Standing ducked out of the tent. ‘Did he say what it’s about?’

  ‘I’m a mushroom, me,’ said Mearns. ‘But word is that the captain is going to be eating through a straw for a few weeks.’

  ‘Shit,’ said Standing.

  ‘If ever a Rupert deserved a punch in the mouth, it’s him,’ said Mearns. ‘He’s been a fucking liability from day one.’

  ‘Cheers, Dave.’

  ‘Chin up, Sarge,’ said Mearns, patting him on the back.

  Standing walked over to the Portakabin that Major Taggart used as the ops centre. There was a mat outside and he scraped off the worst of the dust that was coating his boots before knocking.

  ‘Enter!’ shouted the major.

  Standing pushed open the door. The major was sitting behind a table piled high with files and reports. On the wall behind him a large-scale map of the country was dotted with pins of different colours and a dozen or so surveillance photographs. He stood up and folded his arms. ‘No need to tell you what this is about, Standing.’ He was in his forties with receding hair cut short and he was missing the bottom of his left ear, the result of a firefight with the Taliban more than a decade ago, about the time that Standing had signed up.

  ‘No, boss.’ Standing stood with his arms behind his back. Normally officers and troopers were pretty relaxed in the SAS but he knew he was about get a bollocking. He stood ramrod straight and stared at the map on the wall.

  ‘What the fuck were you thinking?’ said the major.

  Standing didn’t answer. He had a pretty good idea where the conversation was going and he figured there was nothing he could say that would change the outcome.

  ‘You can’t go around hitting officers,’ said the major. ‘Don’t we have enough bad guys out here for you?’ He shook his head. ‘You’re a fucking liability sometimes, Standing. You know that? A fucking liability.’

  He paced up and down behind his desk, then took a deep breath to compose himself. ‘The captain has a broken nose and a cracked jaw. And he’s not going to let this drop. You picked the wrong officer to hit, I can tell you that. He’s not going to put it down to a bit of rough and tumble. He wants you out of the Regiment.’

  Standing gritted his teeth.

  ‘What’s wrong with you?’ said the major, but the question sounded rhetorical and Standing said nothing. The major stopped pacing and folded his arms as he gazed at him. ‘That’s it? You’re going to give me the silent treatment?’

  ‘I’m not sure what to say, boss,’ said Standing. Officers were never referred to as ‘sir’ in the SAS. Nor were they saluted. But that didn’t give them any less authority than they had in the regular army, and Standing knew he had to tread very carefully.

  ‘You could try saying sorry for a start.’

  Standing shrugged. ‘But I’m not sorry, boss. And, given the same set of circumstances, I’d probably do it again.’

  ‘You want to make a habit of hitting your superior officers? How is that a credible career plan?’

  ‘He shoved me, boss.’

  ‘What is this – the fucking playground? He shoved you so you broke his jaw?’

  ‘I just reacted, boss. I saw red. He hit me and I hit him back.’

  The major sighed. ‘What the fuck are we going to do with you?’ he asked, and again it was clear the question was rhetorical. He began pacing again. ‘I’ve got to send you back to Hereford,’ he said. ‘I don’t have any choice.’

  ‘Boss, I’m needed here. I’m no use to anyone back at HQ.’

  The major stopped pacing. ‘Matt, do you understand the trouble you’re in? You could be sent back to your unit for this. Maybe worse. Guy Waters wants you on a charge. You could end up in the stockade.’

  ‘He asked for it, boss. I’ll justify my actions if I have to.’

  ‘Yeah, well, good luck with that,’ said the major. ‘“He pushed me so I broke his jaw.” I’m not sure that will fly as defence.’

  ‘He wanted me to kill kids, boss,’ said Standing, quietly.

  ‘What? What did you say?’

  ‘He gave me an order that would have resulted in children dying. I refused. He pushed me. I hit him. If the captain wants me up on a charge, that’s his call. But I’m fucked if I’ll apologise.’

  The major frowned and rubbed his chin. ‘Tell me what happened.’

  Standing spoke slowly and quietly, running through the mission from the moment he had his target in his sights to the destruction of the wrong building. ‘I wasn’t going to let children die,’ said Standing. ‘If I’d called the jets in on the target, kids would have been killed. When I got back to base, the captain ripped into me. That would have been fair enough, but then he pushed me and I reacted instinctively.’

  ‘Guy knew there were children in the line of fire?’

  ‘I told him, twice.’

  ‘And he said what?’

  ‘He said Ahmadi was a high-value target and that any collateral damage was immaterial. What sort of arsehole says that? We’re supposed to be fighting to save this fucking country, boss. If we’re not saving it for the children, then who are we saving it for?’

  ‘I think the point the captain was making was that Ahmadi is a nasty piece of work and by taking him out we’d be saving lives down the line. A lot of lives, maybe. It’s a numbers game.’

  ‘With respect, boss, this isn’t a fucking game, and if we have to kill kids to get what we want then we’re worse than the terrorists. The captain gave me a direct order that would have resulted in children dying and I refused to do it.’

  The major scratched the back of his neck. ‘This is a bloody mess,’ he said. ‘But I’ve got no choice here. You’re being sent back to Hereford. You can plead your case there.’

  Standing nodded. ‘No problem, boss.’

  ‘I’m going to fill in my report saying that there was a physical altercation that got out of hand. I’ll also be saying that you’re a bloody good soldier, a valued member of your squadron, and that I wouldn’t want to lose you.’

  ‘Thanks, boss.’

  ‘I’m serious, Matt. You’re a fucking good soldier. One in a million. But you can’t go around hitting officers, not without there being repercussions.’

  ‘Understood, boss,’ said Standing.

  ‘There’s a Herc leaving in two hours,’ said the Major. ‘Be on it, with all your gear.’

  Shepherd arrived at Brighton Marina at nine o’clock in the morning in his BMW X5. He parked and went in search of Willoughby-Brown’s boat. It was easy enough to find, halfway down one of the jetties to the left of the marina. It was called Second Wind and was a tidy, single-masted yacht with a teak deck that had weathered to a dull grey over the years. There didn’t seem to be anyone around so Shepherd called, ‘Anyone there?’

  ‘Below decks,’ yelled Willoughby-Brown. ‘Come aboard.’

  Shepherd climbed onto the stern. He was wearing a blue waterproof jacket over a thick black pullover and black jeans and carrying a black nylon backpack. Willoughby-Brown hadn’t told him what to bring but Shepherd had checked the weather forecast and it was supposed to be a mild day with little chance of rain. Beyond the wheel there was a hatch: Shepherd ducked his head and took the stairs one by one until he was in the main saloon. Willoughby-Brown was sitting at a table with a chart and a steaming mug of coffee in front of him. He was wearing a black fleece over a green polo-neck. He raised his mug. ‘Welcome aboard,’ he said. He gestured at the galley. ‘Kettle’s just boiled. Only instant, I’m afraid.’

  ‘Instant’s fine,’ said Shepherd. He made himself a coffee and squeezed onto the seat opposite Willoughby-Brown.

  ‘So, what do you know about boats?’ asked Willoughby-Brown.

  ‘Just the basics,’ said Shepherd.

  Willoughby-Brown pulled three paperback books from a shelf behind him. ‘This is where your trick memory will come in useful,’ he said. ‘These cover the basics of seamanship and navigation.’

  Shepherd took them. His eidetic memory meant that he pretty much remembered everything he read, heard or saw, so memorising the contents of the books wouldn’t be a problem. But memorising facts and acquiring physical skills were totally different, and for the latter he’d need Willoughby-Brown’s help.

  ‘So, this is a Catalina 375,’ said Willoughby-Brown. ‘The hull is solid fibreglass, the mast is a deck-stepped with backstays and fore and aft lower shrouds.’ He grinned as he saw confusion flash across Shepherd’s face. ‘Don’t worry, I’ll run through the terminology when we’re on deck. The point is that you’ll need to know the jargon. So the back of the boat is aft, also known as the stern. The front is the bow. Port is left of the bow, starboard to the right. Leeward is the direction opposite the way the wind is blowing and windward is the way the wind is blowing. The boom is the horizontal pole extending from the bottom of the mast. The rudder is the piece of fibreglass sticking into the water that steers the boat. I’ll explain tacking and jibing once we’re under sail.’ He drained his mug. ‘Okay, let’s get started.’

  Willoughby-Brown took Shepherd up through the hatch and went over to the wheel. ‘Okay, so we call this the cockpit, and this is obviously the wheel,’ he said. He pointed at a rope that ran along the side of the boat. ‘This is a line. Always a line, never a rope. A line might be made of rope, but it’s still a line. Every line has a role and its own name. Sometimes at sea there’s a lot to do in a short space of time so everyone needs to know what they’re doing. So, the ropes that adjust the sails are called lines. But the one that runs up the mast to pull up the mainsail is called the halyard, and the one that brings the mainsail down is called the downhaul.’

  ‘Halyard, downhaul,’ repeated Shepherd.

  ‘Now, there’s a particular type of downhaul called a Cunningham that you need to be aware of, and then there’s the vang, also known as the kicker. The Yanks call it a vang. We Brits say kicker. Potato, tomato.’

  ‘Cunningham. Vang. Kicker,’ Shepherd repeated.

  ‘I’ve had a boom vang installed on this boat,’ said Willoughby-Brown. ‘The vang pulls the end of the boom down and bends the mast. The more you pull on the vang, the more the sail flattens, which de-powers it. So, for instance, when you’re sailing upwind in a strong wind you want the sail as flat as you can get it. That means you want the vang pulled as tight as it’ll go. So, with the vang right on you can then let the mainsheet out. The sail will stay flat and therefore be de-powered.’

  ‘You’ve lost me,’ said Shepherd.

  ‘I’ll demonstrate when we’re out to sea,’ said Willoughby-Brown. ‘Basically, if there’s too much wind passing over the sail it can destabilise the boat. You have to make the sail less efficient. You can do that by steering, but the vang is a more efficient way of achieving it.’ He pointed at a line that led to the mainsail. ‘The lines that we use when we’re sailing are called sheets, and the name of the sheet refers to the sail it controls. So, to trim the mainsail – that’s the big one, obviously – you use the mainsheet. To trim the jib – the sail at the front – you adjust the jib sheet. The rigging that supports stationary objects, like the mast, is called the standing rigging and more often than not it’s steel cables. They’re not called lines. They’re known as shrouds or stays.’

  ‘Shrouds. Stays,’ repeated Shepherd.

  ‘So the line that runs from the mast to the bow is the forestay. And the lines that run from the mast to the stern are the backstays … I know there’s a lot to learn but if you’re going to pass yourself off as a mariner you’ll have to have these terms on the tip of your tongue. You’ll be surrounded by sailors and they’ll spot a fake a mile off.’

  ‘I’ll be okay,’ said Shepherd.

  ‘I’m sure you will. The engine is a three-cylinder, fortyhorsepower Yanmar diesel, which will give us more than six knots at two thousand r.p.m. We’ll only be using the engine to get into and out of the marina. Once we’re on the open sea we’ll use the sails. This is about you getting the hang of sailing, not motorboating.’

  Willoughby-Brown pressed a button to start the engine, then jerked his thumb at the lines tethering the boat to the jetty. ‘The lines that tie us up are called docklines or warps. So, cast off the docklines.’

  Shepherd untied them. Then Willoughby-Brown pushed the throttle and guided the yacht away from the jetty. Shepherd sat down and watched him steer. There was an iPad mounted to the right of the wheel and Willoughby-Brown flicked through various screens showing the position of the yacht. ‘Navigation, these days, is all down to GPS, but any sailor worth his salt will still know his way around a sextant and have a working knowledge of the stars.’

  ‘I’m okay on celestial navigation,’ said Shepherd.

  ‘Ah, yes, of course. Your special-forces background. What about charts? Your memory okay with them?’

  ‘Sure. I’ll need to be shown how they work but, yes, I’ll have no trouble memorising them.’

  ‘There’s a local-area chart on the desk. Bring it up and I’ll show you how it works. Oh, and make us both a coffee, will you?’

  Shepherd threw him a mock-salute. ‘Aye, aye, Captain.’

  ‘So you’re in the SAS, then?’ asked the taxi driver, a man in his sixties wearing a flat cap and a corduroy shirt. He had a pair of glasses on a chain around his neck. Standing had got into the car outside Hereford station and asked for the Credenhill camp, some six miles to the west. The man had driven in silence for the first twenty minutes, but he kept looking at Standing in his rear-view mirror and was clearly itching to start a conversation.

  ‘Nah, I’m a cleaner,’ said Standing, looking out of the window.

  ‘Like fuck you are,’ chuckled the driver. ‘I’ve lived in Hereford all my life so I know the wannabes and I know the real thing.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘For start, the guys who are in the SAS will never admit to it. But the wannabes, that’s all they talk about. You see them in the pubs all over, talking big and trying to pick up impressionable girls.’

  ‘Yeah?’ said Standing. The man was right. It wasn’t something he would ever admit to or boast about. Not to strangers, anyway. But as soon as a group of SAS lads got together and booze flowed, all you got was war stories, and most of them were embellished beyond all recognition.

  ‘I see you’ve got a bit of a tan there,’ said the driver. ‘Been anywhere nice?’

  Standing laughed. ‘Not really.’

  ‘Iraq? Afghanistan? Syria?’

  Standing laughed again. ‘Or D, all of the above.’

  The driver grinned into his mirror. ‘I get it,’ he said. ‘I know you can’t admit to it. I respect that. But I tell you, you guys are heroes, no question. You wouldn’t get me out there in the desert fighting those mad mullahs. Not for all the tea in China. Have you seen the videos of what they do to their prisoners? Fucking animals, they are.’

  ‘No argument here,’ said Standing.

  ‘If it was up to me, I’d nuke them all. Just drop a bomb on them. End of.’

  ‘That’s a view,’ said Standing.

  ‘You don’t agree?’

  ‘There’s a lot of civilians out there who just want to get on with their lives.’

  ‘Yeah? Looks to me like they want new lives over here. You know they were going to build a mosque in Hereford? Can you believe that? The home of the SAS and they wanted a bloody mosque. They got very short shrift, I can tell you.’

  ‘Yeah, religion has a lot to answer for. Remember the John Lennon song “Imagine”? If people didn’t believe in Heaven, maybe they’d be nicer to each other.’

  ‘Chance’d be a fine thing,’ said the driver. ‘Seems to me the best way would be to throw out anyone who doesn’t want to be British. And there’s nothing British about wanting to pray in a mosque and refusing to eat a bacon butty.’

  ‘I guess not,’ said Standing. Any further discussion was curtailed by their arrival at the main gates of the Credenhill barracks. ‘How much?’ asked Standing.

  The driver shook his head. ‘Your money’s no good to me, mate. You’re a bloody hero, you and your lot. Least I can do.’

  Standing took out his wallet and gave him a ten-pound note. ‘I’d rather pay.’

  ‘Okay, suit yourself,’ said the driver, taking the money and shoving it into a plastic cup next to his gearstick. ‘Thanks. I appreciate it. Stay safe, yeah?’

  ‘You too.’ Standing climbed out and pulled his large canvas kitbag after him. The car drove off and he went to the gate where he handed over his ID. A uniformed security guard scrutinised it and waved him through.

  Standing shouldered his backpack and walked quickly to the administrative offices. Colonel Davies was the man he was there to see, the man who had Standing’s future in his hands. Standing hadn’t been given an appointment: he’d just been told to report to the colonel as soon as he’d arrived in the UK. It had been a long journey. He had flown from Syria to Gibraltar in an RAF Lockheed C-130 Hercules, stayed on the Rock for twelve hours while a crew change was arranged, then flown into RAF Brize Norton in Oxfordshire, where 47 Squadron was based. The RAF had been good enough to lay on a car to get him to Charlbury station and provide him with a rail warrant for the two-hour journey to Hereford. He hadn’t shaved or showered since Gibraltar but he still looked presentable in his black leather jacket, green turtleneck sweater and blue jeans.

  He knocked on the door to the admin centre and went in. Two female civilian workers sat behind computers, tapping away on their keyboards. Standing knew them both. The older of the pair was Debbie, the wife of one of the Regiment’s sergeant majors, the younger was a fit young blonde called Emily, who, by all accounts, was working her way through all the captains in the Regiment. If the rumours were true, she’d already slept with three.

  ‘I’m here to see Colonel Davies,’ said Standing. He dropped his kitbag onto the floor with a thud.

  Debbie looked at him over the top of her glasses. ‘Take a seat, Matt,’ she said. ‘I’ll tell him you’re here.’

  Standing didn’t feel like sitting so he paced up and down. His heart was pounding and he was sweating. Facing the colonel was more stressful than going up against Taliban fighters. He saw Emily looking at him and flashed her a smile. ‘They say you’ve been a naughty boy,’ she said.

 

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