Echo of the Reich (43 page)

“Down here,” he said, and led the way down another street, pushing through the crowds that clogged the pavement.

Simply getting through the press of people was difficult enough, because they were moving against the flow, away from the stadium, and the two men had to rely on their bulk to shift people out of the way. But within minutes it was clear that they weren’t going to make it in time. They had to do something else.

“Here,” Bronson instructed, and turned off the pavement into a gap between two buildings.

“What?”

Bronson didn’t reply, just opened the bag he was carrying and pulled out two black nylon vests with the word “police” printed on them, front and back. He had also brought along his utility belt, which he buckled around his waist. Both men put on black baseball caps, again bearing the word “police,” on their heads. The final touch was the sunglasses, which rendered their eyes completely invisible.

Weeks checked his MP5, then slung the weapon across his chest and stood waiting as Bronson looked him up and down. His own Walther was in a belt holster.

“It should be a ballistic vest, obviously,” Bronson said, “and you should have a utility belt, but otherwise it looks quite convincing. I think the British public’s got used to the sight of Heckler & Koch submachine guns on the streets, which isn’t necessarily a good thing. Now let’s get going.”

Faced with the sight of two grim-faced and heavily armed police officers, who were clearly in a hurry, the crowds parted easily in front of them, and Weeks and Bronson were able to run along the pavements almost unobstructed. A couple of times they were forced to detour down less crowded streets simply because of the mass of people virtually blocking the more direct route.

“That’s it, right ahead,” Bronson panted, as a huge building came into view.

He and Weeks slowed down to a jog as they approached the structure, both men looking for the first sign of the trucks that Angela had seen on her television screen. “Over there,” Weeks said, pointing.

To one side of the building was a large open area where rows of broadcast trucks had been parked, presumably after whatever equipment needed had been removed from them. Bronson and Weeks strode across to the high wire fence that enclosed the parking lot and walked steadily along beside it, looking carefully at the parked vehicles.

Around them, crowds of people ebbed and flowed, and above everything else the noise of the thousands of spectators talking and laughing and arguing provided a constant soundtrack.

“Remember we’re looking for an Israeli TV truck,” Bronson said, peering through the fence.

“There are still a hell of a lot of them here.”

“I didn’t say it was going to be easy.”

There were dozens of trucks parked in rows, many with unfamiliar registration plates and bearing logos for TV stations neither man recognized. Large satellite dishes
were mounted on the roofs of the majority of the trucks, but most were folded down because the crews would be using the on-site facilities to relay the events being filmed in the stadium direct to the studios in the country where their TV stations were based.

Bronson and Weeks walked down the side of the fence, looking closely at every single truck as they passed it, alert to anything unusual or suspicious but, as far as they could tell, all the vehicles seemed to be legitimate. Several had their doors open as technicians and other staff bustled purposefully about, getting a few last items of equipment as the media circus prepared for the imminent opening ceremony.

“This is hopeless,” Weeks muttered, as they strode past yet another group of lorries. “There are just too many of them.”

Bronson shook his head.

“I don’t believe that Marcus is planning a suicide trip, for himself or for any of his men, so what we’re looking for, I guess, is a lorry that looks more or less the same as the others, but is probably locked and with nobody working anywhere near it.”

“Okay,” Weeks conceded. “I suppose that does narrow the field slightly.”

Bronson shook his head again. “We’re not going to achieve anything wandering about out here,” he said. “We have to get inside this compound right now, find the truck and work out how to stop the device from being triggered.”

He pointed at a set of gates wide enough for a truck to pass through easily, gates that were of course closed,
and beside which was a smaller pedestrian gate set into the boundary fence, with a booth containing the security checkpoint beside it.

“Just follow behind me,” Bronson said, “because I’ve got a warrant card, and that should be enough to get us inside.”

Half the skill of being an impostor is attitude. People judge others by their bearing, by the way they walk or the way they talk, and Bronson and Weeks knew this as well as anyone. So as they approached the entrance to the compound where the trucks were parked, both men adopted a slight swagger, trying to exude confidence. They weren’t the only armed police in the area. Several pairs of officers were patrolling different parts of the Olympic Park, and that should also help them reach their objective.

The civilian staff member manning the entrance in a glass-fronted booth looked up as they approached.

Bronson stepped forward and held up his warrant card, Weeks right behind him, and strode up to the barrier.

“Let us through,” he instructed.

“What’s the problem, officer?”

“I didn’t say there was a problem,” Bronson replied.

“But we already have a police patrol covering this area. An unarmed patrol,” he added.

“And now you’ve got an armed patrol as well, okay? Nobody told you to expect us?”

“No.”

“So after you’ve let us through, you’d better check with whoever your supervisor is and find out who needs a swift kick in the nuts.”

The civilian gave a resigned nod and gestured for them to enter.

The two men strode on without a backward glance, crossed over to the parking area and then started working their way down between the lines of trucks.

“There’s something else that might help us,” Bronson said. “As far as I can see, none of these trucks are connected to external power, because the crews are using the built-in facilities in the media center. Before the Bell can be activated, it’ll need some form of power supply, so if you see a lorry that’s got a generator running, that could be it.”

And almost immediately, they found one. And the truck seemed to fit the bill in other respects as well. It had a Star of David painted on the side, was somewhat battered around the edges, and had the name of a television station that neither Bronson nor Weeks had ever heard of handwritten on the side panels. And from inside there was a distinct noise of some kind of a motor running.

“God, I hope this is it,” Bronson said. “Cover me, will you?”

Weeks stepped back a few paces and leveled his MP5 to cover the side of the truck over to Bronson’s right.

“Ready.”

Bronson nodded, readied his own weapon, then stepped forward and rapped smartly on the double side doors of the vehicle.

To his surprise, one of them opened almost immediately, and a man wearing blue jeans and a white shirt peered out.

“Hello?” he asked.

As soon as the man spoke, and Bronson could see into the truck behind him, he knew that it wasn’t the vehicle they were looking for. It was very obviously full of recording and other equipment, and he could now identify the noise he’d heard as a heavy duty air-conditioning unit, maybe with worn-out bearings.

Bronson looked at the man for a few seconds, then turned away, gesturing for Weeks to follow him.

“Wrong one,” he muttered.

He walked back to the end of the parked truck and turned right to continue the search.

27 July 2012

“Damn it!” shouted Bronson. “Keep looking. I’m certain it’ll have generators running inside. And the doors will probably be locked, because the weapon must be triggered by some kind of timing circuit.”

“I’ve got it,” Weeks nodded. “Bit of a bloody needle-in-a-haystack job, though. There must be hundreds of trucks here.”

That was a slight exaggeration, but there were a
lot
of trucks in the park.

They walked along the first double row of trucks side by side, looking at every vehicle they passed, searching for any that met the rough criteria Bronson had specified.

“Hang on a second,” Weeks said, as they reached the end of the row. “All these lorries are parked in a kind of herringbone pattern.”

“Yes.” Bronson nodded. “So what?”

“So if that bloke Georg was telling the truth, and the
truck only arrived today, it’s probably been parked in one of the spaces off the central avenue. It can’t be in any of these other rows because those vehicles are boxed in by the trucks behind them.”

“Bloody good thinking, Dickie,” Bronson said.

They jogged over to the center of the truck parking area and started heading back the way they had come, checking the vehicles on both sides of them as they did so. They had almost walked back as far as the closed entrance gates before either of them saw anything that looked like a possibility.

And then it wasn’t something they saw, but rather something they heard.

Bronson stopped short and raised his hand. Even over the all-pervading noise of the crowds of people that surrounded the Media Center, he’d heard something distinctive: a deep rumble, overlaid with a higher-pitched mechanical noise, like a small petrol engine running at constant power. He turned his head to the left and right, trying to identify the source of the noise.

On the opposite side of the open central avenue was yet another of the heavy trucks, an articulated unit, the sides bearing logos that identified the vehicle as belonging to Karel TV in the Czech Republic, and a quick glance at the registration plate confirmed the truck’s origin.

“Dickie,” Bronson called, pointing across to the truck and starting to move. “Over there.”

Weeks trotted across the tarmac, following Bronson.

“You reckon this is it?”

“Maybe. There’s an engine of some sort running in this truck,” Bronson said as he stopped beside the truck
and looked at it critically. “And there are closed padlocks on all the doors. You wouldn’t normally leave a generator running and then lock up the vehicle. This could be the one.”

“I thought you said it would be an Israeli truck?”

“I did. And I got it wrong, okay? I suppose the Israelis would have sent their trucks by ship. It’s only just dawned on me.”

“Right, then. Let’s get inside it and find out.”

They had no bolt-cutters to remove the padlocks, but Bronson thought a nine-millimeter bullet or two would be just as effective.

He stepped forward, drew his Walther and aimed the pistol at the padlock that secured the side door of the truck. He fired at virtually point-blank range at the body of the padlock, which simply blew apart under the massive impact.

But before Bronson could do anything else, he heard the sound of another shot, very close by, and turned quickly to see Weeks tumbling backward, the MP5 dropping from his grasp. And at the rear of the truck, a man wearing overalls was taking aim at Bronson with his pistol.

Instinctively, Bronson dropped the Walther, and dived sideways, rolling across the ground while simultaneously bringing his Heckler & Koch up to the aim.

The man fired twice, both shots cracking through the air somewhere above Bronson.

Then Bronson opened up with the MP5, a double tap followed by another. At least one of the bullets hit the man in the stomach, and he screamed as he fell to the floor, his weapon dropping to the ground.

Bronson glanced over at Weeks, who lay unmoving on his back a few feet away. Then he ran across to the injured man and seized his weapon. The man was whimpering with pain, but there was nothing Bronson could do for him, or for Weeks. His first priority had to be disarming the Bell.

He presumed the injured man was one of Marcus’s men, left to guard the vehicle and ensure that nobody interfered with the countdown to the triggering of the weapon.

The noise of the shots had reverberated from the sides of the vehicles parked all around, and the sound made by a submachine gun firing is very distinctive. Bronson knew that he’d soon be surrounded by armed police officers. He had to confirm that this actually was the truck containing the weapon as quickly as he could because if he’d gotten it wrong it would be too late. The opening ceremony would be starting in less than five minutes.

He glanced behind him: a uniformed police officer was running from the compound. The alarm had already been raised, and within minutes the area would be swarming with police. Time was running out.

He took another glance around him, just in case there were any other armed men lurking in wait, then strode back to the side door of the truck, pulled it open and climbed inside, holstering his pistol as he did so.

It was immediately obvious that this vehicle was very different from all the others he’d seen inside. There was no sign of any recording equipment or the spare parts and cables and lights and microphones Bronson had glimpsed in other vehicles. All that was in it were three large petrol-powered
generators in locked steel cages, their motors running, exhaust pipes running up to the roof, and armored power cables vanishing beneath the floor of the truck. Beyond them, the rest of the truck was blocked off by a steel partition with a single door set into it. The door was also made of steel and protected by a combination lock.

Set into the partition was what looked like a viewing panel, a slab of heavy glass secured inside a steel frame. Bronson walked across to it and peered into the second compartment.

He’d never seen anything like it.

In the center of the hidden space was an object that looked remarkably like a bell, mounted on a steel framework. It was about five feet tall and perhaps three feet in diameter, made of some kind of metal that appeared bluish in color in the dim light. From the base of the object, a mass of cables extended vertically downward, disappearing below the floor.

On one side of the truck was a control panel, further armored cables snaking from it under the floor and presumably connected to the object that lay behind the steel partition.