Chameleon - A City of London Thriller (6 page)

Nonetheless,
the plan was working so far. The uniformed Gendarmes had cleared
the top of the street to allow free access to the limousine. The
Minister would get out of the car and walk less than fifteen metres
to the relative safety of the gardens, which were ringed with
machine gun toting French police. Once the Minister had finished,
the Gendarmes would move the protestors onto Allez De Justes,
behind the limousine, to allow it to freely exit the bottom of the
one-way street.

Laurent’s main
concern remained the few metres between the car and the garden. He
had to concede that everything looked secure, but this was where
the Shin Bet men would have been stationed, if they hadn’t been in
hospital.

Laurent looked
around as the limousine turned into the narrow road. The only
building overlooking the arrival and departure was an academy of
some kind, but luckily the windows were barred and opaque. The
ancient building had two half glazed green doors that in normal
circumstances would open outwards, but which were today barred and
padlocked to prevent access or egress to the arrival point. The
glazing was opaque Georgian wired glass which was protected by
vertical steel bars at six-inch intervals.

Outside each
green door was a worn stone step around five feet wide, and three
French students sat on each step. Even though they were probably
aged no more than sixteen or so, they had been frisked.

The car pulled
up, and Laurent took up his position. His duty was to open the car
door when it was safe to do so and let out bodyguard number one.
Bodyguard number two would exit from the far side of the
car.

In a few
seconds both doors were open and the two bodyguards were looking
around to assess any threats. They made the decision that the
greater threat was the demonstration rather than the seated
students, and so they placed themselves between the protestors and
the Minister as he exited the car.

Two missiles
flew over the police line, but Laurent and the bodyguards deflected
them with their hands. One balloon was filled with flour, the other
with ketchup. Laurent got the ketchup, and as he parried it away it
burst open and covered him.

Eager to get
the minister into safety, the bodyguards shielded him from the
crowd by walking to the side of him, one slightly in front, one
slightly behind. This allowed the minister to walk with some
dignity towards his smiling host, who had his arms outstretched in
welcome. The Minister moved towards his host, but never reached
him.

The Rabbi on
the welcoming committee was the first one to notice something odd.
The three students on the stone step were looking up to where the
glazed panel in the door had simply disappeared, leaving an
opening. It had been removed silently. Before he could shout a
warning, a black machine pistol poked through the orifice and fired
off a controlled burst of six rounds. Every one hit the sprightly
eighty two year old Minister.

Suddenly there
was mayhem. The police did not know where the shots had come from,
and by default surrounded the crowd of protesters. Laurent and the
Rabbi pointed to the door, where three students were now cowering
and crying, but they could not make themselves heard. Laurent
withdrew his sidearm and ran to the door.

One of the
Gendarmes from the garden rushed out to see the minister bleeding
to death on the ground, and the Rabbi shouting in Yiddish and
pointing to the door. The Gendarme saw a man running away holding a
gun, and had to make a split second decision. He fired.

***

The Chameleon
was delighted that the plan had worked so well. Of course, it had
meant the sacrifice of a perfectly good backpack bomb to give the
Israelis’ intelligence community a false sense of security. The
bombers’ code words were easy to repeat; the Chameleon had used
them before when working for the Mossad.

Justine had
done well. Just a couple of drops of Botox, or Botulinium Toxin,
was enough to cause considerable distress but not death.

The French
Police had kindly obliged by barring the doors to the academy,
meaning that no one could give chase. The Chameleon had been in the
Academy all night, first hiding and then stripping away the glazing
beads and putty holding in the glass from the inside. The rest had
been easy; the glass was replaced, being held in only by blu tack.
From the outside it looked the same, but it could be removed in two
seconds. Finally a pinhole viewer inserted into a hole drilled in
the door allowed the Chameleon to see exactly when the Minister was
in range.

Perfect. The
Chameleon relaxed into the first class seat on the Eurostar, and
ordered dinner.

***

The Duty
Controller at the Mossad HQ in Tel Aviv sat with his head in his
hands. He had just presided over the death of an Israeli Minister
he had been charged with protecting, by an assailant who had
managed somehow to get clean away without being seen by
anyone.

One of his
best agents had been cut down by friendly fire, and was probably
already dead when he slid down the wall he had been thrown against
by the impact of the French Gendarme’s 9mm parabellums. Pictures of
him would find their way onto the front pages of newspapers around
the world because, in the rush to evacuate the dying Minister, no
one had stopped the paparazzi. Ari looked at the photos of the
whole crime scene that were being offered for sale on the Internet,
but he couldn’t take his eyes off the handsome young French Israeli
sitting against the wall. Laurent still had his gun in his hand;
blood had poured from his mouth after two of the rounds had
destroyed his lungs, the whole picture becoming even more bizarre
when one took into consideration the fact that he was also covered
in tomato ketchup.

Even worse
for Israel was the likelihood that, beside the picture of Laurent
on the front pages, would be the picture of the pregnant
Palestinian woman lying dead on the pavement on
Rue
Geoffroy
L'Asnier
, dead eyes staring, having
been run down by the panicking Israeli Limousine driver.

The phone rang
and an electronically enhanced voice spoke.

“
Perhaps now
you will pay your debts. Usual account, by the end of the week, or
I work my way through the Cabinet.” The phone line was
disconnected.

Ari knew the
Chameleon would have to be paid, despite what he had done. The
government must never know that this was all about a dishonoured
debt. If they ever found out, the Mossad would be closed down
within a week.

Anyway, it
wasn’t Ari’s problem any more. He had been fired ten minutes before
the call came in.

Chapter
1
0

Hokobu
Apartment, Parnell House, Oakley St, Kensington, London, Tuesday
8:30am.

The morning
was grey and miserable but the frost wasn’t as cruel as it had been
on previous mornings. Deep cloud cover seemed to have kept the
temperatures to just below freezing. Dee turned onto Oakley Street.
She had travelled on the tube from Greenwich, where she shared an
apartment with her new husband Josh Hammond. Her coat collar was
turned up, ineffectively, against the wind and her breath was
expelled in clouds of water vapour through the scarf she held in
front of her face.

Parnell House
was a six-storey brick building, as anonymous as it was faceless.
Probably built in the 1950s, it offered a view of an expanse of
brickwork, windows and a flat roof to those passers-by who deemed
it worthy of examination. The building had no aesthetic value that
Dee could determine, but she knew that it was about to be listed as
the minimalist architect that designed it was now popular again
after years in the wilderness, thanks to a scathing critique of his
work by an outspoken royal. In the centre of the long low building
was an opening with apartments built above it. The opening was
about six metres wide and four metres high. A metal grating which
was actually an electronically operated gate filled the space. To
the left hand side was a turnstile, which was operated by an
electronic key fob or by the guard behind the glass
window.

This level of
security ensured that the only way into Parnell House was past the
guard on duty. Dee stepped up to the turnstile and the guard
pressed a button which initiated a buzzer, indicating that Dee
could push on the turnstile and enter the security
office.

Once inside
she explained who she was and showed her driving licence, which was
retained, and in return she was given a security card hanging from
a lanyard, which was labelled VISITOR. The guards were all ex
military types with abundant muscle and menace, all with short
haircuts and no stubble. Their blazers and ties were identical.
They were as anonymous as the building they were guarding. Five
minutes after leaving the place, any description you gave of the
guard that assisted you would probably fit every guard on the
roster.

A capable but
silent guard accompanied Dee right to the door of the Hokobus’
apartment and waited until she entered, before returning to his
post downstairs. In the elevator, recently refurbished to its 1950s
grandeur (which wasn’t in fact very grand at all), Dee had asked
why the security was so much more visible than the last time they
had used the facility. The guard mentioned that the premises were
almost permanently on Condition Black Alert due to the sensitivity
of the security services to the presence of one of the occupants.
The guard would not say who it was, but Dee knew anyway, as did
anyone who read the newspapers.

The sixth
floor apartment housed the Hokobus, but the fourth floor was home
to one of the Crown Princes of the United Arab Emirates whilst he
studied in London. His Highness Crown Prince Arbaaz bin Al Salfah
was studying Economics and Politics at Post Graduate level at the
LSE and he appeared to be a clean-living, dedicated Muslim, which
was not always the case with crown princes from the Middle
East.

Geordie stood
in the kitchen preparing breakfast. The aroma of bacon was
irresistible and the sound of it crackling on the grill made Dee
feel hungry, even though she had already had a breakfast of bran
flakes and orange juice.

“
Mussi, you
must make some breakfast for your lady boss, she is too thin,”
Victoria joked. “In Marat she would be the last girl to be picked
in a marriage festival.”

Geordie simply
smiled and shook his head. Dee sidled up to him and looked to see
what other goodies were cooking. It was to be a traditional English
breakfast with bacon, eggs, sausages, mushrooms, tomatoes and baked
beans.

“
Why does she
call you Mussi?”

“
Don’t ask.
It’s a longer story than you’ll have the patience for listening
to.”

***

Breakfast was
enormous fun. Samuel and Victoria knew a host of amusing anecdotes
about life in Marat. They regaled Dee and Geordie with tales of
their village hermit, who won second prize in the local lottery and
was presented with a fridge as his prize. He lavished much
attention on the gleaming new appliance, ensuring that it was
always full; the handbook said it was more efficient when it was
full. Unfortunately, the old man did not realise that in order for
it to work properly it needed to be plugged into a source of
electricity, which didn’t matter anyway as his traditional Rondel
home had no access to such modern marvels.

Their village
itself was modern and well equipped, thanks to aid provided by the
US, Canada and the UK under the UN programme. Victoria was ashamed
that they needed aid when the country produced so much wealth, only
for it to be stolen by the mining companies and the
authorities.

Before the
conversation became too sombre, Dee jumped in to lighten the
mood.

“
So, why do
you call Geordie here ‘my little Mussi’?”

Victoria told
them the story.

“
In our
folklore a village in the central bush was being terrorised by a
big lion who would come into the village and take food and people
away. The menfolk were scared of the giant beast, the womenfolk
stopped singing and the children no longer laughed and
played.

Then a little
white boy came to the village selling sticks, and he promised that
if the villagers bought all of their sticks from him he would get
rid of the lion. The villagers made the promise and little Mussi
had the lion chase him into the forest, to the biggest tree in the
jungle. It was so big that it took an hour to walk right around it.
The foolish lion began chasing Mussi round and round the tree, but
soon the wise Mussi was sitting high in the branches. The foolish
lion ran around the tree chasing Mussi all day and all night and
all the next day, whilst Mussi slept in the branches.

The next
morning when Mussi came down from the tree the lion was exhausted.
It had worn its legs away with all of the running and it was all
skin and bone. Mussi killed the lion easily with his spear, and
returned to the village wearing the lion’s magnificent mane around
his shoulders. The menfolk became brave again, the women sang happy
songs about Mussi and the children laughed.

So, you see,
he is my little Mussi, he has come to save me from the lions who
would terrorise me into silence, and who would like to stop me
singing.”