Richard Wiseman - To Kill Or Be Killed

In the dark the cigarette lit up a profile and Michael mentally stored the lines of the face, another skill the watchers had honed to an edge from natural talent by DIC trainers. Even then he didn’t stop there. He scanned a line inland and caught dim outlines, fuzzed by gloom, but moving nonetheless. He got as far as a fourth and with a narrowing of eyes he took the shortest route between the edge of the ocean and his attic.

The smoker flicked the butt away unaware, though he knew his habit was unhealthy, how true the black writing on the Lucky Strike pack was ‘Smoking Kills’.

A short time later Michael Dewey was back in the loft in the house in Drumbuie, tea in hand. He accessed the DIC network via the internet and alerted them to the illegal incursions. He contacted the police describing the men, but knowing that the remote location and the size of the area that such a small number of police patrols had to cover immediate capture of the intruders was unlikely. DIC wouldn’t expect Michael to take them on personally, not in those numbers, besides given the power of the DIC network and its coverage Dewey felt certain the men would be captured very soon. Messages sent Michael sat down to draw a sketch of the smoker.

Dover

7 a.m.

April 17th

Mary McKie waddled uncomfortably through her kitchen door, paused for breath and called up the stairs clutching her rounded bump.

“Come on David you’re going to miss your train!”

“Alright I’m coming.”

David McKie, tall, broad shouldered, sandy haired and dressed in a dark brown suit heavy footed down the stairs of his Dover semi. He checked his reflection briefly in the hall mirror, aware in his Spartan soul of the dangers of narcissism.

“Don’t want to be late first day.”

David bent and kissed her puffy cheek and rubbed at her denim covered pregnancy. She took one hand and held his face examining his eyes.

“No. You’ll be alright no?”

She had watched him stagnate at Dover customs, always wondering why with a degree in history he had applied to the civil service. True he had passed the Executive Officer’s exam and gone into the Scottish Office at the top, but he hadn’t liked the desk work. Then transferring to customs had brought the family to Dover and the adventurer in him had stopped him getting further up the promotion ‘ladder’. It was so like his father who’d spent twenty years in the army and got no further than sergeant. She was pleased that he’d got the London job and she was glad he’d be working from home most of the time. She was worried though mostly because of the lockable metal gun cabinet and the loft full of technical equipment the two men had come and fitted two months ago, but mostly she was worried because of David’s month long absence at Lympstone in Devon. She knew from Conor, David’s dad, that the marine commandos trained at Lympstone. She shared her worries with him and he had reassured her and she knew that he wasn’t a man to be held back from things he wanted to do. She also knew he wasn’t a man to take random risks.

“I’ll be fine and don’t forget I’ll be at home here a lot of the time. It’s only two weeks on the active rota three times a year, the rest I’ll be here.”

“That’ll be nice, especially now.” She hugged him as tightly as the pregnancy bump allowed.

Their three year old son Conor joined the scene.

“Me hug! Me Hug!”

He grabbed their legs and pulled at them. David bent down and picked him up and squeezed him. Conor struggled against the gaggle of kisses David planted on his son’s morning ruffled hair.

“A wee hug for my man Conor here!”

“I’m a boy.”

“You’ll be the man when I’m not here though. Look after mummy and bump.”

“Okay daddy.”

David put him down and for a moment there was silence.

“You’d better go, you’ll be late.”

“Righto.”

On his way to the door David picked up a medium sized black rucksack and a large black holdall. To his strong arms the rucksack was surprisingly light, especially when he thought that it contained his hand gun, ammunition, laptop, satellite phone, night binoculars, a digital SLR camera and a gun microphone. The holdall had changes of clothes and toiletries.

“David…”

“Aye…”

“I’m proud of you. Take care.”

“Bye love. See you in two weeks.”

“Call me tonight.”

Outside of the nineteen thirties semi-detached house on the outskirts of Dover, towards the Folkestone side of the Kent coast, David inhaled deeply and cleared the moisture from his eyes.

But for the contents of the rucksack, and the large black holdall, it might have been any man commuting to a job in London. As he closed the black iron garden gate David McKie thought momentarily of the thrill of being a spy.

“Morning David.” The neighbour’s voice cut into his thoughts.

McKie checked his stride for his retired neighbour’s undoubted banal conversation and turned, surreptitiously glancing at his watch.

“Morning Tom.”

“Off to Customs today? Guarding the borders?”

“Aye. That I am.”

“Listen David a word about that new satellite dish up on your roof

…”

David cut across him. “Not now Tom I’m late. I’ll talk to you later.”

With the view that people thought too much of the glamour of espionage David marched to the train station.

A87 near Port an-eorna

Scotland

7- 30 a.m.

April 17th

Trevor Stanton, the ‘fifth man’ that Michael Dewy had failed to spot when he had spotted the other four illegal entrants to the country on the shores of Loch Carron, had hitched a lift on a truck bound for Inverness. It was a lucky break and he knew it. The truck was on a return from Plockton, delivering refrigerated supplies to the hotels. Stanton knew he could have waited for hours, even had to have walked quite a long way before he’d got any transport. It wasn’t a straw he had drawn; he had chosen this starting approach to his journey south. It made most sense to him. The others had drawn for transport down the country.

He sat in the passenger seat of the van’s cab listening to the banter of the stereotype trucker. Stanton was barely able to keep his eyes open. He had brown, almost black eyes; harsh hard marbles with no hint of friendliness. The swim had really pushed into his energy reserves. Ten years in the French Foreign Legion, six years as a mercenary and the last three as a freelance assassin, hiring himself for the most part to foreign governments, had taken their toll on him. He was still incredibly fit, but at thirty nine, the oldest of the five, it was tough going. He knew the money on this one was enough to retire on though so it seemed worth it. Somebody wanted someone very important dead that was for sure.

“Where have you been?” The truck driver asked.

Stanton knew the drill. He reeled off some well rehearsed and thoroughly researched tourist details. The stock in trade lies of assassins and spies everywhere rolled out of his mouth with enthusiasm and verve. In spite of being tired he kept his focus.

The truck driver enthused over his homeland and bemoaned the effects of the tourist industry with a careful ‘no offence meant’ thrown in.

Duirnish Rail Station

7-30 a.m.

April 17th

Peter Mason, the first of the four illegal entrants to the country Michael Dewy had spotted, sat on a bench at Duirnish station. The station was a short damp walk from his arrival point on the shores of Loch Carron. He had a relatively short wait for his train, though the cold would make it seem longer. The train wasn’t due in until seven forty-one; they’d even had to ask for the train to stop there, as it was a request station, which Peter didn’t like; it felt like he was ‘lit up’. He could cope with the cold though. Six years in the army, three of those in the infantry and three in the SAS had given him layers of toughness that practically no environment could break through. The over work of infantry service in Afghanistan had led him to leave. He went into security work and got bored. Then he had gone ‘freelance’ as an assassin and had made good money and a polished reputation making tricky hits on both sides of the law. He had been contacted for this job three months ago. He had no idea who the mark was. All he knew was that the target would be revealed when he reached the contact point in London. Three words had been given for the contact point; ‘Priory Arms Vauxhall’. It didn’t give any indication of who was funding the job.