The Babylon Idol

  Ben reached for his Gauloises and Zippo lighter, flicked a cigarette from the familiar blue pack, clanged open the lighter and lit up in a cloud of smoke. It suddenly felt even better to be home. Puffing happily away, he reached across the desk for the stack of mail he’d been sifting through. So far it had all been bills, bills, and more bills.

  But this letter looked different.

  Chapter 2

  The letter certainly was unusual. More than the Italian postmark, Ben was surprised to see the ink-stamped legend ISTITUTO PENITENZIARO BOLLATI on the envelope. He’d heard of the Bollati medium-security prison in Milan, but never been there, could think of no connections the place could have to him, and wouldn’t have expected to receive a letter from anyone there.

  Yet there was no denying his name and address neatly handwritten on the front of the envelope. Above them, the date on the postmark showed that the letter had left Milan while Ben was struggling to survive somewhere in the middle of the Congo jungle.

  ‘Hm,’ he said.

  At his feet, Storm cocked an ear and glanced up as though to see what the fuss was about, then lost interest and went back to sleep.

  Ben took another slurp of scalding coffee and another drag on the Gauloise, then put down his mug, rested the cigarette in the ashtray and picked up the old M4 bayonet that served as a letter-opener in the Le Val office. He carefully slit one end of the envelope, reached inside and was about to draw out the single folded sheet of paper when his phone suddenly came to life and started buzzing on the desk like an upturned bee.

  ‘Got a problem in Sector Nine.’ Jeff’s voice was barely audible over the crackle of the wind distorting his phone’s mic. Sector Nine was what they called part of the east perimeter fence. ‘That sodding apple tree Marie-Claire wouldn’t ever let me cut down? Well, we won’t need to now. Sorry to drag you out here, mate, but I need your help.’

  Ben could imagine what had happened. He’d read the letter later. He grabbed his leather jacket from the back of his chair and slipped it on.

  ‘You want to come?’ he said to Storm, who instantly sprang to his feet as though it were feeding time. Life was simple if you were a dog.

  Outside in the biting wind, the sleet was turning snowier by the minute. Ben pulled up the collar of his jacket and crossed the yard, past the minibus and over to the ancient Land Rover. It was a tool box on wheels, filled with all kinds of junk including a greasy old chainsaw. Storm hopped in the back and found a space for himself while Ben got behind the wheel, and they set off across the yard and down the rutted track that ran between the buildings parallel with the rifle range and led across the fields towards Sector Nine. He heard the muffled boom of a rifle coming from the range, the ear-splitting report and supersonic crack of the bullet in flight muted by the high earth walls that ran parallel from the firing points to the butts at the far end and prevented any ‘flyers’ from escaping the range boundaries. Not that such elementary mistakes could happen under Tuesday’s expert supervision; he could splatter grapes all day long at five hundred yards with his modified Remington 700, and he was one of the best instructors Ben had ever seen.

  The old tree had been a bone of contention for years. Marie-Claire, the local woman they’d employed from day one as an occasional cook, swore the particular apples it produced were essential to her mouth-wateringly delicious traditional Normandy apple tart recipe. As popular as her tart was with the parties of hard-worked and hungry trainees at Le Val, Jeff had always griped that the tree was too close to the fence and had argued that they could get perfectly decent apples at the grocer’s in Saint-Acaire or the Carrefour in Valognes. It had been an endless and hard-fought debate, with neither side giving an inch, while the tree kept growing taller and spreading outwards year on year. Now it looked as if the winter wind had settled the argument for them.

  The track wound and snaked through the grounds. To Ben’s right, he passed the patch of oak woodland, now bare and gaunt, that in summer completely screened the ruins of the tiny thirteenth-century chapel where he sometimes retreated to sit, and think, and enjoy the silence. To his left, beyond hills and fields and forest, he could see the distant steeple of the church at Saint-Acaire pointing up at the grey sky.

  He loved this place, in any season. He couldn’t imagine why he’d ever wanted to leave it.

  But then, he’d done a lot of things in his life that he couldn’t understand why, looking back.

  As Ben approached Sector Nine, he saw Jeff’s Ford Ranger over the grassy rise up ahead. Then Jeff himself, arms folded and frowning unhappily at the branches that had become enmeshed in the wire. The whole tree had uprooted and toppled over, flattening a thirty-foot section of fence with it. Those ever-lurking jihadis had only to come leaping through the gap, and they’d be just a step away from total European domination.

  ‘What did I always say?’ Jeff said, pointing at the fallen tree as Ben stepped down from the Land Rover. ‘What did I always warn that old bat would happen one day? And did she ever listen to a word? Did she buggery.’

  ‘No use crying about it now,’ Ben said. He grabbed the chainsaw from the back of the Landy. The dog clambered into the front seat, fogging up the windscreen with his hot breath as he watched the two humans set about dismantling the tree.

  Ben started with the smaller branches, trimming them off while Jeff dragged them away and tossed them in a heap to one side. Once the gnarly old trunk was as bare as a telegraph pole, it was time to start chopping it up into sections before the real work of rebuilding the broken fence could begin. By then, the sleet had delivered on its threat to turn snowy. Ben and Jeff took a break, and sat in the Land Rover watching the snow dust the landscape. Ben lit another Gauloise, smoking it slowly, savouring the tranquillity of the moment.

  ‘I love her, you know,’ Jeff said, out of the blue after a lengthy pause.

  ‘The old bat?’

  ‘Chantal. I’m in love with her, mate.’

  Ben had never heard his friend say anything like that before. From his lips, it was like Mahatma Gandhi saying how much he loved a good juicy beefsteak.

  Jeff shook his head, as though he could hardly believe it himself. ‘I mean, I know what it sounds like, and I never thought this would happen to me. But I think she’s the one. Christ, I really fucking think so.’ He glanced at Ben. There was a look in his eyes something like helplessness.

  ‘Chantal’s great,’ Ben said, even though he’d only met her briefly a couple of times.

  ‘Yeah, she is.’ Jeff swallowed, like a man about to make a confession. ‘Listen. I … uh, I asked her to marry me. She said yes. Wanted you to be the first to know.’

  Ben masked his complete astonishment and said, ‘I’m sure you’ll be very happy together.’ The subject of marriage wasn’t one that was ever discussed between them, given Ben’s patchy history in that department. He was more unqualified than most people to extol the joys of married life, but it was all he could think of to say right now.

  ‘Thanks, mate.’ Jeff smiled, then pointed through the windscreen, obviously keen to change the subject. ‘Look at this frigging snow.’ It was thickening by the minute, blown about in sheets by the increasing wind.

  ‘No point waiting for it to stop,’ Ben said. ‘Let’s get on.’

  The chainsaw buzzed and snorted and kicked in Ben’s hands as he sliced the tree into sections, bending over the prone trunk, with Jeff standing at his shoulder waiting to grab each piece as it came loose and toss it into the pile. Ten minutes later, the top half of the tree was next year’s firewood logs ready to be loaded on a trailer and split and stacked in the barn.

  Two minutes after that, it happened.

  There was a strong gust of wind, followed immediately by a strange whizzing crack that was only faintly audible over the noise of the saw. At almost the same instant, Ben heard Jeff’s strangled cry of shock and pain. He looked quickly around, just in time to see the blood fly. As if in slow motion, like a scarlet ribbon fluttering from Jef
f’s body, twisting in the air. Jeff doubling up. Falling against him. Collapsing into the trampled grass. Mud and snow and sawdust and more blood. Lots of it, spilling everywhere. Ben yelling Jeff’s name. Getting no response. The sudden fear twisting his guts like a pair of icy gripping hands.

  In those first confused instants, Ben thought that the chain had broken and gone spinning off the bar of the saw, hitting Jeff in some kind of freakish accident. In a panic he hit the engine kill switch. The saw instantly stopped, and Ben realised the chain was still intact.

  He threw the saw down and fell on his knees by Jeff’s slumped body. Jeff wasn’t moving. The snow was turning red in a spreading stain under him. Ben yelled his friend’s name. Tried to shake him, to roll him over, to understand what was happening. Blood slicked his hands and bubbled up between his fingers. So much blood.

  Now Ben was thinking that the spinning chainsaw might have dislodged an old nail or fencing staple buried deep in the tree trunk from long ago, and sent it flying through the air like a deadly piece of shrapnel.

  ‘Jeff!’

  Jeff’s eyes were closed. His face was white, except where it was spattered red. His jacket and shirt were black and oily with blood. Ben ripped at the material.

  And then he saw the gaping bullet wound in Jeff’s chest.

  Chapter 3

  You didn’t need to be a forensic pathologist to recognise the devastating effect that a high-velocity rifle bullet could have on the human body. And Ben was no stranger to gunshot wounds.

  This one was bad. It was very bad.

  A gust of wind slapped a fresh flurry of snowflakes over them, and suddenly it was blizzarding. Ben crouched in the mud and the blood and the snow, bending over his friend’s inert body, blinking away the flakes that swirled into his eyes. His hands shook so violently that he could barely control them enough to check Jeff’s pulse. Inside the Land Rover, Storm was howling and barking and scrabbling at the window to get out.

  There was no pulse. The shock of the impact had stopped Jeff’s heart. He wasn’t breathing. Red froth was bubbling at his lips.

  Ben closed his mind to the panic that rushed up inside him, and dived into action with artificial respiration to try to force Jeff’s lungs to start working. His own face was soon slick with blood. He could taste the coppery saltiness of it on his lips. He spat and kept trying.

  After ten breaths there was still no response. No breath. No pulse.

  Using the edge of his hand Ben gave a sharp rap to the lower part of Jeff’s breastbone in the desperate hope that the cardiac compression would jar his heart back into life. That was, if the bullet hadn’t carved it into butcher meat.

  No pulse.

  Jeff was dead.

  But Ben couldn’t allow that to happen. He yelled, ‘No!’ And hit him again, terrified of doing further damage to the wound but not knowing what other choice he had. Blood sprayed from the impact. Jeff’s flesh felt cold and lifeless to the touch.

  One more time, Ben resorted to the mouth-to-mouth to try to force oxygen into Jeff’s inert lungs.

  And this time, Ben’s own heart soared as he suddenly felt a pulse, as ragged and delicate as a damaged butterfly’s wingbeats. ‘You’re not dead yet, Dekker!’ Ben yelled, wanting to shake him, slap him. Jeff’s body convulsed and a spout of blood burst out of him with a rattling gasp. He was alive, though Ben knew he could slip back down at any moment and not come back up again.

  There had been no more shots. In his near-panic, Ben struggled to think straight. He remembered that Tuesday was out with the trainees on the long rifle range. Could a bullet have gone astray somehow? Impossible. Not on Tuesday’s watch. And in any case, the shot that had hit Jeff had very clearly come from the opposite direction.

  Beyond the fence. Outside the boundaries of Le Val. Logic dictated that the shooter had hidden himself among the wooded hills somewhere between here and Saint-Acaire. He could have been half a mile away. Waiting, watching through his scope, biding his time for the perfect moment to pull the trigger.

  But who was he? And why had he done this?

  The landscape was rapidly turning white, visibility suddenly diminished to not much better than a hundred yards. There was no sign of anyone. Nothing moved or made a sound, except for the whistle of the gusting wind and the swirl and patter of the falling snow. Ben didn’t want to leave Jeff, but it haunted him that the faceless shooter was still out there, somewhere, perhaps hundreds of yards distant, or maybe moving in closer to finish what he’d started. Ben ran to the Land Rover, wrenched open the tailgate and grabbed the old shotgun that kicked about in the back among the shovels and other tools. A rustic twelve-bore against a long-range rifle was no match, but it was better than being unarmed. He rummaged inside the vehicle for the green plastic first-aid box and shoved it under his arm.

  ‘Storm, go find Tuesday!’ Ben told the German Shepherd. ‘Fetch!’ The dog was trained to know the names of everyone at Le Val, and to locate and alert them on command. Storm cocked his head, understood what Ben was asking him to do, bounded out of the Land Rover and streaked away through the snow like a heat-seeking missile.

  As he ran back to Jeff, Ben tore out his phone and dialled 15, the emergency SAMU number for urgent medical assistance. He forced himself to speak clearly and slowly as he explained what had happened. ‘Please hurry.’

  The nearest hospitals were in Valognes and Cherbourg, both miles away. Jeff was going to need everything Ben could do to keep him alive until someone got here. He was still losing blood much too fast. The bullet had passed right through his body, making an exit hole between his shoulder blades that Ben could have poked three fingers inside. More blood was leaking from that hole than the entry wound, but he’d have to stem the bleeding from both before Jeff lost a fatal amount.

  Ben pulled open a bandage pack from the first-aid kit and tore it in half. Struggling to get Jeff’s dead weight rolled over a little he wedged one knee under his friend’s back with a wad of bandage pressed tightly between it and the exit wound, and used both hands to maintain pressure on the entry wound with the other wad. He squeezed with all his might to staunch the deadly haemorrhages. It could take ten or fifteen minutes of steady pressure to stem the flow – by which time it could all be over. Blood quickly soaked through the bandages until they were saturated.

  It wasn’t long before Storm came pounding back through the snow. Tuesday was sprinting after him, still clutching the scoped rifle they’d been using for their training session. The dog was barking frantically and running circles around Tuesday to guide him on. In their wake came the eight SDAT guys. Tuesday’s jaw dropped in horror at the sight of Ben crouching over Jeff’s bloody form in the snow.

  ‘He’s been shot,’ Ben said tersely. ‘Don’t ask me more, because I don’t know. Just help me. I’ve called for the ambulance but I need more bandages from the kit. Quickly. And keep your head down. The shot came from that way, eleven o’clock. The shooter could still be around.’

  Tuesday nodded dumbly, dropped the rifle and set about tearing open more bandage packs. He knew better than to ask questions. Once a soldier, always a soldier; like Ben he was no stranger to dealing with gravely injured comrades in the field. The SDAT guys were good at what they did, and they were experts in looking tough and intimidating in the black balaclavas and tactical armour they wore on the job, but they had about as much real-life battlefield experience as any other cops, and in those first shocked instants they could do little but watch grimly as Ben discarded the blood-soaked pressure pads and replaced them with the fresh ones Tuesday quickly handed him.

  The SDAT team leader was a tough, gruff Frenchman called Roman Vidal. He took out a phone and urgently, efficiently called in police reinforcements, then picked up the rifle and the shotgun and began delegating orders to his men, marshalling them as though they were dealing with a terrorist attack.

  Which maybe they were. Ben had no idea what was happening, and right now it was the last thing on his mind. Jeff’s
pulse was vacillating wildly, sometimes barely there at all. The blood kept coming, though now the flow seemed to be easing a little.

  With Tuesday’s help Ben laid Jeff out flat on the ground with his legs elevated to make it easier for his weak heartbeat to pump blood to the head. Ben had taken off his bloody jacket and laid it over Jeff to keep him warm. That was all they could do, except hope they could get their friend out of here as soon as possible.

  The SDAT guys fanned out along the perimeter, keeping low and scanning the terrain beyond the fence for any sign of the shooter. The falling snow wasn’t helping. It was becoming hard to tell where the horizon ended and the sky began. Tuesday stayed close by Ben and Jeff, biting his lip in agonised worry and holding in the thousand questions that were bursting to come out.

  ‘Hang in there, Jeff,’ Ben kept saying in his ear. ‘Help’s on its way. You’re going to be all right. You’re going to be fine.’

  He didn’t even know if Jeff could hear him.

  Finally, after what seemed like hours, Ben caught the sound of an approaching helicopter. He looked up and saw the aircraft thudding towards them out of the grey clouds.

  Ben would never know the pilot’s name, but he would forever bless the guy’s heroism for having flown out in such bad weather. The white SAMU air ambulance landed just inside the perimeter, whipping up powdery snow from the ground by the blast of its rotors. Two paramedics jumped out and hurried over.

  It took a monumental effort for Ben to stand back and let them take charge of the situation. Within minutes, Jeff was being stretchered aboard the chopper. Ben kept his hand from shaking as he scribbled out a few details on a form: Jeff’s name, address, blood type and next of kin, which Ben wrote down as Lynne Dekker. Jeff’s father had walked out when he was eight. His mother Lynne had emigrated from the UK to Australia’s Northern Territory a few years back, where she and her new man, an outbacker called Kip Malloy, ran a crocodile farm supplying leather to the cowboy boot industry. Ben couldn’t remember the name of the place.