The Watchman

  • ISBN: 9780712681520
  • Author: Chris Ryan
  • Description:
    Alex is a 36 year old SAS Captain. Recently commissioned from the ranks, he is returning from a hostage-rescue mission in Sierra Leone when he finds himself summoned back to the UK. Someone, it seems, has been murdering MI5 officers. And murdering them in a particularly gruesome and horrific way. A hammer is involved, as is a skinning-knife. The security services, however, are more concerned with the why than the how. Because it is beginning to look as if the killer is an insider, SAS-trained, one of the Regiment's own. The body-count is mounting, and under strict cover of secrecy Alex is ordered to track down and eliminate the killer. To assist him in this task he is assigned an MI5 liaison officer - the attractive but abrasive Tracey Weaver. And so begins a deadly and relentless manhunt. The killer, Alex discovers, was almost certainly an undercover soldier codenamed the Watchman who, in the early '90s, infiltrated the highest levels of the IRA's Army Council. He was - and without doubt remains - a lethally skilful operator. But why is the Watchman slaughtering his way through the upper ranks of the security services? A nightmare chase, a betrayal and a dawn firefight will all ensue before Alex learns the bitter truth: that in the shadowy battlegrounds of the Intelligence wars there is no good and no evil - there are only winners and losers. From the Publisher A duel to the death between an SAS soldier and the man who trained him. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title. About the Author Chris Ryan was born near Newcastle in 1961,he joined the SAS in 1984. During the Gulf War, Chris was the only member of an eight man team to escape from Iraq, of which three colleagues were killed and four captured. It was the longest escape and evasion in the history of the SAS. For this he was awarded the Military Medal.Christian Rodska has recorded over fifty audio books together with several hundred radio plays, wildlife commentaries and poems. Numerous TV appearances include Sharpe, Taggart, Wycliffe, Spender, Casualty and Follyfoot. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title. Excerpted from The Watchman by Chris Ryan. Copyright © 2001. Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved. Sierra Leone After an hour's march, Captain Alex Temple held up his hand and the patrol came to a cautious halt. Above them the waning moon was obscured by lurid bruise-coloured rain clouds. In the forest to either side of them insects drilled and screamed. It was fifteen minutes after midnight and all six men were soaked to the skin. They were sweating too, as their dark-accustomed eyes scanned the clearing. Alex had been right. Above the distant booming of thunder, just audible, was a faint staccato crackle. Gunfire, surely. To his side, all but invisible in the dank shadows, Don Hammond nodded in agreement, showed two fingers - two clicks ahead - and pointed up the trail. Yes, thought Alex with fierce joy. Yes! This is what I joined the Regiment for. This is what I'll do for as long as they'll let me. He grinned at the wiry sergeant and glanced round at the four other members of Zulu Three Six patrol as they melted into the dank foliage. Immediately behind him was a sharp-faced trooper named Ricky Sutton, the patrol signaller. At twenty-three, Sutton was the youngest and least experienced member of the team. Covering Sutton's back as he worked was Stan Clayton, a long-serving and famously mouthy cockney corporal, and on the other side of the clearing, shadowy in the dimness, crouched Lance Wilford and Jimmy 'Dog' Kenilworth, a corporal and a lance-corporal respectively. Like Alex, they were dressed in sodden jungle kit and webbing, and carrying M16 203 rifles and a sheathed parang. Beneath the frayed rims of their bush-hats their faces were blackened with cam-stick. All had compasses attached to their wrists and rifles. At Don Hammond's sign, the patrol members quietly lowered their heavy Bergan rucksacks and began to cache them. Mosquitoes whined around them, settling greedily on their hands and faces. A couple of the men had leeches visible at their necks and wrists, and Alex guessed that they all had at least half a dozen sucking away beneath their wet shirts and combat trousers. Crouching in the dank foliage, Hammond unfurled the aerial of the sat-com radio, and reported the patrol's position and the direction of the small-arms fire to the SAS base in Freetown. When Hammond had completed the report Alex resumed the lead scout position. Signing for the rest of the patrol to follow, he set off towards the distant gunfire. This was it, he thought - this had to be it - and breathed a silent prayer of thanks to the gods of war. He was thirty-five years old and a commissioned officer, and both facts militated against him. SAS officers, or 'Ruperts' as they were known, were usually directed into planning roles, while the 'chopping' was done by the troopers and NCOs. As a Rupert, Alex was lucky to be here at all. Somehow, against all the odds, it seemed that he had been granted one last adventure.
  • Pages: 320
  • Format: Paperback
  • Genre: General
  • Rating: Not yet rated

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