The Vengeance Man (51 page)

Finally Robertson shuffled the papers together. "Right, Mike, let's just clear this up." The light on his telephone flicked on and off, and he pressed a button to divert the call. 'You met a bloke in a hotel bar in Pakistan.  He tells  you he's an ex-SAS officer now working for a dodgy insurance firm that he reckons is an MI6 cover job." He lit a cigarette and blew smoke at the ceiling.

“The guy claims that he’s the man who topped Lord Isaac Roberts, in the famous shooting of the
decade
, on the direct instructions of Number Ten.  Then he arranged a fake accident for that well
-
known spacer Jonno Briggs, all on the orders of some furtive little Civil Service Committee tucked away in the Treasury.   A department  responsible  for the elimination of the Queen's enemies. Or belting strange Italians around the head to nick their notebooks. Not content with his official duties, our hero, freaky Fritz, the well known ex-SAS heavy, tells you he's privatised the mayhem business, and coyly confesses that he is in fact the darling of the tabloid press, the man we've all been looking for eighteen months, the famous Vengeance Man - but only when he can fit it in with his day job. Which just happens to be killing people on behalf of Her Majesty's G
overnment.  Like Isaac Roberts.
"  Fielder looked  taken aback.   Robertson's sarcasm was notorious.

"So our ex-SAS man decides as a recreational activity he'll, one: slice off the goolies of Spicer, your friendly neighbourhood sex-criminal;  two: stick a poker into some ex-Tory MP turned City shark, who’s fiddling  the Inland Revenue
-
and anyone else who's mug enough to invest with him.  Not to mention a little sideline in blackmail. Right?" 

Fielder nodded glumly.   Robertson continued, "Thus regrettably  causing his sad demise - accidentally, of course,"  he added, with heavy irony. "And last, as his
pièce de resistance
, your maudlin ex
-
SAS drinking companion admits to being the well known public servant who knocked off the infamous Brixton three in an absent-minded moment with some home made dum-dum bullets that he's just run up on the kitchen table.   Right?  Is that it?"

Fielder muttered a shocked 'yes'.

"So then your tame- but garrulous, killer - eyeballs now swivelling in different directions doubtless, and smelling  of last night's whisky - goes off to fame, glory - and according to you,  certain death - on some mysterious job in the wilds of Afghanistan for HMG.   Minus
his sentimental CD player.
But he tells you. Why? Why
you
Mike?
Do you have a sympathetic face?  Or are you both just founder members of the Khyber Pass Chapter Of Alcoholics Unanimous?"

"It wasn't like that, Bill." Fielder sounded tired.

Robertson looked long and hard at his reporter. “Do you really believe all this drivel?”

Fielder looked  crushed.  “Yes. I do. Remember, I met this bloke.”
His voice suddenly sharpened.
“But I met him and you didn’t. I’ve checked it out and flogged round half bloody London since I got back. Yes, I do bloody well believe it . All of it. It's all there. On the tape. Check it yourself if you’re so fussed. It all checks out. Anyway, it should sell a lot of papers. It's a good story. You know it is."

Robertson nodded absently. Of course, Fielder was right. A story like this could sell a lot of copies of the paper, given a bit of a puff, and lots of hype. Couple of prime time TV ads… God knows the comic needed more publicity at present. Marketing was the name of the game today. And it
was
a good story. Better than that -- it could be a
sensational
story. Oh yes. A story like this had legs.

Eventually he spoke.  "Do you know what I'm going to do, Mike?  I'm going to give you a bonus. A big, fat bonus  for a fine piece of reporting. I'm even going to give that second-rate feature piece of yours on the
'Plight of the Afghan Refugees'
-
which is why we really sent you there in the first place , if you can remember that far back
-
a centre page feature, which is a damn sight more than it deserves."

The reporter glowered. “But you're not going to publish my story about Fritz
-
Wright?"

"That's right. I'm not going to print it.   It's spiked.  And do you know why?"

Fielder shook his head, crushed. His silent resentment smouldered.

"Because I think it's true. I believe it. "

Fielder looked up, startled.

“Oh, yes Mike," said the News Editor, nodding emphatically.  "I think it's true.  Every bloody word. So why ain't we going to print it?   Because for a start we'd have an official Number Ten Defence Advisory Notice slapped on us so fast our feet wouldn't touch the ground. And then, in about two days' time you'd get knocked off that silly wee motorcycle of yours and get squashed flat by some taxi or other, or something like that on the way home from work.  All a total accident, of course."

He dragged hard on his cigarette and blew smoke out contemptuously. "No connection. Pure chance. The taxi driver might even go to nick for it." He corrected himself quietly, "No, these guys would make
certain
the taxi driver went to jail for it."

Robertson cocked his head on one side and stared at his reporter. "Can't you see that you're mixing with the big league now?    You’ve stumbled onto a big operation here, can’t you see?  Look, these bastards are obviously hard enough to screw down their own tame SAS man and shop him to the Taliban or the Chinese or anyone else to get rid of him.    Do you think they'd stop at you?  They'd make mincemeat of you. Do you want to end up like Jonno Briggs?" Fielder shook his head. "Look, son, tell yourself I'm doing you a favour. 'Cos I am ... "

He ran his hand through his thinning hair and looked at the younger man.

"Don't sulk, Mike. And don't go around looking for cheap exposures in the fringe mags, either.  If this turns up in the 'Eye' you're dead. Probably literally. Why do you think Tom Hemming's staying
schtumm
? Don't you think he smelled a bloody good story over Briggs?  He’s no fool and a greedy
,
conniving bastard at the best of times. But even he's keeping  quiet because he knows the score.  He's been warned off. And he’ll go on staying quiet for a long time. That's the way it is, and if it's good enough for Hemming - and it's his specialist field - then it's good enough for you. And me."

Fielder shook his head, eyes on his shoes. "No, no," he muttered. "You can't ditch the best story I've ever got ...  You can't."

"Why?   Because you want to expose them? Is that it?"

"Of course,.." started Fielder.

Why?" asked Robertson. "You won’t win. They'll deny it.  In a heart beat. And they can prove you're wrong: yes they can. They can
prove
it. And they will. They’ll wreck whatever reputation you have; leak stories about you. Blacken your name. Probably come round and arrest you for having kiddy pornography downloaded onto your computer…”

Fielder gasped and coloured. “That’s a bloody lie! I’d never do stuff like that. You know I wouldn’t. There’s never been anything like that on my computer…”

“Oh, I’m sure there isn’t.  But by the time these boyos have finished with you there would be, believe me.”  Robertson looked grim. “They’d fit you up in a heartbeat and have you all over the Sun before you’d even called  your lawyer. You’d not be the first, take my word for it. And even if you proved innocent eventually, the damage is don
e. I’d be forced to suspend you
.”  He crunched his cigarette out ven
o
mously.

“Oh I can just see the cosy chat round at Downing Street. The quick couple of discreet words with the Proprietor, at some Number Ten cocktail party. And after that you’d probably never work again, except for the Chipping Sodbury Clarion and Bugle. Can’t you just hear it?, ‘Oh, that’s Fielder the child pornography fellow - you remember…  There’s no smoke without fire’, etcetera.” He looked grim. “These boyos’ll fix you laddie, don’t be in any doubt.”

Fielder sat stunned.

Robertson went on, “Be your age, Mike.  These guys are
big
, whoever is doing this. This is government. Just look at all the trouble they've gone to already.  All the time and money they’ve invested in this.  The flat, the girlfriend, the company. The removals, the Foreign Office pair in the flat, Mallalieu, whatever his name is.... Don't you see?  This is a
very
big,
very
thorough,
very
expensive cover up.  It's been well organised. They'll say we've made it all up, and you won't be able to prove otherwise. 
T
hey'll all lie - even the girlfriend, if what you say is true.  'Cos she'll be praying lover boy's coming back if she's a good girl.....   It’ll be your word against half a dozen solid citizens, all of whom have already been bought off. Or scared off.  Oh, it's good, " he mused.  "It's been well done
, from what you say
..."

"And then you'll have
an accident -
or one of your family will, Mike..."  Fielder looked up sharply. "Oh yes, my friend. You're in the big league now.  This isn't the bloody Kent Messenger or wherever else it was you started . "

Fielder was shaking his head in shock and indignation, "They wouldn't dare.... They can't.  It's wrong!", he choked with anger,

Robertson pulled a face. "Oh, c'mon now. Be your age, Mike,"  said Robertson. "Stop behaving like some adolescent who's just discovered masturbation, morality and Playboy magazine. Do you think that there's no need for this sort  of thing?  Do you think that any state in any age has got by without a little bit of muscle up some dark alley?  It's got to be done, Mike, whether you like it or not. And bursting into print to tell all those miserable commuters on the 8.15  what's  going on their behalf isn't going to make the great British taxpayer feel any happier; or make Whitehall’s Private Finance Initiative
special
goon squad disappear overnight.  Believe you me. It'll just drive it even further underground." Fielder was looking up, startled.

“Of course a bit of killing, a bit of the heavy stuff goes on. Even in Whitehall. From time to time. All governments have to do it. Kill the occasional problem off. Don't you think that the Drug Barons and the CIA and the anti-terrorist organisations use it?  They're at it - all the time. How does Mossad fight Hamas?  By playing Mr Nice Guy? How do you track and trap international terrorists, eh? How would you fight them, Mike?  By throwing down your arms and parading your liberal conscience? Do you really believe that Liberty, the
law courts
and the concerned leaders in the Guardian are really going to protect the country, Mike?  'Tough on the causes of crime?'  Bollocks. D'you reckon that a few daft political slogans are going to change the way the world really works? Eh?"

He didn't wait for an answer. "I'll tell you how. You get yourself a small, rather nasty, gang of dirty tricks goons, a
defensive
squad mind you, with your own tame psychos and heavies tucked away in the background, protecting all those nice wee folk on the 8.15.  And you never,
ever
tell them. You know why?"

Fielder shook his head.

"Because you don't want to put the voters off their breakfasts. Because you don't want to shatter their cosy little commuter worlds.  They’ve got enough to worry about. Austerity,
cuts,
mortgages,
stuff
like that.  Because we like to pretend everyone abides by some rule of law as we tut tut over the latest revelation in the caring press. And when it goes wrong sometimes - like with your drunken lunatic in Pakistan  or wherever - then you quietly sort it out. Deny it. Tuck the problem away. And sometimes that gets a wee bit messy."

He sat forward and fixed
Fielder
with a stare. "Have you ever been in an abattoir, Mike?" Again Fielder shook his head, and muttered 'No'

"Well, I have, and I'll tell you this;  that's a bit messy, too.   It put me off my chops for a week. But I got over it, and I still eat meat. Beef, BSE an' all.   And now I accept the fact that some poor bastard has to work in a slaughter house up to his arse in blood and giblets so that you and I can enjoy a cosy steak dinner once in a while when we take the missus out
on a Saturday night
. That's what it's like out there, laddie. Some people have to work in the bloody  abattoir, so that people like you and me can enjoy our chops in peace. You and
I
, " he corrected himself, absently. 

"I don't like it any more than you do Mike, but I'm old enough to realise that there's a need for it, just like I accept there's a need for coppers.  Bent, bastards, or otherwise.  And funnies. And spooks.  Just don't ask me to be one. They're all bloody wolves and vultures. Believe me: I know."

There was a long pause.

"It's the way of the world, laddy."  Robertson looked at Fielder almost gently. "Look - has anyone come knocking on your door at three o'clock in the morning because of this?   Or on Hemming's?"