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No answer from Jeremy, and no answer from me either.
We plunge into a tunnel for a moment, into darkness.
Chapter59
FREDDIE FARRADYof Scotland Yard’s Special Branch is having a troubling and confusing day, and it shouldn’t be happening.
Yet here it is.
And here he is.
In New Jersey.
Trailing Mike Patel.
This morning he’s traded off surveillance duties with Portia Grayson of MI5, and surprise number one is seeing his target—and suspected terrorist—standing on the subway platform in Astoria carrying a heavy-looking knapsack on his back and a black satchel in either hand.
Surprise number two is shadowing Mike as he takes the W train, passes his Cortlandt stop, then gets off at 34th Street and Herald Square. That’s the first time Mike haseverchanged his regular routine, and Freddie doesn’t like it. He likes it even less when surprise number three pops up and slaps him across the face.
Mike takes a PATH train, which goes underneath the Hudson River and deposits him and a few hundred other folks at the bustling Hoboken Terminal in New Jersey.
Now seeing Patel with the large backpack and the two satchels in the middle of all these busy and moving commuters, Freddie grows nearly sick with concern. What is Patel up to? Why is he in the middle of this crowd?
Although he’s armed with his illegal Glock 26 9mm in an ankle holster, he also feels desperately alone, with no backup or resources. He can call Portia Grayson, his MI5 boss, if necessary, but what would he say?Patel is in New Jersey, with luggage?For all he knows, Mike Patel is running away from his new home.
Luckily the crowds have been heavy this morning, all the way from Queens to here, and keeping track of Patel has been pretty straightforward. Either Patel is one very cool customer, or is innocent, which is—
Damn it!
In the well-lit and high-ceilinged central part of the terminal—looking like a distant cousin of Grand Central—Patel is putting the satchels down and taking off the backpack right near one of the main doors, where hundreds of people are funneling out.
Freddie drops to one knee hard, pretending to tie his shoe, ready to grab his pistol and start shooting if he sees Patel reach for wires or some triggering device. Maybe he’ll cause a diplomatic crisis by shooting him, but better that than—
Wait.
Patel readjusts the straps of the backpack and shoulders it again, then grabs the satchels and goes outside.
Freddie gets up and follows him out into the sun. Patel moves quickly, walking south, going one block, then two, and then turning right onto 14th Street, approaching a gated entrance. There are high fences going up and down the block, and there are freight trains and locomotives lined up, some of them slowly moving out. The fences look shiny new.
Patel approaches a small gatehouse and talks to a uniformed security guard. A door within the wide gate is opened and Patel walks in, then disappears from view.
What the hell?
Freddie crosses the road, looks at the large signage near the gatehouse.
HUDSON VALLEY RAILROAD—SOUTH TERMINAL
He digs into his back pocket, takes out a folded street map of Manhattan and the surrounding boroughs and cities, flips it open. Computer maps on cell phones are fine, but sometimes it pays to look like the stereotypical tourist.
He passes a billboard attached to the fence, where there’s a graphic cartoon of New York’s Hudson Valley all the way up to Albany, with train tracks and trains displayed.
At the gatehouse a young African American man in a security-guard uniform—crisp dark blue trousers and light blue shirt—comes out as Freddie walks up to the open door.
“Help you?”
Freddie decides to play it up some. Broadening his British accent, he says, “Sorry to bother you, old man, but I’m curious about this place. Is it new?”
The security guard smiles on hearing his British accent. “Couple of years, I guess. It’s a rail line that hauls shit from here and up to Albany and then back again.”
