The Protector by Duncan Falconer Read Free Book Online Page A

decision to resign. The money or the adventure of retrieving it dominated his thoughts and he knew that he would remain restless until he did something about it. It was only after he committed himself, when he walked into HQ Company, met with the duty clerk and asked for the necessary papers, that the thought of the cash in the graveyard stopped pestering him and he set about planning his expedition in earnest. But he was soon to acquire a whole new collection of concerns.
    Mallory’s initial research had already revealed that his mission was going to be more complicated than simply arriving in Iraq, digging up the box and leaving with it.The struggle between the various religious and political factions in the country as well as the general resistance to the coalition occupation had begun.There was an increase in crime and banditry due to the absence of law and order. Further research revealed that westerners were not permitted visas to enter the country unless they were employed by a certified Iraqi reconstruction contractor. But the Marines were not going to let Mallory go for another ten months anyway, by which time he hoped Iraq would be back to normal. With luck, he could then go there on holiday, hire a car, buy a shovel, dig the money up at his leisure, take a tour of the country, go out by road through Turkey or Jordan and start spending his cash on a relaxing drive back through Europe.
    Mallory saw it all as a great adventure and began to feel more relaxed about the whole thing. He started enjoying his work once again and appreciated the company of his colleagues more than ever, knowing that it was all soon to come to an end. And, of course, he spent many hours contemplating the delightful problem of how he was going to spend the money. What finally made everything much more worthwhile was the realisation that whatever happened, even after he’d got the money, he could always rejoin the Marines and pretty much take up where he’d left off. There’d even be an amusing exploit to tell his grandchildren. Mallory would be a winner whatever happened: he looked forward with relish to revisiting Fallujah and concluding the greatest adventure of his life.

2
    Abdul’s Dilemma
    Abdul Rahman stood beside his hand-painted white and blue Iraqi police Toyota pick-up parked near a busy road junction outside one of the north-west entrances to the Green Zone that were heavily guarded by the US military. The elaborate checkpoint, protected by layers of interconnecting sections of concrete blast-walls, was overlooked by the majestic historical monument known as the Assassins’ Gate. It was also one of the locations where a year previously jubilant Iraqis had unceremoniously pulled from its plinth a statue of Saddam Hussein in celebration of his defeat by the US-led invasion forces.
    The afternoon was a normally busy one despite the thousand-pound vehicle bomb that had gone off the day before directly outside the checkpoint. The death toll eventually totalled more than twenty people after the most severely wounded had failed to survive the night. One man had been killed almost a kilometre away while shopping in an open market after a piece of the artillery shell that had made up part of the bomb landed on his head. Seven of the dead were at the time inside the van which was ferrying workers who lived in the city into the Green Zone. The only person in the vehicle aware of the explosives packed under the seats and in boxes in the back was the driver. As instructed by his religious guide, he had picked up his passengers after explaining to them how the normal taxi had broken down and, since the replacement van belonged to him, he would be taking the driver’s place until the other one was fixed. As they arrived at the checkpoint and waited in line to pass through a security inspection he flicked the two arming switches, cried, ‘ Allah akbar ’ - and pushed the final firing button.
    The large crater over a foot deep and