Killer Elite

28

Douggie Walker had managed the Antelope pub for a good many years. Like his soppy black labrador, Sam, who loved the clamor and life of the main downstairs bar, Douggie was a large and amiable figure. The Antelope’s clientele on the evening of Thursday, October 30, 1986, was as rowdy as ever, a mix of all backgrounds, with always a good many strangers to add to the atmosphere.

At the bar Douggie recognized a gang of ex-Army Regulars and accepted the offer of a pint from Keith Ryde, one of several Oman Army officers who used the pub as a rendezvous, usually at lunchtime.

The talk was of a yuppy named Jeremy Bamber who two days earlier had been jailed for life for the callous murder of five members of his own family. Hoping to inherit a fortune, he had intended that his sister be blamed. A heated conversation developed on the topic. Douggie, Ryde, “Smash” Smith-Piggott and Jackson could be counted on, under the gentle influence of Benskin’s draft bitter, to escalate the most unlikely of subjects into a major debate. Mike Marman was normally in the thick of it all but that evening he felt a touch subdued and decided to go home for a quiet read and an early night.

On the wrong side of forty and unemployed, he was temporarily feeling a touch sorry for himself. His mood probably stemmed from his last meeting with his fiery but beautiful ex-wife, Rose May. The previous weekend he had called at her Kensington flat to take their sons out for the day. There had been a fierce argument that still tasted bitter to him. Sometimes they seemed to hate each other but then he would notice afresh her blond hair and goddesslike figure, her classic Slav features and those lovely, faraway eyes and wonder how he and Rose May had ever grown apart.

She was born Rose May Cassel-Kokczynska, of a Swedish mother and a dashing Polish officer who had taken part in the last recorded cavalry charge against German tanks in 1939, spent the war years in Soviet camps, then settled in England, where Rose May was born. When Mike met her, on vacation in Sardinia, she was head teacher at her own Montessori school in Kensington.

He was at first everything that Rose May had dreamed of: a charming, handsome cavalry officer, regimental skier, communist-fighter, and an unashamed lover of the good life. When she knew him better she found he needed mothering and this was doubly attractive.

Marman looked about the Antelope, searching for he knew not what. I should not have left the Army, he thought; that was when things started to go seriously wrong between us. He looked at his watch: 6:15 p.m. He would have to hurry if he was to make it back for his favorite part of the day: a hot bath listening to Radio 4. He took his leave of the others and left.

At the door to the pub, Marman was suddenly aware of a brawl going on fifty yards down Eaton Terrace and right beside his pride and joy, a brand-new, red and black Citroen 2CV. Two men were slugging it out on the narrow pavement, right against his car. Breaking into a run and ignoring the huddle of jeering bystanders, Marman found his car key and got in. He would be bloody annoyed if there were any dents. The 2CV might look like an upturned bucket but it was highly economical and that was increasingly important after six months without a job. One of the combatants, a black man with a bald and bleeding skull, bounced back against the passenger door as Marman, swearing, pulled away and accelerated out of Eaton Terrace, vaguely aware of blue lights flashing to his rear.

Past Battersea and well into Clapham, he turned into Blandfield Road. Since his divorce three years ago he had grown close to a lovely girl named Julia, but they lived their separate lives and Marman had purchased his Clapham terraced house with his Army savings. There were usually a couple of art students renting a bedroom, but that evening his only current tenant was out on the town, so he had the house to himself.

Marman’s house was directly opposite the shop of a friendly greengrocer who often looked after his keys and mail. Marman parked as close to home as he could and let himself in. He flung his blazer and tie on to the sitting-room table, poured himself a whiskey and rushed upstairs. As usual, he left the front door ajar, for he was a sociable sort and few days passed by without some friend or other dropping in. Marman was not worried by security. As he often said, “There’s nothing worth stealing, except for my radio, and if they want to get in, a lock won’t stop ’em.” Within minutes Marman was in a foaming Badedas bath with his drink beside him and the radio drowning out all other sounds.

Meier double-parked immediately outside 9 Blandfield Road and, at 7:05 p.m., as soon as the signature tune of The Archers began, he nodded. “Davies says Marman never misses the program and likes to listen in his bath. The door is half open. The camera is all set.”

De Villiers carried two plastic salesman’s bags, one containing brochures about life insurance. Once in the sitting room, he went directly to the blazer. Davies had assured him that Marman’s black Economist diary was normally kept inside the inner pocket. De Villiers swore silently after glancing at the handwriting: it was too small for the 1600 ASA film in the Olympus XA4 to cope with without using a tripod or flash. The result might prove too grainy, when enlarged, to be legible. Better to play it safe, especially as there was little danger of interruption. Meier, in the car outside, would find a pretext to stall any visitor and they knew only Marman was at home.

From one of the bags, de Villiers took out Meier’s custom-made foldaway frame. He placed the diary on the table, ensuring that its open pages were kept flat by the strip of piano wire that stretched between the legs of the frame. Next he slotted the Nikon F2 camera into place, pointing down and some seventeen inches above the open diary. Meier had selected a slow, fine-grain film in conjunction with a flash attachment and manually set the optimum exposure. De Villiers pressed the plunger of the cable release and took a single photograph of each set of pages for the month of November. Six minutes later he was once again with Meier and the diary was back in Marman’s blazer pocket.