Vicious Circle (53 page)

‘Good Irish thinking,’ Hector commended him. ‘That’s great for the entry. But how do we exit after we have done the job? We have already heard that it would be impossible to get out of Kazundu on foot.’

‘The drop plane would land to pick us up,’ said Paddy, defending his ideas. ‘The same way Johnny did it originally.’

‘Johnny wasn’t on a hunt-and-kill raid, as we will be. He did not have to get control of the airport to have an escape route. He was there to waste Justin and take up permanent residence,’ Hector pointed out. ‘Anyway, this is a different situation. King Justin’s army was a music-hall joke, a small bunch of palookas with no ammunition in rifles they didn’t know how to shoot. Now Johnny’s gang is made up of well-equipped men who he has hand-picked and trained with the help of Sam Ngewenyama. Both Johnny and Sam are military veterans. We can only land forty or fifty men at a time. Andrew Moorcroft, who was on the ground in Kazundu, estimates that Johnny has a couple of hundred trained men. We are up against pros; not a single palooka amongst them. What is more, we will be heavily outnumbered.’

‘Shit!’ Dave Imbiss said quietly but vehemently.

‘Indeed,’ Hector agreed. ‘A big smelly lump of it. Andrew has also told us that Johnny Congo is fully aware that the airfield is his Achilles heel. He exploited it himself to get his men in. So what he has done is build a heavily sandbagged redoubt at each end of the runway. Set in embrasures in the walls are batteries of fifty-calibre heavy machine guns. No uninvited or unwelcome aircraft can land or take off without being raked by MG fire from both fore and aft, even before its wheels touch or leave the ground.’

They considered the proposition with expressions of cold distaste, until Jo Stanley broke the silence at last. ‘Unless, of course, it is Carl’s own Antonov Condor,’ Jo said gently.

‘Of course!’ Hector agreed dismissively. ‘But we are not going to be in his Condor, are we?’

‘No, we are not,’ Jo agreed demurely. ‘Unless, of course, you hijack it for us.’

A solemn silence followed this statement. Nastiya broke it with a whoop of laughter. ‘Look at their faces, Jo. They have run fresh out of smart-arse masculine replies. Come on, boys. What have you got to say to the lady?’

‘Goodness gracious me, Jo Stanley!’ Hector shook his head in mock disbelief. ‘I knew you were bright, but I didn’t realize that you are bright enough to light up the sky.’

‘Hector Cross!’ Jo tried to keep a straight face as she replied. ‘Don’t you dare hijack my terms of speech. Why don’t you rather go and hijack an aircraft?’

*

It took two more days of intensive planning before Hector was satisfied with the logistics for the assault on Kazundu.

‘The Condor will only be able to carry a safe limit of eighty-four fully equipped men and sufficient fuel for a round flight from Abu Zara to Kazundu and return,’ Hector had decided. ‘I estimate we will need a force of around fifty. What is the present strength of Cross Bow Security, Paddy? How many men can we field, right now?’

‘We are short of about fifteen or so,’ Paddy admitted, and glanced across at Dave Imbiss. ‘Am I right, Davie?’

‘Here in Abu Zara we are shy of sixteen men. But I can fly reinforcements in from our other oilfields in South America and Asia. Give me five or six days, and I can have the full complement assembled and ready to go on the airstrip of the Zara Number Thirteen concession.’

‘Get cracking right away, Dave,’ Hector ordered him, and then turned back to the others. ‘Once we have landed at Kazundu airport and overwhelmed the men in the two forts that guard it, we will have control. We will leave the Condor under the protection of the guns in the northern fort. That is the one closest to the castle on the hill.’

‘It’s not a good idea to park it in the open,’ Paddy advised. ‘There is going to be a lot of incendiary bullets and shrapnel flying about. Just a single hit from one of those and the Condor goes up. Boom!’

‘No!’ Hector held up his hand. ‘I don’t have pictures of it, but Emma Purdom has recorded conversation of Carl and Johnny discussing the building of some type of laager to protect the Condor when it is on the ground. It seems as though the floor of the bunker is well below ground level with an entry ramp at each end. The sides of the bunker are screened by walls of sandbags. Once the Condor taxies down the ramp, it is immune from small arms and RPG fire. Only problem is that this laager is situated well away from the main buildings where we will be disembarking. Our pilot will only be able to get the Condor under cover when we are clear.’

He looked around at their faces. ‘Any more questions?’ They shook their heads, and Hector went on. ‘I am assuming that we will have to go after our targets in the castle. I am going to leave twelve men to hold each of the forts on the airfield. Their firepower will be enhanced by the captured heavy machine guns that Johnny Congo has mounted there. I am going to leave Dave in command of these contingents to cover and protect the airfield from counterattack.’

At this stage Hector was presented with an unforeseen problem. It had never occurred to him that Jo Stanley would be any part of the strike team. She was not a trained warrior like the others. To his mind Jo’s place would be in the safety of Abu Zara, possibly helping Bonnie to take care of Catherine Cayla. Now suddenly Jo spoke out in a stronger and more assertive tone than she usually used to express herself.

‘The northern redoubt will also be the best place to site my comms post,’ she said.

There was a sudden and complete silence in the cinema. Every eye turned to Jo, and then immediately went back to Hector.

Nastiya was at the water fountain drawing a mug of cool water. She was as surprised as any of them by Jo’s outburst, but she recovered and went swiftly to stand at Jo’s side, before Hector had decided on his reply. Hector was left in no doubt whose side Nastiya was on.

‘I hadn’t thought about you coming with the strike team to Kazundu, Jo.’ Hector broke the pregnant silence carefully.

‘Well, you should think about it now.’ There was a tone in Jo’s voice that he had never heard until that moment. ‘I am arranging with Emma Purdom to set up special communications with her so that while the raid is in progress Emma will be able to keep us informed of everything that is happening in the castle. She will be shipping the equipment to me here in Abu Zara within the next few days. My specialized task will be to keep in constant contact with her in Houston. She is the only one of us who has eyes inside the castle. If either Johnny Congo or Carl Bannock goes to ground in there you will need Emma and me to provide you with live coverage of their movements.’

‘Jo has a diploma in electronic communications, on top of her law degree,’ Nastiya pointed out in the pause that followed Jo’s announcement.

‘How do you know that?’ Hector snapped at Nastiya. He was under attack on two fronts.

‘She told me when we were in the girls’ room a short while ago. She knows the layout of the castle better than any of us sitting here,’ Nastiya explained as if to a child. ‘If you want to know how I know that, well, think about who gave us the drawings of the place.’

‘Nazzy and Jo are making good sense,’ Paddy chimed in. ‘If one or both of those bastards gets away into the castle we will need all the edge we can muster. I for one will be happy to have Jo whispering in my ear to point out the way through the maze.’

‘You are being heavily outgunned, Heck.’ Dave Imbiss joined the discussion, ‘A wise man would give up gracefully.’

‘Who is talking about wise men here?’ Nastiya asked ingenuously. ‘I thought we are talking about Hector Cross.’

‘Okay.’ Hector carried on as though he was totally deaf to this fusillade of repartee. ‘So, we are unanimously agreed on my suggestion that Jo goes along with us as field director of comms? Let’s move along, then.’

He paused to pour himself another mug of coffee and to recover his equilibrium. Then he flashed Jo a conciliatory grin, before he resumed. ‘We will use two kill teams, each comprising fifteen men. I will command the first and Paddy the second. Carl Bannock will be my prime target so my call sign will be “White”. Paddy, your prime target will be Johnny Congo, so it follows naturally that your call sign will be “Black”. Paddy, you can choose your number two.’

‘I’ll take Nastiya,’ Paddy said.

‘Why am I so surprised by your choice? I would have taken her if you had passed,’ Hector mused aloud. ‘I will have to settle for Paul Stowe as my number two.’

Hector’s former head keeper at Brandon Hall had swiftly worked his way into the top echelon at Cross Bow after Hector had given him the job. He had proven himself to be a highly trained fighting man. He was quick-witted, intelligent and utterly reliable; a good man to have beside you in any scrape.

‘By the way, where the hell is Paul?’ Hector looked at Paddy.

‘He is down on the old Number Twelve concession doing a routine inspection of the security there,’ Paddy replied.

‘Get him back here as soon as you can. He must be brought up to speed with our planning.’

Paddy grunted acquiescence and scribbled a note on his pad.

‘We will go over the details again later, but that covers just about everything in broad outline, with one notable exception,’ Hector summed up. ‘How the hell do we get our hands on the Antonov Condor and who is going to fly it into Kazundu with fifty armed men on board without Johnny Congo and Carl Bannock knowing what we are up to?’ He paused to let them consider the question and then he went on. ‘I know who I want to fly it.’

There was a murmur of agreement from everybody except Jo, who looked puzzled. Hector addressed her directly.

‘Sorry, Jo.’ His expression softened. ‘There is no way you could know that I am referring to Bernie and Nella Vosloo. They are a couple of commercial pilots, a husband and wife team, who own and run a small air charter company operating all across Africa. They can fly anything with wings, and they aren’t too fussy about abiding strictly by aviation or any other laws. They did a tremendous job for us a while back.’

‘I know about the Vosloos, Hector,’ she corrected him mildly. ‘They are the people who flew you and your team into Somalia to rescue Hazel’s daughter from the pirate gang who had kidnapped her.’

‘How did you know that?’ Hector stared at her.

‘Hazel told Ronnie and me about them. The Bannock Family Trust had to pay the Vosloos’ bill, remember?’

‘You get to the winning post before I even start running!’ Hector conceded. ‘Well then, perhaps you also know that the Vosloos operate only a single aircraft. It’s an ancient Hercules C-130. But the type is about as close to the Antonov Condor as it is possible to get, except for the possibility that the user manual is printed in Cyrillic. But Bernie and Nella don’t need a manual to fly a Russian copy of a Hercules.’

‘Sure of that we are, Heck? Will they take the job?’ Nastiya cut in.

‘In both respects sure of that we are indeed, Nazzy, if you can follow that convoluted bit of grammar. I sent Nella an email last night. My question to her was, “Can you fly an Antonov Condor? Love Hector”. I received her reply a few hours ago.’ He held up his iPhone so they were able to read the text on the screen.

‘This is the typical Nella Vosloo reply. “Can a peacock pee in the park? How far? How high? How much? Love Nella”.’ All of them chuckled. But Hector looked seriously at Jo.

‘Can your friend Emma hack into the Condor’s communications system, Jo?’

‘I told you, Emma is the original IT whizz-kid. No worries.’

‘Can she transmit a message to the pilots of the Condor as if it originated from Carl Bannock in Kazundu, and can she then intercept the reply from the Condor so that Carl Bannock is entirely unaware of the exchange?’

‘Of course she can. She placed her own bug in the Condor and she can play it like Little Walter played his harmonica.’

‘Who the hell is Little—’ Hector began then changed tack. ‘Scrub that question. Next question, I don’t suppose our Emma would be able use her bug to track the Condor in flight, and give us a fix on it when we ask her?’ Hector pressed Jo for more specifics.

‘Absolutely. There are no secrets safe from our girl,’ Jo responded without hesitation. ‘She can read the Condor’s instrument panel from three thousand miles away as though she was sitting in the pilot’s seat.’

‘Will you ask her for a breakdown of the Condor’s recent flights and the destinations of each flight, covering the last six months?’ He paused to consider and then went on. ‘Also please ask her for the personal details of the two Russian pilots. If at all possible I would like her to give us ID photographs of the two of them, perhaps even copies of their licences?’

‘I am sure she will be able to do all that for you.’

‘How long will it take her, do you think? Please impress upon her that it’s urgent.’

‘It won’t take long. Emma is totally switched on,’ Jo replied. ‘Even allowing for the different time zones it will only be a day or so. Emma sleeps with her computer on one pillow and her boyfriend’s head on the other. Given a choice, I think she prefers the computer.’

‘Okay.’ Hector stood up and stretched, and then he checked his wristwatch. ‘It’s almost seven o’clock already. So we can take a break. Rumour has it that the chef has cooked up a feast for this evening, so you are all invited for eight p.m. That gives you an hour to primp and preen. See you all later.’

The dinner was heavy on the New Zealand green-lipped mussels, Maine lobster, bluefin tuna, gulf snapper and Chablis. Hector was the only one who stayed with the red burgundy.

Before they had finished eating they received proof that even Jo had underestimated Emma Purdom’s efficiency. At the same time as the dessert was being served, Emma’s response to Jo’s queries was brought through to the dining room by one of the radio operators from the Cross Bow communications centre. Hector opened the envelope and scanned the page quickly, before he looked up again at his dinner guests.

‘Ladies and gentlemen, hear the gospel according to St Emma. The Condor took off from Kazundu this morning at oh-eight-hundred hours GMT bound for Tehran in Iran with an unlisted cargo. Its ETA in Tehran is approximately one hour thirty minutes from now. On all its three previous visits to that city over the past six months the Condor remained in Tehran for twenty-four hours. Of course, that is in accord with DCA regulations to enable the pilots the stipulated rest period. After that it flew on to either Hong Kong or Russia. However, it always returns to Kazundu via Bangkok, where it takes on passengers. I am going to wager all my marbles on the Condor making the same homeward flight via Bangkok this time around. About now Carl and Johnny will be ready for some fresh Thai meat from the Bangkok flesh markets. According to St Emma, when in the Sin City the Russian pilots stay over at the Mandarin Oriental hotel for their requisite twenty-four-hour rest stop. So that gives Nastiya and Nella Vosloo a clear six days to get to Bangkok ahead of them and to be in the Oriental to meet the crew of the Condor when they arrive. Emma will send a message to the head pilot, purporting to emanate from Carl Bannock, to meet our two ladies and to ferry them down to Kazundu.’