Anthony Horowitz - Eagle Strike

In fact, they wouldn"t let me—and I don"t know what would have happened if they hadn"t had that extraordinary accident with the car. It fell on them, you know. I can"t say I was terribly upset, although of course I had to pretend. But you know what I thought? I thought that God must be on my side. He wanted me to be a success and so He had decided to help me.” Alex glanced at Sabina to see how she was taking this. She was sitting rigidly in her chair, her cup of tea ignored. There was absolutely no colour in her face. But she was still in control. She wasn"t giving anything away.

“Anyway,” Cray continued, “the best thing was that my parents were out of the way and, even better, I had inherited all their money. When I was twenty-one, I bought myself a flat in London—actually it was more of a penthouse—and I set up my own band. We called ourselves Slam! As I"m sure you know, the rest is history. Five years later I went solo, and soon I was the greatest singer in the world. And that was when I started to think about the world I was in.

“I wanted to help people. All my life I"ve wanted to help people. The way you"re looking at me, Alex, you"d think I"m some kind of monster. But I"m not. I"ve raised millions of pounds for charity. Millions and millions. And I should remind you, in case you"ve forgotten, that I have been knighted by the Queen. I am actually Sir Damian Cray, although I don"t use the title because I"m no snob. A lovely lady, by the way, the Queen. Do you know how much money my Christmas single, „Something for the Children", raised all on its own? Enough to feed a whole country!

“But the trouble is, sometimes being famous and being rich isn"t enough. I so wanted to make a difference—but what was I to do when people wouldn"t listen? I mean, take the case of the Milburn Institute in Bristol. This was a laboratory working for a number of cosmetics companies, and I discovered that they were testing many of their products on animals. Now, I"m sure you and I would be on the same side about this, Alex. I tried to stop them. I campaigned for over a year. We had a petition with twenty thousand signatures and still they wouldn"t listen. So in the end—I"d met people and of course I had plenty of money—I suddenly realized that the best thing to do would be to have Professor Milburn killed. And that"s what I did. And six months later the institute closed down and that was that. No more animals harmed.” Cray rotated a hand over the biscuit plate and picked one out. He was obviously pleased with himself.

“I had quite a lot of people killed in the years that followed,” he said. “For example, there were some extremely unpleasant people cutting down the rainforest in Brazil. They"re still in the rainforest … six feet underneath it. Then there was a whole boatload of Japanese fishermen who wouldn"t listen to me. I had them deep-frozen in their own freezer. That will teach them not to hunt rare whales! And there was a company in Yorkshire that was selling landmines. I didn"t like them at all. So I arranged for the entire board of directors to disappear on an Outward Bound course in the Lake District and that put a stop to that!

“I"ve had to do some terrible things in my time. Really, I have.” He turned to Sabina. “I did hate having to blow up your father. If he hadn"t spied on me, it wouldn"t have been necessary. But you must see that I couldn"t let him spoil my plans.”

Every cell in Sabina"s body had gone rigid and Alex knew she was having to force herself not to attack Cray. But Yassen was sitting right next to her and she wouldn"t have got anywhere near.

Cray went on. “This is a terrible world, and if you want to make a difference, sometimes you have to be a bit extreme. And that"s the point. I am extremely proud of the fact that I have helped so many people and so many different causes. Because helping people—charity—has been the work of my life.”

He paused long enough to eat the biscuit he had chosen.

Alex forced himself to drink a little of the perfumed tea. He hated the taste but his mouth was completely dry. “I have a couple of questions,” he said.

“Do, please, go ahead.”

“My first one is for Yassen Gregorovich.” He turned to the Russian. “Why are you working for this lunatic?” Alex wondered if Cray would hit him. But it would be worth it. All the signs indicated that the Russian didn"t share Cray"s world view. He seemed uncomfortable, out of place. It might be worth trying to sow a few seeds of discord between them.

Cray scowled, but did nothing. He signalled to Yassen to answer.

“He pays me,” Yassen said simply.

“I hope your second question is more interesting,” Cray snarled.

“Yes. You"re trying to tell me that everything you"ve done is for a good cause. You think that all this killing is worth it because of the results. I"m not sure I agree. Lots of people work for charity; lots of people want to change the world. But they don"t have to behave like you.”

“I"m waiting…” Cray snapped.

“All right. This is my question. What is Eagle Strike? Are you really telling me it"s a plan to make the world a better place?”

Cray laughed softly. For a moment he looked like the diabolical schoolboy he had once been, welcoming his own parents" death. “Yes,” he said. “That"s exactly what it is. Sometimes great people are misunderstood. You don"t understand me and neither does your girlfriend. But I really do want to change the world. That"s all I"ve ever wanted. And I"ve been very fortunate because my music has made it possible. In the twenty-first century, entertainers are much more influential than politicians or statesmen. I"m the only one who"s actually noticed it.” Cray chose a second biscuit—a custard cream. “Let me ask you a question, Alex. What do you think is the greatest evil on this planet today?” “Is that including or not including you?” Alex asked.

Cray frowned. “Please don"t irritate me,” he warned.

“I don"t know,” Alex said. “You tell me.” “Drugs!” Cray spat out the single word as if it were obvious. “Drugs are causing more unhappiness and destruction than anything anywhere in the world. Drugs kill more people than war or terrorism. Did you know that drugs are the single biggest cause of crime in western society? We"ve got kids out on the street taking heroin and cocaine, and they"re stealing to support their habits. But they"re not criminals; they"re victims.

It"s the drugs that are to blame.”

“We"ve talked about this at school,” Alex said. The last thing he needed right now was a lecture.

“All my life I"ve been fighting drugs,” Cray went on. “I"ve done advertisements for the government. I"ve spent millions building treatment centres. And I"ve written songs. You must have listened to White Lines…”

He closed his eyes and hummed softly, then sang:

“The poison"s there. The poison flows It"s everywhere—in heaven"s name Why is it that no one knows

How to end this deadly game?”

He stopped.

“But I know how to end it,” he said simply. “I"ve worked it out. And that"s what Eagle Strike is all about. A world without drugs. Isn"t that something to dream about, Alex? Isn"t that worth a few sacrifices? Think about it! The end of the drug problem. And I can make it happen.”

“How?” Alex was almost afraid of the answer.

“It"s easy. Governments won"t do anything. The police won"t do anything. No one can stop the dealers. So you have to go back to the supplies. You have to think where these drugs come from.

And where is that? I"ll tell you…

“Every year, hundreds and hundreds of tons of heroin come from Afghanistan—in particular the provinces of Nangarhar and Helmand. Did you know production has increased by fourteen hundred per cent since the Taliban were defeated? So much for that particular war! Then, after Afghanistan, there"s Burma and the golden triangle, with about one hundred thousand hectares of land used to produce opium and heroin. The government of Burma doesn"t care. Nobody cares.