Stephen Leather - The Long shot

Shorty shook his head. “No, but it’s the number of a man who might be able to help you — if you can persuade him that you’re to be trusted.” He drained his glass, stood up and went back to the bar. Kelly slipped the card into the pocket of her coat and left. The two young men drinking Guinness watched her go. So did FBI agent Don Clutesi, his eye pressed to the camcorder on its tripod at the window overlooking Filbin’s. Clutesi didn’t recognise the woman, but she was clearly a cut above the normal type of customer who frequented the bar. Clutesi wondered if she was a hooker on the make. Young, blonde and pretty, what other reason could she have had for visiting a bar alone? She’d spoken to Shorty but Clutesi hadn’t picked up anything from the listening devices. Either they’d been out of range or they’d been whispering. Clutesi made a note in his incident book and stretched his arms above his head. He was tired, but there was another two hours to go before he was due to be relieved. Then he had to go back to Federal Plaza to meet the agent from Phoenix.

An FBI driver was waiting outside JFK holding a sign with Cole Howard’s name on it, and he carried Howard’s bag to the car. They made polite conversation on the drive into Manhattan, about the Mets, the weather, and the murder of three DEA agents in the Bronx that afternoon.

The driver took Howard into Federal Plaza and helped him obtain a visitor’s pass which Howard clipped to the breast pocket of his suit. The receptionist rang the Counter-Terrorism Division to tell them that Howard was on the way up, then she told him which floor to go to. The driver nodded goodbye and Howard headed to the elevator.

When the doors hissed open a small, shrewish woman with grey hair and a reluctance to look him in the eye took him along to Mulholland’s office. Ed Mulholland was in his fifties, with a craggy, lined face and a grey, military crewcut. He had a bone-crushing handshake and looked as if he worked out a lot.

“Cole, good to see you. Jake Sheldon speaks very highly of you. You want coffee? Tea?”

Howard shook his head. “No, I’m fine.”

Mulholland looked over Howard’s shoulder. “Katie, can you get Hank along for this, please? And ask Frank Sullivan and Don Clutesi to sit in, too. Thanks.”

As the secretary scurried away, Mulholland motioned to two grey sofas which were set at right angles to each other in the far corner of his office. The sofas faced a low, square brass and glass table on which were scattered half a dozen law-enforcement magazines. “Let’s sit over there, shall we, Cole, it’ll give us a bit more elbow room.” As the two men walked across the office, Mulholland slapped Howard on the back, a friendly pile-driving blow which almost rattled his teeth. “I’m really glad to have you on the team, Cole, you’ve done some great work on this. Great work.”

Mulholland reminded Howard of a crusading general who’d happily lead his men into battle, rushing towards a hail of bullets in the sure and certain knowledge that he couldn’t be touched, while all around him his adoring troops fell dying and wounded. He inspired confidence, but Howard felt that he was a bit too gung-ho, and too lavish with his praise. Howard put his briefcase by the side of one of the sofas and sat down, smoothing the creases of his trousers. Mulholland pulled over a high-backed swivel chair and placed it facing the sofas. A balding man of medium height in a cheap brown suit came into the office. Mulholland introduced him as Hank O’Donnell, Jr, director of the Counter-Terrorism section. O’Donnell looked more like a career bureaucrat than an anti-terrorism agent, and when Howard shook hands with him he noticed that his fingers were stained with ink as if he’d been writing with a leaky pen. He had a file under his arm. As O’Donnell moved to sit down on one of the sofas, Howard saw that the seat of the man’s pants were shiny as if he spent a lot of time sitting down.

Another man entered the office and Mulholland introduced him as an agent from the Counter-Terrorism (Europe) Division. Frank Sullivan was tall with sandy hair, a sallow complexion and a sprinkling of freckles across his snub nose. He explained that Don Clutesi was out on a surveillance operation and that he would be back in the office within the hour. Sullivan sprawled on the sofa while Mulholland eased himself into the chair like some omnipotent monarch taking his throne.

“This is by way of a pre-briefing prior to a meeting which we’ll be having with the Secret Service in Washington later tonight,” said Mulholland, his massive forearms folded across his barrel chest. “I want to get a feel for exactly what we’re up against here. Cole, you’ve done the lion’s share of the work on this, why don’t you bring us up to speed?”

Howard nodded and picked up his briefcase. He unlocked it and took out the files it contained, and dropped two of them onto the glass table. “Mary Hennessy and Matthew Bailey, both members of the Provisional Irish Republican Army, both wanted for murder by the British,” he said, “and both of them were filmed taking part in an assassination rehearsal in the Arizona desert.” He put a third file on the table. “Ilich Ramirez Sanchez, AKA Carlos the Jackal, the world’s most notorious terrorist responsible for a string of murders, hijackings and kidnappings. He was with Hennessy and Bailey in Arizona as they put three snipers through their paces.” He put the two Navy personnel files on the desk. “Rich Lovell and Lou Schoelen,” he said, “former Navy SEALs and expert snipers. Capable of hitting targets at a range of two thousand yards. The third sniper we haven’t managed to identify yet.”

Hank O’Donnell coughed quietly. “I think we might be able to cast some light on the third sniper,” he said, and handed his file to Howard. “Dina Rashid, Lebanese, one of the Christian militia’s best snipers.”

Howard opened the file. A colour photograph of a thin-faced girl with long brown hair, dark skin and black eyes was clipped to the inside cover. Howard remembered that the third sniper in the video had long hair.

“According to our Middle East Division, Rashid has been missing from Beirut for the past five months, and there’s a general request out for information on her whereabouts,” O’Donnell continued. “We’ve no record of her entering the US, but then we had no record of Hennessy, Bailey or Carlos passing through Immigration, either. You’ll see from the file that she and Carlos are not exactly strangers.” He coughed, almost apologetically. “In fact, for a time they were lovers.”

Howard nodded, and put the file on top of the rest. “We all know that Carlos was one of a number of terrorists summoned to Iraq by Saddam Hussein, and it’s generally assumed that they were briefed on a terrorist campaign aimed at the States and the United Kingdom.”

Mulholland leant forward, linking his fingers. “It’s more than an assumption, Cole. The IRA were among those who attended the meetings in Baghdad and only weeks afterwards they launched a mortar attack on Downing Street.”

Sullivan nodded. “There were several known IRA terrorists reported in Iraq over Christmas 1990, and the mortar attack was on February 7, 1991. The British Prime Minister, John Major, was in the Cabinet Room with his War Cabinet, and they were damn lucky not to have been killed. One of the mortars landed in the garden of Number 10 Downing Street and cracked the windows. Margaret Thatcher had installed blast-proof net curtains some years previously — that’s what saved them.”

“There’s no suggestion that Hennessy or Bailey were involved, is there?” Howard asked.

Sullivan shook his head. “Special Branch have their theories, but neither Hennessy nor Bailey was mentioned. Bailey was in the States at the time, anyway.”