‘Don’t lose them!’
‘Not likely,’ replied Barron. ‘They’re on foot.’
‘What?’
‘It looks to me as if they’re just going round the corner as usual to the coffee shop.’
‘Shit!’ said Dewar. He couldn’t bring himself to even contemplate a scenario not involving the Iraqis. He rested his elbow on the window ledge of the car door and brought the heel of his hand up to his forehead while he thought. ‘That’s it!’ he exclaimed.
‘What’s it?’ asked Malloy.
‘The cafe! The Bookstop Cafe! That’s where the hand-over’s going to be. It’s the one place they never arouse any suspicion by going to. They set it up that way by going there every day! They’re regulars! Ferguson must be going to meet them there! Move it!’
Malloy drove. Dewar called Barron..
‘The hand-over is going to take place in the Bookstop Cafe,’ he said. ‘The Iraqis’ contact is one, George Ferguson, male Caucasian, six two, red hair, early fifties. Is he there yet?’
There was a long pause. Malloy swung the car into Hanover Street and stopped at the traffic lights.
‘Roger that. A male fitting that description is currently inside the cafe’
‘Is his car outside?’ asked Dewar. ‘He couldn’t be sure if Ferguson would have the virus with him or whether he’d leave it in the car. ‘It’s a white Ford Escort.’ He gave the number.
‘Negative,’ said Barron. ‘What do you want us to do?’
‘Ferguson and the Iraqis must not be allowed to leave. As long as they stay put take no action until we find his car. With any luck the virus’ll be in the boot. Once we have that they’re all yours.’
Dewar called the police again and asked them to concentrate their hunt for Ferguson’s car in the area around the Bookstop Cafe but on no account were officers to pass in front of the cafe Ten minutes passed with still no sighting. Dewar could feel the sweat breaking out on his forehead. ‘Come on, come on,’ he urged impatiently. They were now sitting in Forest Road, just round the corner from the cafe Dewar’s impatience made him get out the car. He walked to the end of the road and caught sight of Barron, watching the cafe He called him on the phone. ‘Still inside?’
‘Laughing and talking just like any other day.’
‘And Ferguson?’
‘He’s joined them. There are a couple of books on the table in front of him that he’s just bought. For all the world it looks like he’s just having a cup of coffee before leaving and is chatting to people at a neighbouring table.’
‘Just books? No boxes or parcels in front of him.’
‘Not as far as I can see.’
Dewar looked towards Barron again and saw that he was using the medical school building on the other side of the street as cover for his watch on the cafe ‘The medical school!’ he thought. The police wouldn’t have checked the car park in the quadrangle. It was just conceivable that Ferguson might have left his car there. He said so to Barron.
‘Want me to check?’
‘No, you keep your eyes on the cafe They might try to leave. I’ll walk to the corner and cross the road. I’ll only be exposed for a few seconds. If they’re all inside the cafe, talking I should get away with it.
Dewar pulled up his collar, stuck his hands in his pockets and walked to the corner junction with Teviot Place. He ran across the road and picked a moment when a bus was coming along to hurry up to the entrance of the medical school. The bus shielded him from view from the cafe He looked around the quadrangle at the cars parked there. A man in uniform was walking among them, looking at windscreens for permits. Dewar looked along the line. At the far corner, nearest the building was a white Ford Escort. He couldn’t see the number but he felt sure it would be the one. He hurried over and saw that the number checked out.
Dewar informed Barron and the police. He needed help as quickly as possible
to get inside the car but he didn’t want patrol cars screaming into the quadrangle and uniforms running everywhere.
Barron said that he would send one of his men round. He was in plain clothes, so wouldn’t arouse suspicion; he was more than a match for a Ford Escort.
‘How long?’ asked Dewar.
‘About thirty seconds,’ replied Barron. ‘He’s watching the cafe with me.’
It took the agent a further thirty seconds to break into Ferguson’s car. Dewar searched the interior but found nothing. He pulled the boot release catch and hurried round to lift it up. There was nothing there apart from a travel rug, a few tools and a folding chair.
‘Damn, damn, damn,’ exclaimed Dewar. ‘He left the house with it. He must have it with him.’
‘In the cafe, you mean?’ asked the agent.
Dewar nodded. He called Barron.
‘All we needed.’
‘But you said he doesn’t seem to be carrying anything?’
‘I can only see the top of the table. He could have a bag or a box at his feet for all I know.’
‘Oh fuck!’ exclaimed the agent at Dewar’s side.
Dewar looked at him and then at what he was looking at. The old man who had been checking the parking permits was watching them and had a phone to his ear.
‘He’s calling the police!’ said the agent. ‘He thought we were trying to steal the Escort!’
Dewar called the police and tried to have the response cancelled but the sound of police sirens was already in the air and getting louder. ‘Call them off!’ he yelled into the phone but it was too late. Two patrol cars came hurtling into Teviot Place and the people inside the cafe jumped to the wrong conclusion. Siddiqui and Abbas got up to leave.
Barron ordered his men in to stop them leaving the cafe Dewar ran round to the front of the medical school leaving the agent to deal with the arriving police. ‘Get the virus!’ he yelled at Barron. ‘Forget everything else. Just get the virus!’
Dewar was the last to enter the cafe Ferguson had gone as white as a sheet and was sitting in a corner as if paralysed. One of Barron’s men had charge of a box he’d taken from under the table and was guarding it with his body. Barron’s men had pulled their weapons. Siddiqui was back sitting sedately in his seat as if nothing had happened. Abbas was looking distinctly more uneasy but he too had resumed his seat.
‘Is that what you’re after?’ Barron asked Dewar. The agent stood back to let Dewar examine the box.
Dewar opened it and saw that it contained six individual flasks. ‘I think so,’ he replied. He looked at Ferguson and snapped, ‘Well, is it? Do they contain smallpox virus?’
Ferguson nodded his head in hang-dog fashion and then looked down at the floor.
Dewar squatted down in front of Siddiqui and looked him in the eye. ‘Well, Professor. What do you have to say for yourself?’
Siddiqui looked at him disdainfully and said. ‘I am an Iraqi national, here to liaise with students from my country. I have nothing to say.
‘And your relationship with Mr Ferguson here?’ asked Dewar.
Siddiqui looked at Ferguson and said, ‘I have never seen this man before in my life. He came in while my friend and I were having coffee as we always do at this time in the afternoon. I would like to go now please.’
‘Lying bastard,’ said Ferguson.
Dewar picked up the case that sat at the side of Siddiqui’s chair and snapped it open on the table.
‘I protest,’ began Siddiqui but his protests fell on deaf ears.
Dewar lifted up the lid to reveal it was full of English bank notes. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘I remember the coffee here being quite reasonably priced. You’ve got some explaining to do.’
Siddiqui’s nerve held but Abbas snapped. He leapt to his feet and vaulted over the counter to snatch up a knife and hold it to the throat of the young lady who owned the cafe and who had been watching events with an air of bemusement.
Siddiqui rasped something in Arabic at him and it didn’t sound complimentary but Abbas seemed determined to make his own bid for freedom. ‘Let Susan go,’ said Siddiqui, this time in English. ‘She has always treated us with courtesy. Perhaps she might even forgive you this misunderstanding … if you let her go!’