Moresby pursed his lips. ‘You sure you didn’t drop in on our friends while you were there?’ He meant the CIA, FBI, NSA and all the other acronyms peppering the US Intelligence community.
‘As I said, I was on leave.’
Moresby sniffed and turned his head to study a photo on the wall. It was a bleak study of the iconic Kaiser-Wilhelm Memorial church in central Berlin, in profile against the evening sky. Vale had been given it many years before by an opposite number in the German Bundesnachrichtendienst — the Federal Intelligence Service — after they had worked together on a lengthy and complex insertion operation against the Russians. It had been a wry acknowledgement of shared history and of future co-operation. By return, Vale had sent him a framed copy of Mason’s iconic wartime photo of St Paul’s Cathedral. They had been friends ever since.
‘Scene of one of your triumphs, was it? You and all those other Cold War warriors?’ He gave a twisted smirk. ‘It’s over, don’t you know that? Your time has passed. Why don’t you retire and leave the rest of us to get on with business.’
Vale sat back, surprised by the venom in Moresby’s words. They had never got on well, being of different generations and outlooks — even education. But this was a whole new level of hostility, signalling that the gloves were off. He guessed his continued presence must be getting under the new man’s skin.
‘I will, soon enough,’ he said quietly. ‘Is there a point to this visit or are you merely bored?’
Moresby’s eyes flashed and his jaw went tight. ‘You don’t like the way I’m doing things, Vale — and that I can understand. After all, it’s a whole new game, isn’t it? Things are moving at a faster pace than you and your generation ever witnessed. But that’s the world we live in now. I know you went into bat against my proposals; I know you went upstairs and tried to stop me; I know you had a cozy little chat with Scheider the other day. What was that about — sticking a spanner in the works? No, don’t tell me — I’m not interested.’ He breathed heavily, then added, ‘I don’t care what you think of me or my plans. And who I send out into the field is no longer your concern. So back off.’ He walked to the door, then turned back. ‘You’ve had your time in the limelight, old man. It’s time to step back.’
‘You’ve made that quite clear,’ Vale murmured. They had been down this road before, only in a more formal and outwardly civilized manner, documented and recorded for posterity, an example of the bureaucratic jousting which Moresby and his kind seemed to enjoy. He saw no reason to prolong it just because teeth were now bared. ‘Close the door after you.’
Moresby gave a mirthless chuckle. ‘Think you’re so hard-nosed, don’t you?’ His face went tight. ‘You get in my way, old man, and you’ll find out what hard-nosed really is. I promise.’ He walked out, pulling the door closed behind him.
Vale waited until he was certain that Moresby wasn’t coming back, then picked up his phone and made a call to the US Embassy. He asked to speak to James Scheider.
Twenty-Three
Inside the citadel that was the US Embassy in London’s Grosvenor Square, James Scheider listened carefully to the call from Tom Vale, then said goodbye and cut the connection. The deputy station chief for the CIA looked across his desk at his new assistant, Dale Wishaw, who had just entered.
‘Tom Vale, MI6,’ he explained. ‘The British are running an operation in Somalia, near Kamboni. We were given an eyes-on out of courtesy because of two UN people caught up in the hostage situation out there. The Brits have been made an offer to negotiate for their release, and they’ve sent out two reps to see if they can work out a deal.’
‘UN? That’s not good.’
‘No. But with no US citizens involved, we get to stand back and watch. The UN people probably work out of the New York headquarters, but can’t be seen to interfere unless they make a formal request for us to do so. And frankly, I don’t trust anybody in State or the UN to stay quiet on this issue long enough to resolve it. If it got out that talks were being held with pirates, I think the media coverage would sink it dead.’
‘But we’re talking to the Taliban. What’s the difference?’
‘The Taliban as a whole have shown willing. This bunch of pirates isn’t the same. They could easily get frightened off if the media shows up.’
Wishaw eyed him carefully. ‘But you’ve promised to help?’
‘I did, God help me. Limited to over-flight capabilities and supplying whatever intel we can get, using drones for real-time footage of anything that moves.’
‘NSA?’ Wishaw himself had transferred across from the National Security Agency, the equivalent but far bigger cousin to Britain’s GCHQ. With vaster resources and capabilities and, some cynics were fond of saying, fewer official scruples about privacy rules when it came to intelligence gathering, it spent its life and budget trawling the incessant and growing amount of phone traffic, message boards, chat rooms, forums, blogs and websites used by terrorist and other extreme organizations.
‘I promised I’d copy Tom separately on all material.’
‘How come? Doesn’t he already get it?’
Scheider chose his words with care. If any of this ever got out, he would be shipped back home to a senate committee hearing accused of engaging in back-door operations counter to official policy. It was a surefire career killer and one he wished to avoid.
‘You would think so, right? I get the feeling Vale’s no longer part of the inner circle. This is Moresby’s operation and he’s new school. Vale is old school and not far off retirement.’
‘Problem?’
‘Yeah. He has bad feelings about this whole negotiation thing. To be honest, I don’t blame him. It smells bad. Why should the Somalis offer to negotiate for any group after months of silence? They don’t know that two of their hostages are UN, so why make an exception right now?’
‘What does the chatter say?’ Wishaw was referring to the buzz and rumour that inevitably peppered the airwaves when something big was in the wind.
‘That’s the problem: there is none.’
Wishaw blinked. ‘What, at all?’
‘Not a peep. Whoever’s controlling it — this guy Musa, whoever he is — he knows how to keep things under wraps.’
‘If Vale doesn’t like the plan, why doesn’t he say so?’
‘He tried. Nobody’s listening.’ Scheider shifted in his seat. ‘I owe him for past favours so I said I’d do what I could.’
‘So why look so worried?’
Scheider squinted at him. ‘You’ve never heard of this Kamboni before?’
The younger man looked uncomfortable. ‘Actually, I have, but I can’t recall where.’
‘It’s been on the watch list of terrorist training areas for several years, since the Nairobi embassy bombing in ’98 and Mombasa four years later. Nothing was proved, but local intel has it as a jumping-off point for border crossings into Kenya and beyond.’
‘I’ll read up on it,’ Wishaw promised.
‘You do that.’
‘But if it’s that hot, why have the Brits agreed to send people in there?’
‘Because some hotshot thought it was a good idea.’
‘Not Vale, I take it.’
‘No. But that’s where we come in. He’s got a plan running on the side, without Moresby or anyone else knowing. He’s sending in a shadow to watch their backs.’
‘A shad— you’re kidding. Is he serious?’
‘Absolutely. It’ll be off the books and completely deniable, but he’s going for it.’
‘How does it affect us?’
‘I agreed to run any intel or personnel checks he wanted to make. He came across a name he wanted to use, so I ran it through the database to see what we knew. It came up warm.’