Terminal

Five

London. 10 February 1984. 8?. Tweed, short and plump- faced, middle-aged, was gazing out of the window of his office at SIS headquarters in Park Crescent when Mason called from Vienna.

Through his horn-rimmed glasses he looked out towards Regent's Park across the Crescent gardens. Small clusters of gold sprouted amid the green in the watery morning sunlight. Early spring crocuses. It was something – promising the ultimate end of winter. The phone on his desk rang.

`Long distance from Vienna,' the internal switchboard operator informed him. Tweed wondered when Vienna was a short distance. He told her to put the call through and settled himself in his swivel chair. They exchanged the normal preliminaries identifying each other. Mason sounded rushed, which was unusual.

`I've got something for you. Won't specify on the phone…'

`Mason, where are you speaking from?' Tweed asked sharply.

`A booth in the General Post Office, middle of Vienna. The Embassy phone goes through the switchboard. I've just hurtled back from Schwechat Airport – that's…'

`I know where it is. Get to the point…'

Tweed was uncharacteristically sharp again. But he sensed a terrible urgency in his caller's voice. Mason was the SIS man in Vienna under the cloak of military attache. The British were at last learning from their Soviet colleagues – who were never who they seemed at embassies.

`I've got something for you, something rather frightening. I won't specify over this line – I'll bring it with me when I come to London. Main thing is a Lear jet with Swiss markings left Schwechat half an hour ago. Destination Switzerland is my educated guess…'

Tweed listened without interrupting. Mason was his normal concise self now. Short, terse sentences. Not a wasted word. As he listened Tweed made no notes on the pad lying in front of him. When Mason had finished Tweed asked him just one question before breaking the connection.

`What is the flight time Vienna to Switzerland?'

One hour and ten minutes. So you have less than forty minutes if I've guessed right. Oh, there's a body involved.. `See you in London.'

Tweed waited a moment after replacing the receiver and then he lifted it again and asked for an open line. He dialled 010 41, the code for Switzerland, followed by 31, the code for Berne, followed by six more digits. He got through to Wiley, commercial attache at the British Embassy in Berne, in less than a minute. He spoke rapidly, explaining what he wanted.

`.. so alert our man in Geneva and the chap in Zurich…'

`The time element is against anyone getting to the airports to set up surveillance,' Wiley protested.

`No, it isn't. Cointrin is ten minutes from the centre of Geneva. Twenty minutes in a fast car gets you from Zurich to Kloten now they've finished the new road. And you can check Belp…'

`I'll have to put my skates on…'

`Do that,' Tweed told him and broke the connection again.

Sighing, he got up and walked over to the wall-map of Western Europe. Mason could run rings round Wiley. Maybe he ought to switch them when Mason arrived home. Vienna was a backwater – but Berne was beginning to smoulder. And why did everyone forget Belp? Even Howard probably had no idea Berne had its own airport fifteen minutes down the four-lane motorway to Thun and Lucerne. Plus a thrice- weekly service from Belp to Gatwick. He was studying the map when his chief, Howard, burst into the office. Without knocking, of course.

`Anything interesting cooking?' he asked breezily.

Howard had all the right connections, had gone to all the useful schools and university, which completed the circle, giving him all the right connections. An able admin. man, he was short on imagination and not a risk-taker. Tweed had been known – in a bad mood – to refer to him privately as Woodentop.

`Possibly Berne,' Tweed replied and left it at that.

`Berne?' Howard perked up. 'That's the Terminal thing you latched on to. What the hell does the word mean – if anything?'

`No idea – that it means anything. Just that we keep getting rumours from a variety of sources.' He decided not to mention to Howard the reference Mason had made to 'a body involved'. It was too early to excite Howard.

`I hope you're not employing too much manpower on this,' Howard commented. 'Terminal,' he repeated. 'Might be an idea to watch the airports. That would link up – airport, terminal…'

`I've just done that.'

`Good man. Keep me informed…'

Wiley phoned Park Crescent at exactly 4 p.m. He apologized for not calling earlier. The lines from the Embassy had been jammed up most of the day. Tweed guessed he had really waited until nearly everyone – including the Ambassador – had gone home. It was now 5 pm in Berne since Switzerland was one hour ahead of London in time.

`I got lucky,' he informed Tweed. 'At least I think so. If this was the plane you're interested in.. He described the machine and Tweed grunted and told him to go on. 'A passenger disembarked and carried a large cardboard container to a waiting truck. A canvas-covered job. Stencilled on the side were the words Chemiekonzern Grange AG…

`Let me write that down. Now, go on…'

`It's a weird story. I followed the truck – the passenger travelled in the cab beside the driver – back along the motorway towards Berne. It turned off on to a road I knew was a cul-de-sac, so I waited. Pretended my car had broken down and stood in the freezing cold with my head under the bonnet. God, it was cold…'

Mason would have left that bit out. Patiently this time, Tweed waited. At four in the afternoon he had the lights on. It was near-darkness outside and cars passing along the main road had their lights on also. Tweed felt a little disappointed in the report so far. He couldn't have said why.

`About a quarter of an hour later a small van appeared down the same side road. I nearly missed it – then I spotted the same passenger sitting beside the van driver. I followed the van which headed towards the city. Lost it in the traffic on the outskirts. Funny thing is, I could have sworn it passed me later driving down the opposite lane – away from the city…'

`So, that's that?'

`Hold on a minute. I did notice the name painted on the side of the van. I'm damned sure it was the same one both times…'

Tweed was writing down the name when Howard came into the office, again without knocking. Tweed scribbled out the second name as Howard came round the desk to peer over his shoulder, another irritating habit. He thanked Wiley and put the phone down.

Tweed had no doubt Howard had paid one of his frequent visits to the switchboard room – to see if anything was going on. He also knew that Howard often stayed back late at night so he could poke around his staff's offices after they had gone home. Which was why Tweed locked away anything of interest and only left trivia on his desk.

`Any developments?' Howard enquired.

`I'm not sure. I haven't decided yet but I may have to go to Berne myself. As you know, we're fully stretched. Keith Martel is away on a job and it's all hands to the pumps…'

`Any excuse,' Howard commented drily and rattled loose change in his pocket. 'You like Berne. Any developments?' he repeated.

`This morning Mason reported he had something for me – something rather frightening were the exact words he used. I think it was delivered to him at the Embassy. He's bringing it to us within a few days, so it has to be serious – maybe very serious…'

`Oh, Christ! You're building up another crisis.'

`Crises build themselves up,' Tweed pointed out. 'And that was Wiley on the phone…' As if you didn't know, he thought. 'From Vienna Mason reported to me this morning he followed a man – who may be an assassin – to Schwechat Airport outside the city. He saw this man board a private Swiss jet. I put tags on three Swiss airports – although there are plenty of others. Wiley has just told me a similar aircraft landed at Belp…'

`Belp? Where the hell is Belp? Funny name…'

`Look at the pin sticking in the wall map. It's the airport for Berne.'

`Didn't know there was one.' Tweed said nothing but peered over his glasses as Howard scrutinized the map. `So it was an airport,' Howard said with satisfaction. 'A terminal! This is getting interesting..

With Howard it always helped to get him on your side – or at best in a neutral status – if he thought he had contributed an idea himself. Tweed continued talking in his level tone.

`Wiley saw the aircraft disembark one passenger carrying a large container. Eventually he was driven away in a small van. Wiley noted the name on the side of the van. At the moment I have several disconnected pieces which may eventually build into a pattern.'

`Or a crisis,..' It was the nearest Howard ever came to cracking a joke. He swung round on one heel, flicked an imaginary speck of dust off his regulation pin-striped suit. Howard was a trendy dresser; always wore a camel overcoat of the length which was the latest vogue. 'Well, what was the name on the van?' he asked.

`Klinik Bern…'