Private Wars

all.”

There was a silence for a moment as the American digested what he’d said, and Crocker took the opportunity to feed a cigarette into his mouth. Ron held out a light, and Crocker leaned into it, accepting the flame.

“We’re on the same page about this now?” Seale asked.

“If you mean the page where I’ve got an agent caught in the cold and quite possibly dead, then yes, we’re on the same fucking page, Julian.”

“I’ll be there in half an hour,” Seale said, and hung up.

Crocker handed the phone back to Ron, pivoted, looking back to the plasma wall. Nothing had changed. Nothing would change, not for a while yet. He could stare at it for another hour, and it would tell him nothing he didn’t already know. The anxiety that had propelled him into the Ops Room began to wane, and the seething in his veins began to settle into the familiar queasiness of uncertainty. He tried to think of what else he could do, what else he should do.

“Lex? The line still open to Tashkent?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Put me on.”

She nodded, quickly plugging in a second headset to her coms station, handing it over to Crocker as soon as he reached her. He settled the earpieces, adjusted the boom.

“Craig? D-Ops.”

“Good morning, sir,” Craig Gillard said in his ears. There was a hiss on the line, and beneath Gillard’s voice a low, regular beeping, indicating the communication was being scrambled.

“Not very,” Crocker said.

“No, sir. I’m a little unclear as to what to make of things here.”

“I can imagine. You’ll receive a proper directive from me later this morning, but for now I need you to proceed as if you’ve already received the appropriate authorizations, do you understand?”

Gillard hesitated before answering, and Crocker didn’t blame him. He was thirty-six, and Tashkent was his first posting as a Number One, after twelve years within SIS. He’d been in-country for eleven months, with another year scheduled on his tour. It was a well-earned posting—Crocker wouldn’t have endorsed the placement if he’d felt Gillard couldn’t do the job—and one of priority, for all the same reasons the Americans made Uzbekistan a priority. Gillard was looking at coming back home to a senior desk position under Rayburn’s eye, and then possibly further promotion within SIS. All of that incumbent, of course, on his doing his job not just well, but discreetly.

And Crocker had yet to meet a Station Number One who ever was well pleased when things started exploding on his or her watch.

“Yes, sir, I understand,” Gillard said. “What seems to be the trouble?”

“I’ve heard the Hizb-ut-Tahir nonsense. Do you know what really happened?”

“Hayden’s been beating the bushes,” Gillard answered, referring to the Station Number Two. “Got himself a contact in the NSS he’s been working on for the last few months, since November, name of Jamshid Nalufar. Nalufar says that it wasn’t the extremists, but Ruslan’s people trying to get him out of the country, he thinks in the wake of President Malikov’s death. Problem with that, sir, is that Ruslan doesn’t have much in the way of people, and those he does have are all in the south, mostly centered in Qashqa Darya Province, cities like Karshi, Shakhrisabz, and Samarkand. It’s not making a lot of sense.”

Crocker exhaled smoke, then said, “No, it’s not Ruslan’s people, it’s ours. The operation is called Crystalgate. You’ll get the brief on it in the morning, as I said.”

“Jesus Christ.”

“Still with me?”

“Jesus Christ,” Gillard repeated. “You’re running a bust-out in Tashkent, you didn’t bother to notify me?”

“Believe me when I tell you it was not by choice,” Crocker said. “No one was looking to burn you, Craig. The agent has had no contact with either you or your Number Two. The orders were to steer clear of the Station.”

“For all the good that’s going to do. The operation’s a bust, it’s completely blown. Hayden says the NSS shut it all down, they’ve got the kid, Ruslan’s reported dead—”

“I don’t care,” Crocker interrupted. “There are two things I need from you, and I need them immediately.”

“Go ahead.”

“The explosions, the SAM that took down the helicopter and the one that blew up the house, I believe those were both caused the same way, with a Starstreak. I need you to confirm that, and then get that confirmation to me, that’s one.”

“We’re arming the Uzbekis with MANPADs now?”

“That’s one, Craig. Second, I need to find out what happened to the agent. I need to know if she’s dead, if she’s been captured, or if she’s still running.”

“She?”

“Tara Chace. She’s running under the name Tracy Elizabeth Carlisle. It’s vital I know what’s happened to her.”

“Yes, sir, I understand.” Gillard paused, then added, “All right, Hayden and I will get on it right away. I’ll have him hit his contact again, though God knows he’ll resist communicating with him twice in the same night.”

“Soon as possible, Craig.”

“Yes, sir, that’s understood as well. I’ll contact you as soon as we learn anything.”

“London out.” Crocker pulled the headset off, dropped it back on the MCO Desk, then dropped his cigarette to the floor and ground it out with his toe, frowning. He had to get back upstairs, to inform Barclay and Gordon-Palmer what had happened, and he needed Seale to arrive, and soon. But that was it for the moment, that was all he could do. If Chace was dead, the Station would confirm it soon enough.

“I’ll be with C,” he told Ron. “When Seale arrives, ring me. Have him escorted to my office, I’ll meet him there.”

“Yes, sir.”

“And find me the number of Valerie Wallace, Barnoldswick, Lancashire.” Crocker hesitated, then added, “I may need it later.”

He headed back upstairs to rejoin the battle in C’s office.

CHAPTER 29

Uzbekistan—Tashkent—Yunus Rajabiy,