Adrian Magson - No Tears for the Lost

A bird chirruped overhead, then flew away through the branches with a clatter of wings. Riley held her breath and half-closed her eyes, in case the man looked directly at her. She knew that if you stared too hard at somebody, it might eventually trigger an instinctive response and draw his attention.

Suddenly he was looking right at her, eyes opening wide in surprise. Before she could move, he turned and was gone.

Riley was still holding her cup in her other hand. She dropped it and pulled out her mobile. She could just about see Palmer and the others through the branches, but they were too far away to alert without shouting. It was pointless anyway. If the men around Palmer were just locals, they might panic and start blowing holes in the trees right where she was standing.

‘What’s up?’ Palmer’s tone was casual, but he knew there was a problem.

‘I’m in the trees, in front of you and slightly to your left,’ she told him. ‘There’s a man wearing a grey baseball cap and what looks like camouflage cream. I thought it was one of Keagan’s men, but when he saw me he legged it.’

‘Which way?’

‘Back towards the road.’

‘Wait one.’ She watched him turn and speak to Keagan. The Major snatched a radio from his pocket and began calling names. He repeated one name several times without any response and began to look alarmed, as if all his plans had suddenly come unstuck.

Palmer came back on. ‘One of his men has gone off-line,’ he said softly. ‘Stay where you are and watch your back.’ He began walking towards the trees at an angle away from Riley. He was holding the shotgun in front of him.

Riley felt a cold shiver run down her spine at the thought of all the space behind her, most of it in deep shadow. Two steps sideways were sufficient to disguise anyone dressed in the right colour clothing; four steps rendered them invisible. She tucked her mobile into the top pocket of her jacket, then slid against the comforting bulk of a nearby tree, gripping the stick with both hands. She lowered herself to a crouch, hoping to see some sign of movement nearer the ground, but the thicket was too heavy to see more than a few yards in any direction.

A crashing to her right signalled the man was coming back. She held her breath. Then a darker shape than the background foliage appeared, charging through the thicket but moving with surprising speed.

Riley tensed. If he carried on his path, he’d crash right into her — and she had nowhere to go. She gripped the stick tightly and waited for the impact, hoping she didn’t get mown down like a helpless fairy.

But the intruder must have spotted her at the last second. He suddenly veered away with a muttered oath, hurtling at an angle through the trees and leaving behind a whipping frenzy of shaking branches and falling leaves. One of the branches swatted Riley across the mouth and sent her spinning, and by the time she got to her feet, the silent watcher was gone and a tall figure was standing over her with an impassive look on his face.

He was holding a pistol pointed at her head.

‘Did you see him?’ Riley asked, spitting out bits of bark and clambering to her feet. Her pride was more bruised than her face, and she wondered where this latest man had sprung from. God knows how they taught people like him and Palmer to move, she thought. They were like ghosts.

‘See who?’ he replied, and before she could protest, he’d spun her round and pushed her against a tree and was running expert hands over her. It was as impersonal and casually expert as it was demeaning, and she wanted to drop-kick him into the undergrowth.

When Palmer appeared, he was no longer carrying the shotgun, but had a furious Keagan in tow, shouting into a small radio. The minder who had searched her waited for a nod from his boss, then stepped back and disappeared among the trees without a word. Riley decided there was nothing wrong with their teamwork, even if their manners sucked.

‘You okay?’ said Palmer. He spoke automatically, but the look in his eyes showed concern.

‘No, I’m bloody not!’ Riley muttered. ‘That ape just treated me like a criminal.’

‘That was my fault,’ said Keagan. ‘I forgot to give him a description.’ He went back to his radio, clearly not too disturbed by the omission.

Palmer made a signal to Riley to follow him, and they walked back to the car. ‘We might as well leave,’ he explained. ‘Right now, we’re in the way. It’s still their job.’

‘They’ve got four watchers in place, yet someone gets close enough to lob a brick,’ Riley said angrily, pulling off her boots and replacing them with shoes. Her upper lip was smarting and she had a flash print of the man’s eyes in her mind, boring into hers. Not that it would help her recognise him again. The smears of black on his face had done a good job of breaking up his features. ‘Some protection team.’

‘Maybe.’ Palmer nodded, deep in thought. He looked back towards Keagan, busy organising his men to make a sweep of the woods for their missing colleague.

‘You’ve gone all quiet and moody,’ she said. ‘What’s up?’

Palmer climbed in the car and started the engine. ‘Something about this doesn’t add up. Keagan told me he’s been told to stand down as of tomorrow, ready for re-assignment. That’s another way of saying that Myburghe no longer rates a security team.’

‘So?’

‘If Myburghe was still an important member of the diplomatic corps, there’s no way they’d leave him exposed — especially if serious threats had been made against him. It would be like telling anyone who cared to listen that it was open season on Her Majesty’s Foreign Office staff. They’d have nutcases and terrorists coming out of the woodwork all over the world.’

‘So they’ve cut him adrift?’

He nodded. ‘Looks like it. The only question is why?’

‘Maybe Tristram will tell me.’

‘If you could get him to talk. And if he knows anything.’

They drove back to London.

‘You were out in Colombia, weren’t you?’ Riley looked across the table at John Mitcheson, who was staring dreamily back, a happy smile on his face and a glass of wine in his hand. They were in a local Italian restaurant having a late dinner. Mitcheson had completed his latest assignment earlier than he’d thought, but was about to go off on another the next morning. After the excitement of her day in the woods, it was a welcome diversion.

‘Uh-huh. For a while.’

‘What did you do out there?’

‘A bit of training, mostly. Their government supplied the anti-drugs units and the British army ran the courses. Why?’

‘Bear with me. What’s FARC?’

Mitcheson sat up, eyes instantly losing the dreamy look. ‘Bloody hell, that’s a conversation stopper.’

‘Sorry. It’s a work thing. Palmer told me a bit about them, their fight with the Colombian government. Are they dangerous?’

He nodded. ‘As snakes. The British and American governments are helping the Colombians wipe out the poppy fields, which is where FARC and the cartels make their money. No poppies, no money, no weapons, no fight. If they can’t have a pop at the army or the anti-drugs troops, they take it to the streets and try to knock off anyone they don’t like the look of.’

‘Successfully?’

‘When they want to. They’ve killed some DEA people — the US Drug Enforcement Administration — in the past few years, and a lot of Colombian army and police, along with some judiciary. They don’t mess about.’

‘Is it dangerous being an embassy employee down there?’

‘It can be. It’s a dangerous place.’

‘Does FARC ever target them specifically?’

‘It’s been known. Not so much the Yanks — they’re too well guarded, although they’ve lost some undercover people. But the British are less inclined to use high walls. Other than a team of Redcaps at the embassy, and a few special forces guys helping train the local army and police, embassy staff have to take care of themselves, how they travel, where they go and stuff. But nobody can be protected one hundred percent. On the other hand, FARC know if they go too far, they’ll bring down a lot of heat on themselves.’ He shrugged. ‘It’s a sensitive situation, but so far it’s been self-regulating. Why the interest? What’s Palmer got involved in?’