Assassin

'Do me a favour,' Carver interrupted. 'You heard the sound of the kid's toy. He probably thought it was all a big game. And if you think a toy gun sounds anything like the real thing, you need your ears examining, as well as your head. How about muzzle-flash, see any of that? Notice any bullet holes anywhere, any ricochets? You were in a cabin no more than eight foot square. If he had been firing a real gun, you'd have known all about it.'

'I didn't have time to work that out, did I?' Tyzack protested. 'I don't know, maybe I thought he had a suppressor. And there was at least one adult in the cabin. They could have been armed, too. I couldn't afford to take chances.'

'Bollocks,' said Carver, quite calmly. 'I'll tell you what happened. You were on your first mission. You'd just had your first kill and you were practically coming in your pants with excitement. You couldn't wait to do it again. So when you saw two people in that cabin you let rip. And all the training you'd ever done went right out the window. How many hours had you spent in the Killing House, training for exactly this kind of moment? That's why we did it, so we didn't kill the wrong people. And if you really want to know, what pissed me off was not just that you were such a blatant bloody psycho, it was that you were a total amateur. You're just a fucking awful soldier.'

Whatever scenes Tyzack had played out in his mind, that hadn't been in the script. He came to a halt, turned to face Carver and there was outrage in his voice as he protested, 'That's not true! You said it yourself, my assessment scores were better than yours. I was just inexperienced. If I'd been given a chance, I wouldn't have made mistakes like that again. But you never gave me the chance. You humiliated me in front of the other men, and then you had me kicked out.'

Carver shook his head in disbelief. 'That's what all this is about, is it? I'm sitting here because I'm the man who got poor, misunderstood Damon Tyzack his dishonourable discharge? You moron. You'd still be in prison if it wasn't for me. I didn't ruin your life. I saved your bloody neck. '

59

Carver had said nothing when he saw the bodies. He stepped across to the light switch, turned it on, and took off his night-vision goggles as the cabin suddenly filled with the harsh glare of an unshaded bulb. Then he put a hand up to his face and massaged his forehead, the movements of his fingers alternately smoothing and deepening the single deep furrow on his brow, the outline of his goggles still visible on his skin. When he removed his hand and opened his eyes, they looked as chilly and green as the ice in a glacial crevasse.

'You're very lucky,' he said, looking straight at Tyzack. 'This is a secret operation, and we don't want it compromised by a murder inquiry, or getting in the media. So we're going to have to destroy the evidence. I want you to place charges on the fuel and water tanks. If you've got any spare, put them against the inside of the hull, below the water-line, ten-minute fuses on the detonators. When they're set, open the seacocks, so the boat starts flooding. That'll do most of the work. The charges will just blow the buoyancy out of the tanks and give us a bang for the fly-boys to see.'

There was a clattering of boots behind Carver and another SBS man, Sergeant Hirst, appeared in the doorway.

'We found half of Colombia down there, boss,' he shouted. 'Tons of the stuff. You'll never…'

Hirst fell silent as he took in the scene in the cabin.

'This ship's got to have a life-raft,' said Carver. 'Find it. Launch it. And get the lads together. We're scuttling the ship.'

'But, boss, the cocaine… it's worth millions…'

'Makes no difference. Customs are only going to burn it anyway.'

Hirst gave a shrug of his shoulders and left the cabin, shouting orders as he walked up on to the deck. Now Carver was on the radio, talking to the helicopter pilot.

'We found the cocaine. Two crew, both dead. Bad news is, they stuffed the ship with enough C4 to sink the Titanic. I don't know if they managed to set the fuses before we hit them and I'm not waiting to find out. Nor should you. Get well out of range. We're going to abandon ship and take the life-raft. We'll give it the standard thirty minutes. If she blows, you can come and pick us up. If she doesn't, we'll get back on board. Got that? Over.'

'Absolutely. Have a jolly cruise. Out.'

No one would question the story. Drug-smugglers routinely scuttled their boats if they thought they were going to get caught. That way they destroyed the evidence, and when they were found floating on a raft maritime law defined them as rescued sailors, not suspected criminals, so no charges could be pressed.

'What are you waiting for?' Carver snapped at Tyzack. 'I thought I told you to sink this boat?'

'Yes, sir.'

'Well, get on with it. The sooner you do it, the less distance you'll have to swim to reach the life-raft.'

'You're not waiting?'

'You heard what I told the man. The ship could explode at any moment. I can't risk the safety of my men, can I? And you, Lieutenant, can't risk this ship not sinking. Can you?'

Carver did not wait for an answer before he left the cabin. It took Tyzack several minutes to set the charges and open the seacocks. By the time he dived over the side, into the cold, choppy waters of the Bay of Biscay, Carver and the other men in the life-raft were barely visible in the distance. He was still swimming when the Maid of Dumfries exploded and sank to the bottom of the sea.

60

'Oh I see, you were doing me a favour, were you?' Tyzack sneered. 'And I'm the amateur, am I? But even I know that a true fighting man doesn't let his brother warriors down. That's why I was willing to let the matter rest. All right, so you humiliated me in front of the men and risked my life making me set up the charges and swim to the boat. But never mind, I'd have let bygones be bygones. But no, you felt obliged to deliver a full report to Trench. And that meant he was obliged to have a court martial. He didn't want to, but you left him no alternative. Trench told me that in a letter. I've still got it. He even said he'd put in a good word for me with my old man…'

'Did he really?' Carver gave a weary, humourless laugh. 'Sounds like Trench. Hope you didn't believe him.'

'Didn't make any difference either way. My dear old daddy just did what he'd always done. He got out his horsewhip and thrashed me… rather like I've thrashed you, actually. I always thought to myself I'd pass on the favour one day, so that's one resolution kept. My mother, of course, just stood there, doing nothing, just fiddling with her pearl necklace while he beat the hell out of me. I should have killed him then, of course. I don't know why I didn't, because I was more than strong enough, but I… I…' Tyzack sighed. 'For some reason I couldn't fight back. Why was that, do you suppose? I just stood there and took my beating like a man. That was my father's great phrase: Take it like a man. Oh well, I made him take it a few years later. I thought about my darling parents and made an executive decision. I had to let them go.'

'You killed them?' asked Carver.

'No, I sent them on holiday to Barbados. Oh, for goodness' sake, do I have to spell it out?'

'I just wanted to make sure. And by the way, in case you've ever wondered what happened to Trench, he tried to have me eliminated, but I got to him first.'

'Really?' asked Tyzack, genuinely interested. 'What did you do to him?'

'I fired a flare gun into his face at point-blank range and turned him into a human torch.'

A smile crossed Tyzack's face. 'And you loved it, didn't you? I can tell.'

'Yes, I admit, that one did give me a certain satisfaction. So there have been times when I've gone too far. Innocent people have died. But if you think that makes me anything at all like you, you're wrong. I may cross the line, but you don't even know the line is there.'