by Mark Dawson
He wondered what the council was discussing now that he was gone. Primakov thought that he had done enough, but there was no way to be sure. The president sometimes appeared omniscient, and, despite his compliments, Primakov could not help but harbour doubts.
He thought of Natasha. He had taken a grievous risk for her. He had risked his career. His life. He had done it because he loved her, because he was old and she made him feel young. And now he wanted to see her and tell her that her problems were at an end, and to enjoy the gratitude that he knew she would feel.
Southwold
18
They arrived over Southwold. Milton saw the black expanse of the sea, the twinkling lights of big oil tankers laid up a mile offshore, and then the brighter lights of the town itself that glowed up at them through the deepening dusk. The lighthouse stood over the town, casting a golden finger of light that flicked out over the frothing waves. The pilot told them to hold tight as he brought them down on The Paddock, a grassy area that formed the inner part of Southwold Common on the town’s southern boundary. The wheels bumped once and then settled.
Tanner opened the cabin door, slid it back and hopped down onto the grass. Shah followed, then Ross, then Milton. The downdraft was strong, disturbing rubbish from a nearby bin and forcing them to duck their heads as they scurried away. Milton stayed close to Ross as they followed Shah to the man who was waiting for them just outside the stone wall that marked the boundary of the United Reformed Church. The two men shook hands and exchanged words before Shah turned back to them.
“They’ve set up base in there,” he said, pointing to the church. “The police are briefing everyone in five minutes.”
They followed Shah through a gate and into the church grounds.
The church had been taken over as a central control point for the police and intelligence operation. It was close to the house where Aleksandrov had been found. The church hall was busy. There was a collection of men and women, some of them in suits, others in clothes that suggested that they might have been called to the town at short notice. Milton guessed that the crowd would include detectives and intelligence operatives. Milton, Shah and Ross stood together. There was a tangible buzz in the room, the crackle and pop of electricity, the expectation that something extraordinary was going on.
There was a folding table at the front of the room with two chairs behind it. A second table bore a large television screen. A man and a woman emerged from a room at the back of the hall and made their way through the crowd to the front. The man sat down but the woman remained on her feet.
“Thank you all for coming,” she said. “My name is Francesca Kennedy. I’m the Deputy Assistant Commissioner and the senior national co-ordinator for counter-terrorism policing in the Metropolitan Police. Suffolk Constabulary has now handed over this incident to us. The Assistant Commissioner is here”—she indicated the man sitting next to her, who responded with a nod of his head—“but I’m going to brief you. As you all already know, the victim was a former Russian spy who had been working for SIS for many years before he was exposed and prosecuted. He’s been living here in Southwold under a new identity since his request for asylum was granted. Given that background, his murder raised numerous red flags.”
She took out her notebook and flipped through the pages, setting out the timeline. A few additional facts had been added, but it was largely the same situation as the one that Shah had briefed them on in the helicopter.
“Aleksandrov was found at home, as you know. Single gunshot to the head. We’ve been piecing together his activities this afternoon. He was seen in the Old Nelson public house just after lunch. The publican knew him and said that it wasn’t unusual for him to go there for a drink around that time. He normally drank alone, but the publican said that he was with another man today. He didn’t get a look at the man and hasn’t been able to provide a description or any additional details.”
Shah raised his hand, and Kennedy nodded to him. “Raj Shah, SIS,” he said. “We have no idea at all who the other man was?”
“No. Not yet. But he’s obviously of significant interest. Finding him is the main priority. You got any ideas?”
“Not yet,” Shah said. “If we think of anything, we’ll share it at once.”
Milton noticed Ross lean closer to Shah so that she could whisper something into his ear.
“CCTV?” one of the detectives asked.
“Nothing in the pub—the publican says he can’t afford it. There’s not a great deal of coverage in the town, either, but local uniform is securing everything they can. We’re going through it now—if there’s anything useful, they’ll find it. We don’t know that much at the moment, but we’re working as fast as we can to build it up. I’m grateful for the extra help.”
Milton doubted that the help would make any difference. They might be able to put together Aleksandrov’s last few hours, and they might—eventually—be able to put a name to the men or women who had killed him. It wouldn’t matter. Milton knew that if this was a professional job, then the assassins would already be miles away from here. They would be heading for the nearest airport and a flight out of the country. He doubted that they would have the information they needed in time to stop them from leaving. They might already have gone.
Kennedy went on. “Aleksandrov lived on Wymering Road—that’s five minutes northwest of here. We’ve secured the property and moved the neighbours out. We’d rather limit access to the property until the SOCOs are finished gathering evidence and are out of the way. I’m told we’re looking at another hour for that. After that, I don’t have a problem with small teams going in to look for themselves, but for obvious reasons I’d like it to be under police supervision.”
Kennedy brought the meeting to a close. Tanner, Milton, Shah and Ross moved to the side of the room.
“This is all going to be too little, too late,” Tanner said quietly.
“I agree,” Milton said.
“Where do you think they are now?”
“If they’re not on a plane already, it won’t be long. We’re already five hours behind them.”
“A little optimism?” Ross said. “You’re not giving up already?”
“It’s realism,” Milton said. “This sounds like a professional job, probably a state-sponsored one. Men and women like that don’t wait around to be caught. They do their job and then they leave. And they have a big head start.”
“I’m going to update HQ,” Tanner said, taking his phone out of his pocket and turning away.
Milton waited in the church hall and then followed the departing officers out into the alley. The night was cooling fast, and he zipped up his jacket. The high street at the end of the alley was quiet. Milton wondered how long it would stay like this. How long would it take for the news to leak? A Russian spy had been assassinated on the streets of a sleepy English coastal town. It would be a big story. A scandal. They probably had the town to themselves for the night, and maybe for some of tomorrow if they were lucky. After that, it would be pandemonium. They needed to get a lead before then or they never would.
London
19
Vincent Beck was listening to Brahms when his landline rang on the table next to his record player. He picked it up and saw, with a quickening of his pulse, that the caller ID was a number that he recognised.
“Is this Vincent Beck?”
“Yes,” Beck said. “Who is this?”
“We believe that you were sold an insurance policy with a mortgage you took out ten years ago. It’s sometimes known as PPI. Does that sound like it might be right?”
Beck’s throat was arid. “How many years ago did you say?”
“Ten,” the man said.
“No,” Beck replied. “Not me. I’m afraid your records are mistaken. Goodbye.”
Beck ended the call and stared at the phone. It took him a moment to gather his thoughts. He had known that a moment like this would come—it always did, eventually—but he had be
en here so long without issue that it was difficult to accept it. But the moment had come and, now that it was here, he had to make sure that he reacted appropriately. He went to his bedroom, took the small suitcase from underneath the bed and packed a change of clothes. He took his keys from his pocket, lowered himself to the floor and slid beneath the bed far enough so that he could reach the loose floorboard. He used a key to prise up the end and removed the board so that he could reach into the void beneath. He took out his go-bag, scrambled out from underneath the bed and opened it up. The bag contained a burner phone, a passport and driver’s licence in a false name, £5000 and a small Glock 26 handgun, together with two spare magazines. The Glock was designed for concealed carry, with a small frame and abbreviated barrel that meant that it was easy to hide anywhere on the body. It was chambered in 9mm, with ten rounds in the magazine and one in the spout. Beck zipped up the bag and put it into the suitcase. He confirmed that the burst encoder was hidden in the suitcase and closed it up.
He took the suitcase to the hall and then quickly passed through the rooms to make sure that he hadn’t left anything that might later prove to be incriminating. Satisfied, he went back to the suitcase, extended the handle and wheeled it out of the flat’s front door. One of his neighbours was just stepping out of the lift. She was an old woman who spent her days in a pub down by the river. Beck bid her good evening and she did the same, her words a little slurred as usual. Beck put his arm between the doors to stop them from closing and pulled the suitcase into the lift. He hit the button for the ground floor and waited for the doors to close.
He took a moment to compose himself. It had taken him five minutes to clear the flat. That was good. Fast enough. There was no time to spare, and no way of knowing how serious the threat against him was. If anyone had been listening to the call that he had received, they would have concluded that it was from a call centre. It would have sounded authentic, and that was the intention. However, the precise wording had been agreed to in advance and the answer to his question—“ten”—served as the trigger signal. Each number, from one to ten, bore a separate meaning. “Ten” meant that Beck and his agents had been, or were at imminent risk of being, blown.
The lift reached the ground floor and the doors opened. Beck stepped outside. There was a group of young boys smoking weed on the scrubby patch of grass outside the building, but nothing else that made him nervous. Beck was always careful, but tonight required even more caution than usual.
It was nine in the evening when he set off and wheeled his case down to the river, following the route that he took every day. He followed the gentle curve for a mile, maintaining the same leisurely pace as yesterday, the day before that, and all the days before that. Beck was an old man, in his seventies, and, to any normal observer it would look as if he was just off to catch a bus or a train. The main purpose of the walk was to help him to identify surveilling parties and, if necessary, lose them. It was an SDR—a surveillance detection route—and Beck had learned it from a retired KGB colonel who had taught a class at the Dzershinsky Higher School in Michurinsky Prospekt. Beck had been in his twenties when he had attended the KGB school, but the lessons were just as relevant today as they had been then. The fundamental art of espionage was unchanged, despite the advances in technology that had added so many opportunities and perils to the work. In this case, Beck needed to be sure that he was black before he met with his agents. The utmost caution was required.
He usually stayed on this side of the river until he reached the Hurlingham Club, but today he carried his case up the steps from the footpath and crossed the water into Putney. He headed south and then continued along Putney High Street until he reached the overland train station. It was a couple of miles from his apartment, and he used all the tricks designed to flush out surveillance: he paused to tie a lace, crossed over the road to look in the window of the Franco Manca restaurant, turned onto Disraeli Road and then quickly turned back on himself. He waited on the platform for a train, scanning the other men and women to see whether any of them were repeats. He had never spotted anything that made him suspect he was under surveillance, but that did not mean that today might not be different. He looked for clothes that he might have seen before, and, when nothing registered, he checked shoes. Clothes were easy to change, but, in his long experience, Western agents never remembered to change their shoes. It was sloppy tradecraft and an easy giveaway but he saw nothing tonight that gave him cause for concern. There were no signs of pursuit: no suggestion of agents leapfrogging each other, no obvious handovers, no one following him along his erratic route.
The train rolled into the station. He climbed aboard and took a seat at the end of the carriage where he would be able to watch anyone else who got on with him.
Beck was too wily to relax. He had years of experience playing this particular game and had deployed the same tactics in any number of denied areas around the world: he had operated in San Francisco, Madrid, Paris, Berlin—on both sides of the Wall—and Washington. His posting to London had been the longest of his career, and it would be his last. His real name was Vladimir Rabtsevich but he had used this particular legend for so long that now he thought of himself as Beck. He was a retired language teacher at the Znaniye School in Chelsea. He had worked there for ten years to provide the ballast for the legend. A wife had been invented for him; they had used the usual trick, finding a candidate by working their way around Highgate Cemetery until a deceased child of suitable age had been located and then building a persona with the benefit of their birth certificate. Mrs Beck was said to have died, but the fact that she had been British allowed him to stay in the country without a visa. He lived alone with a cat called Lenin, ate microwave meals for one, and occasionally visited the Curzon for the foreign arthouse films that they showed there. He didn’t own a mobile phone because, as he said whenever anyone asked him, he didn’t like their intrusiveness. The real reason, of course, was because he had no wish for the spooks at GCHQ to be able to track him between the phone masts that prickled across London’s streets. He used burner phones and telephone boxes to arrange his business, different ones each time.
Beck got off at Clapham Junction and changed onto the train to Winchester. He looked around at the quiet Sunday night carriage. He was comfortable, still confident that he was black. He looked at his watch. He had an hour until he arrived.
20
“All units, this is Blackjack. PAPERCLIP is on the move. Minimal comms unless operationally necessary. Out.”
The earbud was loose, and Michael Pope pushed it in until it was snug. He was sitting in the back of one of the Group Three backup cars; a surveillance expert occupied the driver’s seat. They were parked on Fulham Palace Road, waiting for PAPERCLIP’s route to be relayed.
PAPERCLIP was the cryptonym of Vincent Beck, an ex-pat Russian who had been living in the United Kingdom for ten years. He was ostensibly a retired teacher of foreign languages, but, as a result of intelligence received from BLUEBIRD, the Secret Intelligence Service had confirmed that he was a senior agent runner working for Directorate S. BLUEBIRD was MI6’s pride and joy, an active source buried within the SVR, and the tip about Beck had been just the latest in a long line of valuable intelligence scoops.
Beck had been subjected to round-the-clock surveillance ever since he had been uncovered. His landline had been tapped, his apartment bugged, and he had been followed every time he stepped out of the front door of his house. So far, though, he had revealed nothing except a predilection for long riverside walks, arthouse cinema and the borscht served at Zima Russian Street Food and Bar on Frith Street in Soho.
“This is Alpha. He’s going down to the river.”
This operation was sensitive and complex enough to warrant the involvement of several of the Groups that comprised the Firm. Group Three was responsible for human surveillance, the teams of agents who coalesced around a target so that it was practically impossible for that person to go anywhere without being obse
rved. In the way that the agents of Group Five—responsible for ensuring the smooth transmission of intelligence among the Groups—were informally referred to as ‘postmen’ and the cryptanalysts of Group Six were ‘hackers,’ the agents of Group Three were dubbed ‘bloodhounds.’ They had earned the sobriquet through the diligence and discretion of their surveillance and tracking and the reputation, hard won, that, once a target was put under their surveillance, it was impossible for them to be shaken off.
The agents of Group Fifteen were referred to as ‘cleaners’ or ‘headhunters.’ Pope, as Number Five, was one of its most senior operatives. Pope was emplaced in the event that a decision was taken to interdict PAPERCLIP, or anyone else that he might meet. Control was rotating his agents to keep them fresh; this was the second day that Pope had been on the team, and tomorrow he would be rotated off in favour of Number Six.
“This is Alpha, handing off.”
“This is Bravo. Picking up. PAPERCLIP is heading toward the bridge.”
The team was extensive. There were ten agents assigned, with none of them staying with him for longer than necessary. Beck was good, and they were assuming that he had been operational for the entirety of the ten years that he had been in the country. He had never been caught, and that suggested a certain expertise. The sophistication of the surveillance had been ratcheted up in accordance with that.
