The bus lurched to a stop. Even braced, Nina had still been thrown over the steering wheel. Pained, she remained still for a moment, thinking she could hear a ringing in her ears — before realising it was the sound of distant bells. She sat up. Pedestrians and people in the stationary cars gawped at her. ‘Eddie? Roy?’
‘I’m still here,’ Roy groaned. ‘I think…’
Footsteps thumped down the stairs. She turned to see her husband carrying the unconscious Removal Man. ‘What’re you doing with him?’
‘Getting rid,’ Eddie replied, going to the open middle door. ‘Don’t need him causing you trouble if he wakes up.’
‘That sounds like you’re not planning to stay around to deal with him,’ said Roy.
Eddie tossed the man out on to the pavement as Nina engaged reverse gear and started to extract the bus from the dented barrier. ‘You need to get to the embassy. Roy, what’s happening with the computer?’
‘The file’s still copying to the flash drive,’ the young man told him as the Routemaster lurched free.
‘Still? Fuck’s sake, is that laptop steam-powered? Okay, I just heard Big Ben — it’s quarter to twelve. If I find Brice before noon, I might be able to stop him. It’s about a mile and a half to the Houses of Parliament, so I can make it in time if I run.’
‘But you don’t know where he is,’ said Nina.
‘I’ll just head for the weird noise.’ He jumped down to the street.
‘It’ll be too late by then!’
‘I’ve got to bloody try! You get that video to the embassy.’
‘I’m not leaving you!’
He looked back at her. ‘I don’t care what Brice says, this is my country — and I’m not going to let him fuck it up. Now go!’ He vaulted over the barrier and raced away.
‘Eddie, wait!’ Nina shouted, but he was already gone. ‘Shit!’ Knowing there was nothing she could do to bring him back, she set her jaw and put the Routemaster into gear.
37
The traffic had cleared the bridge ahead, either oblivious of what had happened behind or wanting to escape the chaos. ‘Okay, Roy,’ said Nina as she accelerated, ‘how do we get to the embassy?’
Roy regarded the approaching south bank of the Thames. ‘We’ve got to get around Battersea Power Station, so… okay, head down this road to a roundabout, then go left. That’ll take us into Nine Elms — and that leads us straight to the embassy.’
‘Great!’
‘It also leads straight to Vauxhall Cross, so anyone sent after us from SIS headquarters will be coming down it.’
‘Not great!’ A flash of alarm as she spotted blue strobe lights in the distance — but again, the police had clearly been ordered not to intervene, the car not moving. Her capture — or elimination — would be left entirely to MI6’s assassins.
She raced on, sweeping past expensive, anonymous new apartment blocks on the left, a large park on the right. The roundabout came into view. The road to the left was clear, the police car preventing civilians from becoming ensnared in the chase. She was being channelled, corralled; her pursuers had probably realised where she was trying to go.
Which meant they could wait for her to come to them.
Pushing the grim thought aside, Nina brought the bus through the turn. ‘Under the bridge, there,’ said Roy.
A broad Victorian railway arch spanned the new road. She steered beneath it, careful to keep the shredded roof clear of the ironwork. ‘How far to the embassy?’
‘About a mile.’
‘And what about the video? Has it copied yet?’
‘Almost done… yes! It’s just finished.’
‘Okay, give it to me.’ He quickly unmounted the little flash drive and handed it to her. She shoved it in a pocket. ‘Okay, hold on!’
Roy hurriedly retreated and gripped a handrail as she blasted the horn and swung the bus out to overtake more sluggish traffic.
Brice brought his van around the green common of Parliament Square, slowing at its north-eastern corner. Instead of continuing around it, however, he turned on to the pavement. The tourists and passers-by merely flowed around him. The grubby Transit pickup, orange warning lights flashing on its roof, was the perfect stealth vehicle. Nobody would even look once, never mind twice, at a council workman on some mundane business.
He carefully guided the van along the little park’s northern side, halting in front of a statue of Winston Churchill. The sight of the great wartime leader gave him a surge of both pride and determination. Churchill had done whatever was necessary to protect his country from the forces seeking to destroy it; now he was going to do the same.
He got out and climbed up into the van’s rear. The lead box containing the Shamir was hidden under a dirty tarpaulin. His first task was to line the ancient weapon up on its target.
A glance across the square. The Elizabeth Tower dominated the scene, the clock standing tall over the northern end of the Houses of Parliament. The Victorian-era Gothic edifice was a globally recognised icon of Britain itself, visual shorthand for an entire country…
And he was going to bring it down.
He knew full well the damage its destruction would cause to his nation’s psyche. Indeed, part of him was appalled by the prospect. But it had to be done. The gaping scar in the London skyline would unify the people, bring up the walls necessary to protect against all enemies outside. And once they were in place, the process of rooting out those lurking within could begin.
The purge would begin in Westminster itself. Those in Parliament who were about to weaken and diminish their own country, who would sell it out to foreign powers, could not be allowed to take control. And he had the Prime Minister’s authorisation to prevent it.
He pulled the heavy box into position. Once he opened the lid, he would still have to position the strange stone itself to focus its destructive effect upon its target, but then all he needed to do was ensure it remained in place until the job was done… and that no one interfered.
He saw someone who might do just that. Parliament Square was the nearest area of open ground to the Houses of Parliament, and as such was under high security, both covert and visible. An example of the latter was now approaching, a uniformed Metropolitan Police officer who had taken an interest in the van.
SIS’s forgers had provided him with bogus work orders to justify his presence, but Brice had no intention of wasting time arguing with some dullard of a woodentop. He had taken the precaution of also demanding something that would get rid of interlopers with no questions asked. ‘Excuse me, sir,’ said the young policeman. ‘Would you mind stepping down?’
Brice jumped to the ground, drawing something from an overall pocket: a Met warrant card and badge. ‘DI Carver, Special Branch,’ he said in a low voice, his smooth elocution replaced by a harsh East End growl. ‘I’m on stakeout, and yer gonna bollocks things up if yer don’t get moving.’
The officer flinched, but held his ground. ‘Uh, sorry, sir,’ he said, peering more closely at the ID, ‘but you do understand that this is a high-security area? I need to—’
‘Course I bloody understand,’ snapped Brice. ‘Why d’yer think I’m ’ere? We got word that some of our bearded brethren might cause trouble today. Me an’ a dozen lads from SO15’ — the codename for the Metropolitan Police’s Counter Terrorism Command — ‘are watching for ’em, but they’re not going to poke their bloody noses out while yer standing ’ere like a streak of glowing piss!’ He jabbed a finger at the cop’s hi-vis vest. ‘All right, sonny, now just nod yer ’ead and piss off. You got a problem, report me to yer watch commander. Just do it from somewhere else.’