The next day was a Tuesday—their third day in Pakistan and the chance to make progress given they now had the leaving time and they knew how the roads and traffic worked. The team concentrated on the south of the twin cities, capturing images that would fit with the film’s soccer-playing scenes. The hero had a sporting aspect, so they cruised some of the football fields and made a big deal of taking photographs and scribbling notes. It was a chance to interact with locals and have a friendly chat with shop owners, a legend-building exercise in itself. Templar and de Payns even discovered that the smoking bans were not strict outside the centre of the city and they could smoke with their coffees.
They ate an early evening meal at the hotel, letting the staff see them in one happy group, and just before 5.30 p.m. they exited separately. When they met up in the street, they headed west in the Nissan. They tanked at the service station with the yellow awning at 6 p.m., with the car aimed north, and waited for the parade of cars which started queuing at the T-junction at 6.06. Templar drove past the T-junction, giving them a look at the cars.
‘Big Mercedes is seven back,’ mumbled de Payns as Templar stopped the Nissan north of the T-junction and left it idling. Templar kept his eye on the rear-view mirror and Brent tapped on his Toshiba keyboard, switching the machine to spinner mode. No one turned back to look.
‘And … we’re go,’ said Templar, hitting the indicator stalk and easing into the traffic. As they hit the flow of vehicles, the black Mercedes was three cars in front of them.
De Payns couldn’t waste time on the small fry. The Company wanted to be in the top-secret layer, not in the slops. They needed a vehicle belonging to a senior person, someone with status and probably travelling with bodyguards, and the most obvious vehicle was the black Mercedes.
‘What do we have on the radar?’ asked de Payns, not taking his eyes off the Mercedes.
‘Thirteen IMSIs and growing,’ said Brent. ‘Make that eighteen.’
When a cell phone was switched on, it registered with the closest cell tower it could find: the spinner. After ten minutes of driving north, most of the IMSI numbers had dropped off the spinner’s list as cars turned off the main road and connected to another cell tower.
Fifteen minutes after they started their hunt, there was only one vehicle—a white VW van—between the Alamut crew and the black Mercedes, and the spinner had just four IMSI numbers that had stayed connected since the MERC.
‘That van come from the MERC?’ asked Templar as they backed off slightly.
‘I think it was already on the main road,’ said Thierry.
The question was potentially important. If there was a senior person from the MERC in the black Mercedes-Benz, did he or she have a bodyguard. And if so, were they in the car or were they following in a van? It might not mean much the first time the team followed the black Mercedes, but if there were bodyguards in another vehicle, they’d eventually pick up the team’s Nissan. The white van’s indicator blinked on the right side and turned off. They now had three IMSI numbers at the top of the spinner screen and they pulled back, allowing a car to get between the Nissan and the Mercedes.
It was getting towards dusk and the car’s interior suddenly filled with red flashing lights. Templar swore under his breath and pulled onto the gravel shoulder of the road, waiting as an ambulance roared past. De Payns pointed his pen ahead through the windscreen, getting his mind back on the job.
The traffic sorted itself out again, and Templar got the Nissan positioned two cars back from the Mercedes. One of the cars in front of them turned off, and there were three IMSI numbers at the top of the list.
‘All the cell phones are probably in the Mercedes,’ said Brent from the back seat. ‘They’re all connecting.’
‘Scientist and two bodyguards?’ suggested Templar.
‘Three co-workers, sharing a ride?’ offered de Payns.
‘Husband and wife,’ said Thierry. ‘One of them has two phones—one for home, one for their lover.’
‘Ha ha!’ said Templar, slapping the wheel. ‘Be careful with that kind of thinking—they’ll put you in actions teams, right, Aguilar?’
De Payns smiled. ‘Like he said, Thierry, be careful with that.’
The convoy continued north through scrub and market gardens as daylight faded. De Payns checked his watch: 6.31 p.m. They had a strict commitment to stop following at seven o’clock.
A modern-looking suburb loomed out of the scrublands, and as they closed on it the Mercedes’ indicator light started blinking. The brake lights came on and the black vehicle was rolling to a stop at the traffic lights on the edge of the residential area. Templar switched on the headlights and pulled back. The atmosphere in the Nissan was tense as they rolled closer to their prey and waited for the tell-tale signs of a head in the car turning to see who was behind. The heads didn’t turn.
The traffic lights turned green and they turned left into suburbia, with modern, wide streets and detached houses. The verges were green and there were established trees and acacias, suggesting this was an area that was irrigated, and not for agriculture. A status symbol in Pakistan.
They followed the Mercedes into the comfortable suburb, losing sight of it as the convoy of three cars took a long bend. On the other side of the bend, de Payns couldn’t see the Mercedes.
‘Side streets,’ said de Payns. Templar slowed and de Payns saw the Mercedes’ brake lights down a side street on their right, as it stopped and turned left into a driveway.
Templar slowed and did a U turn, circling back and into the side street. They crept down the street, keeping a constant speed as they drove past the Mercedes, parked in a driveway beside a medium-sized house. One man in a black suit was opening the rear door of the car and another man, also in a black suit, was entering the side door of the house.
Templar kept driving. They made their way back to the main road and headed south, back to the expressway and into the heart of Rawalpindi. Now they had a street and a number, and they’d seen at least two people. But neither looked like a scientist.
‘Three occupants of the car,’ said Templar. ‘Those two are the bodyguards. Our VIP was in the back seat.’
‘The one at the door was doing a security sweep of the house?’ asked de Payns.
‘That’s what I saw,’ said Templar.
‘We need some surveillance and a photograph of the VIP,’ said de Payns.
‘Copy,’ said Templar. ‘I’ll return tonight, confirm the house set-up.’
‘Pictures in the morning?’ asked de Payns.
‘Consider it done.’