passport and a letter of authorisation from John Muller’s company, were each given a visa. Shepherd wasn’t travelling under his real name: he was using a passport he had been given for an undercover case the previous year.
The arrivals area was like the Wild West. It seemed that every Westerner there was armed to the teeth and wearing body armour. Within seconds Shepherd had seen a dozen different types of handgun, along with carbines, shotguns and rifles. There were men with bands of ammunition over their shoulders, twin holsters on their hips, huge hunting knives strapped to arms and legs, and machetes hanging from belts. There were men in baseball caps, cowboy hats or with bandanas tied round their heads.
‘This is a freak show,’ said Armstrong, dropping his bag on the ground and lighting a cigarette.
‘Any Westerner can carry a gun,’ said Muller. ‘Sometimes it gets taken to extremes.’
‘Who the hell are they planning to shoot?’ asked Shepherd. Most of the Westerners looked as if they were about to go to war, but virtually all of the locals, other than those in police and army uniforms, were dressed casually, either in traditional dishdasha s or in jeans and T-shirts. There was a lot of posing going on, the heavily armed Westerners standing with their hands on their hips, scrutinising the crowds through impenetrable sunglasses.
‘I wish I was hard,’ said O’Brien, dropping his bag next to Armstrong’s.
‘Half of those guys look like they’re on drugs,’ said Shortt.
‘They might well be,’ said Muller. ‘Not everyone is too selective about who they take on out here. There’s a fair number of Walter Mitty types about.’
Shepherd looked at Muller. ‘You’re serious, are you? Any Westerner can wander around with whatever firepower he chooses?’
‘I’ve never heard of there being any restrictions,’ said Muller. ‘The army might say something if you wandered around with an RPG but I’ve seen pretty much every hand-held weapon out here.’
‘Grenades?’ asked O’Brien.
‘Smoke grenades, sure. And Thunderflashes. Regular grenades are probably a grey area.’
‘And if they kill someone?’
‘Depends who dies,’ said Muller. ‘Frankly, most of this shit is for show. How many guns can you fire? You need a long and a short and that’s it. There’s a woman we see now and then who has a samurai sword on her belt.’ He grinned when he saw the astonishment on Shepherd’s face. ‘I’m not making that up.’
‘Don’t tell me your guys are dressed like Ninjas,’ said the Major, walking up with his holdall. It was about the only time Shepherd had ever seen him without the metal briefcase that contained his satellite phone.
‘They’re a bit more restrained,’ said Muller. He led them outside to where two Toyota Land Cruisers were waiting, similar to the ones they had used in Dubai, and a Mercedes SUV with gunports in the front, side and rear windows. The logo of Muller’s company was on all the doors. Three large men with Uzis in nylon slings and a dark- haired woman with a shotgun, all wearing khaki fatigues and body armour, were standing by the vehicles. Muller introduced them, all South Africans. Joe Haschka was the biggest, with a shock of red hair and freckles across his broad nose and cheeks; Ronnie Markus was lanky with a crooked smile and mirrored sunglasses; Pat Jordan was the oldest, in his late forties, with a grey crew-cut and a tattoo of a leaping panther across his left forearm; Carol Bosch was in her late twenties with shoulder-length wavy black hair and charcoal grey eyes. They took it in turns to shake hands with everyone. Bosch had the tightest grip of the four, as if she enjoyed showing the men how strong she was.
There were two large duffel bags on the ground by the first Land Cruiser and Bosch knelt down to open them. ‘Helmets and body armour,’ she said, in a strong Afrikaans accent. ‘The only time we don’t wear them is when we’re in the compound.’ She handed out the equipment. ‘You’re a big one, aren’t you?’ she said to O’Brien. ‘Biggest I’ve got is XXL.’
O’Brien gave her a cold smile. ‘It’ll be fine, right enough,’ he said.
‘You can loosen the straps.’
‘Carol,’ he said frostily, ‘it’ll be fine.’
Shepherd pulled on his body armour and the Kevlar helmet, then picked up his holdall. Three other men were driving the vehicles, also South African.
‘No locals?’ Shepherd asked Muller, who was adjusting his body armour.
‘We’re not going to be using any on this,’ he answered. ‘Our Iraqi team members have been vetted and I’d vouch for them, but in case we run into problems, a foreign passport will be a big advantage.’
‘They know what we’re going to be doing?’ asked Shepherd.
‘They know we’re going to try to get Geordie,’ said Muller. ‘That’s all they wanted to know. We’ll have a full briefing at the villa.’
‘Are we staying in the Green Zone?’ asked Shepherd.
‘Our place is a mile or so outside it,’ said Muller. ‘We used to have a place inside, but it was a pain getting in and out. At busy times you can be three hours getting through the checkpoint and you’re more of a target standing in line there than almost anywhere else in the city. We’ve got three villas in a compound and we control the security. We know the locals and go out of our way not to annoy them.’
Shepherd, Muller and the Major got into one of the Land Cruisers. Pat Jordan took his Uzi from its sling and climbed into the front passenger seat. He kept the gun on his lap, his finger resting on the trigger guard. He popped a piece of chewing-gum into his mouth and his jaw worked rhythmically as his head moved left and right.
O’Brien, Armstrong and Shortt got into the other Land Cruiser with Bosch, while Haschka got into the Mercedes.
The convoy started up and drove slowly through an armed checkpoint manned by American soldiers and Iraqi troops. The Americans were wearing full body armour and Kevlar helmets, but the Iraqis either had not been given armour or had decided not to wear it. The Americans stared stonily as the convoy went by, but the Iraqis smiled and one, a Saddam Hussein lookalike, gave them a thumbs-up. They drove out on to the main road. ‘How’s it been while I was away?’ Muller asked Jordan.
‘Company-wise, we’ve been fine,’ said Jordan. ‘The city’s heating up. Two car bombs yesterday, three the day before. And that bloody sniper’s making everyone nervous. The only good thing is that he seems to favour Americans.’
‘What about hostage-taking?’ asked Shepherd. ‘Anything recent?’
‘An American camera crew was snatched in Basra two days ago but there’s been no demand yet.’
Ahead they could see two Iraqi ambulances at the side of the road, parked next to an electricity pylon. ‘What happened there?’ asked Shepherd.
Jordan laughed harshly. ‘The electricity company’s been cutting the power off at night to save money. Some of the locals realised they could climb the pylons and cut the wires to sell for scrap while the power was off. They took hundreds of metres and the power company got fed up with replacing it. So last night they cut the power off and switched it back on an hour later. They electrocuted four men, but when the army saw the bodies they were worried it might be a trap so they sealed off the area while they checked for IEDs. They’re only just clearing the bodies away.’
‘Poor bastards,’ said Shepherd.
‘Yeah, literally,’ said Jordan. ‘That’s the biggest problem out here. Money’s pouring into Iraq but there’s hardly any trickle-down. The locals who get jobs with the coalition forces or the international companies do all right, but everyone else is living hand-to-mouth.’
‘Not that different from South Africa, then,’ said the Major.
‘There’s a lot of similarities,’ said Jordan, ‘but the murder rate here is a hell of a lot higher.’
They drove past a dusty football pitch where a group of Iraqi youngsters were kicking around an old ball between makeshift goalposts. Two Humvees were parked nearby and a half dozen soldiers in flak jackets and helmets watched the game, M16s resting on their hips.
Two horses, their ribs outlined against their hides, wandered behind one of the goalposts. Clouds of flies swarmed round them, but the animals didn’t seem bothered.
Everywhere Shepherd looked he saw discarded plastic water bottles, in the road, in the gutters, on the pavements, in the central reservation of the road, and in the fields they drove past. The three vehicles powered down the main road. Shepherd could see that the driver spent as much time checking the verges as he did looking ahead. ‘IEDs still the big problem here?’ he asked Muller.
