‘What about getting Marty to talk on tape? We can be creative. I’d like some record of the money being handed over. I don’t suppose there’s any way we could get them to go with you when you do it?’
‘They’ll probably insist on using a third party. But let me play it by ear.’
‘How long have we been after the O’Neills? It’s going on six months, right?’
Shepherd nodded. ‘Since I first got introduced to Marty.’
‘Softy softly, catchee monkey.’
‘Has to be that way, obviously. Can’t be seen to be too keen. It has to look like their idea.’
‘And what about Marty? How do you feel about him?’
Shepherd’s eyes narrowed. ‘What do you mean?’
‘It must be strange, cosying up to him when he’s the enemy.’
‘He’s not really an enemy,’ said Shepherd. ‘He’s a target. “Enemy” suggests there’s bad feeling between us. There’s nothing like that. He’s a criminal. I work for an organisation that tries to put criminals out of business.’
‘But to do that, you have to befriend him, don’t you?’
Shepherd shrugged but didn’t answer.
‘And then you have to betray him. All of them, in fact. How does that make you feel?’
Shepherd held the man’s eyes for several seconds before he spoke. ‘What was your degree in?’
‘PPE. Philosophy, politics and economics. Why?’
‘Not psychology, then?’
‘Very droll, Daniel. No, not psychology.’
‘So maybe we should leave any psychological evaluation in the hands of the experts.’
‘I was just asking, out of interest.’
‘To be blunt, how I feel about what I do is absolutely no concern of yours. All you need to worry about is how well I do my job and how I deal with the tasks I’m given. The O’Neill investigation is going as planned and that’s all you have to know.’
‘You sound defensive,’ said Willoughby-Brown, leaning back in his seat and steepling his fingers under his chin.
‘It’s a natural reaction when somebody suggests I’m not capable of carrying out my job effectively,’ said Shepherd. ‘I hang out with Marty and his mates, I drink with them and chat with them, but I never lose sight of the fact that they’re my targets, and at the end of the day, if I do my job properly, they’ll be behind bars. But that’s down to the choices they’ve made. No one forced them to become criminals.’
‘And how do you think they’ll feel when they eventually find out who you are?’
‘They won’t,’ said Shepherd. ‘Not if you do your job properly.’
‘They’ll suspect, surely.’
‘Again, it’s a question of making sure that doesn’t happen.’ He frowned. ‘I hope you’re not serious, Jeremy. They must never even suspect my role in this.’
‘It wouldn’t be the end of the world – they’ll be behind bars for a long time.’
‘You think that’ll stop them running things? They’ll still have money and they’ll have the contacts. They can put out a hit on me from a cell in Belmarsh as easily as they can from the Mayfair bar.’
‘Do you have an exit strategy?’
‘I might have to die, like McGovern. We’ll see.’
‘Whatever you’re comfortable with, Daniel.’
‘I’ll keep you posted. Meanwhile, there’s something I wanted to run by you,’ said Shepherd. He took the RAF thumb drive from his pocket and held it out. ‘I’ve got pictures of three guys on the roof, just before the missile hit. You’ll be able to confirm that our two targets are there, but the sniper might have got away.’
Willoughby-Brown took it. ‘Can’t win ’em all.’
‘Be handy if you could ID the sniper. Get the technical boys on it.’
‘Syria’s full of snipers,’ said Willoughby-Brown. ‘It’s not really our problem. We’re more interested in the British jihadists and, so far as I’m aware, there are no Brit snipers out there.’
Shepherd gestured at the thumb drive. ‘That guy’s special,’ he said. ‘He was looking at a shot of a mile or so. And there were two men on the roof with him. Two spotters is unusual. And I think he had even more jihadists watching out for him. That was how he managed to avoid the explosion. It looks to me like IS were going out of their way to protect him, which would make him a high-value target.’
‘But not for us.’
‘The Americans, then. I’m serious, Jeremy. There’s no way of knowing how many guys that sniper has killed. At least get your people to do facial recognition on the pictures, see if he’s known.’
‘Okay,’ said Willoughby-Brown, but Shepherd had heard the lack of conviction in his voice.
‘What now?’ he asked. ‘I’m getting a bit tired of sitting in that container watching video feeds.’
Willoughby-Brown grinned. ‘I can remedy that,’ he said. ‘I need you out in Turkey.’
‘Since when has Five operated in Turkey?’
‘We’re liaising with Six.’
‘They don’t have their own people?’
Willoughby-Brown grimaced. ‘Why are you giving me a hard time, Daniel? I thought you might jump at a bit of overseas travel. Get you out of your rut.’
‘What rut?’
‘I just meant a change is as good as a rest. Revitalise the old batteries while serving Queen and country. But the threat is a UK one. We have a source in a refugee camp, a chap by the name of Yusuf Yilmaz. He’s made contact and is offering us names and photographs of Islamic State fighters who have passed through the camp pretending to be Syrian refugees. He helped them get the paperwork. He says they’re on their way to Europe. The UK in particular.’
‘So fly him over and debrief him in Thames House.’
‘I wish it was that easy,’ said Willoughby-Brown. ‘He has a number of demands, including fast-track to British citizenship and rather a lot of money.’
‘If the intel’s good, what’s the problem?’
‘Because we don’t have the intel. All we’ve got is an initial contact, via an agent of ours who works for an NGO out there. We need someone to go and talk to him, to see if he’s offering us gold or shit.’
‘You can send anyone. A bloody intern could handle it. Check out the intel. If it’s good, put him and his family on a plane.’
‘Our local guy has met with Yusuf but I need someone more experienced to sit down with him.’
‘So he’s a people-trafficker, this Yusuf?’
‘It sounds like it. As I said, at the moment we have little in the way of hard information. But if he has what he says he has, we could have a major Islamic State cell, or cells, already in place in the UK.’
Shepherd sighed. ‘Okay. When do I leave?’
‘I’m having your John Whitehill legend refreshed for you as we speak. The documents should be ready within the hour. The Hampstead flat still works as Whitehill’s address and we’ve been placing various bylined stories in magazines and on websites so it’s the perfect cover. Have you heard of Suruç?’
Shepherd nodded. ‘The Turks have one of their largest refugee camps there. Forty thousand Syrians, last I heard.’
‘It’s a massive set-up,’ said Willoughby-Brown, ‘basically a huge tent city with two hospitals, seven clinics, and enough schools for ten thousand kids. It’s just over the border from Syria, close to where Kurdish forces have been battling it out with Islamic State.’
‘How many refugees are there in Turkey now?’
‘Around three million,’ said Willoughby-Brown. ‘Even if just one in a thousand of those are Islamic State bad guys then we’re looking at three thousand potential Islamic militants in Europe. Suruç itself is relatively safe though there was a bombing there in July 2015 that killed thirty-two people.’
‘At the camp?’
Willoughby-Brown shook his head. ‘Outside a cultural centre.’
‘Nice,’ said Shepherd.
Willoughby-Brown slid a photograph across the desk. ‘This is our agent, Craig Parker. He’s been on Six’s payroll for the past ten years but he’s gainfully employed by Refugee Rescue, an NGO that’s funded mainly out of the US and the EU. Parker was in the former Yugoslavia when Six first spotted him but latterly he’s been all over the Middle East, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, then Syria and Turkey as of last year. He’s reliable, a bit of a lefty, but he helps us if he thinks it’s the right thing to do.’
‘Be nice if we could all be as choosy as that.’
Willoughby-Brown chuckled drily. ‘It’s just a question of phrasing our requests in the right way,’ he said. ‘But in this case he was on the phone to us as soon as Yusuf made the approach.’
‘So Yusuf knows Parker’s with Six?’
‘Oh, God, no. Yusuf was just mouthing off and Parker said he might know someone who could help. He put him in touch with one of our people from the embassy in Ankara. That guy did the preliminary interview but Yusuf is insisting on talking to someone from London. That plays into our hands because it means you can take a look at whatever he’s got.’
‘What do we know about him?’
‘Not much. He’s just a run-of-the-mill people-trafficker, so far as we know. No links to terrorism.’
‘Do the Americans know about him?’
‘We haven’t checked with them yet.’
‘Yet?’
‘We don’t go running to the Americans every time we get a piece of intel. This is exclusive to us and we’d like to keep it that way.’
‘Sure, but the Americans have way more intel on what’s going on in Turkey and Syria than we do. It would be handy to know if Yusuf is naughty or nice.’
‘Well, yes, but it’s the quality of the intel that matters at the end of the day, not the source.’
‘I’m more concerned about my safety, frankly,’ said Shepherd.
‘Turkey isn’t a war zone.’
‘It’s right next to one,’ said Shepherd. ‘How do we know Yusuf isn’t part of some greater plan to put an MI5 officer in an orange jumpsuit and behead him on YouTube?’
‘Shuttleworth said he seemed kosher.’ He grinned. ‘Well, not kosher obviously. But there were no red flags.’
‘Shuttleworth?’
‘Our man in the embassy. Derek Shuttleworth. He interviewed him, covered the basics, and now it’s time for us to take over.’ He took a drag on his cigar and flicked more ash. ‘We can give you protection out there, I’m sure.’
‘Bodyguards?’
‘Army, if you prefer. Just let me know what you need.’
‘First sign of anything and I’m out,’ said Shepherd.
‘Absolutely. Wouldn’t have it any other way,’ said Willoughby-Brown. ‘Your safety is paramount, as always.’
Shepherd didn’t reply. He doubted that his personal safety was of the slightest interest to Willoughby-Brown.
‘So we’re good?’ asked Willoughby-Brown.
‘When?’
‘Soon as.’
‘There’s a boxing do tonight. Black tie. Marty will be there.’
‘What about Tommy?’
‘No one’s mentioned it, but they never do. He flies in and out, like the Scarlet Pimpernel. But he’s a big boxing fan so my guess is that he’ll be there.’
‘So, fly tomorrow. I’ll get you on the BA flight, direct. It’s less than four hours. Leave in the morning and you’ll be in Suruç before dark.’
‘Get me a stopover. Schiphol, Frankfurt or Paris.’
‘Because?’
‘Because if I’m being tailed it’ll be that much harder to follow me.’
‘If that’s what you want.’
‘Yes, it’s what I want, Jeremy,’ said Shepherd.
He shrugged. ‘So mote it be.’
Shepherd frowned. It was a strange expression for the man to use. ‘So mote it be’ was a phrase Freemasons used at the end of prayers instead of ‘amen’. Was Willoughby-Brown a Freemason? A lot of police officers were but he hadn’t come across it in the security services.
‘I’ll get the flights fixed. And what about tonight? Do you need any equipment?’
Shepherd shook his head. ‘It’s social.’
Omar Hassan arrived at the family garage just after lunch. As always, it was busy, with his three brothers hard at work. ‘Where’ve you been?’ asked Zack, the eldest, who was in charge when their father wasn’t there.
‘I told Dad I’d be late. He was cool with it,’ said Omar.
‘I didn’t ask whether you’d told him, I asked where you’d been.’
Zack was almost ten years older than Omar and a good two inches taller. As the eldest he was supposed to be accorded respect, but Omar despised him. He was weak and flabby, too fond of Coke and fast food. He was a bad Muslim, too, often missing prayer time while working in the garage. Worse, much worse, he was dating an English girl. A
kafir
. For that alone he deserved to be treated with contempt. But Omar’s trainers had taught him well. He smiled and put up his hands to apologise. ‘I’m sorry, bruv. I was at the dentist’s. One of my back teeth was playing up.’
‘Okay now?’
Omar pulled a face. ‘He gave me an injection, said it should quieten the nerve down. But if it doesn’t get better I might need the root working on.’
‘Unlucky, bruv,’ said Zack, ruffling his brother’s hair. He gestured at a white Transit van. ‘New brake linings. And the steering’s loose.’
‘I’m on it,’ said Omar. He hurried to the locker room.
Another of his brothers, Toby, was bent over the engine of another Transit. ‘You okay, bruv?’ he asked, as Omar went by.
‘Yeah, all good,’ said Omar. Toby was a couple of years older than Omar, and had thought he might one day become a jihadist. But the imam who had groomed Omar was less convinced by the older brother. He had spoken to Toby at length over a six-month period not long before Omar had gone to Pakistan and pronounced him too weak and too corrupted by the West. Omar knew that the imam had a point. Toby prayed every day, but never more than once or twice. He liked pop music and had posters of Beyoncé and Rihanna on his bedroom wall. He abused himself every night. Omar knew that to be the case because his bedroom was next to Toby’s and he could hear him through the wall.
‘When you’re done with the Transit, I could do with a hand here. We’ve got a rush on.’
‘We’ve always got a rush on,’ said Omar. ‘Dad takes on too much work. He’s killing us.’
‘Make hay while the sun shines, bruv,’ said Toby, wiping his forehead with his sleeve. ‘We’d be moaning if we didn’t have any work. At least this way we’re earning.’
Omar’s father had set up the garage a few years after arriving in the UK, funded with money he’d borrowed from family and friends. The early years had been a struggle but he was a good, honest mechanic and had a lot of return business, mainly from within the local Pakistani community. But it was the boom in online shopping that had taken the business to a whole new level. With more and more people ordering online, courier firms sprang up around the country, with fleets of vehicles that needed repairing and servicing. Omar’s father had landed half a dozen lucrative contracts and the garage had been working at full capacity for the past two years. Now he was searching for larger premises.