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Authors: Daniel Silva
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after the Second World War. He saw in the ragged, bearded college student the makings of a perfect field officer—intelligence, leadership skills, charisma, attitude, and the ability to speak several languages.
What the professor did not know was that Michael’s father had worked in the clandestine service and that Michael and his mother had followed him from posting to posting. He could speak five languages by the time he was sixteen. When the Agency came for him the first time, he turned them down. He had seen what the job had done to his father, and he had seen the toll it had taken on his mother.
But the Agency wanted him, and it kept trying. He finally agreed after graduation, because he had no job prospects and no better ideas. He was sent to Camp Perry, the CIA training facility outside Williamsburg, Virginia, known as the Farm. There he learned how to recruit and run agents. He learned the art of clandestine communication. He learned how to spot enemy surveillance. He learned the martial arts and defensive driving.
After a year of training he was supplied with a cover identity and an Agency pseudonym and given a simple assignment: Penetrate the world’s most violent terror organizations.
Michael drove along Route 123, turned onto the George Washington Parkway, and headed toward the city. The road was deserted. The tall trees on either side twisted in the gusty wind, and a bright moon shone through broken clouds. Reflexively, he checked his mirror several times to make certain he was not being followed. He pressed the accelerator; the speedometer showed seventy. The Jaguar rose and fell over the gentle landscape. The trees opened to his left, and the Potomac sparkled in the moonlight. After a few minutes the spires of Georgetown appeared. He took the Key Bridge exit and crossed the river into Washington.
M Street was deserted, just a few homeless men drinking in Key Park and a knot of Georgetown students talking on the sidewalk outside the local Kinko’s. He turned left on 33rd Street. The bright lights and shops of M Street vanished behind him. The house had a private parking space in the back, reached by a narrow alley, but Michael preferred to leave his car on the street in plain view. He turned left onto N Street and found a spot; then, as was his habit, he watched the front of the house for a moment before shutting down the motor. Michael enjoyed being a case officer—the seduction of a good recruitment, the payoff of a timely piece of intelligence—but this was the part of the job he didn’t like, the gnawing anxiety he felt every time he entered his own home, the fear his enemies would finally take their revenge.
Michael had always lived with an element of personal risk because of the way he did his job. In the lexicon of the CIA, he was a NOC, the Agency acronym for non-official cover. It meant that instead of working out of an embassy, with a State Department cover, like most operations officers, Michael was on his own. He had been a business major at Dartmouth, and his cover usually involved international consulting or sales. Michael preferred it that way. Most of the CIA officers operating from an embassy were known to the other side. That made conducting the business of espionage all the more difficult, especially when the target was a terrorist organization. Michael didn’t have the albatross of the embassy hanging around his neck, but he also didn’t have it for protection. If an officer operating under official cover got into trouble, he could always run to the embassy and claim diplomatic immunity. If Michael got into trouble—if a recruitment went bad or the opposing service learned the true nature of his work—he could be thrown in jail or worse. The anxiety had receded gently after so many years at headquarters, but it never really left him. His overwhelming fear was that his enemies would go after the thing he cared about most. They had done it before.
He climbed out of the car,
What the professor did not know was that Michael’s father had worked in the clandestine service and that Michael and his mother had followed him from posting to posting. He could speak five languages by the time he was sixteen. When the Agency came for him the first time, he turned them down. He had seen what the job had done to his father, and he had seen the toll it had taken on his mother.
But the Agency wanted him, and it kept trying. He finally agreed after graduation, because he had no job prospects and no better ideas. He was sent to Camp Perry, the CIA training facility outside Williamsburg, Virginia, known as the Farm. There he learned how to recruit and run agents. He learned the art of clandestine communication. He learned how to spot enemy surveillance. He learned the martial arts and defensive driving.
After a year of training he was supplied with a cover identity and an Agency pseudonym and given a simple assignment: Penetrate the world’s most violent terror organizations.
Michael drove along Route 123, turned onto the George Washington Parkway, and headed toward the city. The road was deserted. The tall trees on either side twisted in the gusty wind, and a bright moon shone through broken clouds. Reflexively, he checked his mirror several times to make certain he was not being followed. He pressed the accelerator; the speedometer showed seventy. The Jaguar rose and fell over the gentle landscape. The trees opened to his left, and the Potomac sparkled in the moonlight. After a few minutes the spires of Georgetown appeared. He took the Key Bridge exit and crossed the river into Washington.
M Street was deserted, just a few homeless men drinking in Key Park and a knot of Georgetown students talking on the sidewalk outside the local Kinko’s. He turned left on 33rd Street. The bright lights and shops of M Street vanished behind him. The house had a private parking space in the back, reached by a narrow alley, but Michael preferred to leave his car on the street in plain view. He turned left onto N Street and found a spot; then, as was his habit, he watched the front of the house for a moment before shutting down the motor. Michael enjoyed being a case officer—the seduction of a good recruitment, the payoff of a timely piece of intelligence—but this was the part of the job he didn’t like, the gnawing anxiety he felt every time he entered his own home, the fear his enemies would finally take their revenge.
Michael had always lived with an element of personal risk because of the way he did his job. In the lexicon of the CIA, he was a NOC, the Agency acronym for non-official cover. It meant that instead of working out of an embassy, with a State Department cover, like most operations officers, Michael was on his own. He had been a business major at Dartmouth, and his cover usually involved international consulting or sales. Michael preferred it that way. Most of the CIA officers operating from an embassy were known to the other side. That made conducting the business of espionage all the more difficult, especially when the target was a terrorist organization. Michael didn’t have the albatross of the embassy hanging around his neck, but he also didn’t have it for protection. If an officer operating under official cover got into trouble, he could always run to the embassy and claim diplomatic immunity. If Michael got into trouble—if a recruitment went bad or the opposing service learned the true nature of his work—he could be thrown in jail or worse. The anxiety had receded gently after so many years at headquarters, but it never really left him. His overwhelming fear was that his enemies would go after the thing he cared about most. They had done it before.
He climbed out of the car,
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