Dark Forces by Stephen Leather Page B

want. He’s a fixer. But he doesn’t come cheap.’
    ‘False papers?’
    ‘Officially, I don’t know. Unofficially, yes. Sure. For the right price, Yusuf can get you any papers you need, and get you into any country. Pretty much guaranteed.’
    ‘So you let a people-trafficker have the run of the camp?’
    ‘If we kept him out, there’d only be someone else. Or he’d just wait outside. It’s like they say, better to have him inside the tent pissing out than outside pissing in. And Yusuf isn’t one of those bastards shoving families into leaking dinghies and pushing them out into the Mediterranean. He looks for high-end refugees, people with money. And he finds them.’
    ‘And does what for them?’
    ‘Arranges passage into Europe. Advises them on the best way of claiming asylum. Arranges paperwork, passports and the like.’
    ‘He told you that?’
    ‘He doesn’t go into details. But it’s generally known what he does.’
    ‘Do you trust him?’
    ‘Not as far as I can throw him, and he’s a big guy. He’s like all of them. He smiles and he nods a lot and he calls you his friend, but I’ve no idea what’s going on behind his eyes.’
    ‘And this latest thing, he came to you?’
    Parker nodded. ‘Said he had a problem and wondered if I knew anyone who could help.’
    ‘Why do you think he chose you?’
    ‘I’ve always got on well with him. Some of the NGO guys treated him like shit. I was always respectful.’
    ‘Do you think he knows you’re Six?’
    ‘I don’t think so.’
    ‘It’s important, Craig. Him asking a friend for help is one thing. Putting out feelers to someone he knows is with the intelligence service is something entirely different.’
    ‘You think it could be a trap?’
    ‘There’s no need to go jumping the gun,’ said Shepherd. ‘I’m just trying to get the lie of the land. But if Yusuf is playing both ends against the middle, there might be something else going on. What did he actually say when he made the first approach?’
    ‘We were in a bar. Yusuf is a Muslim but he likes his beer. He was a bit worse for wear and said he was in deep shit with some Islamic State people. He said he’d heard they weren’t happy about him fraternising with the NGOs and were planning to take out him and his family.’
    ‘What’s his family situation?’
    ‘Wife and three kids. They’re in Urfa about forty kilometres away. He’s got them protected, he says, but fears for their safety. He was badmouthing Islamic State, saying they were shits for targeting him after all he’d done for them. I asked what exactly and he tapped the side of his nose. You know, Secret Squirrel, couldn’t tell me.’
    ‘He said that? He said he’d been helping Islamic State?’
    ‘Like I said, he’d been drinking. Said he needed to get out of Turkey. Said he’d only be safe in the US or the UK.’
    ‘He specifically said the UK? Not the EU?’
    ‘He’s got relatives in London. Said he’d be safer there. Anyway, he puts his arm around me, starts calling me his one true friend and did I know anyone who could help him out of his predicament.’
    ‘No mention of Five or Six? You were just a friend?’
    Parker nodded. ‘I said I’d see what I could do and that was the end of it. He started talking about this and that. Didn’t mention it again.’
    ‘And what did you do, afterwards?’
    ‘I put in a call to London. London got Shuttleworth to call me, we talked it through and he drove down. Spent an hour with Yusuf but I got the impression they didn’t click.’
    ‘Because?’
    ‘Yusuf said he didn’t trust Shuttleworth, to put it bluntly. Too smooth, he said. Too quick with the promises, too eager to see the gold up front.’
    ‘The gold being?’
    ‘Names and photographs of Islamic State fighters that Yusuf had moved into Europe. Most of them with fake Syrian paperwork.’
    ‘So he has pictures?’
    ‘He was fixing them up with fake passports. He says he’s kept copies.’
    ‘But Yusuf