ‘Recovered from your
sejour
with the old
mukhabarat
?’

Spud kept up the poker-face routine, but rolled up his sleeve. There was an angry, jagged red scar from just above his wrist to his elbow. ‘Still hurts a bit in wet weather, pal,’ he said in a contemptuous voice. ‘You know how it is with these old war wounds. Or maybe you don’t.’

Buckingham smiled blandly. ‘Not really, old sport. Managed to keep everything pretty much in order. Please forgive the Downton Abbey routine. Best to be safe from prying eyes in matters like this.’ There was something about the way he pretended to be an old hand that particularly grated with Danny. Buckingham looked over at their police liaison officer. ‘Thank you, Fletcher,’ he said, as if he was talking to the butler. ‘You can wait in the car.’

Fletcher’s moustache twitched with irritation, but he nodded obediently and headed back out of the house.

‘Bit of a reception party next door,’ Buckingham said. ‘All bloody eager to meet you. Just give us a couple of minutes, would you?’

Danny shrugged, but Buckingham had already turned his back. He walked into the room and closed the door behind him. Instantly, Danny walked up to the door and put his ear to the crack. He heard voices – muffled, but just clear enough to understand.

An American man was speaking. ‘Considering we’re offering you the full backup of US intelligence,’ he was saying, ‘I would hardly say my presence here is controversial.’

‘Not controversial at all, Harrison,’ said a woman’s voice with a slight northern accent. She sounded rather prissy, as though she was offended by something but was pretending not to be. ‘Simply not strictly necessary. But that doesn’t mean we aren’t delighted to have you on board. I daresay the NSA will be sending you transcripts of our every conversation in any case.’

‘As it happens, the NSA were unaware of Hammerstone until you first invited me here. I guess none of you ever had a game of Angry Birds in here?’

Nobody laughed at the badly judged joke. ‘Well, it’s good to know we have
some
secrets. Yes, Hugo? Are they here?’

‘Waiting outside,’ Buckingham said.

‘Well, for goodness’ sake show them in, will you? We haven’t got all day, we do all have desks to get back to, you know.’

Danny stepped back from the door. Buckingham appeared. ‘This way, lads.’ He smiled at them. Danny and Spud followed him into the room.

It was large, oak-panelled like the hallway, and similarly depressing. There was an old grand piano in one corner, and a collection of sofas and chaises longues dotted round the room. A large inglenook fireplace, but no fire. Just to its left, six empty dining-room chairs set in a circle. Two chandeliers hung from the ceiling, but the scant light they gave out was barely enough to burn away the gloom that pervaded the whole room.

‘Danny Black, Spud Glover, bloody good soldiers, just the men for the job,’ Buckingham announced as he walked into the room. Three figures stood around the fireplace. Danny’s practised eye immediately started to record their details as Buckingham made the introductions.

They were a mismatched trio: one woman, two men. The woman was short – no taller than five foot six – and in her forties. There were hints in her tired face that she was once a beauty, but those days were long gone. ‘Victoria Atkinson,’ Buckingham announced. ‘MI5. We all –’ he indicated everyone in the room, then made a show of pointing to Danny and Spud in turn ‘– report to Victoria.’

‘Thank you very much for joining us, gentlemen,’ she said in her strangely nasal, northern accent. Then she removed a tissue from up her sleeve and blew her nose. Danny could almost feel Spud’s repressed sarcastic comment. This was no Stella Rimmington, for sure. She was carrying a bit of weight, and wore a strangely unfashionable floral blouse. Her hair was dyed black, but the roots were grey. She smiled at them, but couldn’t hide the flustered frown on her forehead.

The suited man standing next to her had a square, craggy face with a nose that looked like it had been broken several times. His right eye bore a slight squint. He was a little older than the woman, and prematurely balding, though he had combed a lot of hair over from one side of his head to disguise it. He had a distinctly military bearing. Danny thought he recognised him. From the papers, maybe? Or perhaps he’d seen him around Hereford?

‘Piers Chamberlain,’ Buckingham said, and something clicked. Of
course
he knew the name. Chamberlain had been an SAS rupert back in the day. He had a bit of a reputation around Hereford for his work in Northern Ireland. Now he was in thick with Five. He was close to certain members of the royal family too, and his features were often to be seen lurking at the back of a royal photo. Danny was pretty sure he had some letters after his name, just to show how important he really was. Chamberlain winked at the two SAS lads, a strange gesture for an officer to give a soldier, and if he thought a bit of forced friendliness would bridge the gap across the ranks, he was wrong. ‘Aye, aye,’ Spud muttered. Bang on cue, Chamberlain’s squint grew a bit worse, and for a moment there was an uncomfortable silence in the room.

The second man was younger. Late thirties, Danny reckoned. A full head of thick, blond hair, an open collar and stylish brown blazer. ‘Preppy’, as Clara would say. Danny would put money on him being the Yank. ‘Harrison Maddox,’ Buckingham said. ‘CIA liaison. There were several American casualties last Friday, as you know. Harrison has been most helpful in providing us with relevant intelligence from Langley’s sources.’

‘It’s a pleasure, gentlemen,’ Maddox said in his soft American accent, very urbane. ‘I know a number of boys in Delta Force who speak highly of your regiment. Met a couple of them who joined up with a few of yours to undermine a Spetznaz operation in the Middle East. Nothing but praise.’

Danny and Spud nodded a brief greeting, but said nothing.

‘Right,’ Victoria said briskly, ‘well, I’m sure we’re all very pleased to meet each other. We’re also all very busy, so shall we get down to work? Please take a seat, everyone. Hugo, now we’re all here, I think we should see the footage.’

Buckingham nodded. As everyone took a seat at the dining chairs to the left of the fireplace, he withdrew a laptop from a leather case and placed it on an occasional table so everyone could see it. He fired it up, then double-clicked on a desktop icon. A Quicktime video filled the screen, but it didn’t play immediately.

‘Not for the fainthearted, I’m afraid,’ Buckingham said with a grimace. The screen showed three figures. One of them was sitting on a stool. He looked to be of Middle Eastern extraction, and young. He held a long, ornate knife in one hand. On either side of him were two other figures, wearing black balaclavas. Behind them, a drape with a black Arabic symbol.

‘Why do I have a feeling I know how this movie ends?’ Spud asked, and before anyone could reply: ‘What does the writing say?’ It looked like a ‘w’ followed by an ‘l’, with various other squiggles above them.

‘It’s the Arabic for “Allah”,’ Buckingham said. ‘A very sacred symbol to the Muslim community.’

‘Looks like a bird’s arse,’ Spud breathed.

‘Of course, the Muslims have 99 names for God,’ Victoria said, covering up her obvious embarrassment at Spud’s comment. ‘
As-Salam
, the Source of Peace;
Al-Gaffar
, the Forgiver . . .’

‘Who’s the fourth person in the room?’ Danny interrupted quietly.

Everyone looked at him sharply, then back at the screen.

‘Only three people in the room, old sport,’ said Buckingham. He had a sudden edge to his voice, as though Danny was embarrassing him.

Danny shook his head. ‘Count the shadows,’ he told them.

He was right. Each of the three figures in front of the camera cast a small, distinct shadow. But there was a larger one too, very faint and fuzzy around the edges, that seemed to encompass the other three. Danny stepped forward and traced the outlines with his forefinger.

‘Ah, yes,’ said Buckingham, flushing slightly. ‘Well I suppose there must have been a camera operator.’

‘For
goodness’
sake!’ Victoria snapped. ‘Why haven’t our people flagged this up already?’ Her irritation was clearly directed at Buckingham, who looked momentarily flustered.

‘I’ll have them follow it up.’ He tapped the laptop screen. ‘Shall I?’

‘I think you’d better.’

Buckingham clicked the ‘play’ button.

The young man in the middle of the picture started to speak. ‘
My name is Karim Dahlamal. I was born in Hatfield. My parents are Raniyah and Yussuf Dahlamal. They will not understand what I am about to do. They do not understand the world.
’ A pause as the kid looked nervously at the floor. ‘
Three days ago, my friends struck a glorious blow in the holy Jihad. It is the first of many. We will not stop until the sins of the infidel are washed clean by their own blood. The bombs will continue until all your sons and daughters have died. You think you can stop us, but I tell you that you cannot. Because unlike you we are willing to die. We welcome death. We embrace it . . .
I
embrace it . . .
’