Games Traitors Play (30 page)

Fielding had agreed with Armstrong that it was too much of a security risk for both of them to travel to Fairford, so she had stayed behind in London to liaise with COBRA, which was now sitting around the clock. The air show remained the most likely target, and Fielding needed to be there, even though he knew it could be dangerous. He also wanted to get out of London, away from the endless meetings, and clear his head. Ian Denton had offered to mind the shop in his absence – a little too keenly, Fielding thought afterwards.

Just outside the airfield's perimeter fence, he asked his Special Branch driver to pull into a lay-by, where several plane-spotters had parked up in camper vans, ready to watch the display without paying. Marchant had Fielding's personal number, and he still hoped that he might call him, give him some warning, however late, of Dhar's murderous intentions.

If the threat was airborne, it would involve a repeat of the earlier breach of British airspace. Had Marchant asked Myers to help him out a second time? So far, Fielding had resisted talking to him about Marchant's earlier request. The risk of being monitored by the Russians was too high. He assumed Myers must have hacked into Britain's early-warning radar network, allowing the MiG-35s to fly over Scotland unchallenged. Now he needed to know for sure if Myers was involved again. He dialled his mobile number.

Twenty miles away in Cheltenham, Myers watched his handset vibrate on the desk next to the keyboard. He looked at his Russian minders.

‘Answer it,' Grushko said, waving his gun at him. ‘And let us listen.'

Myers picked up the handset and switched it to speaker phone. The number was unknown, and he assumed it was someone from GCHQ. Colleagues often called him at the weekend with technical queries. He would remind them about GCHQ's internal IT support unit, and then do what he could to help.

‘Paul Myers,' he said, as casually as possible.

Fielding detected the tension in his voice at once.

‘It's Marcus Fielding. Is everything OK?'

‘Fine, all fine,' Myers said, swapping the phone to his other hand and glancing at Grushko. Fielding always made his palms sweat. The added presence of the Russians was almost too much.

‘Is it convenient to talk?' Fielding asked. Grushko nodded. ‘I wanted to ask you about –'

‘Could you hold on a moment?' Myers pressed the privacy button and turned to Grushko. ‘He's going to suspect something. I'm sorry, I'm trying to act normally but this guy always makes me nervous. And he just knows when someone's lying. It's his job.'

‘Then keep it brief. Does the Chief of MI6 ring you often?'

‘Yes, no, I mean…I was seconded to Six for a few months, I worked directly for him.'

‘He is an important man,' Grushko said, waving his gun at the handset. ‘Talk to him.'

‘Sorry,' Myers said, speaking to Fielding again. ‘There was someone at the door.'

‘Are you at home?' Fielding asked. He had expected him to be at work. If he was about to help the Russians again, he would be preparing to do it now. He sounded even more nervous than usual, under duress. Fielding couldn't risk asking what Marchant had requested him to do, but he still needed to give his call some purpose, a reason for Myers to be rung by a security Chief, in case he was being monitored.

‘Yeah, got the weekend off.'

‘I wanted to ask you about Daniel Marchant.'

Myers glanced up at Grushko, who leaned in towards him, listening intently.

‘Dan? Is there any news? Was he definitely the one who was taken in London?'

‘Yes. I was wondering when you saw him last, if he'd discussed anything out of the ordinary with you.'

‘Is he OK?'

‘We don't know. How did he seem when you last met him?'

Myers thought back to the pub, when Marchant had asked him about the MiGs. He glanced up at Grushko, who shook his head. Why did Fielding suddenly want to know? Last time they spoke he had hung up on him.

‘Fine. I don't remember anything unusual. We drank too much beer and talked a lot about Leila.'

‘We're working on the theory that he might have defected rather than been taken.'

‘Defected? Dan?' Myers had never been good with people, but one thing in life he was certain of was Daniel Marchant's loyalty. He was about to say as much to Fielding when he saw that Grushko had sat back and was more relaxed. Myers had no idea what game Fielding was playing, but he did know when to keep his mouth shut.

‘I'm afraid so,' Fielding replied. ‘Listen, if you do remember anything, give me a call, will you?'

‘Sure.'

In the lay-by outside Fairford, Fielding put down his phone. His rash impulse to find out more had nearly jeopardised everything. Myers was evidently about to repeat whatever he had done before for the Russians, and it sounded as if he was being babysat. If they were listening, he hoped he had said enough to confirm Marchant's defection story.

Myers placed the phone back on his desk. ‘I can't believe it,' he said, as if to himself. ‘Daniel Marchant defecting?'

‘Is it really such a big leap for him to make?' Grushko asked. ‘I am only surprised that he did not come across earlier, given the way he has been treated.'

Myers checked himself. He wanted to clear Marchant's name, tell the Russians how much his friend loved his country, but he had to shut up. Whatever was going on, Fielding and Marchant were in it together, and he didn't want to do or say anything that might compromise them. Marchant's defection had to be a cover story, otherwise Myers might as well pack his bags and emigrate.

‘We have ten minutes before they reach the edge of the UK's Air Defence Identification Zone,' Grushko said, looking at his watch. ‘Are you ready?'

The American Raptor took off before the Russian SU-25, accelerating down the runway to the thumping soundtrack of ‘I Don't Want to Stop', by Ozzy Osbourne. It lifted off the ground and flew past the private enclosure at twenty feet, before pulling up into a vertical climb that had the crowds gasping. A pugnacious American had taken over the commentary box, his wild WWF style of delivery in stark contrast to the clipped tones of the ex-RAF pilot who had introduced the earlier aircraft.

‘Ladies and gentlemen, I present the most feared combat aircraft in the world, the fifth-generation F-22 Raptor,' the commentator said, rolling out the Rs. ‘This awesome aircraft enjoys superiority in every conceivable dogfight scenario. It has no rivals. There is no battlefield that the Raptor cannot dominate. There is no battlefield that the Raptor
will
not dominate. Designed without compromise to sweep our skies of all threats, keeping the peace through strength.'

The Georgian delegation had been joined by a posse of US military top brass and senior executives from the global arms industry. Acting against the CIA's advice, the US Secretary of Defense had also flown in to join the celebrations. Not everyone was pleased to see him, as he had halted future production of the $155-million Raptor, but his presence was a sign of the strategic importance of the Georgian deal.

After the Raptor came the SU-25, taking off without a soundtrack and eliciting barely disguised disdain from the American commentator.

‘Ladies and gentleman, a plane from another era, a mudfighter from the past, a relic of the Cold War, the SU-25, known without affection in the West as the Frogfoot. In a moment, the two planes will pass from left to right along the display line, where the quantum difference in technology will be plain for all to see.'

‘Frogfoot One, time for your farewell tour,' Major Bandon, the American pilot, announced over the r/t as both planes banked at the far end of the runway.

‘Copy that, Raptor One,' the young Georgian pilot replied, peeling away. The plan was to put the Raptor through its paces, while the SU-25 took a sanctioned tour of southern Britain before returning for the mock dogfight. ‘Good luck.'

‘Thank you, Frogfoot. Only sorry you won't be here to see the fun and games.'

‘Doing anything special while I'm away? To please our generals?'

‘A few tail slides, paddle turns and muscle climbs, the usual. Maybe a power loop or two. If you take your time, I might even pull a Pugachev cobra at the finish. There's been too much talk in your neck of the woods that we Americans can't get it up.'

‘Dream on, Raptor One. Out.'

‘And go to hell,' the American said to himself as he watched the SU-25 head off to the east. He knew the pilot was from Georgia, one of America's new allies, but the plane was Russian, and old habits died hard.

Marchant no longer thought that he had a strong stomach. He had been sick shortly after take-off, when Dhar over-corrected a sudden lurch to the right and put the plane into a 3-G turn. For a painful few seconds, in which he had nearly blacked out, he had wondered if they might not get further than Finland, but he was starting to relax as they flew low and fast over the North Sea towards the east coast of Britain. It was the speed of their progress that he found the most disorientating. At first, it had felt as if he was being dragged along behind the aircraft, like a waterskier. Dhar had told him to look far ahead, to anticipate. Marchant was impressed by how much Sergei must have taught him. He was flying well, untroubled by the G-forces. His only concern appeared to be their ETA.

‘You're a natural,' Marchant said over the intercom.

‘Another two weeks of training and you wouldn't have been sick, but there was not enough time,' Dhar replied.

‘What's the big rush?' Marchant asked. Dhar had synchronised watches before they left, and had regularly asked him to call out the minutes and seconds.

‘There is an important air show today. At a place called Fairford. It only happens once a year. I don't think they would have delayed it while I improved my flying skills.'

‘Are we topping the bill?' Marchant asked, calculating the implications. He knew the air show well, having been taken there by his father when he was a child. Red Arrows and Airfix models, candy-floss and Concorde. Fairford held less happy memories, too. It was where he had flown from with a hood over his head and shackles on his feet, when the Americans had renditioned him to a black site in Poland. But his first thought now was of the number of people on the ground. Tens of thousands of potential casualties.

‘That's one way of putting it.'

‘Sergei mentioned collateral.'

‘I know.'

‘What did he mean?'

There was a long pause. Marchant adjusted his helmet and oxygen mask, thinking that contact had perhaps been lost.

‘One of our LGBs is a dirty bomb.'

Marchant felt sick. It was only a few feet away from him. He thought of the contamination on the ground, the years of cleaning up. A thousand-pound dirty bomb exploding in the middle of a packed crowd would kill hundreds, but many more would fall ill afterwards from radiation sickness. And no terrorist had ever deployed one before. It had become the Holy Grail, not so much for the number of people it killed as for its propaganda value. The problem was its difficulty to assemble, unless you could tap into the caesium resources of a country like Russia.

‘And Sergei didn't approve?'

Another silence.

‘My mother loved Britain. For a long while I never knew why. Now I know her loyalties were misplaced. Our father's heart beat for another country. One day I will tell her. Despite Iraq, despite Afghanistan, I never hated Britain in the same way that I detest America. Perhaps I was blind, but it gave shelter to many brothers. Now it has become a legitimate target.'

‘Its people or its politicians?'

Dhar said nothing. Marchant wished he could see his face, gauge his mood from his eyes. It was hard to tell from his voice alone, particularly over the plane's intercom, but something had shifted. Hairline cracks were appearing. Should Marchant tell him now about their father and Primakov? He instinctively glanced around the cockpit, above and to the sides, checking for threats. Marchant felt vulnerable with his back to Dhar, but there was nothing his half-brother could do except listen. He couldn't kill Marchant, physically throw him out of the plane, unless he could operate both ejector seats.

‘Vasilli Grushko was right to be suspicious of Primakov,' Marchant said over the intercom, taking the risk. He would tell it to him straight, give the bare facts. ‘What he found in the KGB archives was true. Primakov used to work for MI6. Our father signed him up in Delhi more than thirty years ago. In order for him to recruit Primakov, our father let himself be recruited by the Russians. It was a risk, and once or twice he handed over more than he should have, more than Primakov was giving to London. But he never once betrayed Britain. All the intel was about America.'

There was another long silence. Again Marchant began to think the intercom was faulty, and adjusted his helmet. He felt so defenceless with his back to Dhar.

‘How do you know this?' Dhar eventually said, almost in a whisper.

‘I've seen the file. Moscow Centre thought it had the Chief of MI6 on its books, when in fact Primakov was working for us. He was, right up until the moment he died.'

Marchant closed his eyes, imagining Dhar's face behind him. He had to keep it together, not let Primakov's death choke him up.

‘Until the moment you shot him,' Dhar said.

‘I'm my father's son, Salim. I've never stopped working for MI6, or believing in Britain. My defection was hollow, nothing more than an elaborate charade, a way of meeting you, my brother.'

‘Is there no truth in your Western life? Is everything lies?' The aircraft rocked in a pocket of turbulence.

‘Our father disliked America. There was nothing false about that. If the CIA had ever found out what he was telling the Russians about them, he would have been arrested and tried for treason, if they didn't torture him to death first. I dislike America too. I mistrust its military foreign policy, its corporate and cultural power, its fundamental values, the way it's started to define what it means to be human. But our father loved Britain with a passion, just as I do. Your mother wasn't misguided. She was right. And she isn't in the hands of the CIA. She's safe, in Britain. I give you my word, just as I gave it to her.'

Marchant was bluffing now, but he was confident that Shushma hadn't been with Spiro for long in Madurai, that it had just been a ruse by Fielding to get him into the right mental place. And Lakshmi wouldn't have allowed any harm to come to Shushma, he was sure of that. Despite everything, he realised how much he had come to trust her.

‘So you lied to me about my mother too,' Dhar said.

‘I had no choice. Unlike you. What is our exact target? Why the dirty bomb, the air-to-air missiles?'

‘Do you know why I agreed to bring you along today?'

‘Tell me.'

‘Because I discovered that Fairford is close to Tarlton, where our father lived, where you grew up with your other brother. I wanted you to show me the village as we flew over, point out the house. It is 18.5 kilometres due west of the airfield.'

Marchant was taken aback by the way Dhar's mind worked. Everything was thought out, had a reason. For a moment, his task seemed hopeless, but he had to turn around the
jihadi
juggernaut.

‘I can still show you. Tarlton's a beautiful place. We used to play in the orchard, Sebbie and me, throw apples into the long grass behind our father's back, pretend the rustling sound was approaching tigers. He was always fooled – at least, he said he was. Do you know what his wishes were? Why he asked Primakov to bring you and me together? He wanted you to work for MI6. He didn't expect you to change your views on America – he shared many of them himself, as I do. It's what unites all three of us. He just hoped to explore some common ground. Find out what each side wants from the other. We need a back channel into the global
jihad
, just as you need one with the West. It's what our father most wanted, Salim.'

After another long pause, Dhar eventually spoke. ‘I'll be of no use to anybody if I don't go through with this today. The
jihadi
who almost shot the US President, who almost –'

‘Almost what? Tell me the precise target.'

But before Dhar could speak, a deafening noise above the cockpit made Marchant duck. He turned around and saw a jet fighter disappearing into the distance.

‘What the hell was that?' Marchant asked.

‘Another SU-25. From the Georgian air force. And only thirty seconds late.
Inshallah
, our time has come.'