Tehran Decree (33 page)

She continued undaunted on her relentlessly quest to
dress Clement in his badge and tie; she was now down to the last
eight brass screws. The lid showed signs of movement and she turned
and started to pull at the top end where Clement’s upper torso
resided.

Jenkins moved forward, his attention anchored on Mrs.
Chester’s antics, he got to the top of the aisle blocking the exit.
Suddenly he dropped down into the semi crouch position, looked
quickly around him, then pulled a service pistol from a concealed
body holster.

The coffin lid was beginning to vibrate and
threatened to detach itself from the body of the coffin. Jenkins
clipped a pencil laser site to the top of his pistol and took
careful aim, locating the laser dot on Mrs. Chester’s bust, then
fired off a volley of shots at her.

She squealed again as the bullets tore through her
chest and propelled her backwards into the milling crowd of
onlookers.

Jenkins quickly concealed his pistol and ushered his
men and the coffin out of the cathedral. A group of police with
their weapons drawn closed in on the entrance.

Jenkins held up his arm and pointed into the
cathedral.

‘Quickly...there’s a mad man in there...’ The police
rushed in as the congregation rushed out, creating a writhing mass
of humanity blocking the great doorway.

The bearers hurried down the steps and pushed the
coffin into the hearse, Jenkins signaled his men towards the
motorcade.

‘Follow me,’ he snorted, as he climbed into the front
seat of the hearse. Jenkin’s put the large automatic vehicle in
drive and pressed the accelerator to the floor. The back wheels
squealed alarmingly generating a huge volume of acrid white smoke.
This summoned a multitude of angry police officers who came
charging out of the cathedral doors, their guns drawn. Several
shots were fired at the smoke-screened vehicle as it turned into
St. Mary’s Road and disappeared behind the cathedral. It was
quickly followed by three other heavy, black Sudan's, packed with
secret service agents.

Chapter Sixty-seven

Jansen parked his car opposite the cathedral and
squinted incredulously at the milling crowd outside. Decimated
flowers and wreaths were scattered all around. Men and police were
arguing, woman were crying and throwing their arms in the air.
Armed police were scattered everywhere trying to control the
brawling congregation.

Jansen looked at his Sergeant.

‘That must have been some funeral.’

‘I’d say so sir...takes me back to the Irish
troubles.’

‘You were there then sergeant?'

‘Hell no, but we watched it at college on telly, and
did a comprehension exercise on the worst riots over there.’

A plain clothes police officer spotted Jansen and
came over.

‘Hello commander, we’ve just had an incredible
incident here...someone has shot Mrs. Chester during the service,
and the US vice president, along with his security agents, have
just hijacked Clement Chester’s coffin,’ Jenkins looked intently at
the officer. The statement by itself sounded like a ridiculous sick
joke, but if Jenkins had hijacked Chester’s coffin, there was one
hell of a bloody good reason for it.

Jensen pulled his gun and fired into the air -- it
gave him the attention he needed.

‘Stop this stupid squabbling -- the man responsible
for all this has just hijacked Chester’s coffin,’ he looked at the
plain clothes officer, ‘get your men together...we’re going after
Jenkins -- which way did he go?’

‘He turned into St. Mary’s Road and onto Crown
Street. I’d say he was heading for the Pacific Highway.’

‘Good, then let’s get after him,’ Jansen got back in
his car and half smiled at Dutton sitting in the front seat.

‘At last, it seems our impeccable vice president has
made his first disastrous move, he’s stooped to body snatching,’
Dutton returned the smile, rubbed his chin and gunned the car
ignition.

It was fifteen minutes later after some tricky
driving in precarious Sydney traffic that Jansen caught his first
sighting of the hearse and accompanying black secret service SUVs.
It always seemed strange to him that the choice of a secret service
vehicle was always a black, highly polished SUV. This was about as
anonymous as a pink convertible in a funeral procession and
actually made it easier for him to keep tabs on the vehicle.

Jansen checked the line of vehicles in the harbour
tunnel as they neared the exit. There were at least six police
vehicles behind him and another six in front, with no hearse in
sight.

Jenkin’s three car motorcade had made its way through
the harbour tunnel exit just as the traffic came to a stop. Three
minutes later they were cruising at substantial speed along the
Pacific Highway.

Chapter Sixty-eight

Sunlight glinted off the highly polished stainless
steel tank of Brian Ralph’s pristine 3.5 thousand litre petrol
tanker. It was exactly one week since it came out of the
manufacturers workshop sparkling brand new. Custom made according
to Ralphs specifications; it looked like a giant silver bullet with
its sleek stainless steel lines and gleaming crimson fitments.
After trading in his last rig in he still owed $200,000 dollars on
the super tanker.

Today was his first consignment involving the rig,
with a full tank of 3.5 megalitres of premium grade petrol,
destined for two service stations along the Pacific Highway. It was
his proudest moment and his fifteen year old son Raymond had come
along to support him on his special day.

Traffic was heavy on Cleveland Road, as it always was
in the middle of the week, and Ralph took his time making sure his
rig didn’t receive its first scrape on the vehicle’s inaugural
run.

In spite of the enormous amount of flammable payload
in his rear, Ralph felt safe in his expertly made state-of-the-art
tanker. The seats were well upholstered and comfortable, but not
overly so -- falling asleep at the wheel was discouraged by a
special sensor situated at the top of the windscreen, which
detected a specific change in eye movements. He smiled at Raymond,
thinking he was a chip off the old block, as the traffic began to
thin out towards the end of Cleveland Road, where a large traffic
island directed them onto the Pacific Highway.

Ralph could hardly remember a time when he didn’t
want to be a truck driver. The ambition went right back to his
early years in juniors at Paramatta school.

He could remember playing with his ‘Dinky’ dump
trucks in the sand pit and around the school playground. Untold
hours were spent shunting little piles of sand to and fro from pit
to playground. A year later a new kid named Tim Wilson entered the
school and joined him in the sand pit. He brought along his prize
possession -- a shiny new ‘Dinkey’ petrol tanker with the words
ESSO embellished along the side in midnight blue. This was
something different; a truck with a giant petrol tank on the back
of it -- this would the toy he would fall in love with for the rest
of his life.

Ralph made a deal with ‘Willo’ the kid who had the
best Dinkey toy in school. It took two dump trucks, a bag of
marbles and a box of licorice allsorts to take the miniature tanker
away from Willo, who drove a very hard bargain.

Ralph had no regrets even though he was now reduced
to one Dinkey toy, and even this was on very shaky ground. As one
boy after another tried to rest it away from him via a game of
marbles or conkers...Ralph would have non of it.

He looked around the cabin of his new truck admiring
the plush leather seating and full instrument fascia panel. Opening
the glove compartment he gazed at the battered Dinkey petrol tanker
laying on its side, its role had changed over the years, it was now
his lucky charm, and as long as the toy remained with him he knew
he was safe. It had been on innumerable trips with him and he never
missed a delivery without his precious Dinkey tanker. Having been
comforted by his lucky charm he closed the glove box and looked up
ahead.

The large traffic island which would take him onto
the Pacific Highway was now just fifty yards away and it was now
time to concentrate. Such islands could be a great danger for long
petrol trailers unless the driver handled the rig carefully,
jackknifing a new trailer was the last thing he needed. The traffic
began to slow and Ralph handed his son a large red apple to keep
him occupied while he concentrated on the handling the big petrol
rig.

‘So far, so good son...we’ll be onto the highway in a
couple of ticks,’ his son beamed as he sank his teeth into the
polished apple.

Ralph applied the brakes just before entering the
island producing a satisfying hiss as he operated the brake pedal.
It was then he noticed a large black vehicle approaching the island
at a prodigious speed with a convoy of other vehicles locked onto
its rear.

Nervous pulses ran down his oesophagus and culminated
in his stomach initiating a backward ripple. He’d encountered
scenarios like this before and knew that they nearly always ended
in disaster. His mind went into overdrive...there was no way the
vehicle would be able to stop safely before it reached the island.
A series of past fatal incidents flashed through his brain --
scenarios that had remained fixed in his mind on account of their
tragic horrors. They goaded him on, as if to say...
get out of
this one if you can
!

Somehow he had to get the trailer out of the way. It
was impossible to reverse with all the traffic backed up in his
rear. With only a few precious seconds left an instant decision was
needed.

Ralph pushed his foot on the accelerator and twisted
the steering wheel hard to the right as he tried to negotiate the
island at high speed. Both actions created an over correction and
Ralph struggled to correct it. Fear intervened and wiped out any
rational thinking, as the rig hit a ballard, and knocked over a
large street lamp, trapping the tanker across the traffic island.
Petrol spilled out from a large hole in the belly of the huge steel
tank -- it was the dreaded tanker accident Ralph had feared the
most, a jackknife across one of Sydney’s major traffic
intersections was the ultimate petrol tanker faux pas.

‘Silly bastard,’ shouted Jenkins as the tanker loomed
large in the hearse’s windscreen. The tires howled and whined as he
pumped the brakes. The coffin shot forward smashing the glass and
metal dividing screen and missed Jenkins by millimeters.

The hearse wasn’t designed for speed or emergency
stops, and lightweight brakes fitted to the vehicle were no match
for the inertial mass of a runaway coffin filled to capacity with
Chester’s obese corpse.

An ear splitting screech and a retort, that only God
could have created, shook the area for miles around. The heavy
coffin conveyance went straight through the tanker splitting it in
two and showering petrol fifty feet into the air, soaking
everything within thirty feet of the traffic island.

Jenkins, strapped in the wreck and barely alive,
looked up at the sky through blooded eyes and blackened face. He
squelched in premium grade petrol, which floated up to his chest.
Above his head a light fixture dangled precariously swinging to and
fro -- abruptly it snapped and hit the curb creating the tinniest
of sparks -- but it was enough to cause the next monumental
detonation.

Jansen and the police motorcade were thirty yards
away when the eruption occurred. A blinding flash followed by
intense heat were the first deadly harbingers to arrive. Anyone in
eye contact was temporarily blinded by the flash and then deafened
by the huge explosion. Finally a huge gust of hot air singed
everyone's eyebrows within thirty feet of the centre of the blast.
The heat built up as the massive pile up of machinery and
combustibles combined to produce a gigantic fireball, melting the
bitumen and blanketing the area with choking black smoke. Several
of the following SUV’s were caught up in the mayhem and plied into
the burning mass of vehicles. The sudden impact and disorientation
of the incident caught many of the security detail off guard, and
all of Jerkin's secret service personnel were promptly incinerated
as well as dozens of other people in the vicinity.

The furnace like conditions burnt and singed trees,
cars and people. Many of the street lights exploded as flames
licked away at the their vitals. Traffic was grid locked for
hundreds of metres in all directions making it almost impossible
for many people to flee the scene. One vehicle after another caught
fire and the flames started to spread along the lines of the
traffic like a slow Dynamite fuse. Fire engines and ambulances were
fighting to get through to the center of the conflagration.
Wreckage and debris cluttered the area, glass was scattered
everywhere, burnt metal parts littered the gutter. Pools of hot
water and glycol smoked away as the coolant of a multitude of
broken radiators shed their precious fluids. All glass windows
within a fifty yard radius were completely blown in. The massive
black smoke cloud from burning tanker fuel began to turn day into
night and the air became near impossible to breath. People covered
their faces with tissues, handkerchiefs, scarves and any thing that
would protect their airways from the fowl stench of burning rubber
and fuel oil. Every other person brandished a mobile phone and was
either speaking animatedly into it or snapping endless photo’s for
posterity or possible media exploitation.

There was nothing like a messy disaster, it attracted
people like bears to honey. Whole areas of the road and pavement
were crowded with gawkers and ghoolish onlookers, who actually
jostled each other for a better view. Some thought it was the set
of a new action movie; such was the popularity of Sydney as one of
the action movie capitals of the world.