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  The sun was doing its best to melt the ground she stood on, and it was a relief to see uniformed figures approaching the fence from the inside of the compound. The last of her water had run out an hour earlier, and Jalal was making his own thirst known.

  At ten o’clock, a minibus arrived and volunteers began handing out bottles of tepid water. Malika gladly accepted a couple and let Jalal have his fill, all the time looking at the reception building. The crowd was trickling through the gates, all women and children, and she heard shouts as three Eritrean males demanded to be let in. It soon turned into a crush as more and more men had the same idea and pushed forward, urging the officials to take their details and send them on their way to the airport.

  With the increase in tension, it was inevitable that violence would follow. A group of Eritreans, unhappy that Syrians seemed to be getting preferential treatment, began scuffling with a bunch of males from Homs. Within seconds, objects were flying through the air as both sides used anything they could get their hands on as missiles.

  The battle intensified as more men joined in, and it raged for ten minutes before the police arrived in sufficient numbers to restore peace. It was another hour before the combatants were dispersed, allowing the gates to be opened once more.

  Malika and her four friends gained access at two in the afternoon, and she was shown to a room where a woman sat behind a desk piled high with paperwork. The small space was at least air-conditioned, a blessing after hours spent standing under the summer sun. She took a seat opposite the curly-haired woman and handed over her passport.

  The clerk flipped the document open and entered the details onto a laptop.

  ‘You’re from Syria. Why didn’t you travel to Greece? Why come hundreds of miles when Rhodes is half the distance?’

  ‘That was our original destination, but the boat we were on suffered engine trouble during the first night at sea. We drifted for days, and when we finally saw land, they put us in smaller boats and told us to make our own way here. It was only when we landed that we discovered where we were.’

  The clerk entered this information, then asked why Malika was fleeing Syria.

  ‘I am a Shia Muslim. Last month, a group of men went from house to house looking for anyone who wasn’t Sunni. I was in the backyard when they turned up, washing my son. I heard them shouting at my husband and father, and then the shooting started. I took Jalal and hid, but then the whole house shook with an explosion. I ran back inside and saw that the roof had collapsed. I didn’t know if it was a bomb from the sky or a hand grenade, but the roof timbers had fallen in and one of them trapped my father. He was still alive, but my husband was already dead. I tried to lift a burning beam off my father, but it was too heavy and I burned the skin on both hands.’

  She held them up for the woman to see. The palms and fingers showed the classic signs of third-degree burns, the skin taut and pink, like epidermal lava that had cooled in random, jagged patterns.

  The clerk showed no emotion as she added this detail to Malika’s record.

  ‘We’ll still have to fingerprint you,’ she said. ‘We’ll be taking a DNA sample, too.’

  ‘I wasn’t able to move the beam,’ Malika continued. ‘I had to watch my father die. After that, I went to stay with neighbours who let me stay in a hidden cellar. They were Sunni, but not like the men who killed my family. They kept me safe for a few weeks and helped me with my injuries, but I knew I couldn’t stay with them forever. They retrieved what they could from my house and sold everything to raise enough money for my journey here.’

  ‘And where do you plan to live?’

  ‘I would like to go to France,’ Malika said. ‘My friends told me that there is a Syrian community on the outskirts of Paris. My son and I will be safe there.’

  The clerk asked for Jalal’s details, which she typed into the computer.

  ‘There wasn’t time to get him a passport,’ Malika explained.

  More questions came Malika’s way: how many people were aboard the boat when it set sail? How many survived the journey? Where did they set off from? Who was the captain? How much did she pay to the people smugglers?

  Malika gave the prepared answers to each question, and once the paperwork was complete, the clerk printed out two copies and asked Malika to sign both, then stamped one and stapled another document to the front of it. She then swabbed the inside of Malika’s mouth before doing her best to extract prints from Malika’s disfigured fingers.

  ‘Go out of the door and turn right. At the end of the hallway, you’ll see a set of double doors. In there you can get something to eat and they’ll call you when the bus is ready to take you to the airport.’

  Malika thanked her for her kindness and followed the directions she’d been given, ending up in a vast room. Tables lined three walls, where more volunteers were handing out food parcels and offering tea and coffee. There was also a station where hot food was being served, and Malika got a packed lunch for later and two bowls of vegetable soup. She went in search of somewhere to eat it and found that Inas had beaten her through processing. She sat down and began feeding Jalal.

  ‘They seemed to believe my story,’ Inas whispered. ‘Did you have any problems?’

  Malika shook her head. ‘The real test will be when we get to England.’

  Ramla soon joined them, and within half an hour, the quintet was reunited. They chatted in low voices until a man with a clipboard appeared in the doorway and began calling out names. They dutifully lined up when requested, and once the man had exhausted his list, he led them outside, where five buses were waiting. Twenty minutes later, they arrived at the airport.

  The sun was kissing the horizon by the time the plane left the runway, and Malika finally felt that she could relax. This was the only time-sensitive part of the journey, and it now seemed that they would reach the mainland with two days to spare.

  Malika sat outside the café with Ramla, both nursing tea. The other three members of the party had gone to buy provisions, and they were due to meet their escort within the hour.

  After landing at Lamezia Terme International Airport, they’d been given temporary accommodation and food, and the next day they’d been driven almost the entire length of the country by the Italian authorities. Their destination had been Ventimiglia, a small place that was one train stop from France. The 760-mile journey had taken more than twelve hours, and Malika felt grateful for the money Karim had given them. After the confines of the bus, she’d been able to afford a room in a small hotel for the night, where she had showered for the first time in a week and changed into fresh clothing. They’d spent the intervening hours talking in the local parks until the time had come to meet up at the rendezvous point.

  The others had finished their shopping and were sipping their drinks when a VW camper van pulled up outside the café. The driver, a balding man in his forties, got out and walked over to them.

  ‘Malika?’

  Malika stood and nodded, and the others followed as she climbed into the back of the van.

  ‘How long will we be on the road?’ she asked as the man took his seat behind the wheel.

  ‘Five hours to reach the border, then another five to Lyon. The truck will meet you there.’

  Malika settled into her seat and watched the countryside roll past. They had a couple of toilet stops before they reached the Strada Statale 25 del Moncenisio, the road that took them up into the Alps and across into France. Malika’s concern now was that French border officials might try to stop them, in which case they’d be forced to turn around.

  The Schengen Agreement between EU member states allowed free movement of people between countries, but that had been strained at two years ago when several nations had erected fences along their borders to combat the tens of thousands of refugees pouring into Europe from Africa and the Middle East. Fortunately for Malika, that had been in reaction to the refugees landing in Greece and travelling up through the former Yugoslav states; the French–
Italian border remained largely unchanged.

  As she saw the tiny sign welcoming them to France, Malika put her hand on her stomach and felt the lump where the surgeon had sliced into her abdomen. The skin itched as it healed, but it was a minor inconvenience. Soon she would be going under the knife again, and her ordeal would be almost over.

  CHAPTER 14

  Friday, 11 August 2017

  A chill greeted Malika as she climbed out of the VW van. Still another four hours until the sun would rise again. She hadn’t yet become accustomed to the milder climate.

  They had parked behind a lorry in what looked like a disused industrial estate: a row of drab buildings, many adorned with signs alluding to companies long since closed or moved to pastures new. There were no streetlights but, more importantly, no cameras to watch over them.

  The women gathered at the back of the lorry, and the driver climbed out of the cab and walked the length of the vehicle. He was a short, elderly man, with pockmarked skin from an acne-ridden youth. At the rear, he opened the doors and climbed inside to switch on an internal light.

  ‘Listen up,’ he said. ‘In here are five industrial heating units, one for each of you. You have to climb inside, and I’ll seal it shut with this.’ He pointed to an acetylene torch propped against the wall.

  ‘How will we be able to breathe?’ Ramla asked.

  The driver went to the first unit and pulled out a cylinder attached to a tube that ended in an oxygen mask. ‘There’s two in each heater. One for you, and one for your child. They have filters containing a form of soda lime built in, so when we go through the port, they won’t detect your CO2. They’ll last for five hours, which is more than enough time. Only use them when I seal you inside, which will be when we’re close to Calais.’

  ‘What if our children cry while we’re in the port?’ Malika asked.

  The driver put his hand in his pocket and took out a small bottle of pills. He gave one to each woman. ‘These will knock a child out for four hours. Just before I seal you in, give them to your children. You might as well be the first to try things out,’ he said to Khadija, and took hold of her child while she climbed aboard the truck.

  He guided her to a heater at the back, which stood five feet tall and was long and wide enough for a couple of people to lie down in side by side.

  ‘The rest of you, gather round.’

  He handed Khadija’s child back to her and demonstrated the breathing apparatus, showing them all how to get the oxygen flowing and how to turn it off again. He had Khadija try it, and when she showed that she could handle the simple task, he told her to get into her unit and put the end piece back in place.

  One by one, the women showed that they could operate the oxygen tank, and the driver told them to make themselves comfortable.

  ‘It’ll be nearly seven hours before we stop again, so if you need to go to the toilet, do it now.’

  Two of them disappeared behind a wall and returned a few minutes later, climbing into the back of the truck and settling down for the long drive north.

  The trip was conducted mostly in silence, with most of them grabbing a little sleep. Night had given way to a bright morning by the time the doors were opened once more.

  Their driver jumped up into the back and took a strip of different tablets from his pocket. ‘These are for you. Travel sickness pills. Take them now.’

  Malika took a strip of four pills and popped one in her mouth, then handed the others out.

  ‘Who hasn’t got one?’

  Khadija Tawfeek put her hand up and the driver took another pill from his pocket and gave it to her, along with a bottle of water to chase it down.

  ‘If you look inside, you’ll see that there are slats at the bottom of the side panel. They’re covered with Perspex to stop any smells leaking out, but it will enable you to see when the light is turned on. If it comes on, it means the truck is being inspected by the port authorities, so it’s important to be completely silent.’

  He told them to get into their units, then began sealing them in. It took an hour before the last one was ready, and the driver went back to the first and brushed grey paint over the fresh welds to make it look like they’d been applied in the factory.

  Happy with his handiwork, he turned off the light and locked the outer doors securely with massive chains and a tamper-free tag, then got behind the wheel and set off for the port and the ferry that would take them across the English Channel and on to a secluded place just north of Canterbury.

  The driver was keenly aware that getting across the border, despite the measures he’d taken, was by no means guaranteed. It was still an easy task compared to what he would face on the other side of the Channel.

  CHAPTER 15

  Friday, 11 August 2017

  Veronica Ellis stood and adjusted her pencil skirt, then strolled to the glass wall to look out on the main office. She caught her reflection and saw that the recent strain had taken its toll. The lines around her eyes seemed more pronounced these days, and her platinum blonde hair looked dull and lifeless. Whether it was the stress of the job or just the natural passage of time, she felt a lot older than a woman in her mid-fifties.

  She saw Andrew Harvey walking over to her, and she opened the door for him.

  ‘We’re seeing lots of increased activity,’ Harvey said. ‘Al-Hosni’s up to something.’

  ‘Anything specific?’

  ‘Not yet, but his routine has changed over the last couple of days. In the past week, he barely left his house. Now he’s going to the mosque four times a day and staying for half an hour after prayers end. Three people on our watch list have suddenly started worshipping at the same mosque, always when al-Hosni’s presiding. This all started after he got a visit from a guy called Qureshi. We matched his photo with airport CCTV, but we just heard back from the Turkish National Intelligence Organisation. They’ve got no record of him.’

  ‘Then who is he?’

  ‘We don’t know,’ Harvey admitted. ‘The passport was a fake, and clearly a very good one, too. Good enough to fool their own border security. They doubt Qureshi is even a Turkish national, which makes me think he hopped across the border from Syria. The fact that he came all this way just to talk to al-Hosni suggests something big is on the horizon. He could be the main man or just another link in the chain.’

  ‘How many people do we have watching him at the moment?’

  ‘Just two on the day shift and one at night,’ Harvey said. ‘Given the recent activity, we could do with a few more. We’ll also need resources on the people he’s been meeting with.’

  ‘That may be wishful thinking,’ Ellis said. Her meeting with Maynard and the Prime Minister a few days earlier could have gone a lot better. While the PM had recognised the seriousness of the situation, he had only issued instructions for additional funds to be released as and when it became critical to the investigation, and he’d left the Home Secretary to make those calls. She’d had to fight simply to get authorisation for the three men currently monitoring al-Hosni’s activities; even with the recent change in the imam’s habits, Ellis knew she would have a tough time selling further expenditure to the Home Secretary.

  ‘If we can get an idea of what he’s up to, I might be able to put a few more feet on the ground, but as things stand, I don’t have enough to approach Maynard. The funds are available, but he has final say on their allocation.’

  ‘It strikes me as too much of a coincidence that al-Hosni starts making contact with people suspected of being members of banned organisations, and at the same time the X3 is still unaccounted for.’

  ‘That had crossed my mind, too. Do we have any informants that could shed some light on what al-Hosni’s up to?’

  ‘I’ll put the word out,’ Harvey said, ‘but usually they come to us. If they haven’t heard anything yet, chances are they never will.’

  If al-Hosni were planning to take delivery of the chemical agent, he obviously wouldn’t discuss it in public. He also
hadn’t mentioned anything about it in his phone conversations, and the traffic they’d intercepted from his broadband provider had amounted to nothing more than benign chatter.

  ‘Okay,’ she said, ‘give me a breakdown of how many you need and get them to work right away. I’ll put in a retrospective request to Maynard once we have something to report.’

  ‘Are you sure you want to do it this way? He’s not going to be happy.’

  ‘He can have kittens for all I care,’ Ellis said. ‘Just make sure you get me something to justify the overtime.’

  Harvey left her office and returned to his own desk, while Ellis considered ways to squeeze some more money out of the Home Secretary.

  Malika was approaching full-blown panic.

  She’d been in the cramped container for more than six hours and the stifling heat and stink of her own sweat – not to mention the contents of Jalal’s nappy – had created a creeping sense of claustrophobia. She’d never feared enclosed spaces, but the pitch-black interior of the heating unit had her pulse racing now.

  She told herself to be grateful for the cool oxygen from the tank – that the ordeal was almost over. She’d sensed the transition from land to sea and back again, but the ride had been stop–start since then. The truck would move a few yards, then the air brakes would hiss and the engine would idle for a few minutes. She assumed they were still in the port at Dover, the last barrier before entering England proper. Once on the open road, she would be able to relax a little, but for now she fought off another bout of fear, this time the thought of being discovered. To be caught at this point would mean an abrupt end to the mission, and failure would not only affect her, but also those back in Syria who had spent so long planning it.

  Malika cuddled the child closer. Jalal was sleeping soundly, the pill working as expected. She couldn’t see him in the darkness, but she gently stroked his brow as she wondered what would happen to him in the months and years to come. The British were no fools, and eventually her part in this would come to light, at which point she would lose Jalal forever.