Liz Carlyle - 06 - Rip Tide (28 page)

‘I hope they stay a little further from shore this time.’

‘That seems to make no difference nowadays. The pirates are becoming bolder all the time. They seem perfectly willing to go miles from shore if they think there’s a sitting duck out there. And the whole point about this shipment is that we want them to think it’s a fat bird, ripe for the plucking. The ostensible manifest is mouth-watering and its value is in the millions. It’s a fake, of course, but it’s been drawn up with the utmost security, so no one in the office has any reason to believe it’s anything but legit. They may know we suspect a leak – and if this girl Maria was murdered because someone knew we’d put her in there, then they’ll know what we suspect – but I’m willing to bet they’ll still go for this shipment.’

‘You’re probably right. So what’s this thought of yours?’ She’d learned long ago in dealing with Fane that it was always best to stick firmly to the point. Otherwise, he’d lead you round and round, in a bewilderingly indirect dance. And you’d find yourself tied up in knots and agreeing to things that you’d regret later.

For once Fane was equally direct. ‘I want to put a man on board. Undercover, of course.’

Liz looked at him with a slight frown. Behind her cool grey gaze her mind was racing. What was Geoffrey Fane up to now? ‘And what would he do, your man?’

‘Find out if anyone on the ship is helping the hijackers.’

‘That seems most unlikely. If you’re right, they’d already know which ship to attack, and what it’s carrying. They don’t need anything further from someone on board the
Aristides
.’

‘Unless the pirates have people there to help them take control when they try and board.’

Liz thought for a moment. What Fane said made sense – there might well be an advantage to the pirates in having accomplices already on board. Or allies anyway, she thought, thinking of the crewmen who had jumped ship in Mombasa after the last hijacking attempt. And suddenly it occurred to her that this might be the whole point: men on board could certainly assist the hijackers, but more importantly, once on shore, they could stay there and join the pirates or else the forces of Al Qaeda, who might well have recruited them in the first place.

She realised, as she sat gazing blankly at Geoffrey Fane, that she hadn’t thought through the full implications of all that Peggy had discovered. She’d been distracted: by the attack on Boatman, and the urgent need to get him and his wife to safety; by the recruitment of Tahira to cultivate Malik. All of this had taken her attention off Peggy’s research.

Now, as she thought about it again, everything seemed a lot clearer. Amir Khan had attended the New Springfield Mosque. He had gone from Birmingham to Pakistan; from there he had somehow got to Athens, how or why he was still refusing to tell them. Then he had turned up with a band of pirates in Somalia. The six crewmen who had disappeared in Mombasa had, Peggy had discovered, been recruited for the
Aristides
in Athens, via a Pakistani company. They had false Pakistani passports but had spoken to each other in English, so were probably not Pakistanis at all. Had they come from Birmingham too? Could it be that Amir Khan was just the tip of the iceberg? Were many more British recruits heading for Somalia? She needed to think more about this idea before she shared her whole investigation with Geoffrey Fane. She’d rather talk to Peggy first, and then to Martin to see what he made of it.

Her eyes focused on Fane again and she realised he was still talking about his proposal to put someone on board the ship. But, if she was right, it was hard to see how placing a solitary undercover agent on the
Aristides
could do anything to foil a plot of this complexity. It was far more likely to blow the investigation and precipitate a change of plan by the plotters. She started to repeat her objections to Fane’s proposal.

He cut her off with a raised hand. ‘Hear me out, if you would, Elizabeth. If we have someone on board, with direct communications of course, he’ll be able to alert us immediately the attack takes place – if it does. We’ll have naval forces all over the area who can move in quickly – there’s not a chance the pirates will get away. Then we’ll discover what this is all about and who the leaker in UCSO is.’

The plan still seemed to Liz just the sort of John Buchan-like adventure that had filled MI6’s past history – and which, in her view, rarely achieved its objective. Her scepticism must have showed clearly on her face. Fane said earnestly, ‘I can see you’re doubtful about this, but what’s the risk?’

In the first place, somebody’s life, thought Liz, looking at him and remembering what had happened to Maria, his last attempt at infiltrating an agent. The dead girl seemed to hold for him all the importance of a tax deduction – something to be written off.

Fane went on, ‘Look, the simple truth is, if we don’t take charge of this operation, the Americans will.’

‘The Americans? What have they got to do with it?’

‘Quite a lot by now.’ He was looking slightly sheepish. ‘You were right about the head of the Athens office – he’s ex-Agency. Langley has suddenly started to take an interest in what they’d previously dismissed as a parochial Greek affair. It feeds into their growing concern about Somalia.’

‘What’s that got to do with putting someone on board the
Aristides
?’

‘Simply this: if we don’t do it, Langley will. And I’m sure that neither of us wants that to happen.’

She didn’t answer at once. Fane was right to think that it would be disastrous for the CIA to come charging mob-handed into the case. Now was not the moment for a ‘bombs away’ approach.

But Fane’s alternative, putting a Six officer on board, was equally unpalatable to Liz. The emphasis then would be less on discovering any links between the Birmingham mosque, Al Qaeda and Somalia, and more on adventures against pirates and . . . well, ultimately, she thought cynically, furthering Fane’s own glory. No, thanks, thought Liz.

She said, ‘I agree we don’t want the Americans taking over. But I don’t think it should be one of your people on board.’

‘Why not?’ demanded Fane, looking affronted.

‘Because if anyone’s going to do this, it should be one of us.’ Before he could object, she continued, ‘If there are people on board who are in collusion with the pirates, the likelihood is that they will be British masquerading as Pakistanis.’ She told him what Peggy had found out about the six crew members who had disappeared during the
Aristides’
previous voyage. She went on, ‘And we’re obviously in the strongest position to spot them. We’re already investigating the mosque in Birmingham that Amir Khan used to attend. We think that’s where he was recruited to do whatever he was sent out to Somalia to do. It may be that all this links together. Anyway, it’s in our bailiwick. So whoever we put on the
Aristides
should know the details of our investigation and be from this side of the river.’

She pointed out of the window. ‘Low floor perhaps, but the view from here looks pretty clear to me.’

Chapter 42

In the Athens office of UCSO, the shock of Maria Galanos’ death had begun to wear off, to be replaced by an atmosphere of oppressive gloom. The usual high spirits of the Greek girls were dimmed, and Mr Limonides had become even more withdrawn. Katherine Ball was due in from London the following day, and Mitchell Berger was hoping that her brisk professionalism would lighten the mood and return them to normality.

Claude Rameau had come back from ten days in Rwanda, and Berger had been trying to keep track of her – not an easy task since she clearly regarded the office as merely a convenient place to drop in to from time to time when it suited her. The more he thought about it, the less likely it seemed that Claude Rameau was the source of the leak about the UCSO shipments. An accomplice, possibly, but not the prime mover. For a start, she wasn’t in the country enough, let alone in the office, to know in detail what was going on – or to keep an eye on the ships’ manifests.

No, the obvious suspect was not someone in the office at all. Berger’s suspicions were now focused on the shipping agent, Mo Miandad. Acting on these suspicions, he had followed Miandad the previous week when the man left the UCSO offices in the late afternoon after one of his regular visits to Mr Limonides. When Mo got on to a bus, Berger hailed a passing cab and, to the obvious delight of the taxi driver, told him to follow the bus. They’d stopped and started, keeping closely behind the bus as it made its way for two miles or so across the city, until Berger saw Miandad alight. The taxi driver had been disappointed when Berger leaped out and paid him off. He’d asked if he should follow on slowly behind, ready in case he was needed again, but Berger told him to go away.

They had ended up in a part of Athens that Berger did not know – a suburban enclave of flats and small houses, which from the look of the pedestrians on the street seemed to be occupied largely by older people, with a good smattering of ethnic minorities. He followed Miandad from a distance, and spotted him turning into a terrace of stuccoed houses where he opened a front door with a key. This must be where he lives, thought Berger. That seemed to be confirmed when, minutes later, an Asian woman and a teenage girl, both wearing headscarves, came out of the same front door.

There was nothing suspicious going on here, it seemed, and Berger turned away to return to the office. It was as he was walking back to the bus stop that he noticed a name on one of the streets that rang a bell with him. He’d seen it somewhere before, but couldn’t recall where. It was only as he was sitting on the bus that he remembered – he’d seen the name in the police report on Maria’s murder. It was the street where she had lived.

Now, a week later, Mo Miandad had come into the office for a morning session with Limonides. Berger hovered in the corridor, keen to see if the Pakistani would go and talk to the newly returned Claude Rameau. He didn’t, but when the Frenchwoman left early for lunch, followed only a few minutes later by Miandad, Berger decided to follow the shipping agent again.

This time Miandad stayed on foot, walking quickly through the middle-class neighbourhood where the UCSO offices were situated, heading towards the harbour. Berger found him easy to track. Though he was comparatively short, he was wearing a hat – an old-fashioned fedora, which could be spotted from a good distance. Berger followed him through a commercial zone of rough bars and fast-food outlets, then into a better neighbourhood with modern office buildings and an American chain motel three storeys high.

Mo walked on, past the entrance to the hotel’s reception area. And then suddenly he turned and went up an external flight of stairs which led to the walkways that ran around the second and third floors of the motel. He must be meeting someone in a room up there, thought Berger, with increasing excitement. Maybe it was Claude Rameau – she could have taken a cab and be waiting already inside the room.

Quickening his pace, Berger followed him up the same staircase, listening for his quarry’s steps on the treads above him.
Tonk-tonk-tonk.
The metal stairs reverberated as the man climbed. Then suddenly the noise stopped; Berger stopped too. When the steps resumed he continued climbing, treading lightly, two steps at a time, until he reached the third floor where he paused just short of the top of the flight of stairs. Slowly he extended his head and peered cautiously along the walkway, first in one direction, then the other – where he saw, at the far end, almost a hundred feet away, the familiar figure of Mo Miandad. There was someone else there, in front of him – a blonde woman with her back to Berger, wearing what looked like a black raincoat. It could be Claude Rameau; Berger’s pulse quickened. Mo Miandad looked back for a second and then they both disappeared around the corner. Had he spotted Berger?

He sprinted after them along the gallery, then slowed as he reached the corner, listening for footsteps. He saw another stairway leading down and could hear footsteps on the treads. He went to the top of the steps and peered down. Two floors below he spotted Mo and a fleeting glimpse of the blonde woman, just as she left his field of vision. Damn!

He ran down the staircase without any thought for the noise he was making – his only aim now was to catch up with them and confront them. When he reached the bottom of the stairs he hesitated. There was no one in sight. He turned along the passage which led past the long line of ground-floor rooms. A door halfway along was ajar, as if someone had just gone inside. Running towards it, he realised that he didn’t know what he was going to say to explain why he was there – but it was they who needed to do the explaining.

As he came up to the open door he slowed down. Inside, the room was pitch black. He stepped through the doorway, reaching out for the light switch. He flicked it on and at the same moment felt a hand on his back. Before he could turn around, the hand pushed him – hard – and he stumbled forward, landing on the concrete floor with a painful crack to his knees. He winced and tried to get up to confront his assailant. But the door behind him closed with a sharp click. Trying to ignore the pain in both his legs, Berger reached for the door handle. It was locked.

He looked around and saw that he was trapped in a service cupboard, facing two brooms and a row of mops, bolt upright in their buckets. A trolley against one wall held piles of clean sheets and folded towels. On the wall, bottles of disinfectant and liquid cleaner crowded a shelf. This was obviously not where Mo conducted his assignations.