One hundred and fifty miles, they had told him. And the going should be pretty good once they got out of the jungle. He’d be there early the next morning.
“The British High Commission is expecting you,” Dr. Murcia had said as he bade him farewell. “May I suggest you think up a plausible story as to why you happen to be wandering round the jungle, that’s if you want them to send you home.” Jack had smiled as he shook his hand, thanked him for his help.
“It’ll be fine.” He said, outwardly confident, inwardly wondering how the hell he was going to explain this to the staff at the Commission.
They hadn’t been travelling long before the truck slowed, a shadowy figure in the road ahead waving his arm for them to stop. Jack sensed the driver tense, his knuckles gripping the wheel tightly.
“What is it?” Jack asked. The driver shrugged, the man by the road was holding something white above his head, looked like a tee shirt on a stick.
“Could be a hitch-hiker, could be someone about to highjack us,” he said. Jack wasn’t sure if the driver was joking. He stared at the figure, there was something familiar about the way he held himself, shoulders back, neck slightly stooped. The driver braked suddenly as the man ran into the middle of the road.
“What the?!” He exclaimed. The hitchhiker sprinted to the side of truck, yanked open the door, shoved in his rucksack and climbed aboard.
“Evening lad. They managed to fix you up alright then?”
“Dad?” Jack was stunned. “This better not be another bloody hallucination.”
Sir Clive was sitting stony faced in a meeting with external IT contractors when the call came. Charlotte relaying the message from the Ugandan High Commission. He excused himself and stepped away from the table, pressing the call back function.
“Charlotte, put me through to the Commission in Kampala will you?” His said, his usual gruffness slightly mollified by the speed with which she had passed on the message. He heard the sound of fingertips pressing buttons.
“Done,” she said. A ringing, long intermittent tones.
“High Commission Kampala, Clarke speaking,”
“Nick Clarke?” Sir Clive asked, not bothering to introduce himself.
“Indeed.”
“Excellent. Message came through you might have one of our boys turning up. Got a name and description?”
“Not yet. Can’t get through to the camp and there’s no means of contacting him. Be here early tomorrow though.”
“Good, good. Call me as soon as you’ve spoken to him,” Sir Clive said. Officer Denbigh. Had to be. Sounded like he’d managed to make it out after all. Should be able to get a full debriefing from the man.
The idea that Jack Hartman, untrained and untested, might have stumbled through the waking nightmare Sir Clive and Centurion had unleashed on the Congo didn’t even occur to him.
The empty aid trucks trundled through the night, making good progress on the deserted highway that connected the capital to the north west of Uganda. As they bumped over the potholes Jack told his father what he had learnt from Monsieur Blanc about Centurion, their need for coltan, and Sir Clive’s elaborate hoax to allow him to take out Clement Nbotou and secure the mines.
His father had shaken his head. “Lions led by donkeys. What a waste of men.” His father said, then became silent, partly out of respect, and partly out of shock that a high-ranking member of the Security Services could display such wanton disregard for the lives of soldiers. And all for personal gain.
“We need to decide what to do. We’re not going to the High Commission. They’ll have a tame spook there pretending to be a desk officer. A hotline to MI6, to Sir Clive.” He ran a hand through his mop of greying hair. “This is big, Jack. He’s a powerful man with a lot to lose.”
They entered the city as dawn was breaking, the other two trucks peeling off the main road to head for the airport.
“Change of plan driver,” his father said. “We aren’t going to the Commission just yet, I think it would be best if we freshen up first. Can you drop us in the centre of town, wherever the hotels are?”
68
Patrick Little checked the clock on the wall. Still no sign of the new arrival. He wasn’t overly concerned. There could be any number of setbacks on African roads, and the later the man arrived the better, as far as his hangover was concerned. He rubbed his eyes and dropped a couple of aspirin into a glass. It felt worse than usual, must have been something in the water the barman mixed with his whiskey.
The phone on his desk sounded its loud and unpleasant tone. He jumped, spilling the fizzing liquid onto his laptop. He would really have to work out how to turn the damn thing down one of these days.
“Patrick, it’s Nick Clarke here, how are you feeling this morning?”
“Fine,” Patrick replied through gritted teeth.
“Glad to hear it, hope the Foreign Office budget hasn’t had to be cut by too much on account of your bar bill.” Patrick ignored him and downed his drink. Sarcastic bastard. He had been there too, at least as far as he could remember.
“Is this just a social call or did you have something you’d like to discuss?” He replied irritably.
“I’ve had London on the line, senior officer at MI6. Twice already. Wants us to let him know the moment this chap arrives so he can debrief via videoconference. Might be worth putting a call in to the Refugee camp. Check they left on time. Check they’re on their way.”
“Fine.” Patrick replied, putting down the phone. Not exactly a big ask. He fired up his laptop and sent off a quick e-mail.
The reply came back almost straight away.
Convoy left yesterday evening. Jack Hartman aboard. Arrival in Kampala confirmed this morning.
He picked up the phone and dialled Nick.
“Aid trucks are already in town old chap, but our friend Jack hasn’t checked in.”
“Jack?” Nick repeated, quick as a flash. “That’s his name? You didn’t tell me he had a name.” That’s because I didn’t bloody know his name. Patrick thought to himself. Nick had an irritating habit of implying you’d deliberately withheld information, that he’d caught you out in some carefully planned deception. He checked the e-mail again.
“It’s Hartman, Jack Hartman.”
69
Jack watched his father as he carefully took apart two automatic pistols, checked the action, wiped them down, then re-assembled them and dropped them onto the brightly-coloured bed spread. They’d found a mid-range hotel near the food market. Good crowd cover if they needed to make a run for it during the day and no need to hand over ID or a credit card when you checked in.
“Not the most reliable of things, automatics, need a lot of looking after, especially in this type of environment.”
“Right,” Jack said. His father was transformed, a million miles from the dressing gown — wearing half-drunk shadow of a man he had been only days earlier. There was a purpose to his movements, an efficiency. He passed one of the guns to Jack. “You remember how to fire it?”
“Of course.” Jack replied, feeling the weight of it, the cold metal in his hands.
Archie had explained about the tracker in the watch, how he’d followed him to the airport in Cambridge, flown to Burundi, hired a helicopter, picked up his trail through the jungle. Jack was impressed, he knew he shouldn’t have been, his father had spent years doing exactly that sort of thing, it was what he had trained for. He just never thought he would be explaining to him how he did it. Neither of them mentioned the hallucinations, the vision of Paul. Didn’t need to. It was understood.
Jack walked over to the sink in the corner of the room, looked at his face in the mirror before splashing himself with lukewarm water. The beard was getting seriously out of hand.