packed. And every one of the passengers appeared to be a young Asian male. At the front of the line was a police car, its lights flashing, acting as an escort.
‘Holy shit,’ said Carver, still looking out of the window. ‘What are the plod going to do about that?’
‘What can they do?’ said Grantham. ‘They can hardly keep them out. Everyone gets to see the President, except the Muslims? That would go down like a cup of cold sick.’
‘But they’ll have to strip-search the lot of them!’
‘And then they’ll start claiming discrimination-’
‘Which it is.’
‘Up to a point. You noticed any Hindu terrorists on our soil lately?’
‘But those people will say they aren’t terrorists, they’re upright British citizens. What a mess.’
‘I know,’ said Grantham, his face wreathed in a broad smile. ‘And our good friend Assistant Commissioner Manners has been lumbered with it.’ He sighed contentedly. ‘I knew this was going to be an entertaining day.’
The Bradford convoy was directed to a special area of the coach park where a line of policemen diverted from other duties was waiting for them. Each vehicle was carrying at least fifty passengers. When the luggage holds were opened it was revealed that every one of those passengers had a rucksack and many were also supplied with large placards and banners, some carrying slogans like those on the coaches, others bearing the flags of Iran, Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan and Pakistan. A police inspector was foolish enough to order the men to leave their belongings on the coaches and proceed to Broad Quay empty-handed. At once, he was surrounded by half a dozen irate community leaders.
‘Look!’ shouted one, pulling out a woven mat from his bag. ‘Prayer mat! You telling me I cannot pray? This is religious hatred! This is harassment!’
‘What about all them lot?’ said another, his accent pure Yorkshire, pointing at a line of young white people, many of them carrying bags no different from those being taken from the coaches and waving banners emblazoned with peace signs and pictures of Lincoln Roberts. ‘Tha’s not stopping them. That’s racism, that is.’
A group of more than fifty furious young men gathered around their leaders, shouting and waving fists at the now-terrified inspector, whose own men moved in to rescue him from the mob. As a stalemate was reached at the coach park – a seething mob of Asian Yorkshiremen on one side, a nervous line of police on the other – word of the confrontation reached Peter Manners in his command centre, and Tord Bahr, newly arrived at Fairford.
‘Get them out of there, right out of the city!’ Bahr shouted. ‘These are the people who let off bombs in London. They’re Islamic terrorists. I don’t want them anywhere near this thing.’
‘I’m afraid it’s not that easy,’ said Manners, trying to keep his cool. ‘In the first place, the government does not acknowledge the concept of Islamic terrorism, the official term is “anti-Islamic activity”-’
‘You have got to be kidding me!’
‘And in the second, any attempt to remove around five hundred fit young men would require all the manpower I have available, quite apart from the potential for widespread public disorder if the riot spreads. Just let us handle it. We’ll let them in, but not before we’ve made certain that they can’t do any harm.’
Half an hour was spent organizing the Bradford contingent into a line, complete with all their baggage. They were marched down to the security checks under massive police escort. More chaos ensued as all were subjected to bag and body searches whose severity slowed down the entire crowd as they waited to get into the speech site, causing shortened tempers and raised voices and adding to the confusion.
The tallest building on Broad Quay, a new office development, was also the closest to the stage. The building had been closed to the public, its occupants given the day off whether they liked it or not. Up on the roof three men, all wearing variations on the theme of black urban-combat uniforms, were peering back up the quay through binoculars, trying to get a look at the chaos.
Two of the men came from a Secret Service counter-sniper team. They bore small Stars and Stripes patches sewn on their packs and uniforms. Their handguns were carried in holsters strapped to their right thighs, directly below which their gold badges were displayed. One of the pair was standing by a custom-made sniper’s rifle of a type known as a JAR, or ‘Just Another Rifle’, because its manufacturer and specifications are confidential.
‘Man, you guys have sure screwed this up,’ he said.
‘Oh, I wouldn’t worry,’ said the third man in a languid upper-class English accent. ‘I’m sure we’ll have it all more or less under control by the time your boy gets up to say his piece.’
One of the Americans rolled his eyes at the other, who nodded back. The arrogant and often unjustified air of casual superiority affected by some British officers had become a publicly acknowledged source of irritation to their US Army counterparts in Iraq and Afghanistan. Now they were going to have to spend a whole day stuck on a roof getting their chains yanked by this mousy-headed, sulky-faced jerk-off.
Damon Tyzack, however, couldn’t have been happier, even if he had been obliged to dye his hair. He had counted on the fact that the weak spots in the security for any major event occur along the fault-lines between different nations and agencies, all of whom mistrust, despise and compete with one another to a greater or lesser degree. At the very least they fail to communicate fully. So if the system were put under unexpected additional stress, he’d felt certain it would crack.
The Bradford Pakistanis had done their job perfectly and were well worth their hundred grand. Tyzack had confidently sauntered past an overworked gatekeeper with a single flash of a well-forged military ID card. Once he was inside the security cordon, looking as though he knew what he was doing, no one had asked him any questions. Now he’d found himself a grandstand seat for the big event, up here on the roof. Everything was proceeding exactly as he had planned.
Tyzack’s iPhone was encased in a black rubber housing which gave it a military air. He used it to call Ron Geary, who was sitting with two other men in the back of the white Ford Transit, parked near an open expanse of playing fields, all deserted on this weekday morning, to the north-east of the city.
‘Confirm your status,’ he said.
‘Ready to go, boss. Just say the word.’
‘Await my command,’ he said. ‘Out.’
Everything was in place. All he needed now were his targets.
87
‘Hello, Lara, my name is Lincoln Roberts. Well, don’t we make a pair?’
Jake Tolland had to smile at that. Roberts was the epitome of an African-American patriarch: physically imposing, exuding a commanding dignity, with a full head of hair lightly dusted with silver threads among the black. Next to him, Lara looked tiny, very young and utterly vulnerable. The White House stylists had deliberately gone for the most innocent, girl-next-door look they could find, rejecting anything that even hinted at sexiness. So she’d been dressed in flat shoes, loose-cut jeans, a plain T-shirt and a knitted cotton cardigan to ward off the cool of a grey day in June. Her hair was tucked behind her ears and the make-up artist had given her face just enough definition to show up under the stage lights, without adding any glamour whatever.
Even so, Tolland thought, Lara looked wonderful and he agonized for the umpteenth time about the fact that his heart did a backflip every time he set eyes on her. It was inappropriate in every way. She was too young for him. She had been appallingly abused by men. They were supposed to have a dispassionate, professional relationship. If she wanted anything from him, it was protection. Yet he could not deny what he felt and the detached, observing side to his nature saw that she was the perfect poster-girl for Roberts’s campaign. The world would fall a little in love with her, too. And for a black President to be fighting for the rights of a white slave girl, well, Tolland reckoned that was a stroke of public-relations genius.
‘And you must be Jake Tolland…’
Tolland realized with a start that the President was talking to him. He just managed to splutter an answer: ‘Er, yes, Mr President.’
Lincoln Roberts looked him in the eye, and as he looked into that strong, warm, wise face Tolland found himself overawed, almost hypnotized by the sheer charisma of the man.
‘You wrote a good story, Mr Tolland. I could tell that you were being true to your subject. I admire that. I can
