Dirty Little Secret

by Jon Stock

  He had no choice, he told himself again, as he stood up and walked around the foyer. There was a damp, musty smell that reminded him of Delhi in the monsoon. He had smelt it somewhere else, too – on the curtains of the hotel in Madurai where he had stayed with Lakshmi. He thought of her again, beside him as he had driven to the hospital in Caen. It’s blackmail, she had said of his deal with Dhar. We’ve both been blackmailed.

  He tried to focus on what lay ahead. The Americans would do all they could to stop him. As far as he could establish, they had already tried hard to prevent the Bradstone Challenger from reaching Bandar-Abbas, using sanctions drawn up to prevent Iran from obtaining military-use technology.

  When it had first arrived in Durban from Antwerp, the powerboat was on a merchant vessel called the Iran Mufateh, which was registered to the Islamic Republic of Iran Shipping Lines. Both were on a US watchlist. The Iran Mufateh subsequently changed its name to the Diplomat, and then to the Amplify, re-registering to a front shipping company called Starry Shine and flying under a Hong Kong flag. By the time the US Department of Commerce’s Office of Export Enforcement realised what had happened, it had already left for Bandar-Abbas.

  The US considered intercepting it at sea, but feared a diplomatic incident. Instead, it turned to Pakistan for help. The PNS Zulfiquar, a Pakistan Navy frigate, intercepted the Amplify and escorted it into Karachi, where the Bradstone Challenger was removed from the hold for inspection. Relations between Washington and Islamabad had since deteriorated, following a drone strike that had killed civilians inside the Pakistan border, and the boat was languishing in a dry dock.

  Marchant’s brief was to ensure Bradstone Challenger completed its journey. To that end he was playing the role of ‘Jez Giddings’, a wealthy Western playboy who wanted his toy back. He had been dressed in a sharp suit by Ali Mousavi and given a Rolex Yacht-Master (fake) and a British passport (also fake), along with an impressively thorough cover story, which he had memorised on the flight. If the Pakistanis could be persuaded that the end user was a private individual based in the Gulf, and not the Revolutionary Guard, they might release the boat. To help them in their decision, Marchant’s minder was carrying a briefcase packed with $100 bills.

  A buzzer disturbed the heavy afternoon atmosphere. Marchant glanced up at two small lightbulbs on the wall of the port office foyer. One was green, the other red. The green one was lit. From nowhere, a sleepy peon in a faded khaki uniform appeared and showed them both into the main office.

  ‘I’m sorry to have kept you waiting,’ a beaming official said, shaking their hands. He was short, but exuded power, or at least wealth. Marchant noticed the Cartier watch and a well-fed stomach bulging beneath his Ralph Lauren shirt. His office was less affluent. A calendar on the wall displayed a photo of a high-stacked container ship, and a large ceiling fan stirred the air. The walls were painted a municipal cream colour.

  ‘How are you finding our weather?’ the official asked, as he settled down behind his desk.

  Remembering the subcontinent’s preoccupation with the monsoon, Marchant had checked the reports in the Dawn newspaper on the flight from Dubai.

  ‘Eighty-five per cent humidity today,’ he offered.

  ‘Too much,’ the official said, holding one hand up and twisting his fingers as if he were changing a large lightbulb. His forehead glistened with a patina of sweat. ‘This evening will be better, when the south-west wind comes in off the sea. A little drizzle, but very pleasant. Tomorrow will be a total wash-up.’

  ‘Thank you for agreeing to meet us,’ Marchant said, keen to move things on.

  ‘Not a problem, not a problem.’ An awkward pause. ‘My difficulty is that the Americans have sent me this,’ he said, picking up a fax from his desk and brandishing it in the air. ‘A “stop order” preventing the export of your beloved Bradstone Challenger, isn’t it.’

  ‘On what grounds?’ Marchant asked. He had agreed with his minder beforehand that he would do all the talking.

  ‘Shall I read the damn thing to you? “The Bradstone Challenger is powered with two US-origin Caterpillar C18 engines and two Arneson surface drives, items subject to the regulations and classified under Export Control Classification Number 8A992.g.” We love bureaucracy in Pakistan – a legacy of your fine country – but even I find this ridiculous. Poppycock. Apparently your boat contains “greater than a 10 per cent de minimis of US-origin items”.’

  ‘Isn’t the real problem the end user? For some reason they think it’s Iran, and not me.’

  ‘My friend, all our lives would be much easier if you can provide evidence that you are a wealthy private individual, and not on the US Treasury’s list of Specially Designated Nationals.’

  It was the verbal cue that Marchant had been waiting for. Fearing it might have been missed, the official glanced at the case resting against the minder’s legs. Up until now, he had studiously avoided looking at it.

  ‘That shouldn’t be a problem,’ Marchant said.

  He nodded at the minder, who picked up the case, walked over to the official and placed it on his desk. The man opened and then closed it, putting it on the floor by his chair. It was all done in reverential silence.

  ‘I think we can lose this,’ he said, smiling, as he screwed up the fax and dropped it into the steel-mesh bin beside him. ‘These things get mislaid all the time. As our American friends enjoy reminding us, our country’s communications are positively Third World. I will need your passport, though. To make a copy. Forms will need to be filled.’

  Of course they would, Marchant thought. Duplicated and rubber-stamped, too. He stood up and handed over his fake passport. Then he shook the official’s hand, eager to wrap things up in case anyone changed their mind. The beaming official pressed a buzzer on his desk. For the first time, Marchant saw a smile on his minder’s face.

  ‘We will have the boat put back on board MV Amplify at once,’ the official said.

  Without speaking, he handed Marchant’s passport to the peon, who had entered the room in response to the buzzer.

  ‘I was hoping to deliver it myself,’ Marchant said, watching as the peon left the room again.

  ‘To Bandar? Why not? It’s less than seven hundred nautical miles. That would take no time in such a boat as this.’

  ‘There’s one other thing,’ Marchant said, glancing at the phone on the desk. ‘Can I make a quick call? My mobile, the battery –’

  ‘Of course, of course,’ the official said, resting a hand on his shoulder. ‘My office is yours.’

  ‘Thanks. Actually, it’s a private call – girlfriend trouble.’

  Marchant pulled his best three-in-a-bed smirk, then glanced at the minder, checking how he would react. He wouldn’t want to upset the deal, but he also had strict instructions to keep his charge incommunicado. There was a pause while the official turned to the minder and then back to Marchant.

  ‘Be my guest. Come, let us leave this playboy of the Western world to his women troubles. Your passport will be returned on the way out.’

  The minder hesitated, but the official was already ushering him out of the door like a guest who had outstayed his welcome. Marchant waited until the door had closed before he dialled Fielding’s direct line in London.

  112

  Fielding took the call moments after he had spoken to Armstrong. He had been surprised to see her from his office window, walking along the north side of the Thames.

  ‘I haven’t got long,’ Marchant said.

  ‘Are you on a secure line?’ Fielding asked. His comms console had identified the number as a business line in Karachi, Pakistan.

  ‘There’s no choice. I’ll have an address later today – for a second cell. They’re targeting civilians.’

  ‘And what do we give in return for this information?’ Fielding asked.

  There was a pause, and for a moment Fielding thought the line had dropped. ‘A boat. Quite a fast one. If I don’t deliver it, there’s no address.’

&
nbsp; It was worse than Fielding had feared. The Iranians had been on a shopping trip in recent months, trying to buy up high-performance powerboats from around the world for use in swarm attacks. Their most recent attempt had been thwarted by the Americans in Karachi, where Marchant was calling from.

  ‘Our cousins might not be pleased.’

  ‘It’s your call. If you want that address, you’re going to have to keep them off my back during transit. I’ll do all I can to disable the boat once I’ve got the information.’

  Fielding was about to ask for a stronger guarantee when the line went dead.

  113

  ‘At least we were right about there being a mole in MI6,’ Spiro said, watching the Director of the CIA pace around his airy office in Langley. Spiro was sitting on a bisque sofa in the window. It was a good sign. The last time he was in trouble, he had been shown to the hard-backed chair opposite the DCIA’s desk. Today was a sofa meeting. It was also ‘with coffee’, another good omen. The coffee had yet to arrive, but at least it had been ordered. No one was ever dismissed with coffee.

  ‘We just backed the wrong guy,’ the DCIA said. ‘Jesus, what is it with the Brits? The sooner we’re out of there, the better.’

  ‘I shouldn’t have supported Denton,’ Spiro said. He had already decided that contrition was his best option, even if it didn’t come naturally.

  ‘I’m more concerned about finding Salim Dhar.’

  ‘So am I.’ On his way up to the DCIA’s office, Spiro had walked past the new operations room dedicated to Dhar’s recapture – a sprawling web of maps, computer terminals and flow charts on the second floor.

  ‘You still have a big role to play here, Jim,’ the DCIA said. ‘I know Dhar was lost on your watch, but you found him once, and you more than anyone know how to find him again.’

  Spiro looked up, sensing he was about to discover why he hadn’t lost his job.

  ‘I’m giving you one last chance,’ the DCIA continued. ‘I can’t protect you any more if you screw up again.’

  ‘How can I help?’

  ‘I read your report about Daniel Marchant’s role in Dhar’s escape from Bagram, how you think Dhar’s been turned by the British. I’m beginning to believe it. We think Dhar’s in Iran, but we can’t be certain. We do know where Marchant is. He showed up on the grid in Karachi a couple of hours ago, flew in from Dubai.

  ‘If you’re right, Fielding’s behind all this, using Marchant to run Dhar. Not that it’s helped Britain so far. You know this guy better than most. Find out where he’s going, and if we need to cut him some slack, so be it. Dhar is the priority here, and Marchant may be the only one who can lead us to him.’

  Much to Spiro’s surprise, the DCIA walked him down to the operations room, where he was introduced to the hand-picked staff charged with finding Dhar. There was no need. Spiro knew them all, too well.

  ‘Jim will be heading up the hunt now,’ the DCIA told everyone. ‘I’m sure you’ll give him all the help he needs.’

  Spiro wasn’t so sure, but this was a welcome show of support, a public message to rival colleagues. He hadn’t been brought back to Langley to be dismissed, as he knew everyone had hoped – he was here to kick Salim Dhar’s butt.

  Just as Spiro was feeling better about life, the DCIA turned on his way to the door.

  ‘Jim, I nearly forgot to ask. How’s the wife? I heard she’d been away.’

  The entire operations room fell silent. How much did the DCIA know? Had he brought him down here to humiliate him in front of Langley’s finest? To tell them all that Linda Spiro had been throwing stones at Israelis in Ramallah?

  ‘She’s back, thanks,’ Spiro said.

  ‘Glad to hear it.’

  114

  The wheel of the Bradstone Challenger was made of black leather and steel, and was smaller than Marchant had expected, the size of a dinner plate. For some reason he had imagined a large wooden helm. His Iranian minder was behind him, lounging on a padded leather banquette at the stern. It was curved and looked like a Jacuzzi. Marchant had been at the wheel for ten minutes, following a brief lesson on the various navigation screens in front of him.

  ‘Are you in the navy?’ he called out above the roar of the Caterpillar engines. Earlier, the Iranian had manouevred the vessel out of the busy docks at Karachi with knowing ease.

  There was no answer. Marchant glanced around. The minder had fallen asleep, his head resting on a round cocktail table. The cabin was dark except for the navigation screens and a line of blue floor-lighting under a shallow step. The décor was gunmetal grey, broken up by coral-red cushions on a leather sofa that ran down one side of the cabin. The whole scene reminded Marchant of the back of a limousine, or a sleazy room at a nightclub. Jez Giddings, his cover, would have loved it.

  He checked the oil and fuel gauge dials. They were above a large compass on the instrument panel. In different circumstances he would have relaxed, enjoyed the sensation of carving through the Arabian Sea on a clear night at 35 knots, but now wasn’t the time. The Americans might be tracking them. He hadn’t told his minder why he had wanted to take the wheel. He wasn’t sure himself. But a part of him sensed that in the coming hours he might need to know how to operate a Bladerunner.

  He glanced at his fake Rolex Yacht-Master. It was past midnight. They had left Karachi at 8 p.m., after the port official had personally overseen the boat being lowered into the water. The plan was to hug the Pakistan coastline throughout the night, travelling at 35 knots. Any faster and they might attract unwanted attention. The port official had spoken with the Lieutenant Commander (Marine Wing) of Pakistan Coast Guards, who had agreed to turn a blind eye to their transit, but several American warships were on exercise up ahead in the Gulf of Oman.

  ‘I thought about joining the navy once,’ Marchant said, as much to himself as to his sleeping minder. He suddenly felt very alone on the dark water. The boat was cutting through the waves, but there was still an incessant thud on the bottom of the hull. ‘Always loved boats.’

  They expected to reach Iranian waters just after 3 a.m., when they would be met by a Revolutionary Guard patrol boat that would escort them into the port of Chabahar for refuelling. From there it was a seven-hour journey to Bandar-Abbas, travelling at 40 knots. By then he might even have had a conversation with his minder. There was nothing like sharing a boat to get to know someone. The Iranian had made no mention of the phone call from the office in Karachi. Marchant was convinced that he had smelt alcohol on his breath. The port official must have plied him with a quick whisky, something with which to toast his suitcase of dollars.

  ‘My father used to keep a yacht down at Dittisham,’ Marchant continued. ‘A Westerly 22. Took it across the Channel once, lost the rudder.’

  Did he keep on talking because a part of him sensed that his minder was not asleep? If that was the case, he should have sensed that the man had quietly risen to his feet and was standing behind him, a length of plastic tubing in his hand. Afterwards Marchant blamed the hypnotic motion of the boat for his carelessness. All he could do now was try to prevent himself from being strangled.

  ‘Who did you call from the port office?’ his minder shouted as Marchant gasped for air. Already he was feeling light-headed, his resistance fading. He attempted to get his fingers between his throat and the tubing, but it was too tight. The boat was beginning to veer to starboard, towards the shore. ‘Tell me who you called!’ the Iranian shouted again.

  Marchant tried to think, but he was losing consciousness. Should he stick with the girlfriend line? Hope to persuade him that he really did have women problems? The man would know he was lying.

  ‘OK,’ he managed to say, his legs kicking beneath him like a demented tap dancer. Only the truth was going to save him. ‘I’ll tell you.’

  ‘Who?’ The tubing tightened.

  ‘London.’ He felt the minder’s grip slacken a notch, enough to stop him from passing out. ‘I was calling my boss, the Chief of Britain’s Secret Inte
lligence Service. I’m still working for MI6.’

  Marchant knew he only had a split second to strike, the synaptic moment in which his assailant’s brain processed the significance of what he had just been told, calculating the implications for the mission, for his own career. In one movement, Marchant clasped his hands together into a single fist and swung them upwards as hard as he could, above his head, as if he was chopping wood. They connected with the soft tissue of his minder’s mouth, flattening his lips and splintering his front teeth.

  Marchant leapt out of his chair, pinning the Iranian’s arms by his side. He swung his head into a steel luggage rack by the cabin door, and then again, harder this time, grabbing his hair with one hand as he smacked his head into the rack. The body fell limp.

  Breathing hard, Marchant grabbed the wheel, turning the boat back out to sea, and reduced speed to 10 knots. Then he dragged the Iranian up onto the deck, where he removed his phone and wallet. He couldn’t say they had ever bonded, but he hesitated as he heaved the body up onto the gunwale. The man was still unconscious, and wouldn’t survive in the water. After glancing around at the dark, empty sea, Marchant slipped the body over the side. He knew too much. Then he rang Fielding on the Iranian’s phone, tossing it into the night after he had finished.

  115

  ‘All well at Langley?’ Fielding asked, looking through a sheaf of surveillance photos on his desk.

  ‘The sun’s shining,’ Spiro replied. ‘But I don’t suppose you’re calling about the weather.’

  ‘You never know with the British. Thanks for looking in on Paul Myers. He’s making a good recovery.’

  ‘Listen, Marcus, I’m kinda busy right now. Trying to find Salim Dhar. You know how it is.’

  ‘Congratulations on the job, by the way.’ Fielding had heard that Spiro, far from being sacked, was heading up a new unit tasked with finding Dhar. The Agency never ceased to amaze him. ‘I had the DCIA on the phone earlier,’ he continued.