An Enemy Within Read online

  Praise for Roy David’s previous works:

  Lester Piggott; Downfall of a Legend

  ‘Compelling reading.’

  Daily Express

  ‘An absorbing and fair-minded account, spiced with a knowledge of racing’s shadier side.’

  Kenneth Rose, Sunday Telegraph

  ‘An enthralling tale, full of pace.’

  Howard Wright, Racing Post

  The Shergar Mystery

  ‘Stunning.’

  Daily Star

  ‘Roy David knows more about the Shergar kidnap than any man. His book is the standard work on the saga.’

  Brian Vine, Daily Mail

  Robert Sangster; Tycoon of The Turf

  ‘Roy David’s best prose is for the horses, and details of them and the money are vivid enough to make your hands smell.’

  Sunday Express.

  ‘A worthy successor to the much-acclaimed book on Lester Piggott.’

  Sporting Life

  About the author

  Roy David has forty years experience as a journalist and has written for most of Britain’s national newspapers. On leaving school in Liverpool, he became a drummer for a Cavern-based blues band, appearing with acts including The Rolling Stones, Stevie Wonder, Sonny Boy Williamson, Howlin’ Wolf, Memphis Slim and Eric Clapton and the Yardbirds.

  Roy then went into journalism and was at various times a news reporter, crime reporter, sub-editor and racing correspondent.

  He is the author of Lester Piggott: Downfall of a Legend (Heinemann, 1989), which reached No. 9 in The Sunday Times bestsellers list and was short-listed for the William Hill Sports Book of the Year Award. Previous books include: Short Heads and Tall Tales, The Shergar Mystery and Robert Sangster: Tycoon of the Turf. Roy was also originator and technical advisor of the major BBC drama, Shergar.

  He lives in Cheshire and is married to an emeritus professor.

  By the same author

  Short Heads and Tall Tales (Stanley Paul, 1986)

  The Shergar Mystery (Trainers’ Record, 1986)

  Lester Piggott; Downfall of a Legend (Heinemann, 1989)

  Robert Sangster; Tycoon of the Turf (Heinemann, 1991)

  AN ENEMY WITHIN

  Roy David

  Book Guild Publishing

  Sussex, England

  First published in Great Britain in 2014 by

  The Book Guild Ltd

  The Werks

  45 Church Road

  Hove, BN3 2BE

  Copyright © Roy David 2014

  The right of Roy David to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, transmitted, or stored in a retrieval system, in any form or by any means, without permission in writing from the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

  Although some of the characters are real, this is a work of fiction.

  Typesetting in Sabon by

  YHT Ltd, London

  Printed and bound in Great Britain by

  CPI Group (UK) Ltd, Croydon, CR0 4YY

  A catalogue record for this book is available from The British Library.

  ISBN 978 1 910298 02 2

  ePUB ISBN 978 1 910298 02 2

  Mobi ISBN 978 1 910298 03 9

  For all brave journalists and truth-tellers

  Thanks to:

  Everyone at The Book Guild for their professionalism, especially copy-editor Imogen Palmer for her eagle eye and designer Kieran Hood for a great jacket. Gratitude as well to my friends who read and commented on the work: fellow authors Julian Assange and David Donachie, former colleagues Fred Meachin and Michael Unger, and also to Tony Mulliken, ex-US marine Charlie Rose, Charlie Wright and rock star Bob Young. Finally to my brother Raymond for his encouragement, and, of course, to my darling wife Tricia.

  Contents

  About the author

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  1

  20 April 2003

  The voice inside Lieutenant Matt McDermott’s head taunted him, driving him crazy, as he watched for moving figures on the screen. It sent a gnawing chill, like a hunger, to churn his gut.

  ‘It’s just like a video game, man,’ it kept repeating. ‘That’s all… just a crazy freakin’ video.’

  His eyes reached straining point, fixed on the thermal viewer monitor inside the Bradley Fighting Vehicle. Ahead, he could see ghostly shapes of low-roofed buildings as the vehicle inched slowly towards the Baghdad hamlet. An insurgents’ training camp, intelligence said.

  ‘Take them by surprise if possible – and hit ‘em hard,’ the major had instructed back at base, dispatching two Bradleys, nine men in each, on their first engagement. A pincer movement.

  And McDermott, nerves at screaming pitch since leaving HQ, was in command. His rookie operation.

  He fingered the crucifix around his neck and prayed: Dear God, help us all get through this.

  The Bradley came to a halt, now in range. He ordered his driver, Bobby-Jo, to cut the engine. Now they switched to silent watch mode, the only sound the faint hum of battery power.

  Still no movement on his screen. What was he waiting for? He’d visualised coming under attack as they’d drawn closer, maybe a barrage of mortars, RPGs, Kalashnikovs. Then returning fire with the Bradley’s superior force.

  But he had the element of surprise. The enduring simplicity of battle throughout the ages. Invaluable. The perfect offensive action scenario – just as they’d said at the Academy.

  ‘Wait, wait, wait,’ McDermott breathed into his mouthpiece to the six infantry outside, taking cover behind the Bradley.

  McDermott’s master gunner, Joe Herman, also received the order in his turret. He could see the target buildings through his night sight.

  Suddenly, the sound of gunfire. Although distant, McDermott was taking no chances. ‘Open fire!’ he yelled.

  Herman’s 25 mm cannon burst into life, spewing out rapid-fire rounds into the darkness – a thunderous, overpowering, metallic hammering, shaking the frame of the Bradley and sending McDermott’s seat jumping. The noise seemed so much louder than on exercise.

  Instantly, red tracers from the rest of the unit smashed into the huddle of ramshackle houses. On the monitor, McDermott saw them as dotted white lines, rising in a slight arc at first, then falling away.

  The Bradley’s grenadier, a twenty-year old acne-ridden kid they called P.J. from someplace in Iowa that none of the unit could remember, was ordered to let loose with illumination rounds from his grenade launcher.

  In the eerie light from the white star clusters, McDermott spotted figures scurrying to a gap between buildings. He counted three, dark-clad. One stumbled. ‘Hajiis – LEFT!’ he screamed. The unit’s sustained fusillade dropped them all in seconds.

  A minute later, after no sign of resistance, he called for a ceasefire. Silence. ‘You okay, He
rman?’ The words came out croaky.

  McDermott had cautioned his gunner about the earplugs. He’d caught him on their last exercise without them, oblivious to the black and yellow warning sticker in the turret near his head. ‘You’ll be deaf by the time you’re thirty,’ he’d admonished.

  Now he wasn’t wearing them again. It was against regulations. But what could he say? He’d had no answer to Herman’s retort that muffled messages can get you killed.

  ‘Yeah, Lieutenant. Just fine and dandy,’ Herman now replied from the turret.

  ‘Wait some,’ McDermott said.

  No one flinched. Except McDermott himself. Sudden excruciating cramp in his left calf muscle. The commander’s seating compartment in a Bradley, back-right of the driver, was a squeeze for anyone over 6 feet. Grimacing, he shifted posture, half-standing and flexing his foot upwards, so the spasm vanished just as quickly.

  Outside, his men waited, soaked in the sweat of fear and adrenalin. Half-choked with dust and cordite, some gasped for breath in the windless calm. Somewhere in the distance, dogs barked. Then more gunfire. McDermott deduced it came from the second Bradley, realised it was the origin of the first shooting they’d all heard.

  ‘Hit the lights and wait ten,’ he said. ‘And, Herman – don’t forget!’

  Herman’s searchlight flooded the area. McDermott trusted he’d remembered to slide down behind the armoured glass window of his turret. In a briefing to young lieutenants fresh out of West Point like himself, the consequences were hammered home. Some dumb-cluck gunner who forgot ended up in the mortuary with a sniper’s bullet through his right eye.

  McDermott gulped hard. They were 300 metres away but, in the screen’s close-up mode, he could see the shapes of several bodies in and around the alley. So this is what it’s really like. The killing. This taste of war. ‘Dear Lord,’ he whispered under his breath.

  Duty called him to survey the carnage, yet he didn’t want to move.

  ‘Fall in,’ he eventually spluttered to his men who gathered behind the vehicle. ‘Let’s go, Bobby. Real slow,’ he said to his driver.

  Bobby-Jo started up, hit the accelerator and, grabbing the steering yoke with both hands, moved the Bradley forward on its tracks. Closing in, McDermott called a halt. Lowering the rear ramp, he picked up his rifle and dismounted. On his first few steps, his legs felt unsteady – not just because of the rocky terrain.

  He left Bobby-Jo sitting rigid in the driver’s seat, Herman on cover, now with the machine gun. Leading the rest of his men towards the buildings, he made sure they fanned out, just like the infantry manual said. Closer, he could see some of the buildings were rough breeze-block affairs with corrugated iron roofing, other structures crudely assembled.

  ‘Semi-auto,’ he ordered, activating the night light on the barrel of his gun. A one-pull burst of three rounds was enough to take anyone down. The pencil beam lit up a doorway.

  He gestured for two of his men to go round the back, his forward obs man and another to check the alley. With the other two, he ran to the only entrance in sight.

  McDermott kicked the flimsy wooden door so hard it came off its top hinge. ‘More light,’ he hissed.

  P.J. switched on a flashlight, quickly scanning the room. ‘Dear God… holy fucking Mary,’ he shouted. McDermott constantly reprimanded his men for swearing. This time he didn’t flinch.

  Two women were slumped in a corner, obviously dead. ‘Sweet Lord,’ McDermott said, slowly kneeling down beside them. ‘Oh, no… no,’ he wailed, spotting the shoeless feet of a baby, half-hidden beneath one of the women, whom he guessed was its mother.

  He ran his finger down the baby’s face, a smear of blood still wet. Probing further, no injury was apparent. Reasoning the crimson slash came from the mother’s wounds, he let out a long, laboured sigh and, with trembling hands, picked up the little body which slumped in his arms as lifeless as a doll.

  Herman’s high-explosive bullets had punched holes through the building’s façade like it was papier mâché and the woman had tried to do what all mothers did – protect her baby.

  ‘She must have fallen on it, smothered it,’ he said, devastated, hugging the baby as if the embrace could restore life.

  The spectre of their ordeal burst into his head. Huddled together in a hopeless battle for existence. Inconceivable terror as bullets pulverised the building. He felt so grateful he’d been too far away to hear the screams.

  But the poor child… ‘Suffer the little children to come unto me and forbid them not, for such is the kingdom of Heaven.’

  Gazing into the baby’s eyes almost overwhelmed him. Still open, the deepest brown, staring at him kindly, nearly a smile.

  He remembered the photograph of himself, on the mantle-piece back home. The same look in the eyes, the same colour.

  For a moment, this was him. Bouncing on his father’s knee, all chuckles, after Pop came home from the timber yard, the smell of fresh pine on his rough workclothes. Mom scurrying from the kitchen, wiping her hands on that red apron, constantly praising the Lord for giving them this gift, their only one. A boy who was so cherished they cried when he told them he was joining up.

  ‘But why?’ they pleaded.

  It was a question he had been trying to answer to himself ever since.

  His earpiece suddenly crackled to life, his forward obs man from the alley. ‘We’ve just got several old dudes down, Lieutenant.’

  ‘All meet up outside,’ he barked, carefully laying the baby down next to its mother, jumping to his feet. He felt flustered, aware his men were watching him. He wanted to reach out, touch the wall to steady himself. God, he wanted to be somewhere else, anywhere but here.

  He pressed a button on his radio. ‘B unit, come in.’

  ‘Yes, Lieutenant.’

  ‘Got anything, Sergeant?’

  ‘All clear and secure. No casualties. Body count fifteen, sir. All male, look like Hajiis to me – loads of weapons, too.’

  ‘Thank Chri… meet up. You stay put. Someone your end shine one.’

  Outside, lifting the rifle to his eyes, he peered through the night-sight into the distance, saw a flashing light.

  ‘You got a fix, Lieutenant?’ the sergeant said.

  ‘Yeah,’ he said, exhaling loudly. ‘Yeah, I see you.’

  It was only a video, the voice had teased him. But, for the love of Jesus, this was no game.

  * * *

  A heavy silence hung, pall-like, inside the Bradley as it rumbled back to base.

  McDermott dimmed the light, but the pale orange glow still caught faces frozen in sombre reflection.

  P.J. began to cough, desperately trying to clear his throat. The noise grated, even above the clanking of the twin turbo diesel engine. McDermott turned his head to look. P.J. raised his hand to cover his mouth, pressing back hard. The lieutenant could see he was starting to retch.

  ‘Halt,’ McDermott shouted, the Bradley coming to a quick stop. ‘Outside,’ he gestured to the grenadier.

  Others sat, unmoved, until they heard P.J. throwing up. Two more dived for the rear door, just making it in time. McDermott swallowed hard, could feel the bile rising in his throat. He reached for a water bottle, taking a long gulping drink.

  He mustn’t be sick, not in front of his men. Stooping, he worked his way to the open ramp. Deep, measured lungfuls of the night air quelled the feeling. He gazed up into the starless sky, a shudder running through him. Rubbing tired eyes, he felt them moist on his fingers.

  ‘Let’s hit the road,’ he finally urged, handing water bottles to those in need.

  Just before starting off, Bobby-Jo fingered a CD he’d picked up at the base, a thumping, heavy metal band he thought would rock them all the way home after the operation. The guys liked his choice of music. He glanced at the cover but put the CD back in his rack, figuring it would have to wait for another day.

  Halfway back to base, Joe Herman broke the silence, suddenly exclaiming that intelligence had screwed up big ti
me. ‘No women and no children,’ they’d assured.

  It was true, McDermott thought. He’d read the intel briefing many times, practically knew every word off by heart. They would claim mitigation, of course. Impossible to get everything right.

  But where did that leave him? What would everyone say?

  Numb, and lost in his own world, visions of the baby flooded his mind, setting his hands trembling. Rubbing sweaty palms down his trousers, he glanced out of his forward periscope, only a mile to base. Sudden fear screwed up his insides. What sort of charge would he be on? His unit had wiped out harmless civilians – under his command. It wasn’t his men’s fault. Only he would carry the can. He’d step forward, take full responsibility and accept whatever they threw at him. A court martial? He’d be disgraced, annihilated, his whole life in ruins. The thought churned his stomach.

  Just before they parked up, McDermott reflected that during the attack, he’d also called them ‘Hajiis’. Back in Kuwait, preparing for the invasion, he promised himself he’d be different. He shook his head, disgusted with himself that he hadn’t even stuck to that simple vow.

  McDermott ordered each of the team to say nothing to anyone. The major would instruct them further after debrief.

  Finally dismissing his men, he waited for everyone to disperse then headed for a quiet spot, which he found in the shadow of a palm tree. For several minutes he knelt on a patch of damp turf, seeking God’s guidance and offering a prayer for the dead. He wondered what the baby was called, but knew he would never find out.

  He strode purposefully towards the major’s office, his mind set.

  There, he believed he would be in the deepest trouble a soldier could ever imagine.

  * * *

  ‘Come in.’ McDermott’s CO was an experienced tough-nut major named Walter Douglas, early forties, from a good Boston family. He rose from behind his desk.

  McDermott stood nervously to attention. He’d tuned himself for the onslaught he thought was coming, his body braced. Would the major shout and bawl, flay his very soul with a terrifying, barbed attack, and suspend him from duty there and then?