Skinner's Festival (7 page)

Sarah spoke for the first time. Skinner sensed her striving to appear as formal with him as she could, to stake out no special position within the team. 'Won’t that involve thousands of people? And will the photo-booth machines be able to cope?’
He nodded. 'Sure, we’ll have to issue thousands of passes. But I’m going to second the Scottish Office Information staff to do the processing. And the passes won’t be photographic. They’ll be credit-card style with a signature on the back. We’ll make every applicant sign their pass in the presence of the issuing officer, and then we’ll make them sign in and out of their venue every day. But come on, doctor, tell me. What’s the real reason for the passes?’
Sarah felt as if everyone in the room was watching her. A frown-line appeared suddenly above her nose, emphasising her concentration on his question. Then, just as suddenly, her face lit up.

'It’s all about the application forms. You want every performer or stagehand to fill in an application form.’
Skinner was pleased at her perception, but kept it to himself. 'Right, They fill in the application form. Then Mr Plod feeds the details into his great big computer, and if his great big computer is any bloody good at all, out pop all the nasty secrets. Unless we turn up a very nasty secret indeed, something like a convicted paedophile giving a one-man show for kids in the back of a Transit, we do nothing precipitate, but we keep a very close watch on all the odd-bods, to see where we get led.’

Skinner switched his gaze to Macgregor. 'What else do we do, Barry?’
The young detective beamed with pleasure. 'Hotels, sir. Everyone checking into a hotel is asked to fill up a registration form. We just expand them a bit, if necessary. Then, every day,
we collect copies of all the completed forms and stick them through the computer as well.’
That’s the game, son. And what do we get out of all that?
Probably sweet FA, but we do it anyway. And, just like with all the other routine precautions we’re taking, we hope that God’s luck’s on our side.’
He paused to look around the room, fixing his eyes on each member of the team in turn. When he spoke again, it was in a gentler tone.
'OK, my good people. Go out there and do your very best and, as usual, that’ll be good enough for me. But, as you do it, keep this thought in your minds. I saw that poor boy today. I know in my heart that this one will get even nastier than today before it gets better. We’ve got other people’s lives in our hands here. Let’s not let them slip. While you’re at it, look out for yourselves, too. I love you all, as friends as well as colleagues, and I don’t want any mishaps. Go to it. This is a no-leave job, so I’ll see you all tomorrow morning.’

TEN

'Andy,’ said Skinner, and nodded for Martin to follow as he headed for the door.
They left the room, Sarah following on their heels and waving goodbye to the rest of the team as she closed the door behind her.
Bob paused in the corridor and turned towards her. 'Sorry, love, Andy and I have a few things to do. No need for you to hang around here any longer. What you could do for me when you get home, though, is look at your copy of their letter – which I see you did not shred before you left the room.’
'Uh-oh, my first blooper.’ Sarah turned a shade of pink.
·And hopefully, your last. Still, let’s put it to advantage. Read it carefully, study the language, the style, anything in particular that strikes you, and see if you can come up with some sort of a psychological profile of the author.’
'Yes, boss!’
'And, once you’ve done that, burn it!’
She nodded. 'Yes, sir, will do. See you later. We will get to Alex’s play, won’t we?’
'No problem. I’ll rest easier if I’ve taken a bloody good look at that venue myself, anyway. I’ll be home for 7:30, latest. We can eat after the show, so book us a table somewhere, eh?’

He started off towards Martin, who stood waiting at the end of the corridor, but she held him back with a gentle tug at his sleeve.
'Bob. In there, earlier on, I had the impression that Andy was going to say something important, but you shut him up. Was it something that you didn’t want the whole team to hear – or just me?’
He looked at her wide-eyed. 'Don’t know what you’re on about, love. When did I ever chop Andy off in public – and before you lower ranks, too?’
The unmasked doubt in her expression countered the wide-eyed innocence in his. 'Skinner, you are being evasive. We
will
discuss this later.’ Her tone left no room for doubt.
“Nothing to discuss. But I’ll see you.’ He strode off to join Martin.

As soon as they were out of sight, the big ACC cuffed the Head of Special Branch lightly around the ear. 'Dropped me in it there, mate, haven’t you. Don’t tell me you weren’t on the point of chipping into my briefing with a homily about gun-toting motorcycle messengers in Charlotte Square. Christ, if I hadn’t been looking at you at the time! There are things you need to break to the wife in private – if you choose to break them at all.
Now I’ve got no choice!’
Martin wore a guilty look that was rarely seen. 'Sorry, boss. I just didn’t think.’
Skinner considered his point made. 'It’s OK, son. I chose to bring Sarah into the team, so it’s half my fault for putting you in the situation, anyway. There’s another side to it, though, and a good reason not to tell the team about my wee bit of excitation.
These Apache Couriers are all over town. I’d hate to think of what might happen if next week one of them even looked sideways at one of our team while reaching into his jacket. Bang,
bang. Dead courier. “Oh, you were only getting a hankie out were you. Sorry about that. Just a wee mistake.” No, thank you very much! Not even Proud Jimmy would see the funny side of that one.’

They had reached Skinner’s office in the Command Suite.
'Come on in, Andy, and I’ll let you halfway in on a state secret. I told you I’ve already accessed available files on the MI5 computer from my other office, and come up blank?’
Martin nodded.
“Well, not all the stuffs on computer. With all these hackers and folk like that, and viruses and so on, the plain fact is that information technology doesn’t have the security you need at the very top level – or at the bottom level, depending on how you see these things. There are files still kept on paper, in London, behind a very thick door with a very long combination and a very loud alarm. I’m going to use my secure phone to brief the MIS analysts to look at them all, and prepare me a list of people to be considered. It probably won’t be a long list, but I’ll bet they’ll have some entries for us. This will all be stuff I probably haven’t myself. I’ll have picked up bits of it now and then, just wee scraps of information, but the total picture is gathered together by section teams in Head Office.’

He sat down in a chair at the side of his desk and pulled his scrambled telephone to him.
'While I do this, Andy, could you access your SB stuff through my terminal, and run another list for me. Journalists – anyone you’ve got on file, either here or in branches in the rest of the
country. Look at their special interests and their known associates. I fancy we’ll want to talk to one or two of them, too, when the moment comes.’
That not a bit of a risk, leaning on journalists?’ asked Martin.
'Who said anything about leaning on them? We’ll just say we’re consulting them; it’ll make them feel important. The hack is not yet born who is so hairy-backed and anti-establishment that he doesn’t want the polis owing him a favour. You do that, while I make this call. Then we’ll get off to the George to scare the shit out of the Festival directors.’

ELEVEN

The George is not the most imposing of Edinburgh’s first-division hotels, but it is one of the best. It is situated on the street from which it takes its name, and its narrow entrance affords clients a greater degree of privacy than its massive rivals at either end of Princes Street. It is possible to slip virtually unobserved into the George, while entry through the wide doors of the Caledonian or the Balmoral, past their liveried and effusive keepers, is always something of a performance.
Skinner and Martin arrived at the hotel in the BMW just after 5:00 pm, finding a parking place with unusual ease, as the Saturday shopping crush had eased off. Martin, who enjoyed
special relationships with every hotel manager in the city centre, had asked for a private room for their meeting. He carried a briefcase as they walked into the hotel. Six of the seven Festival directors were waiting for them. Only Trevor Golley of the Book Festival had been unavailable. None of the six had been told in advance that the others would be present. As the two policemen entered the room, the low buzz of conversation stopped, and half a dozen faces turned towards them.

Skinner broke the ice. 'Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. I must thank you for coming along here at such short notice, and in response to such a mysterious invitation. We appreciate how busy you must be just now, so we won’t keep you long.’
Three large Thermos jugs lay on three occasional tables in the centre of the room.
'Everyone all right for coffee, before we begin?’ An assortment of grunts and nods came from around the room. 'Right, if you’ll each find a seat, I’ll explain what all this is about.’
The long room had no windows. It was furnished with three deep and comfortable two-seater sofas and two armchairs. The policemen each took a chair, leaving the sofas for their guests. As the directors sat down. Skinner saw that they seemed to sort themselves unconsciously into natural pairings.

Harriet Nelson, in her second year as director for the 'Official’ Festival, sat on the left-hand sofa, alongside Colonel Archie McPhee, organiser of the Military Tattoo. Even seated, Harriet Nelson was an imposing woman: tall, heavy featured and with flaming red hair. She had won her spurs in the arts in her late twenties, as one of the very few leading female orchestral conductors, and had wielded her baton in concert halls around the world for almost two decades. Her appointment as director of the Edinburgh International Festival had been announced by the governing committee as a major coup, which indeed it was.

Colonel McPhee, the Military Tattoo director, was in his own way as imposing as his neighbour on the sofa. Before his retirement from active service, five years earlier, he had been a battalion commander in the Parachute Regiment, and had seen bloody combat in the Falklands. He was in his early fifties, with close-cropped, receding hair, a sharp nose and piercing, perceptive eyes. He was dressed in light slacks and a short-sleeved green shirt,
an outfit which emphasised an impression of total physical fitness.

The director of the Film Festival, Julia Shahor, sat directly facing Skinner and Martin, next to the one person of the six whom Skinner had not met before, whom he knew therefore to be Ray Starkey. head of the television event. Julia Shahor’s shock of very black hair exploded in a natural Afro, framing a small, pale but unforgettably attractive face. She wore a voluminous white robe which covered her from neck to ankles. She was a small woman, the youngest of the six directors by at least seven or eight years, Skinner guessed. She had come to the Film Festival ten months earlier, on a one-year contract, and like Harriet Nelson she had been regarded as a catch for Edinburgh. She was still in her twenties, but already she had built a brilliant career as a screenwriter. It was said that her ambition was to emulate one of her predecessors by using the Festival as the springboard for a career as a movie director in America.

Ray Starkey wore large, yellow-framed spectacles, with lenses which made his eyes seem huge. He was very fat, and dressed incongruously in a pale blue Armani suit, with a grey shirt, yellow braces, and a tie which seemed to have been hand-painted, badly,
that same afternoon. Skinner knew that Starkey had come to run the television event after having been a casualty of the 1991 commercial television licence auctions. He had been programme controller with one of the losing franchise-holders and had waited in vain for a year for one of the winners to offer him a contract, before being invited to take up the Festival post.

Finally, seated together on the sofa to the right of the two policemen, were David Leroy, the director of the Fringe, and Jay Hands, his counterpart at the Jazz Festival.
The Edinburgh Festival Fringe enjoys a reputation as one of the great showcases for new-wave theatre and new performing talent.
Many artists now world-famous had made their first impressions upon public consciousness at Edinburgh Fringe productions.
David Leroy’s appearance was completely at odds with the avant-garde style of his Festival. While many of his performers found kaftans and sandals de rigueur, the Fringe director could have been taken for a successful big-firm chartered accountant. Even on an August Saturday he wore a blue Austin Reed suit, black Loake shoes, a white shirt with a thin blue stripe, and an Edinburgh Academy Old Boys’ tie.

However, Jay Hands, the longest-serving of all the directors, was much more in tune with the image of the grizzled jazzman.
Even seated, he seemed round-shouldered. He was in his late fifties, tall and lean, with a sallow complexion and lank grey hair which looked two months overdue for a trim. He had the tired eyes of a man who played with a jazz band several nights a week, then stayed on after the show.

The six directors now sat in waiting, some looking curious, some – Nelson and Hands in particular – showing an edge of annoyance. Skinner smiled his warmest smile. 'For those of you who haven’t met us, I’m Bob Skinner, Assistant Chief Constable and head of CID in Edinburgh. It’s a matter of public knowledge that I also act as security adviser to the Secretary of State. My colleague here is Detective Chief Inspector Andrew Martin, head
of Special Branch in Edinburgh. Some of you may have guessed why we’ve asked you to meet us.’
Only two reacted in any way. Archie McPhee smiled tightly and nodded. Jay Hands looked puzzled.
'For those of you who don’t already know, we have had what we describe in police-speak as “a serious incident”, specifically an explosion. It happened at midday today at a Festival hospitality venue in Princes Street. In fact, we now know that it was a bomb attack on the Festival itself.’

He paused. Opposite him, Julia Shahor’s eyes seemed to grow impossibly wide.
'Jesus Christ!’ whispered Jay Hands.
Skinner went on. 'Shortly after the bang, we received this.
Would you all read it, please.’
He handed his copy of the letter to Harriet Nelson. She scanned it slowly, then, white-faced , handed it to Archie McPhee. By the time Jay Hands had finished studying the letter, and handed it back to Skinner, all six directors looked considerably shaken.
'Before any of you ask me, I’ll tell you that we are taking this letter at face value. We believe that the people behind this atrocity are serious. We don’t know the first thing about them
yet, but we do know that anyone who can lay hands on a pound or two of Semtex is unlikely to be a one-hit wonder. Therefore, ladies and gentlemen, we have to believe that the Festival events for which you are responsible are now all under threat. More than that, while I don’t want to alarm you unnecessarily, we have to assume, for safety’s sake, that each of you could be a target.’

He studied each face in turn. The expressions ranged from the incredulity of Ray Starkey to the serenity of Julia Shahor. As Skinner had expected, the first to speak was Archie McPhee.
The colonel’s eyes seemed to gleam with memories of conflict as he asked softly: 'What would you like us to do about it. Bob?’
'I’d like all six of you to co-operate with us, but, Archie, I’d like you to do a wee bit more than that. The Tattoo isn’t run by the army, but it is military in nature, and it does take place at what is in fact an army base – the Castle. I’d like you yourself to take on responsibility for extra security. Pull in soldiers from Craigiehall if you have to. You won’t have any difficulty getting them. I can promise you that. At the moment I’m considering whether I need
help from other quarters for the wider task. Is that okay with you?’
'Certainly!’ said McPhee emphatically,

'Thanks. Now, everyone else, the first thing to say is that we do not believe that we should, nor do we even believe that we could call off any or all of your Festivals in response to this threat. And that isn’t just a police view. It’s a decision of the Secretary of State. So Mr Martin and I have two tasks. First, we have to take steps to protect all the Festival events, organisers, performers, and audiences, as best we can. Then, having done that, we must make it all unnecessary by catching these terrorists and putting them away. I have already set up a team to tackle both those jobs.’

He described the instructions which he had issued earlier to his own team.
'When my officers make their security checks, they’ll do so discreetly. I don’t want to cause any more public concern than is necessary. At the moment, that letter’s between you, us, and
some very cooperative newspaper editors. We’ve secured a news blackout on it, otherwise you’d have heard about it before now. I would ask you to assist my people in every way, as they assess each of our priority venues. If they need specific help or information, please let them have it without question. If any curious managers ask you what that was all about, the party line is that it is routine procedure. Please stick to that.’

Skinner look around and smiled. 'OK so far? Good. That’s what we’re doing about the buildings. Now for the people – and this is where you’re asked to give us the greatest help. As part of the security operation we need to ensure that each participant can be identified, and also that we know when they’re on site. That means a pass system for everyone who is performing at every Festival event, front or back stage, prima-donna or call-boy.’
There was a collective cry of protest from five of the six directors. Only Archie McPhee stayed relaxed, sprawled comfortably back on his sofa. The Military Tattoo had operated
its own pass system since its inception.

'You can’t mean everyone!’ said Harriet Nelson.
'That’s impossible!’ said David Leroy.
'I do, Ms Nelson – and it isn’t, Mr Leroy.’ He looked across at Martin. 'Andy, explain how we’ll go about it.’
Martin waited until he was sure that he had the full attention of every one of the six. He flashed a wide smile at Julia Shahor, who responded with a small one of her own.
'As Mr Skinner has said, it’s important that we are able to check people’s identity and that we know precisely when they’re in their venues. God forbid, but we could have another incident like today’s, or an arson attack, or even just a warning that we take seriously enough to act upon – and if this threat becomes public knowledge we could have every drunk and nutter under the sun calling in hoaxes. If anything like that were to happen, we’d have to clear the place in question totally, and account for everyone supposedly there. Ticket stubs would tell us how many people are in the audience, but we need a pass system for the performers.
Agreed?’

His last word was a statement rather that a question. Martin sat forward on his chair, accidentally swinging his bolstered pistol into full sight. His vivid green eyes were intense as they scanned the three sofas. Five heads nodded. Even Colonel McPhee sat up straight.
'Good. Now let me tell you how we’ll do it. These passes needn’t be photographic. They’ll be credit-card style, and they’ll be signed on the back by the holder, in the presence of the issuing officer, when they’re allocated. We’ll use experienced Scottish Office personnel to process the applications and issue passes on the spot. They’ll be based in your various offices. So what we’d like you to do, as soon as you all get back to your offices is to
organise a circular to every performing company that’s here so far. It should advise them that the fire safety officer has demanded that, in the light of new regulations, all performers and
crew will have to carry passes and show them whenever they enter their venues. Here’s a draft for you to work on.’
He delved into his briefcase, produced a handful of copy letters, and handed them round.
“This asks everyone involved to report to whichever Festival Office is appropriate, between four and seven o’clock tomorrow evening, and to take with them some form of personal identification.’

Jay Hands broke in. 'What if they don’t possess any?’
'We won’t actually turn anyone down on those grounds, but I think you’ll find that nowadays everybody carries something with their signature on it. We’ll put experienced people into your offices to do the job. It’ll be painless, I promise you – no worse than the queue at the building society on the last Friday of the month.’
He grinned at the six directors. Julia Shahor smiled back; the rest reacted with an assortment of grunts and snorts.
'Of course, you and all of your staff will require passes, too.
Even you, Colonel McPhee, in case you need to go backstage at any other event.’
The colonel acknowledged with the faintest nod of his head.
Harriet Nelson voiced again her earlier concern. No exceptions at all?’

Martin shook his head. 'Ms Nelson, if the Royal Ballet had the ghosts of Fonteyn and Nureyev appearing in Swan Lake, I’d want them to have passes. There are no exemptions when it comes to security. Even the Prime Minister has to carry a pass for the House of Commons.’ He looked around the room once more.
'Your circulars should make it clear that, as from Monday, anyone without a pass just doesn’t get in. So that this daily signing-in routine isn’t a burden with the larger companies, we’ll
put our own plain-clothes people in to look after it. The smaller groups should be able to handle that end themselves.’
Martin picked up his briefcase again, and lifted the lid. 'As Mr Skinner said earlier, we have to consider every foreseeable threat, however remote it might seem. For example, these terrorists may decide that it’s easier to target individuals than venues. You’re all prominent people, and we have to keep you safe. If any of you want round-the-clock police protection, just ask and you’ll have it. In my view, that’s not necessary, but just say the word.
Anyone?’