The 9th Directive

13 Overkill

Isolated in the small high room of the condemned building I was kept in touch with events by the transistor and two-way radio. A general report was now in from Loman and it added a few details to the public announcements. It was as follows.

The arrival of the Person at Don Muang Airport was without incident. He looked very fit and said he was delighted to see the sunshine. There was great enthusiasm from a large crowd. The police were present in strength. It was confirmed that Forsythe and Johns of the Special Branch were accompanying the Person. Prince Rajadhon was among the official welcoming party and it was therefore certain that he would take his place beside his distinguished guest in the public procession. Details of this had now been made official: the motorcade would be led by ten motorcycle outriders of the Bangkok Metropolitan Police. Traveling in the Royal car would be the Person, Prince Rajadhon, the British Ambassador, the First Counselor of the British Embassy, and two bodyguards of the King's Household. The second and third cars would contain ministers, equerries and security men. The central section of the motorcade would be flanked by twelve outriders and there would be a rear guard of fifteen motorcycle police. All officers would be armed.

Some time before my building was entered and searched there had been a further signal from Loman and for the first time there was the suggestion of nerves in his voice.

'The motorcade has just left the Palace and is now heading north toward Rajdamnoen Central Avenue.'

It was from that point that the worst of the waiting began. It was broken up by the police search of the building, but once I had gone back to my room and fixed the carpet over the door there was nothing else to do.

When I switched on the two-way radio again it was apparent that Loman had been trying to signal.

'Me, Quitter? Can you--''

'Go ahead,' I said. There'd been fright in his tone. He must have thought the radio had packed up.

'Is everything in order?' Still talked like a bloody textbook.

'Yes. Police have made their search. On my own now and all set.'

There was silence and then he came in again, his tone a bit steadier.

'Five-minute halt at Government House. Next halt will be at the Embassy.'

I said all right and cut the switch.

The sound of the crowd floated up on the warm air; it was like a vast aviary, the women's voices pitched sharply, the children piping now and then in little bird cries. It was odd not to hear the traffic. I kept away from the window now.

When I took a sighting through the Balvar scope it picked up movement at once in the oriel of the temple. He still had the smoked glasses on; I had never seen him without them. I wondered how he was feeling. He was a professional and he'd done this before but he was putting something like half a million on one shot and that would be important to him. There would be time to get in a second and even a third even with a bolt-action, but it was the first that would count because it would be unhurried, a slow sure pull against the springs. A second or third shot would be affected by the- knowledge of a miss, a nervous block difficult to get through because the aim had to be better, not just as good.

He wouldn't miss. He was Kuo the Mongolian.

There would be a period of some ten seconds in which he – and I – must operate.

The signal sounded and I cut in.

'Can you hear me, Quiller?'

'Go ahead.'

'The motorcade has arrived at the Embassy. They will be here for fifteen minutes. After ten minutes from now -at 1535 – I want you to keep open for me. Please acknowledge.'

'Keep open from 1535. Will do.'

I cut him out. I didn't like the sound of his voice. It wasn't just speaker distortion; there was that scream of fright trying to push out past every word.

A period, yes, of some ten seconds in which Kuo and I must operate. It would begin when he sighted the vanguard of police outriders coming into the Link Road and it would end when the leading car of the motorcade was lost from his sight below the trees of the temple gardens. Putting it more precisely, the period of time was – for me alone – narrowed down to about half, because I would wait until he raised his gun. I had decided on that without reference to Loman, without reference to anything really. It seemed good manners. M'sieur, tirez le premier. Or try.

The noise of the crowd was making me restive; I wanted to look down from the window, to look at the road where it curved through the gay colors of the silks and the flowers and the parasols. I mustn't go near the window.

The room was very hot and I had to keep wiping my hands. From the back of the room all I could see was the great gold dome of the Phra Chula Chedi brilliant against the afternoon sky. And the ring of oriels.

Loman came through without a signal because I had done what he'd asked and kept open from 1535.

'Can you hear me?'

'Go ahead.'

He had to talk slowly. It didn't fool me. A dog has a nose for the smell of fear.

'He is just getting into the car. Prince Rajadhon following.''

I could hear the crowd in the background.

'Now the Ambassador.'

Two muffled reports: the car doors shutting.

'The motorcade is moving off.

It was 3:41.

I said: 'All right Loman, it's over to me now,'

He began saying something but I cut the switch.

Eight or nine minutes to go. Speed would be twenty-five miles per hour or thereabouts. Plern Chit Road, turning right down Vithayu and past the Arabian Embassy, crowds lining the route all the way, Spanish Embassy, flags, flowers, people clapping, Japanese Embassy, children being lifted so that they could see the distinguished man who had come such a long way to visit them, Netherlands Embassy, first-aid parties pressing a gangway for a fainting case, American Embassy, the soft-drinks men profiting from the heat, the thirst, the excitement. Lumpini Park.

I had already moved to the side of the room and could see the trees of the park and above them the fragile shape of the kite, yellow with a blue cross, unsteady because there was only a low breeze across the open space of the lawns but lifting higher all the time in little jerks.

The heat seemed worse and the handkerchief was damp from wiping my hands. Three minutes, at the most four. I could see part of the Link Road below the building. Patches of color, parasols. An ambulance moving very slowly in reverse down the side road, stopping when it reached the back of the crowd. A man selling balloons.

A false alarm – there always is: the roof of a police car mistaken for the vanguard of the motorcade. The voice of the crowd rising in a sudden wave, subsiding.

About a minute.

The mission had seemed very long, all those weeks, living in the Toyota, living with the Jupiters, learning him like a brother. Soon we would be strangers.

Sound came from the distance, clapping, cheering, at first faint, loudening, so I moved round to the back of the room and wiped the sweat from my hands for the last time, wrists, palms, between the fingers, carefully between the fingers of the right hand.

There was a flat square top to the tripod with a set-screw proud in the center to take the camera and I had put a cloth pad over it with elastic bands. The blue steel barrel of the Husqvarna had left its impression on the pad from previous sightings. I raised the Husqvarna and laid the barrel across the pad and flicked the safety catch off. The smell of the machine oil was strong, a good smell, clean and efficient.

The sound of the crowd was rising in a slow wave from the distance and the people directly below the condemned building began calling his name and I had the crosshairs centered dead on the face in the oriel.

His gun came up and I saw the long glint of the barrel and my finger took up the tension of the preliminary spring and went on squeezing, and when the big Husqvarna kicked I kept the sights on the target and saw redness color the face and head, but something was wrong because the crowd had begun screaming and I knew that I'd killed for nothing because something was wrong down there.