Ascension
Page 4
“It really didn’t occupy much of my time until Dominic called. The radars do their thing. It’s important enough that one of the main reasons we keep the Falklands is to defend Ascension in case anyone gets too interested. This cable project is partly so we can show the US that we’re maximizing its potential.”
Kane removed a cigarette from Taylor’s pack, lit it, and took her place by the window. A TV flickered in the living room across the road. In twenty minutes, the couple watching it would go to bed. A man would return to the house next door wearing paint-covered overalls and eat standing up alone in his kitchen. Clouds the silver of pencil lead crossed an orange night sky.
What was Ascension like right now? He imagined it silhouetted against the sea. Precious enough for the UK to cling on to. Precious as an offering to the States. The whole GCHQ-NSA relationship was fragile, Kane knew. The Americans wanted to monopolize the flow of Western signals intelligence. What did they get from the Brits, they asked? Some good mathematicians, a loose regulatory environment, then a few strategically placed lumps of rock. The UK didn’t have Hong Kong to wave at them anymore. There was Cyprus, of course, its British base hoovering up data from the Middle East. Then Ascension.
“The island captures half the communications circulating the planet,” Taylor said. “But it’s not an easy place to keep tabs on, ironically.”
“The eye sees not itself.”
“Not this one. The installations are mostly managed remotely. I’m told they target long-range high-frequency radio for the most part: military, shipping, that kind of thing. The men on the ground are private contractors, on hand in case a screw needs tightening. Otherwise, we’ve got a permanent crew of about fifteen RAF personnel, four or five radar engineers, more subcontractors maintaining the runway. I need someone to get into the community, find out about Rory’s last days. There are very few officers read into Echelon with the training for overseas missions of this level. You’re the only one I know.”
The only one who knew about Seeb, Kane thought. How much of this was about Taylor’s conscience?
“He might have left something,” she said. “Intentionally or unintentionally. A message.”
“Anything to suggest it?”
“That’s my speculation. You always talked about the need for humans on the ground when it came to espionage.”
“I’m very happy being away from the field.”
“No, you’re not.”
“Aren’t I?”
“I don’t think so.”
“I think you mean you’re not.”
She considered this. “I’m not happy. I’m certainly not craving a return to the field.”
“What are you craving?”
“Dreamless sleep. A large vodka tonic. Why haven’t you sent any students our way?”
“Why do you think?”
She sipped her tea.
“You think we’re all better off out of it.”
“I’m thinking you’re doing well, all things considered. You’re going to make it to the top. And it would be a better service if you did.”
He watched the succession of emotions cross her face. She had been ambitious—he had recognized that in Oman. And he recognized now the caution with which she handled that ambition, on the other side of personal catastrophe. A readjustment. But not entire, otherwise she wouldn’t have been here, trying to get him on this job. When he finished the cigarette, Kane closed the window.
“How would I get there?” he said. “If I went.”
She studied his face before replying, as if to ensure he really wanted to cross this threshold.
“A flight goes once a month from Johannesburg via Saint Helena, the other island of ours a few hundred miles to the south of Ascension. There used to be a direct military flight from the UK, but that’s been canceled, so I think via South Africa is our best bet. But we’d have to move fast. The next flight is in a few days’ time.”
“A few days? Jesus.”
“There’s a cruise ship swinging by on Sunday, but passengers only land for twenty-four hours, so it’s not much use to us. What do you think? You’d have to be there for a month, until the next flight back. We’d arrange all cover, something that gets a visitor’s permit from the Administrator without drawing undue attention.”
“Like what?”
“Sportfishing.”
“I’m not going to do much from a boat.”
“But at night you’d be socializing: meeting people. Your sort of thing. Isn’t that how one does it? It’s been a while.” She hesitated. “Obviously if there’s more to this . . . If there’s a hostile presence on the island, I’d want you to feel you were in the right place, mentally.”
“You mean do I think I’ve still got it.”
“Yes. Do you feel mission-sharp?”
It wasn’t just a question of sharpness, Kane thought. Missions like this took a particular kind of willpower. A suspension of disbelief. He knew men braver than any, the ones you sent in when no one else would go, who one day kitted up and couldn’t walk out the door. And they had to step away from the front line forever because—this was Kane’s analysis—they had become sane: suddenly, painfully sane. They didn’t crave the cocktail of testosterone and adrenaline that overrode this sanity, couldn’t justify the willingness to inflict pain on others. They were healed.
“If I say no? If this is beyond me?”
“I would understand, of course. Dominic will insist on continuing with the project regardless. I’ll have to pray that that’s not foolish in any way.” She placed her mug down on the coffee table. “Sleep on it. Have a think.”
Taylor stood up. Kane walked her downstairs, where they swapped numbers, then hugged tightly.
“I want the final decision to be yours,” she said.
“It will be.”
“One way or another, Rory died. Something happened to him over there.”
When the sound of her car had faded, Kane put his coat back on and walked to the college library.
It was open 24/7 during term time. One reason he didn’t recruit any students for MI6 was that the current crop lacked experience of misbehavior. To be good spy material you needed time falling carelessly into other people’s lives. Even at this hour the library was busy. But it remained hushed and still served as a refuge, a place where it felt like the world couldn’t reach him. It had its own reality, separate from the clock and the calendar and identity itself.
The security guard nodded.
“Elliot.”
“Harry.”
“Late one.”
“Can’t sleep.”
The guard nodded. Gray-mustached, surely former military by his posture. Kane had befriended him out of habit: You always made sure security were on your side. He was still getting used to befriending people for no purpose. The only sounds inside were the hum of the heating system and the soft turning of pages. Did he want to leave all this for a rushed and ill-defined mission? Taylor’s request was framed with the assumption that you can go on a job and return, then continue where you left off. That was rarely the case.
Kane typed Ascension Island into a catalogue terminal. Three results: one book on marine conservation, a travel guide that covered Saint Helena, Tristan da Cunha, and Ascension, and a history of the island.
He found the history book on its shelf at the back of the library, blew the dust off. It began with the discovery of Ascension as related by a member of the Portuguese crew that had first stumbled across it. In the spring of 1503 a fleet of ships sailed from Lisbon, under the command of the great admiral Alfonso d’Albuquerque. The Portuguese had established their empire in India and set about emptying the place of spices, gold, and precious stones. When the native rulers began to fight back, Albuquerque was tasked with putting them in their place. This was the purpose of his voyage: not to find treasure but to spill blood. We left Lisbon on 6 April 1503, in a fleet of four ships: The St James, the Holy Spirit, St Christopher and the Catarina.
We saw a multitude of ragged, craggy, sharp-pointed rocks for miles along the shore, appearing white with the dung of seafowl of several kinds. It was the most desolate land that my eyes had ever seen, like a land that God has cursed. I believe the whole world affords not such another piece of ground; most parts of it are the color of burnt brick, reddish, the substance stones, somewhat like pumice stones; the rest like cinders and burnt earth.
The day they saw the island it was the Feast of the Ascension of Jesus Christ, according to the Church calendar, and the Portuguese crew named it Ilha da Ascensão. But they didn’t stop.
The island remained unclaimed for three hundred years. Black rats got ashore from passing ships and infested it. Some goats were set down in case any wrecked sailors needed to survive. Neither softened its desolation. In 1656 a Cornish adventurer and travel writer returning from his third voyage to India confirmed the views of his Portuguese predecessors: A more bleak and barren landscape cannot be imagined. Truly, it struck my eyes as Hell with all the fires put out.
How bad could it be, Kane wondered? He opened a browser, searched “Ascension” on images. The first result was a girl’s face.
He didn’t pay too much attention to it initially. She was smiling, pretty, with a light-brown complexion. Every other image showed variations of volcanic slopes and empty beaches. Then he saw the text beneath the thumbnail.
Search continues for missing Ascension Island teenager.
It was from the Times, two hours ago. Kane clicked.
Residents of Ascension Island, a British Overseas territory in the South Atlantic, continue their search for 15-year-old Petra Wade, last seen six days ago. The island, owned by the British since 1815, is considered a temporary home by 800 people. Its 35 square miles of terrain are rugged with cliffs and sea, and concerns are mounting that the teenager may have fallen while out walking, or been washed out to sea by exceptionally high tides. In a statement, her parents said: “There is no indication Petra had any reason to disappear, and we beg every individual on the island to help look for her. We believe she may be injured somewhere.” Ascension itself has its own small police detachment, plus military who are assisting in the search.
Last seen six days ago. Kane checked a calendar online. It was the day Rory Bannatyne killed himself. His phone screen lit up: Kat Taylor calling. Kane answered, stepping out of the reading room.
“The situation’s got a bit more complex,” Taylor said.
“I’ve just seen. Anything to suggest it connects?”
“Apart from everything?” She sounded breathless, agitated. “The girl went missing a few hours before he died.”
“Did you have any idea about this?”
“No.
“Still want me to go?”
“Do you think you can?”
“Yes, I think so.”
“Okay. I’ve just got into Vauxhall. It’s going to be a long night, and there’s police involvement on the horizon. I’ll let you know what I can find out. If I don’t speak to you later, let’s speak in the morning. Thank you, Elliot. This is . . .”
“We’ll see what it is.”
“Yes.”
Kane returned to the books, his heart beating with a forcefulness he hadn’t felt for a while. Do you feel mission-sharp . . . The guard approached. Kane moved instinctively to cover the history of Ascension, then stopped himself.
“Looks like no one’s had that for a while,” the guard said, nodding at the book.
“I’m doing some interesting research.”
“What’s that then?”
“It’s about an island in the South Atlantic: Ascension. Belongs to us.”
“Never heard of it.”
“Might be some travelling involved.”
“Tropical island, eh? Want to swap jobs?”
“I’ll send you a postcard.”
“Jammy sod.”
The guard walked on. Kane clicked into secure browsing, searched for any more news on the missing girl, but there was nothing. Then he searched for academic research networks: colonialism, sixteenth century, South Atlantic, watching his fingers type but thinking through an operations checklist: transport, equipment, cash, ID.
He brought up a photograph of the girl again, then a map of the island’s thirty-five square miles.
4
Twenty-four hours after his visit to GCHQ, Kane was in a briefing room in an anonymous MI6-owned office above an insurance company in Holborn. By Thursday morning, he was walking through Johannesburg’s OR Tambo International Airport, watching the crowds thin out as he approached the gate for his flight to Saint Helena, the second leg of his three-flight journey to Ascension.
In his bag were the books and research materials he had managed to acquire in the limited time available: two histories of Ascension Island; one on the Royal Marines; Charles Driver’s Chronicle of the British Empire; and the translation of a diary left by a Dutch sailor abandoned on Ascension in the 1700s. He had a passport, driving license, and bank cards in the name of Dr. Edward Pearce, a postgraduate researcher in early modern history at Pembroke College. Two cardboard wallet files contained the notes for Pearce’s work in progress: “Islands in the Imperial Imagination.”
There’d been no sign of the missing girl. It was ten days since Bannatyne had hanged himself and Petra Wade disappeared from the world. In the absence of useful leads, Kane had read everything he could find regarding the island, as if this itself might prepare him. But it only enhanced his sense of unease. Ascension was the tip of an undersea volcano. One percent of it was above water. Head down another few miles and you got to the rift that stretched from Iceland to the Antarctic, where continental plates pulled away from each other and the earth’s boiling core welled up. One myth said that Ascension was still warm when the first humans stepped on it. That was a few millennia out, but it said something about the lack of invitation that the rock extended.
Nearly forty dead volcanic cones rose up from its surface of lava and ash. For centuries these belonged to the seabirds who came there to breed, and the giant turtles who, once a year, swam from Brazil guided by some imperishable logic to lay their eggs before swimming back again. Humans had been dissuaded from any settlement by the scarcity of fresh water. It hadn’t been entirely uninhabited in its earlier days, however. Sailors visiting Ascension in 1726 discovered a tent and the diary belonging to a Dutch mariner abandoned there the year before as punishment for sleeping with another crew member. The diary recorded his descent into terror and insanity.
It took British aggression to see the island’s potential. In 1815 Napoleon was imprisoned on Saint Helena to the southeast. The British garrisoned Ascension as a precaution against it being used as a base by any French troops trying to rescue him. By the time of Napoleon’s death, the island had become a midocean supply station and hospital for fever-stricken crews from the anti-slavery patrols. Eventually, freed West African slaves from the Krumen tribe were brought ashore to provide cheap labor. In 1823 the island passed into the hands of the Royal Marines, and in 1899, when the first telegraph cable arrived, it brought civilians into the population. By 1921, the navy had handed over all administration to the telegraph company, who now operated under the name Cable and Wireless.
That was the most peaceful period: just two hundred people on the rock, handling the wires. Then World War II arrived and fifteen hundred US troops descended in a matter of days. They worked around the clock to build the airfield, shielding the floodlights from enemy ships. The stony ground chewed up their drill bits, and the men—four thousand of them at the height of the war—slept on the beaches and among the rocks.
When the war ended, they al
l left. And none of the available accounts was very clear about what happened next. A year later, some Americans returned to survey the place, and a few months after that, new constructions appeared: radars and antennae and installations more mysterious than both. The Cold War had begun.
That was how the island had been for the last sixty years: useful, secretive, silent. As NASA began to develop its Apollo program, they built a tracking station on the island. When the Falklands kicked off, Ascension provided a staging point for bombing raids. Otherwise it was uneventful, if events meant a physical occurrence in the public domain. Saint Helenians provided a local workforce. They were known as Saints, manning the bars, teaching at the school, helping with maintenance and fishing. They came over from the sister island on temporary permits and brought their families with them. In 2005, George and Jackie Wade came over with their three-year-old daughter, Petra. George worked as a private contractor doing operational support at the airfield; his wife secured a job in the US base canteen. Petra joined the small community of Ascension Island children who attended a nursery and school in Two Boats, the village in the center of the island.
Petra did well at the Two Boats school, which followed the English curriculum. Extracurricular activities included camping, diving, and singing. Last year, at age fourteen, she won Miss Ascension. In pictures she looked older than her years: confident, healthy with a life of sun and sea. Locals described her as lively, spirited, charming.
At five p.m. on Tuesday, November 7, she told her mother she was going out to meet a friend, Lauren Carter, who lived in Two Boats. Petra’s father was working. School was finished. Her mother said the girl was keen to get out, but in no way upset or distressed. She was wearing denim shorts and a striped vest top, pink Adidas trainers, and an unbranded pale blue baseball cap. The day had topped thirty degrees Celsius. She took her bike.
The last sighting of her was by a shopkeeper in Two Boats roughly an hour later, who said Petra was looking for someone, or on her way to meet someone, but they didn’t know who. She still had the bike with her. Lauren Carter said she never saw her; said that they had had no arrangement to meet in the first place.