Jack Higgins - Dark Justice

“Now, what in the hell does that mean?”

“Well, I can’t comment unless you tell me.”

“That was the man himself, Saddam. He wants to see me at the presidential palace.”

“Which one?” Ashimov asked dryly.

Belov ignored him. “You can forget dinner. Better phone this Greta and cancel. I’ll need you with me.”

Ashimov was all attention now. “Of course, Colonel, at your orders,” and he reached for the phone.

They drove through the city in a Range Rover, found a small crowd of people at the presidential palace and a few cars. They paused at the gates, where Belov presented his identity card and they were passed through with an efficiency that indicated they were expected. They stopped at the bottom of the huge steps leading up to the palace.

Belov said to Ashimov, “You’re carrying?”

He took a Walther from the shoulder holster under his left arm and Ashimov produced a Beretta. “Of course.”

Belov opened the glove compartment and put the Walther in. “And you. If we take the hardware inside, we’ll set every alarm bell in the palace ringing.”

They went up the steps to the entrance and found an army colonel waiting impatiently. “Colonel Belov, he keeps asking for you. This way. I’m Colonel Farouk.”

The lighting was subdued, the statues in the marbled corridors only half visible in the dusk. They halted at a beaten copper doorway, a sentry on each side. The colonel went in. A moment later, he came out.

“He’ll see you now, gentlemen,” he said, and leaned forward and murmured in Belov’s ear, “For the sake of all of us, take care, Colonel. He’s in one of his manic phases. Anything is possible.”

He opened the door and ushered them in. Saddam sat behind a huge desk with a shaded light as he looked up from some papers. He wasn’t in uniform, and he stood up and came around the desk and spoke in Arabic, extending his hand.

“Colonel Belov, good to see you, and who is this?”

“My aide, Major Yuri Ashimov.”

“Also of the KGB or the Federal Service of Counterespionage or whatever you’re calling it now. Does Department Three no longer exist? I rely on Moscow.”

“Excellency, you may be sure it still exists for the specific purpose for which it was created, however much our masters juggle around with changes.”

Saddam’s eyes glittered. It was as if he was on something, and he paced around the desk restlessly. “Sit down.” He gestured to two chairs.

“It’s good to know you are still operating, Belov. I have always looked on you as a friend, but these days, times are uncertain, the Americans waiting for any excuse to pounce. I’ve done everything they’ve asked for in the treaty, and what happens? The oil stays in the ground, no way of getting it out.” Which was not strictly true, but he carried on. “And the exclusion zone, I’m constantly harried by their air force.”

At that moment, a siren sounded in the distance and the palace was plunged into darkness. He hurried to the great windows and watched as lights turned out in patches.

“Curse them. I’ve never felt so impotent. And what can I do?” He turned, hands wide. “Tell me, what can I do?”

He was smiling madly, sweat on his face, turned, picked up a vacant chair and hurled it across the room in a rage and then seemed to pull himself together.

“But no, I’m a poor host. Now what about that? Women or wine? Boring. Action, passion, that’s the thing. Tell me, Colonel, did you come in an embassy limousine?”

“No, Excellency, Major Ashimov drove us here in a Range Rover.”

“A Range Rover?” The lights came on again, extending across the city. “It’s been a long time since I drove one of those. I’m sure you’ll lend it to me.”

“Of course, Excellency.”

“Then let’s go,” and Saddam led the way out.

It was a fact known only to intimates that he frequently roamed the city late at night, driving himself, often with no guards of any kind, even though Belov had heard that guards did usually attempt to follow him. Farouk was half running to keep up with him as Saddam plowed ahead.

Belov tugged on Ashimov’s sleeve and they held back. “He’s in one of his mad moods, so we just go with the flow. Anything can happen. We’ll arm ourselves the moment we get in the Range Rover.”

“As you say, Colonel.”

They passed outside the main door at the top of the steps while Farouk pleaded. “Allow me to bring an escort, Excellency, that at least.”

“It’s a shameful thing if I can’t drive through my own city without an armed guard. You will wait here.”

He started down the steps to the Range Rover, and Belov paused by Farouk. “Give me your pistol.” Farouk took a Browning from his holster and handed it over. “Good. Now, my advice is to follow us at a discreet distance.”

In later years, he often wondered whether Saddam had seen himself as the great Caliph Haroun al Rashid in the Baghdad of old, mingling with the common people in disguise by night, but that couldn’t be true, for he drove the Range Rover like a madman, scattering the crowd outside the palace, and bouncing three cars out of the way.

He laughed harshly. “I am an excellent driver, is it not so, Colonel?”

“Of course, Excellency.”

Belov had the Browning in his pocket and now opened the glove compartment, passed Ashimov his Beretta and slipped the Walther into his shoulder holster.

They carved their way down into the city, swerving from one street to another, colliding with a number of vehicles, people jumping for their lives, and Saddam, in high good humor, drove even faster.

Ashimov murmured to Belov, “We’re being followed.”

“I know. I suggested it to Farouk.”

“They’re not military vehicles.”

Saddam, oblivious to all this, crossed an intersection that led him onto a four-lane highway.

“Now for some real speed,” Saddam cried, but at the same moment a red Ferrari accelerated beside them, a man leaning out of the rear window with a machine pistol. As he started to fire, Ashimov shot him in the head.

Another man in the front passenger seat beside the driver sprayed the Range Rover again, bursting one of the front tires. Saddam cursed, working the wheel furiously, and the Range Rover rammed into the metal road barrier and came to a halt.

A number of passing vehicles accelerated out of the way, but the Ferrari swerved, braking ahead of the Range Rover, and three men got out, all armed. At the same moment, an old white van pulled in, the rear doors opened and three more men joined the others.

Belov got out of the Range Rover and pulled Saddam with him. “Stay down, Excellency.”

Ashimov joined him, his face sliced open from one eye to the corner of his mouth. “Are you all right?” Belov asked.

“Not really.” Ashimov fired twice at the ones who crouched behind the van and the Ferrari. “Traffic seems to have ground to a halt back there.”

“Who can blame them.”

Saddam also had blood on his face and seemed dazed. “In my own city,” he said. “In Baghdad.”

Belov weighed the Browning in one hand, the Walther in the other. He smiled slightly at Ashimov. “Shall we get it done?”

“Why not?”

“You take the left, I’ll see to the right.”

A burst of machine-pistol fire thudded into the Range Rover and he called in Arabic, “No more, Saddam is dead. I’ll come out with my friend.”

There was a pause, excited conversation. A voice called, “Throw out your weapons.”

“We only have one gun,” Belov shouted, stood up with the Walther in his left hand, and threw it toward the other vehicles, Ashimov rising beside him.

“Now,” Belov said, as the six men moved into the open, and he fired very rapidly, knocking down the three on the right while Ashimov took out the three on the left. There was a movement in the van, its driver peered out and Ashimov shot him.