Bionic Agent (16 page)

“Keep looking,” Winter replied. “What else is there? Any e-mails?”

Jordan started the e-mail package and then nodded. “Yes. He sent his last one on 11th April – the day after I went to the boatyard.” He opened the most recent messages that
Norman had written. “There’s nothing interesting. Hang on. I’ll do a search on the whole computer.”

But he drew a blank.

Jordan also searched all documents for the terms
Richard Montgomery
and
explosive
, with the same result. Lightfoot had no files containing those giveaway words.

“I’m going into Internet Explorer.” Jordan clicked on
History
to see the websites that Lightfoot had visited before he disappeared. He scanned down the sites and then
gasped.

“What is it?”

“He did a search on my name.
Jordan Stryker
.”

“You
did
spook him last week,” Winter said. “But it’s okay. He won’t have discovered anything about you.”

Feeling unsettled, Jordan continued down the list. “Look,” he said. “This might be important. Websites about shipping.”

Together they went through the pages he’d visited. The last time Norman Lightfoot had logged on to the internet, he’d delved into the schedules and destinations of ships leaving the
Thames Estuary. His final piece of research concerned a ship leaving for Trondheim in Norway.

Winter smiled. “I’m getting a consistent message here. It doesn’t take a genius to work out where he’s gone. Let’s face it: he’d be expert at getting out of
the country by ship. He’s bound to know how to sneak on board without raising suspicions.” She put down a notepad and said, “He hasn’t left a trail on paper. Come on. Best
to get out of here before the cops arrive. I think our work’s done.”

“But we haven’t proved anything...”

“No, but the innocent don’t do a runner when a boy comes sniffing around,” Winter replied. “Anyway, we know where to find him. I’ll settle for that.”

“All right,” Angel said to Winter. “I’ll book you onto a flight for Trondheim tonight – if there is one. And I’ll have a team go with you.
Well, a couple of agents. That’s all I can spare. But it’s enough.”

Winter nodded.

Jordan looked at Angel with expectation on his face.

Angel shook his head. “You lost your holiday today. You can have tomorrow off instead.”

“But...” Jordan began.

“No, Jordan. You’ve been really helpful, I know, but you’re not going. That’s final. Think about it. Unit Red doesn’t exist. We don’t have any authority in
Norway. Winter and the others will go as tourists. You’d be a minor travelling without parents. That’d raise too many tricky questions with immigration officials.”

“And getting you through the metal detector would take some explaining,” Winter said with a grin.

“That’s not all,” Angel added. “Lightfoot would make a run for it if he saw you coming.”

Angel’s decision was as solid as a brick wall that even Jordan’s arm could not demolish. There was no point even trying.

Lying in bed that night, though, doubts began to niggle at Jordan, keeping sleep away. He wondered if Angel and Winter had jumped to the obvious conclusion too quickly. What if Norman Lightfoot
had laid a false trail – all the way to Norway? What if he’d anticipated that the powers-that-be would find all of the information in his house? What if it was a deliberate bluff? After
all, the pictures of Norway had been left lying around, his computer password had been easy to crack, and he hadn’t deleted the record of his internet search history.

Maybe that was too far-fetched. Maybe the disgraced captain had thought about leaving the country – and even researched it on the internet – but decided it was an over-the-top
reaction to a boy asking questions. As far as Norman Lightfoot knew, he was up against a curious teenager. He didn’t know he had Unit Red on his scent. He could be in a clinic dealing with
his drink problem. He could be anywhere sorting his head out. He could be on a massive drunken binge. Or he could still be in Chalkwell.

Jordan realized what he had to do. Tomorrow he would sacrifice another day’s holiday and return to the marina where he’d met Norman Lightfoot, where Cara Quickfall used to moor her
boat.

Jordan walked back along the seaside lane towards Chalkwell Marina. On his left, beyond the sandbank, a tanker entering the mouth of the Thames seemed to be moving at walking
pace in the same direction. Going much faster, a train bound for London rumbled past him on the right. He hadn’t got a plan in mind. He just knew he had to go to the boatyard and check it out
for clues on Lightfoot’s whereabouts.

He hesitated at the corner of the marina and looked down on the landing stage. It contained the same range of boats: from cheap to costly, from shoddy to smart. Three of the moorings were
empty.

It struck Jordan that looking after a few family boats would be quite a comedown for the sacked captain of
Ocean Courage
. After being in charge of a giant ship, every day working in this
small marina would remind him of his fall from favour. Every day, he would feel humiliated. But was that enough of a motive to kill so many people? If Norman Lightfoot had sabotaged the
Richard
Montgomery
, maybe he’d expected the effects to be limited to the passing
Ocean Courage
. That’s where his real grievance lay. Maybe he hadn’t meant to cause such a
massive catastrophe.

No one seemed to be around. The door to the shack was closed. Wondering what he’d do if Lightfoot was hiding inside, Jordan breathed in the clean sea air and went towards the familiar
shed.

Readying his robotic arm for action, he banged on the door with his left hand and opened it without waiting for an answer. But no one rushed at him.

A young man jumped up from the chair by the computer as if taken by surprise. “Hello?” he said.

The walls were still covered with the same pictures, but the smell of whisky had gone. Jordan was both relieved and disappointed. Trying to act naturally, he grinned. “Computer games
instead of logging boats, eh?”

“Who are you?”

“I could ask you that. Norman knows me. He looked after my mum’s boat. Cara Quickfall. Is he around?”

The new manager checked the boatyard’s spreadsheet and found a reference to the Quickfall family. He seemed to relax, believing that Jordan was genuine. “I took over a week back. Mr.
Lightfoot left. I don’t know why.”

“That’s a shame,” Jordan replied. It meant that the discharged captain really had vanished. “I wanted him to help me sort out what to do about our boat. It went missing
ages ago.”

“Yours too?” he blurted out.

“What do you mean? Has another one been nicked?”

“No, I don’t suppose so. It was Mr. Lightfoot’s and it’s gone.” He brought up the details on the monitor. “I guess he took off in it.”

Jordan edged towards the computer screen. “Can I see?”

The young man stood in front of the monitor. “Why?”

With a grin on his face, Jordan replied, “Because I’m part of a secret organization investigating Norman Lightfoot.”

The man laughed. “Yeah. Right. Nice line.”

Jordan said, “If I know which boat was his, it’ll help me find him.”

The manager stood aside. “I’ll let you look if you don’t tell anyone.”

“Done.” Jordan bent closer to the screen. “
Windsong
. A lot posher than ours. And it was last logged on Tuesday 17th April.”

“Yes,” he said. “Before I started.”

Jordan nodded. “Interesting.”

Jordan stood on the triangle of sandy beach outside Chalkwell Station and watched some kids messing about at the edge of the water. “It might look like he’s gone to
Norway,” Jordan explained to Angel, “but I think he’s really living in a boat called
Windsong
. All one word. We need to check for sightings. It’s a Sealine S28 Bolero
sports cruiser, made in 1998. I don’t know what half of that means, but I memorized it from the spreadsheet.”

“I’m not convinced Winter’s on a wild goose chase,” Angel said into his ear. “Perhaps Lightfoot expected you to go back to Chalkwell so he hid his boat, knowing
you’d come to the wrong conclusion. I think it’s more likely you’ve sniffed out the decoy and Winter’s onto the real thing.”

Jordan’s mood took a tumble. He hadn’t thought of that.

“But I’ll put someone onto it anyway. You sunbathe – or whatever you want to do with your day off by the seaside – and I’ll call you back if we get any
hits.”

Jordan was sitting on the seawall and drinking Coke when his phone rang again.

It was Angel. “Get yourself a taxi to Burnham-on-Crouch. It’s just round the corner from where you are. About forty kilometres by road.”

“Why?” Jordan asked.

“Because
Windsong
’s moored there, according to the local authorities. Along with hundreds of yachts. But you’ll find it if you look hard enough. And Jordan?”

“Yes?”

“Take care. Just in case Lightfoot is there.”

The Crouch was dotted with countless buoys and boats. Their masts cluttered the skyline like exclamation marks. Yachting clubs sent lines of pontoons into the river and,
further out, colourful sails ballooned in the wind.

Burnham-on-Crouch seemed to exist for sailing. It had the laid-back atmosphere of a model village, as if it wasn’t part of the real world. The Quay was buzzing even though it was Friday
and not a weekend. It wasn’t even in the tourist season. Perhaps there was going to be a yachting event of some sort.

Jordan had his vision on maximum as he walked slowly beside the river, trying to spot one particular boat among the many. He grumbled into his phone, “Can’t they pin it down a bit
more? ‘Not in one of the marinas’ means anywhere in the river. And that’s overflowing with yachts.”

“What you’re after should stand out,” Angel replied. “It’s a powerboat. It doesn’t have a mast. It’s a white sporty number with a rail around the front.
If you want to see what it looks like, I’ve put a photo on the system.”

“I’ll check it out, but everything I’m seeing here is a yacht or a rowing boat.”

He dodged around a group of people drinking beer outside a hotel and almost tripped over a dog lead. He continued along the front, straining to see as far as possible across the wide waterway.
Along the front, there were no amusement arcades or other trappings of the tourist trade. The River Crouch was Burnham’s attraction.

He was just coming up to a series of landing stages for larger boats when he saw it. At least, he saw something that matched Angel’s description. He was too far away to see the
motorboat’s name. He stopped and concentrated. In his mind, he compared the profile with the picture on Unit Red’s computer. And it matched.

Looking round to make sure no one was watching him, he ran out along a jetty and scrambled down two wooden steps into a dinghy. He untied it and began to row out into the river towards the white
sports cruiser. He was clumsy. He had not done much rowing and his right arm was so much stronger than his left that it threatened to drive him round in circles. He reduced power to his artificial
arm to try and make it match his real one. After a few minutes he began to get the hang of it. He wove his way between yachts tied to buoys.

As he drew closer to the powerboat, he could see that he’d got the right vessel. The name,
Windsong
, was painted in handwriting style near the prow. There was no one on deck.

Jordan found it difficult to manoeuvre the dinghy up to the motorboat’s stern where there was a step for boarding. One of the oars kept getting in the way. In the end, he pulled as hard as
he could on both oars, propelling himself in the right direction, and then removed the oars from their rowlocks while the dinghy glided up to
Windsong
. He reached out and grabbed the rear of
the powerboat and stood up, ready to step across, but the dinghy went backwards and he toppled.

He splashed down into the cold river. His sodden clothes and heavy arm dragged him down further than he expected. Underwater, he could see a grid of orange mooring ropes and something attached
to the bottom of
Windsong
. He wasn’t an expert on boats but he knew that a box about the size of a small suitcase did not belong there.

He broke the surface, took a gulp of air and dived down again. Swimming up to the metal object, he couldn’t figure out what it was, but it certainly wasn’t part of the design. It had
been attached with suction pads.

Then it dawned on him. He could be looking at the same type of explosive device that had been attached to the
Richard Montgomery
.
Windsong
had been booby-trapped. He guessed that
the bomb had been rigged to blow if he went on board or if Lightfoot, watching from a distance with a remote control, saw him clamber on deck.

The boat could be both a test and a trap. Norman Lightfoot could well have set it up to check if Jordan was hunting him and, if he was, to put an end to that hunt.

Jordan knew he had to get away.

Chilled, he rose to the surface and swam a few strokes to the dinghy. Almost capsizing the boat, he yanked himself awkwardly up and into it at the third attempt. He brushed wet hair from his
face, refitted the oars and rowed away as quickly as he could, driving the dinghy back to the shore.

He tied the boat hurriedly to the jetty and pulled himself up onto the wooden platform. Dripping water from his saturated clothes, he shivered and surveyed the riverside walkway. He
couldn’t see Norman Lightfoot, but there were too many people around to be certain he wasn’t there. Jordan expected him to be nearby, keeping an eye on his trap.

A toddler pointed at Jordan and giggled. “That boy’s all wet!”

Jordan realized for the first time that a few people were staring at him. He shrugged and hurried back down The Quay, looking frantically around. Sidestepping the prams and pushchairs, dogs,
slow-moving old folk and small groups of people who had stopped for a chat, Jordan continued along the promenade. As he went, he warmed up and forgot how uncomfortable he felt.