‘Point one: fraternizing was not what I had in mind. Point two: they’re never going to find out unless one of us tells them. Point three: you don’t work there, and nor do I, so they can stuff their rules. Now stop dithering about and pour me a drink.’
Chapter Eleven
Richter woke early. He glanced to his left, expecting to see Carole-Anne Jackson lying there, but the bed was empty. In fact, the sheets were pulled up neatly, and her clothes had gone from the back of the chair where she’d left them the night before.
‘So much for breakfast in bed,’ he muttered, though in truth he wasn’t bothered. He’d always found ‘morning after’ conversations difficult, especially when he hardly knew the woman who’d shared his bed. Most of his infrequent sexual encounters tended to be of the one-night stand variety and, on the one occasion when he had become deeply involved, it had ended in disaster.
He was usually happy to follow the pithy advice of a wealthy but alimony-weary American friend many years earlier: ‘If it flies, fucks or floats, rent it.’ Cynical maybe, sexist certainly, but not having a wife or a permanent girlfriend meant Richter had one less thing to worry about.
But as he relaxed on the pillows, the bathroom door opened suddenly and Jackson appeared, fully dressed. She smiled at him. ‘Sorry to rush off now, but I’ve got an early start. I’ve had a call from Caxton.’
‘I didn’t hear the phone.’
‘I left my mobile set to silent and I found I’d missed a call from the office, so I’ve just rung in. Julian Caxton, our Head of Station, wants to meet you here at the hotel before you leave for the UAE.’
‘No problem. What about?’
‘He didn’t say. Probably just to apologize for your wasted journey.’
‘As you said last night,’ Richter pointed out, ‘it wasn’t entirely wasted.’
‘No,’ Jackson agreed, ‘not entirely. Anyway, Caxton will be here around ten, and he’ll see you down in the lobby. Something urgent’s come up at the office that I have to deal with, so I’d better go now.’ She walked round to Richter’s side of the bed, bent down and kissed him. ‘I guess I’ll see you around,’ she added.
‘I don’t think I’m likely to get back out here. Once I’ve finished in Dubai my boss will expect to see me hunched over my desk in Hammersmith, pushing piles of paper around.’
Jackson smiled down at him. ‘I don’t know why,’ she said slowly, ‘but I have the distinct feeling that we’re going to run into each other again.’
Saadi lowered the miniature binoculars and looked thoughtfully towards the Nad Al-Sheba racecourse. When the operation had been formulated in Afghanistan, the planners had realized that without detailed knowledge of the racecourse’s layout and security systems, the question of obtaining access could not be addressed. So they’d left Saadi to work it out for himself.
But getting inside wasn’t going to be as easy as he’d hoped. With a full programme of racing already in progress, the racecourse was constantly active, with groundsmen, caterers, bar staff and other tradesmen milling around, not to mention thousands of spectators.
‘My friends,’ he turned to Massood and Bashar, ‘I would welcome your suggestions. How are we going to breach their security?’
‘I think we’ve only two options,’ Massood said at once. ‘We must enter either openly by day, or by stealth without being detected. By openly I mean that we would have to assume the identity of regular tradesmen you might expect to see at the racecourse, as electricians or caterers, perhaps, or we attend as spectators. Otherwise we’ll have to go in at night, avoiding the guards.’
‘Which do you think offers the best chance of success?’
‘Impersonating tradesmen might be risky, since we don’t yet know the layout of the racecourse, or what sort of identification is required. And we would need to steal or hire a suitable vehicle, with sufficient tools and equipment to convince the guards that we were legitimate.’
‘We could steal a vehicle from a company that’s already working here,’ Bashar suggested.
‘That’s true,’ Massood agreed, ‘but we would probably have to kill the workers themselves, and that would leave a trace. A husband who doesn’t return home, a son who goes missing — questions would soon be asked. Entering as race-goers wouldn’t work because of what we have to take with us. The gate guards would not allow us inside the racecourse without inspecting our bags, so it looks like we’ll have to slip in at night.’
Saadi turned to Bashar. ‘Do you agree?’
‘Yes. Massood is right. We’ll only succeed if our intentions remain unknown.’
‘This evening we can work out exactly what extra equipment we’ll need, but now we have to decide where to cross the fence. That means surveying as much of the perimeter as we can.’
As Saadi put the Renault into gear and drove it down the road closer to the racecourse, Massood picked up the piece of paper on which he’d already made copious notes.
Richter was waiting in the lobby when Caxton and Evans walked in. Evans made the necessary introductions, then ordered drinks.
‘I’m sorry your trip out here has been to no purpose,’ Caxton began, ‘but we had to check the report, however unlikely it might seem.’
‘It wasn’t a problem,’ Richter replied, ‘though the timing could have been better. If I’d got the call a day later I might have finished in Dubai and then flown back to the UK from here.’
‘What were you up to in the UAE, assuming that isn’t classified information?’
Richter smiled at that, but didn’t respond until the waiter was out of earshot. ‘You’re the SIS Head of Station here, so I think I ought to be able to trust you. But it wasn’t classified, and I think I’m going to be wasting my time there as well. It involves checking out an expatriate Englishman who claims he experiences dreams about terrorist bombings before they actually happen. You’ve probably seen something about him in the traffic coming from Vauxhall Cross.’
‘Oh, yes, James Holden.’ Caxton stirred his coffee thoughtfully. ‘I gathered some kind of investigation was in progress, but I was surprised they’d sent someone all the way from London. I would have thought a local officer could have been tasked.’
‘So would I, but I don’t think SIS really believed there was any substance in what Holden was claiming, so they decided to pass the investigation over to my outfit. We tend to get given the jobs that Vauxhall Cross doesn’t like the look of.’
‘And how is Richard Simpson these days?’
‘You know him?’ Richter was surprised, knowing that his boss tended to keep a low profile.
‘I’ve run into him a couple of times, and I also know a bit about your organization at Hammersmith. He’s still keeping cacti, I suppose?’
‘Yes, whole flocks of them. You can barely get near his desk for the prickly little green bastards.’
‘So what do you think about Holden?’
‘I don’t know. If he’d just pitched up after the event, we’d have dismissed him as one of the usual loonies, but his statement in advance of the Damascus suicide bombing was very detailed. Maybe he’s a genuine psychic, able to tune in to certain future events. If he is, then at least we have to look seriously at his claim that a Gulf State hotel is about to be hit. That’s the logical conclusion, but my personal opinion is that it’s all rubbish, and there’s actually something else going on that we know nothing about.’