Gerald Seymour - Battle Sight Zero

Andy Knight had the seat tilted back, his eyes closed, and the radio was tuned to a European station that played soft jazz, and he nearly slept.

The VW had driven well and he had held a steady but not excessive speed on the A13 route and had sidelined the Rouen turning and kept heading for Paris, then had skirted Versailles and transferred on to the A6 and headed south-west. Gone as far along the Autoroute de Soleil as a service station, Achères-la-Forêt, and had stopped in a far corner of the parking area, had locked his doors, had crashed out. He had thought himself too tired to dream. One of his last thoughts, dozing deeply… the VW had been sweet tuned by the mechanics at the depot. Good guys. They’d not get the thanks they deserved because he would not be coming back to work there, drive a lorry, exchange banter with them and crap talk about the football teams, and ask vacuous and insincere questions about their wives, kids, mums and dads, and would no longer be the decent joker who was liked and had his car given a thorough and professional service check… But he had left his customers in the lurch when he had done jobbing gardening and landscaping and they’d have been expecting him next week and some of the projects were half-completed, but he had not been there to finish what he had started. Had had a small delivery business, out of a rented van, and people would have been hitting their phones and trying to raise him, and wondering why such and such a pick-up was not made, and were left angry, let down. It was what he did… Came into people’s lives, used them, and then eased out. Never went back and did a contact with those who had helped him, had sustained in ignorance his cover; there would be no postcard thanking them sent to the guys in the depot garage.

It sort of hurt. But not enough to stop him sleeping, or from thinking about her, and her touch and her taste, and had a rug over himself to keep him warm into the night… and he did not know how it would be there, in Marseille, far to the south, and beyond pretty much all of his experience.

Andy Knight slept in. Might almost have found a sort of peace.

The hard part of what he did – and Phil and Norm – was in the first stage of the infiltration. This time round was when he had charged down the darkened street and launched at the guys who were dealing out grief to the girl. They had, all three of them, been well briefed and had known not to hurt her but only frighten her, and had known that they’d take a bit of a slapping… had been owed an apology, not least the one who had taken her kick in the groin, where it hurt bad and where he might have suffered some real damage… and then the next step in turning up at the Hall of Residence. She would have talked to the people who controlled her, and would have told them of this guy – simple and unsophisticated and politically vacuous – who ate from her hand, was a pigeon in a park. It had worked well, the great idea, that she would get him to drive her back from Marseille and the promised reward was a shack-up night or two in a crap hotel, maybe without clean sheets – which was a difficulty. He was out to the world in his car, had the seat tilted back.

The other hard bit, potentially, was what Phil and Norm had endured; suspicion, and violence chucked at them. But Andy Knight was clear of that. The life and death moment was sidestepped. He slept deep. Had he dreamed, which he did not, it would only have been as a witness of the final curtain being drawn. If he were there to see, then he’d be hunkered down in the back of a police wagon and would have a vantage-point through a smoked glass window. It would be messy if it were done at the university, inside the Hall of Residence or on campus or in the Students’ Union, and they were more likely to have chosen her home, Savile Town. Not necessary to break down the door, just a ring of the bell and a middle-aged man opening it and seeing a street filled with uniforms, some with firearms, and a bare word of politeness before they surged past him. She would be taken out fast, handcuffed, and then, after she had been driven away, the search team would arrive. She would not see him. It would be the intention to lift the whole nest of them, all of the cell, and to take back the weapon with the bug embedded into the cleaning kit hole in the stock. She would be in shock and whipped into a custody suite and the questions would come flying before she’d the wit to gaze up at the ceiling and break her silence to demand legal representation. He might see Pegs and Gough one last time, might not. He would slip into Prunella’s office and they’d offer him leave, indefinite, but expect to keep a hold on him… It would probably be for the last time, but he’d not share his future intentions with her. Was not for ever, was it? Not pensionable employment – fast burn-out with hefty premiums. Prunella would blow him a kiss when he went out through the door with his grip, all that he owned, what he had cleared from the Manchester bedsit, and he would take a train to anywhere or drive to anywhere. ‘Anywhere’ was a place where he was not known, had never worked. There would be a court case, but not for at least a year, water under the bridge by then, fast flowing.

It mattered where he slept, whether he slept with her. Mattered that the discipline of a serving officer stayed firm. Mattered where he was, her bed with her, or his bed and alone. A psychologist had talked to them once: had grinned, then prefaced his lecture – ‘Sleeping with the Enemy’… ‘When you’re on the plot and you start getting close to one of the women there, and she close to you, don’t ever think it is about true romance, won’t be. It is need . You, for all your training, are vulnerable. So is she. It is a way of sharing the burden for both of you. You are both on the edge, nerves frayed to breaking point… not love, just something animal. If you can avoid it, then all well and good; if you can’t, then don’t think any the less of yourself. It’ll be, given certain circumstances, difficult to avoid…’ And he’d shrugged like there was nothing more to say.

But the hard part of it was done, dusted, and the sleep was good and he felt safe: should have realised that was dangerous at worst, foolhardy at best. Stress leeched out of him and the traffic on the Highway to the Sun swept past the service station, and the sun would be high before he woke, went for a wash, took breakfast, hit the road to where they would meet.

Zeinab was awake.

The New Zealand boy had slept, his head had lolled against her shoulder and his first snore had erupted, and she had kicked his ankle – not as hard as when her toecap had hit the thief’s privates. Firmly enough for him to grunt and flail with an arm, and take a moment to realise where he was. He had the grace to apologise. She did not have another opportunity to sleep because the boy had called his mother. His mother was on the South Island of New Zealand. He told her where he was, where he had been for the last two days; said that she should not worry about him, that Paris was well protected and those goddamn terrorists were kept far away from the main tourist haunts. He was fine, he was safe. They talked a quarter of an hour and he seemed interested in the rest of his family.

Did she want chewing gum? She did not.

Then called his father; his father was somewhere else but also on South Island. She had no option but listen. She did not sleep.

‘What, Dad? The terrorists… No, I’ve had no scares. They have troops and police out, all the public places are guarded, and Germany, I feel very secure… was talking to a guy yesterday, French. You want to know what he said? He said they need decapitating, the terrorists do. He said they were vermin – that’s the terrorists – they had different governments in the past, but now they’ve toughened up. And, Dad, you there, Dad?… In Germany they reckon they’ve too many migrants, don’t know who they are, and everything had gotten too liberal. Should be stamped on… Lyon, Dad, that’s where I am going. Good to speak, Dad… The baby is okay? You are a bit of an old goat, Dad, don’t mind me saying it. Yes, I’m safe, I’m good. They say, Dad, you can smell these people, the terrorists, and see it in their eyes, animal eyes, sort of dead eyes: I met a sociology guy in Berlin. He said that. Oh, Mum sounded good. This guy, Berlin, he said they can’t hide. What? You have to go?… Night, Dad.’