Inverness
8-15 a.m.
April 17th
The ride in the ‘chopper’ from Plockton air strip had taken Marco Spencer roughly as the crow flies to Inverness, skirting Loch Ness and to his mind making the land beneath him look like a rapidly scrolling version of the satellite map he’d studied as part of his preparation. The pilot had been too busy for conversation and Spencer was lost in thoughts. The ‘ride’ didn’t register. He’d been on that many helicopter flights, mostly across the Middle-East, and even then in ‘khaki company’ in semi darkness, fearing hand held missile attacks, ready to be dropped, army style, in disguise, meeting contacts and watching his own back weeks on end until ‘extraction’, usually by chopper again, to a debriefing where he had offloaded the intelligence he had gathered and explained any killing he had had to do, or at least those of note or those likely to cause any fuss.
This chopper hovered and settled with a mild bump at Inverness Airport one hour after his arrival in Scotland. Being an internal flight, there was no clearing of security or customs. He’d entered the country and slipped into society with barely an eye brow being raised.
When the blades had stilled Spencer climbed out, thanked the pilot and with the casual attitude of a rich man he made easy strides into Inverness Airport, to get a coffee, not to mention a good breakfast, and think carefully about his next move.
He was going to buy a ticket for Gatwick, on a Flybe flight at nine forty-five, but that was an obvious move. There was the train, the night sleeper, but that put him behind again and Mason was booked on that train. The whole ‘not all the eggs in one basket’ situation had been made clear to all of them. Having been part of the espionage network in the UK he knew about DIC, the secretive watching agency, and was aware that he could be ‘tagged’ coming in. He hadn’t told the others, it was ‘every man for himself’ as far as he was concerned.