Target

  Target

  Brian Freemantle

  writing as Jonathan Evans

  Contents

  Introduction

  Book One

  1

  2

  3

  4

  5

  6

  7

  8

  9

  10

  11

  12

  13

  14

  15

  16

  17

  18

  19

  20

  Epilogue

  Book Two

  21

  22

  23

  24

  25

  26

  27

  28

  29

  30

  31

  32

  33

  34

  35

  Epilogue

  Book Three

  36

  37

  38

  39

  40

  41

  42

  43

  44

  45

  Epilogue

  Author’s Note

  A Biography of Brian Freemantle

  Introduction

  The preliminary events culminating in the various operations described in this book — and the operations themselves — are entirely fictional. All the characters are fictitious too, and any resemblance to actual persons, either living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  However, in a certain central African state—although not that identified in this book—in the mid-seventies a complex covering 100,000 square kilometers was developed by a company whose shareholders were predominantly West German. The function of the complex was to build and launch, at a cost of $70,000,000, a spy satellite for any Third World country prepared to pay for such a device.

  Although initially supported by a West German government research grant, the complex became a political embarrassment to Chancellor Helmut Schmidt after Soviet protests at the United Nations labelled the installation a cover for Western military operations in Africa. To monitor the activities of the complex, the Soviet Union positioned two spy satellites of its own over the area.

  The presence of the installation was fully disclosed in Great Britain by the BBC’s current affairs program Panorama in October, 1978. In 1981, the Israeli intelligence service, the Mossad, and America’s CIA received reports indicating that the complex was being moved northwards from the location of its initial development into Libya.

  In January 1979, Leonid Brezhnev, General Secretary of the Soviet Communist Party, chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet and Marshall of the Soviet Union said during an official interview: “On the whole, over the last couple of years, there have been few encouraging moments, to be frank, in Soviet-American relations. Speaking quite candidly, I will tell you that very often we are hard put even to understand Washington’s persistent desire to seek advantage for itself in the disadvantage of others. All this has, indeed, been tried — on more occasions than one — by American politicians in the cold war period. However, objective reality led the United States to conclude that it was necessary to cooperate with the Soviet Union, particularly in preventing nuclear war and in settling conflict situations in various parts of the world. Our reciprocal will to act precisely along these lines was then recorded in the relevant documents which we in the Soviet Union highly value and in which we continue to see a good basis for a durable and lasting turn for the better in relations between the USSR and the USA.”

  Book One

  I have no spur

  To prick the sides of my intent, but only

  Vaulting ambition, which o’er-leaps itself

  And falls on the other.

  — William Shakespeare, Macbeth.

  1

  The previous night had been bad — one of the worst he could remember — so Peterson was not surprised that Lucille was still heavily asleep. He still went quietly into her room, anxious not to disturb her. She lay on her back, mouth open, snoring. She’d tried to get her dress off, but had become entangled with one strap off the shoulder and the other in place and then apparently collapsed backwards, unable to bother further.

  Peterson knew he should have checked when he came home. Had he not been so completely absorbed with the current crisis, he would have done. But it still wasn’t a very satisfactory excuse: it rarely had been.

  Gently he lifted her legs fully onto the bed and pulled up a sheet to cover her one exposed breast. He realized she was dribbling and when he turned to the side table for a Kleenex to sponge her chin he saw that she had upset the glass. He looked down to the carpet, but there was no liquor stain. She stirred at the movement against her face and he stopped, apprehensively. Her make-up was patched and lined and in her sleep her face had an oddly collapsed look, like a child’s colored balloon the day after the party. Poor Lucille, he thought, poor darling. He paused, turning to put the dirty tissue into the waste basket, aware for the first time of Paul’s graduation picture lying flat upon the side table. It must have been her attempt to stand it there that had upset the empty glass. He picked up the frame, gazing down at the photograph. There had been nothing flaccid or collapsed about her face then. She looked bright and eager and vibrant with happiness — and pride. Certainly there had been everything to be proud of that year. His appointment as Director confirmed, Paul’s graduation magna cum laude and the vacancy awaiting him in one of Washington’s most prestigious law firms, and Beth, still with her teeth in braces, but already showing the roundness of womanhood in her long white dress, promising to be even more academically brilliant than her brother.

  Two years, he calculated. What had happened? What in God’s name had caused them to disintegrate into what they were now: a wife who slept every night in an alcoholic stupor, a cult freak daughter somewhere on a commune refusing to respond to any name but ‘Y,’ and a son who seemed to enjoy the embarrassment he caused as the capital’s foremost advocate for decriminalizing the drug legislation and defender of the underprivileged.

  Washington, Peterson supposed. It was certainly the social brawl that had shown Lucille the way to anaesthetize herself against her disappointment. But Washington wasn’t the only cause — not even the main one. It was him, Peterson accepted. He had allowed it to happen, by imagining that examination results and Phi Beta Kappa keys meant adulthood. When they had needed him, he hadn’t been available. He’d been at the headquarters at Langley or the White House or at the National Security Council or in some embassy in some foreign capital, the dynamic chief of the world’s most effective intelligence agency, not intelligent enough to realize the effect of his neglect on his family.

  Lucille whimpered in her sleep, a pained sob. She turned, thrusting the sheet away and carefully Peterson covered her again. The movement caused his watch to show, warning him how soon his driver would be arriving. Because of the crisis, Peterson had ordered him an hour earlier than normal. He’d been awake before dawn and wished now that he’d summoned the car sooner. He was anxious to learn what had come in overnight.

  He went back to his own room to prepare himself. He frowned at the word, recognizing it as appropriate. That was what he did: prepared himself. Like an actor applying the make-up for a particular performance, James Peterson every day adopted the carefully rehearsed role. He chose a discreet tie to accompany the discreet suit, selected a matching shirt from among those still crisp in their laundry cellophane and took from its accustomed drawer the duster specially placed there to give his already gleaming shoes a final buff. He surveyed the completed effect; overall it was one of competence. That’s what he was, Peterson thought — competent.

  Apart from Paul
’s occasional, slightly endangering outbursts in the Washington Post or the Star, the shambles of Peterson’s personal life was carefully kept behind the triple-locked front door of the Georgetown brownstone. Publicly — and that was what mattered in Washington — he was regarded throughout the capital as someone who had reorganized and run the CIA with a competence and ability far beyond that shown by at least three of the Directors who had preceded him. Not once had he submitted a faulty foreign analysis to the President or the National Security Council; not once had an operation been initiated or sanctioned and later become a diplomatic embarrassment.

  Through the window he saw the black, armored limousine pull into the curb, the bodyguard leaving through the front passenger door even before the vehicle came to a halt. Peterson straightened, as if trying to attain some stature, and breathed deeply, a small, almost inconspicuous man packaged for the world outside.

  Two years without a failure, Peterson calculated again. He’d been lucky, he accepted realistically — but always competent. And now that record, the only thing left in which he had any pride, was endangered. He knew little more now about what was happening in Africa than he had done when they were first warned of the installation and then confirmed its presence with satellite reconnaissance. Less, in fact. What had occurred since they had started investigating had increased rather than lessened the mystery. A month before it had been an uncertainty; now it was approaching priority proportions. And the Russian involvement only added to the worry. The President wouldn’t like the presence of the Russians.

  Peterson heard the doorbell chime and immediately left the room, before the maid could call up and possibly awaken Lucille. The woman was waiting as he descended the stairs, the door already open.

  “Mrs. Peterson isn’t feeling very well,” he said.

  “No,” she said expectantly.

  “She’ll probably stay in bed, until lunchtime at least.”

  “Of course.”

  They knew their lines very well, thought Peterson. Another performance. He nodded to the guard, following him out to the waiting car. The glass shield separating the driver from the back seat was lowered and when the car began moving Peterson raised it, indicating that he didn’t want any conversation. For several moments he stared out, as the limousine slowly made its way out of the ghetto of the Washington élite, but as soon as they entered the city proper he turned back inside the car. The Washington Post and The New York Times were already laid out waiting, and beyond them was the foreign news digest which was prepared throughout the night and made available for him every morning, an exact copy of that prepared for the President.

  Irrationally — which was unusual because Peterson was not an irrational man — he felt a stab of impatience at having to wait until Langley to discover what he really wanted to learn. He grimaced at the feeling, irritated by it; at this stage it would be ridiculous to permit that sort of anxiety. Knowing it would be equally ridiculous to expect it, he still went through the newspapers and then the digest seeking any reference to the part of Africa about which he was scheduled to brief the President that morning. There was nothing.

  He went back to the newspapers and then the overnight roundup, reading them this time for their proper purpose. Peterson had an encyclopedic yet analytical mind, capable not only of total absorption but also of immediate recall, and by the time the limousine turned off into the CIA complex deep in the Virginia countryside, he knew he was sufficiently briefed for any discussion that might arise during the day.

  Walter Jones was already waiting when Peterson entered the office, knowing that the Director would expect him to be there.

  “Anything?” demanded Peterson, immediately.

  “Not enough,” said his deputy. Jones was a balding, scholarly-looking man who affected tweeds and a pipe which he always appeared to have difficulty lighting. They had known each other for fifteen years and Peterson regarded him as one of the few good friends he had in Washington. Frequently he envied the man’s unencumbered life as a bachelor.

  “What?”

  “They’d already buried Brinton by the time our people got from N’Djamena … it’s customary apparently, because of the heat.”

  “I know that,” said Peterson, impatiently.

  “They managed an exhumation,” said Jones. He indicated Peterson’s desk, turning his mouth distastefully, “There are the pictures. Poor bastard.”

  “Nothing apart from a crocodile attack?”

  Jones shook his head. “They weren’t equipped for a proper autopsy, of course. But that was all that was obvious. He’d been terribly mauled.”

  “What about Jenkins?”

  “Still nothing,” said the deputy.

  “Did they inquire?”

  “As best they could, without wanting to cause any undue interest. There wasn’t a trace.”

  “When was his last radio contact?”

  “Two weeks ago.”

  “Anything on the emergency frequency?”

  “We’ve had a twenty-four hour monitor established for over a week. There hasn’t been a thing.”

  “They were both good men.”

  “The best,” agreed Jones.

  Peterson picked up the photographs. “So we can’t believe that this …” he frowned at what they showed, “… or whatever has happened to Jenkins is an accident. Or carelessness.”

  “No, definitely not.”

  “OK,” accepted Peterson, leaning across the desk to talk the problem out. “We’ve discovered a perfectly bona fide consortium of West German companies, all with links or association with rocket research and development, who have apparently established an installation in the middle of an underdeveloped African country and could appear to be building a communication satellite.…”

  “So far, so good,” agreed Jones.

  “And so far, no illegality,” continued Peterson. “The indications are that they intend to lease out at a very high price access to and usage of the satellite, wherever they place it.…”

  “Which creates a political problem,” interjected Jones.

  “Political,” seized Peterson immediately. “But that’s still all it is. So why have two of our operatives been eliminated?”

  “That’s the big one,” said Jones. “If that hadn’t happened, I’d have said all we’d got was an irritation. Now we’ve got to find out why.”

  “And who,” said Peterson. “The consortium might be constructed to avoid tax, but every member is well established and respected, not just in Germany but throughout the world. They don’t kill people.”

  Peterson once again took up the photographs of what remained of the agent whom they had infiltrated in through the Cameroons the previous week.

  “Jesus!” he said softly.

  “Hope to Christ he was dead first,” said Jones.

  Peterson thrust the pictures aside, turning to the file that had been taken from the security room and laid in readiness on his desk. “Does the President have a copy of everything?” he asked.

  Jones nodded. “There are some fresh satellite shots, although they don’t add much.”

  Peterson opened the folder. The Chad border with Libya, Sudan, the Camaroons, Nigeria and Niger had been superimposed, for ease of discussion. Peterson isolated Lake Chad, then the capital N’Djamena, and then, to the north, the huge complex.

  “No sign of any rocket yet?” he demanded, not bothering for the moment with the detailed analysis.

  “No,” said Jones. “But that doesn’t mean much. Anything would be kept in a silo until the last minute.

  Peterson was bent forward over the analyst’s report of the space-satellite photographs of the installation. He looked up suddenly, his finger marking the spot at which he had stopped reading on the second page.

  “From the silo dimensions,” he said, as if he found the information difficult to accept, “they estimate the rocket size capable of lifting a nuclear pay-load into orbit.”

  “Just the capability,” s
aid Jones, cautiously. “Our intelligence talks only of a monitoring satellite.”

  “You’ve ordered the people back from N’Djamena?”

  Jones looked at his watch. “They’re due at Andrews airbase in about four hours.”

  “I want them brought here immediately.”

  “I anticipated that,” said Jones. He fumbled to get his pipe ignited. There was a lot of flame but nothing happened.”

  Peterson finished the photographic analysis and sat back in his chair.

  “So our only remaining hope is Williams,” he said.

  “It would appear so.”

  “Is he maintaining contact?”

  “On the button,” said Jones. “He hasn’t missed a transmission yet.”

  “When’s he next due?”

  “Six tonight, our time. According to the last message, he should have reached the installation by then.”

  “What about the Russians?”

  “Nothing more than you already know.”

  “They’ve put a satellite over it, like we have?”

  “Unquestionably,” said Jones.

  “We can’t be left behind on this.”

  “I know,” said the deputy.

  Peterson braced his hands against the desk, a prelude to a decision. “What would happen,” he said, “if we put out an all-stations call to anyone with a double agent to try to discover how much the Russians know?”

  Jones regarded him doubtfully. “Odds are that Moscow would find out and realize how badly we’re doing.” He appeared surprised at the question.

  Peterson nodded, accepting the warning. “So they might make a mistake … give us a lead we haven’t got.”

  Jones remained doubtful. “It’s risky,” he said.

  “But justifiable,” said Peterson. “They might just do something silly, through overconfidence. Maybe it’s time to start considering insurance options. I want it done.”

  The Director reached out again for the pictures of the agent who had supposedly been killed by crocodiles. “Let’s hope Williams has more luck than this poor son-of-a-bitch,” he said.

  “Yes,” agreed Jones. “Let’s hope.” His pipe flared at last and he sat back in a billow of smoke. And let’s hope this Russian lure isn’t a cock-up, he thought.