by Tom Bradby
‘And how do we know that “Who stands in our way?” refers to their candidate,’ Rav asked, ‘and not someone – or something – else entirely?’
Kate took another drag of his cigarette. ‘“Who stands in our way?” And “There will be other candidates …” They absolutely must have their own horse in the race. And, given their enthusiasm for interfering with the democratic process, it would be more of a surprise if they weren’t trying to pull some stunt. If they’ve tried it in other countries, why not in the UK? Some of our politicians probably come cheaper than others elsewhere.’
‘And who the hell is Viper?’ Julie asked.
‘“Viper can help”.’ Kate shook her head. ‘It could be anyone – a politician, someone in Whitehall, a newspaper editor.’
Rav trod his stub into the stone floor of the suite, then picked it up and put it into the ashtray. ‘Ian’s going to love this. It’ll bring out all his inner machismo.’
‘The foreign secretary has to be prime suspect,’ Julie said. ‘He served in Kosovo with the Paras. The Russians were all over that place like a rash.’
‘That’s a bit of a leap,’ Kate said. ‘And probably wise not to rush into pointing the finger at our nominal superior.’
‘We can hardly ignore him,’ Rav said. ‘Every piece of speculative crap in the last five years puts him on the list of leadership front runners.’
‘I’m not saying we should,’ Kate said.
‘Has Stuart heard any whispers? It looks like his boss is in the clear,’ Rav said. ‘Unless, of course, they’re already fucking us about.’
‘A lot of people in the party want someone from the next generation,’ Julie said, ‘so Imogen could easily be in the frame. But the field is actually pretty wide.’
‘Right,’ Kate said. ‘Julie, you stay here and keep an eye on Lena. Rav and I will get the first flight back in the morning. Well done, everybody. They may still be talking about this operation in fifty years’ time.’
She turned at the door. ‘Especially if we crash and burn.’
4
It was almost four in the afternoon by the time Kate reached the space-age bubbles that controlled entry to Vauxhall Cross. Rav had gone home for a change of clothes, so she rode the lift to the fifth floor alone.
The office occupied by C, the head of the Secret Intelligence Service – currently Sir Alan Brabazon, a tall, good-looking man, who’d made his name in his dealings with Russia and the former Soviet Union – was not quite as magnificent as his wood-panelled executive dining room on the top floor, but it still boasted a spectacular view of the Thames and the Houses of Parliament, their stonework gold in the occasional shaft of sunlight.
Sir Alan’s desk stood in the middle of the room with two open laptops – one internal, one external – at the ready, but he ushered Kate and her boss, Ian Granger, head of Europe and Russia, to the soft seating area in the far corner. Unless he had bad news for you, he served coffee and biscuits, which Ian could never resist.
Ian was lean and wiry – tales of his Iron Man triumphs were legendary for their tedium – with wavy blond hair he allowed to curl over the nape of his neck, like a 1970s rock star. He was clever, and couldn’t resist letting everyone know it. He also had a tendency to state the blindingly obvious as if it were biblical revelation. Kate had just about found a way to cooperate with him until Sir Alan had named her as one of his potential successors the previous summer. Their relationship had since been plunged into the deep freeze.
‘I think we have to be realistic,’ Ian said. ‘Don’t you, Alan?’ Ian’s version of being realistic was to agree that someone else must have made a mistake. He tugged at his cuffs. He had once made a point of telling everyone in the office that he had his suits, shirts and shoes handmade on Savile Row. It had been his way of auditioning for entry to the inner sanctum of the establishment. He’d dropped the references since diversity had become the management’s watchword, and begun stressing his state-school credentials instead. He hadn’t lost his taste for the clothes, though.
C displayed quality tailoring with a great deal less effort and more pleasing effect than his colleague. He picked up Kate’s file, raised his tortoiseshell-framed glasses and cast his eye once more over the transcript. ‘Realistic, Ian?’ he said. ‘In what way, precisely?’ His stillness was unnerving, and even Ian was not immune to it.
‘Well, we start with a basic credibility problem. Are we really being asked to believe that three of the most powerful men in Russia’s intelligence hierarchy – arguably the three most powerful – suddenly turned up on a yacht in the Bosphorus to discuss these vital and sensitive matters at a time when we just happened to have an intelligence operation in place?’
Sir Alan’s gaze was steady. Silence was another of his weapons, and he used it now.
‘It’s a classic misinformation ploy,’ Ian said. ‘They’re hoping to spark up a witch-hunt among our political elite for whoever is their “dog in the fight”, as Kate puts it, and a mole-hunt across Whitehall and beyond for this rather colourfully named agent “Viper”. They must be laughing their heads off in Moscow Centre already. And they’ll split their sides if they get a whiff of the possibility that we might be taking it seriously.’
Kate’s cheeks reddened. She hadn’t expected Ian’s assault to be quite so obvious.
‘Fair comment, perhaps.’ C lowered his spectacles and gave Kate his undivided attention. ‘What do you think?’
‘Perfectly fair,’ she said, ’but not entirely reliable.’
‘Let’s roll with it for a minute,’ C went on. ‘The clear implication here is that in a potential leadership contest – and I’ll come back to the premise in a minute – our foremost adversary will have a candidate.’ He was still looking at Kate.
She nodded again.
‘Who?’ he asked.
‘We’ve looked at it all ways,’ she said, ‘and, honestly, your guess is as good as mine right now. Some backbench MPs say they want one of the new generation, but in a lightning-strike contest, I think it’d be difficult to imagine someone more or less unknown to the public becoming a serious candidate. Which means it probably has to be a current member of the cabinet, and Vasily would be aware of that. So, to be talking about this seriously, their man – or woman – must already be close to the top of the tree.’
‘Well, we can rule out Imogen Conrad at Education, since they helpfully – but perhaps too helpfully – identify her as the principal barrier.’ C twirled his glasses and gazed, apparently absently, at the Houses of Parliament. ‘So I guess that leaves Simon Wishart at Defence, the chancellor, and our very own foreign secretary.’
‘Meg Simpson would be an outside bet, though the NHS strikes might have done for her.’
C rose to his feet and moved to the window, as if seeking inspiration from the home of British democracy. ‘I’ve known the foreign secretary for a very long time, and it’s no secret that I’m not his biggest fan. But it’s a bit of a stretch to perceive him as a potential agent of a foreign power.’
‘Unless they’ve found a pressure point …’
‘Hmm. He’s never made any great virtue of marital fidelity, so it’s equally hard to imagine that some video of him with even a roomful of hookers might cause him any sleepless nights.’
‘Given everything, we should stick this recording in the bloody bin where it belongs,’ Ian said, almost under his breath.
‘What do you mean, “given everything”?’ Kate said.
‘It’s just another Russian conjuring trick. They love these things.’
C turned from the window and walked back. ‘What Ian means is that we’ve been caught out before and, no doubt, will be again. But I’m afraid we need to take each case on its merits. That has to be the golden rule. They want us to let each drop of invective and every tissue of lies poison the well. Then they would have achieved their aim.’
‘How have we been caught out before?’
‘Ian ran the Russia House befor
e you, and I did before him. So we’ve all been on the receiving end of the Kremlin’s fantasy factory’s output.’
‘Should we talk to MI5?’ Kate asked.
‘Of course not!’ Ian almost choked on his coffee.
‘It’s a bit early for that,’ Sir Alan said, more smoothly. ‘I may not have long to go in this chair, but I think even I have to be sensitive to the fact that James Ryan is the foreign secretary and thus our direct superior. As luck – if it is luck – would have it, we’ve been offered an easy means of testing this. According to the transcript, the prime minister is going to resign this week. I’ve heard not a whisper that he’s unwell, let alone that he has cancer. If that proves to be correct, we’ll need to take it all seriously. If not, we can come back to it. Agreed?’
Kate nodded. Ian followed suit reluctantly.
‘I’ll say this for the Russians,’ C said, ‘they certainly conspire to keep life interesting.’
Kate followed Ian to the lifts. He hit the call button as if it was an explosive device and waited with a disproportionate degree of impatience.
‘Have we come across something like this before?’ Kate asked. ‘It would be helpful to know.’
‘No,’ he said. ‘Not that I can think of. I mean … not specifically like this.’
The doors slid open and they got in. ‘If there has been anything similar, then I guess—’
‘As you should know, Kate, it’s the first rule of the Desk to assume that everything you get fed by the Russians is manufactured. Start there, and you can’t go far wrong.’ He hit the wrong floor button, cursed and tried again. The doors closed.
‘While we’re on the subject of manufacturing, did you take up that translator I checked out in Istanbul? Irina?’ Kate asked. ‘I’ve been meaning to ask.’
‘No.’ He gave a sigh of what might have been exasperation. ‘Why?’
‘Just wondered. I met our Turkish connection in a bathhouse and remembered the last time I’d been there.’
‘Jesus,’ Ian said. ‘She was a nobody, with zero prospects. And that was a lifetime ago.’
‘Of course. It’s all flooding back now.’
The doors opened. They got out and turned their separate ways.
‘Have a good evening,’ Kate said.
Ian didn’t bother to reply.
She walked down to her small corner office overlooking Vauxhall station. Rav was scrutinizing an aerial photograph of the foreign secretary’s home in Hampshire on his laptop screen. ‘He’s got a very big house for a man who has only ever really been an army officer and an MP.’
Kate smiled. ‘As you never tire of telling me, the ruling classes have deep reservoirs of inherited cash, so that doesn’t prove anything.’ She signed the stack of expenses forms on her desk and put them in the out-tray for Maddy to process.
Later, when she called home, Stuart answered. ‘I’m coming,’ she said.
‘Exciting. How was your trip?’
‘Very good.’
‘Did you get what you were looking for?
‘More than.’ She ended the call and stood. ‘See you tomorrow, Ravindra. Sir Alan wants us to leave it for now.’
He carried on tapping away.
‘You did hear me, didn’t you? C said to park it for now. It sounded like an order.’
‘I heard you.’
‘Sometimes you bear a striking resemblance to my son.’
‘Have a nice evening.’
‘Is Zac at home?’
‘He’s with his parents.’ Rav looked up. ‘In Scotland.’
‘Well, don’t stay here all night.’
Kate swapped her heels for trainers and retrieved her coat. ‘Funnily enough, Stuart and I are having dinner with Imogen Conrad and her husband tonight.’
Rav swung around. ‘Are you going to ask her about the PM’s health?’
‘I don’t see any harm in saying I’ve heard a rumour, do you?’
He raised his palms. ‘Could have come from anywhere.’
Kate thought about this. ‘You’re right. See you tomorrow.’
‘I can hardly wait.’
She always walked home, rain or shine. It wasn’t the capital’s most scenic route, but provided time for reflection. She thought about what Ian had said. The Russians loved misinformation almost as much as they loved agents of influence and raw intelligence from inside government departments. But she had been extremely careful, right from the start, about how and when details of the Istanbul operation were disseminated.
Ian knew that Igor and Mikhail were the intended targets, and had signed off on the cost, but he hadn’t known – or asked to know – how they had planned to get a microphone inside the yacht. The security teams setting up and manning the equipment and sweeping the approach to the money-changer’s cubby-hole in the bazaar had been told no more than they needed to know. Danny had had no idea of what they were up to until he’d done his techie stuff that night. Only she, Rav and Julie knew all the details, including Lena’s identity. It was inconceivable to her that either of her close colleagues could be compromised. And if the operation was secure, how could the SVR have believed they were planting misinformation via that microphone?
And the final possibility: that the man who’d let her know that the cream of Russia’s intelligence hierarchy would be meeting on Igor’s yacht had done so only to manipulate and deceive her …
No. She’d thought of that. Night and day. And continued to dismiss it.
It was not possible.
He would never lie to her.
It had started raining again so Kate ran the last hundred yards to her front door. The mood in the house matched the weather outside. Gus was at the kitchen table, shackled to his Facebook feed on the iPad they’d bought him for Christmas. He had his headphones on to shield him from the yelling match taking place upstairs. Kate removed them. ‘What is going on?’ she asked.
‘What do you think is going on?’
‘Well, I’ve just come in from several days’ rather complicated and demanding work and while I am, by common consent, a genius, I’m not blessed with second sight. So how about you just tell me?’
‘They’re having an argument.’
‘You don’t say. About what?’
‘Guess.’
‘Your father wouldn’t let her go out until she’d finished her homework.’
‘That was the last straw. But they’ve been at it since you left.’
Kate kissed her son’s head and wrapped an arm around his chest. ‘Hello, Mum, how lovely to have you back.’
He grunted.
‘How was your trip? Oh, it was fine, thank you, Gus. It went rather well, actually.’
Now he was smiling at her. ‘You were away?’
‘Cheeky,’ she said.
He gestured upstairs in the direction of the shouting. ‘We missed you.’
Kate took off her raincoat and hung it in the hall, then came back, kissed Nelson, and lay down for a moment beside him.
Gus wrinkled his nose. ‘I thought you told us not to kiss anyone until we knew where they’d been.’
‘You’re right,’ she said. ‘He does bloody stink.’
‘He’s old,’ Gus said. ‘You’ll smell that bad when you’re his age.’
‘Nice.’
‘Granny does. Which reminds me, the care home called.’
‘How long ago?’
‘Twenty minutes.’ He scratched his head theatrically with his stylus. ‘Or maybe yesterday.’
‘What did they say?’
‘Not much. They asked you to call back. Not urgent.’
Kate picked herself up and went to join the skirmish on the landing.
Stuart just looked at her. ‘Now,’ he said.
‘No!’ Fiona’s response wasn’t discernibly muffled by the door that separated them.
‘It was not a request!’
‘Go away! I hate you!’
He held up an imaginary white flag and eased past Kate. ‘All you
rs.’
‘Welcome back, my darling,’ Kate said, as he disappeared downstairs. ‘How was your trip? Oh, actually, it went really well.’
But Stuart was long gone.
She moved to the bathroom door and knocked. ‘Hon, it’s me.’ She waited. ‘Fi, it’s me. Mum.’
‘Actually, I have a pretty good idea who “me” is.’
‘Can you open up?’
‘Why?’
‘For starters, because I haven’t seen you for a few days. And because I love you and missed you terribly.’
‘That I doubt.’
‘All right, but the loving-you bit is true. And because you’ve clearly had an argument with Dad and, honestly, he looks a bit cross, which probably means you’re even crosser, and because I’m tired and would like to progress to a cup of tea without too much more time elapsing.’
Kate waited again. No one had warned her about the titanic reserves of patience one required to deal with teenagers. The door was eventually unlocked. A few moments later, it opened. Kate took a step forward.
‘Don’t come any closer!’
Fiona sat on the edge of the bath, her eyes puffy. Kate sat down beside her. ‘So … I’m guessing Dad wouldn’t let you go out tonight.’
‘He’s a total jerk.’
‘Well, he can be, but we’ve all been there. I suspect he was concerned about your homework.’
‘I’ll do my homework! I always do my homework!’
Kate drew her daughter gently but firmly towards her and hugged her. ‘I assume you wanted to go and see him.’
Fiona didn’t answer.
‘You won’t believe me, but he’ll like you more for not jumping every time he calls.’
‘You know literally nothing.’
‘True.’ Kate stood. ‘But I have to go to the home now and see Granny.’
‘Is she all right?’ The concern in her daughter’s voice was instant and genuine and reminded Kate – not for the first time – that the children reacted to her mother with an affection she’d never managed. There had to be an explanation for their desire to excuse the older woman’s many faults, but she couldn’t conjure one up.
‘I’m pretty sure the dementia is here to stay. Aside from that, I should think so.’ She paused. ‘A cup of tea can be very soothing. Will you join me?’