to Stein’s left side because he lurched suddenly to the right, then continued running towards the car. Murphy sighted again carefully, then squeezed the trigger.
A small rock about ten feet in front of him and just to the left suddenly shattered and sent razor-sharp stone splinters in all directions. At that instant Stein knew that the sniper had gone back to use his rifle. He also realized he was as good as dead.
The agent wasn’t in bad physical condition – he worked out at the local gym twice a week back home – but he’d always concentrated on upper-body exercises. Track and field had never been his strong point, so even the run up the slight slope to the parked Seat had exhausted him. But when a bullet screamed past him he found extra reserves of strength to accelerate.
And he very nearly made it. He was less than twenty yards from the Cordoba when a 7.62mm round from the Dragunov smashed into his left thigh. It splintered his femur and sent him tumbling and screaming to the ground.
The contact that the Surface Picture Compiler had labelled track two three one had continued heading directly towards Crete. By early afternoon it was only some fifteen miles off the coast, but it had been identified several hours earlier.
One of the CAP Sea Harriers had been instructed to descend to low level and take a quick look at it while the contact was still around fifty miles off the Cretan coast. The pilot had then radioed the
When it reached twelve miles off the coast, the frigate slowed and began loitering. Just before fifteen hundred local time one of the
In the Operations Room on board the
But instead of the ringing tone he expected, he heard a pre-recorded message in Greek which he guessed meant that the mobile was either switched off or outside range of a cell. He tried again, then shrugged and gave up. He had no other way of contacting Richter, except to try calling him a few more times over the next half- hour.
At fifteen ten the helicopter began to descend west of Platanos, until its radar return was lost in the ground clutter. Eight minutes later the helicopter re-appeared, again climbed up to five hundred feet, and headed west back towards the frigate. As soon as it had landed on board, the American ship turned towards the northwest and increased speed to twenty knots, heading away from Crete.
Murphy gave a grunt of satisfaction as, through the Bushnell scope, he watched Stein tumble to the ground. He slipped the magazine out of the Dragunov, pulled out his pistol and jogged down the hill towards the road. He could hear Stein screaming when he was still a hundred yards away. Murphy slowed to a walk as he approached the Seat, moving carefully and deliberately, his pistol held ready in a loose two-handed grip. He could bring it up into aiming position in under a quarter of a second.
Stein had managed to crawl another few yards towards the car, but was still about ten yards away when Murphy stopped moving and gazed down at him over the sights of the Daewoo.
‘Make it easy on yourself,’ Murphy called out, raising his voice over the noises the man on the ground was making. ‘Answer a couple of questions and it’ll all be over. Just one shot, I promise. You’re going nowhere and I’ve got all day. If you don’t tell me what I want to know I’ll take my time over it.’
Stein looked up at him from where he lay on the ground, his useless left leg stretched out, his trousers soaked with blood, and his screams now moderated to a dull moaning.
In his career with the Company, he himself had killed many times, officially and unofficially, and he’d always believed he was smart enough to die an old man in his own bed. The realization hit him hard that he was in exactly the same position as many of his victims had been, staring into the relentless barrel of a gun. In the instant that he looked up, he experienced the same feeling of hopeless, helpless dread that he’d induced in so many others over the course of his career. He closed his eyes briefly.
‘You’re Stein?’ Murphy demanded, and the man on the ground nodded slightly. ‘What have you done with the steel case?’
‘Trunk of the car,’ Stein gasped. ‘In a black bag.’
‘Who was the other guy?’ Murphy nodded towards the Seat.
‘British Intelligence,’ Stein said, sweat pouring from his forehead. ‘Don’t have a name.’
‘British?’ Murphy murmured to himself, a brief smile appearing. ‘That’s not so bad. At least not Mossad. Those fucking Israelis never forget. The Brits have a bunch of rules and scruples. They’re never going to come after me.’ He nodded in satisfaction, lowered the muzzle of the pistol slightly and pulled the trigger. The pistol kicked in his hand, the silencer reducing the sound of the shot to a dull cough. The 9mm bullet hit Stein squarely in the stomach and he clutched at the wound, screaming with the pain. Stepping across to him with unhurried steps, Murphy looked down at him and smiled.
‘You said one bullet, you bastard,’ Stein gasped.
‘I lied,’ Murphy grinned, ‘and you shouldn’t have run.’ He lowered the pistol, took careful aim and shot Stein through the head. Only then did the screaming stop.
Murphy gazed down at the dead man with contempt before kicking him once in the ribs, then headed cautiously up the hill towards the Seat Cordoba. Though reasonably certain that he’d find the British agent either dead or seriously wounded, he wasn’t taking any chances. It was still just possible that the man was alive and waiting with a gun.
He stepped directly behind the Seat, glanced into the wide-open boot to verify that the black-wrapped bundle was still there. With the Daewoo aimed straight ahead, Murphy stretched out his left hand to ease the boot lid downwards a few inches.
Now able to look over it, as far as he could see there was nobody in the car, either in the front or the back seats. Murphy looked quickly all around him but saw nothing. He eased forward slightly to check the left side of the car first, then the right. That was when he started worrying, because he now registered the blown right-hand front tyre. His bullet hadn’t hit the driver, but one of the wheels, which was what had caused the vehicle to swerve off the road. So where the fuck was the driver now?
How could he have got out of the Seat without being seen? Murphy knew he’d watched the car for at least two minutes after it had lurched to a stop, and then he’d put a bullet through the front of the vehicle; he could see both the entry and the exit holes.
Then Murphy remembered something. As the Seat had slid off the road onto the waste ground there had been a short period – just a very few seconds – when the dust swirling around it had almost blocked his view of the car through the Bushnell. It was possible, just barely possible, that the driver, this British agent, could have slipped out of the car through the passenger door.
This realization had come late to Murphy, though his assessment of what had happened was remarkably accurate. Unfortunately for him, it was too late for him to do anything about it.
He whirled round, suddenly conscious that he might have unwittingly made the transition from predator to prey. He swung the Daewoo up to face the threat that he was suddenly sure he was now facing, but he was too late. A lifetime too late.
The bullet from the SIG took Murphy in the right shoulder, spinning him round as the Daewoo clattered to the ground. As he fell back with a shout of pain, stumbling into the rear of the Seat, Murphy looked up at the figure standing ten feet in front of him, and met Richter’s ice-blue gaze.
