"We have a debt to settle."
"I"ve never seen you before in my life."
"But I"ve seen you." Khazid was so absorbed he"d virtually forgotten about Hussein waiting. "At Hazar, I used to watch you on the deck of the Sultan Sultan through Zeiss gla.s.ses as I stood on the terrace at the great house at Kafkar. You and your people murdered two of my best friends." through Zeiss gla.s.ses as I stood on the terrace at the great house at Kafkar. You and your people murdered two of my best friends."
"Dear G.o.d," Stone said. "You"re not Hussein, so you must be the other one, Khazid." He shook his head. "Come for your revenge."
"And I intend to have it," Khazid told him. "Your world is a world of books, Professor, but in mine one sword is worth ten thousand words, so it teaches us in the Koran."
"To h.e.l.l with your d.a.m.ned ideology. What do you want with me?"
"We intended to call on Sara and her parents at their house in Hampstead, but Ferguson has had them spirited away. We want to know where."
"And you think I know?"
"You"ve been involved in the whole business since the beginning, and you"re Ferguson"s cousin. I"m sure you do."
"Actually, I don"t. And even if I did, I wouldn"t oblige you."
"Be it on your own head. Get into the sitting room."
Stone turned, opened the door, then swung it behind him and ran through the open French windows and made for the garden door. Khazid fired twice. The first shot hit Stone below the left shoulder, driving him against the door. He managed to reach for the large bolt at the top of the door and pull it to one side, and Khazid shot him again in the lower back. Hussein, waiting impatiently, pushed on the door, sending Stone staggering to fall flat on his face.
The body twitched and went still. "What in the h.e.l.l are you playing at?" Hussein demanded.
Khazid said, "He tried to make a run for it."
"Why-what did you say to him?"
Khazid, calmer now, was reduced to a certain dishonesty as regards the facts. "He said I was the other one. He knew my name. All I did was try to get the information about where the Rashids have gone from him. He said he had no idea and wouldn"t tell me if he could."
"And you threatened him?"
"What did you expect me to do, pat him on the head? I told him I"d start with his kneecap; he slammed a door on me and made a run for it."
"You should have waited for me."
Hussein knelt on one knee, Hal Stone"s face was turned slightly to one side. He looked terrible, blood seeping through his shirt. Hussein felt in the neck. He shook his head. "He"s dead."
"Are you certain? Another in the head, perhaps?"
"I studied medicine, fool. How many times have you been glad of that in the past two years?" He stood. "Leave him in place and let"s get out of here." He pushed Khazid before him. "Hurry, I tell you. Straight to the railway station and back to London."
"As you say, brother." Khazid dumped his gown and scarf, put on his trench coat again and followed Hussein as they left the cottage, walked up to the main road and turned to the railway station. They got there with fifteen minutes to spare, just in time to use their return tickets to board.
Once the train was moving, Khazid lay back in the seat, exhausted. "Now what?"
"Give me time to think about it." Hussein turned to stare out the window, wondering what was happening. His lie to Khazid, the still beating pulse in Hal Stone"s neck that his fingers had felt. Why had he done that? There was no answer, and for Hal Stone, life or death was a matter for Allah.
ALI Ha.s.sIM HAD BEEN IMPRESSED when Khan told him Hussein would be in touch with him for any help or aid that Ali could offer. For him, Hussein was the great warrior, the Hammer of G.o.d, a liberator for the people from Allah himself. He remembered his shock on first hearing Hussein"s voice on the radio news program from the Middle East, and then in the middle of his Arabic rhetoric, Hussein describing himself in a simple English phrase, Hammer of G.o.d. Hammer of G.o.d. It was a gesture of contempt for his enemies, but that name was now known to millions of Arabs in the Middle East who were not familiar with the English language at all. It was a gesture of contempt for his enemies, but that name was now known to millions of Arabs in the Middle East who were not familiar with the English language at all.
So, thinking over his problem about who to first tell about Zion House, he realized that he had found a new and worthier allegiance. But he needed to make everything perfect, so he called in another member of the Brotherhood, a young accountant in a financial firm in the city. A short chat over the phone, the suggestion that he could be of great service to the Brotherhood, produced the man he wanted within an hour, and he also sent for his laptop expert and waited.
SAM BOLTON WAS actually Selim Bolton, his father English, his mother Muslim. He had been raised in an English culture until his first year at London University, studying business and accountancy, and then his father had died of cancer. An immediate consequence of this was that his mother was restored to Islam.
There were those in the Brotherhood who saw great possibilities in individuals with a similar background to his, and he joined their ranks as a sleeper, a handsome young man in a good suit and a university tie, accepted anywhere.
He turned up at the shop and discovered Ali waiting with the laptop expert. Ali said, "Listen carefully while our brother explains," and the laptop man told him everything regarding Zion House.
Bolton took it all in. Finally, he said, "So what you really want to know is the feel of things generally, the att.i.tudes of the villagers, perhaps to Zion House itself?"
"Exactly. What"s special about it."
"I think you mean what its purpose is, if any." He stood up. "I might as well get on with it. I called in at the flat, so I"ve got an overnight bag in the Audi."
"So you accept this a.s.signment?"
"Of course."
"You could not do our cause a greater service."
"I"ll be in touch."
The laptop man left and Ali nodded to himself. He was doing the right thing. No phone call to Khan. He had set things in motion and could afford to wait to hear from Hussein.
HAL STONE"S CLEANING LADY, a widow named Amy Robinson, usually only worked mornings, but she had her own key and his laundry to deliver, so she called in at the cottage and discovered him in the garden. She had once been a nurse and was still expert enough to establish that he was alive. It was roughly an hour and a half since Hussein and Khazid had left.
She dialed 999 and called for ambulance and police, stipulating gunshot wounds, then she went out with a rug and pillows and tried to make him comfortable. She was kneeling beside him, stroking his hair, when his eyes opened. He looked at her, bewildered.
"Amy?"
"Don"t fuss, love, lie still. There"s an ambulance on its way. Who did this to you?"
"My cousin General Ferguson-you met him when he visited the other year. My address book"s on the desk. His private mobile number. Call him for me."
"Don"t upset yourself, love, I"m sure he"ll be contacted in time."
"You don"t understand." He clutched at her with a bloodstained hand. "Tell him they were here, both of them. They were here in England. The other one shot me." He closed his eyes and opened them. "I didn"t mention Zion."
He lost consciousness again and there was a sudden confusion outside as the ambulance arrived.
She went to the front door and admitted the paramedics, who followed her as she showed what waited in the garden. And then, of course, the police came, first one car, then two. She waited, bewildered by it all, and then a man in civilian clothes arrived, who she was told was a Chief Inspector Harper. He had a quick look round the cottage and went outside to the wall. When he returned, a police sergeant was taking a written statement from Amy.
"He did say something strange when he came to for a moment." She told him what it was.
Harper, coming in through the French windows, heard. "Did you say General Ferguson?"
"Yes, Professor Stone"s cousin. He"s very important in one of the ministries."
"You can say that again, if it"s who I think it is."
"The professor said the General"s personal number was in his address book on the desk."
Harper rushed to find it, and so it was that Ferguson, who had just arrived at the Holland Park safe house to discuss progress, heard the dreadful news.
THE TRAIN WAS just twenty minutes out of King"s Cross when Ali received the call from Hussein. "We"re just arriving from Cambridge. A waste of time. We"ll come round to your shop. We"ll need somewhere to stay."
"I"ve been waiting to hear from you. I have discovered where they have taken the Rashids."
"But where does such information come from? Khan, I suppose, and presumably he would have got it from the Broker?"
"No, neither Khan nor the Broker know about it. It was the action of the Rashid woman, the doctor, which came to our aid. She was concerned for the welfare of a child she had operated on and telephoned the surgeon who has taken over the case. He wanted to be able to get in touch with her if there was a change in the child"s condition. One of the nurses, a member of my network, was on duty and obtained the address for us."
"This is truly unbelievable. They are still in England then?"
"West Suss.e.x, a place called Zion House. Not only can I show it to you on a laptop when you get here, I"ve also sent a trusted agent straight down there to scout the place out for you. I"ve impressed on him the urgency of his report."
"It is hard to imagine that Ferguson let them make phone calls."
"She probably broke the rules," Ali said.
"And must pay the price. It would suit me very well for the enemy not to know that we are here. If you mention your discovery of Zion House to Dreq Khan, he will in turn inform the Broker."
"And that one you distrust?"
"He has had his uses, but he has his fingers in too many pies. You must not take this as an attack on Osama bin Laden, whom Allah protect, because on the ground, he represents Osama in certain matters. In those affairs, he is simply serving a great man"s needs and he must remember his place. Sometimes such men see themselves as being more important than they are."
"Professor Khan, for example?"
"It is difficult for some people to remember that the cause they represent is more important than themselves," Hussein said.
Ali said calmly, "Khan will not be told of Zion from me. I look forward to receiving you."
"We shall be seeing you soon," Hussein told him.
He turned off his phone. Khazid said, "What was all that about?"
"Brother, Allah is on our side. Ali Ha.s.sim has discovered where the Rashids have been taken." He proceeded to tell Khazid as much as he needed to know.
"Perfect," Khazid said. "With the professor dead, no one in Ferguson"s organization even knows we are here."
"Of course," Hussein said, a faint shadow on his face as that wavering pulse came back to haunt him. He took a deep breath. "Nothing can go wrong now." A few moments later, the train arrived at King"s Cross.
AT HOLLAND PARK, Ferguson was speaking to Harper again. "Chief Inspector, I"m invoking the Terrorism Act, to put a blanket on this for the moment. Some very nasty people are involved."
"We are dealing with terrorists here, sir?"
"I have a special warrant from Downing Street on this one. I also have an official request to your chief constable that you act as my liaison there."
Harper"s spirits lifted. "Very good of you, sir. Happy to be on board."
"I"ve borrowed a police helicopter from the Met, thanks to the commissioner. They"re lifting me from a school football field just down the road from here."
"Stone"s hanging on by inches, General, that"s what the surgeon in charge informs me. The scans show two bullets, one under the left shoulder that"s apparently fragmented much of the shoulder blade, and there"s a major artery close by that will give a problem."
"And the other?"
"Low in the back. It"s done a lot of damage to the pelvic girdle. What I"m telling you is what the scans show. I expect the major surgery will reveal much more."
"Thanks very much. I"ll see you soon."
Roper said, "What a b.a.s.t.a.r.d." Dillon and Billy looked grim.
Billy said, "What did he say to the cleaning lady?"
"He said to tell me they were here, both of them, they were here in England. The other one shot me. I didn"t tell them about Zion."
"It was them, all right," Dillon said. "Has to be."
"And the other one, the b.a.s.t.a.r.d who shot him in the back, was this Khazid guy." Billy was angry.
"I think that"s obvious," Ferguson said, and there was the chatter of the helicopter pa.s.sing overhead to the football field. "Sean," he said to Dillon, "Hal is the closest relative I have left. Would you come with me?"
It was a direct appeal that couldn"t be refused. "Of course I will."
"Good luck," Roper called as they went out the door.
The noise of the helicopter was with them for about ten minutes and then the aircraft lifted and moved away. Roper reached for the scotch.
Billy said, "Knock it off. At a time like this, a man needs friends to drink with."
"That"s the best idea you"ve had for some time." Roper started his wheelchair and Billy followed him out.
ON HIS WAY TO ZION, Sam Bolton had stopped in Guildford and visited the army and navy store, where he purchased an anorak, a jumper, a waterproof bush hat and trousers to go with it and some boots. He then cast around for a pair of binoculars and found something suitable in a camera shop. He also purchased a canvas carrying bag from a nearby store, then went into a convenient hotel and found the gentlemen"s toilets.
He changed clothes in one of the cubicles, putting his smart suit, tie and shoes into the bag. When he emerged, he was wearing everything else he had bought and hung the binoculars around his neck.