‘That won’t be a problem,’ Bolton replied. ‘When do you think you’ll be ready?’
‘No later than three months before the Games. I met with my planner in Beijing the last time I was there and he’s assured me that any substance can be distributed throughout the city, for a price,’ Halliwell added meaningfully. The well-connected leader of the Sanhehui, the Triad Society, had not come cheaply but getting the vials to the right targets would be crucial.
CHAPTER 81
T he suburb was one of the wealthiest and oldest in the city, its big colonial homes overlooking a meandering river from the sides of a substantial hill. As night fell, another of Kadeer’s cells was at work in a quiet backstreet, gaining access to the ageing hydrant outlet that was connected to the fresh water mains. Their uniforms had been tailored to look like those of the local fire brigade. The specially adapted stand-pipe had been bought through one of the many companies that sold fire-fighting equipment on the internet and the 64-milimetre screw fitting would have fitted perfectly were it not for the appalling condition of the hydrant base and the complete lack of maintenance by the City Council. At least there had been a blue marker in the middle of the road to indicate where the hydrant was, otherwise Kadeer’s men might never have found it. The team leader, Muhammad, used a shovel to clear away the matted grass from the top of the rusted iron plate that was marked FH. As he prised it open, a frog leapt to safety; he reached in to clean the mass of debris from the clogged well.
‘I wonder what they do when there is a real fire, Abdullah,’ Muhammad said, as Abdullah, one of his cell members, wrestled the stand-pipe into the well and locked it onto the two lugs at the bottom.
‘I don’t know but it’s just as you predicted, up here the pressure is poor,’ Abdullah said as the stand-pipe spindle depressed the concave pressure disc in the base of the hydrant and the water flooded up and into the specially fitted pressure gauge. ‘Only 200 Kpa. The compressor will overcome that easily,’ he said, connecting the other side of the T to the pressure vessel containing the caesium chloride. ‘ Allahu Akbar! God is Great!’ Abdullah muttered fiercely as he started the purpose-built compressor and opened the valve. A hundred litres of dissolved caesium chloride was forced into the city’s fresh water mains. Abdullah bent over and vomited in the gutter. The deadly gamma radiation he’d absorbed when he’d dissolved the blue pellets was beginning to have a devastating effect on his body, but both he and Muhammad knew the radiation would not end their lives before they were able to carry out their final mission. Tomorrow, Allah be praised, they would still be able to explode their backpacks of blue powder in the centre of the city. Muhammad would take the lift to Level 9, 79 Adelaide Street and explode his pack in the reception area of the Chinese Consulate. Abdullah and a third cell member would head for the top of a building that overlooked the flame of remembrance in the CBD, an area that was dedicated to those who had fought for their country. Both men knew that the winds would take the fine, deadly powder and distribute it for thousands of metres. The city would become a gravesite.
Nearly 12,000 kilometres away, one of al-Falid’s most important recruits had clocked on shift at the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission water treatment plant in Millbrae. Two years before, the cell member from the Muslim community in the Bay Area of San Francisco had secured a job at the plant. In April 2006, he had reported back to the cell leader that the Commission had installed a tank containing nine bluegill fish. Sophisticated banks of computers had also been installed to monitor the fishes’ breathing. Just as humans coughed to get rid of food or liquid that might have ‘gone down the wrong way’, fish flexed their gills to clear particles of sand and other matter from their breathing passages. This system was designed to monitor the way fish coughed; if any of the bluegills were upset by foreign or toxic matter in the water, the computers could sense which fish was breathing abnormally and trigger a pager and email alarm to those on duty and to senior management. The team leader of Kadeer’s San Francisco cell was not in the least perturbed. By the time the fish sounded the alarm it would be too late.
The ‘Peace Rocks’ concert was a sell-out. 15,000 people had packed around the stage beneath Nelson’s column and for nearly four hours, as rock stars strutted their stuff on the temporary stage, dissolved caesium chloride cascaded from the famous fountains. A strong breeze whipped a fine spray into the air but the frenzied crowd were oblivious to the lethal mist drifting over them. Red, green and yellow strobe lights played over the stage as the bands sent the crowd wild. The water and mists from the cascading fountains glowed a deep and beautiful blue.
The President of the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission, Hank Arkell, was enjoying a round of golf when his beeper warned him that all was not well with one of the bluegills. Passive electrodes in the tank, amplified 10,000 times had picked up the distressed breathing of one of the ‘fish police’. The Vice President and three other Commissioners were also paged but none of them had been unduly alarmed. If one of the fish was breathing erratically, the system was designed to automatically sample and analyse the water for chemical impurities. By the time the analysis had revealed the presence of caesium chloride and gamma radiation, all of the fish were dead.
Mahmood al-Masri’s backpack was faded, matching his jeans and white T-shirt. No one took the slightest notice as he exited the Tube at Hyde Park Corner at the start of another working week. The morning after the Sunday concert the underground was crowded with early-morning commuters. The sky over London was unusually clear and blue as Mahmood walked through the Queen Elizabeth Gate. He headed past the bandstand and on to The Lookout, the former police observation point. As the last seconds of his life ticked away, he said a silent prayer, thanking Allah for the success of the operation and the moderate breeze that was coming from the west. Raising his fist in the air, he turned away from the Serpentine towards Mecca and shouted ‘ Allahu Akbar! God is great! Allahu Akbar! God is Great!!’ The blast sent shockwaves around the park as the wind picked up the cloud of deadly caesium chloride and whisked it towards the crowded city.
Ten minutes earlier, Mahmood’s companion, Abu Zayyat had walked out of Blackfriars Station and headed for an access to the roof of the building where he worked as a sales consultant, not far from St Paul’s Cathedral and overlooking the great city’s financial district. For one last time Zayyat stared out across the city he had lived in all his life, turned towards Mecca and as he raised his fist and shouted ‘ Allahu Akbar! God is Great!’ a second blast rocked the city. A cloud of superfine radioactive dust drifted out across Threadneedle Street, the Bank of England and the Stock Exchange. A short distance away, a third explosion destroyed the front of the Chinese Embassy in Portland Place. Apart from the death of the suicide bomber and some minor injuries to the staff in reception, there appeared to be little damage.
A little earlier, and over 16,000 kilometres away, the evening peak hour was beginning. Just before close of business, Muhammad, buoyed by early reports of an outbreak of sickness in the wealthy Brisbane suburb of Hamilton, took the lift to Level 9 at 79 Adelaide Street and detonated his deadly bomb. Seconds later, Abdullah and the other cell member gained access to the roof of the hotel overlooking Brisbane’s Central Railway Station. As the sound of sirens filled the streets of Brisbane, Abdullah paused to vomit again, and both men moved to the edge of the roof. They stared down on the clocktower of the station and the sandstone dome surrounding the Flame of Remembrance. Turning north-west to face Mecca and a fiery sun that was setting over the city’s rush hour, they raised their fists in unison and shouted ‘ Allahu Akbar! Allahu Akbar! God is Great! God is Great!’. As they’d practised many times before, they pressed their detonators together.