become your man, the recruitment and so on.’
‘Yes, he was tortured.’
‘But not by the characters who have flown into Europe for their big party. Some other part of their organisation determined that he was working for you and got hold of him.’ He coughed and felt for a pipe that wasn’t in his pocket. He had given up tobacco four months before. ‘In that case I think this is a very dangerous affair. These people have already proved exceptionally adept at carrying on their business while being observed. I’d take the view that there’s very little useful intelligence to be had from watching them. Arrest the whole lot and throw them into jail on whatever charges keep them in there longest – or worse.’
‘You mean kill them?’
‘Yes, these men have no fear of suicide. They’ve moved to a certain level. You can’t reason with men like that or seduce them from the cause because self-interest in the normal sense has been rejected.’ He paused and raised his eyebrows. ‘And Teckman is apparently out of the picture?’
She nodded.
‘And that bloody little tick Vigo is back – astonishing!’
‘Yes.’
‘Well, I doubt the Chief is really out of it. Just lying doggo, waiting to make his move.’
‘Against his successor?’
‘Let’s hope so. Spelling is all mouth and no trousers. Complete phoney.’
She smiled. Her father’s forceful opinions meant that he had never stood a chance of rising in the Service, although the operations he conducted against the KGB along the Iron Curtain for twenty-five years were textbook studies, celebrated for their panache and cunning. He had once summarised it thus: ‘They relied on my judgement to keep myself and others alive in the field, but when I got back to London I was expected to let others think for me. I couldn’t get used to it.’
‘What about the operation itself,’ she asked. ‘Any advice for me?’
‘You know it all, Isis. Probably more than I do. The first thing you must realise is that these men know they’re in enemy territory. They’re like we were during the war. We couldn’t trust anybody in France and these holy warriors will suspect everyone they come in contact with. They will have had training in anti-surveillance techniques, so don’t fall into any dry cleaning traps. If they’re taking a particular route every day they’ll get used to the sights along that route and will know what is normal. They will also build in a couple of observation spots along the way so they’ll be able to tell when they’re being followed. Apply all the same rules if cars are involved, only more strictly.’
She nodded. She knew most of it but there was no stopping him now.
‘What you need to do is to learn the place thoroughly before you start the watch. There wasn’t a street I didn’t know in Stockholm or Vienna during the Fifties. I could have been a tour guide in Istanbul. This is very important: you can’t just go to a foreign town and blend into the scenery without knowing the place like the back of your hand. Take care with your clothes, too. Study what the women wear locally. There’re always slight variations of fashion between towns on the continent. A particular shop may be popular and you will need to get one or two items from there. If you need cover, a job to help you get close to your target, choose this very, very carefully. It’s important to keep your flexibility, so don’t rush into his local cafe and get yourself work as a waitress on the grounds that he visits the place twice a week. You won’t learn anything that way and you’ll tie yourself up. Other opportunities will present themselves.’
He stopped and examined her with fierce compassion. ‘Isis, you know these men aren’t playing things the way we used to. If we were spotted it often didn’t matter. It was part of the game of cat and mouse. But these men are utterly ruthless – they butcher air stewardesses without the slightest qualm; they think nothing of killing thousands of people one fine morning. They’re different from what we had to face – much, much more dangerous. But remember, you’re different too. You’re one of the few people who know the full extent of the operation against them. If you fall into their hands, they may work out that you have a lot to tell them and that is not an enviable position to be in.’ He put up his hand to stop her interrupting. ‘Of course I know there will be others with you, but from what I gather your people are nothing like as good at field craft as we were. Not interested in the detail, no preparation. You’ll have to watch your colleagues as closely as you do your own behaviour. I don’t want some berk from Vauxhall Cross on the phone telling me you’ve been killed, do you hear? You’ve got to use your own judgement.’
He slapped his hand against his thigh and then rubbed his knee. ‘It’s not much fun, this business of getting old. I’ve lost the feeling in my legs sitting here. I’m going to have to move.’
She helped him up. They stood on the Cup and Ring Rock and he looked at her, his rigid grey hair standing up in the wind, his eyes misted by limitless affection. ‘You know I can’t help seeing your mother in you. It’s twenty-four years since she died, but there hasn’t been a day I didn’t think about her. And now I see you so close to the age she was when she died, well… I fear for you, Isis.’ He stopped and looked apologetically down at her. ‘It’s an old fellow’s panic, I know. But I think I’ve reason enough to be worried.’
‘Come on, Dad. I may look like Mum but inside I’m all you – hard and practical.’
‘You’re going to have to be very hard and very practical,’ he said, almost angrily. ‘Don’t lose your concentration for a moment.’
They took the longer route back to Hopelaw House, stopping along the way for her father to pluck things from the hedgerows and scrape pieces of moss from the trees. ‘I mean to go on to some studies of lichen,’ he said, ‘and the moths that pretend to be lichen. They’re getting rarer and that’s because their camouflage is only good for one set of circumstances. The lichen disappears with all this pollution and the moth is left sticking out like a sore thumb. So, end of moth. It’s a point to remember. Your cover should be adaptable.’
‘Dad! I’ve been trained.’
‘Yes, you have,’ he said as though to scold.
They tramped back to Hopelaw House and her father disappeared into his study where the bits and pieces he had collected on the walk were interred in cotton wool. Then he emerged clutching a felt envelope.
‘Found this the other day,’ he said. ‘Thought you ought to have it. Mislaid it for years.’
She undid the package and found inside a photograph frame and a small black and white picture of herself and her mother, bent double with laughter in the sunlight of an afternoon long ago.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Khan was beaten casually and inexpertly as a natural part of detention. Perversely the treatment gave him hope. As he sat, shackled to a chair in the first-floor interview room, hearing the sound of children playing in a sunny courtyard below, he reasoned that if the police had thought him important, they’d have made sure that they could hand him over to higher authorities without a cut lip, swollen eye and bruised ribs.
The police captain, a man named Nemim, had departed. Khan sat respectfully and passively, hoping to look cowed. The hot afternoon passed slowly. A lone policeman sat in a chair tilted against the wall. An old 303 rifle lay in his lap. Khan thought that he might be able to overpower him, if he could persuade them to remove his manacles – perhaps for prayer – and climb down from the window into the courtyard. But where to after that? He didn’t have the strength to run. He had caught sight of his reflection in the police van’s mirror on the way in and hardly recognised the haggard face staring back. He looked condemned, just like the two poor Pakistanis on the road. It would be better to sit this out; get some food in him, sleep, make a plan.
This discussion with himself ended when Captain Nemim came back with a sheaf of papers and an open notebook. A look of animated curiosity had entered his expression. Khan realised that Nemim now saw him as an opportunity, a gift to an officer who could speak English and harboured ambitions way above his present tenure as the chief in a mountain station.
‘So, Mister Khan, or is it Mister Jasur? What do we call you?’
‘Khan – Mister Khan.’
‘Then why you are carrying these documentations belonging to Mister Jasur?’
‘Mister Jasur died when we were chased by Macedonian security forces. I took his possessions so I could tell his family when I reached safety.’
