For Kingdom and Country (31 page)

The other three men in the room were standing near to the open French windows. Two were civilians, dressed in dark business suits. Lock couldn’t see their faces clearly as they were masked by the final man in the room, the man standing with his back to the French windows. But Lock knew who he was. It was Wassmuss, or Feyzi, and he was very distinctive, indeed, dressed in a blue tunic with red collar and cuffs, a full dress uniform usually only worn by
birinci feriks
at Headquarters.

‘Only a colonel, but dressed like a general?’ Lock snorted to himself. ‘Tisk-tisk, Wilhelm, you really are a snob, aren’t you?’

And then Lock caught his breath and stared, slacked mouth into the room. Wassmuss had leant forward momentarily to pick something up from the desk beside him, and Lock had a sudden clear sight of the two businessmen. One was Grössburger, the fat Swiss whom Lock had last seen tied to a chair in a prison cell in Basra. But he wasn’t really surprised that he was here, after all Betty had said that they’d had to release him
following pressure from the Swiss consulate. But it was the second businessman, the thin, grey, sallow-faced man wearing round spectacles perched on a straight nose, that was a shock to see. He was a man whom Lock was convinced was dead, a man whom Lock had seen lying on the floor of Ross’s cabin on the
Espiegle
two months ago, with a stab wound to the heart, face fixed in a grimace of surprise.

‘Lord Shears?’ Lock gasped.

The tink-tink-tink of a knife tapping against glass called the room to order and the conversation quickly died down.

Lock was fingering his holstered Beholla. He had a full clip. Seven rounds. Tempting … He had to get closer, he had to hear what was being said in that room.

Circling round the fountain, and keeping to the shadows, Lock made his way back to the window he had climbed out of earlier. He crept past the bushes until he was able to press himself up against the wall just to the left of the open French windows.

‘
Zum
Wohl!
’ came a toast from inside. That was Wassmuss’s voice, no mistaking.

‘
Herzlichen
Glückwunsch!
’ one of the German officers said throatily.

There was a murmur of approval and then a moment of silence while the men took a drink. A glass clinked as it was placed down on a surface.

Much to Lock’s irritation, the overheard conversation that followed was in German. But he made a mental note of a few words and names that he recognised, especially one name: ‘Djavid’. He was the Turkish Minister of Finance. A small argument broke out when the name ‘Metternich’ was mentioned two or three times, followed by the German word ‘
trottel
’, and then by two words Lock knew, ‘
Zaptielis
’, the Turkish Military Police, and ‘
khafiyeh
’, the Turkish word for spy. These seemed to calm things.

Lock’s ears then pricked up when ‘Godwinson’ was mentioned, followed by laughter and a spit once again of the word ‘
trottel
’. Another
name was mentioned that Lock didn’t quite catch. There was a pause.

‘
Verstehst
Du?
’

‘
Ja
, ja
. Townshend. Amy Townshend.’

Lock’s heart skipped a beat. Why were they talking about Amy? He cursed his lack of understanding. Why can’t you bastards stick to Turkish? he thought.

There was another burst of laughter and then shifting movement and a buzz of murmured
Auf Wiedersehen
and
Hoşça kahn
. It would appear the briefing was over.

Lock risked taking a peek through the crack in the door where the hinges met the frame. The men were collecting their various caps and hats from a table in the far corner and nodding farewell to Wassmuss. He was standing, arm outstretched, subtly herding them out, while the Turkish naval adjutant stood holding the door open.

‘
Kommen
Sie gut nach Hause
.’

‘
Danke
.’

‘
Gute
Nacht
.’

‘
Îyi
geceler
.’

Lock could hear the soft click of the door closing, then footsteps returning across the carpet. There was a pause, followed by a rustle of fabric, the sudden jangle and turn of a key in a lock and then a tiny creak like a cupboard opening. Silence again, and then what sounded like the jangling of beads, followed by some shuffling of papers and the dull thud of a number of items being placed down on a wooden surface. A sigh of satisfaction was followed by the hack of a throat being cleared, then the clink of a glass and the glug-glug-glug and fizz of champagne being poured. A pause, then a slurp, followed immediately by a sharp hiss and a curse.

‘
Sheiße
. Dieses Glas hat einen sprung
.’

Lock drew his Beholla and stepped out from his hiding place and into the threshold of the French windows.

‘
Guten
Abend, Herr Wassmuss
,’ Lock said.

Wassmuss was standing, glass in hand, while his other was a few inches from his mouth. There were spots of blood on his fingertips and a bleeding cut on his bottom lip. He was frozen to the spot, eyes wide, a look of bafflement on his face.

Lock stepped into the room and smiled wryly. ‘Or should I say
Binbaşi
… Sorry,
Miralay
Feyzi?’ He spoke in English.

Wassmuss glanced at his fingertips, put them in his mouth and sucked. He tut-tutted and placed the champagne glass down on the desk to his right.

Lock took a step forward, gun raised. ‘Hands flat on the desk.
Bitte
.’

There was a pinpoint flame of anger in the intent blue eyes, and then it was gone and Wassmuss, placing his hands flat on the desk in front of him, blinked calmly back.

‘Herr Lock,’ he said. ‘Good evening.’

Lock felt his finger twitch on the trigger of the Beholla. He vowed to shoot this man the next time he saw him and yet here he was unsure of the best thing to do. There were too many unanswered questions, there were too many lives at stake, his own included. He eased off the trigger, but didn’t lower the gun.

‘Surprised to see me?’

Wasmuss shrugged. ‘If I had known you were coming I would have asked for an additional glass. Though your get-up did, I admit, confuse me momentarily. However,’ he smiled thinly, ‘I do like the eyepatch. Most fetching.’

‘It’s the best I could do at such short notice.’

Wassmuss parted his fleshy lips and flashed his white teeth. ‘Well, I had planned for you to be halfway up the Tigris on a … How do you say it? Wild duck chase?’

‘Goose.’

‘
Ja
, “goose”,’ Wassmuss chuckled. ‘But I underestimated your determination to track me down, Herr Lock.’

‘Perhaps if you hadn’t tried to have me killed …’ Lock said.

Again Wassmuss shrugged. ‘
Ja
. Perhaps …’

The two men stared back at one another in silence for a moment. Wassmuss’s face was, Lock noticed, covered in tiny little scars.

His eyes dropped to the desk in front of the German. There was a pair of kitchen scales, iron weights and a number of drawstring cloth bags. Very similar bags, in fact, to the one he had found in the possession of the
liva amiral
back on the tiny sand island next to One Tower Hill.

‘So, not only Grössburger, but Lord Shears and, I imagine, the entire board of APOC are part of your network, too?’ Lock said.

Wassmuss didn’t say anything in return, but just stared back at Lock defiantly.

‘We’re closing in on your operations, Herr Wassmuss. Grössburger, Brugmann, Harrington-Brown, Godwinson …’

Wassmuss gave a snort of derision. ‘You really have no idea, do you, Herr Lock?’

‘You will talk. I’m taking you back with me to Basra.’

Wassmuss started to chuckle. ‘And just how do you propose to do that, Herr Lock?’

‘In your launch, down by the river.’

Wassmuss frowned. ‘How do you kn—’

He cut his question short, realising his mistake. He’d just gone and told Lock that he did have a launch.

Lock gave a wry smile. ‘And when we get back to Basra, I know a certain sergeant major who’d like to make your acquaintance. He’s also extremely good at extract—’

The door at the far end of the office opened and closed, and the Turkish naval adjutant entered, his nose buried in a sheet of paper.

‘
Excuse me, Miralay Feyzi Bey, could y
—’

The adjutant’s eyes lifted to meet Lock’s, and he froze on the spot, the paper fluttering from his hand.

Wassmuss took advantage of the split-second distraction and flung the chipped champagne glass at Lock with a swipe of his hand. Lock put his arm up to dodge the glass, and it bounced off his elbow and smashed on the edge of the desk.

‘
Guard! Guard! Assassin! Spy!
’ the adjutant shouted, as he turned and wrenched at the door handle to make his escape.

Lock felt the Beholla kick back in his hand as he pulled the trigger once, then again.

The adjutant collapsed against the door, slamming it shut, and crumpled to the floor. Wassmuss yelped, stumbled back, and crashed back against one of the chairs to the left of the fireplace. He gasped and slumped down onto his backside, hand pressed to his neck. Blood was pulsing through his fingers and down over his hand, staining the cuffs of the white shirt that protruded from the sleeve of his blue tunic.

There was a commotion of running footsteps from the corridor outside and then a frantic banging on the closed office door.

‘
Miralay
? Miralay? Are you all right?
’ came a shout from the other side. The handle was jerked up and down. But the door was jammed shut by the body of the adjutant. He was lying at an impossible angle, his face twisted up towards Lock, brown eyes staring back at him, lifeless and dull.

Wassmuss gurgled, but could form no words. Lock stepped over and crouched down beside him. He pulled Wassmuss’s hand away from the neck wound. It was deep and the bullet had nicked the artery. Blood was pulsing out at a steady beat. Lock pressed Wassmuss’s hand back to the wound.

‘Bugger,’ Lock said softly.

A flurry of voices was arguing from out in the corridor. Then came a heavy bang as someone began to try to kick the door in. Lock put two more bullets through the door.

The banging stopped.

Lock knew that he didn’t have long before the men on the other side decided to come round through the garden. He looked down at Wassmuss. The German’s eyes were flickering and the colour was draining from his face.

‘What were you planning with APOC? Why was Shears here? Is he part of your network?’

Wassmuss grimaced up at Lock and shook his head.

‘Tell me one thing before you die,’ Lock said coldly. ‘What does the list mean? The
Braut
and
Bräutigam
list …’

There was a flicker of surprise in the blue eyes staring up at him.

‘Is it a death list? People marked for assassination? Is Amy Townshend in danger?’

Wassmuss suddenly convulsed, but Lock couldn’t tell whether the grimace that stretched across the German’s face was in amusement or pain.

‘Are you really even Wassmuss?’ Lock said.

The German’s eyes narrowed. He coughed once. A trickle of blood oozed from his mouth, and then he was still.

Lock grabbed the lapels on Wassmuss’s uniform and pulled the German towards him. ‘Answer me, you bastard,’ he spat, giving the German a shake. ‘What are you planning to do with Amy? Shit!’

Wassmuss’s lifeless eyes just stared back at him. Lock wasn’t going to get any more answers from this man. Ever.

Lock shoved the German back against the fireplace and stood up. He glanced up at the door just as an axe blade came splintering through the top panel, then back down at the still German.

Raising the Beholla, Lock put a bullet between Wassmuss’s eyes. A halo of red bloomed across the wall behind the German’s head.

‘Now I know you’re dead.’

Lock turned and hesitated. Behind the desk, in the wall next to the French window, was an open safe. There was a portrait propped up on the floor just below that of Enver Pasha. The axe splintered the door panel a second time. Lock moved to the safe. Inside were a number of files, a wooden jewellery box stuffed full with drawstring bags of pearls, and a very familiar leather-bound notebook held together with string – Wassmuss’s notebook. Again the axe crashed into the door panel. Lock pulled out the jewellery box, stuffed the notebook in his pocket, turned to the table and pocketed the rest of the drawstring bags of pearls. And then he ran, out through the French windows, past the water fountain, and into the darkness, heart pumping, feet pounding. He ran on across the lawn, through the trees, leaves and branches scratching at his face, and down towards the river. He could hear whistles and shouts of ‘
Khafiyeh
’ far behind him now. Then a sudden sense of calm washed over him, and he slowed, realising that the two men who had seen him in that office back there were dead, and that the clerk at the desk in the corridor would perhaps not even associate the one-eyed naval officer with the killer. Still, Lock thought, it would be foolish to hang around. There was a weak light up ahead and when he reached the river’s edge, Lock could see that it was a lamp post illuminating a small wooden jetty. Tied at the end of the jetty was a lone motor launch.

‘Thank you for your predictability, Wilhelm,’ Lock smiled to himself. He holstered his Beholla, glancing up and down the high, grassy bank. There were plenty of other tied vessels there, but Lock could see no signs of life, and the river itself was dark and still. He strode purposefully out onto the jetty, unfastened the tie ropes, and climbed aboard.

It was a small wooden motor launch, about twenty-five feet long
and fashioned in mahogany. The cockpit was situated behind a curved windscreen, itself above the forward cabin that was accessed through a pair of solid mahogany doors set in the forward bulkhead. Next to this, the wheel and throttle. A Turkish flag hung limply from the mast at the stern. Lock checked the cabin just to be sure. It was empty. He glanced back along the jetty and up the long garden that rose to the building of the Command Headquarters of Nasiriyeh’s garrison. He could just make out the light from Wassmuss’s office through the trees. There were torchlights now, dancing and cutting through the dark. Voices called and shouted to one another. But nobody had run down to the river. Yet.