Woodger waved goodbye to his colleague and sat for a moment finishing his tea. Suddenly, he reached across his desk for a small cellophane package, then got up and called out.
‘George? Sorry mate, could you have a look at this. It was found by one of my lads working on the outrider’s bike. The one who got injured in the BR-101 trailer accident, down at Pembridge. He pulled it out of the bike, but swears to me it isn’t part of it.’
Hamble walked back up to Woodger and took the package from him. ‘I’ll get it checked out. Any ideas?’
Woodger shook his head in puzzlement. ‘Not a clue. It looks a bit weird to me, there’s some scorch marks on it, so I thought you would be the man with the answers.’
Sergeant Hamble took the object out of the bag and examined the scorching. ‘Certainly been subjected to some heat. Look at the way this section has melted. Tell ya what, Charlie’s in and he’s good with pyrotechnics, so I’ll give it to him to look at.’
Woodger returned to the hut and sat down to the mountain of paperwork that faced him while Hamble walked into the armoury hangar and looked at the Aden cannon on the workbench. Leading Aircraftsman Charles Ambrose walked up to him, cleaning a component of the long cannon barrel.
‘Morning Charlie. ‘Ere, could you have a look at this at some point? I’ve just been given it by Sergeant Woodger over in Maintenance.’ Hamble handed the package to Ambrose, who took the object out of the packaging, and looked at it closely. ‘I thought as you are good with the pyros that you could tell me what it is.’
Ambrose looked at the object, noticing the scorch marks and the melted plastic.
‘Bloody hell. I may be wrong, but I think this is part of a detonator. Where did it come from?’
‘Harry said it came from the bike that the outrider was riding, when the tyres burst on the BR-101 trailer going to Pembridge.’
‘Christ Sarge, look here. These wires would lead to the explosive, that’s why it is only scorched at one end. The blast was probably small, but enough to rip through the tyres. This thing is really similar to the stuff we used to deal with in Borneo with the CTs, when they booby trapped their jungle hideouts.’
Do you think the bloody trailer could’ve been sabotaged?’
Ambrose nodded. ‘If a small explosion went off in the right place, it would almost definitely have caused the trailer to go over.’
‘Blimey,’ exclaimed an astonished Hamble. ‘This is serious stuff, Charlie. I better take it and report this. God only knows what kind of a hornet’s nest we’ve just stirred up.’
In the deep Buckinghamshire countryside, up on a hill, the sandstone structures of Stowe School reflected the sun, lighting it up like a beacon. To the left of the main building two of the rugby pitches were occupied. On one field, the young, striped- shirted male players ran around the pitch, and the elliptically shaped ball rose occasionally into the air, only to be caught and carried or passed by a player.
David Barnett stood under the tall, H-shaped goal posts. He had been placed in a defensive position, something that he always dreaded during a match, as he would be solely responsible should the opposition breakthrough the midfield and attack for the try line.
In the school reception, Matron Sandra Weston acknowledged the two men standing at the desk. ‘Good morning, gentlemen. May I be of some assistance?’
One of the men smiled at the Matron and replied with an American accent. ‘Good morning, mam. I was wondering if you would be able to contact a pupil here at your school. David Barnett is his name.’
The Matron gave the two men a puzzled look. ‘May I ask what this is about, gentlemen? As school policy, we don’t normally give out information on our pupils.’
One of the men sighed. ‘Oh, that’s okay mam. We’re friends of his father, and we have some news for him.’
The Matron paused. ‘If you give me the message, I will see that it gets to him. I believe he is in games lessons at the moment, so I will see him at lunchtime. What is the message?’
The men gave a defeated look to each other. Then one of them spoke to the woman. ‘Well, please let him know that his father is nearby and hopes to get an opportunity to see him today.’
The Matron suddenly began to feel that something did not seem quite right with these two. The look that the men had given each other had now cemented that suspicious doubt in her mind. ‘Very well, Gentlemen, I will let him know. Thank you for your visit.’
‘Thank you, mam.’
The Matron closely watched the men walk down the hall and out the entrance, then stared at the vacant doorway for a few seconds before sitting back down at her desk. Outside, the two men walked towards a black Ford Zephyr saloon, one of them stopping to light a cigarette. ‘Stuck up bitch!’
As they walked towards their car, they could hear some shouting to the left of the building. They looked over, scrutinising the spectacle of the rugby game. ‘Say, you don’t suppose he’s playing in that match, do ya Joe?’
The bigger man nodded. ‘Maybe. But we wouldn’t know, as Maitland never gave us any photo or anything.’
Defeated in their task, the two men climbed into the car and drove out of the school’s main gates.
Waiting to see the outcome of a penalty kick awarded to his team, David Barnett looked across at the hedge and watched as a black car passed down the lane, beside the playing fields.
Chapter 11
Swan and Gable exited the canteen and walked across to the assembly hangar. ‘This is going to be interesting,’ commented Gable. They entered the hangar, walking past the assembly jigs supporting the half built Rapier production airframes.
Swan then noticed the service pit where James McGregor had been found, and stopped to examine the area more closely. Spying the faint bloodstain on the floor, he pointed it out to his colleague.
‘McGregor fell from here. Yet, according to the inquest report, his head somehow got underneath the support brace here, and hit the floor. It doesn’t make sense, does it Arthur?’
Gable nodded his head in agreement and they walked to the back of the hangar, where a row of offices were located. They then arrived at the small end office which had been nicknamed The Pentagram.
Frank Maitland came to the door and opened it for the two men. ‘Gentlemen, please come on in. I have some fresh coffee on the go. Name’s Frank Maitland, Head of Operations for the GK Systems Python Hawk project. This here is my deputy, ‘Jake Brannigan.’ Brannigan remained seated, raising a hand to greet the two men. ‘Howdy,’ he said in his native Texan drawl.
Maitland gestured to two chairs that had been arranged by his desk. ‘Feel free to ask anything you want that will help in your evaluation Mr Swan, Mr Gable. I’m totally at your service.’
Swan nodded, smiling. ‘Thank you, Mr Maitland. Your co-operation in this inspection will be most appreciated, and hopefully make my job easier.’
‘Please, call me Frank. We don’t much go for formalities round here, do we Jake?’
Brannigan nodded with a smile while scribbling on a form. Swan continued. ‘Thank you Frank, I’m Alex, and this is Arthur. I will need to ask you a few questions, which I understand may be too classified to answer. I’m aware that the Python Hawk is very much on the secret list, so will appreciate any information that will help me complete my report.’
Maitland nodded. ‘Fire away Alex, I’m your man.’
Swan suddenly felt he was being psychoanalysed by the American, and decided to exercise a counter move. ‘So how are things going with the Python Hawk system?’