Dusty sacrificed one of his vans by ordering it to overtake the target vehicle and confirm that the vehicle emitting the tracking signal was the same, and that the suspect was still inside it. With a target of this quality Dusty would not risk using the van again anywhere near it, and so the footmen were soon after transferred to other vehicles, and the van returned to London.
“Someone just made a pick-up.” Observed Art.
Counter Intelligence in the UK was the job of the British Secret Service, not the CIA, but he would be very interested to learn whom the SIS eventually caught servicing the dead letterbox near the lay-by.
For a further hour they trailed the car, onto the M25 motorway where it crossed over into Kent, and then to a cul-de-sac off a quiet street in the town of Swanley.
This was the first time on the follow that Dusty ordered the vehicles to punch up, and he then deployed footmen to cover access routes from the dead end street.
The two motorcyclists Dusty had sent ahead of the target kept a discrete eye on the end of the street for the few minutes it took for the two vehicles worth of footmen Dusty selected to arrive and deploy, and so when their suspect appeared the only people he saw were a couple of pedestrians going about their business.
Their suspect was good; there was no doubt about it. Three hours after his encounter with the vagrants he was still alert to possible surveillance as he made his way through the small town on foot. Using shop windows as mirrors he discretely checked his six o’clock position for tails as he traced a circuitous route around the town.
Gemma Daly took over the ‘eyeball’ position as the target turned into Sycamore Drive, and when he turned apparently to see if there was a bus in sight she saw his body telegraph his intention a moment before his sudden movement. It was barely susceptible but she caught it anyway, his right shoulder dropped fractionally before he swivelled around at the waist, looking sharply behind him and taking in all that was in the street before turning back.
He saw Gemma of course, or rather a rather dowdy looking woman across the opposite side of the street and about ten yards back. But she wasn’t looking at him or doing anything to cause suspicion.
Further back along the street, on his side, a man and another female were walking in the same direction as him. They weren’t walking together and everything seemed normal, but he didn’t relax.
The target was level with the Convent of Mercy when he suddenly stopped, and this caused problems for the foot follow.
There was no cover for Gemma and the other footmen that he had in view as he stood there with his back to the convent looking up and down the street. It was a tactic designed to force a tail to lose contact or ‘show out’, because there were no handy shop doorways, no alleyways or opportunities to drop temporarily from sight.
Gemma put out the warning on her body set, her lips barely moving. “Stop, stop, stop.” Those footmen not in sight went into shallow cover, ready to go deep if the target did the reciprocal, retraced his steps. The female officer furthest from the target in Sycamore Drive got lucky, sticking out a hand for a bus, which pulled in for her at a request stop she had just walked past. The male ahead of her had no such options open except to keep walking right on, and gave a very convincing frown as he walked past he target who was staring at him. The male officer was now ‘burnt’, their quarry hadn’t sussed him out but he would be recognised if seen by the target again.
Gemma wasn’t quite as ready to accept defeat, though what she tried is a difficult trick to carry off as any taught on the surveillance courses.
The target paid close attention to passing vehicles as well as pedestrians, but in the minutes he waited he did not recognise any vehicle as one that had driven around the block and past him again.
Across the road from him the dowdy woman had bumped into an old friend, and they were gossiping away as women did in his own country too when they hadn’t seen each other for a time, and he turned toward the town centre again.
Gemma hurriedly said goodbye and promised to stay in touch this time with the local housewife she had never seen before in her life but had nonetheless convinced that she and Gemma had met years before on a holiday in Spain. She breathed “Off, off, off.” Informing everyone the target was again on the move, as she continued the follow.
There are strict rules to be adhered to in the voice procedure of a follow, both vehicular and on foot. When the follow is electronic you ask the controller for permission to speak, but when you don’t have the aid of a tracker then that permission must come from the ‘eyeball’.
No matter who you are, if you are in the eyeball position then that becomes your callsign, ‘eyeball’. When the eyeball is speaking nobody else does, and even when the eyeball is not commentating on the target, you ask eyeballs permission before you speak, and that includes the controller.
Dusty was pleased with how Gemma had maintained contact, but now would be a good time to set up a change.
“Eyeball, permission?”
“Go.”
“Mel’s in perfect cover ahead. You recycle with One Four down the next right.”
“Ok.”
Ahead of the target she saw her colleague appear out of the entrance of St Bartholomew’s Roman Catholic school and without giving a single glance to the approaching target, he negotiated the traffic to gain the far side.
No one expects their tail to be the guy or gal in front of them, because tails are always following behind you, right?
So Mel had a leg up on the creditability scale, and by crossing the road he had allowed the target to overtake and put him in the classic tail position.
The target took advantage of a glass bus shelter for a free look behind him. Despite the graffiti scratched on it by bored individuals with sharp door keys, its reflection told him three people were behind him, but only two were heading the same way. The mousy woman, who was now turning down a side street, and the parent/teacher from the kid’s school.
Out of sight of the target down the side turning Gemma climbed through the side door of a van and began a quick change. None of the vehicles carried changes of clothes, although most had workmen’s coverall’s and maybe a grubby coat, so what took place was a swap of outer clothing and accessories amongst the footmen inside.
As in any walk of life, policemen come in different shapes and sizes, but unlike other departments the dedicated surveillance officers are chosen for their looks as well as intelligence, but not in the way a soap star would be.
The old C.11 Criminal Intelligence Department were the very best at surveillance in any police force anywhere, and they set the standard that is still strived for in other covert police set-ups.
When would-be members of C.11 came calling and they entered the door to the units offices at NSY, some would have noticed a mark on the doorframe. In those pre-equal opportunities days there was a height limit for the police service in London so there was no second mark on the door frame to designate that the caller was below average height, so only those who were shorter than the mark on the door frame went on to the second and subsequent stages of selection.
Gemma was no head turner, and neither were any of her colleagues; they were all of the ‘nothing special’ category in attractiveness. Not too good looking or unattractive to attract attention, the all-round Mr and Ms Average.
With a vehicle full of averaged sized people, a change in wardrobe was not that difficult to achieve as One Four’s avoided passing the target who he made his way toward the large Asda Superstore in the town centre.
As Gemma slid open the side door again she paused, reaching forwards to pluck the cap off the drivers head and after trying it for size she emerged in the stores car park. The dowdy spinster-type was gone, and a middle-England thirty-something Mum sought shallow cover until Dusty called upon her once more.