The Purple Contract (9 page)

 
 
 
 
5

 
13 - 18 May, 2013

The police officer looked suspiciously at the dark blue Renault parked in the gloom under a faulty street light. He checked the number plate front and back, then leaned close to inspect the interior of the car through the driver’s side window. Straightening up, he reached for the radio attached to his lapel.

The hand that appeared over his left shoulder firmly grasped his chin and pulled, while the unseen right hand helped to rotate the head sharply backwards. The officer collapsed, his neck broken. The two indistinct figures clad in dirty blue overalls grinned at each other as they jumped into the unlocked car...

Hollis yawned and switched the satellite TV receiver off with the remote control, leaning back in the fireside chair and staring at the ceiling. Then he repeated the action with the TV set itself. There was too much on his mind to concentrate even on such simple escapist entertainment.

He fetched a glass and poured a generous measure of Glenlivet from the bottle sitting on top of the glass-fronted drinks cabinet and carried it over to the rarely-used dining table in the corner beside the window. Hollis pulled the curtain back to peer out into the quiet of the night. Bright silver moonlight was reflecting across the sea, bringing the silent landscape into sharp silhouette. Even the persistent wind had died away, leaving an almost eerie stillness.

Hollis loved nights like this and had been known to wander the countryside in the early hours around dawn, enjoying the silence and the solitude. But then that was one of the reasons he lived in this isolated place instead of an anonymous apartment in an anonymous city block: just another rat in the sewers.

He dropped the curtain and turned back to the table with a sigh. Far too much work to do before there would be time for such things.

The table was strewn with papers, maps and scribbled notes. Had been so for the best part of two weeks or more now. Hollis pulled out a chair and hunted through the mess until he found the list of Royal engagements that Harrison had given him immediately before they parted in Amsterdam. The problem was that although the target was scheduled to make a number of public appearances, many of them involved unacceptable locations: opening a new wing at a nursing home, meeting residents in a London AIDS hospice, touring an award-winning Welsh primary school and so on. Even after all these years, there were still limits beyond which Mike Hollis simply would not go.

In fact it was a source of considerable irritation that, as he sat here desperately trying to create something from nothing, the Prince was currently a guest of the Thai monarch. Enjoying the sunshine and splendour of that exotic––and crime ridden––kingdom. A more perfect scenario would have been difficult to find. If these bastards, whoever they were, had only got off their butts a few weeks sooner! Potentially, an ideal opportunity had been wasted.

Four times now he had been through the list from top to bottom. Analyzing every entry, picturing in his active mind the difficulties and the possibilities. Rejecting one after the other, sometimes throwing a pencil clear across the room in frustration, and coming up every time with the same solitary option.

Belize.

A small, sparsely populated country on the Caribbean coast of Central America, the northern half being little more than low-lying swamp. To the south there is a rough, high plateau - inhospitable at the best of times, while off the coast lies the world's second largest coral reef. The largest being the Great Barrier Reef off Australia.

Once known as British Honduras, independence brought moderate success for local industries such as citrus fruits, bananas, sugar and timber production, which were no longer tied to outmoded British ideals. Latterly tourism had been developing slowly, although stumbling occasionally thanks to the persistent territorial disputes with Guatemala. Partly due to this the National Assembly, encouraged no doubt by the constitutional monarchy who felt a little insecure, had offered facilities for the training of British troops. Thereby ensuring a continuing British military presence as a deterrent to over-enthusiastic neighbours. However, times change.

The Prince had been persuaded to make a morale-boosting visit to the currently deployed regiment. Many of whom knew they would be heading for civvy street and the viscously means-tested Social Security system when their tour of duty ended and they returned to the UK. While at home, the European Parliament was nagging all and sundry to make further cutbacks in military spending, and rumours were rife of the entire Regiment being disbanded in consequence. Then there had been the tragic accident just a few months previously: one of their number being shot and killed during a live-firing exercise. It was understandable that morale should suffer,
had
suffered, under the strain.

So from the 7th to the 10th of June His Royal Highness would be visiting a small corner of Central America. A place, indeed, that large numbers of his subjects-to-be could not have pointed to on a map to save their lives. But for Mike Hollis it was an opportunity, certainly the best of an uncertain bunch. Not least because he knew he would have no difficulty in rousting up some help in those parts when it came to getting clear afterwards.

The military aspects worried him not at all. In fact there was reason to believe that the presence of British troops would be an advantage. The local security services could be relied upon to assume that the British military authorities would be taking full responsibility––and indeed the Army would certainly insist upon it. But those self-same soldiers were hardly in top-line order under the circumstances. Not to dismissed lightly of course, but plainly a lot less effective than would otherwise have been the case.

Hollis grunted as the malt burned down his throat. It was a flaw; a crack in the armour. A wedge he could use to force open the door of opportunity. And one chance was all he had ever needed.

It was well after 11 pm when he gave it up for the night and moved over to a more comfortable chair, clicking the satellite TV remote control to bring up Sky News. The on-the-hour bulletin was just finishing, the attractive auburn-haired presenter repeating the hour's headline story:

'Just to recap: Prince Charles has seriously injured his arm in a fall during his visit to Thailand––'

Mike Hollis turned his head slightly and started to listen. A
frisson
passed down his spine, leaving him almost chilled.

'––same arm which was broken many years ago playing polo. Initial reports indicate that the damage may be quite severe, although he is said to be comfortable tonight in Bangkok's Royal Hospital.'

The gray-blue eyes were riveted now on the television screen and the pictures of a stretcher being hustled into an ambulance, itself practically surrounded by shouting security men and police.

'And some news just in: within the last few minutes Buckingham Palace have issued a statement confirming that the Prince's arm is now known to broken in two places and that he will be detained in hospital for at least forty eight hours. They have also announced with regret that all of his public engagements have been cancelled for the foreseeable future.'

Hollis could only stare in speechless, frustrated anger. Two weeks of wasted effort. Two weeks of planning, god knew how many miles paced back and forth across the living room carpet. All for nothing, destroyed by a moment of carelessness halfway round the planet. Without knowing how he got there, he found himself glaring helplessly out the window into his own reflection in the dark glass. His mind a turmoil of churning emotions.

Unheeded behind him the newscaster was finishing her script, looking forward to a cup of coffee and then getting home to her children. 'And finally, the body found floating in Leith docks yesterday has now been identified as that of a Mr Ralph Manson. He appears to have drowned, possibly while under the influence of alcohol or drugs. Local police say it appears to be just a tragic accident, although they claim Mr Manson's name has been linked with certain criminal elements …'

 
 
 
 
6

 
20 – 25 May, 2013

The red dragon, with it's coiled whiplash tail and jagged dorsal spines reminiscent of a shark's fin and the gaping jaws flaming with smoke and fire above the evil grasping talons holding a jewel aloft in triumph had terrified him. This was wrong.
Wrong!

Wing Chang Hui knew this with every fibre of his being. The old man was dead, there was no doubt about that. They had casually killed a revered ancient, a harmless old man who had managed to survive the Maoist revolution and its bloody aftermath: the madness and the genocide which had transformed a proud society into a shambling ruin.

In any event the elderly man was not, could never have been, a threat to them; hadn't even known what was happening. But the out-thrown arm had been sprawled across the gathering pool of his own blood like an accusation. The horrific sight of the red dragon tattoo on the inside of both wrists was only heightened by the spreading red pool forming an ugly backdrop to an act of unthinking and needless violence. The revered ancient had been a priest, or at least an initiate, in one of the old Orders. Possibly he had left China to escape the persecution and the killing. It was more than likely that he had watched his temple burn, and some of the holy men with it.

One of these two heathen Libyans; Mammar something-or-other and Alij Hassan, had shot him out of hand. Hadn't even broken stride as the old man fell against the broken, rotted side of a long-abandoned wooden hut, breaking through and falling with a crash among the rusted tins and mildewed rope.

He must have come from the small town of Kusadeshi, four kilometres along the coast. What manner of bad luck had brought him to this secluded Turkish cove today of all days? Probably just enjoying the walk and the cool air of the early morning, while his
Tao
merged with the sunlight and the sea and the earth on which he stood.

But it had been the wrong time. The wrong day. He had walked round the sharp bend in the track and gazed in some surprise at the three of them lugging yet another crate across the shingle from the battered truck to the dark green fishing boat moored at the remains of an even more battered jetty. It was the second last crate, another of the very heavy ones with Cyrillic lettering stencilled on each side and it was taking Wing Chang and Hassan a lot of effort so they had waved for Mammar to give them a hand instead of standing there grinning. He had only taken three steps when the ancient had come round the corner and Mammar had fired twice without breaking step and Wing Chang had dropped his end of the box and started running, but it was too late. Much too late.

And now the master's
Tao
was spread on the wind behind them, leaving Wing Chang Hui with a sense of foreboding so deep as to completely swamp his dislike of being afloat in a small boat with a pair of undoubted psychopaths and a hold full of munitions stolen from some ex-Warsaw-pact stockpile. The blood-soaked dragon haunted him, terrified him. This was wrong. Wrong!

Mammar cursed quietly and fluently in Arabic, winding the wheel rapidly to port in order to guide the boat past yet another tourist launch full of laughing, gesticulating infidels with their damned cameras and half-naked women. Not that he objected to the women as such, although he preferred a bit more flesh about them than these European skeletons. It was just that his upbringing automatically called into contempt any female who brazenly flaunted her body in public like this. Exhibiting things to strangers that only her husband should ever see. Did they have no
shame
?

As this diatribe was running through his head the well-built girl sunbathing topless in a deck-chair at the stern chose that moment to raise herself up and wave brightly at him. Mammar went an even deeper shade of purple and actually shook his fist at her, which amused the crowd lining the rails no end. A cacophony of catcalls and whistles reverberated between the vessels and slowly faded astern.
A plague on them all, and on their damned money
. Muttering, Mammar came back on course to pass just south of the Greek island of Tinos, one of the Cyclades group; scattered across the sparkling sea like a handful of marbles.

They would make landfall for the night in a quiet bay somewhere on one of the small islands adjacent to Milos. There was far too much shipping in these Aegean waters during the hours of darkness for Mammar's limited marine skills. Hassan was no sailor either and there was just
no
way he was trusting this valuable cargo to that Chinese madman. Maybe Allah knew what was wrong with him, Mammar surely didn't. He had been in a very funny mood since the thing on the beach. Mammar couldn't figure it at all.  By the look of him the old man hadn't much life left anyway; so what did it matter that he had died today instead of tomorrow, or next week? It was very puzzling.

All the more so since Wing Chang Hui had been a good man to have around this last year or so. There had been a good few shaky situations but he hadn't shown any signs of this nonsense before; even when the Russian Mafia had caught them cold with twenty kilos of the best Ukrainian crack-cocaine hidden in the back of their car.

Alij Hassan still had a bullet in him from that bit of excitement but Hui had loved it; blasting away with that bloody Kalashnakov like world war three had started. So what was all this about now? Maybe the stupid bastard was pining to go back to Hong Kong, where they had literally pulled him out of the harbour under the noses of the Peoples Liberation Army. He was welcome to
that
. Mammar had liked Hong Kong, feeling strangely at home amid the teeming clamour and the anything-goes freedom of the place. But that had been before 1997. Before the arrival of the geriatrics from Beijing and the red flags on every street corner. Now you could keep it, and that
was
a fact!