Free Spy Out the Land by Jeremy Duns Page B

apologised for the trouble, and headed back to Claire, who was peering at him anxiously.
    ‘What was that about? You ran off very fast.’
    He shook his head. ‘Nothing. Just a misunderstanding.’ He pointed at the clouds. ‘The sun’s going in. Why don’t we head home?’
    She looked at him, her eyes searching his for trouble, then folded her newspaper and stood, propping her hands against her back and arching it. ‘If you like. Time for some coffee,
perhaps.’
    Dark crouched down and started gathering up Ben’s toys. When they left the park a few minutes later he looked back and saw that the man had moved from the bench and was crouched on his
haunches by the birds, still clicking away. Was it a ruse? It was possible – it was an old surveillance trick to pose as an amateur snapper, and the book on the bench had seemed rather neat.
Or was he overthinking, becoming paranoiac? Yes, he thought, it was surely nothing. Just a tourist photographing some birds.

Chapter 10
    Thursday, 17 July 1975, Salisbury, Rhodesia
    In a suite on the first floor of the Meikles Hotel, Major Roy Campbell-Fraser listened as Pete Voers explained how he had conducted his surveillance on the woman and her child
in Stockholm.
    ‘What about the boy’s father?’ he asked when Voers had finished. ‘Still in the picture? Another
munt
?’
    ‘No, a Swede. I got some of him as well.’ Voers removed several glossy black-and-white photographs from the briefcase on his lap and handed them to Campbell-Fraser, who held each up
to the light in turn.
    ‘Looks like a hippy.’
    ‘An old one. He’s fifty. Name of Erik Johansson.’ Campbell-Fraser looked surprised and Voers gave a ferrety grin. ‘I made some enquiries about him through the tax office,
posing as an accountant. It’s all public there, no questions asked. He works for a haulage firm in the centre of the city, and volunteers for a charity a few nights a week.’
    ‘Do you know which nights?’
    Voers took a small notebook from his trouser pocket and flicked through the pages.
    ‘Tuesdays and Fridays. He usually starts at five and comes home at around midnight.’
    Campbell-Fraser continued to examine the photographs. Then he gathered them together into a tidy bundle and placed them on a side table.
    ‘Thank you for this, Peter. I’ll have to look into it more closely, of course, but it certainly seems interesting. We know how to reach you if need be. That will be all.’
    ‘Sir.’
    Voers saluted curtly and left the room. Campbell-Fraser picked the photographs up and lowered himself into an armchair near the window to look through them again. He was excited by the possible
ramifications of them. He hadn’t indicated this to Voers, partly for security reasons and partly because he was unsure what to do about the man. He’d dismissed him from the regiment a
year earlier when he had discovered he’d raped a guerrilla’s wife in a raid on one of the villages across the border with Mozambique, and as a result had been in two minds about whether
to meet him when he had called his office that morning claiming he had valuable intelligence. But if the information was correct –
if
– it was undeniably a breakthrough.
    After a few more minutes of contemplation, Campbell-Fraser packed the photographs into his briefcase and left the room, switching off the lights. He took the stairs down to the lobby, paid for
the room, and walked out into Cecil Square to find his car.

Chapter 11
    Joshua Ephibe grasped his ribs under the thin sheet and shivered at the sight of the man who had just walked into the ward. It was Sammy Oka, whom he had last seen four years
earlier at the training camp in Mgagao. Oka had been one of the more impressive recruits, and Ephibe had earmarked him for fast promotion in his passing-out report. Now he was one of his gaolers.
He looked in good shape, too, his muscular physique encased in a camouflaged T-shirt, faded khaki shorts and plimsolls, all of