Day of Reckoning (11 page)

She turned, as if in fury. 'I'll be back.' She walked out. Regan was shaking. Dillon said to Miller, 'Uncuff him, Sergeant, he isn't going anywhere.'
'As you say, sir.' Miller got out a key and unlocked the
manacles. Dillon opened his old silver cigarette case, took
out two cigarettes, lit them, and gave Regan one.
'There you go, just like in
Now Voyager.'
Regan was shaking. 'What in the hell are you talking
about?'
'Never mind, Sean, I've a weakness for old movies. Now listen. Me, I got smart. I could have faced a Serb firing squad,
but Ferguson is an extraordinarily powerful man. He saved
my life, and in return I dropped working for the glorious
cause and work for him instead. Which means I'm alive.'
Regan was trembling, and Dillon turned to Miller. 'A large brandy, Sergeant.'
'Certainly, sir.'
Miller opened a cupboard and returned with a glass, which
Regan emptied at one throw. He looked up at Dillon. 'What
do you want?'
'What's best for you. Look, Ferguson's in charge now, and
you did shoot that fella, Dalton. Peace process or not, he'll
make you stand up in court if he wants to.'
On the other side of the mirror, Ferguson said, 'In you
go, Sergeant Major.'
Helen Black went back into the sitting room, a document in one hand. 'All right, I've had enough. It's back to Wandsworth for you, you bastard.'
Regan simply fell apart. 'For God's sake, tell me what you want, just tell me.'
'Excellent,' Roper said. 'Pure Gestapo. They used physical
abuse much less than people realized. Didn't need to. They
just messed with their heads.'
Ferguson said to Hannah, 'We won't overwhelm him.' He turned to Roper. 'You and Blake stay here. You come in with me and do your Scotland Yard bit, Superintendent.'
Ferguson walked in with Hannah and said to Miller, 'Give him another brandy, Sergeant.'
'Sir.' Miller did as he was told, and Regan took the glass
with shaking hands and drained it.
'Do I have a deal?'
'That depends on what you have for me.'
Regan looked at Dillon, who said, 'The Brigadier's a hard man, Sean, but a moralist. If he says it, he means it.'
Hannah said, 'Mr Regan, I'm Detective Superintendent Bernstein of Special Branch. I'd be interested to know if you can assist us in our inquiries regarding the activities of one Brendan Murphy.'
Regan said, 'What do you want to know?'
'I understand there's an underground concrete bunker somewhere in County Louth.'
'Semtex, machine guns, mortars,' Dillon said. 'Enough to
start a civil war. Where is it, Sean?'
Regan said, 'Close to Kilbeg.'
'Jesus, son, there are Kilbegs all over Ireland.'
'Well, this one is in Louth, like the Superintendent says,
just south of the border in the Republic and south of Dundalk Bay. Near Dunany Point. Very remote.'
'I know that area,' Dillon said.
'You wouldn't last long, Dillon. They're a funny lot.
Strangers stand out like a sore thumb.'
Ferguson said, 'Let's be specific.'
'When I fled to the States, I was helped by a wealthy Irish
American group who were a bit radical. Didn't approve of
peace. I brokered a big financial deal for Brendan. The idea
was to prepare for the future, the next war.'
'Which explains the bunker,' Ferguson said.
'But where did the arms come from?' Dillon asked. Behind the mirror, Roper was making notes.
'Oh, that was a Mafia connection. Brendan had worked
with them in Europe. A fella called Jack Fox.'
'Fronting for the Solazzo family?' Hannah said.
'Well, I always figured he was fronting for himself. He supplied the arms.'
'Anything else?' Hannah asked. 'Lebanon, for example?' 'Christ, is there nothing you don't know?'
'Get on with it,' Dillon said.
'Murphy was trained in Libya years ago, has strong Arab
contacts, can even get by with the language, enough to order
a meal, anyway.'
'So?' Ferguson asked.
'Well, Fox controls the Solazzos' drug operations in Russia,
so he has big contacts. Murphy has the Arab link.'
'Which Arab link?'
Regan hesitated. 'Saddam. Iraq.'
'That's nice,' Dillon said. 'What's intended?'
'There's a freighter down from the Black Sea next week.
Called the
Fortuna.
If it's on time, it's due at a place called
Al Shariz, south of Beirut, next Tuesday.'
Dillon took over. 'Russian crew?'
'No, Arab. All Army of God.'
'And the cargo?' Regan hesitated. 'Come on, what's the
bloody cargo?'
'Hammerheads.'
There was a pause, and Hannah turned to Ferguson. 'Hammerheads, sir?'
The door opened and Blake entered. 'Sorry, Brigadier, but
I know all about those. They're short-range missiles mounted
on a tripod that only take two minutes to erect. Their range is three hundred miles. Nuclear-tipped. They wouldn't take out Israel or Jordan completely, but Tel Aviv wouldn't look
too good.'
Ferguson turned to Regan. 'Have you told me the truth,
told me everything?'
Regan hesitated again. 'When the boat gets in, the
Fortuna,
Brendan will be on board. Fox meets them, gets paid in gold. Five million.'
'Dollars or pounds?' Dillon asked.
'How the fuck would I know? Paid on the boat is what I heard, because they want to arrange another consignment a
month later.'
'And all this is true?' Ferguson asked.
'Yes, damn you.'
Ferguson turned to Helen Black and Miller. 'Send him
back to his room.'
They took Regan out between them, and Roper came in
after they left.
'I've had a thought,' he said. 'I've got details of Fox's
Gulfstream. It's parked at Heathrow, as I recall. Let me
check its movements.'
They followed him to his ground floor suite, where all his equipment had been set up. Roper started on the computer,
fingers deft on the keys.
He grunted. 'Fox has a slot booked out of Heathrow for Monday morning, destination Beirut.'
'Wonderful,' Dillon said. 'Regan was telling the truth.'
'So what now, sir?' Hannah asked.
Ferguson said, 'We can't send in the SAS, and we do
have other business with Fox. Something more subtle is
needed.'
Hannah said, 'The Israelis wouldn't like this, Brigadier.'
'Exactly what I was thinking.' Ferguson turned to Dillon.
'You went to Beirut the other year with the Superintendent
here. Stayed at the Al Bustan.'
'How could I forget it? It overlooks some excellent Roman
ruins.'
'You remember my man there, Walid Khasan?'
'Very well. Lebanese Christian. He and the Superintendent
got on rather well. Which is not surprising, considering that
he was actually Major Gideon Cohen of Mossad.' 'Lieutenant colonel, now.'
'Had a nice sister, Anya, I remember. A lieutenant.' 'Captain, now.'
'And there was another one — what was his name? Captain Moshe Levy?'
'Major. Everything goes up in the world, Dillon. Yes, I
think Colonel Cohen might be interested. I'll give him a
call.'
Lieutenant Colonel Gideon Cohen wore uniform only on
occasion. Sitting in his office now at the top of a secluded building in Tel Aviv, he was wearing a white shirt and linen Slacks, all very unmilitary for a Mossad colonel. Forty-nine
years of age, he had olive skin, and hair that was still black
and down to his shoulders.
His sister, Captain Anya Shamir, sat at a corner desk,
working a computer. She'd been a widow since her husband's death on the Golan Heights.
In the other corner, Major Moshe Levy sat at a second
computer. He was in uniform because he'd had a report
to make at Army headquarters, and wore khaki shirt and
slacks, paratroopers' wings and decorations. The phone on Gideon Cohen's desk rang.
A voice said, 'This is Ferguson. Are you coded? I am.'
'My dear Charles, of course I am.' Cohen waved to Anya
and Moshe. 'Ferguson from London.'
He pressed the audio button on his telephone. 'Charles,
old boy.'
'Don't call me old boy just because you went to Sandhurst. I'm glad to say I still outrank you.'
'Something special, Charles?'
'Something rotten in the state of Lebanon.'
'Tell me.'
Which Ferguson did.
When he was finished, Cohen said, 'Hammerheads. We
can't have that.'
'Jerusalem wouldn't look too good after one of those.' 'Exactly. Charles, I need to consider this.'
'What you mean is, you need to talk to the general,
your uncle.'
'I'm afraid so.'
'That's no problem. But this is a black one, Gideon. Keep
it close.'
In his penthouse office, General Arnold Cohen, head of
Mossad's Section One, the group with special responsibility
for activities in Arab areas, listened gravely.
When his nephew was finished, he said, 'Hammerheads.
This is very serious.'
'So what do we do? Call an air strike on this boat, the
Fortuna?'
'In Lebanese waters? Come on, Gideon, we're supposed
to be nice at the moment while our British and American
cousins castigate Saddam.'
'And he's going to send Hammerhead strikes up our backside.'
His sister, Anya, standing with Levy by the window, said, 'Can I make a point, Uncle?'
'Of course you can. You've gotten away with murder with
me ever since you learned to speak, so why should this time
be different?'
'Why don't we use Dillon, uncle? He's hell on wheels, that
one – remember that job with him in Beirut the other year?
He was incredible.'
'She's right,' Levy put in. 'What's important here is disposing of this
Fortuna
boat and its cargo with a minimum
of fuss, right?'
'So?'
'So we make it a small-scale operation. With Dillon to call
on, the three of us – Anya, Moshe, me – can handle it in
Al Shariz. The right equipment, and we can blow the damn
boat to hell.'
'He's right,' Gideon Cohen said. 'No adverse publicity. No
air strikes.'
'I like it,' the general said. 'Get on with it.'
Ferguson said, 'Fine, Gideon. I'll send over Dillon. Also
an American colleague, Blake Johnson, who works directly
for the President. You'll find him most useful. I'll put
Dillon on.'
A moment later, Dillon said in bad Hebrew, 'How are you, you lying dog?'
'Dillon, we seem to have business together.'
They switched into English. 'I'm not sure how we'll do this,' Dillon said. 'If we're to blow this
Fortuna
out of the
water, we'll need mines, Semtex, some scuba equipment.'
'We'll take care of it. We'll keep it low-key. Myself, Levy, my sister. With you and this American, that's five. We don't
want to draw attention, although things have changed since
you operated in Beirut, my friend. It's not quite the war zone
it used to be. People are trying to build up the infrastructure again, tourism and so on.'
'Where would Fox stay. Beirut?'
'No, there's an old Moorish palace in Al Shariz which has
been refurbished as a hotel. I'd say he'll be there. It's called
the Golden House.'
'No good for us, then.'
'No problem. We'll come up on a motor yacht, like tourists. You and your friends can stay on board.'
'We can't exactly sit in the bar at the Golden House,
though. We don't want Fox to know it's us. It'd be much
better if he thought it was an Israeli job.'
'Do you recall my sister Anya?'
'How could I forget? She played a lady of the night better than a lady of the night.'
'Enough to ensnare this Fox.'
Dillon laughed. 'Enough to ensnare friend Fox.'
'You and Johnson, Levy and myself, we'll stay on our
boat, the
Pamir,
well out of the way. Anya can squeeze
what she can out of the guy. We'll send the
Fortuna
down
when we're ready.'
'You Israelis are such morally committed people,' Dillon
said. 'But you'll sink that boat, crew and all, without a
flicker.'
'Not even half a flicker,' Cohen said. 'See you soon.' Dillon hung up, and Ferguson said, 'So, here we go again.' Hannah Bernstein said, 'What about me, Sir?'