Day of Reckoning (12 page)

'Not this one, Superintendent. Dillon and Blake, plus our
friends from Mossad, are enough. What I'd like you to do
is get a little more basic with friend Regan as regards the
bunker in County Louth.' He turned to Roper. 'I'm sure the Major here will be more than willing to help.'
'A pleasure, Sir,' Roper said.
'Sorry, Hannah, I'll have to love you and leave you.' Dillon turned to Blake and smiled, a strange excitement there. 'Here we go, old buddy, back to the war zone again.'

LEBANON
AL SHARIZ

Brendan Murphy leaned over the rail of the small coastal
freighter, the
Fortuna,
and watched the distant lights of
Syria. The ship was Italian-registered and had definitely
seen better days, but under its battered exterior the essential bits, the engines, were in excellent condition. They'd left the Black Sea two days earlier and had made good time.
The man who approached him, wearing a seaman's reefer
coat, held a cup of coffee in one hand, which he passed to
him. His name was Dermot Kelly and he had unfashionably Irish blond hair and a hard, pocked face. He lit a cigarette.
'Jesus, Brendan, they're all fugging Arabs, this crew. If I
light up in the saloon, they glare at me. Lucky I brought a
bottle on board.'
'Fundamentalists,' Murphy said. 'Army of God, this lot.
They're just waiting for death in the service of Allah, so
they can go to Paradise and have eternal pleasure and all
those women.'
'They must be crazy.'
'Why? You mean we're Catholics and we're right, and
they're Muslims and they're wrong? Come off it, Dermot.'
An Arab, in a reefer coat the same as Kelly's, came down
a ladder from the bridge. He was the captain and his name
was Abdul Sawar.
'How's it going?' Brendan demanded.
'Excellent. We'll be on time.'
'Well, that's good.'
Sawar said, 'Any problems?'
'Well, I miss bacon and eggs for breakfast,' Kelly told
him.
'We do our best, Mr Kelly, but some things are not
possible.'
'Well, you'd probably have a problem in reverse in Dublin,' Kelly told him.
'Exactly.'
Sawar went back up the ladder, and Murphy said, 'Don't
stir the pot, Dermot. You can't expect good Irish bacon on an
Italian boat crewed by Arabic fundamentalists off the coast
of Syria.'
'All right, so I'll just think of the money.'
'The gold, Dermot, the gold. Speaking of which, we'll
check it out.'
He led the way to the stern of the ship, and went down a companionway to a rear saloon. There were two cargo boxes wrapped in sacking.
Dermot lit a cigarette. 'They look like shire to me.'
'Five million in gold, Brendan.'
'How do we know?'
'Because Saddam wants another cargo next month, so he won't screw around with this one.'
'Do you think it's all going to work?'
'Like a Swiss watch. Fox will be on a plane. We'll offload the gold, and take it to the airport at Beirut, where the right
officials have been bribed. The plane is routed to Dublin,
but it puts down at an old air force base in Louth on the
way. We unload our half and Fox carries on, announcing a mid-air change of destination.'
'Where will he go?'
'Supposedly Heathrow, but on the way there, when the
plane is in uncontrolled air space, he'll put down on this estate nearby in Cornwall, called Hellsmouth. There's an RAF aero
drome there from the Second World War. The runway's a
bit rough, but it can take a plane like the Gulfstream.'
'Sounds good to me, Brendan.'
'And me, Dermot.'
The other man smiled, took a half bottle of Paddy whiskey
from his pocket, unscrewed the top, and drank deeply. He
passed it across.
'Well, here's to Irish bacon and eggs, soda bread and rain.' He smiled. 'I miss the rain, Brendan. The good Irish rain.'
Gideon Cohen, his sister and Moshe Levy had left a yachting marina on the coast near Haifa in a forty-foot boat of a kind regularly rented by tourists interested in diving. There were
stocks of air bottles in the stern, bunks for seven people
below, a good kitchen gallery, every convenience.
Cohen's passport was British, in the name of Julian Grant; his sister and Levy had become a Mr and Mrs Frobisher, also British. Their background being impeccable, and Lebanon
desperate for tourist money, they'd had no trouble getting
the necessary visas, and pushed towards Al Shariz through
the late afternoon.
Cohen was at the wheel, Levy lounging beside him, Anya looking out of the half-open window.
'So, let's go over it,' her brother said. 'You and Moshe
book into the Golden Palace, and do remember, Moshe, this
is my sister you're sharing a suite with.'
'How could I forget, Colonel?'
'Fox is booked in with these two hoods, Falcone and Russo.
You make yourself available in the bar, Anya, just in case
there's information available.'
'Oh, dear,' she said. 'Here I go again. Stage Six at MGM, playing the whore.'
Her brother smiled, and hugged her with his spare arm as
he steered. 'No, the good-looking whore.' He shook his head. 'This is a bad one, little sister. We can't make a mistake.'
'Well, at least we have Dillon.'
He laughed out loud. 'My God, yes, the poor old
Fortuna
doesn't know what's going to hit it.'
On the plane on the way to Beirut, Dillon said to Blake,
'So, we're interested in establishing an electronics factory, a joint Anglo-American project, jobs for all. Three days in
and out.'
'No problems?' Blake asked.
'Certainly not. They're still trying to build up the country
again, while surrounded by people who want to cut each
other's balls off.'
'So, we join Cohen's boat, look like recreational scuba
divers.'
'And send the
Fortuna
to the bottom. Hammerheads, the
lot,' Dillon said.
'And the crew?'
'Murdering fanatics. If they didn't want the risk, they
shouldn't have joined.'
'But, Dillon, there's five million pounds in gold on board.'
'Yes, isn't that, as Ferguson would say, delicious? It also
goes to the bottom. A fabulous expression of conspicuous
consumption.' He waved to Flight Sergeant Madoc. 'Bring
me another Bushmills, I'm celebrating imagining how Jack
Fox will feel.'
Fox booked into the Golden House, with Falcone and Russo. He had a nice suite on the first floor – marble, scattered rugs, all very Moorish. He felt good. The Colosseum was a bad
memory, and his lawyers seemed to think they might be
able to fix things. Whether they did or not, the gold from
the
Fortuna
was a certainty. Added to that, the cash Murphy owed him in Ireland from Irish-American arms orders would take the pressure right off.
'Everything okay, Signore?' Falcone asked.
'Couldn't be better. Tonight's the night, Aldo. Gold, there's nothing like it. It's still the one commodity you can rely on. You've checked with the harbourmaster?'
'Yes, Signore, the
Fortuna is
due in at ten. A crew of twelve,
all Arab. It left the Black Sea the day before yesterday.' 'Where will they anchor, on the pier?'
'No, it's full. A few hundred yards out in the entrance to
the bay.'
'Excellent. I'll have a shower, then dinner. I'll see you
later.'
Their plane landed in early evening. Dillon and Johnson
booked in as Russel and Gaunt and took a taxi to Al Shariz.
On the way, Dillon called Cohen on his mobile.
'Lafayette, we are here. I'm saying that on behalf of
Blake.'
'Well, we're here, too. Lower yacht basin.
Pamir,
Pier
Three.'
'See you soon.' Dillon switched off his phone and relayed
the information to the driver.
On the
Pamir,
Cohen looked through a pair of Nightstalker
glasses and watched the
Fortuna
drop anchor. He said to
Anya, 'Off you go. All I want to know is what he's up to.
It could give us a clue to his movements.'
'Sure,' she said.
'Another thing.' He was strangely awkward. 'Duty is duty, but you're my beloved sister. Don't get close to this one. He's bad news.'
She kissed his cheek. 'Hey, little brother, don't worry.'
She booked into the hotel, changed, then went down to
the bar, resplendent in a black mini dress, her dark hair to
her shoulders, and looking terrific. She sat at the bar, and
Fox, over by the window, Falcone and Russo at the next
table, saw her at once. He nodded to Falcone, got up, went
to the bar, and sat next to her.
'Hi, there.'
'An American!' She smiled. 'What are you doing here?'
'Investigating tourist prospects,' he said glibly. 'What
about you?'
'Oh, I'm over from London with my husband, on the same errand.'
'Your husband?' Fox was disappointed.
'Yes, well, he's been called to Tel Aviv. Left me on my
own for three days.'
Fox put his hand on hers. 'That's terrible, a nice-looking
lady like you all on her own. But you've got me now. Have
you eaten?'
'No.'
'Well, join me.'
Which she did, for a sumptuous meal, part Arab, part
European, and lots of Cristal champagne. She endured his questing hand on her thigh and waited. Finally, Falcone, who had stood by the window, answered a mobile, came over and whispered.
Fox squeezed her thigh. 'Listen, I've got to go.' 'What a pity.'
It was ten o'clock. He said, 'I'll be a couple of hours. Will you still be here?'
'Of course. I'll see you.'
He went out with Falcone. She followed, and stood in the
shadows of a palm tree and shrubbery while they talked on
the terrace.
'The
Fortuna is
in, Signore.'
'Good. We offload the gold in two hours.'
'There's just one thing I don't understand,' Falcone said.
'These Hammerheads are short range?'
'Absolutely.'
'So if we're talking Iraq, I'm puzzled. I mean, we're off
the coast of Syria, so they can't be fired from Iraq.'
'Aldo, you don't get the point. They're very easy to set
up and fire. The
Fortuna is
going to be a gun platform. The
entire crew, as you know, is Army of God. All they want
to do is take out Tel Aviv. Jerusalem, they're funny about.
After all, it's the second most important Muslim city.'
'My God, they're animals, these people.'
'Depends on your point of view. Now let's get moving.'
Anya called her brother on her mobile and relayed the
information. Gideon said, 'Right, get out of there now. I'll
expect you within the next half hour.'
On the
Pamir,
Dillon, Blake, Cohen and Levy were sitting
under the stern awning having a look at the harbour chart when
Anya arrived. She paid off the taxi and stepped over the rail.
'Jesus, woman,' Dillon told her. 'You look like page sixty-
four in
Vogue
magazine. You should be a young Jewish
mother having babies and making your husband's life miserable. Instead, you're still going around shooting bad guys.'
'It's my nature, Dillon. Who's your friend?'
'Blake Johnson. Former FBI and works for the President
now, so let's have some respect here.'
She shook hands with Blake. 'Nice to meet you,' she said
and turned to her brother. 'As I told you, I overheard Fox
talking to one of his men on the terrace. The gold is definitely on board, as well as the Hammerheads. The worrying thing is that the boat is to be used as a gun platform, with Tel Aviv a possible target.'
'Not if we blow that thing out of the water.'
'I couldn't put it better myself,'
told him.
'And sooner rather than later,' Blake put in. 'The boat's
here, and Fox will want it offloaded as soon as possible. We know from Roper that he has a return slot booked for seven o'clock tomorrow.'
'Right, then let's get on with it.' Cohen turned to Dillon.
'How do we do this?'
'Well, you remember in ninety-four in Beirut, when we
blew up the
Alexandrene
with all that plutonium on board?'
'You mean,
you
blew up the
Alexandrene,'
Anya said.
'And how did you do that?' Blake asked.
'Took a shallow dive, went up the anchor chain, created
a little mayhem, dropped a block of Semtex in the engine
room, and that was that.'
Cohen said, 'Sounds good to me.'
'A one-man show?' Blake said. 'I don't like it.'
'Blake, Vietnam was a long time ago.'
'Stuff that kind of talk, Sean. We go in together.'