Globusz^® Publishing 

e checked his breast pocket for the small pen like detonator, at the same time recalling, with some amusement, the words of his tutor. “Don’t put the detonator in the same bag as the semtex, unless you wish to retire early”. The bag in question he put down, carefully, and extracted the firing device and its trigger handle. It was old and simple, but quite adequate for the job he had in mind. There was no point in carrying that device the rest of the way only to bring it back later. He checked again what was left in the bag, a small block of plastic semtex explosive, a reel of twin core wire with both the ends already bared, some insulating tape, a craft knife, pliers, a small trowel and a newspaper. This morning’s Daily Express, sent electronically to Spain and printed locally, especially for the resident Brits.

It was a warm night and the sky clear, the moon had not yet risen over the high ground to the South. There was however, enough light for him to do the job coming from the stars and the faint after glow of sunset which was spread before him. But there was not enough light for the man to be seen against the dark of the countryside as he continually scanned all about him. A pity he couldn’t do the job nearer the copse of trees as that would result in a much more spectacular crash. Unfortunately it would also put him nearer to the small farm house that he could just see sheltering in the lea of the copse, and what farm doesn’t have a noisy dog?

No! This was the best place; he couldn’t be seen, dressed as he was in dark trousers and jacket with a black base ball cap to cover his light ginger hair. He also had extra cover from a hedge which ran all the way up to the railway embankment in front of him and on the embankment, about a hundred metres away, was the railway line from Bilbao to Madrid. From where he was crouched beside the low hedge at the outer point of the curve he could just discern the track disappearing away in either direction. On his right where it emerged from behind the small copse of trees, the track lay on the embankment, some two metres above the surrounding field. He would need this small embankment to topple the train. If the ground were on the level with the line, the carriages could possibly stay upright. From this point the land gradually rose until it reached the same level as the railway about half a mile to his left. Further still to his left the track followed the contour of the land curving gently around the shoulder of a small rise in the fields on its way to Madrid. ‘Actually,’ he mused, ‘it was the other way around because the train I'm interested in is coming from Madrid in the South.’

Shaun took from his pocket a pair of latex gloves and put them on. Picking up the bag again he ran quickly, half crouched, the hundred metres to the railway line. Lying down on the top of the embankment and not wishing to expose him self on the skyline, he started searching for the nearest weld between sections of the track. The light wasn’t that good so he had to feel for the weld, running his hand beneath the flange. His luck was holding and he found one ten metres to his right and nearer to the farm house. Adjacent to the weld was the weakest point in any rail track, and so working carefully, he pushed the plastic semtex in the gap between the rail and a sleeper jamming it where possible with stones. Then removing the detonator from his pocket he slowly inserted it into the semtex, threaded the two wires from the reel under the track and attached them to the detonator, before he carefully taped the connections with the insulating tape. It was a rather awkward and clumsy job with his hands in thin gloves, but better that than leave his fingerprints anywhere near the scene.

After using the trowel to pile more stones around the semtex and then on to a loop of the wire he slid down the embankment a little way before removing a sheet of the newspaper from his bag. Laying the paper down, he placed some stones at each corner before retreating down the rest of the embankment. Backing towards the hedge he paid out wire leaving plenty of slack. Then to ensure any further pull on the wire wouldn’t pull the detonator out of the semtex, and of course to keep things tidy, he decided to tape the wire to a post in the hedge. If everything’s neat and tidy then there was less chance of things going wrong. So cutting off a length of insulating tape he put it over the wire and on to the post. The wire slipped out from under the tape as he pressed it down and with his gloves on he couldn’t lift the tape. Removing his right glove he got his thumb nail under the end, lifted a portion of the tape, put the wire under and pressed the tape down. Then returned along the hedge whilst unrolling the twin core wire he made his way to where he had left the firing device, putting on his glove as he went. The night was still quiet and he had plenty of time. The train wasn’t due for another twenty minutes. All he had to do was connect the other, bared ends of the wire, to the firing device then everything was ready.

‘Okay!’ He thought, ‘now lets check everything, firing device and handle inserted, wires connected, semtex with detonator inserted and connected. Put all the other tools in the bag, tape, pliers, knife, and trowel.’ As he picked up the rest of the newspaper to put it in the bag a small page three by line caught his eye. ‘One Million dollar ransom. U.S. Senator’s assistant missing in South America,’ he read, as he sat back to wait.

* * *

The senior assistant for the U.S.A’s Senator for Texas a Mr Drew Roband went missing in the South American country of Cordilla whilst on a fact-finding mission for his senator. A one million dollar ransom has been demanded for his release. Will the U.S. government pay up?

A spokesman for the US government said. “This administration has never paid a ransom to kidnappers and will never pay a ransom in the future. These people that demand a ransom for innocent prisoners are no better than terrorists; they will be hunted down and brought to justice.”

* * *

‘A million dollars... Now what could I do with that in South America,’ he pondered. ‘It’s a long way from Northern Ireland and the IRA... Damn! Those Brit’ negotiators. Who ever would have thought that they would come to an accommodation with the IRA? Then next minute I’m made redundant, and with no redundancy money either!’ He froze as he heard some rustling in the hedge before carefully climbing to his feet for a look round when the wild life scuttled away. All safe and sound, no lights no further movement. Again he squatted down and made him self comfortable, but not too comfortable. ‘Mustn’t forget the time, mustn’t fall asleep,’ he thought, as the recent events that had brought him to this field in northern Spain sprang to mind.

‘Still! It’s much better sitting here on a warm evening than the cold of Northern Ireland, and it’s a hell of a lot safer. The opposition doesn’t even know my face in Spain so between jobs I can make this a real holiday. Maybe get a suntan on the beach. No! That wouldn’t do, with my skin I’d turn out like a lobster. Perhaps I could change my name permanent like and then settle down with a woman, have kids, get a steady job! No I don’t think so, Shaun Maile! Husband and Dad! A ‘9 to 5’ worker; life would be far too boring.’

‘So what to do in the future? It would be too hot working for the ‘Real IRA’ they are definitely on a hiding for nothing. That lot will have the Yanks on their back as well soon; the Yanks don’t like being suckered into financing terrorism. Especially after that September 11th job... that one certainly poked a stick in the hornets nest.’

‘Perhaps I should think of retiring after all!’

His thoughts drifted around this subject for a while. ‘I would have to improve my Spanish. At least there are plenty of good looking women around, but first I would have to acquire some serious money... Perhaps a bank could help?’ This brought a smile to his lips. ‘No a better bet would be a security company or anywhere else that had a large sum of money. As long as I play a lone hand, couldn’t get those Basques involved. I must build up a reserve of plastic and detonators just in case. The amount of plastic that they had offered me to do this job was truly amazing. There was enough to blow up the whole f---g train. I only need to trip it up. I’ll show those Basque separatists, having a laugh at me because I only want to use the minimum. They’re just like that film... what was it? The Italian Job.’ He was smiling broadly as he recalled the words of Michael Cane when the van blew up, “I only wanted you to blow the bloody doors off.”

If you get it right only a little semtex was needed to break the rail track. His experiments in Ireland for the IRA had shown that as long as the semtex was reasonably contained, and the more contained the better, the track would crack very close to the weld. The forces from the train would do the rest. It was a pity the IRA hadn’t used this knowledge more than the once he mused. But then the British were always having train crashes, they didn’t need any help from the IRA on that score. One or two extra wouldn’t have made that much difference.

* * *

Peter Harding sighed as he put down the newspaper he had been reading, he’d read the paper from cover to cover and now had no excuse but to start work. Riding with his back to the engine, his shoes were off and his feet rested on the seat in front of him. On his lap lay his computer. Sighing he opened the lid, waited for it to boot up and started work. The gentle swaying of the train didn’t hinder his typing. He clicked away with two fingers, compiling his notes from his sojourn in Spain. The notes he was adding to were a report about the conference of the International Monetary Aid Foundation (IMAF), in Madrid that had finished earlier in the day. He was pleased with this idea of his, to go home the slow way via the train, then the Santander ferry to Plymouth and a second train to London. This way it gave him two whole days to gather his thoughts and ideas together and edit them into a decent report without being side tracked or badgered by the boss. With his phone switched off he was even less likely to be disturbed.

The main theme in his report was that they must rectify the over spend on projects. And by far the best way to do this was to control the leaks from the project funds. On average nearly 10% of the money on a project was lost unaccountably. It disappeared into some persons back pocket and it didn’t seem to mater how many accountants you had; in fact it appeared the more accountants you employed on a project the faster the money leaked away. They had been fighting a battle against venality for some time now. The trouble was the (IMAF) had such big funds available. People thought missing a little here and a little there won’t hurt because it’s no ones money, no person actually owns the cash so no person loses. Now there is an idea! If we could show who loses, who goes without for every dollar that is mislaid. Better still, prosecute the thieves when they do find them and make a loud noise about it with lots of publicity. The problem with that was the thieves were usually the relatives of someone high up in the country or even one of the ‘high ups’ themselves. It’s very difficult to prosecute the president or his relatives in some countries.

Even with the distraction of that very pretty looking nun sitting facing him across the isle two seats back he had managing to get some work done. The frown of annoyance when he had slipped his shoes off and put his feet up on the opposite seat, he had noticed. It was still lingering on those lovely lips around that very sweet mouth. Eventually the frown got to him and with a gentle sigh he lowered his feet, slipped them back into his shoes, and began a new paragraph. Several sentences later he paused to gather his thoughts together, looking up in time to see a beautiful smile of approval on the face of the nun. To avoid further distraction he closed his eyes, just for a moment, to gather his thoughts. ‘I wonder why such a pretty woman should take up such a vocation,’ he mused. ‘Hang on a moment though, that’s a bit sanctimonious, why should it matter that she is pretty or not... though surely a woman could do an equally good job without being ‘married to Christ’ as it were. I wonder! Is some poor man going to go without a wife because of it?’

With this chauvinistic hypothesis his thoughts drifted away. The fantasies of kissing the nun persisted and lulled by the gentle swaying of the carriage as it hissed along the welded track, he dozed. His reading glasses slipped down his nose slightly as he relaxed. To a casual observer he looked like any other business man, tired after a days work, resting on the way home. It was only during a second look an observant person would perhaps notice that, even with his eyes closed, the man had a distinct hardness in his face. Further study would reveal the firm strength in the hands, the broad chest and an athletic physic, all perhaps indicating that there was much more to the man than first appeared. The observer may hazard a guess as to his occupation, a policeman perhaps. No! Not quite right. An architect or surveyor perhaps. No! Too studious looking. Maybe an accountant or manager then. No! He looked too 'outdoorsy' and relaxed. The observer would however have been partially correct on all these accounts, for his occupation was in fact an international trouble shooter and investigator of construction projects for the (IMAF).

* * *

She sat there very upright swaying ever so slightly to the movement of the train, hands demurely clasped in her lap, feet together on the floor. Without turning her head, which remained quite still, her eyes flickered rapidly over the people in her immediate vision. In just a few months she had lost the habit of gazing about her. An appearance of serenity and tranquillity had been strongly encouraged. Then she frowned, a little annoyed with the world. It had been a difficult day looking after the children in the convent, now she was tired and wanted to kick off her hard sensible shoes. To relax and put her feet up, rather like that man was doing at the front of the carriage. She was only a novice of six months and already had doubts about her vocation. ‘Everyone is so polite, but nobody outside the order ever speaks to me about anything but work. If only I could have a reasonable, sensible, grown up conversation about... oh! Anything. Even the weather. But all the adults appear too embarrassed to pass pleasantries with a nun, especially men.’ She thought more and more each day about leaving the order, missing the frivolity and spontaneity of her close friends. ‘Am I destined to be serious for the rest of my life, apart from the laughter with the children and the occasional forced laughter in cloisters?’ Pondering about this a smile played around her face as she recalled the times spent with those friends. There always seemed to be young men hanging around then; now it was so different they dare not speak to her about anything, even talking about work was difficult. She thought about this for some time, at the same moment noticing the man at the front of the carriage had put his feet down, sat further back in his seat, and once again started to type on his lap top.

* * *

The very quietness of the night allowed him to hear the train from some way off. Starting as a vague whisper it soon increased to a rumble as the single headlight appeared around the bend. He could clearly count the six carriages that followed the engine as they all began swaying a little when they took the banking. This must be the right train, and surprisingly, almost on time. He sat up, grasped the detonator handle and waited.

His eyes flicked between the single headlight and the newspaper marker about 100 metres in front of the engine... Then 75 metres... now 50 metres, the paper showed up quite clearly in the starlight. The maximum strain on the track was just ahead the front wheels as a travelling shock wave was transmitted along the rail line in front of the train. That’s when he needed to blow it.

Wait! ... Wait! ... Now!

In his excitement and with the rush of adrenalin he nearly toppled the firing device. The turn of the handle wasn’t smooth. Nonetheless he saw the flash of the explosion. A little late it was, right under the front wheels of the engine, then!

Nothing! The train continued on.

The first carriage then? That too continued without fault.

The second carriage? The third?

God! He’d made a mess of it; the Spanish track must be stronger than the others he’d tested against.

The fifth carriage was straddling the newspaper marker now, when he saw the rear bogey bounce but it must have landed back on the track as the carriage continued along the line.

He sucked in his breath and clenched his fists. What was it he had said when he boasted to the Basque leader, he’d meant to say something about the news standing out on the front page, and they had all had a laugh. He’d be lucky if this made the news at all. 

Now it was the turn of the sixth carriage, each of the preceding carriages had distorted the broken rail further and further, so that now it was decidedly out of true. When the front bogey of the last carriage hit the break it jumped in the air, the flange came down on top of the broken rail then the rim slid off outside the rail. The wheels landing on the stone ballast threw up a shower of sparks and stone chippings as the carriage lurched. The last bogey of the sixth carriage, and at the very end of the train, didn’t stand a chance. As it hit the break it too leaped in the air and jumped clear of the track.

But! The train continued on its way with the sixth carriage bucking and bouncing, like a dog wagging its tail. The train driver eventually realised something was wrong and began to shut off the power. Before he could apply the brakes the coupling to the last carriage gave up the struggle and fractured. Then the brake hose parted and the carriage was on its own; now rapidly approaching the copse of trees and running down the embankment as it toppled to the right. The front of the carriage dug in to the soft ground at the base of the embankment. The rear of the carriage rose and it stood up on end, coming to rest rather spectacularly leaning against the first trees of the copse.

He suddenly let out his breath and stood up to see better, a smile slowly began to form around his mouth as the tension left him.

Now! Now, he remembered what he’d said to the Basque leader. He had made a mistake in the translation and had said that ‘the news will stand UP on the front page’.

‘Well! Let’s see them laugh that off. I’ll play it real cool and make out that it was completely as I intended.’

He stood still for some time admiring his handiwork, until well after the rest of the train had stopped. It was only when people were running back down the track he decided it was time to leave. To get away before the emergency services were summoned. He pulled in the wire and coiled it quickly around the reel, dropped it in his bag with the firing device and tools. Then after a look around and a last look at the carriage, still standing on end, he made his way back to the car parked some way down the lane.

* * *

A sudden crash and a jolt brought Peter awake; his eyes flew open in time to see a look of alarm appearing in the eyes of the nun. A second later the seat bucked under him and threw him in the air only for him to land back in the seat with his feet on the floor. His hands grabbing the laptop trying to retain it on his lap as the lid slammed shut. A third jolting crash as he realised that they had been derailed. The gentle swish from the wheels replaced by a screeching chatter as they rode the ballast of the rail bed with the stones flicking up under the carriage in an unending drum roll. Then the lights went out. His other senses took over whilst his eyes adjusted to the dim emergency lights. He felt the carriage begin to tilt to his left, quite slowly it seemed, as he grabbed the arm rest to save him self from sliding to the window. The rattling, jolting twist accompanied by incessant drumming beneath his feet, seemed to go on and on. A moment later he was pressed hard into his seat, his head against the back rest. At the same time the nun across the aisle did the strangest thing. She stood up and dived at him, arms out-stretched, robe flapping like a cape. Her mouth was wide open and her eyes full of fear. Instinctively he raised both arms for protection and to fend her off, but instead caught her one hand on each shoulder. He was a strong fit man but trying to catch a 130 lb of woman, flying at him was impossible, even for him. He was only able to break her headlong flight and to steer her head almost past his own.

He didn’t exactly lose consciousness, not at first, but it took him a few moments to gather his wits, to realise that he had survived and that his head hurt. He was lying on his back buried beneath the softness of a woman, several other bodies and lots of paraphernalia. He couldn’t move, hardly able to lift his chest to breath and he couldn’t see anything. By his right ear there was a moan, at least the nun whose face was touching his seemed to be alive. She was breathing but, like him, was gasping and wheezing for air. He realised if he didn’t do something soon they would both suffocate. There was a very hard object sticking in his stomach and it was beginning to hurt or was his head hurting more? He tried moving his hands, the right one was trapped, somewhere near his right ear, still holding the shoulder of the nun. He could hardly move the fingers. His left hand cupped something soft. ‘Ahh!’ He thought. ‘My hand certainly shouldn’t be there and they didn’t know each other, hadn’t been introduced.’ He smiled at his own joke. ‘Never mind I couldn’t move it even if I had wanted to.’ He lay there gasping for breath and drifting in and out of consciousness, fantasies played tricks with his mind. The nun flying towards him, robes flapping like wings, her eyes framed in that beautiful face and lips puckered for a kiss only to be replaced at the lest moment by a soundless scream.

He came to some time later, again lying on his back but now in the rough scrub of a field. A young woman, not the nun, was bending over him, gently tapping his face whilst speaking Spanish, trying to get him to open his eyes.

“Okay! Okay!” he said, fending her off with his left hand as he remembered what had happened. Then he attempted to sit up only to be firmly pushed back down.

“I’m okay really, just help me sit up please?” he said in English, not trusting him self to translate into Spanish at the moment.

Apparently she understood some English and with her arm around his shoulders helped him sit up. He took a few deep breaths and looked around. Just a couple of metres away he saw the nun lying on the ground. She appeared to be alive, breathing heavily, as he could see her breasts moving. Another lady was bending over attending her. He lowered his head, averting his gaze then started coughing repeatedly as he inhaled some dust from his shirt. It was even more embarrassing when the woman attending him showed further concern. He put her at ease and asked for help to enable him to stand. His right shoulder ached and he found he couldn’t do much with his right arm. Carefully he stood up and again, thanking the Spanish woman who had helped him, assured her once more that he was all right.

Gingerly he made his way over to the nun. She was lying on her back still breathing deeply, all the colour had gone from her face except for a red graze on her right temple. The nun’s clothes were dirty and dishevelled with the dust from the carriage and the ground. Immediately a phrase ‘the nun with the dirty habit’ sprang to mind. Trying to suppress a grin at his own witticism he turned it into a cough and quickly put a hand over his mouth to hide the smile. The lady attending the nun looked up at him with trepidation. A man should not gaze on a nun with such fervour, such interest. “Is she all right,” he asked. “Only I tried to catch her but our heads met.” Peter touched his own head for emphasis.

The lady looked slightly relieved. “She will be okay; the doctor had a look at her. He said she should... wake up, soon. Please you will move back, it is best for her... as a nun.”

Peter nodded and turned away, they were about 30 metres from the carriage which looked very odd standing on its end. It also looked precarious and extremely dangerous with people milling about on the ground. At any moment it may topple on those people who were still helping other passengers get out through a window. If it did fall the consequence didn’t bear thinking about. Someone else must have been aware of the danger as most of the people were now being ushered away from the immediate vicinity. Near where he stood several other passengers were lying on the ground with people attending to them and one person, a man, lay a little apart from the others with a jacket thrown over his face.

* * *

The rail track had been closed all night and it was daylight when the railway accident investigator and a police inspector walked back along the track to find the cause of the ‘accident’. It was obvious when they came near the broken rail that it had been deliberately sabotaged. They had both seen the results of explosions before, but this one had been exceptionally localised. A few handfuls of ballast disturbed, a broken sleeper and the chewed up ends of the broken rail. Even the newspaper was still there pegged down by stones.

The inspector bent over and examined the ends of the track without touching them “This looks very different from the others I’ve seen. Not much explosive used, it appears to be a more professional job, unless they are running short of semtex.”... “We should be so lucky.” He added in an aside. “Well it was certainly no accident. I’ll get my team to take some photographs. Then if you could get this section of rail carefully cut out and let me have it. It’s easy to see what happened though, they blew the track just before the last carriage which derailed, the coupling broke and the carriage ended up down there. – It’s a wonder why they didn’t go for the whole train, if they’d done this in front of the engine it would have been a real train wreck... And a lot more than one person killed.”

The investigator form the rail way sniffed. “The track may not have been blown just in front of the last carriage. I’ll have to check the rest of the train carefully and see if there are any cracked wheels.”

“Right I’m going down the embankment and along that hedge, don’t follow me and don’t let anyone else come either. Make sure everyone approaches here along the tracks.” With that the inspector put on latex gloves and carefully picked up and folded the newspaper before slipping it into a plastic-bag. Then he slid slowly down the embankment, and with great care made his way towards the hedge examining the ground for any traces of the terrorist. As he reached the hedge there was his reward. A piece of insulating tape, one end still stuck to the post and the other flapping in the light breeze as if to attract his attention. Very carefully he removed it and placed it in a plastic evidence bag. Then just as carefully he continued walking along the hedge looking for further pieces.

The rest was up to forensics, there was nothing on the newspaper in the way of fingerprints but there was some residue from the explosion. This told them it was semtex from the same batch that had caused recent car bombs in Zaragoza and Bilbao. These explosions had also been claimed by the ETA and Basque Separatists. A thumbprint on the insulating tape from the hedge found no matches in Spain but was passed to Interpol. By 4 o’clock in the afternoon they had a name, Shaun Maile. He was IRA and now obviously on loan to the Basque Separatists. An hour later they had a photograph which was circulated to all ports, airports and train stations. By 6 o’clock that evening the Basque leader also knew who they were searching for and Shaun was incarcerated in a safe house with orders not to leave or go near any windows. Later that evening when they debriefed him the interview was mixed with admiration for the way he had stood the carriage on end. Precisely as he had said, ‘it stood up on the page’ and scorn that he had left his calling card in the shape of a thumbprint. There was much discussion about what to do with him as a result of la policia knowing who he was and having a recent photograph of him courtesy of the Brits’. This ranged from cutting off his thumb to cutting off his head, neither of which Shaun was too keen on. It was eventually agreed that he should grow a moustache and have his hair died black. That, along with the liberal application of artificial sun tan and some quick lessons in Spanish, should surpass to get him to Nicaragua via France and Mexico. After which the Basque’s would wash their hands of him.

Shaun thought this was extremely good of them, considering he now knew one or two of them by sight, yet he had little loyalty towards them or their cause. Not like his IRA friends at all. So some days later he was glad to get away with his life. So much so that he didn’t even quibble when they only gave him the air tickets and 500 Euros as spends. Two of the pencil thin detonators, clipped into his breast pocket, simply disguised with cheap pen clips and caps to hide the wires, also went with him.