At fifty-eight, his black hair flecked with grey, Blake Johnson still had a kind of rugged charm, the air of a man capable of looking after himself. He certainly didnât look old enough to have served in the Marines in Vietnam, though he had, with considerable honour and the medals to prove it. Johnson was personal security adviser to the President, and had been so for more years than he cared to remember. Presidents came and Presidents went, but he went on for ever, or so it seemed, Blake thought ruefully, as he stood in the wheelhouse of a sport fishing launch named Lively Jane, on the late afternoon it all began. He peered through the window at Long Island, a light rain blowing against the glass. It was almost six. Heâd have to hurry.
He had a beach house in Quogue, supposedly for holidays, which hardly ever came, and this time looked to be no different. Vladimir Putin, Prime Minister of the Russian Federation, was speaking at the United Nations in New York, and the President wanted him to attend and report in, not only on the speech but on the general attitude of the Russian delegation.
The British Prime Minister wasnât coming either, but interestingly heâd sent his personal troubleshooter Harry Miller to the speech, presumably to do the same thing Blake was doing. With him was Sean Dillon, once a feared enforcer with the Provisional IRA, now a security adviser himself, and a friend to Blake in good times and bad.
Dillon & Miller. Blake smiled. Dillon would have said it sounded like a cabaret act. He throttled back and coasted in between the boats, so that the Lively Jane nudged against the pier.
A man was on the pier in a yellow oilskin coat, the hood pulled up against the rain, which was driving down now. Blake emerged from the wheelhouse and picked up the line to throw it.
âCan you give me a hand? Catch the line and tie her up and Iâll switch off.â
âI donât think so. Iâll be needing that engine to drop you into the sound,â the man in the hood said.
His hand came out of his right pocket holding a Beretta, and Blake, his senses sharpened by years of hard living, was already hurling himself over the rail, aware of the muffled sound of the silenced weapon fired twice and a burning sensation in his right shoulder, and then he was diving down into twenty feet of murky water.
He swam under the boat, his back scraping the keel, and surfaced on the other side as she drifted, the engine still throbbing. He saw the man at the stern, leaning over the rail and emptying the Beretta into the water. He ejected the magazine and took another from his pocket.
Blake heaved himself over and scrambled into the wheelhouse. There was a flap under the instrument panel and it opened at his touch. Held by two clips inside was a short-barrelled Smith & Wesson .38, and he was holding it as he turned.
The man in the hood was frantically shoving the magazine up the butt of the Beretta. Blake said, âDonât be stupid. Itâs over.â
Not that it did any good. âFug you!â the man said, and his hand came up and Blake shot him between the eyes, knocking him back into the water.
It was very quiet, out of season, nobody around. Even the little café on the pier was closed, so he did the only thing he could, he switched off the engine, went along the deck and managed to loop a line to one of the pier rings, then went below.
His shoulder was hurting now, hurting bad. He sat down in the kitchen area and scrambled out his special mobile and called in. The familiar voice answered, the Presidentâs favourite Secret Service man.
âClancy Smith.â
âItâs Blake, Clancy. I just came in to the pier on the Lively Jane and a guy was waiting with a Beretta.â
âFor Godâs sake, Blake, what happened?â
âIâve taken a bullet in the shoulder, but I put him over the rail.â He was lightheaded now. âHell, Clancy, thereâs nobody here. Closed down for the season.â
âJust hang in there, Iâll have the police there in no time. Hold on, Blake, hold on. Iâll call you back.â
Blake reached into a cupboard, pulled the cork from a bottle of very old brandy and swallowed deeply. âHold on,â he muttered, âthatâs what the man said.â He took another gulp from the bottle, fainted and slid to the floor.
At the same time in London, it was an hour before midnight at the Garrick Club, where a dinner for twenty ministers from various Commonwealth countries was drawing to a close. General Charles Ferguson, for his sins, had been asked to deliver a speech on the economic consequences of terrorism in the modern age, and he couldnât wait to leave.
The affair had been expected to finish at ten, but it was now eleven, thanks to a certain amount of squabbling during the question and answer sessions and naturally, and to his great annoyance, Ferguson had been involved. Heâd had to call his driver on three separate occasions until at last, the whole sorry business came to an end. He made his escape as fast as possible, found a string of limousines waiting, and his not among them. His beloved Daimler had suffered damage and was being refurbished and the Cabinet Office had provided an Amara and a driver named Pool, who now came forward anxiously.