Origin (20 page)

Using the same rationale as that of entering the estate – the cameras and body-heat monitors were used at ground level, as that was where security would expect a threat to be moving – Adams decided the best way to get to the house undetected would be to use the trees. And so – slowly, carefully, often
painfully
– Adams used his superior climbing skills to stay up in the trees, working his way towards the house high up in the branches of the trees.

He was careful to keep his breathing, his heart rate and his physical movements as slow and deliberate as possible, not wanting to disturb the animals that used the trees as their home, knowing that a flock of birds escaping the treetops en masse at this time of night would be as good as a high-decible alarm call to the guards. And so what should have taken two or three minutes stretched to over three hours as he negotiated each and every tree branch by branch, sometimes able to step easily to the next tree along, other times having to jump, while on other occasions having to work his way around small clearings, which added even more time to his journey.

Twice, dog patrols passed through the woods, although never directly below him; Adams heard them a long way out, assessed their likely route, and laid up high in the treetops until they passed. The covering of mud of his body also reduced his natural scents, giving nothing to alert the dogs’ acute senses.

It was a long and drawn-out process, but by the time Adams approached the edge of the treeline on the house side – the lights of the east wing shining brightly through the branches – he was sure that he had got there completely undetected.

He had considered getting the Najana brothers to create some sort of distraction, to take the security force’s attention away to another part of the estate, but had eventually decided against it. Better that the security forces were not alerted at all, he had figured.

He had taken even more time to manoeuvre his way through the last few trees, knowing that the lights of the estate might now serve to illuminate him. He had a natural instinct, honed by years of practice, that enabled him to keep to the darkest areas, understanding how the trees would appear to anyone looking directly at them. He had now succeeded in attaining an excellent observation point, hidden in the treetops in direct line of sight of the east wing of the mansion house.

The brothers had offered him a collapsible, micro parabolic mic, with which he could have listened in to voices within the house from his current position. But he had been worried about the electrical charge given off by the device, keenly aware of the security group’s counter-electronic surveillance capabilities. He had therefore decided to go in ‘naked’, without any electrical or technological equipment. It wasn’t that he didn’t trust it, or thought that such equipment was useless; on the contrary, during his time in the Shadow Wolves he had used many such devices, and had at times found them invaluable. In this particular situation, however, he decided that relying on his natural resources was going to be the best option. Which meant he was going to have to get closer.

He had memorized the layout of the house – the living areas, the kitchens, dining room, study and library, the bathrooms and the bedrooms – and knew that he was looking directly at the first-floor guest bedroom, with the kitchen on the floor below. Jacobs’ own bedroom was on the rear side of the east wing, facing the lawn and the bay. His private study was also to the rear, with French doors leading to the lawn’s terrace. The rear façade of the house was illuminated by garden lights aimed directly at the white stucco exterior. Conversely, the eastern edge of the building that Adams was looking at was dark, unlit and shaded by the trees.

The question was, how to cross the forty feet of trimmed, open lawn between the treeline and the eastern edge of the house? There would doubtless be motion sensors in addition to body-heat detectors, not to mention the guards and their dogs. But again, it would seem that all such sensors were directed at ground level.

Still cloaked in the dark, Adams started to unravel the long, thin rope that was coiled round his body.

‘Do you think he’s there yet?’ Lynn asked Thomas with more anxiety than she wanted to display.

‘Well, he’s possibly at the treeline by now, looking out over the house, probably trying to assess whether he can make it all the way with that rope of his,’ Thomas responded. When he saw that this did not immediately reassure her, he added, ‘But he must be doing OK, we’ve not heard any alarms, and there’s not been any shouting or barking, so I think he must be doing all right.’

‘From what I’ve heard about him, there shouldn’t be a problem anyway,’ Jacob Najana, the youngest of the brothers, interjected. ‘I mean, he’s a legend, right? He—’ Jacob was interrupted by a bleep from the secure digital satellite radio resting between them.

‘Guys,’ they heard Ben’s voice come through loud and clear, ‘there’s a problem.’ Ben Najana was stationed up on Cemetery Road, observing the main access route to the house. ‘Eight big SUVs just passed the main gates and are turning down the driveway. They’ll be at the house in two minutes.’

Lynn went white. Matt didn’t even have a radio. There was no way to warn him.

A
DAMS HEARD THEM
before they had even entered the estate, picked out the rough, V8 burble of large vehicles – eight or nine of them – travelling in convoy on the main access road to the north of his position. He heard the deceleration, the sound of tyres turning, and knew they were on the driveway, heading towards the house.

He considered his options as he hung suspended thirty feet above the side lawn from his black nylon rope. He had had to throw the rope to the far rooftop, hoping that his aim was sound. He had watched with trepidation as it had gone sailing through the night, the weighted end aimed at one of the roof’s railed edges, all too aware that if it failed to hit the right spot, it would tumble uselessly to the lawn below, its forty-foot length impossible to haul back up before it hit the ground and activated every sensor and detector in the area.

But it had flown true, and anchored on the correct point, and after breathing a sigh of relief, Adams had started climbing, upside down and hand over hand, legs secured over the rope for stability.

Now he was halfway across, with around eight vehicles carrying maybe five people in each – forty extra, unknown people – about to arrive. Should he go back, or press on? The decision had to be made instantly, as within two minutes the headlights of the oncoming vehicles would hit the house and illuminate him like the proverbial sitting duck.

Never one for retreat, there was hardly a decision to be made, and he continued doggedly on his way, one fist pumping steadily over the other.

Jacobs looked up from his paperwork as Wesley Jones entered his study.

‘We’ve got a problem, sir,’ he announced with military understatement.

Jacobs stared at Jones through his half-moon reading lenses. ‘What do you mean?’ he asked.

‘Secret Service has just entered the estate,’ Jones said uncertainly.

‘What?’ Jacobs nearly spilt his brandy over his papers. ‘What the hell for? Where’s Tony?’

‘Tony is still at the White House, I just called him. He doesn’t know anything about it.’

Jacobs’ mind was racing. What was going on? Why had the Secret Service decided to visit him, so close to the end?

‘Who are they?’ Jacobs asked agian. ‘How many?’

‘Gate security reports eight cars, four men in each. And one of them is Lowell himself.’

Jacobs groaned inwardly. Harvey Lowell was the Director of the Secret Service. He had been a guest at a Bilderberg meeting just last year and, unknown to him, had been under consideration to become one of the chosen. He hadn’t made the grade in the end, though, and the offer had never been made. His psychological profile, as well as his answers during their private, informal interview, indicated that he would have moral issues with the sacrifices that were going to be made.

But did he suspect something? Had he figured out what was going on? And why had he arrived with so many agents? Why the show of force?

Jacobs slowly took the glasses off the end of his nose and rested them on his desk, pushed his chair back and stood up.

‘Well,’ he said resignedly, ‘I suppose I’d better go and meet him, hadn’t I?’

Adams heard the vehicles getting closer and closer, could almost feel the heat of the incoming headlight beams, so heightened were his senses.

Finally, he reached the house, fingertips touching the railings, his thin-soled climbing boots resting carefully on top of the exterior brickwork of the window frame below. He would have rolled directly on to the roof, but the information gathered by Stephenson suggested that it would have its own infrared sensors strung out along the top. He therefore clung to the side of the building, melting into the dark as he disconnected the rope from the railing. He would have loved to have used the rope to get back to the treeline, but knew that a forty-foot rope spanning the space between the woods and the house would not go unnoticed for long. And so he took the weighted end and hurled it as hard as he could back at the trees he had come from, watching as it once again sailed through the air, mercifully coming to rest hidden in the uppermost branches, even as the bright headlights arrived at the turning circle at the front of the house.

He quickly pulled himself further back into the wall, flattening himself as much as he could, becoming immobile, aware that any movement now could give him away. And then the lights were brighter as the vehicles moved round the turning circle, and for a few brief seconds Adams was sure he would be spotted, certain that his dark, mud-covered silhouette would be all too visible against the white stucco of the mansion’s wall.

And then, mercifully, there was dark again as the vehicles – large, black SUVs with government plates, Adams noticed – completed their turns and came to rest at the front entrance.

Adams started to edge his way down the building.

‘Lowell, to what do we owe the honour?’ Jacobs asked charmingly as he opened the large front door of his home.

Before him stood Harvey Lowell, tall, angular and thin, with a receding hairline and a look of fierce intelligence. He was flanked by six men, all dressed in identical dark suits.

‘We need to talk,’ Lowell said evenly.

‘Well, why don’t you come in then?’ Jacobs said graciously, although he was feeling nothing of the sort. ‘Where are the rest of your agents?’ he asked, gesturing at the eight SUVs parked outside.

‘Securing the estate,’ Lowell answered simply, the implication clear: the visit was not friendly.

Jacobs smiled stiffly. ‘I am sure there is no need for that,’ he said. ‘But you better come in anyway.’

In the study, Lowell sat down and gestured at the papers still scattered across Jacobs’ desk. ‘Doing a little research?’ he asked, eyebrows raised.

‘You know how it is,’ Jacobs said non-committally.

Lowell grunted in reply.

‘A drink?’ Jacobs offered next, trying to keep the conversation genial.

Lowell shook his head. ‘No thank you. This is hardly what you would call a social visit.’

Jacobs’ eyes narrowed, and for an instant Lowell was rocked by the intensity of the man’s gaze.

‘Well, in that case,’ Jacobs said with a hint of underlying menace, ‘you’d better tell me what the hell it is you want.’

Adams entered the house through the guest-room window. As he had suspected, the house wasn’t continuously alarmed; people going in and out of rooms would make such a procedure unnecessarily troublesome. And so the security measures were focused largely upon detecting threats before they ever got to the house, and less so on the entry and exit points of the house itself, especially on the upper floors.

The house dated from 1815, and although some major modifications had been made in order to improve security, it was still an old house and was relatively easy to break into if you knew how. After all, with twelve armed security guards on-site, who in their right mind was ever going to break into the house in the first place?

Adams recognized the infrared strip light running across the inside of the window frame. After disabling the lock, a simple hand-held mirror slipped between the light beam as he made his entry was sufficient to stop the alarm going off.

Once inside, he went immediately to the far wall and pulled open a cupboard. He found himself staring down the laundry chute, still in operation and exactly where Adams had expected to find it.

Perfect
, Adams thought, even as he started to climb inside.

As he neared the bottom of the chute, he slowed his descent until he was moving in complete silence, ears straining for any sound. Confident that the basement laundry room was empty, Adams allowed himself to drop out of the chute and into the huge laundry bin at the bottom. He peered out over the top to confirm the absence of security guards. He didn’t know what was going on upstairs but the presence of government officials meant that there were now yet more people in the house to find him, and he would have to be even more careful.

From his position in the bin, Adams confirmed the location of the CCTV cameras and planned his route to avoid them. Then he was on the move once again, moving swiftly across the room to a door on the far side. He pulled it open the instant he was there, slipped quickly through it, and closed it again behind him no more than three seconds after leaving the protection of the laundry bin.

The new room was not a room at all really but a large cupboard, filled with shelves containing various cleaning chemicals, spare sheets and other bedlinen. And according to the building’s blueprints, the cupboard was located directly underneath the ground-floor study of Stephen Jacobs.

‘I
WANT TO
talk about the deaths of Ryan Yordale, Frank Croaker, Yves Desault, Vitor Dzerzewski, Patek Guillaume, Stephanie Ortmeyer, Gustav Schliesser, Helen Holmes, Anthony DeSilva, Jacek Ostrawski and Nicolas St Vincent,’ Lowell said, his tone grave.