Andy McNab - Payback

‘So you’re gonna ask him to help us get Fincham?’

Fergus looked through the window towards the house opposite. ‘No, Danny, I’m not. For a start, Kev only knows because I told him everything when I got back to the UK and made contact. Which means he’s in real danger because he’s of no use to our friend with her so-called case against Fincham.’

‘What d’you mean, so-called case?’

‘I don’t believe her – not a word of it – and I’ve got no intention of falling in with her plan. Even if I wanted to, I couldn’t.’

‘But… I don’t understand.’

Fergus moved over to one wall and eased himself down to the floor. ‘You’d better sit down for a minute.’

Danny followed his grandfather across the room and sat next to him.

‘There’s no one else who knows, Danny, not now that Meacher is dead, I’m certain of that. Fincham’s already got what he wants, he just doesn’t realize it. There’s no one else for them to worry about.’

‘So why are we here then?’

‘Fincham and the woman are a lot closer to the truth than I ever thought they would be. They could even be monitoring my closest former contacts, waiting for me to get in touch. And that’s Kev. His phones could be tapped, so I have to see him to warn him. I owe him that. But then we’re on our own, Danny.’

The Pimlico safe house was starting to smell. Cleaning, tidying, washing up, taking out the rubbish – it was all part of the job for operators on a long-term surveillance. But it was the part of the job that was rarely tackled; not until there were no more clean mugs or plates, or the smell became unbearable. That moment was fast approaching.

Curly and Beanie were on the day shift and had been on duty for a couple of hours. They were sitting in front of their TV monitors. The tabletops were littered with dirty mugs and plates, chocolate bar wrappers, empty Pot Noodle containers with the congealed remnants stuck to the inside, and an ashtray overflowing with stubbed-out cigarette ends. The air was thick with the mingled smell of food and stale cigarette smoke.

‘About time you cleaned up a bit,’ said Beanie as he pushed a Pot Noodle container onto the floor to make way for his mug of soup.

‘Me?’ said Curly. ‘It’s your turn. I did it last time.’

‘Yeah, right.’

‘It’s those other two. They make all the mess.’ Curly unwrapped one of his favourite Snickers bars and dropped the wrapper onto the floor. ‘And their fags don’t help. It’s disgusting. They don’t even empty the ashtray.’

‘We’ll have a word with them.’

‘Yeah, it’s their turn.’

‘Hello, Georgie-boy’s got a call.’

They both turned to look at the TV monitor split into four sections, each one showing a different room in George Fincham’s flat.

Fincham was at home. He rarely took all the leave he was due, but occasionally he took a morning off, to make a leisurely start to the day, and to think. He had a lot to think about.

The flat looked as immaculate as ever: Fincham’s cleaner had been with him for years and made sure it was always exactly as he liked it. Perfect. With nothing out of place.

Fincham had finished his late breakfast. On the mahogany table in the dining room a white bone china coffee cup stood empty, and on a matching plate some croissant crumbs had been methodically pushed into a neat pile.

Fincham’s mobile was resting on a perfectly folded napkin by the side of the plate. It was ringing.

The two surveillance operators watched Fincham move from one quarter of the TV monitor to another as he walked from the kitchen to the dining room. He answered the phone. ‘Yes?’

His voice was perfectly clear in the safe house and Beanie automatically checked that the recording gear was picking up every word.

‘Hereford? When did this happen?’

When Rita Stevens had called her friend from Hereford Station she set off an incredible high-tech chain of events by innocently mentioning that she had seen Fergus Watts. What Rita didn’t know is that every normal, unsecure phone call, text or e-mail is sucked up by the Firm’s satellite vacuum cleaners. Codename: ECHELON.

These satellites collect all the electronic information zipping around in space and send it back down to earth to be stored in huge computer mainframes. If a telephone number is programmed into the ECHELON computer, every time the phone is used, the conversation is downloaded and listened to. But, and more significantly, the computer can also be used for word recognition. Certain key words are programmed for recognition into the ECHELON computer. Words like ‘bombing’ or ‘suicide attack’. Names like ‘Bin Laden’. Or the names that Fincham had programmed in: Fergus and Danny Watts.

‘Unconfirmed or not, Fran,’ said Fincham into his secure phone, ‘I want you and the team to get there now. There must be some of his generation still living in Hereford. Old friends, men he joined up with. Find them. And find Watts. I want this finished. Keep me informed.’

Curly looked at Beanie. ‘We’d better let Marcie know about this.’

Danny and Fergus were sitting on what remained of a sofa, facing the grime-covered bedroom window overlooking Brecon Road and Kev Newman’s house. They had been busy since first light, turning the room into an urban OP, ensuring that they could look out and that no one could see in.

Some old net curtains found on the floor had been hooked above the window, pulled back at a forty-five-degree angle and held in position by bricks. From the outside, the window would look exactly as it had for years.

They stood a rotting wardrobe a metre from where the net curtain was secured to the floor and then draped a soaking wet, dark green curtain salvaged from the garden over it. This made a perfect dark background and meant that anything between the two curtains could not been seen from the outside.

The sofa was placed between the curtains, allowing Fergus and Danny to observe the target house in relative comfort.

Fergus kept his voice low as he slowly got up from the sofa. ‘Sort some food out while I lock up.’

As Danny reached for his sports bag, Fergus went to the bedroom door, closed it and began jamming small pieces of wood between the door and the floor. ‘Anyone tries to come in and the stops will hold it long enough for us to go out through the window. Bit of a drop, but try and make it to the garden centre, where there are plenty of people. Then go for the ERV. OK?’

His grandson nodded, hoping that a quick exit through the first-floor window would not be necessary.

Danny had done the shopping the previous day, so breakfast was a choice between Snickers and Mars bars and steak and kidney pies. Fergus wasn’t bothered; he’d spent years eating junk and convenience food when on ops and had a stomach like iron. He was impressed when he saw that Danny had made ready their rations, removing all the food from its packaging and wrapping it in cling film to cut down on noise in the OP. There was bottled water to avoid the distinctive hiss of cans being opened. The plastic bottles would come in useful when they needed to pee, and in an emergency the cling film also had a secondary use. As Danny knew only too well, everything had to go out with them when they left. Absolutely nothing could be left behind as giveaway clues to their temporary occupation of the building.

Danny sat munching on a Mars bar while looking out at Kev’s house. It was similar to the others in the row – bay windows on the ground floor and a redbrick front – but by no means identical. Big Kev was a do-it-yourself freak, and over the years, as his family had grown, his house had grown too. Now it looked as though it had more extensions than Victoria Beckham’s hair.