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Authors: Gerald Seymour
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either of them, or hold a small fist, but let Alex’s wife do that. There was little point in holding a child’s hand when his own should have been dragging a handgun from its shoulder holster. They hurried to the car. It was only when they were inside the bulletproof, blast-proof vehicle, the doors were locked and the engine running, that he listened to the kids chatter about their morning’s classes.
The MV Santa Maria was now five days out of the Venezuelan port of Maracaibo and was seven days from berthing in the cargo harbour of Cádiz, on the extreme south-west of the Iberian landmass. She was Liberian-registered, listed at 10,000 tonnes, had a crew of eighteen, and her holds were filled with aluminium ore from the Los Piriguajos mine. She was in calm seas and her speed would average 14 knots on a 3,840-mile journey. Personal fortunes and futures rested on two containers forward on her decks, the contents listed as ‘hardwood furniture products’. Those who had raised the money, payment up-front, from backers for their purchase had no reason to doubt they’d made a sound investment.
A message had gone via relays on Cyprus and the Rock of Gibraltar, to the building overlooking Vauxhall Bridge. It was annotated with the code of a sub-station at Baku, and passed to a deciphering section. From there it went to an analyst, who moved it on to the Russian specialists. There, like a pebble carried downstream, it was snagged and was held for four hours. When an answer did not throw itself into a specialist’s face, he tended to move on and find material more readily accessible. A remark to a colleague, an older man, challenged by the electronic age: had he heard of a UK agent killed by Russians, somewhere abroad?
The older man knew. ‘The poor relations, the crowd across the river, he could have been one of theirs. Five years ago, I think. They had no local co-operation in Budapest – hadn’t asked for it. They didn’t deign to tell us what they were doing and were burned. Fully deserved to be. Best I can do.’
The message went on its last journey, from south of the river to north, a rider attached: ‘We would not want to intrude on private – well-justified – grief.’
‘Caroline, you deserve a sight of this.’ The deputy director general had come from his inner office and held the sheets of paper over Caro Watson’s desk. ‘You were a part of it, as I recall, the Damian Fenby business.’
He let the sheets fall. She clicked on her screensaver and could not answer him. She had been a broken reed when – her hair dry – she had received the call from the hotel front desk and gone down. There had been policemen with long faces. She had been driven to the hospital and had identified the body before its transfer to the morgue. Then she had roused the Thames House night-duty staffer, and had started to choke through the detail on her phone, encrypted. She believed that some in the office regarded it as a duty of care to continue to employ her but she was of precious little use to her colleagues. The first two years had been pitiful and her effectiveness at little above zero; the third year had been an improvement. For the last two years she had been a woman with a set, humourless face and moods to match. She did her work with almost manic intensity and allowed no colleague close to her – except one. The opportunities for her to have ‘quality time’ with Winnie Monks were rare. She found her old boss once every six weeks on the bench at the back of the gardens. Now she read at speed, and the knot tightened.
He said, ‘I’ve just come off the phone to Winnie. They’re going to do their business up in the north tomorrow or the morning after. She doesn’t need to be there. She’s driving back tonight. You’ll see her here late this evening. We’re sorting out your travel schedule and you’ll fulfil the rendezvous agreed to. You’ll have a two-man escort and your safety is of
The MV Santa Maria was now five days out of the Venezuelan port of Maracaibo and was seven days from berthing in the cargo harbour of Cádiz, on the extreme south-west of the Iberian landmass. She was Liberian-registered, listed at 10,000 tonnes, had a crew of eighteen, and her holds were filled with aluminium ore from the Los Piriguajos mine. She was in calm seas and her speed would average 14 knots on a 3,840-mile journey. Personal fortunes and futures rested on two containers forward on her decks, the contents listed as ‘hardwood furniture products’. Those who had raised the money, payment up-front, from backers for their purchase had no reason to doubt they’d made a sound investment.
A message had gone via relays on Cyprus and the Rock of Gibraltar, to the building overlooking Vauxhall Bridge. It was annotated with the code of a sub-station at Baku, and passed to a deciphering section. From there it went to an analyst, who moved it on to the Russian specialists. There, like a pebble carried downstream, it was snagged and was held for four hours. When an answer did not throw itself into a specialist’s face, he tended to move on and find material more readily accessible. A remark to a colleague, an older man, challenged by the electronic age: had he heard of a UK agent killed by Russians, somewhere abroad?
The older man knew. ‘The poor relations, the crowd across the river, he could have been one of theirs. Five years ago, I think. They had no local co-operation in Budapest – hadn’t asked for it. They didn’t deign to tell us what they were doing and were burned. Fully deserved to be. Best I can do.’
The message went on its last journey, from south of the river to north, a rider attached: ‘We would not want to intrude on private – well-justified – grief.’
‘Caroline, you deserve a sight of this.’ The deputy director general had come from his inner office and held the sheets of paper over Caro Watson’s desk. ‘You were a part of it, as I recall, the Damian Fenby business.’
He let the sheets fall. She clicked on her screensaver and could not answer him. She had been a broken reed when – her hair dry – she had received the call from the hotel front desk and gone down. There had been policemen with long faces. She had been driven to the hospital and had identified the body before its transfer to the morgue. Then she had roused the Thames House night-duty staffer, and had started to choke through the detail on her phone, encrypted. She believed that some in the office regarded it as a duty of care to continue to employ her but she was of precious little use to her colleagues. The first two years had been pitiful and her effectiveness at little above zero; the third year had been an improvement. For the last two years she had been a woman with a set, humourless face and moods to match. She did her work with almost manic intensity and allowed no colleague close to her – except one. The opportunities for her to have ‘quality time’ with Winnie Monks were rare. She found her old boss once every six weeks on the bench at the back of the gardens. Now she read at speed, and the knot tightened.
He said, ‘I’ve just come off the phone to Winnie. They’re going to do their business up in the north tomorrow or the morning after. She doesn’t need to be there. She’s driving back tonight. You’ll see her here late this evening. We’re sorting out your travel schedule and you’ll fulfil the rendezvous agreed to. You’ll have a two-man escort and your safety is of
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