The Watchers (8 page)

– 10 –

My heartbeat picked up noticeably as the man in the black suit led me not to the MoD building we’d been standing opposite but to the Hotel Metropole just down the road from Trafalgar Square. We passed through a great revolving door into a splendidly decorated lobby – all marble columns and red carpets. The place was oddly deserted. Not a guest in sight. Not even a receptionist.

The man led me across the lobby towards an old-style lift next to which was a sign that listed a basement, a ground floor and five floors above us. ‘Where are we going?’

His only response was to produce a small brass key. The lift doors slid closed behind us and I felt my anger rise, for I was certain that he was enjoying this.

‘Tell me!’

‘Room 800,’ he said as he inserted the brass key into a tiny hole at the bottom of the lift control panel.

My gaze jumped to the buttons. ‘But this building only has five floors . . .’

‘We’re not going up, Mr Wilding. Room 800 is located eight floors
down.’

He turned the key. The lift jolted, and we descended into the ground.

Understanding dawned. ‘The hotel is a front?’

He nodded silently.

‘For what?’

‘You’ll see.’

I had no idea how deep we were going but my ears popped as we descended. The evening’s events were taking their toll: I felt weak and nauseous, and it was becoming increasingly difficult to focus.

‘What you are about to see is classified at the highest level,’ said the stranger as the lift shuddered to halt. ‘What you learn here, you leave here. Understand?’

I nodded.

He dragged back the door to reveal a further steel door, pushed a button, and I heard a locking mechanism turn. Then the door swung open, revealing a wide white-tiled tunnel that ran straight into the earth as far as the eye could see.

‘What the hell is this place?’

‘This city has its fair share of hidden histories and quiet corners. You’re standing in the very best: an underground fortress, Mr Wilding, constructed after the crisis in Cuba to meet the needs of a government and Parliament in hiding. We use it now primarily as a crisis management and communications centre.’

‘How deep are we?’

‘Two hundred feet below ground.’

Buried alive
, I thought.

The man in the black suit led me deeper into the facility. The air was thin, processed, and thick pipes and cables lined the walls.

‘One kilometre long and six hundred metres across, this bunker can house four thousand government officials. It’s totally self-sufficient, blast proof and radiation proof.’

‘Who works down here?’

‘People without names. One hundred senior civil servants. Rotating teams. Three months on, three months off. It’s a way of life for them.’

I had been in nuclear bunkers before, when Bestford had toured some military bases in Scotland. I had been on three such trips, but I had never seen anything quite like this. As the stranger led me along the corridor, the sheer size of the facility became ever clearer: my eyes roamed from the green linoleum floor, to the gleaming tiled walls, to the many turnings into separate tunnels. A sign immediately up ahead was marked with an arrow and read
TUNNEL F: POST OFFICE TOWER, 350 YARDS. HOUSE OF LORDS, 1,700 YARDS
.

‘This is impossible,’ I muttered. ‘An operation this size?’

Legends of underground connections between government offices were rife in Parliament. But no one I knew seriously believed these places existed. Something so large could never remain secret, could it?

‘The Germans managed it,’ said the man in the black suit when I asked him. ‘The secret rocket factories at Nordhausen were four miles deep, huge facilities joined by enormous tunnels constructed forty years ago. I can assure you that modern tunnelling technology is more than up to the job, Mr Wilding. Some bases near the coast join with natural caverns and passages, even extending under the sea.’

Why are they showing me all this?
I asked myself.
And what can possibly be so important, so sensitive, that it needs to be examined under two hundred feet of concrete?

A solid steel door up ahead indicated there was more yet to see. And as my intimidating guide proceeded to open it, I was wishing I had taken the precaution of telling someone what I was doing that evening.

Not that I had anyone to tell.
And they’d never find me anyway.

The enormous door buzzed open. A switch flicked. Rows of lamps suspended from the ceiling above us cascaded on, and I gasped at the sight of a huge strongroom of boxes and files towering up to a ceiling that must have been one hundred feet above. In the centre of this steel-reinforced concrete chamber was a large mahogany desk and an old-fashioned drinks cabinet. The furniture looked distinctly out of place in this setting but fitted perfectly with the silver-haired man rising from his seat at the desk to greet me.

‘Welcome, old chap, to Room 800.’

I moved swiftly towards the man I thought I knew, suddenly full of frustration. ‘Admiral, what the hell is going on? Why am I here?’

A searing pain made me freeze. The man in the black suit had grabbed me, twisted my arm roughly behind my back.

‘No, no. It’s quite all right,’ said the admiral. ‘Let him go.’

He did so. I held still for a long moment, breathing deeply, waiting for the admiral to dismiss the man.

‘Did you know about the explosion?’ I demanded once we were alone. ‘Is that why you told me not to go to the inquiry?’

The admiral came towards me slowly. ‘We didn’t know exactly where and when the attack would happen.’ He saw my hand still trembling and said softly, ‘Now then, I’d try to calm down a little if you can. You’re going to need a clear head for what’s coming.’ He turned and his gaze roamed the enormous room. ‘You are looking at the jewel in the crown, the details of British intelligence operations collected over decades.’

‘I thought government documents are kept at the Public Records Office?’ I said, taken aback.

‘Oh yes, indeed. That’s where they are
supposed
to be.’ His smile was furtive. ‘These are the cases no one knew what to do with – propaganda projects, assassination targets, acts of bribery. Every difficult decision ever faced by successive Cabinet secretaries. If certain issues were too difficult, too sensitive, they were locked up down here.’

Almost involuntarily I reached for the nearest box slotted into place on a metal shelf, but the admiral’s hand shot out and fastened on my wrist. ‘No, no. I cannot sanction that. Some secrets must remain secret.’

I nodded, momentarily embarrassed at my own impetuousness, but I couldn’t help asking the obvious question. ‘Then why bring me down here?’

‘To give you a sense of the overall picture. There is much the people of this country do not know, a secret history that would stun minds: Soviet defections, covert operations. You wanted to know the truth about that night in 1963 – what happened at RAF Croughton, about Project Caesar, why it must remain secret.’ He led me to his desk, sat and leaned back in his chair, studying me closely. ‘I apologize if my friend was a little rough with you. How about a cup of tea? Something stronger, perhaps?’ He nodded at the drinks cabinet and smiled knowingly. ‘Belonged to Churchill. Lends a certain charm to the place, I think.’

‘You run this facility?’

He said nothing, but the answer was in his tantalizing smile. As he lifted his glass, I clocked his perfectly manicured nails, his pearl-white cuffs.

I had assumed that he was a go-between for the MoD and Foreign Office, someone who transcended the endless manipulations of politics. I had assumed I could trust him, not just because he had helped my career, but because he had helped me personally.

It was the admiral who had first noticed my absent moments, the way my eyes fastened on doors and windows, and made me see them for what they were – a nervous condition that could cost me my career. It was the admiral who had given me the name of a doctor I could trust, a psychiatrist with a private practice in Harley Street. And it was the admiral who had paid for the first sessions. I had absolutely no reason to doubt the man, and yet the situation was making me uncomfortable.

‘Where is Colonel Corso?’

‘Now, now. Knowledge is a privilege, Robert. It comes at a cost.’

‘I’ll pay, whatever the price.’

‘Are you sure? You must be very sure,’ he replied, lowering his voice. There was an expression in his eyes I couldn’t quite decipher, as if he couldn’t decide whether to admire me or feel sorry for me. ‘You will have heard things from Colonel Corso, incredible stories that will come to make sense.’

‘How did you—’

‘We listen to everything. Especially matters of national security.’

Selina had been worried someone was making trouble for us. ‘Were your people monitoring her?’ I asked the admiral and felt my anger rise as he nodded. ‘Why?’

‘We needed to know what she knew.’

‘And the high-pitched noise I’ve been hearing on the telephone? At the flat?’

I thought he would nod, but the Admiral’s face was blank. ‘I don’t know what you mean. Our main concern were Miss Searle and Colonel Corso. Weak man.’

‘Did you kill him?’ I asked.

He gave me a disdainful glare. ‘His whereabouts are a mystery, even to us. Kill him? You might as well accuse me of orchestrating the explosion on the Thames.’

‘Did you?’

He met my question with the silence he clearly felt it deserved then said, ‘Your committee inquiry risked exposure at the worst possible time.’

‘For whom?’

The admiral fixed me with a look of great seriousness. ‘For the Americans.’

‘Our closest allies?
They
were responsible?’ And yet I wasn’t shocked. If Colonel Corso’s story was true, our inquiry could have exposed a lot more than the illegal storage of nuclear weapons at Croughton.

The admiral motioned me to a chair at another desk, on top of which lay a slim black lever-arch file. ‘Have a seat.’

I remained standing. ‘Why didn’t you tell me any of this before?’

‘You had no need to know.’

‘And now I do?’

He paused, staring directly at me. ‘Yes, old chap. Now you do.’

‘Am I in danger?’

‘We are all in danger. A great shadow is descending upon our nation.’

‘Admiral,’ I tried again, ‘Colonel Corso told me what happened at RAF Croughton. Project Caesar. The explosion, the black triangle, the silver figure that walked through the perimeter fence . . .’ It was madness to ask, but the question was on my lips: ‘Is it true?’

‘Truth is a hazy concept, old chap. Certainly there was a troubling incident at Croughton in 1963. Events we didn’t understand.’

‘Then what happened? What did Selina know? What did Colonel Corso see?’

‘Croughton was a strategic base for front-line fighter planes. Whatever happened that evening led to events that are in motion now and cannot be reversed. The Russians have got wind of it all and we learned yesterday from a source within the US Navy that the Sound Surveillance Project is tracking a Soviet nuclear submarine bound for the UK. Its current course puts it on a direct heading for St Brides Bay. Diplomatic efforts are of course already in play but the situation does not look promising.’ He gave me a piercing stare. ‘We need you, Robert. And we need
his
help too.’

‘Whose?’ I said dumbly.

Silently he plucked the file off the table, opened it and passed it to me. He didn’t need to say a word: the answer to my question was frowning up at me from an official report.

Randall Llewellyn Pritchard.

My grandfather.

Overhurst Farm,

Broad Haven,

Wales

Monday 7 February 1977

Dearest Julia,

I understand that you have reservations about my trip to the Havens. Please know that I do too, but I’m not getting any younger, and – having finally learned the true identity of my father – please understand that it is truly in my blood to find the truth.

Sightings of strange objects in the sky continue daily. The locals are deeply superstitious and seem to fear these events. They even have a name for them – the Happenings.

One event in particular has caught the imagination. It occurred at the Broad Haven Primary School and involved thirteen pupils aged between nine and ten. Truly their report of their sighting is intriguing, and according to their headmaster school life is taking a rather long time to get back to normal. Not that Mr Howell Cooper believes the object witnessed by his pupils was necessarily a flying saucer on the ground. But after the event many reporters, photographers and television cameramen descended on the youngsters. Their descriptions vary widely, but the consensus of opinion is that the flying saucer was first seen at lunchtime on Friday, behind a bush about three hundred yards from the school.

The children made some crude sketches. Most gave the object a classical saucer shape, though others drew it looking more like a pudding, or even a cigar. Some gave it a dome and windows, others a flashing light.

I know you will be smiling as you read this. And as much as I am inclined to look for a logical explanation for what is happening down here – you know this is precisely what I would urge my students to do – I have already promised myself that I will delve into this curious matter with an open mind, even chronicle the findings in a book, if it will find a publisher.

Indeed, I have already decided the title: ‘The Mind Possessed: A Personal Investigation into the Broad Haven Triangle’.

I will write soon, I promise.

All my love,

Caxton