‘If what you say is true,’ Barzani asked, ‘then how did your hand-held units detect something here?’
‘Simple,’ Wilson said. ‘When the case came through your portal detectors, the explosive was probably wrapped up the way I described it. Since then, whoever was carrying it has opened the package. That means somewhere up there’ — he gestured — ‘is a room with a bomb in it.’
‘Suite,’ the manager corrected him. ‘We only have suites here.’
‘Whatever. What we have to do now is find it.’ He paused for a few seconds, looking up into the atrium, big enough to hold the Statue of Liberty. ‘We’ll start at the top and work our way down. Inspector, can you get your men to bring in the rest of our equipment?’
As Hussein turned away and started issuing orders, Wilson led the three Americans over to the bank of elevators.
The final phase of their long-planned operation was just about to begin.
Richter and Carole-Anne Jackson were waiting for a taxi to take them on their sightseeing trip when his Enigma mobile rang.
‘Get to a secure location,’ Simpson snapped.
Richter gestured to Jackson and then walked outside. ‘Right, I’m outside the building. What’s the problem?’
‘There’s been a hike in the overall alert state. We’ve just gone from Bikini Black to Black Special.’
‘I’m in Dubai, Simpson. Couldn’t you have told me that when I got back? It doesn’t really affect me over here, does it?’
‘It might not, but the instructions from Vauxhall Cross were most specific. All British security personnel are to be informed. That obviously includes GCHQ, The Box, JIC staff, the intelligence sections of the armed forces, the CTC, and absolutely everyone else wearing any kind of an intelligence or counter-intelligence hat. It also includes you. Now, do you want to know the reason for this blanket coverage?’
‘The question had crossed my mind.’
‘You’re going to like this, just not very much. This morning the people at Six took a call, strictly off the record, from your old sparring-partner Viktor Bykov.’
‘Bykov? What the hell did he want?’
‘He wanted, as quietly as possible, to alert us that the Russian military machine is down one nuke. Specifically, a few days ago two men, possibly Americans, persuaded somebody at a Russian ZATO to deliver them a suitcase nuclear weapon.’
‘Oh, shit.’
‘That sums it up nicely.’
‘Why do the Russians think they were American?’
‘They had US passports in the names of “Edwin Johnson” and “Richard Hughes”. The FSB got photocopies from a hotel they were staying in.’
‘What size weapon are we talking about?’ Richter asked. ‘And how the hell did they get it out of Russia?’
‘It’s a biggie, with a predicted yield of one kiloton, which is why we’re all hopping about like freshly fucked ferrets. They apparently carried it overland by lorry and train down to Sochi, loaded it into an air ambulance and flew out of Russia and south over Turkey. The aircraft landed at Cairo, and there the weapon and the two men vanished. Present whereabouts unknown, but Egypt’s not a million miles from where you are, so keep your eyes open.’
Richter was already making mental connections and constructing a hypothesis — a hypothesis that answered some of the questions that had been nagging at him. The possibility that the CIA agents were impostors, James Holden’s ‘premonitions’ and his subsequent murder, the Damascus and Manama bombings and the present activity of the ‘CIA team’. If you mixed them together in the right way, you got a very definite wrong answer.
If he was right, there was absolutely no time to waste. ‘I’ll ring you back,’ he said. He immediately phoned the British Embassy. ‘This is a Military Flash call,’ he snapped as soon as the receptionist answered. ‘Get me Michael Watkinson.’
In seconds the Englishman was on the line. ‘Watkinson. Who is this?’
‘Richter. Look, I don’t have time to explain all this right now, but call Inspector Hussein immediately. Tell him not to let those CIA agents take anything inside any buildings. There’s a real possibility they’re impostors and they’re trying to plant a bomb.’
‘Paul, I can’t just… That’s ridiculous. They’re CIA agents, for God’s sake.’
‘How do you know? Have you checked their identification?’
‘No, but I’m sure Hussein has.’
‘I’ve no doubt they showed him something, but whether he did a proper check is quite another matter. He was expecting a team of CIA agents, and four men turned up just when and where they were supposed to. My guess is that any checks he did would have been cursory at best. Anyway, just tell him what I said.’
‘What’s your source for this?’
‘You’ll hear some time today, but do it, and do it now. If I’m wrong, you can shoot me later. And find out where the CIA men are. I’ve got to call London.’
‘OK, I’ll blame you if it all goes wrong. Just get back to me as soon as you can.’
Richter rang Hammersmith. Simpson was back on the line within seconds. ‘Somewhat abrupt there, Richter. What’s going on?’
‘Right now, I don’t know, but one or two peculiar things have happened out here.’ He quickly explained some of the apparent anomalies.
‘That’s very thin, Richter,’ Simpson replied. ‘You’re going to look a complete idiot if that CIA guy’s identification is confirmed.’
‘I’ll risk it, and I’ve looked like a complete idiot plenty of times before. But there are a couple of things you can check for me.’ Richter explained what he wanted, then rang off.
As he turned back to the hotel, Carole-Anne Jackson walked over, mobile in hand. ‘You’ve heard about the missing Russian nuke?’ she asked.
Richter nodded. ‘It puts a different slant on Grant Hutchings and his merry men, doesn’t it?’
‘You think the two Americans who stole the weapon could be part of the CIA team?’
‘It’s possible. I’ve got my section checking a couple of things that could confirm it. It shouldn’t take them long to find the answers.’
Richard Wilson stood on the twenty-fifth floor and looked around. To say the building was luxurious was a bit of an understatement. It had cost an absolute fortune to build and furnish, and you needed exceedingly deep pockets to stay there. The smallest suite occupied nearly one hundred and seventy square metres, while the massive Royal Suites, outside one of which Wilson was standing at that moment, covered almost eight hundred and were provided with their own private lifts and cinemas. The last house Wilson had owned back in the States would have fitted three times over inside just one of them.
Behind him, Hussein watched as four of his men stacked the Americans’ cases in the corridor. Hovering beside the inspector, Salim Barzani looked decidedly worried. Wilson thought he probably spent a lot of his time looking worried, but at this moment he definitely had something to be concerned about. Behind the manager, three hotel staff stood waiting beside the concierge desk — at the Burj Al-Arab, the guests check in inside their suites, so each floor has its own permanently manned concierge desk, designed in the shape of a golden shell, as an extension of the aquatic theme predominating throughout the hotel.
‘Grant, you take one detector and start at the other end,’ Wilson instructed.
Hussein motioned to his officers to keep out of the way, as the Americans took the units out of their cases and moved apart. They turned on the detectors and headed slowly towards the door of the suite. There they stopped and, after a murmured conversation, turned off the units.