Ye see yon birkie, ca'd a lord,
Wha struts, an stares, an' a' that;
Tho' hundreds worship at his word,
He's but a coof for a' that:
For a' that, an' a' that:
The man o' independent mind
He looks an' laughs at a' that.
Robert Burns
CHAPTER 26 ANGER MANAGEMENT
“Have we got everything.” asked Sir Charles Appledore
“Of course,” said John Rance from the Africa desk.
“We won’t lose our jobs over this you know. We did our best,” said Baroness Whittington
“No. We just get transferred out and forgotten,” said Sir Charles
“Sounds like him now,” said The Baroness
“He seems to be in one of his Tourette Syndrome moods” said Sir Charles.
The Deputy PM marched in with a few others and glowered from the head of the table. “Right I’m bloody here cos the Prime Minister is still up to his arse in bloody Yanks and the Foreign Sec is apologising twenty four seven to the bloody Europeans. The price of oil is going through the bloody roof, and the bloody Arabs say they can’t produce any more bloody oil to bring the price down, and even if they did the bloody Chinese would buy it all. Now this had better be good. Its three bloody days since some bastard blew up those production platforms, so you’ve had plenty of time to work out how it bloody happened and plenty of bloody time to work out a bloody excuse. Well?”
There was a nervous silence as the deputy PM and his people sat down.
“Well? Come on.”
“Well Sir,” began Sir Charles, “as you know we were assisting the Nigerian Navy to guard the oil rigs nearer to shore and we have provided every facility to the US Navy and Air Force at our airfield on Ascension Island. In fact the new airfield was built there just for this eventuality.”
“I thought we built the bloody thing cos the French and the bloody Germans paid us too, so they could land their Space Hopper there.”
“Yes Sir. But there was always a defence commitment involved as we realised the South Atlantic oil fields would grow in importance.”
“But nothing was any damn good in guarding them was it”
“Well Sir. We felt that constant air patrols and radar monitoring of all ships within a few hundred miles of the rigs would be….”
“Exactly. How the hell did anyone get out to the rigs? The Yanks say you had some bloody scheme to flog warships to a bunch of terrs and then track em as they approached the rigs. The Yanks say you bloody blew it.”
“Well Sir. We did have some of de Mervilles men….”
“Who the hell is de Merville?” asked the “Deputy PM
“He is a retired general,” said Sir Charles “Now he runs a security consultancy and provides consultants to friendly governments in the third world.”
“You mean he’s a bloody mercenary.”
“You could say that Sir.”
“I bloody do say that. Why the hell are we messing around with unofficials like him?”
“So that we can remain at a distance and deny any involvement if we need to.” explained Sir Charles.
“So what happened with the bloody boats then?”
“”Um, Well Sir.” It was The Baroness this time. “One is now for sale at Port Harcourt. One is apparently sunk at Calabar and the third is operating a fast passenger service between Calabar, Limbe and Douala.”
“A fast passenger service?”
“The Way Of God Shipping Company,” said The Baroness. “They seem to be a Nigerian company, but they are based in the Tiko Creeks, at Bimbia I think.”
“Are you saying these terrorist vessels are in the hands of local business men?”
“Yes Sir.” The Baroness
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