decoders didn’t have enough knowledge or information to decode what he saw.’
Stratton faced Sumners. The hook was going in.
‘And what am I supposed to do, hang around with him until he has another vision?’
‘They’re not visions. Look upon them as searches. He’s already found something and apparently it scared the hell out of him. I’m afraid we’ve not been able to decode it either.We need someone on the ground with him all the time, asking questions, clarifying the information. Decoding teams will also be on hand as usual. Different viewers are sensitive to different things. This one sees locations but he’s also sensitive to emotions. So far he’s described what he’s seen or felt as an enormous danger but he can’t tell what that is. To use his own words, he’s never felt anything so horrific in his life.’
‘If this is so big, why me? I mean, this isn’t exactly my job description.’
‘Right now our intelligence resources are stretched thinner than they’ve ever been in our history. Wonderful though remote viewers may sound in theory, they are greatly flawed. Much of their information cannot be accurately decoded. It’s often misleading. On average they’re rated at six per cent accuracy.Your rating as a field operative for instance is ninety-two per cent.What you see and report back is real and usually easily verifiable. But the six per cent the remote viewers give us that is successfully decoded is worth the fortune it costs the CIA to run its psychic department - according to them at least . . . These recent viewings are related to the tanker. That’s what this particular viewer has been concentrating on ever since it was attacked . . . And that’s why you are here.’
Sumners had done a good job stroking Stratton’s ego and expectancy back into shape.There was some importance attached to the assignment and it was interesting.
‘He’s here then, in England?’ Stratton asked.
‘Yes.’
The two men faced each other in the dark street, neither sure of where they stood in this most unusual and possibly ridiculous task. All their years of training in their respective disciplines had not prepared them for an operation like this.
‘Okay,’ Stratton finally said. It was bizarre, but why not? What else was going on?
Sumners took a photograph from his pocket and handed it to Stratton. It was a headshot. The man appeared to be in his late fifties, had short grey hair and was refined looking. Sumners took the picture back after Stratton had studied it for a few seconds.
‘He’s described as sensitive with occasional unstable tendencies but not violently so. He’s also paranoid and perhaps even schizophrenic.’ Sumners took a package from his coat pocket and handed it to Stratton. ‘Cell-phone and charger. My numbers are programmed into it as well as others you might need. There’s also five thousand pounds expenses money, a credit card and your MI6 ID. The routine hasn’t changed. Expenses must be justified, all fares economy and I’ll need receipts for anything over five pounds. He’s at the Victory Club under the name of Gabriel Stockton, room 534.’
‘The Victory Club?’ Stratton asked. It was a hotel around the corner from Marble Arch, a basic discount hotel for currently serving and former members of the British military and their families.
‘Where did you expect us to put him up? Claridge’s? He’s expecting you tonight. I’ve reserved you a room next to his. I look forward to hearing from you.’
Sumners turned and walked away.
‘How come he’s expecting me when you didn’t know I’d take the job?’
‘I must be psychic,’ Sumners said without looking back and walked past the entrance to the pub and disappeared around the corner.
Stratton frowned and then weighed the package in his hand, his mind already searching ahead. He was used to automatically planning as many aspects as he could of a new assignment immediately after a briefing, and sometimes during it, but this one left him with little else to contemplate other than how to get to Marble Arch.
He pocketed the package and headed down the street, his philosophical old self surfacing once again. There was never a dull moment in MI6.
Stratton’s taxi pulled up outside the Victory Club, half a block from the corner of Edgware Road, and he climbed out and handed the fare to the driver.
‘Can I have a receipt, please?’
The taxi driver handed him a blank receipt and drove away.
‘Good evening, sir,’ a cheerful Eastern European in a doorman’s uniform bid Stratton as he opened the front door for him. Stratton returned the greeting as he walked inside and headed for the reception desk.
After checking in, Stratton walked around a corner to the elevator, stepped inside and pushed the fifth-floor button. A few seconds later, he exited the elevator on the fifth floor and headed along the corridor, passing a dozen or so rooms bearing brass plaques dedicating them to an assortment of British regiments, until he reached room 534.
He placed his ear close to the door but couldn’t hear anything, no television or movement.
He knocked.
A creaking sound suggested someone was getting off a bed, then came a voice: ‘Who is it?’ a man said with a hint of an American accent.
‘It’s Stratton.’
‘Who?’
Stratton wondered if someone had already screwed up and forgotten to give the guy his name. ‘Stratton. I was told you were expecting me.’
There was a moment’s silence. ‘One second,’ the voice eventually said. Stratton could hear more movement. A moment later the door was unlatched and opened wide enough for the man to look out. Stratton recognised him from the photograph though he was taller than expected, perhaps an inch or so on top of Stratton, his hair had more silver in it and he had a far more distinguished look in the flesh.
Gabriel studied Stratton with what appeared to be suspicion for an inordinately long time.
‘Stratton?’ the man asked, looking unsure.
‘That’s right,’ Stratton said as he looked at both ends of the corridor, checking to see they were alone.
Gabriel opened the door and Stratton walked into the simply decorated room which was barely large enough to allow anyone to move around the double bed without scraping the walls. It had a small television on a swivel bracket bolted into a corner close to the ceiling, a dresser with an electric kettle, two cups and tea and coffee and a tidy en-suite bathroom with a bath, sink and toilet ergonomically fitted into the most confined of spaces. Stratton stood in the gap between the room entrance and the bathroom as Gabriel closed the door behind him, locked it and remained standing, apparently not quite finished with his examination of Stratton.
‘Everything okay?’ Stratton asked, forcing a smile, doing a bit of inspecting himself. Gabriel was conservatively dressed in a wool jacket, striped shirt, plain tie, wool trousers with a razor crease and brown brogues. He looked like a schoolteacher. His build suggested he had been athletic in his younger days but not any more. Everything about him, the cut of his cloth, hair, fingernails and neatness of his belongings suggested he was meticulous. He looked tired though, his eyes red and sunken, the lids blinking lazily indicating a thirst for sleep, and they flickered in harmony with his gravel voice as if sensitive to the coarseness of it.
‘You’re British military intelligence?’ Gabriel said, more a statement of doubt than a question.
‘And you’re Gabriel,’ Stratton said, ignoring the attitude and putting it down to paranoia. ‘You settled in all right?’ Stratton asked, practising his polite tone. ‘How was your trip?’
‘Tiring. I don’t like travelling.’
‘London can be a zoo.’
‘I’ve been here before,’ Gabriel said. ‘I’m not much of a fan . . . Excuse me,’ he said, looking Stratton in the eye as he took a pace towards him. Stratton moved aside and Gabriel walked past and into the bathroom where he packed his toothbrush, toothpaste, soap and comb into his ablutions bag, and walked back into the bedroom to the window where he collected more of his personal effects and placed them into a small holdall.
‘I take it we’re going right away?’ Gabriel asked as he picked up a pair of slippers off the floor and put them carefully into the bag so that the soles were uppermost and not touching any clothing.
‘Going where?’ Stratton asked as he watched Gabriel pull a quilted jacket on having apparently decided they were indeed leaving.
‘They didn’t tell you?’
