Henry Porter - Empire State

Spelling’s confident presentation of the battle plan didn’t fool anyone. If the Americans and British, already welded together in an exclusive eavesdropping treaty known as Echelon, were to start killing or seizing suspects on European soil, untold damage would be done to an already shaky Western alliance. The resentment would last for years. This was to say nothing of the risk – or in Herrick’s mind, the certainty – of one or other European agency catching on and, out of justified concern or sheer bloodymindedness, preempting the situation by arresting the suspect and causing the others to flee. She also knew that the terrorists were nothing if not close students of Western intelligence trade-craft, and that the mastermind who had planned the switch at Heathrow would be the kind of man who had set up trip-wires to give early warning of just such an operation. Sooner or later, someone would stumble across one.

Everyone got this. Equally, they understood they were just at the start of RAPTOR. As time went on, the situation would change; the grand scheme would be buffeted by chance and circumstance. They were going along with it because during an operation the policy makers – in this case a none too bright President and a Prime Minister with attention deficit problems – would become dependent on those who implemented their plan. All of which meant there were great opportunities for the secret servants: advancement, increase in influence and, in Vigo’s case, rehabilitation.

But why show her the secret mechanism? The answer, of course, was that she had made the breakthrough, put it all together, so Spelling had been forced to include her. But why not Dolph, Sarre and Lapping? Simple. She had written the two-page report and then followed it up with her own inquiries at Heathrow. She understood the total operation on May 14 but had not spoken about it to them. That’s what distinguished her and that’s why Spelling had to get her on-side.

Spelling moved his papers together and looked around the table. ‘I think we’ve just about covered everything. Isis, have you any questions? You will of course be briefed over the coming week. In the meantime, I suggest you take some leave, say two days. We’ll see you on Wednesday. You’ll receive instructions tomorrow about time and place.’

‘There’s one thing,’ she said. ‘I want to get clear in my mind why we’re excluding the European agencies as a matter of course.’

‘Because that’s what our political masters have decided,’ replied Spelling crisply. ‘And that is what the Chief agreed with the Prime Minister and Foreign Secretary this morning at Chequers.’

The invocation of all these authorities seemed weak, apparently even to Vigo, whom she was now sure owed his place in the secret deliberations to something more than his recruitment of Youssef Rahe. He shut his eyes with a hint of exasperation, and Herrick had the odd sensation that it didn’t matter whether they were open or closed, Vigo still watched.

She was dismissed a few minutes later and left convinced that she’d already blown it by raising the business about the Europeans. It was crass of her, especially as she now understood that the sole point of the meeting had been to test her reliability, to see if she was fit for the game only the adults played.

She went to her desk, picked up her bag and left a note saying she would be out for a couple of days and if there were any problems to call Guthrie or Spelling. She saw a few people – the shades that always haunted Vauxhall Cross at night – but there was no sign of Dolph, Sarre or Lapping, whom she knew would be regarded somehow as her co-conspirators. They would be seen too, but she didn’t think they’d get the full treatment with Madame Selvey, Walter Vigo and the inscrutable pair from the JIC.

She left the building, collecting the cell phone that always had to be checked in at the front entrance. As she walked out into the dreary no man’s land of the Albert Embankment she noticed that she had a text message. ‘Drnk tonite any time – Dolph.’

She replied. ‘No thanx. Dead tired.’

Khan expected the Albanians to descend into the valley once they crossed over from Macedonia, but they marched on into the mountains taking increasingly untravelled, treacherous paths that caused the six mules to stop every so often, snort and shake themselves as if to adjust their loads. After the first exchange with the head man who had given his name as Vajgelis, they said little to Khan and seemed bent on covering as much ground as possible before the middle of the day. A couple of the youths tagged along behind, apparently speculating about him and his bundle of possessions, which they occasionally poked with their sticks. He turned round and grinned at them, but the only response was a surly lift of the chin to tell him to keep his eyes on the way ahead.

When the sun was at its highest they stopped in the shade of some pine trees and squatted to eat a little cold meat and onion stew, produced from tall canteens. They offered it to him saying, ‘Conlek, eat Conlek.’ In return he offered them food stolen from the Macedonian kitchen, and then asked for water. They gave it to him gracelessly and now seemed to be making jokes at his expense. He smiled, nodded and thanked them. He remembered what they had said in Bosnia, the tales of savagery and endless slaughter amongst their Muslim cousins in Albania. For nearly thirty years the country had been the world’s only official atheist state and under Enver Hoxha the people had happily pulled down their mosques or turned them into cinemas and warehouses. The civilised Bosnians shuddered at the godless barbarity of what had happened under the Marxists. But there again, he thought, he’d seen plenty of that kind of thing in Afghanistan without doing anything: the destruction of monuments; the execution of a whimpering boy who’d been caught listening to a music tape. He’d seen it and, willingly or not, he’d been part of it.

After eating, the Albanians dispersed through the woods to sleep, leaving a couple of men to guard the mules. Khan lay back where he had been sitting on a carpet of pine needles and, hugging his gun and pack into his stomach, told himself that he must snatch the rest while he could. He closed his eyes in the songless, dry forest and fell asleep thinking that he would now have to make his way to Italy rather than Greece. They were a more tolerant people.

In what seemed a very short time he was woken by someone tugging at his gun. The muzzle of a pistol was drawn across his cheek. He looked up. The two young men who’d trailed him during the morning were crouching either side of him.

‘Come Mujahadin. Good. Come.’ Standing above them was Zek, one of the mule guards, who placed his boot on the AK47 while one of the younger men pulled it gently from Khan’s grasp. The third, who had been holding the pistol to his face, withdrew it.

‘Okay. Mujahadin. Come.’ Zek, who was a wiry man of about twenty-five, motioned for them to hurry. Khan got up and shook himself free of their grasp. He didn’t know what they wanted, but since they had tossed his gun away he had to go with them. They walked to a hollow, about fifty yards from where the others were sleeping, and he was prodded roughly down the slope. Khan thought he knew what they were going to do. What they planned to do afterwards was anyone’s guess – shoot him and say he had started the fight, or simply throw him down the ravine they had skirted a few minutes before entering the forest? He raised both hands and made as if to welcome the idea by reaching out to touch Zek’s shoulder.

Zek told the two younger men to hold Khan over the tree, and started unbuckling himself to reveal a rank pair of undershorts. With an interested glance Khan again tried to show that he was more than happy about the situation and indeed enjoyed the prospect of indulging them. He even made to undo his own trousers. But they turned him and forced his head down violently on the tree trunk. The smell of resin and forest mould reached his nostrils. He glanced under the young man’s arm and saw the guard behind readying himself. Lust had drained all meaning from his expression and he hissed for his two accomplices to hurry. Khan placed his feet squarely apart, to appear cooperative, and wiggled with a little coo of excitement. The young man holding the gun to his head sniggered, relaxed his grip and swapped hands to free himself to help yank Khan’s trousers down. This was the opening Khan had waited for. He slipped from under his captor’s arm and jabbed his left elbow back twice into his face, grabbing the barrel of the pistol and sending him to the ground. The completion of the movement brought him face to face with Zek, whose expression flooded with consternation. He smiled awkwardly just before Khan butted him once in the forehead, then knocked him cold with a second blow from his forehead delivered as he grabbed the man’s shoulders and held him.