“I’m with you. Do we ring Dermot and Tod first?”
“All we’ll get is a bollocking again.”
“Then let’s just go,” and Regan stepped to the pavement and hailed a cab.
In Regency Square, Roper had been looking at computer screens too long and was opening his mouth for a yawn when his mobile rang.
“It’s Sean. What’s up?”
“I’m tired, stressed, and I’ve been sitting at this damn thing too long. I need a break,” Roper said.
“How about I come round and take you out for a drink or something?”
“Sounds good to me.”
Roper felt better already and reached in his pocket for cigarettes and found the pack was empty. He cursed. He’d been kept alive from his terrible injuries by a cocktail of drugs, and tobacco had become a mainstay. It was the same for a lot of soldiers in his situation, and the need was overpowering. He’d have to go out to the corner shop.
He made for the front door, got it open and found it was raining. He took an umbrella from the hall stand, pressed one of the electronic buttons on his wheelchair to close the door behind him, went down the ramp to the pavement and raised the umbrella. He sailed, in a way, down the pavement, strangely exhilarated, down to the shop on the corner, where Mr. Khan had installed a ramp at one of the doors especially to facilitate Roper’s comings and goings.
A large, bearded Muslim with a genial smile and a Cockney accent, Khan greeted Roper warmly. “What you run out of now, Major?”
“Cigarettes,” Roper said. “The old cancer sticks. I’ll take a carton of the usual.”
“Maybe you should try and give up,” Khan said, as he got the carton and took Roper’s money.
“And live longer, you mean, in my state?” Roper stowed the carton in a side pocket of the wheelchair. “Wouldn’t make much difference.”
Khan tried to keep smiling, because he liked Roper. “Now then, Major, it’s not like you to be gloomy.”
“You’re right. I’ll be Cheerful Charlie from now on.”
He turned his wheelchair, and Khan said, “There was a man in here this morning asking if I knew where you lived.”
“Oh, yes?”
“An Irish geezer, Ulster I’d say, you know what I mean? It’s a different kind of Irish accent, isn’t it?”
And Roper, veteran of the Irish troubles for twenty years, the finest bomb-disposal man in the business, stopped smiling. “It certainly is. What did he want?”
“Didn’t say. Just asked if I knew you. The thing is, I saw him again with another guy a little while ago, and he sounded the same as they walked past.”
“Thanks,” Roper said. “I’ll keep an eye out.”
He moved onto the pavement, put up his umbrella and took a Codex Four from his pocket and called Dillon.
“Where are you?”
“In a cab on my way. Traffic’s lousy.”
“The fact is, I could have a problem. My friendly local shopkeeper, Mr. Khan, you know him, tells me I’ve been inquired about.”
“And by whom would that be?” Dillon asked.
“Couple of men, Northern Irish accents. I’ve got a lot of history there, Sean.”
“Where are you now?”
“On the street, on my way home.”
“Take it easy, just get inside. I’ll be there in ten minutes. Are you carrying?”
“Of course.”
“Good man.”
He switched off, and Roper started along the pavement.
Regan and Fahy, standing in a doorway on the other side of the road, sheltering from the rain, saw him approach.
“The man himself,” Fahy said.
“What do we do?” Regan already had his hand on the butt of a Browning in his raincoat pocket.
“Wait,” Fahy said. “Not out here on the street. Let him get himself together, then we move very fast over the road and help him inside.”
Roper did his usual maneuver, turned to position, opened the door electronically, then started up the ramp. Quickly, Regan and Fahy darted over the road, and Fahy grabbed the end of the wheelchair.
“Let’s help you, Major,” he said and pushed Roper in. Regan followed them and closed the street door behind them.
“Now then, Major, let’s talk,” Fahy said, and pushed Roper into the living room beside his computer banks.
Roper sat there facing them, no fear in him at all. Regan said, “Do we call Dermot and Tod, Brendan?”
“Don’t be stupid, Fergus,” Fahy said. “You’ll be wanting to call Ashimov next. This is our affair.”
“Dermot and Tod? That would be as in Kelly and Murphy,” Roper said. “Which means that you two idiots are Regan and Fahy.”
“And how would you be knowing that?” Regan demanded.
“Because you’re thick and stupid. You think we don’t know all about you? You work for Ashimov, and that means you work for Josef Belov. Where’s Belov now? Drumore Place? Does he know you’re here?”
“You think you’re clever, don’t you?” Fahy said. “Too clever for your own good. We’ll have to do something about that,” and he took the Browning from his pocket.
13
At that precise moment in time, Kelly and Tod were moving through Witch Wood and paused at the iron grille in the thicket. They both wore hooded anoraks against the rain. Dermot had phoned Smith from the trailer, had told him to do the return flight to Dunkley at once. Smith had been unable to conceal his reluctance, but had soon seen the error of his ways.
Kelly and Tod lit cigarettes. “Well, this is it,” Tod said. “This is where the luck comes in.”
“Oh, you always need that.”
“What about Fahy and Regan, or Ashimov, for that matter?” Tod asked.
“Later,” Kelly said, “when we’ve got the good news. Now let’s get it done.”
He pulled up the iron grille, went down the ladder and Tod dropped the weapon bag down and went after him.
A short while later, at the end of the tunnel, they paused and opened the weapons bag. Tod produced an AK and a silencer and passed them to Kelly, took out another for himself. Kelly went up the ladder, opened the grille and exited, and Tod followed him. They moved through the dense foliage of the copse and crouched behind the Roman statues. It was quiet, only the occasional bird calling, and the rain hissed down steadily.
“Come on,” Kelly said. “Make my day.”
“That was a movie,” Tod murmured. “This could take more patience, so be patient.”
In the sitting room, Ferguson and Selim were having tea at the end of an exhausting session. Dalton and Miller stood watchful as usual, as the two men talked.
“Open the French windows, Staff Sergeant,” Ferguson said to Dalton. “Let’s have a breath of air.”
“Certainly, sir.”
Dalton pressed the button and the windows opened. “I like it,” Selim said. “The smell of the rain in the countryside, the sound of it falling through the trees.”
“I know what you mean,” Ferguson said, and hesitated. “You know, Doctor, you obviously have a genuine love of your native land. Do you regret having been born in London?”
“No, I love the damn place.” He laughed as he got to his feet. “I’m remembering something Mr. Dillon said to me. That I should remember there are mosques all over London.”
He moved to the open windows, and Ferguson joined him. “Then what were you thinking of?”
“There is a passage in the Koran, General, that says one sword is worth ten thousand words. Perhaps that is what I was thinking of.”
And at that moment, Kelly shot him between the eyes, fragmenting the back of his skull. As the body hurtled back, bouncing against Ferguson, the General leaned over slightly to catch it and Tod Murphy’s bullet went askew, slicing Ferguson across the left shoulder. He sank to the floor, clutching Selim, and Dalton and Miller darted past, each drawing a Beretta and firing blindly into the woods, but Kelly and Tod were already working their way back through the copse and dropping down through the grille.