Once finished we didn't strip the weapons to clean them.
Why do that when we knew they worked perfectly? We just got a brush into the area that feeds the round into the barrel and got the carbon off.
Next job was getting on the ground to learn the spots system, at the same time checking our radios and finding out if there were any dead areas. We were still running around doing that when, at 2 p.m." Alpha came up on the net.
"Hello, all stations, return to this location immediately."
Simmonds was already in the briefing area when we arrived, looking like a man under pressure. Like the rest of us, he'd probably had very little sleep. There was two days' growth on his chin, and he was having a bad hair day. Something was definitely going on; there was a lot more noise and bustle from the machines and men in the background. He had about twenty bits of paper in his hand. The intelligence boys were giving him more as he talked, and they distributed copies of the rules of engagement to us. The operation, I saw, was now called Flavius.
"Just about an hour and a half ago," he said, "Savage and McCann passed through Immigration at Malaga airport.
They were on a flight from Paris. Farrell met them. We have no idea how she got there. The team is complete. There is just one little problem--the Spanish lost them as they got into a taxi. Triggers are now being placed on the border crossing as a precaution. I have no reason to believe that the attack will not take place as planned."
He paused and looked at each of us in turn.
"I've just become aware of two very critical pieces of information. First, the players will not be using a blocking car to reserve a parking space in the target area. A blocking car would mean making two trips across the border, and the intelligence is that they're not prepared to take the risk. The PIRA vehicle, when it arrives, should therefore be perceived as the real thing.
"Second, the detonation of the bomb will be by a handheld remote control initiation device: they want to be sure that the bomb goes off at exactly the right moment. Remember, gentlemen, any one of the team, or all of them, could be in possession of that device. That bomb must not detonate.
There could be hundreds of lives at risk."
I was awoken by the noise of engines in reverse and wheels on the tarmac. It was just after 6 a.m. I had been asleep for three hours. It was still dark; the rain had eased quite a bit. I leaned over to the back.
"Kelly, Kelly, time to wake up." As I shook her there was a gentle moan. She sat up, rubbing her eyes.
With the cuff of my coat I started to tidy her up. I didn't want her walking into the airport looking wrecked. I wanted us as spruce and happy as Donny and Marie Osmond on Prozac.
We got out of the car with the bag and I locked up, after checking inside to make sure that there wasn't anything attractive to see. The last thing I needed now was a parking lot attendant taking an interest in my lock-picking kit. We walked over to the bus stop and waited for the shuttle to take us to departures.
The terminal looked just like any airport at that time of the morning. The check-in desks were already quite busy with business fliers. A handful of people, mostly student types, looked as though they were waiting for flights that they'd gotten there much too early for. Cleaners with floor waxers trudged across the tiled floors like zombies.
I picked up a free airport magazine from the rack at the top of the escalator. Looking at the flight guide, I saw that the first possible departure to the UK. was at just after five o'clock in the afternoon. It was going to be a long wait.
I looked at Kelly; we both could do with a decent wash. We went down the escalator to the international arrivals area on the lower level. I put some money in a machine and got a couple of travel kits to supplement our washing kit and went into one of the handicap-accessible toilets.
I shaved as Kelly washed her face. I scraped the dirt off her boots with toilet paper and generally cleaned her up, combed her hair, and put it in an elastic band at the back so it didn't look so greasy. After half an hour we were looking fairly respectable The scabs on my face were healing. No Prozac, but we'd pass muster.
I picked up the bag.
"You ready?"
"Are we going to England now?"
"Just one thing left to do. Follow me." I pulled at the stubby ponytail that made her look like a four-foot-tall cheerleader.
She acted annoyed, but I could tell she liked the attention.
We went back up the escalator and walked around the edge of the terminal. I pretended to be studying the aircraft out on the tarmac. In fact, there were two quite different things I was looking for.
"I need to mail something," I said, spotting the FedEx box.
I used the credit card details on the car rental agreement to fill out the mailing label. Fuck it--Big Al could pay for a few things now that he was rich.
Kelly was watching every movement.
"Who are you writing?"
"I'm sending something to England in case we are stopped." I showed her the floppy disk and backup disk.
"Who are you sending it to?" She got more like her dad every day.
"Don't be so nosy."
I put them in the envelope, sealed it, and entered the delivery details. In the past we'd used the FedEx system to send the Firm photos from abroad that we'd taken of a target and developed in a hotel room, or other highly sensitive material.
It saved getting caught with them in our possession. Nowadays, however, the system was obsolete; with digital cameras you can take pictures, plug in your cellular mobile, dial up the UK, and transmit.
We continued walking around the edge of the terminal. I found the power outlet I was looking for at the end of a row of black plastic seats where two students were snoring. I pointed to the last two spaces.
"Let's sit down here. I want to look at the laptop."
I got it plugged in. Kelly decided she wanted something to eat.
"Give me five minutes," I said.
From what I'd read earlier, I understood Gibraltar was a setup, but it still didn't explain what Kev had to do with it. It soon became clearer.
In the late 1980s the Bush administration had been under pressure from Thatcher to do something about Noraid fundraising for PIRA. With so many millions of Irish American votes on the line, however, it was a tricky call. A deal was struck: if the Brits could expose the fact that Noraid money was being used to buy drugs, it would help discredit PIRA in the USA and Bush could then take action. After all, who would complain about a US administration fighting the spread of dangerous narcotics?
When the British intelligence service started to gather data about PIRA's drug connections with Gibraltar, it seemed to present a window of opportunity. After the events of March 6, however, the window was slammed shut. Those votes were too important.
By the early 1990s the US had a new administration and the UK a new prime minister. In Northern Ireland, the peace process began. The US was told and the message was delivered at the highest level that unless it put pressure on PIRA to come to the peace table, the UK would ex pose what was happening to Noraid funds raised in America.
The failure to fight the drug war in its own backyard, by a power that preached so readily to others, would be a serious embarrassment.