The call from Jéjé came through just after lunch on Thursday. Varnachev had walked through arrivals with a cabin suitcase—no checked luggage—and had jumped in a taxi, heading for town. The entrance to the Four Seasons looked like an old palace with not a lot of hides available to de Payns, so he stood at a pedestrian crossing looking down a cross street and took pictures of Varnachev getting out of the cab, with the Canon resting across his forearm and pointing at right angles to his body.
Varnachev walked into the hotel, checked in and went up to his room on the fourth floor, and de Payns circled back to the sub, climbed into the passenger seat where Templar was playing with the digital receiver and picking up music.
‘What’s that?’ asked de Payns, as Templar tuned the receiver and clarified the sound being captured by Shrek’s wall microphone on the hotel room wall he shared with Varnachev.
‘That’s the in-house music channel,’ said Templar, with a smile. ‘Our Wagner man likes jazz.’
They listened for more than an hour as Varnachev alternated between television news channels and a channel that played jazz. Then Varnachev had a shower before calling room service and ordering a cheeseburger and fries. Judging by the sounds of the door opening and a cap being popped, the Russian had a beer with his burger.
It was cold in Baku when the sun set, and Templar turned on the engine to get the heater working. De Payns went on the radio at 8.21 p.m. to check the airport status with Jéjé. Salah still hadn’t shown and the last arrival for the day was scheduled to land at 10 p.m.
‘We need our sleep,’ said de Payns, when the TV was switched off and they could hear Varnachev brushing his teeth.
‘Zero six hundred at the RV?’ asked Templar.
‘I’ll be there,’ said de Payns.
■
The audio quality was not perfect but it was pretty good for a mic that was pulling words through concrete. De Payns had a hard drive plugged into the receiver, recording everything, and Templar was running another receiver for the directional parabolic mic that Shrek pointed at Varnachev’s wall.
They munched on pastries and drank black coffee as the sun threatened to rise, and at 7.02 a.m. Danny—sitting in an armchair in the foyer—keyed his radio mic and said, ‘Salah just entered by a side door with two thugs. Gone up in the elevator. Stand by.’
They waited, and after forty-five seconds Danny came back on the net: ‘Fourth floor.’
‘Salah’s early,’ said de Payns to Templar. ‘So he arrived by road or he has a private aircraft.’
‘Or he’s been in Baku for a few days and he’s been hiding in a hotel,’ said Templar.
Danny told the mission team: ‘Going to fourth floor,’ which meant he was going to check that Salah’s heavies weren’t harassing people in rooms around Varnachev’s.
Three minutes later Danny came on the radio again: ‘They made one pass of the third floor but all good.’
The wall microphone audio started with a knock on Varnachev’s door, and the Russian taking control of his meeting. ‘They’re not coming in,’ he said—pointing at Salah’s heavies, presumably. ‘The breakfast is good here. We’ll call them when we need them.’
Speaking in English, Salah argued, but Varnachev won the point. ‘If anything from this conversation ever leaks out, I prefer that there’s only one person I have to visit, and that’s you, my friend,’ he said with a big Russian chuckle.
The door clicked shut and the Russian offered Salah coffee and told him where to sit.
Headphones on, Templar and de Payns listened intently. The Cat would not have time to go over possibly hours of conversation, so the message de Payns sent to Briffaut at the conclusion of this meeting would have to get to the heart of it.
The pleasantries ended and they could hear Varnachev offering Salah a gift. ‘How much is there?’ asked Salah, after he’d opened the latches of a briefcase.
‘That’s five hundred thousand euro for you personally.’
‘Personally?’
‘As I said, it’s between you and me,’ said Varnachev. ‘I don’t deal with ideas, and al-Ridha or Hamas or Islamic Jihad are simply ideas. I deal with people. You and I have the relationship, that’s how it works.’
‘Okay, so we have a relationship,’ said Salah, with a heavy accent but pretty good English. ‘Wagner shows us friendship, and al-Ridha returns the friendship.’
‘I’m glad we see it the same way,’ said Varnachev.
‘I understand that we’re going to hit a gas rig, but when do I get the Javelins?’
‘First things first,’ said Varnachev. ‘You have the team?’
‘Yes, they were trained by this Boris.’
‘He trained five—you only need three. You have them ready to go?’
‘I don’t have a target and I don’t have the Javelins.’
‘Are they ready to go?’ Varnachev repeated. There was a pause—Salah nodding, perhaps—then the Russian continued: ‘As agreed, they board a boat in Hadera, between Haifa and Tel Aviv, and rendezvous with a ship. I have the papers for your people. They’re logged in the Israeli security system, and the boat’s skipper is one of ours.’
‘Yes,’ said Salah. ‘They take two Javelins off this ship, and the ship makes for Latakia and delivers one hundred and twenty Javelin systems to my people—’
‘Deliverable on completion of your mission,’ interrupted Varnachev.
‘The men will strike the rig with the Javelins. They are ready for this,’ snapped Salah. ‘But if I am to claim the responsibility and get the credit, I need to know where I’m hitting and have the footage ready for dissemination. You know this. This is the point of al-Ridha working with Wagner.’
‘The point of al-Ridha working with Wagner is that an unknown bunch of Hezbollah puppets in Homs get to strike out on their own account and not be constantly taking direction from Tehran or Beirut. That’s the point. Clear?’
In the van they could hear the heavy sigh from Salah. ‘Yes, we’re clear. But still, I need to know that this ship is real and loaded with our Javelins.’
‘It’s very real, my friend. In fact, it’s being loaded today. The ship will set out for Latakia on Sunday morning, and you will meet it just after midday.’
‘Where do we meet the ship? And what are we striking?’
Templar and de Payns could hear a piece of paper being unfolded, and Varnachev spoke again. ‘That’s the RV coordinates, and your targets: the well bore itself and the rig-side system that the processing ship connects to. Commit them to memory, because that piece of paper is not leaving this room.’
‘There’ll be some activity on Sunday, because it’s the first gas offtake at this rig,’ said Salah. ‘Lots of media?’
‘I’d expect so,’ said Varnachev. ‘There’s a chance that your people will get away in all the confusion.’
Salah chuckled. ‘The Europeans and Israelis are not going to be happy about this one. But I have a question: we can hit the gas platform when it connects to the processing ship, and probably make a big explosion. But they have all those safety valves that trigger as soon as there’s a problem. I don’t know that we can set the field on fire …’
‘You’re talking about the blowout preventers?’ replied Varnachev. ‘You’re right. They contain gas pressure and fire. But a BOP won’t work if there’s no electricity, no sensors or monitors to trigger it.’
There was a brief silence, then Salah asked, ‘You can do that?’
‘Yes, I can,’ said Varnachev. ‘You just put those Javelins where I tell you, and it will be like fireworks night.’
■
De Payns hurriedly sent the sound files to Briffaut on his encrypted system, along with a message.
V & S hitting gas rig off Hadera with two Javelin rockets. Rig is likely to be Pontus since they’ll be attacking a new rig making first gas offtake on Sunday. Hitters will have Israeli security registration. They will pick up two Javelin systems from a ship en route to delivering 120 Javelins to al-Ridha in Latakia. They will hit the well bore and the system on the rig that transfers gas to the ship. Salah remarked that Europeans will not be happy. V claims he will disable the blowout preventers on the rig by removing all power, sensors and monitors.
De Payns split the teams: he and Templar would follow Varnachev, and Danny and Jéjé would tail Salah, a skinny rodent of a man. The Syrian and his thugs moved out of the hotel first, followed by the DGSE duo in a cab. Varnachev left ninety minutes later, and de Payns and Templar tailed him to a corporate helipad in the south of Baku, where he stepped onto an H145 helicopter. They watched the aircraft take off, turn and set a course. It was heading west.
As they drove to the airport, de Payns took a call from Danny on the burner phone. ‘S and friends got on a flight for Amman. There’s a connecting flight to Haifa.’
■
De Payns stood in the Europcar car park of Baku International Airport and called a number in France. He was asked for an ID code to identify himself and then a response code that verified the office he was allowed to call. The operator confirmed and hung up. The burner phone rang three minutes later, Dominic Briffaut on a secure line.
‘I got your message—where are you?’
‘Still in-country,’ said de Payns. ‘Varnachev and Salah have decamped. They’re heading for Haifa and Hadera.’
‘If the timing is for Sunday, we only have Saturday—tomorrow—to sort this out,’ said Briffaut. ‘Any further details on this ship with the Javelins?’
‘Only that the hitters will rendezvous with it on its way to Syria, so that means it’s coming from Egypt or the Suez,’ said de Payns.
‘Or Libya?’
‘The only market that could supply one hundred and twenty Javelins to Wagner Group would be the UAE,’ said de Payns. ‘These weapons have probably come from the Gulf.’
‘If it’s UAE, they’ll be using Oman,’ said Briffaut. ‘Muscat?’
‘Or Sohar?’
‘I’ll get Marie’s team on it,’ said Briffaut. ‘I’ll call the Israelis when I have more to say. This has to go to them, but I want you there anyway. You’re at Baku Airport?’
‘Yes.’
‘Stand by for a lift.’
■
The French government Falcon 50 landed one hour and forty-eight minutes later, and an official from the airport collected de Payns and his team and shuttled them across to the military annexe, where they boarded the small business jet. Once they were airborne for Haifa, the pilot patched through a call from Dominic Briffaut.
‘You’ll be met at Haifa by an Israeli security person. His name is Ben Adinsky, and you’re Manu,’ said Briffaut. ‘He’s your rank at the Shin Bet.’
‘Are we observing?’
‘They’ll let you operate in Israel so long as you’re in Adinsky’s chain of command,’ said Briffaut. ‘They’ve been tracking Salah for months—they’re motivated and will take your input where they can.’
‘Okay, I’ll stay in touch,’ said de Payns.
‘And, just so I’ve said it,’ said Briffaut, ‘nothing to embarrass the Élysée, okay? Frasier is nervous. He’s been told this Pantheon field and the EastMed pipeline is a part of the French plans for our future energy.’
‘Nice of them to tell us,’ said de Payns.
‘Well, we know now,’ said Briffaut.
‘Got it,’ said de Payns, signing off.