Zero Option (31 page)
Authors: Chris Ryan
I took a deep breath and asked, 'What's the position on approval for the shoot?'
'Nothing confirmed yet.'
'Ah, shit!'
'How are you doing, Geordie?' Yorky sounded quite concerned, like some old uncle.
'Slight local difficulty.
But basically, we've got the weapon and done the practice shoot. Once we're out of here, we're going ahead with the recce of the park itself.'
'You'd better carry on, then. As soon as we hear anything, we'll pass it to your safe house.'
'Roger, Yorky… and thanks.'
I was about to switch off when I heard him say, 'Hello?'
'Yes?'
'The Commander's just come back in. I'll put him on.'
I waited a moment,
then
heard Fraser's cheerful voice.
'Geordie?
How's it going?'
'So so.'
I filled him in on what I'd told Yorky, and got back the same stuff about the three locations. But then Fraser added, '
From
what we're hearing, the PI1LA aren't very happy with your man.'
'Don't they want him back, then?'
'Oh yes, they want him all tight. But now their aim is to top him.'
'Delightful!'
'It is,' Fraser agreed. 'Does he realise that?'
'He knows he's in the shit. But he's that arrogant, he probably thinks he can talk his way out of it. At least, that's how we read him.'
I switched off feeling very low. This thing seemed never-ending. It had dragged on so long already that I couldn't imagine it coming to any definite conclusion.
I tried to galvanise myself with the thought that it was going to have to come to a conclusion within twenty- four hours - by this time tomorrow. Either the shoot would go down as the Prime Minister walked out into his rose garden before breakfast, or the PIRA's patience would run out.
Yet again I turned, drove up the hill and past the big tree. No answer on the radio. It could still be that the curve of the hill was blocking us, even if Tony had climbed clear of the range and was struggling up through the scrub. He, if anyone, would get Farrell out of the mess safely. I trusted Tony at least as much as I trusted any of my British mates, not only for his physical strength and capability, but for his levelheadedness.
Back at the lay-by, I pulled in for the third time and sat looking at the map. I'd just tried the radio yet again when I looked in the mirror and saw a car coming up from behind.
Police.
Pulling in behind me, too.
Jesus! I sat tight, watching, while the two men got out and advanced on the lekord. I just had time to scramble the earpiece and throat-mike out of sight before they drew level.
I wound down the window and said, 'Good morning.'
They “returned the greeting civilly enough, but immediately began to ask questions. The boss figure was a sergeant - beefy, red-faced, with a big belly, like a rugger player gone to seed.
'Can I ask what you're doing here?'
'On my way up to Great Missenden. Had a bit of time in hand.'
'You
came the other way just now.'
'That's fight. I was delivering a parcel.'
'Where to?'
'An address in Stonor.'
'Do much delivering, do you?'
I was uncomfortably aware that the second copper was walking round behind the car, giving it the close eyeball. Probably they thought I was a poacher, and had a deer in the back. Probably they were scanning for traces of blood.
'Look,' I said. 'What's the matter?'
'Nothing,' went the sergeant. 'May I have a look in
the boot of your car?'
I got out and faced the guy, to find that he was a couple of inches taller than me. 'You'd much better not,' I said.
'What's in there, then?'
'Nothing to do with you.'
'We
haven't been poaching, have we?'
'Certainly not.'
'So why all the secrecy?'
'I can't explain.'
The radio in the sergeant's breast pocket began honking off, and he was distracted for a moment as he dealt with the call. What could I do? It was possible that the police in the Chequers area had already been squared away and told to stand off, but the guys down here would know nothing about our operation. If I did a runner I'd be chased, and the car would be traced, and Tony would be stranded. If I refused to open up, I might be arrested for obstructing the police.
Before I could take a decision the sergeant said, 'I'm afraid I require you to open the boot.'
'Listen…' I stood between him and the back of the car. 'I'm a member of special forces, on a classified operation. Will you please get on the phone to my control room?'
Without answering, the sergeant lumbered forward and jabbed his thumb on the boot catch. Short of knocking him out of the way, there was nothing I could do to stop him. Up came the lid. With the movement of the car through the bends, the rifle had rolled over once, partially unwrapping itself, and the barrel lay there plain to see.
'What the hell . . .?' began the sergeant. His beefy face suddenly turned even redder as a surge of adrenalin flushed up through him until I thought he was on for vertical take-off, leaching down, he pulled away the bubble-wrap and exposed the main body of the weapon. 'What the devil is this?'
'It's a Haskins five-oh sniper rifle,' I told him in the most casual voice I could muster.
A second later I saw him reaching for his radio in a kind of automatic twitch.
'NO!' I said sharply. 'Don't put through any.report.
Not until you've spoken to my control. Here.'
I pulled out my mobile, dialled the incident room, and providentially got straight through to Fraser. 'John,'
I said.
'Geordie.
I have a problem. I'm with a police sergeant. He's seen I've got a big rifle in my possession, and I need you to explain what we're at.'
'All right.' Fraser sounded imperturbable as ever.
'Where are you?'
'Out in the Chilterns, above the range I told you about.'
'Has he caught you.
with
the weapon?'
'Yes.'
'OK, I'll speak to him.'
I handed the phone over and stood back, watching the sergeant's face go through every conceivable expression: shock, incredulity, alarm, bewilderment. It took several minutes, but I could tell Fraser was winning the battle, because after a while the sergeant began giving details of his own head of station, along with the telephone number. In the end he said, 'Very good, sir,' and handed the phone back 1
;o
me.
'Is he going to speak to your boss?' I asked.
'That's right.'
'Great.
I'm sure they'll sort it out between them.'
The sergeant looked shattered. 'Never heard anything like it,' he went.
'Never seen a weapon like that out here.
Buggered if I have.'
'You live and learn.'
I didn't know what Fraser had told him, and I wasn't going to ask; but now that our practice shoot was partially blown, I reckoned I might as well resuscitate my covert radio.
'I got separated from a colleague,' I explained. 'I'll just see if I can raise him.'
This time the first call produced an answer.
'We're on the RV,' Tony confirmed.
'Has anyone seen or followed you?'
'No.'
'Standby, then.
I'll collect you in a few minutes.'
A moment later the sergeant's radio came to life again, and he got a stream of instructions to thin out.
From the way he kept repeating, 'Yes sir, no sir, very good sir,' I knew it must be his boss. At the end he said to me, 'Well, that's it. I'm to leave you alone.'
'Thanks,' I said. 'And you won't talk about this, either?'
I made it sound like a question, but it was more or less an order - and when he said, 'no' he almost added 'sir' again.
'Cheers, then.' Without more ado I closed the boot, got back in the car, swung round and set off for the ERV.
Not knowing quite what the plods had heard, I didn't want them to see Tony come out of the undergrowth with Farrell cuffed to him, so I went back down the road at a fair bat and scorched to a halt under the big tree. Almost at once Tony emerged from the bushes behind it. Even though I was expecting him, he gave me quite a shock, because his face was covered in blood, with sweat-streaks coming down through it.
Farrell's was the same.
'Get in, get in!' I snapped, holding a back door open.
Then, when we were rolling, I asked, 'What happened?'
'Goddamn thorns!' Tony exclaimed. 'We're to bits by the bastards. We got bushed in that thicket.
Jesus Christ - I never knew you had .jungle like that over here.'
Back at the shit-house, it took us a good hour to sort ourselves out and get some breakfast down our necks.
After they'd had showers, Tony and Farrell didn't look too bad. Their faces were scratched, but only superficially, as if they'd been caught on the job by their girlfriends. As I'd anticipated, they'd had a miserable time forcing their way uphill along animal tunnels under hawthorn bushes and through brambles, while the gamekeepers, decoyed by my distraction shot, charged around in the valley below.
As if to confirm my earlier suspicions, Tony told me that Farrell had gone over the moon about the rifle. When he had seen the bullet holes opening up in the white he'nearly pissed
himself
with delight. Tll tell you one thing,' Tony added. 'Boy, do those rounds make a racket! It's a supersonic crack like nothing on earth. If the Prime Minister
gets
one of them go close past him he's going to jump a mile.'
'No he isn't,' I said. 'He's going to drop down like a sack of potatoes.'
As soon as I'd got myself together, I called the incident room again.
'I hear you've been advertising, your presence throughout the Home Counties,' said Yorky.
'Bollocks,' I told him. 'We couldn't help it.
We did land up in a tight corner, though.'
'Not to worry.
The Commander's got it sorted. And you've got your permission.'
'What?
For the shoot?'
'Yes.
A secure fax from Number Ten came in a few minutes ago.'
Jesus!'
'The Prime Minister has OK'd it. In fact, he's definitely in favour.'
'He must have balls, then.'
'He has. But he's been listening to what Special Branch had to say. They advised him that he's in a dangerously vulnerable position. The threat from the PItLA has intensified, and they can't guarantee to contain it. In other words, they were saying there's a good chance he's going to get bloody shot sooner or later. This operation you've hatched is seen as the best means of defusing the situation.'
'Got it.'
'By
gum, you'd better get yourself sorted,' Yorky went on. 'If this goes wrong, it could bring the government down.'
The PM's reaction was what I'd been expecting- what I'd been wanting, really: anything to get me out of this mess. But when the go-ahead finally came through it was a shock all the same.
Yorky hadn't finished. 'So - you're on. But you still may be saved the trouble. The SP team are going ahead with plans to assault the hostage location, just as soon as we've got it pinpointed.'
'What's the latest on that?'
'I'll hand you over to the Commander. He'll fill you in.'
'Geordie?' It was Fraser.
'Hello.'
'I got your local copper straightened out.'
'Thanks. Sorry to come at you out of the blue like that.'
'Don't worry. You shouldn't get any more hassle from the law. Now, listen. As for the hostages: we're concentrating on our second alternative.
The flat.
It's number fifty-seven Cumberland House, on the fifth floor of a block in
'Oh, God! You think they're there?'
'There's a good chance. It's a two-bedroomed flat Quite an old block, built in the sixties. Your guys are going to do an outside recce, and meanwhile we're trying to trace the owners of the apartment. Also, we need to get the original architect's plans, so that we know the exact internal layout. The trouble is, the flats aren't standardised - quite a lot of variation from one to another. One minute…'
He paused, as if he was looking through his notes, and then continued: 'Various owners have carried out alterations, as well. The firm that designed the block has been taken over, but we're hoping to find the plans with their successors. Also, we're hoping to occupy number fifty-eight next door, to do a bit of through- the-wall surveillance.'
All at once I felt choked, and couldn't speak. The fact that so many people, all highly skilled, were working away on my behalf, doing their utmost to save Tim and
Tracy… Suddenly it seemed too much.
'Geordie?
Are you there?'
I got hold of myself and said, 'Yep.'
'Take it easy, lad. You'll be all fight. Call again when
you're back.'
'Will do.'
'Here's Yorky again.'
'OK.'
'What are your plans now, Geordie?'
'Tony and I are offto recce the park. I don't trust the PIRA measurements and details.
I need to see for myself.'
'Fair enough.
But as soon as you get back, we need a detailed breakdown of your projected movements and timings. OK?'
'Sure.'
Farrell had predictably tried to muscle in on the recce, but I told him there was no way Tony and I would take him with us. 'Walk around the park of the Prime Minister's official country residence with you cuffed to one of us?' I had said. 'Pull the other one. You'd be back in the nick within minutes - and we'd be there with you. You're not walking round on your own, either.'
A few minutes' drive northward through the lanes had brought us within reach of Chequers. It was now
. The day had heated up a good deal but the sky remained overcast, and the air was muggy. I was still high on adrenalin, feeling tense and brittle, both exhausted and hyper-alert at the same time. I'd deliberately left behind the PIRA notes and instructions, but I carried them word-for-word in my mind.
Once again, in an attempt to clear my head, I was bouncing theories off Tony. 'If Fraser's squared things away properly with the local cops, I presume he's done the same with the security force at the house,' I said. 'So we shouldn't get any aggro, either today or tomorrow morning.
'I guess not,' Tony agreed. 'But presumably normal security will be operating. If the home troops see anybody acting suspiciously, they'll challenge them. I mean, they may see us walking round, but they won't know who we are.'
'That's right. We could be a couple of PIRA dickers.
But we've got to get a good look at the place. Good enough to be able to convince Farrell that we've done a proper recce.'
'Sure. Take it easy now.
Only a mile to go.'
We were driving northwards along the bottom of a broad valley, farmland rising on
either slope, and
woods high above us to right and left. I slowed down, and a
moment later To-ny pointed right, saying, 'Dirtywood Farm. Hell of a name for a house. In a minute we'll see the lodge and the park gates of Chequers right in front
of US.
'
There it was. The lodge turned out to be a substantial building made of brick, with pillars supporting wrought iron gates. Beyond the formal entrance the drive ran straight along an avenue of trees towards the main house, which was visible in the distance. Here the main road swung hard right, and we followed it round to the east. Three or four hundred yards on we came to another sharp bend, a left-hander this time, with a rough parking-place on the outside of it. A couple of cars were already standing there, at the point where a long-distance footpath crossed the road. Obviously it was a favourite take-offpoint for walkers setting out on a hike.
I pulled in on to the sandy verge. 'This'll do,' I said.
'We can tab it from here.'
We'd dressed as casually as possible, in check shirts and jeans, to make ourselves look like run-ofthe-mill hikers. Our binos could be just a sign of our interest in birds.
There were already a couple of other people ahead of us on the footpath, so we set off after them, through an iron kissing-gate and across a big open field of young corn. Now we were heading west, back towards the drive and the entrance lodge, with the .house sitting in its shallow valley away to our right. Immediately features began to chime in with the PIIA descriptions I'd committed to memory: the back drive coming in to the house at right angles from our right, the clumps of trees,
the
memorial obelisk high on a hill in the distance.
Soon we came to the avenue and the main drive.
'One camera here,' said Tony quietly.
