were key locations; they needed to be protected. The big green circular ISAF signs told everyone that.
Kabul was so far below me it looked like a map. I walked along the saddle. The Serena and most of the embassies were to the north, down to my right. To my left were the Jock's bar, the Russian embassy and, out on a limb at the southern edge of town, ISAF.
I stopped and admired the view until the taxi was out of sight. Then I went and sat by the wreck of a Russian communications truck, surrounded by artillery-shell casings and ammo boxes like big sardine cans with the tops peeled back.
I pulled out the Yes Man's mobile and looked south, towards the Kabul river. I wasn't going to have any problems with a signal up here. I couldn't move for satellite dishes.
The phone rang twice. The Yes Man came straight on. 'Have you found Condratowicz? Have you got him?'
'I've just housed a possible, that's all.'
'Where is he?'
One of the old guys left the crowd with a can in his hand and went through the motions of washing himself ready for prayer.
'Ali Abad mountain. They call it TV Hill.'
'Where on the hill? Any idea yet if our man's inside?'
'No. Have you got access to anything in the air? I need you to keep a trigger on it and see what happens down there.'
'Nick, I cannot involve any other agency.' His response came with several degrees of frost.
I didn't give a shit. 'Do you want him or not? I need help, and you've got it on tap. I don't know yet if the fucker's in there so find me an airborne Predator. The Americans are bound to have one or two up there. Don't worry about compromise. They do this shit all the time. Just say it's an antiterrorist op, for fuck's sake. You're the boss, aren't you? Think of something.'
One of the guards sauntered out on to the road. He had his weapon over his shoulder but wanted to take a closer look at the local gobbing off on his mobile.
The Yes Man said nothing.
'Just tap into whatever they have up there that covers the north side of the hill. Then get the operator to stand by. When I do a walk-past I can ID the exact building for them. If Dom's in there, this isn't going to be some fucking shoot-'em-up. I want to get in there, try and find him, then get us both out alive – and not get shot by ISAF in the process. And some of their boys are a stone's throw away from me at the top of this poxy hill. So fucking think of something.'
'OK, wait out.'
He cut off and, for the first time in a while, I did what he said. The old guy had finished splashing his face, neck and arms and was now getting down to a serious chat with Allah. I watched him touch his forehead to the ground, then stand and pray over the city.
Another guard joined the first, and they both headed down the road towards me.
They were Turks. Their national flag filled the top half of the arms that were busy waving me away.
70
I moved back towards the saddle, past yet another pile of old artillery casings. Those two hills had been Russian strongholds. If you dominated the high ground there, you dominated Kabul. And that was exactly why a guy in blue body armour was climbing the south side of the hill, probing the ground with what looked like a row of kitchen knives. If you were in the mood to build there, I guessed you decided which bit of slope you wanted to carve out, then got a guy in body armour from the council to come and dig up the mines for you.
The old guys were just dragging whatever they'd been cooking out of the pot. I couldn't see the target. It was down to my left somewhere, but the angle was too steep. What I did see were the scorched remains of a blue burqa. So much for liberation.
The mobile vibrated in my hand.
'You got something up there for me?'
'Yes, we have one tasked. It's overhead.'
I looked up, even though I knew I was wasting my time. The Predator's video cameras and forward-looking infrared (FLIR) thermal imaging would be doing their stuff from fifty thousand feet. The ground crew would be able to see me, big-time. Even through cloud they could read a newspaper