One of the smiling men offered what Graham guessed to be a written suggestion to Joshua Smith, who avoided the look of his fellow admiral and announced, ‘I think that satisfactorily resolves the immediate problem.’
Graham gauged that he—and Operation Cyber Shepherd—had survived by a whisker. A hell of a lot—probably everything—depended upon whatever Jack Irvine had tried to indicate.
* * *
Irvine’s mind worked to mathematical conformity: in Irvine’s world everything, ultimately, had logical, deducible answers. Numerals and lexigrams and symbols and their algebraic substitutes could be disarranged or scrambled into labyrinthine codes and ciphers, but eventually the rules of mathematical certainty applied, irrespective of whatever language concealment or ambiguity in which they might additionally be cloaked. At that moment, on the car journey to Fort Meade, Irvine struggled for an algorithm to the last twenty-four hours. But couldn’t find one.
There was no hypocrisy in giving Sally the England-routed IP he’d initially withheld to force the London prisoner exchange: that was the deal, the domain address for a prisoner. But disclosing his Vevak intrusion—letting her watch his unsuccessful search—wasn’t part of any deal. So why had he let her in so completely? To impress her, get her into bed? No! he rejected, feeling a positive flush of anger. He’d been virtually unaware of Sally’s presence throughout the hunt for [email protected]. Any intrusive thought of sex would have risked a repetition of his first-night humiliation, making it doubly unthinkable. Why then? Why not? was his immediate mental response. Sally Hanning—possibly the best lateral thinker he’d ever encountered—was an officially co-opted, top-security-cleared British intelligence officer who’d practicably contributed more to Cyber Shepherd than any CIA counterpart; she had the professional right to know. But there was one obvious caveat: Was it above and beyond Conrad Graham’s professional right?
No, Irvine forced himself to admit, seeing the first of the Fort Meade signs in the far distance. There’d been every reason to withhold the Vevak coup from the incompetents with whom he’d originally been burdened. But not for keeping it any longer from Conrad Graham. His father’s mistake had been to work virtually alone and … Irvine’s mind blocked at this moment of awareness. Was that the algorithm he needed, the answer to how—and why—he’d behaved as he had last night? Had he told Sally everything as he now planned to tell Graham everything to protect himself from mistakes that had disgraced his father? A lot of factors contributed to that mathematically logical equation. Withholding the Vevak breakthrough from Conrad Graham had been dangerously arrogant, as Sally had implied. But on his way from DC that morning he’d made the first move to rectify that by calling the deputy director. When they identified [email protected], having a Trojan horse stabled in an Iranian intelligence site could be presented as a new coup, not something he’d worked on since Stuxnet.
Personal risk averted, Irvine decided, taking the first turnoff. What about the risk to Operation Cyber Shepherd? A confrontation, Graham had called that morning’s encounter with Homeland Security high-command directors and their deputies. Irvine wished he’d had more warning, had time to properly produce a justification for Cyber Shepherd if one was demanded. Suggesting the strongest lead to the vanished al Aswamy without disclosing details of the smartman interception wasn’t enough. Revealing his being embedded in Vevak would certainly have been. But it would have been a disastrous mistake. It would have been leaked—destroying everything—within an hour of its being announced to a full Homeland Security gathering, even one limited to directors and deputies. What would swing it would be deciphering the IP code to identify a Vevak source inside a U.S. military facility. Which was what he was at Fort Meade to do, he reminded himself as he located a parking space close to the sprawling complex.
As he entered, Irvine should have been warned by Singleton’s reaction to his arrival, but his mind was still on his reflections during his drive over. Without any greeting or question from Irvine, Singleton said flatly, ‘Nothing.’
‘Not from anything I sent last night?’ demanded Irvine, disappointed as much by the announcement as the tone.
‘I told you, nothing.’
Marian Lowell said, ‘We’re still running programs on at least half of what you downloaded. And on the encryption.’
‘There’ll be more from the Pentagon today,’ said Irvine.
‘You’re blatantly breaking the law,’ accused Singleton.
‘There’s a Homeland meeting going on right now in DC with Cyber Shepherd in the crosshairs,’ declared Irvine, stopping at Singleton’s station. ‘I’ve told Conrad Graham there’s potentially something big.’
‘You tell him you’re hacking into the Pentagon!’ persisted Singleton.
‘Not from a cell phone on an interstate!’ It sounded more like avoidance than the sarcasm he’d intended.
‘I’ve officially registered an objection with Packer.’
‘That’s your right,’ acknowledged Irvine, looking further around the room. ‘It’s the right of all of you, if you feel like Burt. Just as it’s your right to resign from the entire project.’ It was a gamble, but Singleton was becoming more of a nuisance than the help Irvine had expected. If Cyber Shepherd survived, maybe it should re-emerge with a fresh team. Adjusted at least.
‘Your decision,’ confronted Singleton.
‘Why doesn’t everyone examine their commitment, take time to consider what you want to do?’ said Irvine, his temper gone. ‘I’m going to continue downloading from the Pentagon while you think about what you want to do. Take your time. I’m the sole Pentagon intruder, the person accepting full responsibility for what I’m asking you to do as the result of my actions, okay?’
Irvine was embarrassed as well as angry as he turned to his terminal, conscious, too, of the discomfort among the rest of the group. No-one spoke, and he had the impression of their moving as quietly as possible, not wanting to attract attention. Malik and Barker silently left the room together, he guessed either for the supercomputer rooms or the number generators. Singleton and Marian concentrated fixedly on their screens.
Irvine’s own concentration during the night had been on access code banks of military bases and facilities within the United States. Now he switched overseas, most of which were annotated alphabetically, which made easier his cursory initial subject comparisons or similarities with the smartman IP, before downloading for the more detailed supercomputer scrutiny. Quickly Irvine became oblivious to everything and everyone around him, as he had in the earlier pre-dawn. Just as quickly he lost count of how many codes he’d downloaded.
Awareness of time went, too, but as it passed, an incipient doubt began to nag. Was he wrong insisting [email protected] needed the operational cover of a military installation or facility? Or could it function through some darknet bot—or series of bots one inside another, like a matryoshka doll—as Burt Singleton argued? It was practicably immaterial: the Pentagon searches were programmed on supercomputers functioning at thousandths of a second, with parallel random-number programs. There were no other ways of getting the access code. Nor was there any wasteful manpower diversion. It came down to pride: Who was right, he or Burt Singleton? Which was … He was abruptly conscious of his shoulder being shaken and of Marian’s voice repeating his name to break through the concentration.
As she said, ‘I think you’ll want to see this,’ and gestured towards her computer, Akram Malik turned from the telephone Irvine had not heard ring and said, ‘It’s Langley, for you.’
28
‘I’ve been waiting,’ greeted David Monkton.
‘The statement was only broadcast thirty minutes ago and I had to get to the embassy,’ retorted Sally from her communications cubicle. As usual she couldn’t gauge anything—impatience or irritation or curiosity—from the monotone that sounded more like a public-address announcement than a human voice.
‘I’ve scanned you the full transcript.’
>
‘I’ve already got it in front of me. It seems to have covered all the points.’
‘You heard from Langley?’
‘No,’ said Sally. ‘Have you?’
‘No.’
‘I’m going to wait for them to come to me.’
There was a brief pause from London. ‘How long?’
‘Until tomorrow, at least.’
‘No longer,’ insisted Monkton.
‘Anything from GCHQ?’
‘Too soon.’
GCHQ had only had the intercept for five hours, Sally accepted. But that wasn’t any longer her major preoccupation. Would Irvine keep that morning’s promise to share whatever he got from the Vevak penetration? It was a test of sorts, she supposed; she’d pass on the memorized Hydarnes domain address if she suspected he reneged, but hoped he wouldn’t. Keeping to what she could discuss with the Director-General, she said, ‘We need something soon. We don’t want another Sellafield.’
‘Sellafield was prevented by you,’ reminded Monkton, although almost dismissively. ‘I’m surprised you didn’t get an advance of today’s announcement, after the co-operation you’ve been getting.’
Sally, in turn, was genuinely surprised at the passing twitch of discomfort. She had nothing to feel uncomfortable or guilty about: what had happened between her and Irvine was quite separate—totally unconnected—from what she was doing professionally. ‘We’re the obvious “friendly intelligence organization” supposed to have named an innocent man as al Aswamy. I don’t know what the curve’s going to be, but there’ll be one.’
‘You think the communiqué is going to defuse all the hysteria?’
‘No,’ said Sally at once. ‘It’ll just re-direct it. Which might, in fact, be the curve.’
‘That’s the way I see it. It’s why I want your impressions the moment you form them. We’ve kept up so far—been ahead, a lot of the time. That’s where I want it to stay.’
‘That’s the way I want it to stay, too.’ She believed she had a good chance of achieving it, although she didn’t expect to see—maybe not even to hear from—Irvine that night. He’d warned before he left Owen Place that morning that he’d stay at Fort Meade until they’d broken the Vevak encryption. Or was he staying down there for another reason? Could he have known about the Homeland statement and used Fort Meade as an excuse to be out of DC when it was issued? It was Irvine who’d suggested that London—with her the most likely focus—would be targeted as a diversion from America if the ruse backfired. Could he have already known about today’s announcement, taken part in formulating it?
‘You think Abu Hurr is the innocent man?’
Sally blinked the reflection away. ‘I can’t see how they could manipulate that, but who knows?’
Sally didn’t expect a direct response to the rhetorical question, but the silence lasted so long that had they not been talking on a secure line, she would have imagined they’d been disconnected. Then, abruptly, Monkton declared, ‘We need to talk specifics.’
The voice had risen above the normal blandness for the first time. ‘What specifics?’
‘We had to bulldoze your acceptance into the working group?’
‘Yes?’ agreed Sally cautiously.
‘Was that resented?’
‘There was a general understanding that it was professionally justified, I think.’ Where was this going!
‘By Johnston?’
‘You, the Director, were the person with whom he was prepared to co-operate, not me.’
‘Bradley?’
‘He lost al Aswamy. He followed wherever the senior officer led, kept his head down whenever we met.’
‘So you weren’t accepted by him?’ pressed Monkton.
‘It didn’t arise, not in any practical way.’
‘As it did in a practical way with Jack Irvine?’ Monkton’s voice, which had subsided, grew stronger again.
‘It’s obvious from what I was able to give you earlier today that he’s co-operating,’ said Sally without any hesitation.
‘Did you use the father’s disgrace?’
‘It came out in conversation, when I told him about my parents. I didn’t use it.’ She shouldn’t have qualified it like that! Sally thought immediately.
‘When I asked you, you told me you weren’t compromised.’
‘I’m not.’
‘Is there a personal as well as a professional relationship between you and Irvine?’
‘I don’t consider that to be a question I should be asked, nor one to which I need to reply.’
‘You just have replied,’ said Monkton. ‘So I’ll ask you again, are you professionally compromised?’
‘No.’ He’d withdraw her, Sally guessed, recite all the prohibiting regulations, even though technically they didn’t apply, and order her immediate return. Which she didn’t want to do, not yet. Could she refuse, postpone it at least? Argue she needed time to pack up or insist upon the long-overdue vacation? She smiled in sudden, belated awareness. She had an irrefutable argument for staying where she was. She had access to the Vevak’s Holy Grail Web site.
From London Monkton broke another pause. ‘Don’t confuse your priorities, Sally. Don’t ever do that.’
It was the first time he’d ever called her Sally, she realized after they’d hung up. As she crossed to her parked car, her vibrating phone signaled another surprise.
* * *
‘Motherfucker!’ exploded James Bradley, thrusting unannounced into Johnston’s office, trailed by Johnston’s protesting secretary. Johnston waved the woman away and told Bradley to close the door. Bradley ignored him, standing instead with his legs spread, hands imperiously on his hips. The secretary closed the door on her way out.
‘Which son of a bitch ordered this!’ demanded Bradley, waving a piece of crumpled paper in his hand.
‘I don’t know what you’re talking about,’ said the covert operations director. ‘What is it?’
‘You didn’t have this sent! Weren’t involved!’
‘What is it, for Christ’s sake!’
‘I’m off the active field register, off covert ops. Re-assigned to a fucking desk job in Personnel with a lot of fucking clerks. That’s what I’ve been demoted to, a fucking clerk!’ Bradley became aware that his jacket was unbuttoned and hurriedly re-fastened it to form his protective shell.
‘Haven’t you seen what Homeland just issued?’
‘I’ve been reviewing the whole al Aswamy thing, trying to find anything we missed.’
Johnston pushed the two-page printout across the desk, saying nothing while the other man read. It took several minutes.
Finally looking up, Bradley said, ‘What the fuck’s it mean?’
‘It means total bullshit and that everyone’s bunkered down and that there have to be internal executions, yours and mine, to account for all the mistakes so far.’
‘You?’ questioned Bradley doubtfully.
Johnston picked up another sheet of paper, fluttering it like a flag, and let it fall back onto the desk. ‘My authority to initiate covert activity has been indefinitely suspended. All such potential action must be submitted for the signed approval of Admiral Jack Lamb.’ He sighed. ‘I’m a fucking clerk, just like you. But as I’m keeping the title, I’m going to be responsible for all the other covert fuckups in the future.’
‘What are you going to do?’
‘Be a fucking clerk. I’ll keep my grade—which you’ll do, too, don’t forget—on which my pension is calculated, and which I’ll draw at the first available retirement opportunity, which I’ve already calculated to be eight years, six months, and four days. That’s more than enough time to find a house on a golf course somewhere in the sun.’
‘They can’t do this!’ declared Bradley, the anger resurging.
‘They can and they just did.’
‘Not to me they won’t. I’m not rolling over to die without taking others with me.’
‘You do that, Jim. You create a bloodbat
h all of your very own.’
‘I will. I know where enough of the graves are to dig a lot more.’
* * *
Irvine was already at Owen Place when Sally arrived, although he’d told her on the phone he didn’t expect to get there until seven thirty. It didn’t occur to either of them to kiss, embrace in any way. He already had his beer open, her wine poured.
She said at once, ‘What did you break, the IP code or the encryption! Tell me it was both!’
‘So far we’ve got neither?’
‘Then why are you back? This morning you said—’
‘You’ve seen the Homeland statement?’
‘Of course.’ So he had known!
‘Bradley and Johnston are officially gone, although Johnston keeps the title. Graham’s in personal control of Cyber Shepherd, which puts him on a very thin line because Homeland want it scrapped and him sacrificed with it. Your detainee is dead. I’m ordered to a breakfast meeting with Graham, eight a.m. tomorrow; that’s why I’m back and why I asked you to come here, where the computers are for me to be properly linked with Fort Meade. That brings you right up to speed with what’s not in the communiqué, so sit down and drink your wine. And I think you look terrific.’
Maybe he hadn’t known about the statement in advance, she thought, her mind switching between her personal and professional satisfaction. Don’t confuse your priorities, she reminded herself. There was a lot to distill from what Irvine had said, maybe even things, inadvertently or otherwise, that he hadn’t told her. But which she had to discover—now—before they became engulfed in the obvious confusion that existed at Langley. ‘Where did Abu Hurr die?’
‘I don’t know. Or how, although that’s kind of obvious.’
‘You told Graham about the Vevak penetration?’ she asked, conscious of his looking for the third time at the blank-eyed computers.
‘Not yet.’
‘You have to.’
He smiled briefly. ‘Lecture time?’
‘Reality time.’
‘Tomorrow. It’s how I’m going to save Cyber Shepherd. And Conrad Graham.’
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