file again. ‘Not bad scores,’ he observed, in a matter-of-fact tone. It was the nearest thing to a compliment he had given out so far. He made a note on the file. ‘But we’ll check it out in a minute.’ He eyed Carney up and down like a piece of meat. ‘When was your last physical?’
Carney had to think about it. ‘I’m not sure,’ he admitted. ‘Probably about five or six months ago.’
Davies made another note. ‘We’ll have to do something about that, as well.’ He looked at Carney appraisingly. ‘You look reasonably fit. Do much in the way of training, working out?’
Carney shrugged. ‘Just regular health club stuff, once or maybe twice a week. Weights, bike machine, a couple of miles on the rolling road.’
‘Sports? Pastimes?’ Davies asked.
Carney smiled ruefully. ‘Don’t get a lot of time these days. I used to climb a bit, and I was junior squash champion at school.’ He studied Davies’s eyes carefully, noting that the SAS man was unimpressed. ‘Actually, all this raises something I wanted to talk to you about,’ he said.
Davies raised one eyebrow. ‘Which is?’
Carney paused for a second, framing his thoughts. ‘Look, I have a pretty fair idea of the sort of men I’m going to have to work with,’ he started out. ‘And I’m prepared for the fact that there’s quite likely to be a certain amount of resentment – me being an outsider and all.’
Davies made no attempt to deny it. There would have been no point. However, it was good that Carney appeared to have a realistic viewpoint. He eyed him thoughtfully. ‘So what’s the point you’re trying to make?’
Carney took the bull by the horns. ‘If I’m to stand any chance of gaining the men’s respect, I know I’m going to have to earn it,’ he said quietly. ‘That’s why I’d like to get involved at ground level, if it’s at all possible. What are the chances of my joining some of the men in basic training?’
Davies was impressed – both with the man’s accurate assessment of the situation and with his bottle. He smiled thinly. ‘Have you got the faintest idea of what you might be talking yourself into?’ he asked.
Carney was perfectly truthful. ‘No,’ he admitted. ‘But I’d still like to give it a go.’
Davies’s smile broadened. ‘Look, it’s fairly obvious that, like most members of the general public, you have a somewhat simplistic view of how we operate,’ he said, without sounding patronizing. ‘It’s not a question of “six weeks basic training and you’re in the SAS”. All our volunteers are already highly trained soldiers. Our selection training is short, brutal and perhaps the most intensive in the world – but it doesn’t just stop there. Basically, an SAS soldier never stops training from the day he joins the Regiment to the day he leaves. It’s an ongoing thing.’
Carney digested all this information stoically. ‘All right, I concede that I’m not prime material to start with. But I’d like to get some time in with the men.’
Davies was more and more convinced that Franks had sent him the right man, but he wasn’t giving anything away. He merely nodded faintly. ‘OK, I’ll see what can be arranged,’ he promised as he rose to his feet. ‘But right now, let’s get you down to the range and see what you can do.’
He ushered Carney out of the room and along a long corridor, eventally stopping by a steel-shuttered door. Producing a security key from his pocket, Davies unlocked the heavy door and swung it open, revealing a flight of concrete steps which led down into the basement. As the door opened, a barrage of loud noise echoed up the stairs. It took Carney a few seconds to identify it as the sounds of gunfire in an enclosed space. He followed Davies down the stairs and through another security door, finally stepping into the vast underground indoor firing range.
The sudden appearance of Lieutenant-Colonel Davies seemed to act as some sort of signal. The half a dozen or so troopers using the target range discharged their weapons quickly, put them down and walked away. Davies led the way over to a shooting booth next to the armourer’s office, summoning the man with a click of his fingers.
The armourer stepped over smartly, slipped a fresh clip into a handgun and laid the weapon down.
‘What have you used in the past?’ Davies asked, glancing at Carney.
‘Standard-issue army Webley .38 revolver,’ Carney told him.
Davies nodded, picking up the semi-automatic in front of him. ‘We tend to use these,’ he explained. ‘The Browning 9mm High Power handgun. They’ve been around for a good few years now, but we find they do the job.’ He picked the gun up and thrust it into Carney’s hand.
Carney weighed the weapon, assessing its feel. It was somewhat lighter than the heavy pistols he was used to, yet oddly it felt somehow more solid, more real. Instinct told him that this was not a gun which had been designed, or ever intended for, making holes in paper targets. This was a weapon expressly created to kill people.
Davies quickly ran through the weapon’s operation, finishing with basic safety instructions. ‘You’ve got eight shots in that magazine,’ he said, ‘although normally it’ll hold up to thirteen. Don’t put it down, or point it away from the target area, until you’ve emptied it.’
Carney moved into the firing position, spreading his feet slightly and balancing his body. Holding the gun in the approved two-handed grip, he squinted down the sights towards the black silhouette at the end of the range.
‘Carry on,’ Davies muttered.
Carney squeezed gently on the trigger, loosing off the first three rounds before checking the target. All three shots were high – the semi-automatic had a greater kick than he was accustomed to. Lowering his aim to compensate, he tightened his grip and fired off three more rounds. They were better – both body hits. He put the final two slugs smack in the middle of the target’s blank black face and laid the gun down again.
‘Not bad,’ Davies said, with grudging approval, as the armourer slid over and inserted a fresh clip into the magazine. ‘But don’t be too obsessed with going for head shots. The traditional “double tap” through the forehead isn’t quite as fashionable now as it used to be.’
Carney looked at him in some surprise. ‘I thought a guaranteed kill was the object of the exercise?’ he said.
Davies nodded. ‘Oh, it is. Basic SAS philosophy is that you don’t point a gun at someone unless you fully intend to kill him. But there can be other factors.’
Carney was intrigued. ‘Such as?’
Davies shrugged. ‘Suppose we were dealing with a hostage situation, involving armed terrorists,’ he suggested. ‘The prime consideration would be to neutralize the gunmen before they could do any harm and to protect the hostages as much as possible. Think about it, Carney – a head is a small target, and the human body is a bigger one. Accurate, sustained fire to the body is going to put your man down just as efficiently, but with less loose bullets flying about the place.’ He paused, nodding down at the the gun in front of Carney. ‘That’s why the Browning is a good weapon. It has real stopping power.’
There was a sudden crash from behind them as the inner steel door was kicked open. It was followed, almost immediately, by the roar of an angry voice. ‘I warned you, Davies – you bastard!’
Carney whirled round, to take in the burly figure of the soldier who had just burst into the underground range. His eyes were blazing cold rage, and his mouth was contorted into a mask of fury. They were looks that could kill – and the L1A1 self-loading rifle that he carried slung at his hip gave him the capacity to do exactly that.
‘I told you what would happen if you turned down my transfer,’ the man raged on, moving purposefully towards Davies. ‘Now I’m going to kill you, you bastard.’
Out of the corner of his eyes, Carney was aware of the armourer trying to edge towards the arsenal. The movement was also noted by the