Andy McNab - Exit wound

Dex nodded. ‘And then, Red, I think we should consider missing out on the Friday-morning golf. We should get an earlier flight.’

Red Ken took a big drag and, a moment or two later, smoke seemed to curl out of every hole in his head. ‘Agreed.’

‘I’m going to keep saying it, lads. You sure you still want to go on? We’ve just picked up another problem, something else we have no control of, and-’

‘Save your breath, son.’ Red Ken moved forward a little and slapped Dex between the shoulder-blades. ‘Right, boy? Still got your eye on that castle?’

Dex turned and grasped his hand. ‘Definitely.’

There was a lot going on there that obviously went beyond words. I felt a little jealous, and pissed off with myself at the same time. These two and Tenny had made the effort to stay tight all these years. ‘What’s all this Monarch of the Glen shit?’

Dex gave a smile that seemed more wistful than his normal don’t-give-a-fuck version. ‘It’s not shit, Nick. I’ve been thinking a lot about my father lately. The night before I went to Eton, he sat me down and gave me just one piece of advice. It’s something I’ve never forgotten.’ The smile faded. He was lost in another world. His voice deepened. ‘“Son, the only way for people like us to succeed in this country is by keeping our heads below the parapet. Laugh, be the happy chappie. Don’t let anyone see you’re cleverer than they are. If you do, you’ll become a threat.”’

We walked some more. ‘And you know what, chaps? He was right. I was the class clown all through school. They called me the Wacky Paki and I crept in under the wire and was top of the class before they knew it.’

We stopped and looked across the hundred metres of Creek. The lights of Ye Olde Dubai danced on the water.

‘And then I joined the RAF, just like my dad. He flew Hurricanes, as you know. They called him Curry-in-a-Hurry. He was brilliant at putting on the smiley face, but in his head he was giving everybody the finger. I’ve done the same, but I’m fed up with smiling now. I’ve made up my mind. I’m going to become a Scottish laird. I’m going to buy the title. I’ve got a castle in mind.’ He looked at Red Ken. ‘Five acres when the tide’s out…’

He came in on cue: ‘… three when it’s in!’

They laughed.

‘I’m going to invent a McWacky-Paki tartan and join Gleneagles and the Royal and Ancient. Two fingers up to the lot of them. One for me, one for my father. He’d be proud of what I’m doing here. I’m going to have the last laugh, something he never had the good fortune to have.’ Dex put a hand on my shoulder. ‘And you, Nick? There has to be something more than just cash.’

‘There is – I told you. I’m here to cover your arses.’

Red Ken flicked his butt into the Creek. ‘Nearly there. You see the compound?’

Seventy or eighty metres ahead of us stood a construction site that took up the entire centre of the road. Diversions and temporary traffic-lights funnelled the traffic into one lane.

I was the only one who looked. Too many eyes on one point at the same time would prompt the boys behind us to ask, ‘What the fuck are they all looking at, and why?’

Red Ken stopped and made a meal of firing up his latest B amp;H. ‘This whole area is being regenerated. They’re going to tart up the promenade road like the Corniche the other side, make it all Gucci. And that’s where Dex lifts our wagon.’

Above the blue-painted wooden perimeter walls, I could see Portakabins stacked four or five high, linked by wooden staircases. Cranes reached up into the sky. Arrows and strips of yellow-and-white plastic tape guided us away from the Creek and around the construction site.

‘That’s if the wagon we want is still there, of course. This is our final recce, so it had better be.’

The site entrance was floodlit. A dozen or so lads squatted on their haunches in the dust around a kettle on a propane burner. A hut that looked like a garden shed provided the only security. Its windows and door were open because of the heat. The guard was watching one of the Indian star channels that played Bollywood 24/7. Flies bounced around in the light.

We let Dex check the place out as we passed the fire station on the opposite side of the road.

‘Everything’s fine, chaps. Three Tatas on parade, present and correct.’

The souk was a collection of narrow pedestrian streets covered by a corrugated roof. To create some kind of air flow, domestic fans had been screwed into each of the supporting pillars. It was packed with brightly lit shops, each with five or six bored-looking Indians sitting behind the counters watching TV. Every window was filled with shiny gold headdresses and belts, and the sort of breastplates they used for weddings out here.

Dex pointed excitedly. ‘I’m going to pop into this one. Look at the name.’ The shop was called Baghdad. That was where Dex had won his DFC, flying into a contact to pick up a wounded American infantryman. The Brits had wanted to bollock him for risking an airframe, but the Americans said if the Queen didn’t give him something, they would. That would have been very embarrassing.

Red Ken and I carried on walking. ‘See you down by the junction.’

He shook his head. ‘He wants to take Cinza to that ridiculous castle. Like I said, soft in the head, that one.’

I caught a glimpse of the checked and white shirts. They had split up, one on each side of the road.

Red Ken had pinged them as well. ‘Fuck ’em, Nick. We’ll deal with them when we have to.’ He pointed back to Baghdad. ‘You know what? She actually likes him. Both of them are nuts. They suit each other.’

‘He buying a ring?’

‘Been trying since the funeral. He can never find the right one, and then when he does, he forgets her finger size. He’s all over the place.’

A group of Indian guys were suddenly all over us like a rash, trying to herd us towards a once-in-a-lifetime bargain. ‘Buy watch, very good? OK Rolex, OK Breitling…’

‘Not today, mate.’

Dex reappeared and they descended on him instead. ‘I’m all right for Rolexes, chaps.’ He lifted his wrist to show a few thousand quid’s worth of chronograph. ‘Already got a real one!’

It was all good tourist banter. We were blending in.

The next assault was launched by guys with trays of cold cans and bottles. This time we were buyers. We stood under a fan and swigged our cans of Fanta. White Shirt followed suit beside a pillar about fifty away. Checked Shirt disappeared down one of the alleyways the watch-sellers wanted to lure us along. They weren’t doing too bad. They’d learnt a thing or two since the mall.

Red Ken took a couple of gulps and moved his head from side to side in the draught from the fan. ‘OK, listen in. We have a walk round, buy some tourist shite and head for a curry before we go back to the hotel. Tomorrow morning we play golf. If these lads stay with us, they’ll have a trigger from the clubhouse – they’re shite, but not so shite they’ll try and follow us round the course. So that’ll give me time to leg it, go get my wagon and position it for tomorrow night. Questions?’

I had plenty. But nothing I had said so far had had any effect, so I kept my mouth shut.

Something in a shop window grabbed Dex’s attention. ‘Now that really is something…’

Red Ken groaned.

‘No, Red, I mean really – behind the counter…’

We looked past the mountains of gold to a digital display. It took me a second to realize it was quoting gold prices in a comprehensive range of different currencies. $27,865 USD. That was about 3K lower than the price at Tenny’s funeral.

‘Fuck me, lads,’ Red Ken said. ‘We’d better get a move on.’