Dead Spy Running (20 page)

Paul Myers hadn't been hit so hard since he was bullied at school. He could have put up with the pain of a broken nose if it wasn't for his glasses, which had been knocked to the floor with the impact. They had been taken off him when he was blindfolded, and put back on over his hood, to the amusement of his attackers.

The sound of them being crunched under a heel hurt even more than the second punch, which split his top lip like a burst grape. Instinctively he curled up into the foetal position, but it was no good. There were at least three of them, and he was soon being kicked in the back. Their feet were accurate, targeting his kidneys. He had always been useless at fighting.

Myers had gone from one bar to another after Fielding had dropped him off in Trafalgar Square, hoping to drown his memories of Leila. He also had nowhere to stay (the friend's flat in North London had been a lie). It was as he was wandering across St James's Park at about 9 a.m. that the van had slowly pulled up, hazard lights flashing. The usual park maintenance markings were visible on its sides, but the men who jumped out of the back doors weren't interested in sweeping leaves.

The journey lasted fifteen minutes. He had no idea where he was being taken, except that the sound of the van's engine echoed shortly before it stopped, suggesting that they had driven into a garage. Somehow he thought Leila was behind it, but he blamed her for everything in his life since he had discovered her betrayal.

As soon as the van's back doors were opened, the beating started. They dragged him out onto cold concrete, and the fall from the van should have hurt him, but he was so drunk that he didn't feel their kicks. He didn't even recognise the voice of Harriet Armstrong as she ordered his attackers to stop.

 

The three fishermen spotted the Westerner two hundred yards off the port bow of their wooden, fifteen-foot boat. The owner had told his son to alter course and pick him up. It wouldn't be the first tourist they had rescued, nor the last. They were usually drunk, high on skunk or acid. He had a cousin in Goa who said it was even worse over there. But Westerners had their uses. They liked having beach barbecues, and would buy tuna directly from his boat for prices three times as high as he could get at the market in Gokarna.

This one was far gone, he thought, as he and his son hauled the heavy body over the gunwhale. He had been swimming with all his clothes still on. Once the Westerner was curled up in the bottom of the boat, he nudged his stomach with his foot. The man groaned and vomited some seawater.

‘He's probably one of Shankar's,' the boat owner said.

Marchant woke before it was fully light, and for a moment he thought he was in his childhood bedroom in Tarlton. The mattress was so thin it had taken him back, in the minutes before he was fully awake, to the time when he and Sebastian used to sleep on the floor in their indoor tent. But as his eyes adjusted to the orange light of dawn, he realised that the cotton above him was not a flysheet but a mosquito net.

He knew that he was lucky to be alive. The sea had drawn every ounce of energy from his body, and then worked on his mind. He had no recollection of being rescued, but he could remember being carried into his tiny room, the voice of Shankar, the café owner, enough to reassure him that he wasn't on board the American frigate.

He went outside, his legs shaky, and looked up and down the beach. It was empty except for the cows, which were standing in a group between the café and the sea, and a solitary squatting figure in the far distance. The sea was calm, lapping at the shore. And then he saw the angular outline of the frigate, still two miles off, slightly further down the coast. He knew he must find Salim Dhar today.

After retrieving his purse belt from the sand, Marchant came across Shankar at the front of the café, trimming a coconut husk with a knife before chopping its top off and inserting a straw. He placed it on a table next to a row of others, each with a straw sticking out. Overnight a turquoise fishing boat had been pulled up onto the beach, next to the chairs that were still littered across the sand. Its name,
Bharat
, had been painted in white lettering on the side, beneath the high-pointed bow. Something about the boat looked familiar.

‘Who do I thank for rescuing me?' Marchant asked, sitting down next to Shankar. ‘The owner of this?' He nodded at the boat.

‘He says you shouldn't go swimming with clothes on.'

‘I need to find someone. Brother Salim.'

Shankar stopped cutting at a new husk for a moment, and then continued.

‘Can you help me find him?' Marchant asked, watching the knife. He knew he was speaking to the right person.

‘So it was you the police were looking for?'

‘Can you help?'

‘The boat goes after breakfast.'

‘Shanti Beach?'

Shankar stood up and walked away, dropping one of the coconuts into his hands. ‘Breakfast. You ask too many questions.'

Fielding lifted the flute to his lips and began to play Telemann's sonata in F minor. He couldn't remember the last time he had been at his flat during the middle of a weekday. It reminded him of being confined to the sanatorium at school while everyone else was in their classrooms. Dolphin Square had been surprisingly busy when his driver had dropped him off at the side entrance. So life went on after the workers had left their homes for the office.

His driver had asked whether he should wait, and Fielding had hesitated. It wasn't a question of how long he would be, but of whether he would ever climb into the Chief of MI6's official Range Rover again. In the end he had told him to go back to the office. Now, as Fielding lost himself in Telemann's first movement, he hoped to find a reason to return to Legoland.

The most powerful person on the planet was about to be under the protection of someone working for an enemy state. He wished he cared more. The future of the free world might soon be hanging in the balance. But it was up to Straker and Spiro and Armstrong and Chadwick now. They had conspired to turn Leila against him; they must live with the consequences.

He had provided the Americans with all the evidence in his possession, but it hadn't been enough. It was too circumstantial, the CIA said. More to the point, Leila was their prodigal signing, the agent who had saved an American ambassador's life. The CIA wasn't about to have her revealed as an Iranian spy by anyone, least of all by a compromised British spy chief whose ultimate loyalties the Agency also suspected.

Now they had taken Myers, an innocent man who had tried to do the right thing. MI5 were talking about a serious security breach, enough for a public prosecution. Leila would be called as a witness, to confirm that Myers had leaked confidential information on the night before the marathon. Fielding would be summoned too, asked to explain why Myers had taken transcripts off the Cheltenham site.

It took him a few moments to realise his phone was ringing. Very few people knew his home number. He walked over and picked up the receiver. It was Anne Norman.

‘Marcus?' She had never called him that before.

‘Anne?' He had never used her first name.

‘There's someone who's very keen to speak to you. From India.'

‘Who is it?'

‘It's Daniel. Daniel Marchant.'

 

The boat left after breakfast, just as Shankar had promised. Marchant met its owner outside the café and walked with him down to the water's edge, where his son was stowing a tangle of blue fishing nets in the bow. The owner was jovial, with a proud potbelly, and was soon joking with Marchant about his misfortune the previous evening.

‘You were floating in the water like a great big jellyfish!' he said, slapping him on the back.

Their laughter stopped, though, when Marchant nodded towards two local fishermen smoking
bidis
, who had stepped out from the shade of the coconut trees at the back of the beach and were walking across the sand towards them. He knew at once from their detached manner that they had come to take him to Dhar. They looked on silently as the owner and his son struggled to launch the boat, helped by Marchant. Once it was afloat, the two men waded out into the shallow water and climbed aboard, ignoring the son's offers of assistance. The owner threw Marchant a nervous glance, started up the engine and steered the boat out towards the headland.

To his relief, Marchant couldn't see the frigate on the horizon any more. He looked inland at the rocky coastline and the hills beyond, one of which was topped with a communications mast covered in satellite dishes and aerials. In the past, he would have been depressed by its presence in such a rugged, timeless setting, but he knew they were everywhere in modern India, and today the sight of its distinctive red and white stripes reassured him.

After twenty minutes, Marchant spotted a small beach where some huts, made of laterite bricks cut from the local Konkan soil, had been built into the hillside. He thought he could make out one or two Westerners on the beach, but the owner kept going down the coast. If it wasn't for the two silent men sitting behind him on the boat, Marchant would have enjoyed the spray and the sunshine of the open sea, but their stony presence was a constant reminder of what lay ahead.

An hour later, the owner finally nudged the tiller away from him and steered the boat towards the shore. The son jumped out first, and dragged the boat ashore. Marchant stepped down into the shallow blue water and walked up onto the beach, followed by the two fishermen. It was in a small cove, barely fifty yards across, and sheltered on both sides by steep cliffs. At the top of the beach was a tatty shack made from wood and woven palm leaves, and a few hammocks hung in the dappled shade of some coconut trees. A sign said ‘Shanti Beach Café', painted in the colours of the Indian flag. There were no Westerners around, no sign that anyone was staying here. As Marchant took in the view, the two men pushed him forward, signalling for him to walk on.

He followed them to the shack, and they led him in through an open doorway. Inside was a small table, and a man standing with his back to them, talking on a mobile phone. He turned briefly to look at Marchant, a cigarette in his hand, and continued to chat quietly in what sounded like Kannada, the local language. He was better dressed than the fishermen, new jeans, printed shirt, sunglasses perched on the top of his head. For a moment his boyish good looks reminded Marchant of Shah Rukh Khan. Marchant glanced at the faded postcards that had been stuck to the central wooden post holding up the roof: London, Sydney, Cape Town.

It was a reasonable effort at cover, Marchant thought.

‘Welcome to the Shanti Beach Café,' the man said, putting away his phone. He looked Marchant up and down. ‘Just our sort of guest.'

‘I've come to see brother Salim,' Marchant said, tensing his stomach muscles. A part of him expected to be punched, bound and hooded at any moment.

‘He's been waiting for you. It's a long walk from here. I don't know who you are, where you've come from, but these two will kill you if you try anything. Salim's orders.'

Four hours later, Marchant reached the crest of the hill and looked back down over the tops of the dense vegetation towards Shanti Beach. It had been a hot, hard climb, and he was out of breath, dripping with sweat. The two fishermen pushed him on. ‘
Chalo
,' the taller one urged. Neither had said anything else to him for the whole journey, ignoring his attempts to speak Hindi.

Marchant walked on from the crest, enjoying the first stretch of downhill since they had set off from the beach. He wondered whether he would ever leave this beautiful place alive. A pair of Brahmani kites soared high above him, enjoying the thermals. Why had Dhar agreed to see him? And would he have any answers about his father? The Namaste Café must have been used by Uncle K as a contact point when he was trying to run Dhar. Word would have reached him that a white man had asked for ‘brother Salim'.

The sound of a gunshot made Marchant drop to the ground and look around desperately for cover. For the first time since they had left the Namasté Café, the taller fisherman, who had kept walking as if he had heard nothing, smiled at Marchant, lying in the red dust. It was an awful smile, teeth stained with blood-coloured betelnut juice. Another shot rang out. Marchant listened carefully to it this time, calculating that it was from a high-powered rifle, fired from as close as twenty yards away. He had excelled in his fire-arms training at the Fort. Looking along the path ahead, he saw a figure approaching, a .315 sporting rifle slung over one shoulder. He knew at once that it was Salim Dhar.

Leila listened as Monk Johnson finished running through the itinerary of his new president's forty-eight-hour visit to Delhi. There were more than two hundred people in the hall, about as many as it could hold. They were almost all Secret Service personnel, who had been in India for the past month as part of the Presidential Advance Team, trying in vain to impose their fixed manual of security demands on a very fluid country. There were a few CIA officers present, too, including Spiro, who was sitting on the stage next to Johnson, sweating in the heat. The US Embassy air conditioning was struggling to keep a lid on the temperature.

Johnson, head of the Advance Team, stood in front of a detailed satellite image of New Delhi, with key landmarks highlighted in red: the Red Fort, Raj Path, the Lotus Temple, the US Embassy and the Maurya Hotel, where the President would be staying. To the right of this there was a larger, more detailed aerial image of the Lotus Temple complex to the south of the city, with a red route highlighted down a tree-lined avenue leading up to the temple. At various points along the route, times had been written, also in red: 5.28 p.m.; 5.30 p.m.; 5.35 p.m.

Spiro wiped his forehead with a handkerchief, preparing his notes before he spoke. Leila had come to know him well in London – too well. He never missed an opportunity to flirt, didn't bother to disguise the glances at her ‘cute ass'. But she had no option but to put up with his attention. He was her American handler, the one who had debriefed her after the marathon. He was also her biggest ally, rejecting Fielding's allegations about an Iranian connection when William Straker, the DCIA, had put them to Spiro, and defending her again when David Baldwin, head of the CIA's Delhi station, had raised his own objections about her prominent role in the presidential visit.

So she had joined in the cheering when Spiro had walked into the embassy that morning, straight from the airport. His recall to Langley hadn't gone down well with the footsoldiers, who were reassured by his straight-talking manner. Johnson had been pleased to see him, too. Spiro seemed to have taken most of the credit for saving the US Ambassador's life at the London Marathon.

‘Any more questions about the threat matrix?' Johnson asked.

‘Might POTUS try to work the people outside the Lotus Temple?' asked Baldwin. ‘In my experience, crowds in India are either too polite or rioting.'

Baldwin shared Spiro's muscular style, but he was one of the few who hadn't welcomed his arrival. Baldwin, a South Asia specialist, felt that Spiro was on his patch. He wasn't in love with India, but he understood its people, and almost felt protective of them. And unlike Spiro, he wasn't trying to get into Leila's panties.

‘No chance,' Johnson said, walking over to the projected aerial image of the temple's gardens. ‘We have to keep him moving to these times.' He pointed to the numbers written in red, dotted along the main avenue leading up to the temple. ‘He's got a seven-minute walk through the fancy gardens, down the main four-hundred-yard avenue. They wouldn't let us bring the cars any closer. I can't emphasise it enough: this is the most vulnerable point in his entire forty-eight-hour stopover, so all units need to be in tight on him. At 5.35 p.m. he'll pause to be greeted at the foot of the steps leading up to the temple by a delegation of senior Bahá'ís. They've all been vetted. One of them will present a garland, placing it over the President's head, and we'll all back off. A couple of seconds, nothing more. It's the money shot, and the photos need to go around the world. They won't appreciate any ugly Security Service agents ruining the frame.'

‘Can't we land him in any closer, bypass the long walk?' a young, shaven-headed man asked.

‘Look, I'd land Marine One on top of the goddamn building and winch the President down through a hole in the roof if I could, but the White House needs the avenue, temple in the background, symbol of world peace. This trip is all about hearts and minds, remember. New president, new beginning. Once he's on those steps, we're fine.' Johnson pointed to the aerial image again. ‘There are high walls on either side, here and here.' Five cascades of steps led up through a narrow, high-sided approach to the main temple entrance, beneath one of the twenty-seven ‘petals' that formed the building's distinctive roof.

‘He'll attend a short ceremony inside, along with a couple of hundred Bahá'ís, then leave by Marine One from the south side and go straight back to Palam airbase. They wanted the temple full, but the Indians couldn't guarantee full security screening.'

‘Have they guaranteed anything on this trip?' Spiro asked. The room laughed politely.

‘This temple's for Bahá'ís, right?' another Security Service officer asked.

‘That's correct,' Johnson said.

‘And if the Bahá'ís come from Iran, are they, like, Muslims?'

‘Kind of,' Johnson replied, looking across at Spiro.

‘Not exactly,' Baldwin interrupted, standing up from his front-row seat. ‘They have their origins in Shia Islam, but that was over 150 years ago. Today's Shia clergy regard them as heretics, infidels, a threat to Islam. The Republican Guard in Iran are all over them right now. They're the country's largest religious minority, and the most persecuted. Leaders executed for apostasy, schools closed down, denied passports, barred from government jobs, civil rights withdrawn.'

‘Which is why POTUS is paying them a call,' Spiro said, reasserting his authority over the gathering as Baldwin sat down again. ‘Symbolic support for regime change. Leila, would you care to enlighten these ignorant people further?'

Spiro threw Baldwin a glance as Leila walked from her third-row seat to join him and Johnson on the stage. For a moment she was standing in the light of the projector, an image of the Lotus Temple playing across her face. She moved to one side, putting a hand up to shield her eyes.

‘There are more than five million Bahá'ís in the world,' she began, emotion rising in her voice. ‘My mother happens to be one of them. The biggest population is in India, the second largest is in Iran, where it all started.' She paused, composing herself, glancing at Baldwin. ‘They believe that Moses, Buddha, Krishna, Jesus, Mohamed and Baha'u'llah, the religion's founder, were all messengers of the same universal God. Baha'u'llah was born in nineteenth-century Persia, so it's a relatively new religion. He believed in spiritual unity, world peace, compulsory education for all. He was also against any form of prejudice.' Leila stopped again. ‘I'm sorry,' she said. ‘It's the heat.'

But everyone knew it was more than that.

‘You can begin to understand why POTUS is so keen to visit the temple,' Spiro said, stepping forward to stand beside her. ‘You want to take a break, babe?' He had one arm around her now, squeezing a shoulder.

‘I'm fine, really,' Leila said, pouring herself a glass of water from a plastic bottle on the table beside her. ‘The Bahá'í House of Worship, better known as the Lotus Temple, was designed by an Iranian architect. Its distinctive shape is based on a partially open lotus flower.'

‘It kind of reminds me of the Sydney Opera House,' Spiro said.

‘They say it's the most visited building in the world,' Leila continued. ‘Everyone's welcome: Hindus, Jews, Christians, Parsees, Muslims, you name it. The President will enjoy his visit. It's a very special place.'

Leila went back to her seat, but she was desperate to get out of the stuffy room, out of Delhi, away from India. She wanted to be with her mother.

‘Thanks, Leila,' Spiro said. ‘We appreciate it.' The room applauded, several of the Secret Service officers turning in their seats to look at her. Spiro glanced at Baldwin as he continued. ‘Given her specialist knowledge, Leila has been asked to join the POTUS party for this leg of the trip, representing the Company.'

‘With the greatest respect to Leila here, isn't that a little unorthodox?' Baldwin asked. ‘We all appreciate what she did in London, but…'

‘No, David, it's not unorthodox,' Spiro interrupted. ‘Not at all. It's a great honour for the Company, that's what it is.'

‘The honour's all ours,' Johnson said, sensing the tension. ‘The President wants to thank Leila personally for her good work in London, as all of us in the Service do.' Another round of applause spread across the hall. ‘It's no secret that we owe Langley. And it's no secret that we don't like to admit it. Needless to say, we're not expecting to have to rely on Leila's heroics this time.'