The thing of it, for Sam, was not knowing. Not knowing if they killed Purdue because of his direction haunted him. If he could only ascertain the extent of the repercussions of what he had done he would know what penalty to impose on his own mind. But he could never tell Paddy this.
“The service has put me on a reconnaissance mission and as luck would have it… ”
“Or fate,” Sam mumbled.
“As luck would have it,” Paddy reiterated with annoyance, “they are giving me the authority to pick my team. I need a photographer and videographer, such as you. I want only the best for this assignment.”
“Call Carl Walsh,” Sam suggested blandly, “or Lynn Manly. She is very good. Also very nosy. Makes for a great investigative journalist. You two should get on swimmingly.”
Paddy just sat staring at Sam, trying not to let his emotions get the better of him, trying not to get up and wallop his best friend just for the unnecessary sarcasm, if nothing else.
“Because you are unfazed by money, I have nothing to reward you with apart from my gratitude, your owing me on the cat-sitting all this time and the fact that it is something you would definitely want to work on,” Paddy threw back some tactful guilt and mystery as bait.
Sam glared at him as he stuffed the last piece of pizza in his mouth. He stood there in his ill-groomed state, looking all but downright wounded. “You had to bring up the cat-sitting. You had to. You were never such a bastard, Paddy. It must be MI6’s influence on you, to make you go there.”
Patrick had to laugh. It was good to hear Sam’s old off-kilter sense of humor purse through his new pallid disposition. Sam kept a straight face only to perpetuate the jest. In truth, he did owe Patrick a sum of rewards and favors for looking after his beloved Bruichladdich every time the journalist had to disappear into oblivion with Nina and Purdue on their incessant Nazi relic hunting. Not to mention the times Sam was caught in life-threatening situations and Patrick came to his aid, indeed, saved his life no less.
Sam had to concede. He needed to get out and he needed to make it up to his best friend, somehow. And this would be the place to start. Sam sat down and sighed, changing his mood to be less disobliging, and looked his friend in the eye with sincere acquiescence.
“What do you need me for, mate?”
Paddy smiled, but he did his best not to look too overjoyed just yet, in case Sam took it as victory.
“Like I said, it is a recon assignment. Just recon for a few days to profile our mark and then back home again. No open season on your Scottish ass by vicious Germans, I promise,” Paddy assured Sam. He put his beer down and rubbed his palms together like an eager teenager and added, “The only thing is, I need to know now. That is why I am here… mostly.”
I need to get my mind off Nina, or I’m going to collapse in a heap of stupid again, Sam argued inside his mind. And it will occupy me fulltime. Maybe by the time I return home, I’ll be more numb about it all, who knows.
“Okay,” Sam announced, “I’m in.”
He did not even ask exactly what the assignment was about and he did not care. He had never worked with Paddy before and the two men trusted each other with their lives, they knew each other like twins and had their own way of communicating. Their logic was in synch and between Patrick’s training and Sam’s expertise they could easily finish this project in a few days.
“Excellent!” Paddy smirked. “Now, some details of the trip. All you have to do is record what we see, where we see it, who the marks are with, and who they contact. I’ll do the rest.”
“Okay, and is it local?” Sam asked.
“No, we are heading to Rotterdam. Our persons of interest have seats globally, but we believe that this one is the main gathering place for the heads of the organization,” Paddy informed Sam. “It is our task to follow them and ultimately locate one of the members, one Jaap Roodt. Once we know where he is, we report back to MI6 head office in Glasgow with all the footage and you get paid for your service to the country.”
“Jesus, you sound like Moneypenny,” Sam remarked, secretly very proud of how far his friend had progressed from DCI Patrick Smith from Edinburgh to Agent Smith of the British Secret Intelligence Service.
Patrick laughed awkwardly, exhibiting some uncharacteristic poise. He had Sam Cleave bagged. Revelation imminent.
Chapter 6
In the pale street lights, a convoy of six black vehicles, three were SUVs and three were luxury cars, traveled swiftly along the side street in the center of Rotterdam. It was well past midnight, going on the early hours of the darkest night, as they always timed their meetings. From Bruges and Paris two delegates traveled to attend the meeting, while the other four were resident in the Netherlands. Inside the secluded compound of their rendezvous the cars formed a circle and came to a halt.
Overhead the massive structure of the old power station hovered. On the vast electrical perimeter fence, countless tin signs were affixed, warning of the condemned state of the colossal old building, due for demolition. However, this was a ruse, and very few residents of Rotterdam actually inquired as to the actual date of demolition, since these signs had hung there for decades. The plain, beige, fort-like walls towered into several stories, with only a few tiny black rectangles to mark the odd window lost on the great flat landscape of concrete. Flanked by two enormous silo-shaped structures the silent giant rested on the hill just outside the city, somewhere between the airport and Lage Bergse Bos.
The surrounding enclosure of the huge power station was flat, a scraped gravel area of dust, and an occasional lamppost from which large security lights illuminated the immediate vicinity. Postapocalyptic and miserable the lonely poles populated the vast nothingness of the yard inside the eight-foot-tall fence where a coil of razor wire assured that all vagrants and vandals would stay away.
Where the vehicles entered, the gates closed automatically and locked tight with a magnetic code. Desolate and haunted, the place greeted the men who emerged from their cars one by one. They were all immaculately dressed in expensive suits and shoes, and the one thing they had in common was their age. Every man present was past his sixty-fifth year. Distinguished men they certainly were, each in their own advanced age, but all strong in character and far from frail.
So arrived the council at the Kraftwerke foundation to convene on the matters concerning the status of the leader of the Black Sun and the fate of the captive who abducted her in the first place.
They spoke not a word as they gathered, each nodding to the others in salutation. They stepped into an old steel-cage elevator that looked deceptively ruined to be in keeping with the pretense of the building. In fact, the building, its elevators, and staircases were sturdy, high-grade titanium-iron, and the whole place was wired with motion detectors.
The six men stood quietly, save for the odd throat clearing or cough, as the cage clanked downward at a comfortable speed. When it reached the basement level the gate clicked loose and the exceptionally narrow-arched corridor led them to the meeting hall. Above them a row of small, sharp lights, lodged in the cement ceiling, lit their way and gave the plain walls a claustrophobic element. In a row, the six men walked until they entered the cavernous hall with no doors.