Guy Fawkes Day

  ***

  Broad Sanctuary, junction of Victoria Street and Parliament Square, 8:20 p.m.

  Darren Chapman followed the policemen through the barricade then proceeded on foot across Parliament Square.

  A cordon of searchlights beamed from every direction across the square, pointing upwards to penetrate the dark recesses and battlements of the palace. Police cars, vans and motorcycles lined the roadside, forming a protective cordon that enveloped the entire square and disappeared into the darkness along the far side of Westminster Bridge to his left and past Westminster Abbey on his right.

  Whitehall was the only road that had not been completely fenced off from Parliament Square, but even here the police thronged three and four deep around a swing barrier. Both Westminster Bridge and Lambeth Bridge were closed, they had told him in the security briefing, as was the Albert Embankment facing Parliament across the Thames. This was still London, but not as Darren Chapman had ever seen or known it.

  It was misty now, but mild and dry. The BBC cameramen kept stopping just ahead to adjust his equipment, and Chapman was glad to see that he was not the only one among them being bossed by nerves.

  Across the square, the lights of the Houses of Parliament looked dimmer than usual, but the stonework was still floodlit and there was no other external evidence of the drama within. The news teams were all down by Poets Corner, still pointing cameras at the shattered southern side of Victoria Tower, whose mangled façade had so engrossed him when he first saw it on the Six O' Clock News back in his office.

  But Chapman's mind was as absorbed with the man he was so shortly to meet as with the unprecedented events in the Houses of Parliament. However spectacular the day's events had been so far, the whole world would soon realize that was no ordinary story of terrorists, bombs, hostages, and plots. Darren Chapman felt confident that Prince Omar Al-Ajnabi or Robert Bailey—whichever name the world eventually chose—would leave as vivid an impression on a global TV audience of billions as he had left on all those who had known him as the Special Envoy of Ramliyya during his brief stay in the UK.

  The policemen led them inside the little church next to the Abbey. Inside was a good a scene of desecration as any he had witnessed. Telephone, electric and fibre-optic cables were coiled all over the floor, connecting to computers, telephones and makeshift desks. Policemen and women both in uniform and out huddled purposefully in small groups focused around computer or television screens.

  Chapman felt his tension further accentuated when he saw that spooky fellow Talbot again, the same fellow who had spoken to him in private at New Scotland Yard before they had been briefed by the Met. Next to Talbot he recognised Commissioner Dinsdale of the Met. The four other men with them were very likely to be senior policemen, M15, senior civil servants and maybe even SAS.

  Commissioner Dinsdale came over and introduced himself to Chapman and the two-man BBC camera crew.

  ‘OK, gentlemen. PC Rennie will take you across the road just in front of St Stephen's Porch. After that you'll be on your own. We've had assurances about your safety, and I understand that Mr Chapman has even met the leader of this group before.’

  Chapman watched Dinsdale raise his owlish eyebrows in a manner that suggested both suspicion and disapproval, to which Chapman simply nodded his affirmation.

  ‘Fine,’ Dinsdale scowled, ‘and I wish you luck then, but please remember to try and keep the interview brief. Just let this Bailey fellow say his piece, then get out. Understand?’

  The two cameramen nodded, but Chapman doubted it would be that simple. He knew the man he was about to face far better than Dinsdale did. Omar Al-Ajnabi had summoned him there to tell a story, not just to issue a set of demands.