Elephants can't hide forever (26 page)

The ferry was in, and Mike boarded with no trouble, so far so good. He picked up the M271 and then swung West onto the A36, heading up to Salisbury. In the town he stopped at the bank and
withdrew as much cash as he could. Whatever happened, he was going to need a lot of money to execute his escape.

Heading north, he skirted Bath, onto the M4 westbound and then north onto the M5. Just over an hour later, and still nothing on the news stations (which struck him as rather odd), he pulled up
at his destination. The Guard on duty at the Credenhill Barracks of the British Special Air Service did a double take.

“Mike Tobin?” he enquired looking startled “I heard you were Killed in Action.”

“Well, I’m a ghost then,” said Mike “Who’s the boss these days?”

“The old man’s still Major Morley,” came the reply.

Thank Christ for that
, Mike thought.

“Can you buzz him, tell him I’m here with Jock Wallace and we need to see him urgently?” Mike asked.

The trooper walked round to the passenger door, took one look at Jock, and whistled through his teeth, but said nothing; the SAS were trained to expect the unexpected. The soldier disappeared
into the Guard room and came back a few moments later.

“OK Mike, he’s in his office, go straight through the barracks, he’s waiting for you.” Another stroke of luck.

Mike pulled up outside the office of the Commander In Chief and told Jock to stay where he was. He grinned, as Jock was already perking up.

“Where the Hell do you think I’m going?” Jock managed to say, and Mike walked in to the boss’s office.

“What the hell’s going on Mike?” was the Major’s greeting.

Mike tried to make light of it. “Good to see you too, Major.”

“Sorry Mike, but I thought you were long gone, it’s good to see you but something tells me you’re not here to re enlist, in fact I can smell trouble,” the Major commented
perceptively.

“I’m not going to bullshit you, boss,” Mike said, knowing that would be futile and probably ruin any chance of the Major’s help. “Jock and me are in a spot of
trouble, best you don’t know the facts, but the bottom line is we need to get out of the country just as fast as we can.”

Mike hoped this would suffice and the Major was shrewd enough not to ask.

“Stone me, Mike,” he said, “I daren’t think what a spot of trouble is where you’re concerned, but if you weren’t in deep shit I know you wouldn’t be
here. Let me make a call.”

The Major dialled the number for RAF Brize Norton and asked to be put through to the Station Commander.

“Hi Doug, Morley here,” he said as the line connected.

“What can I do you Major?” came the reply.

“Doug, you’ve got a Hercules leaving today for Kabul, I understand you’re picking up a couple of Scots Guards for burial over here. I’ve got a couple of passengers I need
to get into Helmand pretty quick, has it left yet and if not can you squeeze them onboard?”

The Group Captain replied, “Must be your lucky day Major, we should have gone two hours ago but there’s a sand storm over there, so we’ve delayed our flight for a couple of
hours. The Met boys say we can go at three pm this afternoon.”

RAF Brize Norton is used by the British Military and certain politicians of various countries to come and go into the British Isles by circumnavigating the immigration laws. There is, and always
will be, a need for certain personnel to travel incognito and out of sight of the general public. and all the immigration checks designed to monitor their movements. And Brize Norton was that
place.

“Thanks Doug, I’ll have them there before it flies. I owe you one,” came the reply. Major Morley looked at Mike.

“You’re in luck, there’s a C130 leaving Brize Norton in a couple of hours. I suppose you need your falsies,” he said.

The term ‘falsies’ was used by the SAS in reference to counterfeit passports. Every SAS trooper had a number of false passports stored under lock and key at the Hereford camp. Never
knowing what part of the world these men were expected to go at a moment’s notice, they couldn’t be held up waiting for the correct documentation to support their clandestine and highly
dangerous occupation.

“Major,” said Mike, “I don’t know what to say, you’ve saved our arses.”

“That may well be,” the Major replied, “But I suspect the shit’s going to hit the fan sooner rather than later, and I want you as far from Hereford as possible, by the
way you weren’t here today. Now let’s get your falsies sorted and get you out of here.”

The Major took the keys to the bunker where the passports were held and walked with Mike past the Mondeo. He looked in at Jock and then looked at Mike and just shook his head.

Ninety minutes later, the Mondeo with the two renegades pulled into Brize Norton and the C130 was on the runway and obviously waiting for them. A signalman waved the motor straight onto the
runway and up to the rear doors.

“We’ve been expecting you guys,” he said. “Climb aboard, we’re ready to roll, give me the car keys and I’ll park it up safely for your return, and good
luck.”

He saluted, knowing these were the guys who really put their lives at risk in hostile environments. Mike helped Jock out and they made their way up the ramp. He turned round to the airman and
threw him the Mondeo keys.

“Keep it,” he said as both men disappeared into the carcass of the huge plane, homeward bound.

The Detective Chief Inspector was new to his role. His rise to the position he now held had been almost meteoric, especially as he had come up through the ranks the hard way.
Partly he had been lucky, but also his tenacious approach to the job had held him in good stead. He was not one to give up and neither would he suck up to the brass; fortunately, when he had
ignored orders from the top it had always paid off and here he was, Head of Serious Crimes, and reviewing a very strange case. The documents before him had been lent as a favour he was owed by a
high flyer in Special Branch; the front cover was marked Top Secret Eyes Only and then The Parkhurst Break Out. It was this that had him intrigued.

He had been alerted to the breakout and the subsequent finding of two prisoners locked in an ambulance, within a few hours of the incident. He had subsequently travelled down to the Isle of
Wight to start an investigation, and his first point of call was the prison Governor. The Governor had immediately agreed to see him, but had clammed up when the DCI had entered his office. He
would not discuss the case and only referred the DCI to his superiors; no explanation was forthcoming and nothing could get the man in charge to open up. So the DCI had returned to London a very
angry man. He had immediately demanded an audience with his boss, the Commissioner of Police. The Commissioner had made it abjectly clear that the case was closed, finished, and that the DCI was
under threat of dismissal should he disobey these orders; and furthermore these instructions were directly from the Home Secretary, and there would be no chance of covering the DCI’s tracks
this time if he pulled his usual trick of ignoring a direct order.

The DCI had made some inquiries, having ignored his previous instructions, and eventually tracked down the documents that now sat on his desk before him. He opened the folder and read. The
contents told of the plot to break out of the three prisons, and it went on to speak of the duping of the Bacteriologist Don Gooch by a rogue SAS man and named him. Furthermore, the plot was so
heinous with the introduction of Ebola into one of Her Majesty’s Prisons that the Home Secretary had personally ordered the case closed and had issued a D notice to all press agencies
effectively banning any release of the facts to the general public. The Home Secretary could not afford the world at large to know Britain had an antidote for Ebola. Both Africa and the World
Health Organisation would be up in arms, the Africans literally. Two of the three prisoners had been returned to prison, one was probably going to die of a different illness soon and the other
would spend the rest of his days in Broadmoor, the penal institution for the criminally insane. As for the third prisoner, Jock Wallace, and the man behind the break out, Mike Tobin, they had fled
the country; probably back to Australia where Tobin was last known to reside. By nature of what they had done their lips would be sealed. The Professor, who had been conned, had taken early
retirement, having been forced to sign the Official Secrets Act; should he ever breathe a word he would be charged with Treason.

There was more, but the DCI had read enough. He wasn’t going to let this one go whatever the Commissioner threatened. The DCI was an extremely resourceful man, so twenty four hours later
he had gained enough information to take an early lunch break. He walked the couple of hundred meters to the nearest Thomas Cook and booked himself the earliest flight to Cairns, Australia.

Mike and Jock had had a relative easy journey back. After landing in Kabul they hitched a lift across the border into Pakistan, where they caught a scheduled flight from Islamabad to Hong Kong.
From Hong Kong they flew 1
^st
class, Mike having accessed some of his bounty, to Cairns where Charlie and Jane were waiting. The reunion was tearful and joyous. Jane screamed as Mike
appeared through the immigration gate. He dropped his bags and ran to Jane’s outstretched arms. Since that emotional return Mike had not let Jane out of his sight, but that was fine by both
of them. Mike was troubled that no news of his adventures had reached the press, having no idea of the British Home Secretary’s intervention.

Charlie had taken Dennis in and was starting to regret it. Dennis was beginning to make a nuisance of himself around town, but word had got round the small community of Dennis’s
involvement in Jane’s return and he was tolerated, just.

It was a fine warm day, and the five of them had gone into town for a drink. Charlie, Jane, Jock and Dennis sat on the same table on the boardwalk where Dennis and Charlie had met those few
traumatic weeks previously. Mike was inside at the bar ordering the drinks when a man ambled up alongside him.

“First beers on you Mike, if I remember right.”

Mike turned to face the stranger, and the first thing he noticed was the little finger on the man’s left hand was missing. He was looking into the eyes of Detective

Chief Inspector Toby Wakefield, formerly of The Parachute Regiment.

THE END