So, he needn’t concern himself with the details of the killers, who paid for them, who snuffed out the man called Oret, or where the chemical warfare agent came from. These things were not his business. But they were the CIA’s, and there was no point in keeping what knowledge he had to himself. He did two things. He texted Anastasia to underline how important it was to find Naji. Not only was he in danger, but he was currently the only person who could help them. ‘As your humble employee, can I ask you to make this a priority and get hold of him as soon as possible? XX,’ he wrote. Then he withdrew Toombs’s card from his wallet and called him. Toombs answered immediately.
‘I may lose you,’ said Samson.
‘You already did! Why the hell did you get off that train?’
‘Those two men were yours?’
‘There were no two men.’
‘The only women I saw were in hijab.’
‘Right. They were there to protect you. Look, Mr Samson, if we can find you, so can the people who want to kill you before you get to Estonia – that’s where you’re headed, right?’
‘I have information for you.’
‘Save it,’ Toombs snapped. ‘I’ll send you instructions for the Company encryption, then sit on your goddamn phone and stop the signal.’ He was told to download an app from a website and enter a series of passcodes into the app, which he did. The app promptly vanished from his screen.
‘The five words,’ began Samson. ‘Berlin, pitch, pearl, etcetera – are all colours, but of course you knew that. I can’t help you with the numbers, but I guess you’ve figured that out, unless the NSA computers are finding it hard to crack encryption that they haven’t seen before.’ He let that hang in the air, but Toombs didn’t bite. ‘Then there was a man named Oret, who seems likely to have hired at least three of the killers, but he was murdered.’
‘We know about Oret.’
‘And you know who killed him and his wife?’
‘Go on.’
‘Try a man called Anatoly Stepurin. Russian. Cyprus-based. Profile looks right: semi-official hood, career killer, and deniable. Résumé includes Special Forces, activity in Ukraine and connections to GRU military intelligence. He’s now into illegal big-game hunting. Pay this arsehole £200,000 and you can shoot a lion. Pay him a fraction of that and he will kill a man for you. Most of this is on an investigative French website called Rochet. Looks like the reporters have good contacts with French and German intelligence.’
Toombs exhaled heavily.
‘Was that a thank you?’
‘Yeah, sure – thanks.’
‘Stepurin could be the supplier of the nerve agent.’
‘I realise that.’
‘Have you got to Nikolai Horobets, the Ukrainian national who killed Harland?’
Toombs didn’t reply.
‘So, you haven’t. Maybe I can do something about that. I have contacts there.’
‘That might be useful. Yes, let us know.’
‘What are you going to do for me?’
‘Aside from trying to keep you alive, although that’s going to be really hard, seeing as you are on a different train to the people who were sent to protect you. What more do you need?’
The morphine induced a kind of sweet, lackadaisical wooziness, but also made things clearer. ‘Who are Nyman and SIS trying to protect?’
Toombs was walking and Samson assumed he was moving so he could talk more freely. ‘You’ve been straight with us, so I’ll help you with this. We don’t think they want to protect anyone. We believe they’re aware of penetration at the very highest level and want to deal with that in their own time. That’s just our theory, which gives your former bosses the benefit of the doubt, and that kind of sticks in my craw. But we think the theory works.’ He paused. ‘And they don’t want you screwing up their plan to deal with the situation quietly. That’s why they won’t give one airborne fuck if you’re killed.’
‘Who are we talking about? You got a name?’
‘Cabinet-level minister, or government official, but I don’t have a name to share with you.’
‘Penetration means Russia, right?’
‘Yes.’
‘And the same thing in the States? Is that what Denis Hisami was going to reveal?’
‘You’ll have to talk to Reiner, that’s his beat. Look, I should go. We’ll be in touch. Stay safe.’
Samson fell asleep almost immediately and did not wake up until they pulled into Cologne station, where he had to change trains. He struggled up, feeling like death but noticing that the pain in his leg had disappeared, and walked the few metres to the Berlin train on the adjacent platform. It was early, but already crowds of passengers were waiting for the doors to open. Without knowing why, he moved to the trickle of people who had reached their destination and were making for the concourse. Something told him he had to leave the station as quickly as possible. As he walked, he noticed on the departure board that a train to Frankfurt Airport was due to depart at 6.55 a.m. This gave him an idea. He exited and found a cab. The driver unplugged his earphones and began to move off. Samson turned. A man dashed from the station, looked around and went to the line of waiting Mercedes cabs. He was big, wearing a suit and a short overcoat and was carrying no luggage.
The cab driver’s ID was visible. His name was Mohammed. ‘Where are you from?’ Samson asked in Arabic as they moved off.
The driver looked in the mirror. ‘Aleppo – you?’
‘Lebanon. A man got in the cab behind and he will attempt to follow us. I need to lose him.’ He leaned forward and placed two folded €20 notes on to the passenger seat. ‘Can you help me do that, Mohammed?’
‘Of course.’ He grinned in the mirror. ‘That driver is my cousin Saaf. We start work
