Honour Bound (14 page)

Norton
smiled at the memory and thought warmly about his two dearest friends who had
cared enough to help him when he didn't even realise help was needed. 

He
looked across at Talbot. "You'd better tell her I've got a job on just in
case she thinks I'm trying to duck and dive, but as soon as it's over wild
horses won't keep me away."

"Oh,
you can be sure I'll tell her, it'll keep her out of my hair for a few
days."

The
waiter returned carrying a silver tray. He placed the drinks on the table and
left immediately.

As
soon as the man was out of earshot Talbot said, "Alright, down to
business. We have a problem. Or to be more precise, you have a problem."

Norton
took a sip of the brandy, the golden liquid coursing a warm path to his
stomach. "Perhaps you'd better let me in on it."

"Somebody
has accessed your personal file. Illegally I should add, because all
transactions on the personnel computer have to go through my office, and I
haven't sanctioned a search on yours."

"How
many people are allowed access?"

"Now
that's the thing.
Just four, including me.
The others
are the directors on the top floor."

"Are
you suggesting we have a leak?" Norton smiled, "If you'll pardon the
expression. Or has someone made a mistake?"

Talbot
shrugged. "A mistake is what Mary is hoping for, me as well I suppose, but
I really don't know. The files can be looked at anytime so there’s no need to
do it secretly. We have a routine, and up to now it’s always been followed."

Norton
raised his glass and inhaled the aroma of the liquid. "Will whoever
accessed it know that you know?"

"
Er
, well no, actually,” Talbot said, “that's why I'm
telling you now before I make any enquiries. I wrote an unauthorised sub
program in the file access routine. When I enter my password it tells me how
many times a particular file has been opened. I then check the number against
the access required slips. A safety net really."

Norton
laughed. "An unauthorised sub program, Tut-tut, whatever next."

"It's
only a little one." Talbot said, in mocking defence of his actions.

It
was typical of Talbot to have a backup, Norton thought. It was the same when he
worked on operations. Always the careful calculating one, weighing up the pros
and cons before taking action, as opposed to himself who would prefer to go in
shooting once the target had been identified. It had been a sad loss for the
covert operations section when Talbot had been forced to transfer duties to a
desk job.

"Do
you know when it was tampered with?" He asked, concentrating on the matter
in hand.

"In
the last couple of days, I check it every two or three days, depending on
workload. Your file was opened and with what's going on at the moment, I don't
like it."

"Okay,"
Norton said, "I'll watch my back. Is it possible to tell who the latest
member of my fan club is?"

"Only
if they do it when I'm actually in my office, that's the only
way
I'll be able to pin down the terminal being used. My
computer programming is rather basic I'm afraid. It's a small system as
computers go, and with only four people using it, it wasn't deemed necessary to
cram it full of security programs."

Talbot
paused, and swallowed half of his Scotch. "Look Sam, I'll deal with this.
I don't really trust any of the buggers up there, and there's nothing that you
can do anyway. I just wanted you to be aware that maybe all is not as it
seems."

Norton
nodded. The mention of computers conjured up an image of Jamie Stewart and his
brainchild. Norton relayed the gist of the meeting to Talbot, and the fact that
the Royal Mail
were
not short of any vehicles that
would match the ones used in the bombings.

"I'll
drop in to the office later," Norton said, "and get a list of cut n'
shut shops. I'll try to find whose branching out into Royal mail paint
jobs."

Talbot
swirled the remains of the Scotch around his glass before finishing it off.
"I took the liberty of talking to the auto crimes chief last thing
yesterday," he said, "he downloaded the list to my office. I'll have
a courier drop it in at your place."

"Ah,
good stuff. Is there any news yet on the two stiffs that killed Willie?"

"They
were French, a couple of relatively small time thugs. They were in the frame
for a contract killing on the continent a couple of years back, but nothing
could be proved, or at least nothing that would stand up in court, so they were
released. They never came to notice again until they bumped into you."

"French
gunmen murder English informer," Norton said as if he was reading a
newspaper headline. "It doesn't sound quite right to me."

"Maybe
they weren't after Willie, maybe they were after you. You've made a lot of
enemies over the last few years. A lot of them are dead, I know, but the live
ones may hold a grudge."

"You
know me Vance, I don't believe in coincidence. Here I am, working on the
biggest fatal bomb attack on the British Isles since God knows when, when two
Froggies
pop up from nowhere and stiff my informant, whose
information just happens to point me at a bomb factory."

He
sighed and emptied his glass. "This is beginning to stink. I assume
Willie's name was on my file?"

"Yes,"
Talbot said, "Shit." A thought burned bright in his mind. "How
does this sound? Someone fed the info to Willie, knowing he would pass it on to
you. Whoever his source was knew, or at least hoped you would find the bomb
factory, a rival group possibly or maybe a good
samaritan
.
Or, or what?"

"The
Froggies
killed him before he got to me. They
couldn't have known for sure we'd have a safeguard."

"Details
of all safeguards are on your file." A cold shiver ran up Talbot's spine
as he spoke. "If you’re taken out we need to know who you were contacting
and how it was done."

"We
need to know who read the file." Norton said, "It's looking like
there's a rotten apple in the barrel."

Talbot
was silent for a moment, thinking, then tore a sheet out of his diary and wrote
on it before handing it to Norton. "If it all goes horribly tits up,"
he said, "this is my password into the computer. I'll leave any
information I come across in my sub routine."

Norton
took the paper and read it.
'Sixteen to go'.
He looked
at Talbot and raised his eyebrows.

"Sixteen
years to retirement," he said, watching the grin spread on Norton’s face.
"All you have to do once the file screen is displayed," he said, with
mock seriousness, "is type in 7667 and you'll get into my program."

Norton
put the paper in his pocket and stood up. "Find him Vance, and perhaps
you'd better watch your back."

-23-

A
thin column of blue smoke from the thick cigar steadily burning itself into a
fragile tube of grey ash, twirled lazily from the quartz ashtray in the centre
of the desk towards a quietly humming extractor in the ceiling. It had been set
down and forgotten by Peter Holmes. He was sitting with his back to the desk,
looking out of a huge triangular window in his penthouse suite perched above
the main entrance to Seymour Wharf, his small round eyes were staring fixedly
on an unseen point in space. His round, ruddy face was dotted with beads of
perspiration, some joining with others to form rivulets, like misplaced tears,
that ran down his cheeks and neck to soak into his shirt collar. His lips were
tightly
pursed,
almost white, he was breathing heavily
through his nose, nostrils flaring with each exhalation, his hands clasped in
his lap. It was a struggle to control his temper, but a struggle he was
winning, one thing he could not control was the black and dangerous look etched
on his face.

Between
thumb and forefinger of his right hand, he was unconsciously rolling a 9mm
bullet. His mind was sifting through two telephone calls he had received within
the last half hour. The first was from one of his managers informing him that
the police had taken over one of his buildings. That did not particularly
bother him. The outlets that were anything less than legitimate could not be
traced back to him, only to a fictitious holding company registered in the
Cayman Islands. The police would shut it down and the courts would confiscate
the contents. So what, it was a game. It was like a prostitute who considered
her fines as the government’s way of getting her to pay tax. He would give it a
few weeks and open another business in a different part of the city. Nothing
ventured, nothing gained.         

What
did bother him though, was the second call. It had come from a source that had
paid dividends in the past. A source bought and paid for in the senior ranks of
the Security Services. That source had laid the cold finger of blame for the
raid squarely on the shoulders of Nigel Winters.

He
turned back to the desk and stubbed out the remains of the cigar, crushing it
to a leafy pulp in the bottom of the ashtray. He looked across the open space
of the suite at Gerry Silver who was sitting, almost lying, in the reclining
chair that he liked so much. He was totally at ease, reading the afternoon
paper. A dozen men like Gerry, Holmes thought, and I could run this operation
without having to rely on outsiders for jack shit.

He
dragged a handkerchief from his jacket pocket and thoroughly mopped his face,
running the thin cloth round and round in circles as though it were a towel. He
dropped it on the desk and leaned back in his seat.

Nigel
Winters, he thought, a paragon of deceit and treachery, a man whose past was
scarred with death and double-dealing, a man, who for most of his adult life,
had worked for the highest bidder. He was the only person in the whole team to
open his mouth about the operation, and one of the few hired by Reginald
Langdon. Langdon should have left all of the hiring to
me,
I know the sort of people who can be trusted and the sort to avoid. What sort
of street people has he ever come across; he is just a fucking
dipshit
who has spent most of his life with a silver spoon
shoved up his arse, he doesn’t have a clue, he should have left it to me.

Holmes
lit another cigar and inhaled deeply.

In
a voice to low for Silver to hear he said, "We shall see about you, Mister
Nigel fucking Winters."

He
leaned over the desk and jabbed a button on the intercom, holding it down while
he spoke.

"Carol,"
he said, keeping any emotion from his voice, "would you tell Mr. Winters I
would like to see him in the vault room as soon as possible."

“Certainly
sir, he came in about twenty minutes ago, I'll make sure he gets the
message."

"Thank
you." He switched off the intercom and added, "So will I."

“Gerry,”
he said, raising his voice for it to carry across the suite.

“Mister
Holmes,” Silver answered as he put the paper down and stood up in one fluid
motion.

Holmes
took a long draw on his cigar, exhaling the smoke around his words as though to
camouflage their meaning. “I'm going to be busy for a while. I want you to stay
up here and hold the fort. Hopefully it'll not be for too long.”

Silver
crossed the suite towards Holmes, his muscular bulk moving like an oak tree in
a gale.

“Is
it anything I can take care of for you?" he asked. "I'll be only too
happy to assist.”

“I
know. You're a good man Gerry, what I wouldn't give for more like you. Thanks
for the offer, but this is something I'm going to take care of myself, in fact,
I'm quite looking forward to it. It'll be as easy as scraping a dog
turd
off the bottom of my shoe, and solve a great big
shitty problem at the same time.”

Silver
smiled dutifully and stood in front of the desk, feet apart, arms hanging by
his sides, waiting for any further instructions.

“There
is one thing you can do,” Holmes said.

“Name
it.”

“Get
hold of Peter Greaves and get him up here as soon as you can. I'll want to
speak to him when I get back, it'll be important by then.”

“Consider
it done.” Silver said, and walked back to the recliner, straightened it up, sat
down, and picked up the phone on the adjacent
table.         

Holmes
made an internal call and settled back in his seat. He had a few minutes yet,
and
Winters
won't mind the wait. He took a penknife
from the drawer and set to work on the bullet.

-24-

The
lift rose effortlessly through the core of the building, the numbers on the
control panel glowing in ascending sequence as it travelled swiftly to the
twenty-fourth floor. According to Vance Talbot's electronic diary, he should
now be in an hour long meeting with Donald Strickland, chief of the external
desk. They met routinely once a week to swap views and observations on national
and international terrorist activities. He had arrived at his office and found
out, through his rather distraught secretary that he’d been taken ill,
collapsing into unconsciousness after a bout of dizziness. The Unit's paramedics
had rushed him to the local hospital just before Talbot had arrived at his
office.

“Everybody
has to work a bit harder these days,” he said to himself as the lift doors
opened, “and Peter's no spring
chicken.”          

Mary
was at her desk busily typing on a docket with a red secret band running
diagonally across the cover. She looked up and smiled as he entered.

“That
was a short meeting.” Noticing the look on his face she added, “Is anything
wrong?”

“Old
Don was taken ill just before I got there. They've taken him to hospital,” he
looked at his watch, “I'll give it half an hour and give them a ring to see how
he is.”

“The
poor man,” she said, concern in her voice. “Whatever happened?”

“I
don't know, apparently he went a bit dizzy and conked out. Look, can you go and
have a chat with his secretary, I can't remember her name,
I
think she might need a friendly shoulder.”

“It's
Lizzy
. Yes, of course. I'll go now.”

She
stood up, and pointed to the file in the processor. “I'll leave that until
later.”

He
nodded.

“I'll
be as long as it takes,” were her parting words as the door closed behind her.

Talbot
walked through to his office. The clicking of the computers hard drive
immediately drew his attention. The conversation with Norton was still at the
forefront of his mind. He went quickly to the terminal and tapped in his
password. His fingers suddenly felt like sausages, he made a hash of the last
four characters, but quickly backspaced and retyped them.

A
menu screen appeared on the monitor, each option highlighted and contained in
its own box. He tapped the screen with his finger within a box labelled
'General Search'.

'Enter
Search Parameters:' appeared at the top of the screen with a flashing cursor
next to it.

He
typed, HD0
:Present
Search:File
?
asking
the computer the name of the file the hard
drive was working on.

The
screen flickered.

Personnel
File:#628/4998@NORTON:SAM

“Bastard,”
he said, “I've got you, for God's sake don't stop now.”

He
had to be quick; if the access routine stopped, he would be in the same
position as he was in now. Whoever it was upstairs that was accessing the
files, would only had to deny it if he confronted them, and with no evidence to
the contrary he wouldn't be able to prove a thing.

Talbot
typed, '
PtrDest
?' asking if the file was being
printed and if so which printer was being used.

A
short wait, the screen flickered again, the hard drive stopped, its access
complete.

Talbot
banged the table. “Shit! Shit! Shit! Another couple of seconds and I would have
had him. Two seconds. Shit!”

The
screen flickered.

Printer #8.

Talbot
leaned forward and put his arms around the monitor, laying his head on the
screen. ”You lovely well designed thing you. I promise I'll never call you a
box of nuts again.”

He
called up the printer location file. Printer number 8 was listed as being in
room 2512.

“Now
what the hell would he want with Sam's file? I think I'll have to pay him a
little visit.”