A Line in the Sand (32 page)

be back there within two weeks to complete th

mb.

bo

d lunged, he could have caught the bird by the wing,

If Hossein ha

the

r the neck -but he would have lost its trust. Then he could

leg o

not

lp it.

he

If he helped it, the peace would come. In peace he could

think.

plan and

The plan at Riyadh, for his last bomb, thought through by Vahid

in

Hosse

and accepted by his brigadier, had been complex. The adaptation of the

petrol-tanker lorry to hold 2,500 kilos of commercial explosive had been carried out in the Beka'a valley of the Lebanon. The explosives and the detonation leads had been loaded, the time switch had been The lorry had been driven into Syria, through Jordan and

fitted.

across the Saudi Arabian frontier. Five days after leaving the

Beka'a

the lorry had been parked fifty metres in front of the eight-storey 208

residential block used by the Americans. The bomb had been set to er had run to the back-up car.

explode and the driv

It was a complex

plan, but no thought had been given to the alertness of the sentry on

the roof, who had raised the alarm as soon as he saw the driver run.

Nineteen Americans killed, 386 injured, but many more would have died without that sentry's advance warning.

For that small mistake Hossein was blamed only by himself.

At peace, his mind clear and rested, in the darkness of the marshes, he

thought of the time he should attack his target, now protected. At the

change of the protection shift? In daylight or at night? In the

middle of the shift? At dawn or at dusk? He chewed the meat and

threw

each piece nearer to his body, always luring the bird closer.

The bell rang.

He glanced at his watch. Blake would come to take over from Davies.

But there had been only one ring, sharp and persistent, unlike the three Blake and Davies used. The bell went on, endless. Perry was watching television, the story of the renovation of a wildlife park in

the Himalayas, the sort of programme that made him forget where he was,

what had happened to him. Stephen was sitting on the floor with his arm on his mother's knee. Meryl was sewing.

He didn't think, and stood up. The bell was still ringing as if a finger was jammed on it. He was in the doorway between the living room

and the hallway when Davies came out of the dining room, pushing back tom of his jacket to reveal the pistol in the waist holster.

the bot

e last thing the lorry men had done, after the laminated plastic

Th

had

gone over the windows, was drill a spy hole in the front door. Davies didn't seem fussed by the bell, took his time. The bell ring pierced the hall, too loud for him to hear what Davies said into the button on his jacket lapel. Perry understood:

microphone

the camera covered the front door, the monitor was in the hut. Davies was clearing the visitor with the men in the hut.

209

"It's your neighbour."

"That's Jerry, Jerry Wroughton always on the scrounge. Probably

"Do you need to see him?"

wants-'

s a good friend."

"He'

ched off the hall light and unlocked the door. Jerry

Davies swit

Wroughton's finger slackened off the bell button.

"Hi, Jerry, you in the business of waking the dead?"

Then Perry saw the clenched mouth, the quivering jaw -hadn't ever

seen

Jerry look so famous and he smelt the whisky.

He'd been about to ask his neighbour to come inside.

d,

He thought Jerry Wroughton was remembering what he had rehearse

e

th

mouth flapping without words as if the memory was slow coming. Meryl d said that Barry Carstairs had read off notes.

ha

s the problem, Jerry?"

"What'

In the

hall

dark

Perry went sideways as if to see his neighbour better,

but Davies drifted across to stay in front of him, shielding him.

"Come on, Jerry, spit it out."

"What's going on? That's the problem. What's happening?"

The poor bastard, sent out into the night by Mary, had forgotten his lines.

"Say what you want to say that's our way, yours and mine say it."

a torrent.

It came in

come home I find you under guard.

"I

Police in your garden, police

with machine-guns. I talk to Barry Carstairs you're on a death list, the kid's been put out of school because of the risk. Who's thinking bout Mary, about the twins? What's the risk to us?"

about me, a

"Come on, calm down."

210

ou're all right, you're bloody laughing! What about us? What

"Y

protection have we got?"

"Jerry, you're upsetting yourself.

to.

Believe me, you don't have

Just

home, sit in your chair, and-' "You've got a problem,

head on back

's

it

lem.

for you to fix it, it's not our prob

You made your bed, you lie

on

it."

He tried to be soothing and conciliatory. He thought he owed that to a

good neighbour.

Right, so Mary had primed him with drink and nagged,

and Jerry had gone all pompous, but he was still a proper friend.

He

d breathed deeply, which was what he always did

rocked on his feet an

to

g temper.

control a risin

"What are you saying, Jerry?"

"You've no right to bring your problems to our doorstep.

t now

Righ

r

ou

e you've got guns

children are sleeping a few yards from wher

otecting

pr

you. Who's protecting them? Who's protecting Mary when she's in

the

garden at the washing-line, when Beth and Clive are playing outside or

don't they matter?"

.

"There's been a professional assessment of what needs to be done ey'd have considered-'

Th

es stood between them like a statue, impassive. He didn't

Davi

ute an iota of support.

contrib

"What good's that to us? We've done nothing wrong. We've done g

nothin

to need protection. Whatever your quarrel is, it's not ours.

"If they come for me, they'll have the right address. Is that your worry? That they'll get the wrong house? No chance!" He laughed, couldn't help himself. The image came into his mind, so fast, of

211

the

turbaned mullah with the beard, carrying the assault rifle, knocking on

, calling up the

doors in the village and going into Dominic's shop

dder to Vince, into the pub, asking for directions.

la

't have laughed. Jerry shook, quivering with fear and

He shouldn

anger

st as Perry had, a long time ago.

ju

an say, Jerry and I don't get told much is that I'm in their

"All I c

're the experts. We're all in their hands."

hands, and they

"That's not bloody well good enough!"

hat is good enough?"

"W

Jerry

ton

Wrough

stood his full height. Spittle bubbled at his mouth.

It was the moment for which he had needed the cocktail of whisky and

's nagging. Davies was between them.

his wife

ld leave just go."

"You shou

"Where?"

just get the fuck out of here. You're not wanted."

"Anywhere

I thought you were my friend."

"Since when?

can do is go be gone in the morning."

"Best thing you

ht friends stuck together, in good times and bad.

"I thoug

Don't you

want to know what I did, why the threat's there?"

amn what you did.

"I don't give a d

What matters to me is my family.

I

t."

just want you ou

at, and

He didn't care any more. There was a sickness in his thro

he

realized the shallowness of what he'd assumed was a valued

ip.

friendsh

There were plenty of other friends, with depth to them. He might

just

talk about it in the pub tomorrow, and they'd all laugh as he described hen-pecked prig, Jerry Wroughton.

the gutless

For long enough, on

212

his

own doorstep, he'd tried to humour the man. His temper snapped.

"Go home and tell Mary that they offered me relocation and a new life.

I chose to stay. I told them that this was my home, with my family and

my friends... Friends."

He stabbed his finger past Davies's elbow, towards Jerry Wroughton's heaving chest.

"Are you listening? Friends. I may not get support from you, when I'm

up against the wall, but I'll get it from my true friends, and I've got

enough of them. Meryl and I, we don't need you, either of you. Go tell her that."

The telephone rang behind him. He realized, at that moment, that

he

could no longer hear the television. Meryl would have turned the

sound

down: she and Stephen would have heard every shouted word.

He walked away and Davies closed the door behind him.

"He's a pathetic bastard."

"You called him a friend, Mr. Perry. You have to face it, people get

cruel when they're frightened."

"I've friends here, believe me, real friends."

"Glad to hear it."

He picked up the telephone in the kitchen.

She was the only one left at the new cluster of desks down at the

far

end of the work area. The consoles were covered, the desks were

tidied, all the lights were off except hers.

Geoff Markham came out of his cubicle and locked his door after him.

The red-haired woman didn't look up from studying the illuminated

green

213

e

squar

and speaking soundlessly into a telephone. There was a ribbon

of light under Cox's door, but the senior journeyman often did that sloped off home and left his room lit so that the lesser people might believe he still beavered.. . Vicky was expecting him at her place for

r an

a verbatim of the interview, but Markham wasn't in the mood fo

inquest.

He wandered towards the woman, towards the halo of light on her hair.

o talk, wanted his feelings massaged.

He wanted t

If she hadn't been

nt doors on to the

there he would have gone out of the fro

banj(n-lent, sat on a bench and stared into the river, watched the Em

barges and the ripples. He waited until she put down her telephone.

"Hello."

She didn't look up.

"Yes?"

"I just wondered can I get you anything?"

"Are you the tea-lady?"

"Can I help in any way?"

She said brusquely, "No."

"If it's not too secret..." he giggled'... what are you doing?"

"Pretty obvious, isn't it, or weren't you listening? The American's erb. Add light complexion to an English-speaking

stuff was sup

accent.

d equal the child of a mixed marriage. He's put at late

It coul

thirties. A mixed marriage, maybe forty years ago. An Iranian

marries

an Englishwoman. That's what I'm looking for. It might be on file if

the marriage was over there the FCO should have it because probably the

consul would have been notified. If it was over here then it's harder but possible. Is that good enough?"

rare shyness. She was older than him. With the white

He felt a

ceiling light bathing her face he could see the first lines cutting her

214

skin and the slight crow's feet at her eyes. He couldn't face Vicky and her questions. He thought that, not so long ago, she must have been beautiful.

"Does that give you time for a drink, before they close? Sorry I don't

know your name."

"I'm Parker."

It scratched in his mind.

"Parker?"

"Cathy Parker."

"From Belfast?"

She turned away from her screen. She looked up at him and her glance was withering.

"I am Cathy Parker, "from Belfast", yes."

"We used to talk about you."

"Did you?"

"The instructors used to lecture us about that bar, escape and evasion,

the bar full of Provos and you taking them on."

"Did they?"

e bar."

"It's a legend there, what you did in th

"You want to know something?"

"Of course, please." What Cathy Parker had done in the bar up on the

hill above Dungannon, East Tyrone Brigade country, when she'd been on

covert surveillance, had been identified, taken by the Provos, was held

up by the instructors as the single best example they knew of the

will

to survive. She was a legend.

215

"Tell me.

She said, "It was all for nothing. What mattered was my tout. I lost

him. I pushed him too far, and I lost him. Did the instructors tell you that? If you'll excuse me..."

"Have you time for a drink?"

"I have you haven't. Hang around here and you'll end up pushing paper plicate, badgering night-duty archive clerks, errand-running

in tri

for

ss farts, sucking your bloody conscience, scrapping for

those usele

a

promotion ladder.

place on the

You'll be sad and passed over, and