Dead Centre - Andy McNab [52]
All the windows had been fitted with plastic or aluminium double-glazing at some stage, the kind that meant you couldn’t possibly escape if someone torched your house. That was just the cheapest way to do it.
Black wheelie-bins and matching Sky dishes lined every front wall.
I checked my Breitling. I’d had a little bit of a spending spree with Anna in Moscow and thought it was time to step up a notch. Funnily enough, it told me the same time as any other watch, but it still gave me a kick every time I looked at it.
It was 01.35.
I slipped it off my wrist and out of sight.
Nadif had told me to keep an eye out for Ali’s convenience store. A car passed, stopped at the junction behind me, and then drove off. I was impressed. Frank’s lads had done really well staying with me.
Now and again a TV blared and light flickered in the gap between the curtains. The only other noise came from trains rattling past the end of the road behind me.
Back in Queen Victoria’s day, Ali’s front window would probably have boasted neat displays of coal-tar soap and jars of imperial jam. Now it was full of Chinese pots and pans and offers of a thousand tea-bags for 99p. Peeling stickers announced it was a gas and electricity pay point, sold SIM cards, Mars bars, the News of the World and fax and photocopying facilities.
The only thing they didn’t advertise was hawala broking services, but I had no doubt that if you wanted to send money to relatives in Karachi, Dubai or Mogadishu, Ali would be your man. You’d bring your cash along and give him a code word or phone number, which he’d pass to a broker at the other end. Your favourite uncle would turn up, say the magic word, and be handed a brown envelope of the local currency – minus commission, of course. The two brokers would sort that out between themselves.
Billions and billions of dollars had been moved all over the world in this way for decades. It’s the money-movement method of choice for criminals and terrorists, for obvious reasons, and a law-enforcement nightmare. Not that any of the lads round here would be financing the next 9/11. They’d just be slipping a few bob to their families back home so they could eat.
The shop was closed, but it wasn’t cut-price tea-bags I was after. It was the blue door to its left, which belonged to the flat above. The wrought-iron knocker was in the shape of a lion’s head. I tapped it three times. I didn’t bother checking whether Ant and Dec were breathing down my neck. I’d brief Frank as soon as I knew what he needed to know.
A light came on behind flimsy curtains on the second floor. The silhouette of a body moved across the room. A few seconds later, two lever locks were being turned and I had to step back as the door was pushed open. I soon saw why. There was an ornate wrought-iron security gate behind it, fastened through the first two bars with a D-ring bicycle lock.
I could tell the lock was an old one by its circular key well. It was probably another of Ali’s bargains – and a complete waste of time. Before manufacturers wised up and introduced flat keys, me and a couple of mates used to supplement our rifleman’s wages by nicking mountain bikes from Andover’s sports centre when we were squaddies in Tidworth. We’d hire a van for the weekend, throw as many in the back as we could liberate, and flog them on the London estates.
A steep, narrow stairway with a threadbare brown carpet led into the gloom the other side of the gate. The woodchip wallpaper could have done with a few licks of paint.
My new best Somali mate stood at the bottom of the stairs, wearing the kind of smile that any vicar would have been proud of. A good six feet tall and slim, with fine features and high cheekbones, he really did come from the place where Africa meets Arabia.
‘You are Nick.’
The voice belonged to a man about three stone heavier. Mr Lover Man back in Moscow would have given his right arm for a voice like that.
I nodded. ‘Nadif?’
16
HE CHECKED LEFT and right my side of the gate.