The constable nods. ‘Appreciate that. We’ve had a few of your blokes try to come in with them. You can go on through now.’
Moments later my headache recedes. I’ve retrieved my bag, which contains only a camera and a large tube of what appears to be sunscreen. Moving quickly past Eton Manor I cross an elevated pedestrian bridge that leads me onto the north-east concourse. Skirting the Velodrome, the basketball arena and the athletes’ village, I make my way continuously south past the sponsors’ hospitality area. I pause to look at them, realising that I’ve overlooked many possible violators of the Olympic ideals.
No matter, I decide. My final act will more than compensate for the oversight. At that thought, my breath quickens. So does my heart, which is hammering when I smile at the guards at the bottom of the loose spiral staircase that climbs between the legs of the Orbit. ‘The restaurant?’ I say. ‘Still open?’
‘Until half-past three, sir,’ one of them replies. ‘You’ve got two hours.’
‘And if I wish for food after that?’ I ask.
‘The other vendors down here will all be open,’ he says. ‘Only the restaurant is closing.’
I nod and start the long climb, barely giving heed to the nameless monsters descending the staircase, all of them oblivious to the threat I represent. Twelve minutes later, I reach the level of the slowly turning restaurant, and go up to the maître d’.
‘Rajpal,’ I say. ‘Table for one.’
She frowns. ‘Would you be willing to share?’
‘It would be a great pleasure,’ I reply.
She nods. ‘It will still be ten or fifteen minutes.’
‘Might I use the gents’ while I wait?’ I ask.
‘Of course,’ she says and stands aside.
Other prospective patrons press in behind me, leaving the woman so busy that I’m sure she’s already begun to forget about me. When she calls my name, she’ll figure I got tired of waiting and left. Even if she has someone check the toilet, they won’t find me. Rajpal is already gone.
I go to the gents’, and take the stall I need, which is luckily vacant. Five minutes go by before the rest of the facility empties. Then, as quickly as I can, I pull myself up to a sitting position on the stall dividers and push up one of the ceiling tiles to reveal a reinforced crawl-way built so that maintenance workers can easily get at the electrical and cooling systems.
A few moments of struggle and I’m laying up there in the crawl-way, the ceiling tile back in place. Now all I have to do is calm myself, prepare myself, and trust in fate.
Chapter 109
KNIGHT AND JACK were inside the Olympic Park by four that afternoon. The sunlight was still glaring and the heat shimmered off the track. According to Scotland Yard and MI5, which had together seized control of security under orders from the Prime Minister, Mike Lancer had made no effort to get inside the park with his security pass, which someone had smartly flagged immediately after the warning about him had been issued.
Around four-thirty, Knight’s head was still aching as he followed Jack into the empty stadium where teams with sniffer dogs were patrolling. At the moment, his thoughts were less about finding Lancer than they were about his children. Were they all right in hospital? Was Amanda by their side?
Knight was about to make a call to his mother when Jack said, ‘Maybe he did get spooked at the marathon. Maybe that was his last chance: he saw it wasn’t going to work, and he’s making his escape.’
‘No,’ Knight said. ‘He’s going to try something here. Something big.’
‘He’ll have to be Houdini,’ Jack observed. ‘You heard them, they’ve gone to war-zone security levels. They’re putting double teams of SAS snipers up high and every available cop in the halls and stairways.’
‘I’m hearing you, Jack,’ Knight said. ‘But given what the insane bastard has done so far, we can’t be sure that any security level is going to work. Think about it. Lancer oversaw a billion and a half dollars in security spending for the Olympics. He knows every contingency that Scotland Yard and MI5 provided for in their plans. And for much of the past seven years that lunatic has had access to every inch of every venue as it was built. Every goddamn inch.’
Chapter 110
AT THREE-THIRTY THAT afternoon, echoing through the fourteen-inch gap between the restaurant ceiling and the roof of the Orbit, I hear hydraulic gears being braked and halted, and feel the slow rotation of the observation deck stop. Closing my eyes and calming my breathing, I prepare for what lies ahead. My fate. My destiny. My just and final due.
At ten minutes to four I squeeze the tube o
f special skin cream onto the turban cloth and use it to turn my skin near-black. A maintenance crew enters and cleans the room below me. I can hear their mops sluicing the floor for several minutes, followed by half an hour of silence that is interrupted only by the soft sounds of the movement it takes to stain my head, neck and hands.
At twelve minutes past four, the first sniffer dog team enters the gents’, and I have the sudden terrible thought that the monsters might have been clever enough to bring an article of my clothing to prime their beasts. But the patrol is in and out in under a minute, fooled no doubt by the smell of the patchouli oil.
They return at five and again at six. When they leave after the third time, I know that my hour is at hand. Cautiously, I grope around under a strip of insulation, finding a loaded ammunition clip put there seven months ago. Pocketing the clip, I lower myself into the stall and then strip off my remaining clothes, leaving me two-tone, black and white, and a terror to behold in the mirror.
Naked now except for my wristwatch, I rip a length of the turban fabric and wrap the two ends around my hands, leaving an eighteen-inch section dangling slack. Taking a position tight to the wall next to the gents’ door, I settle down to wait.