Andy McNab - Exit wound

We walked up the ramp and joined the spur that led to the main terminal. People milled about at gates or drifted in and out of shops that seemed to sell nothing apart from chunky watches and bottles of vodka shaped like AK-47s. I finally spotted a pharmacy.

I’d briefed Anna. She went in, and came out again with a pack of tissues and a jar of stuff that stank of eucalyptus. I looked at her with obvious gratitude and rubbed a handful round my throat. It made my eyes water. I opened the tissues and had a good blow. The airport was bound to be crawling with CCTV. Untold pairs of eyes would already be watching us. This was no time to look furtive or guilty, or anything other than a passenger with two days’ growth and a bad cold.

We came to the end of the walkway and took a down escalator, following the signs for Passport Control and Baggage Reclaim. I could see the Immigration hall straight ahead of us when we were only halfway down the escalator. This was where Igor Sinitsin would stand or fall. It all depended on whether the body had been found. Unlikely until it started to smell. Then it would need to be identified, and the only ID was the Merc’s number-plate. It should give me a few days, but you never knew.

There were four or five people queuing at each of the desks. I blew my nose to give myself something to do. At the same time I reddened my face by holding my nose and trying to breathe out.

We waited in line. I still had my day-sack on my right shoulder. Anna had hers on with both straps fastened, and a small blue plastic wheelie-case by her side. She was a pro: no hold luggage to lose control of or delay you. We exchanged a smile, but there was no excessive eye contact. For those watching on monitors and from behind two-way mirrors, that would add up to suspicious behaviour.

The suit in front of us went through with not much more than a nod and a wave to the official. It was Anna’s turn to approach the booth. She looked back and pointed. I saw her gripping her throat and miming a cough.

The Immigration guy signalled me to join them. He was mid-thirties and looked as if he spent every hour he wasn’t in his booth pumping iron, shaving his head and taking misery pills. He also looked much more interested in her than me, that was for sure.

I handed over my passport. He asked me something.

I made a sound as if to speak, then brought a fistful of tissues up to my face and croaked. My throat was agony.

Anna answered for me.

His eyes flicked up and down as he studied first the picture, then my face. He put the passport down below the level of the desk and I saw the tell-tale glow of ultraviolet light. Something troubled him. He looked back into my eyes and muttered another question. I guessed it wasn’t to ask me why I was so much more handsome in the flesh than on camera.

I gave a weak smile and Anna gobbed off. He grunted something but he didn’t hand back the passport. There was a bit of a lull, like he was waiting for me to fill the silence with a confession.

Then Anna made another comment and he smiled. He put the document back on the desktop. As I took it, his attention had already returned to the line.

I started to walk. We were nearly there.

The sliding doors opened into the arrivals hall and we ran the gauntlet of taxi drivers holding up bits of cardboard and people clutching bunches of flowers. Nobody gave us a second glance.

Anna pointed towards an exit. I was still apprehensive. Being dependent on others gave me the same feeling as knocking on a strange door without knowing who or what was on the other side.

We set off across the huge concourse. Judging by the signs, we were either heading for the car-rental desks, the platform for the Moscow express or the car park.

We came out of the terminal and took a left. Definitely the car park. As we rounded the corner of the building and entered the walkway into the multi-storey, we turned left again. We were at the bottom of a stairwell.

A guy in his late sixties was standing waiting, a black woollen coat over his arm. His hair was grey and well-cut, like the suit he was wearing under his open black raincoat and the woollen scarf around his neck.

Anna flew into his arms and it was full-on hugs all round. They kissed each other five or six times on the cheek then drew back and gobbed off to each other in Russian for several seconds. He ignored me and made her put the coat on. I’d started to appreciate her joke. It might have been summer in Moscow, but there was a chill in the air.

She thanked him for his kindness, gave him a beaming smile and fed an arm through his.

I took the chance to look around. I mostly noticed what was missing. There were no CCTV cameras trained where we were standing. This boy was switched on.

They talked some more. He spoke quietly and warmly, his pale grey eyes fixed on hers. They were slightly rheumy with age, and made him look kind, like everyone’s favourite granddad.

She finally turned to me. ‘Semyon was alarmed after my call. He wasn’t expecting me back for another two days.’

‘And Semyon is…?’

She translated for him and he looked at me and smiled. His teeth were yellowing, but at least they were still his. He offered us both a cigarette from a light blue pack. Anna took one. He said something that seemed to have nothing to do with cigarettes and she answered.

‘What’s he saying?’

He sparked up a plastic disposable and she cupped her hands round his as he offered her the flame.

‘He’s asking me about you. I said we can trust you.’

‘Can you?’

‘I’ve spent my working life around bad people. I can smell them. And why would you risk everything to be here with us now?’

‘Risk everything?’

Now it was my turn for the smile. ‘When he sees what you did to my neck, Semyon will probably want to kill you.’

The old boy spoke again and her brow creased. The waffle bounced back and forth a couple of times.

She turned back to me. ‘It’s not good, I’m afraid. The Falcon came back here, to Moscow.’

‘No – that’s good. Tell him that’s good.’

Anna didn’t bother. ‘He says it’s due to go to the proving ground tomorrow. Assuming everyone is still together, that can mean only one thing. They will test fire. There were rumours that it was faulty, but-’

Semyon gobbed off some more.

‘You know about dark flares? You know the importance of them? You know that the SA-16 can defeat-’

I dredged a name out of my briefing notes. ‘Vologda?’

She nodded. ‘It’s in the middle of a military training area.’

‘I know.’ I undid my day-sack and took out the Nikon. ‘How long will it take to get there?’

‘Maybe six hours by road.’

‘There’s no train?’

‘The line goes from St Petersburg only, and the area is north of the city. No internal flights either.’

Semyon said something else.

‘The weather forecast is cloudy until the afternoon. They will want a clear sky.’

With the camera powered up, I opened the side to replace the memory card. There was something I wanted to show Semyon. ‘Does he know where the people in the Falcon are now? They in Moscow?’

They waffled away, but it wasn’t sounding hopeful.

‘Can he try and find out where they are? It’s really important.’ I didn’t give a shit what Anna had in mind for them after she had her photos. ‘Where is the Falcon?’ If I could get to it before they took off tomorrow, maybe I’d be able to get the job done without leaving the city.

She didn’t have to ask Semyon. ‘No good. M3C have their own hangar in a military air base on the other side of the city.’

I passed him the Nikon. ‘Ask if he knows him.’