A Divided Spy (Thomas Kell Spy Thriller, Book 3) (23 page)

‘How are you, Alexander?’

‘I am well. And how are you, Thomas?’

‘Fine. Glad you could make it.’

The smell of Minasian’s cologne was one of the few consistent characteristics about him: his appearance had otherwise changed to such an extent that Kell felt as if he was sitting next to a new person.

‘What is that?’ Minasian asked, looking down into Kell’s lap. Kell was holding the plastic bag from Goldsboro Books. He passed it across.

‘I bought you something.’

It was a blatant attempt to soften Minasian up, a gift that he hoped would help to establish a degree of rapport, even trust, between them. Kell knew that it was a risk, that Minasian would not necessarily respond to such a gesture; he might even think that Kell, by giving him a book of poetry, was playing on his sexuality.

‘This is extraordinarily kind of you,’ he said, taking the book out of the bag, unwrapping it and immediately turning to the copyright page. ‘A first edition.’

‘Bought it this afternoon.’ Kell had taken a slip road on to the A40, a triple-carriageway taking traffic west out of the city. ‘Have you seen the inscription?’

Minasian turned the page and erupted in laughter.

‘
England is not an irrelevance
,’ he said, quoting what Kell had written. ‘I like this very much. Very funny.’

Kell glanced across and smiled. ‘We should talk about when we’re next going to do this.’ He was following protocol. Always fix the next meeting with an agent as soon as you see them. You never know how long you’ll have.

‘Of course,’ Minasian knew the tradecraft. The Russian services applied exactly the same principles. ‘I will be free in Warsaw for two or three hours on the afternoon of July twenty-fourth. How easy will it be for you to travel?’

‘I can be there,’ Kell replied.

Kell knew that Warsaw was dangerous. More SVR on the ground, more FSB. Minasian could be walking him into a trap. But he felt that he had no choice. If he was going to run GAGARIN, this was the kind of risk that he would have to take; he was not always going to be able to call the shots. They made an arrangement to meet at a hotel in the centre of the old city. Minasian explained that Kell would be contacted in his room by a third party who would give him instructions on where and when they should meet. Kell didn’t like the sound of it and said so.

‘You seem to forget who’s running who, Alexander.’ He tried to keep an easy, friendly tone in his voice. ‘That’s not how this works. You don’t tell me where to meet. I tell you.’

He could feel Minasian bristling. The fragile ego. The ceaseless will to power. His mood could slip so quickly from affable good cheer into hostile silence.

‘Fine,’ he replied, staring out of the window at the passing traffic. ‘You make the arrangements.’

Kell let him run out on the line and slip the hook. It had been important to establish authority over him, but he did not want Minasian to feel humiliated.

‘Look,’ he said, maintaining an acquiescent tone. ‘It sounds fine. I know the Regina. Used to be the American embassy in Warsaw, right?’

‘That is correct.’

‘I’ll get a room under the name Stephen Uniacke. But no third parties, OK? Nobody else comes between us.’

‘Agreed,’ Minasian replied.

‘You have the BlackBerry I gave you?’

‘Of course.’

‘So let’s communicate on that. If you don’t hear from me, we show ourselves in the lobby of the hotel between 2 p.m. and 3 p.m. local time. Same signal that we used today. If you’re wearing a hat, I’m going home. We meet in my room ten minutes after eye contact.’

A tiny nod of agreement. ‘Fine.’

‘Tell me about STRIPE,’ Kell asked, trying to draw Minasian out of his sullen mood. ‘What have you found out?’

‘First I wish to say something.’ Kell took an exit off the A40. He brought the Peugeot to a halt at a set of traffic lights. Minasian was rubbing his face as he said: ‘I want to establish some laws.’

‘Laws?’

‘Rules.’

The lights turned green. Kell moved forward. ‘I’m all ears,’ he said.

Minasian made a small adjustment to his hair.

‘I have been doing a great deal of thinking.’ Another set of lights. Another column of traffic. ‘You were right about Andrei. He spoke to me. He told me that he knew about my relationship with Bernhard.’

Kell was not at all surprised that Eremenko had taken his son-in-law to task, but was astonished that Minasian was telling him about it.

‘He said to me in very straightforward words that I must give up that side of my life, my behaviour with men, that I must concentrate on Svetlana. I must make the marriage work. I am determined to do this.’

‘OK.’ Kell did not want to show his hand before he had heard everything that Minasian intended to say. He could not be sure if the Russian was being sincere or simply embarking on another elaborate manipulation.

‘We have shaken hands on this and made a deal,’ he said. ‘We will have a child, if the IVF can work, and I continue to have my career with the SVR. In three years’ time, Andrei has suggested that I leave the Service and take over the bulk of his business interests.’

‘And what does this have to do with you and me?’

‘It is very simple.’ Minasian put the Larkin back inside the wrapping paper and placed the bag at his feet. ‘I will not survive if we continue in our relationship. I will be caught and I will be prosecuted. In all probability I will lose my life. I am asking you for clemency.’

The traffic was moving steadily forward, the Peugeot boxed in. Kell was looking for a turning into a suburban cul-de-sac where he planned to park. What Minasian had said was exceptional, in his experience, and completely outrageous.

‘Clemency! We’re only just getting started.’

‘Not so.’

Minasian had plainly run through every possible permutation of the conversation and now reached into the hip pocket of his jeans, pulling out what looked like a Duracell battery that he waved in Kell’s eyeline. Kell made the turn into the quiet suburban street and pulled up in the shade of a chestnut tree. He switched off the engine.

‘What’s that?’ he asked, though he knew the answer to his own question.

‘A flash drive. Containing information. A lot of information.’ Minasian unscrewed the copper section of the battery and showed that it could be separated from the lower half, revealing a hidden USB connector. ‘The names of three inspectors on the Iranian nuclear deal whose lives are in danger. Two of them resident in London, one in New York City. And detailed information on STRIPE.’

Kell took the two sections of the flash drive and screwed them back together.

‘And the identity of your Syrian agent in London?’

Minasian was aghast. ‘I cannot give you that, Thomas. I would sooner destroy my own career than reveal the identity of a source. I hope that you would feel the same way about me.’

Kell had no choice but to say: ‘Of course, Alexander.’ He held up the battery. ‘Is he the guy telling you about STRIPE?’

Minasian looked away. ‘I cannot comment on that. It does not matter where the information came from. All I can tell you is that you must act on it quickly. Perhaps even in the next three days.’

Kell felt a numb sense of dread.

‘An attack is imminent? Where?’

‘I do not know.
We
do not know. I am trying to discover this. I do not want to see innocent people die.’ Minasian turned away so that Kell could not see the look on his face. ‘I have taken a very great risk bringing it to you,’ he added despondently. ‘Only a few people in my Service know about this threat.’

‘I see.’

Minasian began to list the principal information contained on the flash drive as a series of verbal bullet points. ‘The name on the individual’s passport. The number of this passport.’ With each detail, he struck the side of his right hand into the opposite palm. ‘The date of issue. The time and date of arrival of his flight from Cairo to Heathrow, eight weeks ago. It is all on there.’

‘I need more than that,’ Kell told him. ‘You said the threat could come at any moment. If we’re too late—’

Minasian interrupted him.

‘With this passport we believe he has opened a bank account at a branch of Santander in Brighton.’

‘Brighton?’

‘Rented a one-bedroom apartment. Taken a job working as a night porter at a supermarket. With CCTV from the airport, and his place of work, you can surely make an arrest within twenty-four hours.’

Kell experienced a counter surge of intense relief, like waking in the dead of night from a dream of sickness and death. He was going to stop a terrorist attack. He was going to be proved right. He tried not to give any indication of his gratitude, but clutched the flash drive tightly in his fingers as if it was a reward for every nerve and sinew he had strained in pursuit of his quarry.

‘That sounds hopeful,’ he said.

It was oppressively hot. Kell turned the key in the ignition a single click and lowered all four of the electric windows. Minasian reacted to the cooling breeze that swept into the car, tilting back his head and stretching his neck.

‘What I want in return,’ he said, ‘is to be left alone. I want our relationship to end.’

‘Then why did you agree to Warsaw?’

Minasian’s reply was instant; he had anticipated the question before Kell had even framed it. ‘Because I knew that you would want to organize a second meeting. I knew that it would be the first order of business between us. I considered Warsaw suitable because I did not know if you would agree to my offer.’

‘I do not agree to your offer,’ Kell replied, adopting the same firm tone of voice with which he had rejected Minasian’s idea of introducing a third party. ‘I will still want to meet you in Poland.’

Minasian looked beaten. ‘Then it will be the last time,’ he said. He touched the stubble on his face and Kell saw that he was extraordinarily tired. ‘I will not be your agent. I will not be your creature. For my own peace of mind, for my own security and personal pride, I cannot work for the British government.’

‘And yet you’ve just given me a flash drive which you say—’

‘Yes!’ Minasian’s face was a picture of frustration. ‘To save lives! To give you something that is of no cost to my country. You will stop this man. I have given you priceless information. If I were found to have done this, I would be charged with treason against the state. And what have you done for me in return? You have forced me into a position in which I am obliged to choose between my career and my marriage, my
survival
.’

It was a completely convincing display of emotional distress, so much so that Kell found himself sympathizing with Minasian’s dilemma.

‘You’re being very melodramatic, Alexander,’ he said. ‘I haven’t given you that choice at all. Things aren’t nearly as bad as you’re making out.’

Minasian did not reply.

‘Let me ask you something.’ Kell leaned an elbow out of the open window and turned in his seat. ‘Do you love Svetlana?’

‘Excuse me?’

‘Do you love your wife?’

‘Of course.’

‘And did you love Bernhard?’

A lowering of the head, a melancholy glance out of the window. ‘I thought that I did.’

‘Meaning?’

‘Meaning that he provided me with things that my wife was not able to provide. I do not wish to discuss it with you. It is personal. This has nothing to do with our work.’

‘But what
does
she provide you with?’ Kell needed to show Minasian why it would be impossible to continue in the life that he was choosing. ‘Money? Is that it? Is that why you married her? So you could afford to buy the right clothes, wear the right wristwatch, feel that you’ve climbed your way out of the gutter?’

The Russian flicked him a look of distilled anger. ‘I did not come from the gutter. How dare you say this? You know nothing about my childhood. You know nothing about my family.’

‘I know about your brother.’ Minasian’s face was bloodless with surprise. ‘I know that he was killed in a war that was prosecuted by a man you keep defending, a government whose lies and greed are destroying your country.’

Minasian shook his head. ‘So we are on this subject again. People are so keen to see duplicity in others, to see cruelty and violence in their supposed enemies. But they rarely see it in themselves.’

Kell ignored this and pressed on. ‘Why don’t you come and live here? Work for us for a while, start a new life? We’ll keep you safe, the British government will protect you. SIS can give you a new identity. You can leave Svetlana, make a new start in London.’ Kell did not believe for one moment that Minasian would consider the offer, or even take it seriously, but he wanted him to hear it, because it threw his hypocrisy and self-interest into relief. ‘We don’t make judgments about a person’s sexuality. We don’t condemn a man for working against a gangster regime. We think of men like you as heroes. You could be true to yourself. You could live an authentic life. You could help to destabilize the regime, to usher in a new era of openness and prosperity for Russia. Otherwise you’re going to live out the rest of your days as – what word did you use? – a
creature
of the Kremlin, a creature of Andrei Eremenko.’

Minasian was silent. He looked at the flash drive in Kell’s hand as though he regretted handing it over. Kell anticipated that he would try to turn the tables on him, and so it proved.

‘You think that you have lived an authentic life, Thomas Kell?’

Kell responded quickly.

‘I’m not lying to anybody,’ he said. ‘I’m not trapped in a sham marriage. I’m free to live the way I want to live, to say the things I want to say. I don’t have a father-in-law with a briefcase of money in one hand and a gun in the other. I don’t work for a Service that turns its back on its own people.’

This last statement was false and Minasian knew it.

‘Really?’ He seized his opportunity. ‘Your Service has always treated you with the respect and integrity that your work and your conduct deserved? That is not what I heard about you, Thomas. That is not what I heard about Witness X.’