Authors: Patrick Robinson
Tags: #Suspense, #Fiction, #Political, #Thrillers, #Weapons industry, #War & Military, #Assassination, #Iraq War; 2003-
Diamondhead (39 page)
Mack Bedford stopped at a garage on top of the hill above the harbor, gassed up the car, and bought himself a cup of coffee, which he drank slowly on the forecourt, gazing across the road, out to sea, at the calm waters of the St. George’s Channel.
He drove down the steep hill to the ferry port at around half past four, parked, and walked to the Stena Line desk to inquire about a ferry to England.
“Actually, it goes to Wales, sir,” said the clerk, a young man whose name tag identified him as Seamus. “And it doesn’t sail ’til 10:15 tonight. You can go aboard around half eight.”
“Not before?” asked Mack.
“Well, before that she’s in the middle of the Irish Sea,” said Seamus. “So I’d say not.”
“What time does it get in?”
“Just before three. Fishguard, South Wales, and you can drive off right after that. But if you take a cabin and decide to stay in your bed until six thirty, that’s fine too. Just tell us when you want to disembark so we can put your car in the right place.”
“Okay, Seamus. Give me a round-trip first-class ticket, for a cabin and a Ford Fiesta car.”
“No one else traveling with you?”
“No.”
“And when will you return, sir?”
“Leave it open, will you, because I’m not sure.”
“That’ll add twenty euros to the cost, sir, without a firm date I mean.”
“I can handle that,” replied Mack.
“Name?”
“Patrick O’Grady.”
“Irish passport?”
“Yup.”
When Seamus asked for the color and registration number of the car, Mack told him dark blue, and then altered at least three of the numbers on the registration, hoping no one would notice, which they didn’t.
“Which card will you be using for payment?”
“No card. Cash.”
“No problem.”
Mack handed over three hundred euros, took his tickets, and left. He considered it, so far, a good day’s work. He was leaving the American Jeffery Simpson behind in Ireland, and he was driving onto the ferry with a ticket made out to the Irishman Patrick O’Grady, who had never been born, and lived nowhere. The false Irish passport had been noted, and the return ticket would never be used.
The car Mack was driving was recorded in the ferry office in the wrong color, with vast discrepancies in the registration, thus rendering it, and its driver, untraceable by any police force in the world. If anyone ever came after him, that is.
Mack retired to the parking lot, which was quite busy, and settled himself in the front seat with the windows open, and a copy of the
Irish Sunday Times
he’d bought in the garage. He decided not to join the line of cars waiting for the 10:15 sailing until around half past seven, because right now he’d be the only one there. What Mack wanted in the line was a car behind him and one in front.
Irish Sunday Times
he’d bought in the garage. He decided not to join the line of cars waiting for the 10:15 sailing until around half past seven, because right now he’d be the only one there. What Mack wanted in the line was a car behind him and one in front.
The two-and-a-half-hour wait passed slowly. Mack slept for a half hour, but he had a lot of time to think. And one worrying truth kept crossing his mind. On every mission, no matter where, from the Afghan mountains to the backstreets of Baghdad, there are surprises, sudden unexpected problems and downright bad luck. There is also apt to be one stroke of very good luck. Amidst all the horror, something almost always breaks for a top SEAL commander. What worried Mack was that, on this mission, he’d already had his one bit of real good luck, and its name was Liam O’Brien. From now on, he pondered, things might not fall right for me. . . .
I’d better be real careful, or I’m going to end up dead.
I’d better be real careful, or I’m going to end up dead.
He joined the long line at around a quarter of eight. They boarded on time, no one asked for any further identification, and he placed his car among the very few first-class ticketed vehicles. He checked his cabin, which was small, but neat and spotless. The steward told him he was welcome to go up to the first-class lounge, where he could have a drink and some dinner if he wished.
He took his bag and climbed the stairs to the upper deck, found the lounge, and poured himself some coffee. He ordered, on the steward’s recommendation, a fresh Dublin Bay sole, off the bone, with french fries and spinach. He drank only orange juice, and finished his dinner with a plate of Irish apple crumble with fresh cream.
The huge ship sailed at 10:15, running slowly along the jetties and out past the great hooked harbor wall. They stood fair down the channel, running out toward the flashing light on the jutting rocky ledge, which marks the maritime roads in and out of Rosslare.
Mack took his bag and left as soon as he sensed the changed beat of the engine, when the ship began to move. He went outside and leaned on the rail, watching the harbor lights disappear, feeling the old familiar roll of the ocean, which would increase as soon as they came out of the shadow of the land and sailed into the rough open waters of the Irish Sea, with the Atlantic swells surging in from the southwest. He saw the high light flashing on the ledge and guessed as they passed that they were making fifteen knots. It reminded him of home, and the towering light on Sequin Island.
But ahead of him was only darkness, and he decided to go to bed. Back down in his cabin he took off his jacket and shoes, locked the door, and crashed under a couple of blankets. The ship was warm, and he slept almost immediately, awakening at around two thirty, after three and a half hours.
The night was still dark, but the ship was rolling less than it had been after they passed the Rosslare ledge. Mack climbed out of bed and stared through the starboard side window. About a mile off their beam he could see the light on Strumble Head, the first rocky point on the British mainland, a famous old lighthouse flashing four times with a seven-second gap, stark in the night on this Pembrokeshire headland.
Mack knew the ship was due to dock in a half hour, but his old seaman’s instincts caused him to consult the complimentary map of the Welsh coastline, which Stena placed in all first-class cabins. On any ship, Mack Bedford always assumed he was either driving or navigating, and he didn’t want any mistakes; he needed to check his bearings. He was the everlasting lieutenant commander.
He went back to bed, resolving to sleep again at least until it was light. He heard the ship dock but then drifted off until six. He stripped off his shirt and shaved, dressed, and walked along to the car deck. He’d been on this ship long enough, and he did not wish to be remembered by anyone, in any way.
He drove straight off the ferry, over the wide steel bridge, and onto the British mainland. He drove down the long exit road from the ship, and up ahead there were tall sheds, plainly a customs checking area. There were also two kiosks, with uniformed security men standing out front. There was only one other car near him, the rest having plainly rushed out of the ship in the small hours.
Mack slowed down and saw the man look at his license plate. “Irish passport, sir?”
“Right here,” said Mack, waving the one that belonged to Patrick O’Grady.
“Straight on, sir,” he replied, without even looking. Mack Bedford thus entered the United Kingdom with a minimum of fuss and total anonymity. He planned, in a few days, to leave the United Kingdom in much the same way. But right now he needed to reach London, and the gunsmith, as fast as this fine-tuned, McArdle-guaranteed Irish automobile would take him.
He climbed the steep cliff face from Fishguard Harbor on the new road, and then turned right, away from the ocean, onto the A40. He drove quickly at this time in the morning, on a long, winding road, almost deserted except for ferry traffic coming the other way. He sped through the spectacular farmland of West Wales, passing villages named in the ancient native language with about three hundred letters and hardly any vowels.
At seven he passed Wolf’s Castle, an extraordinary jagged-rock fortress set high on a hill, silhouetted against the sky. It took another hour to reach the M4 motorway, which runs all the way through South Wales, past the old coal mining valleys, and then on to London, a fast three-hour drive, from end to end of Great Britain’s busiest highway.
Mack crossed the Severn Bridge at nine and stopped for breakfast at the first service area he found. He gassed up the car and then went inside to order a couple of English sausages, toast, and scrambled eggs. He lingered for a couple of cups of coffee, carefully studying a London A-Z guide. He located the gunsmith’s street, and hit the M4 again, running hard, due east toward the capital.
The map had proved extremely useful because it confirmed that he did not need to move into London. He could stay outside, possibly at one of the many hotels that surround the airport out here on the M4. He could deal with the gunsmith from here. Southall, where Mr. Kumar lived, was less than five miles from the airport.
This was all extremely good news, because hotels next to big international airports are the most impersonal organizations in the world. Everyone’s in transit, everyone’s in a hurry, and no one has much time for anyone else. For pure anonymity, they were the perfect answer. All Mack had to do was find one.
He took the London Heathrow exit and turned left, the wrong way for the terminals. Within a half mile he found precisely what he needed, a big commercial hotel, owned by an American chain, with shuttle service to the terminals, running, by the look of the congested forecourt, every ten minutes.
A doorman opened his car door and inquired, “Are you staying, sir?”
Mack nodded his assent. He walked inside and took a large single room for a week, told them he’d be paying in cash, and handed over two thousand British pounds.
The receptionist counted it and told him, unnecessarily, “No problem.” He handed Mack the card key to Room 543, and asked if he needed help with the bag.
Mack declined and was told the boy would bring his car keys to the room when the doorman had parked it.
As it happened the boy was at the room before Mack and was waiting for him. Mack gave him a fiver and took the keys. He removed his shaving kit and other toiletries from the bag and placed them in the bathroom. Then he re-created his Jeffery Simpson persona, and almost immediately went out again.
He followed the map and found Merick Street in nearby Southall, one of the western suburbs of London with a largely Indian and Pakistani population. The place was as busy as downtown Bombay on this Monday morning, and Mack had no trouble locating a hardware store.
There he purchased a workman’s toolbox, metal, eighteen inches long, a foot high and a foot wide, with a central handle set into the lid. Inside were folding racks, built for hammers, screwdrivers, and wrenches.
“Very fine box, sir,” said the Indian in the store. “Very fine indeed. Good box for excellent workman.”
Mack was not certain he looked like an excellent workman in his Jeffery Simpson disguise—more like an unemployed bank clerk. Nonetheless, he smiled and paid the sixty-two pounds for the toolbox, which he thought, privately, was plenty of money.
Outside he aimed the Ford Fiesta into a maze of side streets, searching for the address on the piece of paper handed to him by Liam O’Brien. Eventually, he found it, a wide residential avenue, nicer than any other street in the area, and he turned into number 16, which was a big double-fronted Victorian house in its own grounds.
The garden was overgrown, and the wide driveway was greatly narrowed by overhanging trees. But the house was in excellent repair, with white trim around the windows and a jet-black pair of front doors, glossy, recently repainted.
Mack rang the bell and was shown in by a uniformed Indian butler. “Whom shall I say has called?” he asked.
“Tommy McArdle,” replied Mack.
A few minutes later the butler returned and announced that Mr. Kumar would like his visitor to go down to the workroom. He was led along a short hallway to a padded leather door, which the butler opened and then led him down to a bright workshop.
There was a central table and three working bays around the outside, each one of which was illuminated by a shaded light slung low over a workbench covered in dark-red baize. It looked a lot more like a jeweler’s workroom than an arms factory.
A tall, slender Indian came toward Mack and held out his hand. “I’m Prenjit Kumar,” he said. “I hope I can be of service. You come recommended by a man who was once among my finest customers.”
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