He flicked another cigarette over the side of the yacht and watched it disappear in the blackness. His throat hurt, and his ear and shoulder were aching as if the microphone and receiver were coming alive inside him. He opened the glass case and took the dagger in his hands, holding it up in the moonlight. Behold, the guardian of Israel neither slumbers nor sleeps. The engraving was detailed and elegant, and the dagger itself was solid, well weighted, with a leather-bound handle. He rested on the railing again, weighing the knife in his hands. The Kol was saying something, but he was no longer listening. He wanted Leila. He had been trained for this, of course. He had been taught how to construct an alternative persona and then, when the mission was over, to allow the character’s psychology, fears, hopes, dreams, memories, to melt off him like a coating. But when he was Uzi, he had felt more genuinely himself. The Doctrine of the Status Quo – that had been his. It had only taken the creation of Uzi to bring it to fruition. Everything had been his, everything deep down had been his. He could not get rid of Uzi like a snake shedding its skin. Sometimes, he thought, a man has to act another role to find out his true identity.
He turned to the Kol. She was still speaking, gazing out into the blackness of the night.
‘We need to discuss your friend,’ she was saying. ‘The woman. It would be best if you could join in the interrogation. We could do a lot if you were involved.’
‘Where’s the sick bay?’ Adam interrupted.
‘Why?’
‘I just want to get rid of this mic, that’s all. Somebody was supposed to escort me down . . .’
‘I’m sorry, I wasn’t thinking. Follow me.’
She led him down into the heart of the ship. He was feeling dizzy, despite the gentleness of the ocean beneath them. He rested on the handrail for support, and as he did so, with a single fluid movement, slipped the dagger into his pocket.
44
When Adam and the Kol approached the sick bay, he saw that a guard was posted outside the door. She’s still in there, thought Adam. Leila must be still in there. To his surprise, the Kol left him with the guard and disappeared down the corridor; with a courteous nod, he was allowed inside.
The medic who greeted him was a man in his early thirties, with rimless glasses that glinted in the light. Leila was nowhere to be seen; the medic shook Adam’s hand, murmured his congratulations and got on with the job without the need for instructions. They did not speak as he injected a local anaesthetic into Adam’s shoulder, made an incision with a scalpel, and pressed a pair of tweezers into the ‘cyst’. After a couple of attempts, he slid out a plastic chip about the size of a postage stamp. For months it had been sending audio information to Israel; everything that Adam heard, everything he said, had been transmitted directly to the Mossad in Tel Aviv. He stared at the bloodied chip lying on a surgical swab, like an amputated tongue. The medic sealed the wound.
‘Now the mic in my ear,’ said Adam.
‘Are you sure, Colonel? Perhaps it would be better to wait until we reach Israel.’
‘Why?’
‘It’s a more sensitive area, and a more complicated procedure. At sea, with the unpredictable movement of the ship . . .’
‘Just get it out of me. I want it out of me now.’
‘You’ve had it in there for months. What difference does a few more hours . . .’
‘It makes a difference to me. I almost became schizophrenic with this thing inside me.’
The medic hesitated. Then he sighed and began to fill a new hypodermic needle. ‘As you wish, Colonel.’
It took longer than Adam had expected, but with some effort he held himself firm. Finally the ear-mic, the mouthpiece of the Kol, lay on the swab as well. He had bandages on his ear as well as his shoulder, and both felt numb and fat.
‘The prisoner,’ Adam said, ‘the woman. Is she awake yet?’
‘Not yet,’ the medic replied. ‘She could be out for another half an hour or so.’
‘I’m part of the interrogation team. I’d like to examine her briefly before I go.’
‘Of course, Colonel.’
With no further questions Adam was led to a door, which the medic unlocked by passing his ID badge across a sensor. Inside, the lighting was dim. There, in a low bunk, lay Leila, lying on her back with her arms outstretched. She had been stripped of her wet clothes and – from what he could see under the blankets – dressed in military greens. Her left wrist was handcuffed to the bunk, and a drip-line snaked into her right arm.
Adam, his heart beating like a time bomb, leaned over her and, with gentle fingertips, lifted one eyelid, then the other. For a moment, he felt her breath brushing his hand.
‘You’re right,’ he said. ‘She’s still under. You’ve treated her for hypothermia, I suppose?’
‘Her notes are here,’ said the medic, passing Adam a buff folder. ‘We’ve warmed her up and put her on a high-energy drip. She’s responding well.’
‘How soon until we can start interrogating her?’ said Adam, flicking through the notes.
‘As soon as she wakes up. She’ll be woozy, but not in danger. Not in terms of her health, anyway.’ He smiled slightly.
Adam handed back the file, nodded, turned to go; but then, in one fluid movement, snatched the dagger from his pocket and shoved the medic against the wall, holding the blade to his throat, clamping his hand over his mouth. The man’s breath bulged against his palm.
‘One word,’ snarled Adam, ‘and I open your veins. Understand?’
The medic, wide-eyed, nodded. Adam released his hand from his mouth and grabbed his collar. ‘Now,’ he said, ‘you’re going to unlock those handcuffs. Do it now.’
‘No,’ said the medic, ‘I can’t open it. I don’t have the key.’
Adam, noticing the man’s eyes darting up and to the left – the classic sign of deception – pressed the dagger into his neck until it broke the skin. The man winced and made a noise like a startled animal. A thread of his blood slipped on to the blade and wound into the letters of the engraving: The guardian of Israel neither slumbers nor sleeps. Adam pulled back the dagger.
‘I’m serious,’ he said, ‘release the handcuffs or I’ll bleed you like a pig.’ Panting, the medic stooped over Leila and freed her. Adam rolled the woman gently to the floor, handcuffed the medic to the bed in her place, and stuffed a handful of surgical swabs into his mouth. Then he freed Leila from the drip and dragged her into the other room. He knew that he didn’t have long.
Gritting his teeth, Adam stood behind the door and collected his thoughts. The dagger gleamed in the lights of the sick bay. He took three deep breaths then opened the door; in an instant he was behind the guard, holding the knife to his neck. He disarmed him, struck him three times with the handle of the dagger until he lay still. Then he pulled him into the sick bay, and bound and gagged him tightly. Rolling him over, he searched his pockets and found an electronic entry card, like that used in a hotel, but with the addition of a high-security digital chip. Fate was on his side, he thought; finally, fate was on his side. He pocketed the card, took the man’s gun and, with some effort on account of the numbness in his shoulder, hoisted Leila on to his shoulder. Then he padded quietly down the corridor, trying to regulate the rhythm of his breath.
Adam knew that the odds were stacked against him. He was on a vessel commanded by the Mossad, in waters dominated by the Syrians, with a lover who – until tonight – had worked for the MOIS. Even if he could get off the yacht, even if he could escape the clutches of the Mossad, MOIS and the Mukhabarat, even if he could find somewhere to hole up, he would still need to win Leila over to his position. She had chosen to take a chance with him rather than go to her death. She was brave; but that didn’t mean he had won her trust. Was her love for him strong enough to endure all this? He couldn’t be certain. He was surrounded by a universe of darkness, like a nightmare he had had once as a child – impenetrable darkness without end, stretching to the borders of imagination. The nightmare of death it
self. Yet he knew this: now he was his own master, and from this moment on, for however long he had left on this earth, he would never again be enslaved.
With Leila over his shoulder, he climbed a shallow staircase and turned left along a corridor that he had noted on his way down to the sick bay. Three doors down was a door made of reinforced metal; through a porthole he could see an assortment of electronic equipment. Hoping against hope, he took the entry card from his pocket and slipped it into the slot. He held his breath. Nothing happened. Then, without warning, there was a low clunk and the door swung open. He entered and locked it behind him.
Machinery hummed all around. Adam set Leila down gently in a padded leather chair and set to work on the buttons and dials, bringing multiple screens to life, powering up complicated systems and preparing the equipment for action. He hadn’t seen such sophisticated maritime computers for a long time – not since his Navy days.
All was set. He took Leila in his arms, an unconscious Cordelia, and carried her down the passageway and into the airtight submarine launch chamber. The vessel lay in its docking bay, perfectly clean and in a state of constant preparedness. It was beautiful: dark grey in colour, as sleek as a bullet or a dolphin, as powerful and discreet a craft as he could have wished for. With some effort, he struggled up the ladder and strapped Leila into the passenger seat. She looked so perfect there, unconscious, peaceful, oblivious to the world, her mind resting in inaccessible spheres.
The world was closing in. Adam climbed into the cockpit, strapped himself in and sealed the sub. Then he punched in the commands and, with a sound like a hundred waterfalls, the chamber began to fill with water. This is it, he thought. This is it. Within minutes the waterline crept up the walls of the sub and over the top of the cockpit, sealing them in an underwater realm. Finally a hole opened before them, a dark circle leading out of the yacht and into the boundless depths. Adam glanced at Leila – still no sign of consciousness – and activated the engine. The submarine dislodged from its moorings and moved towards the circular hole, spraying a cloud of bubbles in its wake.
No doubt: he was in more danger now than he had ever been before. But as the sub fell from the yacht like a bomb and disappeared into the tarry ocean, Adam was filled with the sense that everything he needed – everything in the world – was contained within the walls of this little vessel. The noise of the engine filled the craft, making it feel peaceful somehow, riding the currents of the sea. It was quiet. Outside a shoal of glittering fish floated past like a cloud. He was in the eye of the storm; he was at peace. He took the dagger out of his pocket and placed it on the dashboard.
Suddenly Leila stirred and shifted in her seat. She opened her eyes woozily and looked around. Then her eyes widened and she looked across at Adam, as if trying to place him.
‘Uzi,’ she said, ‘where are we? I’m so tired.’
‘Don’t worry,’ he said, ‘you’ve been drugged. But you’re safe now.’
‘My vision is blurry.’
‘That’s OK. It’ll pass.’
‘Last thing I remember, I was fighting a guy in a wetsuit.’
‘He won’t forget you, that’s for sure.’
‘God, my eyes.’
‘Just close them and relax. Give it time.’
‘Have we left that awful ship?’
‘We have. We’ve escaped, just like I promised.’
‘We’re in a sub, right?’
‘Yes.’
‘You won’t get away with this, you know. As soon as I get my vision back I’m going to slap you hard.’
‘I wouldn’t expect anything less.’
A pause. The sound of the engine, of the water rushing by outside.
‘Where are we going?’
‘Somewhere they’ll never find us. Somewhere we can be ourselves.’
‘I don’t think I know what that means any more,’ said Leila.
‘Nor do I,’ said Adam, ‘but together we’re going to find out.’
Acknowledgements
Many years ago, I found myself going through the recruitment process for the Secret Intelligence Service. I passed the first couple of stages, but before long I was rejected. Presumably MI6 decided that a creative type like me, with an unusually small hippocampus and a dislike for anything practical, might not be of great benefit to our national security. So with the world of espionage closed to me, I thought I’d write a novel about it.
Not much has been written about the Mossad, so the brunt of my research focused on two compelling books: By Way of Deception: The Making and Unmaking of a Mossad Officer by Victor Ovsrovsky (which inspired many of the details and operations mentioned in this novel), and Gordon Thomas’s Gideon’s Spies: The Secret History of the Mossad. I am most grateful to both of these authors.
As ever, Danny Angel – to whom The Pure is dedicated – helped enormously by reading the book and offering his impressions. David Del Monté helped in a similar way, and Homa Rastegar Driver gave some invaluable advice about portraying Iranian culture. Toby Wallis consulted on scuba diving matters. Only my dedicated and excellent agent, Andrew Gordon, who spent many hours poring over the manuscript and whose advice is never less than sterling, surpassed their efforts. And the team at Polygon – Hugh, Neville, Alison, Sarah, Kenny – did an admirable job in editing, producing and distributing this book, and in believing in me once again. Thanks also to Caroline Oakley and Mark Ecob for their editorial and design input.
While writing The Pure I tweeted about it (@JakeWSimons). The following people joined the conversation and gave me their ideas: @icod, @belledechocolat, @badaude, @stupidgirl45, @OnlyWantsOne and others. They have my thanks.
I would like to mention by name a certain British diplomat, as well as the various intelligence and Special Forces officers, both British and Israeli, who gave me their views on the plot. For obvious reasons, I cannot. Nevertheless, they have my thanks.
Thanks also to Sha’anan Streett, Yaniv Davidson and Hadag Nahash, the best hip-hopsters in Israel, for allowing Uzi to listen to their music.
Finally I must acknowledge my family, particularly my wife Isobel and my three beautiful children. I’m lucky to have them.
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