“Perfectly,” supported Rebecca, with predictable timing.
“I’ll accept that,” agreed Charlie. On my terms, he mentally added.
“The prime minister has ordered it to be a joint operation,” reminded the other woman.
“It’ll have to be approved through our government masters,” said Monsford, matching the reminder. “It’s still early enough to fix a meeting with Bland and Palmer today. That okay with you, Aubrey?”
“A meeting with the government group is certainly necessary,” agreed the MI5 Director-General. “But to sanction a joint operation in the terms we’ve discussed this morning, not a separation of authority. Charlie will not be seconded.”
“Camese!” declared Monsford.
“What?” demanded Jane, voicing the bewilderment of them all.
“Camese,” repeated the M16 Director. “The mortal wife of Janus, the Greek god with two faces, able to look in opposite directions. I propose Camese be the code designation for Natalia’s extraction. It’s appropriate.”
“So’s getting to London,” dismissed the MI5 Director-General.
It was Aubrey Smith’s suggestion that he and Monsford share the car to London for the quickly arranged consultation with their government liaison, which protectively guaranteed the journey was in an MI5 vehicle with a security-cleared MI5 driver, who was as usual separated by the fully raised, soundproof glass screen. For the first thirty minutes they traveled through the Buckinghamshire countryside in self-reflective, self-protective silence, Smith determined upon a complete mental rehearsal, although predictably it was the impatient Monsford who eventually spoke.
“I imagine you’ll want equal participation in the support group?”
“Of course,” agreed Smith, content with the direction the other man had chosen.
“I suggested we accept Charlie’s argument about too many cooks spoiling the broth.”
“Absolutely.” This really was going far better than he could have hoped, thought Smith.
“I am thinking of no more than six, three of mine, three of yours. They could also handle finance, materiel, and traveclass="underline" everything that Charlie might call upon once he establishes contact with Natalia.”
“Only when he calls upon them,” balanced Smith, choosing his moment. “The timing has to be absolutely precise. The major argument against what we’re proposing is the public debacle if we get things wrong by as much, or as little, as a second. We won’t get approval unless we can satisfy them there is no risk of that.”
“A show trial, you mean?”
“I mean totally satisfying them that success is guaranteed, with no risk of Charlie-or the government-being publicly exposed.”
Monsford lapsed into further silence but when Smith didn’t continue, the MI6 Director said: “You were adamantly opposed to a very specific insurance.”
“As I was opposed earlier today to Charlie’s participation, an objection I’ve since dropped.”
There was another although shorter silence before Monsford said: “As you are now conceding the need for an ultimate insurance, if such a move becomes essential?”
“If such a need arose, we would have lost the advantages of bringing Natalia, with all she potentially knows, here to safety. At which stage it would be containment time.”
“I agree,” fenced Monsford, consciously switching the direction of the conversation onto the other man as he recognized them to be entering the north London suburbs with perhaps only fifteen minutes left in the exchange before reaching their destination.
Smith shifted on his seat, discomfited at being outmaneuvered. “We understand what we’re talking about but it’s not an eventuality we can openly introduce into this afternoon’s discussion: the very purpose for…” The man hesitated, searching for the appropriate ambiguity. “For the airlock through which we have to communicate is to provide legally unchallengeable deniability in Parliament in the event of a catastrophe.”
Now it was Monsford who changed position. “Surely we can sufficiently infer such a guarantee without risking any misunderstandings?”
“There are practicalities that we would need completely to clarify to avoid any misunderstandings between ourselves,” insisted Smith, determined to recover the impetus. “Do you have such an asset?”
Monsford stirred again, aware how perfectly everything was slotting into place. “I have a station chief, Harry Jacobson, completely briefed upon the operation: following Eyes Only instructions, he’s supervised all my preliminary preparations.”
“Could he perform the ultimate insurance proposal?”
“He would need to be totally distanced from everything else. And obviously he was going to be one of my three in the combined support team. If he’s assigned the insurance necessity, I’d need another officer to maintain our three-to-three balance, which creates an imbalance, my four to your three.”
“I don’t think we need be that pedantic,” offered Smith, who hadn’t imagined it was going to be so easy.
“You’d be happy with a four-to-three imbalance?” questioned Monsford, who hadn’t imagined it was going to be so easy.
“We’re not actually on opposing sides, are we?” Smith allowed himself. “Being on opposite sides of the Thames is simply a geographical separation.”
“Of course we’re not on opposing sides.” Monsford sniggered, knowing he was expected to appear amused, which he was, although not at what Smith had said. “It’s been easier for us to understand each other without those damn women on our coattails. Hasn’t it?”
“Very much easier,” agreed Smith.
It had taken close to an hour after the other four left for Charlie’s euphoric mist to lift and for him to confront that his initial reaction had been more fogged than misted by his single-minded fixation upon saving Natalia and Sasha. Now, after that near-transcendental hour in the no-longer-locked-or-guarded room in what would soon no longer be his latest safe house, came the hard-assed examination. Summoning yet again that close-to-photographic recall of every incident and conversation since the numbing moment of hearing Natalia’s metallic-voiced pleas, Charlie for the first time set out to create a mosaic from the pieces he could safely assume, reserving-although not positively dismissing-what he judged the more outlandish hypotheses inevitable from the sparse information available.
His starkest, most frightening awareness had to be the relentless dedication with which the FSB were hunting him, their utter determination such that they’d consciously sacrificed three undetected diplomat-concealed spies in the ridiculous burglary of his Vauxhall apartment. It had to mean …
Charlie’s mind abruptly blocked at the first of the insufficiently considered anomalies.
How had the FSB discovered the Vauxhall flat and its telephone number, neither of which was traceable to him either from its shielded lease or its utility records? Nor was such information available through any documentation in the lawyer-supervised Jersey bank account. The remotest and already partially considered possibility-if true, a further confirmation of the Russian revenge obsession-was the FSB establishing a connection from his television exposure during the Lvov affair and his long ago faked defection. But that still wouldn’t have led them to his Vauxhall flat or its telephone number. Yes it could, came the instant contradiction.
After his initial return from Moscow, Charlie had always called Natalia from an untraceably anonymous, bought-for-cash telephone card, disposable when its charge value was exhausted. But she’d very occasionally telephoned from her apartment, ignoring his repeated, sometimes even angry insistence that she always call from an unlisted public kiosk.
There was another jarring halt to Charlie’s speculation. But always to charge the call collect. Under the pressure to which she had undoubtedly been subjected, reciting the words at least monitored if not actually dictated to her, it would have been far more logical-expected, even-for her to telephone from her apartment: more logical, too, for the FSB eavesdropping enforcers. So why hadn’t she? Had Natalia tried to convey something beyond her obvious coercion, something she was desperate for him to recognize by using a public facility?