“That’s them,” Ziggy said. “Timoshev and Kuznetsov.”
“Send it to HQ,” Pope said. “And call Tanner for me, please.”
Ziggy swivelled in his chair, picked up a headset with an attached microphone and handed it to Pope. He put it on and waited as Ziggy placed the call and then directed it to Tanner.
The call was noisy, with the sound of a powerful engine making it difficult to hear what Tanner was saying. “Hello?”
“It’s Number Five,” Pope said. “We’ve had a development.”
“Report.”
“WATCHER has forwarded pictures to you.”
“Hold on,” Tanner said, then, “They’re downloading now.”
“I followed PAPERCLIP to Winchester, as reported. He took the train and then got a taxi from the station to an address in Kings Worthy.”
“He doesn’t know you’re there?”
“I don’t believe so.”
“You don’t believe so?”
“High level of confidence.”
Tanner exhaled impatiently. “These pictures. What am I looking at?”
“The male and female at the property two minutes ago. WATCHER is running the registration on the car.”
“It’s registered to a Mr. Thomas Ryan,” Ziggy interceded. “The Land Registry has him down as joint owner of the property. The other owner is an Amelia Ryan. Biometric match confirms—that’s them. It’s Timoshev and Kuznetsov.”
“Anything else?” Tanner asked.
“I’m running a full script on them now,” Ziggy reported. “I’ll have more when it’s done.”
“As fast as you can,” Tanner said. “What’s your recommendation, Five?”
“There’s a lot we don’t know. There are at least three adults in the house now: PAPERCLIP, Timoshev and Kuznetsov. Might be more—no way of knowing unless we get closer.”
“We’re going to need you to take them. That comes directly from Control.”
“I’ll need backup. Five or six agents would be ideal.”
“We don’t have five or six. Most of our strength is tied up outside the country. You can have two.”
“That might not be enough.”
“It’ll have to be. I’m two minutes away with Number One. Ten is on her way, too. Hold your position. We’ll be with you soon. Report if anything changes. Tanner out.”
30
It was twelve-thirty when Beck heard the sound of footsteps approaching on the gravel and, a moment later, a key turning in the lock. The door opened and Mikhail came inside.
He saw Beck and stopped. “Vincent,” he said. “Shit. What’s the matter?”
“Where’s Nataliya?”
Mikhail stepped aside and his wife came through the door, closing it behind her. She stepped into the light and Beck saw that there was an ugly contusion on her forehead. There was a cut from her left eyebrow to the scalp above her right eye and it was picked out with a trail of dried blood. The skin on either side ran from deep black to purple to blue.
“What happened?” Beck said.
“Geggel crashed his car,” she said.
“Are you all right? Your head—”
“I’m fine,” she said, allowing him to reach up and gently run his fingers down her cheek. “Mild concussion at worst. I had a couple of hours’ sleep in the car. I’ll be okay. I have a headache, that’s all.”
“Why are you here?” Mikhail asked.
“Come inside.”
Beck ushered them into the front room. He sat down on the sofa.
“Well?” Mikhail said.
“We’ve been compromised.”
He shook his head. “After today? No. That’s impossible. We were careful.”
“No. Not after today—it might not even be because of you. The Center has confirmed it—we’ve been blown. They signalled me this afternoon. There’s no question.”
Mikhail’s anger flared. “What the fuck?”
“Calm down,” Beck said. “Just relax. You’re certain you’re black now?”
“Of course we’re black,” Mikhail snapped. “You think we’d come home if we weren’t? We’re not amateurs. We’ve been driving for hours.”
Beck concentrated on maintaining his sangfroid. “I know you’re careful,” he said. “We just need to be sure.”
“We’re sure,” Nataliya said, more evenly than her husband. Her voice was quiet. She sounded tired. “We took our time. That’s why we’re late. No one is following.”
“What do you mean we’ve been compromised, Vincent?” Mikhail pressed, his temper up. “How did they fucking find out?”
“Please, Mikhail. We need to address this rationally. Please—sit down.”
Mikhail was cool most of the time, but he had a propensity to lose his temper when things had gone wrong. Nataliya, on the other hand, never wavered; she was collected at all times and, even now, Beck was not surprised as she reached over and laid her hand on her husband’s shoulder. He sat down on the other sofa and Nataliya sat down beside him.
“We have to think about what’s next,” Beck said. “Working out what happened can come later. The Center will get to the bottom of it.”
“They’d better,” Mikhail snapped, although some of the anger was gone from his voice. “I’m telling you that we did not mess up. It’s nothing to do with us.”
Beck nodded solemnly. “This is what I know. I got a flare this evening. The British have breached our security and we need to shut down. We’re about to be exposed and we need to shut everything down and get out of the country.”
“How could they possibly know that?”
Beck held out his hands. “I don’t know, Mikhail. It was just a flare—no detail. I’ve heard rumours that there might be a leak within the Center. There’s no evidence to suggest that a traitor has access to Directorate S, but it can’t be ruled out, especially now.”
Both husband and wife were pale-faced when he finished.
“So what do we do?” Nataliya asked him.
“We go.”
“Tonight?”
“Right away.”
They didn’t protest. Beck wasn’t surprised; there had been close shaves before, but this was of a different order entirely. The British would unravel every strand of their fake lives until there was nothing left to unpick. Their property business would be shuttered and then every deal that had been done would be forensically examined for links to Moscow. Their friends would be interrogated. They would visit the restaurants they enjoyed, the tennis club that Nataliya had been attending for five years, the running club that Mikhail ran with every Tuesday night. The Ryans knew that they were burned. They were good at hiding, at blending in, but no one could stay out of sight forever, and not when the spotlight was shining as brightly as this.
“We’ve had bad luck,” Nataliya said. “Losing Callaghan was a blow. This—it feels like they have someone inside.”
“Maybe. Callaghan was a pity, but we did well with him for as long as we could. He was never going to listen to us forever. He was too impatient. Took too many risks.”
“He was an operational nightmare,” Mikhail said.