The Gulf Conspiracy (34 page)

‘
If the hares see us change the hounds to the Marines they’re going to smell a rat,’ said Macmillan. ‘I thought we could mount a professional guard on the aqueduct itself – I’ll call on Hereford - and let the Territorials go through the motions of the man-hunt in the forest as planned.’

‘
Good idea,’ agreed Steven. ‘Maybe it would be as well to have some kind of a stop put on the water downstream of the aqueduct, just in case things go wrong. I think we have to assume that these three will be good.’

‘
Probably ex-Hereford themselves,’ agreed Macmillan, referring again to the home of the SAS. ‘Mind you, that might not be possible if the water goes back into underground pipes again,’ said Macmillan. ‘But we can certainly make enquiries. Anything else?’

‘
I’d like to be there,’ said Steven.

‘
I can’t say I’m surprised but are you sure that’s wise?’

‘
I’d like to see this through to the end,’ said Steven.

‘
Your decision,’ conceded Macmillan. ‘But you badly need some rest. Go home now and come back this afternoon. We’ll talk further then.’

‘
You’ve been up all night too,’ said Steven.

‘
I’ll set some wheels in motion then I’ll grab a couple of hours too.’

Steven showered and set his alarm for three in the afternoon before drifting off into a fitful sleep. His limbs felt heavy and he wanted to sleep for a week, but there were so many questions going round in his head that he couldn’t manage to escape the grey margins dividing true sleep from wakefulness for more than a few minutes at a time before being plagued by thoughts of the exercise to come. He couldn’t see why they had organised it in the first place. Surely a straightforward assault on civilian security at the aqueduct would have been simpler. After all, three Special Forces men were not going to have too much trouble evading Territorial troops or overcoming a guard mounted by weekend soldiers so it would come to the same thing in the end. Unless of course . . . they wanted to keep the contamination a secret!

It was so obvious that Steven shook his head slightly on the pillow without opening his eyes and told himself he really should have seen it earlier. Going through the pantomime of the military exercise would allow the opposition to taint the water without anyone realising what had really happened. He must really be tired not to have seen that.

When Steven got back to the Home Office he noticed that Macmillan was wearing the same clothes and deduced that he hadn’t left the building.

‘
You haven’t had any sleep at all, have you?’

Macmillan responded by taking out a packet of pills from his desk and showing Steven the label. ‘Benzedrine,’ he said. ‘I couldn’t spare the time. They’ll see me through.’

Steven nodded. He knew the stimulants would keep Macmillan awake and alert as long as he kept taking them but sleep deficit would build up and the price would have to be paid when he stopped. ‘What’s new?’ he asked.

Macmillan turned the map on his desk towards Steven and said, ‘There are a number of breather ducts above the pipeline south of the aqueduct. I’ve arranged for a team from 45 Commando at Arbroath to gain access at one and interrupt the water supply for the duration of the exercise.

‘
Good,’ said Steven.

‘
Six men from the SAS regiment have been detailed to support you in mounting the guard on the aqueduct if you’re still intent on being there?’

Steven said that he was.

‘
In that case I’ve to let them know. They’re going up by helicopter. They’ve made a special arrangement to pick you up at City Airport at 6p.m. Don’t be late. They don’t want people asking questions.’

‘
I won’t,’ said Steven.

‘
Best be off then,’ said Macmillan with a look that wished him well.

Steven had a not unpleasant feeling of
deja vu
as he sprinted across the tarmac in a crouching run to get into the helicopter.

‘
Just like old times,’ he said as the door was closed behind him and he barely had time to sit down before the whirling blades had plucked them up and away.

‘
We heard you were regiment,’ said one of the six men sitting there in combat gear but with no badges or indications of rank. ‘I’m Mick.’

‘
A long time ago,’ said Steven.

Mick turned to the others and pointed as he said, ‘Terry, Jonesey, Popeye, Cluedo and Walsh.’

Steven nodded and said, ‘You’ve been briefed?’

‘
Three hours ago,’ said Mick. ‘They said you would fill in the missing bits.’

Steven nodded, screwing up his face with the effort of trying to converse above the noise of the engines. ‘Where are we headed?’

‘
We plan to keep well away from the area in question,’ said Mick. ‘We’ll land on the west side of Loch’ – he pronounced it, Lock – ‘Lomond and boat it across south of Inversnaid. We’ll tab it cross country from there to the Loch Ard Forest and skirt round the bottom of Loch Chon, staying in the forest all the way along the south shore of Loch Ard before approaching the aqueduct. Think you’re up to it?’

‘
I hadn’t anticipated this,’ said Steven.

‘
Just a walk in the park,’ smiled Mick.

Steven’s answering smile was a bit more fragile.

The engine noise made unnecessary conversation difficult so the remainder of the journey was largely completed without it.

Steven felt a slight hollow feeing in his stomach as he watched the helicopter take off into the night sky, leaving them a couple of hundred metres inland from the west bank of Loch Lomond. He busied himself getting into the kit that had been brought along for him while the others prepared the inflatable boat for the crossing. Luckily it was a calm night with stars visible in a clear sky, although it had been raining earlier and the ground was wet and the air full of the smell of wet pine needles.

‘
Ready?’ asked Mick as Steven secured his Bergen rucksack after having packed away his own clothes in it.

‘
As I’ll ever be.’

The loch crossing was bumpy but not as uncomfortable as Steven had anticipated. By the time they were pulling the boat up on to the east shore and finding a suitable place to hide it away, he had actually started to feel exhilarated. It was certainly a change from what he would normally be doing on a Monday night and he felt very much alive. He felt even better when Mick said, ‘There’s a forestry track leading inland from here. We’ll use that.’

They headed inland and were discussing radio codes and channels to be used when Walsh, who was walking up ahead, held up his hand and signalled that they get down. They dropped to their knees and remained quiet and motionless while Walsh investigated whatever it was that had caught his attention. He re-appeared as if by magic a few moments later at Mick’s shoulder and whispered, ‘Two blokes camping. They sound like bank clerks.’

Mick nodded and said, ‘We’re crossing the route of the West Highland Way here. We’ll skirt round them.’

The six men made a slight detour to the north to bypass the men who would never realise they had been there and rejoined the path to head inland. It was heavily rutted in parts through use by heavy Forestry Commission vehicles but easy-going compared to what Steven had feared. Trying to make good progress through knee-deep bracken on ground that never seemed to be level, as he remembered from Highland walks in the past, could be soul-destroying. He was to become reacquainted with the feeling when, south of Loch Ard, Mick said it was time to leave the track.

At three in the morning they were in position at a point west of the aqueduct which afforded them a good view of it.

‘
Get your head down for a couple of hours,’ said Mick to Steven. ‘I’ll wake you if anything’s going down.’

Steven needed no second invitation. He woke at six, alerted by a burst of static on the radio.

‘
Marines are in position in the breather duct one mile south of here,’ said Mick.

‘
Good,’ said Steven accepting the glasses which Mick offered him and taking a good look at the aqueduct and the area round about through them. There was a white van parked near the base with ‘Diamond Security’ on its side.

‘
We’ll move closer as soon as the civvies clock off,’ said Mick. ‘In the meantime we’ll have a brew . . . won’t we Terry?’

“
Yes boss,” replied Terry who set about making tea.

Mick outlined plans for guarding the aqueduct during the course of the exercise. They would split up to individually cover all possible angles of approach, the exception being Steven who would stay beside Mick in case his advice was needed.

‘
How dangerous is this stuff?’ asked one of the men.

‘
It won’t kill you,’ replied Steven. ‘But you could end up wishing it had if you get infected. Ideally we want to take it from these three characters before they have a chance to open whatever they’re carrying it in – probably something that looks like a thermos flask.’

‘
So don’t go having a fly cuppa, Cluedo,’ said Mick. ‘You might get more than you bargained for.’

The comment served to release the tension that had been building almost imperceptibly.

When it got to seven thirty the men turned their radios to the channel being used by the Territorial Army for the duration of the exercise so that they could listen in to what was going on. At a quarter to eight it started to rain and at five to, Walsh, who’d been keeping watch on the aqueduct, reported, ‘Civvies moving out, Boss.’

Almost at the same time the radio crackled into life and the men heard Major David Innes ask his deployed units to report their position. Mick marked them down on the map as they radioed in. ‘Can’t fault that,’ he murmured.

‘
Operation underway gentlemen,’ said Innes. ‘Good luck everyone.’

‘
Half a dozen Terries by the aqueduct, Boss,’ said Walsh.

‘
Mick took a look at the soldiers who’d been detailed to guard the aqueduct and said, ‘Time we moved in. Anyone who gets himself spotted by a Terry gets my foot up his arse.’

The men made last minute adjustments to their camouflage clothing, a couple of them adding yet more bracken to better the match with their surroundings. They wished each other well before moving out at ten second intervals. Steven and Mick moved south east of the aqueduct and fashioned themselves a hide in a small hollow, which they augmented with a makeshift roof made out of dead wood and leaves from the forest floor.

‘
What happens to the flasks when we get them?’ asked Mick.

‘
A mobile lab will be in position just outside Aberfoyle on the east side,’ said Steven. ‘They’ll take care of them.

‘
The very thought of germ warfare makes my flesh creep,’ said Mick.

‘
Can’t say I’m a big fan either,’ said Steven.

Three hours went past slowly in complete radio silence and the small talk had long since run out when Mick let out his breath in a long sigh and murmured, ‘C’mon.’ He looked at his watch and frowned but it was another half hour before he suddenly clapped the earphones, which had been hanging round his neck, to his ears. ‘They’ve got one,’ he told Steven. He slipped the earphones down again and marked the position on his map. ‘Well done the Terries,’ he said. ‘Captured one man and secured the container he was carrying.’

Steven’s facial expression indicated that he was impressed too. He was even more impressed when at one thirty a second terrorist was taken prisoner by the soldiers.

‘
Did they get the flask?’ asked Steven.

‘
Yup, safe and sound. Who would have thought . . .’ said Mick, thoughtfully. ‘These guys are good. I take back everything I ever thought about them. They’re doing a cracking job.’

By four in the afternoon both Mick and Steve were getting edgy. Steven was even beginning to think that the third man might have abandoned the mission if he had been aware of the capture of the other two. He was about to say this to Mick when the radio crackled into life again and Mick smiled broadly as he relayed news of the capture of the third man.

‘
Bloody hell,’ said Mick. ‘We were a waste of space. The Terries got them all.’

Mick switched the radio back on to speaker mode and Steven heard Innes tell his men that the operation was now over. They had taken all three terrorists prisoner and captured the “biological weapons” they were carrying intact.

‘
Well done everyone,’ said Innes before giving out a map reference for the troops to rendezvous at.

‘
Time to offer our congratulations, I think,’ said Steven getting to his feet. ‘I take it you have a cover story?’

‘
MOD observers,’ said Mick with a smile.

The SAS men met up and marched together to the rendezvous point given out by Innes. They arrived there fifteen minutes later, attracting strange looks from the soldiers already there. Steven sought out Innes, showed him his ID and introduced Mick and his men as MOD observers sent in to monitor the exercise without forewarning. Innes beamed as he was congratulated on the performance of his men. ‘We do our best,’ he said modestly like the captain of the winning team on school sports day.

Steven asked about the containers the terrorists had been carrying.