Better off Dead

Chapter 47

I put my phone down on my backpack and began to climb the post. It was easy to grip with my hands. I could just hang on to the fence where it was attached on either side. But it was another story for my feet. The diamond-shaped gaps in the wire were not big enough for my shoes. The toe caps were too wide. Just a fraction. But enough to be a problem. I started with my right and my foot slipped straight out and slapped down onto the ground. I tried again. Slipped again. Then I found that if I pushed my toe in extra hard and pulled my foot up to a steep angle I could just about make it stick. I repeated the process with my left. Raised my right. Kept going. I didn’t fall. But progress was slow. Painfully slow. Precious seconds were slipping away. I had no idea how long Fenton would be able to keep up the ruse with the phone. But then, if I was wrong about the guy who’d brought it to her, it would already be too late.

I kept climbing until my chest was level with the top of the fence. My calves were burning from supporting my weight at such a weird angle. I gripped the wire with my left hand and stretched up with my right. I took hold of the camera. I tried to rotate it. Counterclockwise. But it wouldn’t move. It was jammed solid. I twisted harder and my right foot slipped. My left foot followed. I wound up hanging by my left hand. I grabbed the fence with my right. Jammed both feet back into their gaps. Straightened up. Took a fresh hold of the camera. Twisted again. And felt it give. Just a little. But there was movement. I was sure of that.

I didn’t let up on the pressure. The camera shifted an eighth of an inch. Another eighth. I kept going until it had crept through twenty degrees. Then I climbed down. Slowly. I made it to the bottom without falling. Retrieved my phone. Held it to my ear. And heard Fenton’s voice. She was mid-anecdote. Something to do with her aunt, a jar of marmalade, and a TSA agent. I moved to my left until I was halfway across the section of fence. Put the backpack and the phone on the ground. Continued to the next post. And began to climb again. It was as awkward as with the first one. My right foot slipped twice before I made it to the top. My left, once. I grabbed the camera. Twisted it. This one moved more easily. I rotated it twenty degrees, clockwise. Then climbed down. Moved to my right. Picked up my phone. And heard nothing. Not Fenton. Not the guy. Just silence.

I put the phone in my pocket and tried to pick up any sound coming from the building. Maybe the guy had seen through Fenton’s act. Maybe he just got tired and snatched the phone so he could go back to bed. But the important question was, when? How long ago did he get back to his room? If he’d made it before I was done with the cameras there would soon be footsteps. Guys getting into position with their Uzis. Then the floodlights would come on, silhouetting me against the desert like a target at a shooting range. I crouched down, legs tensed, ready to run.

Nothing happened.

I took my phone out and checked for messages. There was nothing from Wallwork.

Not yet.

If my estimate was accurate I should now be in a dead zone between the cameras I’d moved. Just as long as no one had been watching the monitors when they were turning. And if not, then they wouldn’t pick up on the slightly different view of the desert they were now getting. I stayed in a crouch and took Wallwork’s second item out of my backpack. A pair of bolt cutters. I removed a section of wire. A square, just broader than my shoulders. But I didn’t crawl through. Not right away. I lay down and looked along the surface of the ground between the inner and outer sections of fence. I wanted to see if it was flat. Or if there were any telltale humps. Dendoncker had been selling land mines. If he’d kept any for himself, this would be an ideal place to use them.

The verdict was inconclusive. The land wasn’t flat. It wasn’t even close. But there was nothing to say that the undulations weren’t natural. Or random. The work of the wind. Or the rain. Or the original construction crew. So I took out Wallwork’s third item. A knife. It had a long, broad blade. Ten inches by two, at its widest point. I slid the tip into the sandy surface and pushed it out ahead of me. Slowly. Gently. I kept it as horizontal as possible so that no part of the blade was more than an inch or so underground. It didn’t come into contact with anything so I pulled it out and repeated the process six inches to the left. Nothing obstructed it, so I tried again. I kept going until I had defined a two-foot-wide section I could be sure was safe. I crawled forward, placed my knees on the line my test holes had made, and probed the area six inches farther forward.

It was a time-consuming procedure. I was moving forward at around a foot a minute. Around fifteen thousand times slower than when I’d been in the helicopter. I was expecting a text from Wallwork at any second. And I was completely exposed in a fenced-in no-man’s-land. Completely at the mercy of anyone who came out on patrol. The only upside was that I hadn’t come across any land mines. I was beginning to think I was being overcautious. I made it ten feet. I had fifteen to go. Then the tip of my knife hit something. Something hard. Something metal. I froze. Didn’t breathe. Pulled back on the handle. The first fraction of an inch was the most critical. When the contact was broken. If the thing was a mine.

Whatever the thing was, it didn’t explode. But I wasn’t out of the woods. The knife still had to be removed the rest of the way. Shock waves could still be transmitted through the dirt. The tiniest movement could still be fatal.

The thing did not explode.

I forced myself to take a breath then started again, a foot to the right. I moved even more slowly after that. Found three more potential mines. But made it to the inner fence in one piece. I cut a hole. Crawled through. And hurried to the long wall at the back of Dendoncker’s side of the building. I moved to the boarded-up window belonging to Fenton’s room. I doubted anyone would be inside with her, and she was hardly likely to raise the alarm if she heard me. I took Wallwork’s fourth item out of my backpack. A weighted hook. It had four claws, covered in rubber. And it was attached to twenty-five feet of rope. I stepped back, took hold of the rope three feet from the hook, twirled it around a half-dozen times to gauge the way it would fly, then launched it up toward the roof. It cleared the top of the wall. Disappeared. And landed with a dull clunk. I pulled my end of the rope. Gently. I teased the hook back toward the wall. It kept moving. Coming closer to the edge. Then it caught on something. I pulled harder. The hook held. So I started to climb. Hands on the rope. Feet flat on the wall. Like rappelling, but in reverse. I made it to the top. Scrambled up onto the roof. Pulled the rope up behind me. And started toward the far side of the building. The side that the glass corridor joined onto.