that they hit the ground with him on top. All around them, the flattened grass danced in the helicopterâs downdraft. He grabbed the man by his hair and pushed his face hard into a flintstone lying in the earth. For a moment there was stillness. Marchant stood up and started to run, aware of the first man coming up behind him, the helicopter above. The woods suddenly seemed a mile away.
Twenty yards from the trees, Marchant began to believe that he could make it. Once he was inside the Brail, the helicopter would be useless, providing he kept to the cover of the trees. But he still had the man on his right. Five yards short of the trees, he saw a branch on the ground, heavy with the rain of winter. He veered off his path and picked it up, arcing the sodden log behind him in the same movement. As it collided with the side of the manâs face, knocking him backwards, the blades above him seemed to grow louder, roaring their disapproval. Marchant sprinted into the dark woods, sidestepping through the trees like a street thief eluding his pursuers.
He had run barely thirty yards when the woods opened up into a small clearing. The helicopter swooped low overhead, touching down on the patch of grass in front of him long enough for two more men to jump out. Tired now, Marchant turned and headed back into the woods, but he was soon being dragged towards the helicopter, the smell of aviation fuel filling the air.
Â
Marchant calculated that he had been in the air for fifteen minutes before the helicopter touched down, which made Fairford the most likely airfield. It was run by the Americans, who had spent $90 million extending the main runway for its B-2 Spirit Stealth bombers and the Space Shuttle. He suspected he would be travelling in something smaller. He couldnât confirm which airfield it was for himself because of the hood over his head, and he couldnât hear any cockpit talk because a pair of headphones had been slipped over the hood. His hands had been tied tightly behind his back, and his feet were bound together too. But he wasnât in any real discomfort, not yet.
Mentally, he was as together as anyone could be who knew he was in the process of being extraordinarily renditioned by the CIA. It was the only logical reading of the situation he found himself in, given that it was unlikely MI5 or even MI6 would use such extreme methods on one of their own. During his short flight he had concluded that Fielding, for reasons as yet unclear, must have agreed to hand over the keys of the Wiltshire safe house to MI5, who had duly allowed the Americans to remove him for their own questioning. What made his stomach tighten now, as he lay on the cold metal floor of the stationary helicopter, was the thought of the physical and mental pain that lay ahead.
12
The undisputed waterboarding world champion was Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. Marchant knew this thanks to a flippant email that had leaked its way from Langley to Legoland. The architect of 9/11, the Bali nightclub bombings and a thwarted attack on Canary Wharf, âKSMâ (as the CIA called him) deserved some silverware for his efforts, but instead Al Qaedaâs number three had to make do with grudging respect from his interrogators. Two minutes thirty seconds â there were no officials, but that was the time clocked when he was waterboarded in early March 2003. At two minutes thirty-one seconds he broke, finally believing that he was about to drown. He screamed like a baby and filled his diaper. As the email concluded: the smell of victory is the whiff of excrement.
Marchant knew everything there was to know about waterboarding, a method of interrogation that had been favoured by the Gestapo and, thanks to the CIA, had been enjoying a revival in recent years, until the new President put a stop to it. The sensation of water being poured onto his mouth and nose convinced the victim that he was about to drown, triggering an immediate, involuntary
Twenty yards from the trees, Marchant began to believe that he could make it. Once he was inside the Brail, the helicopter would be useless, providing he kept to the cover of the trees. But he still had the man on his right. Five yards short of the trees, he saw a branch on the ground, heavy with the rain of winter. He veered off his path and picked it up, arcing the sodden log behind him in the same movement. As it collided with the side of the manâs face, knocking him backwards, the blades above him seemed to grow louder, roaring their disapproval. Marchant sprinted into the dark woods, sidestepping through the trees like a street thief eluding his pursuers.
He had run barely thirty yards when the woods opened up into a small clearing. The helicopter swooped low overhead, touching down on the patch of grass in front of him long enough for two more men to jump out. Tired now, Marchant turned and headed back into the woods, but he was soon being dragged towards the helicopter, the smell of aviation fuel filling the air.
Â
Marchant calculated that he had been in the air for fifteen minutes before the helicopter touched down, which made Fairford the most likely airfield. It was run by the Americans, who had spent $90 million extending the main runway for its B-2 Spirit Stealth bombers and the Space Shuttle. He suspected he would be travelling in something smaller. He couldnât confirm which airfield it was for himself because of the hood over his head, and he couldnât hear any cockpit talk because a pair of headphones had been slipped over the hood. His hands had been tied tightly behind his back, and his feet were bound together too. But he wasnât in any real discomfort, not yet.
Mentally, he was as together as anyone could be who knew he was in the process of being extraordinarily renditioned by the CIA. It was the only logical reading of the situation he found himself in, given that it was unlikely MI5 or even MI6 would use such extreme methods on one of their own. During his short flight he had concluded that Fielding, for reasons as yet unclear, must have agreed to hand over the keys of the Wiltshire safe house to MI5, who had duly allowed the Americans to remove him for their own questioning. What made his stomach tighten now, as he lay on the cold metal floor of the stationary helicopter, was the thought of the physical and mental pain that lay ahead.
12
The undisputed waterboarding world champion was Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. Marchant knew this thanks to a flippant email that had leaked its way from Langley to Legoland. The architect of 9/11, the Bali nightclub bombings and a thwarted attack on Canary Wharf, âKSMâ (as the CIA called him) deserved some silverware for his efforts, but instead Al Qaedaâs number three had to make do with grudging respect from his interrogators. Two minutes thirty seconds â there were no officials, but that was the time clocked when he was waterboarded in early March 2003. At two minutes thirty-one seconds he broke, finally believing that he was about to drown. He screamed like a baby and filled his diaper. As the email concluded: the smell of victory is the whiff of excrement.
Marchant knew everything there was to know about waterboarding, a method of interrogation that had been favoured by the Gestapo and, thanks to the CIA, had been enjoying a revival in recent years, until the new President put a stop to it. The sensation of water being poured onto his mouth and nose convinced the victim that he was about to drown, triggering an immediate, involuntary
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