Baptism Page 9

  “So what would they normally do if the driver had passed out or died?”

  “They would evacuate all the trains behind and pull them up end to end, open all the doors in the cabs, and evacuate the passengers through the trains to the nearest station—in this case, Leicester Square.”

  “And they don’t want to do that.”

  “Not until they know exactly what’s going on and what the driver’s playing at.”

  “Presumably the Northern Line has been closed down.”

  “They’re in the process of doing just that. The City branch of the line was closed down earlier on because of a bomb warning.”

  “I heard the line was closed on the travel news. I didn’t realize it was a bomb warning. Was it coded?”

  “No, just the threat of a bomb on a train at Bank but it was taken seriously enough to close down that section of the line.”

  “How many passengers are on this train?”

  “It’s a rush hour train, so maybe three, possibly even four hundred at that stage of the line.”

  The numbers jolted Ed out of his comfort zone. “We’ve potentially got four hundred people sitting in a tunnel in this heat? How long have they been down there?”

  “About three-quarters of an hour so far.”

  “Jesus,” said Ed, enjoying the cool breeze of the car’s air conditioning, “I hope they’ve got plenty of water.”

  At the LU Network Control center in St. James’s, Hooper once again took Ed’s arm as he steered him through the labyrinthine corridors. Ed could feel his hand trembling. This coupled with something that Ed could hear in his voice—a certain breathy nervousness—made him suspect that Hooper knew considerably more about what was going on than he was prepared to divulge.

  “So,” asked Ed, fishing a little as they walked along, “who do you answer to on your side of things?”

  “Howard Berriman.” Hooper said it with a certain amount of pride in his voice. Howard Berriman was the recently appointed director general of MI5 and someone whose meteoric rise to the head of Britain’s security services Ed had followed with interest.

  When they arrived at what Hooper described as the gold control desk, which had been established as the operational hub of any potential negotiation, they were met by DI Calvert and DS White from Special Branch. Hands were shaken, Nick Calvert’s big and muscular as befitted a six foot four inch, 238-pound bear, and Des White’s, smooth and smelling of the alcohol handwash that he insisted on smothering his hands with, which had gained him the reputation of being something of a hypochondriac. Shaking hands between colleagues in the force wasn’t something that Ed had been much aware of before he lost his sight but, robbed of his powers of visual recognition, it had become his way of saying hello. Those who worked with him on a regular basis always knew to shake his hand when they met.

  It felt good to be working with White and Calvert. Ed knew that there were plenty on the force who had wanted to see him pensioned off after the Conor Joyce siege and even now there were those who felt that a special case had been made of him—and they were right, it had. But he had earned his place and it was people like Calvert and White who accepted that and let him get on with what he was good at. They weren’t necessarily the best front men in a negotiation but they were solid, reliable, and also inventive and thoughtful. Calvert was one of the most tenacious, dedicated, and intuitive cops he had ever come across and White’s technical abilities had almost condemned him to the sidelines as a technician until his abilities as a listener during a negotiation had been spotted by Ed, who had championed him as an asset to any negotiation team. The respect between the three men was mutual but it was clear, however, that this was not purely a police operation—Mark Hooper was calling the shots—and the mood in the room was awkward.

  “Ed,” said Hooper, “this is Paul Hinton, the network operations manager for London Underground. He’s got a full breakdown of the train’s movements up the Northern Line since it left Morden this morning.”

  Ed shook Hinton’s hand—sweaty—and, taking the seat that was offered him in a cluster of chairs at which they all sat, he listened while the man described how train number 037 had proceeded up the Northern Line from Morden that morning with an operator by the name of George Wakeham on the handle. Hinton spoke with a strong, almost cartoonish, London accent, and his breath smelled of coffee and cigarettes.

  “Anything unusual about Wakeham?” asked Ed.

  “We’ve looked at his files and there’s nothing I can think of.” Nuffink arcan fink uv. “He’s a good driver. No disciplinaries. Anyway, when the train got to Oval station, the controller had a request from the training department to let a trainee driver ride on the cushions—”

  “Ride on the cushions?” asked Ed.

  “Sorry, it means that another driver was getting a lift in the cab—up to the East Finchley depot, as it happens.”

  “And he definitely entered the cab?” asked Hooper.

  “Yeah, he was seen going in by another member of station staff.”

  “Is that normal procedure?” asked Ed.

  “Yeah, nothing out of the ordinary. And we’ve checked him out too.”

  “We’re already digging deeper, running both drivers through the database,” said White.

  The incoming call alert went off on Ed’s phone. It was the call alert he had dedicated to Serina Boise earlier.

  “Serina, hi.”

  “Hi, Ed. I take it you’re now at St. James’s?”

  “Yes, I’m with the team.”

  “Good, all communication links with the train are being patched through to you there. Just to say that we’ve approved the plan to send the two CO19 officers into the tunnel.”

  “What CO19 officers?”

  “I thought Mark Hooper would have briefed you about it. It’s just a standard approach to see if we can make physical contact with the train in the tunnel.”

  It sounded crazy to Ed but he tried to mask the tone of exasperation in his voice as he said, “Why don’t we send the train behind number 037 into the tunnel to connect up with it and have the CO19 officers enter the train via the connecting doors in the cabs? That would provide them with much more cover.”

  “We’ve taken the view that it would also destroy the element of surprise. Our thinking is that if we can get our men on the train without alerting anyone to their presence and have them mingle with the passengers then we have a much stronger advantage.”

  “The chain of command here seems . . .” Ed pretended to be fishing for the word, inviting Boise to offer one, which she did.

  “Weird, I know. It is but we’re going to have to go with it for the time being. I want you to talk the officers into and out of the tunnel, okay?”

  “I don’t have a problem with that, but I just want to ask whether this is the best course of action at this stage before we even know what sort of threat we’re dealing with.”

  “It’s a decision that’s been made in consultation.”

  “With who? MI5?”

  “Yes.”

  Ed had hoped when he took the call that the others in the room might have continued speaking so he could question Commander Boise without an audience but it was clear that he was center-stage.

  “Okay, I’ll talk them in and out but I’d like this on record that I’m not convinced that this is the safest course of action at the present time.”

  “Noted, Ed.”

  Despite his misgivings, Ed knew when he had been given an order. He and Commander Boise agreed to speak later and she hung up. Ed turned to Hooper and asked, “How do we know that a bomb hasn’t gone off down there?”

  It was clearly something that Hooper had given some thought to and his answer came out fully formed. “There’d be survivors on the track. We’d have picked up something on the radio. There’d be smoke in the tunnel. We’ve had none of those things.”

  There was a moment’s silence as the team gathered their thoughts in preparation for further talk of
strategy and potential solutions. Before the chatter began again, however, Ed could feel something in the vibrations given off by the men in the room. There was no mistaking it; the fear came off them in waves.

  9:52 AM

  Leicester Square

  They were told it might be nothing, a tube train in a Northern Line tunnel between Leicester Square and Tottenham Court Road. It might be that the driver had lost his marbles. That’s how Rob had put it. Glen was glad it was Rob. Glen was the youngest member of CO19, the Specialist Firearm Command; Rob was the oldest. Not that Rob was that old. Forty-two to his twenty-eight. But there was something father-like about Rob and, if Glen could have chosen anyone to buddy up with on his first official assignment, it would have been him.

  Rob drove them over to Leicester Square in the armed response vehicle. He could tell that Rob was deliberately trying to keep the atmosphere calm and Glen was thankful for it. Even though it might be nothing, Glen was nervous. But nerves were important; they kept you on your toes. It felt wrong, he knew, to be thinking like this but he kind of hoped it wasn’t nothing. He felt like losing his cherry. He wanted to prove to himself he was up to the job. All the training and theory in the world can only teach you so much. He wanted to face a real-life situation and deal with it, do whatever needed to be done.

  The streets around Leicester Square had been hastily evacuated. They looked odd being empty, the pavements that were normally so busy, offices, shops, restaurants, coffee bars, theater-ticket agencies, their doors usually flapping continually and now standing still.

  When they came to the cordon around the tube station, Rob showed his ID to a couple of uniforms and they drove through and parked up. From the trunk of the car, they took the flak jackets and Rob took the silver flight case containing the two identical 9mm Glock 17 pistols.

  As they went down a flight of steps into the ticket hall, Glen tried to match Rob’s nonchalance even though his heart was racing.

  “You would,” said Glen.

  Rob frowned for a moment before he saw a large illuminated advertisement on the wall opposite showing an attractive young woman in a bikini. It was advertising sun cream.

  “And you would,” said Rob.

  Glen had passed through the circular ticket hall only the week before with his nephew on their way to the latest Pixar movie in Leicester Square. But it was busy then, there were people everywhere.

  At the control room, they were met by a Special Branch techie who wired them up with walkie-talkies and headsets through which they could keep in contact with each other and, via a three-way link, with DI Ed Mallory at the Network Control center at St. James’s. They checked the equipment and everything was working fine. Mallory came through on the radio to run through the details of the operation.

  “You’re to go into the northbound Northern Line tunnel and approach the train, taking care not to touch the two live rails. We’re going to leave the power on so as not to alarm the passengers by throwing the train into darkness. Once at the train you must try and gain entry to the rear cab using the appropriate key, which will be provided. Having holstered your weapons so as to reduce passenger anxiety and also to give the appearance of being passengers yourselves, you should make your way through the train. If there appears to be nothing untoward, you should proceed to the front cab and try to establish contact with the driver.”

  “Why don’t we approach the front of the train from Tottenham Court Road?” asked Rob, his words being relayed with a tiny delay into Glen’s headset as he said them.

  “From a psychological point of view,” said Ed Mallory, “it would be better if you approached the driver from within the train itself rather than from outside. If the driver is in a state of mental trauma, he might be alarmed by the sight of figures in the tunnel. Now, once you’ve made contact with the driver, you should evaluate whether he is in a state whereby he might potentially cause harm to himself or to others, and if he is, then restrain him and call for paramedics. His name—and I want you to use it if you can—is George Wakeham.”

  “George Wakeham—got it,” said Rob. “Are we under standard ACPO rules of engagement?”

  “ACPO rules, that’s right,” said Ed. “But remember the bit about ‘unless this risks serious harm,’ all right?”

  Ed Mallory knew his stuff and he was clearly trying to prise away the sticky fingers of the state firearms legislation to give them some more autonomy, should they need it. The Association of Chief Police Officers rules of engagement stated that they “must identify themselves and declare intent to fire, unless,” as Mallory had pointed out, “this risks serious harm.” Secondly, they “should aim for the biggest target (the torso) to incapacitate and for greater accuracy.” And finally, they “should reassess the situation after each shot.” It was made to sound so bloody simple.

  “Hopefully, you won’t need the guns,” said Ed. “The best-case scenario is that the driver’s had some sort of breakdown and when he sees you guys walk into the cab with him, he’ll probably crumble. But we can’t be too careful.”

  “Okay, you’re the boss,” said Rob and rolled his eyes at Glen, who smiled, thankful for any excuse to escape his nerves.

  “If you see anything, however, that leads you to believe you may be in imminent danger—anything at all—then I want you out of there straight away. This is no time for heroics. What you’re doing is purely fact finding, got it?”

  “Okay, sure.”

  Rob opened up the flight case, took out one of the two pistols and passed it to Glen along with a clip of ammunition. Glen loaded the gun and slid it into the holster mounted under the left armpit on the side of his flak jacket. Rob holstered his gun and they walked down the stationary escalators and made their way through the deserted corridors, digital advertising panels on all sides vying for the attention of the 250,000 people who passed through the station every day, ads for theater shows and magazines, films, books, and music, all of them now redundant, seen by no one, ignored by the two men walking past.

  They made their way down a second bank of escalators and followed the signs onto the northbound Northern Line platform. There they were met by a group of uniformed officers and an overenthusiastic London Underground engineer who was clearly excited to be involved in the operation. He shook Rob’s hand and then Glen’s before he reached into the side pocket of his jacket and took out two metal objects that looked like oversize Allen wrenches.

  “This,” he said, taking hold of a T-shaped key, “will let you open the door into the cab. And this”—he held up a J-shaped key—“will get you through the J door between the cab and the passenger area.”

  Rob took the two keys and slid them into his pocket. Then the engineer gestured for them to follow him down a metal ramp that had been placed between the platform edge and the middle of the track, between the two sets of rails.

  “These little buggers here,” he said, pointing at two rails mounted on white porcelain insulators, “are the live rails. Keep away from these and you’ll be fine. Now, you got a flashlight, ain’t you?” Rob took out his flashlight and switched it on, briefly blinding the engineer. “Ah, right you are then. Well, good luck to you, boys.” The man’s cheeriness would have been funny if Glen had not been so tense. As the engineer made his way back up the ramp onto the platform, Glen and Rob walked into the mouth of the tunnel, light from Rob’s light flashing around the dark cable-lined interior.

  They moved slowly between the lines, their sneakers crunching against the grit on the narrow ties. About fifty feet from its mouth, the tunnel went into a slight bend and descended through a shallow gradient for another fifty feet or so before it leveled out. With any residual light from the station now left far behind, they trudged through the cone of white halogen thrown by the flashlight. Mice scurried about, playing tricks with their peripheral vision, and hinted at the movement of something much larger and more sinister.

  They made their way toward the red light of a signal up ahead and as they passed i
t, they could just make out the two lights on the rear cab of a train about a hundred yards further up the tunnel.

  “I’ve got a visual on the train,” said Rob. Silence. Static on the headset. Then Ed Mallory’s voice: “Okay. Are the lights on or off in the rear cab?”

  “Off.”

  “Approach the target with care and keep me updated.”

  Glen drew his pistol from the holster and, holding it in a double grip, he raised it up and pointed it at the train as they moved forward, Rob shining the torch. The air was hot and smelled rubbery, like bumper cars at the fair.

  Closer still and they could see well enough from the lights on the train that Rob no longer needed the torch.

  “We’ve got movement on the train,” said Rob.

  Glen squinted and could just make out the window in the door in the middle of the cab as it was lowered. He felt Rob’s hand on his shoulder, a signal for them both to crouch down.

  “What is it?” asked Mallory.

  “The window in the cab door is being opened,” said Rob.

  “Wait and observe,” came the reply.

  They waited.

  10:04 AM

  Network Control center, St. James’s

  “Maybe the radio link has gone down,” said Hooper. To Ed, it sounded as though he was in need of reassurance, desperate for anything to contradict the reality of what they had all just heard. Maybe that was how they did things at MI5 nowadays, it was acceptable for operatives to give a loose rein to their emotions. Or maybe Mark Hooper genuinely felt scared and couldn’t conceal it.

  “No,” said Ed. “The line’s still open, I can hear it.”

  White’s fingers clicked a computer mouse and keyboard nearby. “Yeah, the line’s still open,” he said and Ed heard Calvert sigh. Had it really come to this so soon, that people were dying?