Debrief

[Leander]

This will be the third, and final, story from the Manningtree series.
It compliments Kompromat and The Britons.

[Leander]

One – Cyprus Exchange

A pair of aircraft landed twenty minutes apart at RAF Akrotiri on Cyprus early on the Sunday morning during the last weekend before Christmas. Akrotiri was beside the Mediterranean, a British military airbase that remained entirely under UK control despite being on the independent – and divided – island that was Cyprus.

The first jet to touch down was one that had flown down from Moscow. It was a Tu-214, a special mission aircraft operated by the Russian Government’s Rossiya air service. Crew and passengers waited aboard after landing permission had been given due to the late arrival of the second inbound jet that was also coming from far away. That was another military transport aircraft, this one an RAF Voyager which had flown from the English countryside. It was an aircraft that could be configured for various mission-specific roles from airborne tanker to air-freighter to VIP transport. Bad weather over France had caused a late arrival yet it touched down soon enough.

Jet-ways met the front passenger door of each aircraft, ones which were parked not that far apart at all. Doors opened and with that, so began the Cyprus Exchange.


Sophie Flynn was first off the Voyager. A senior spook with NISS, she’d spent many long years with one of its predecessor organisations: MI-6. Dealing with Russians was part of the job though being involved in something like this was new to her. However, there was a task for her and she set about doing that. A younger spook, Mike, had followed her down and she waited until he was standing next to her in the bright Mediterranean sunshine before she crossed over to where the Russians were.

Nothing here was to be said to anyone on the other side without a direct witness.

“It’s Ilya, isn’t it?”

Sophie extended her hand to the tall Russian in the sunglasses when she reached him. Her hope was that he would be surprised at her knowing his name and give a reaction he’d regret. Alas, that wasn’t to be.

“That’s me.” His English was good. His attitude was as cool as a cucumber.

“It’s a nice day,” Sophie kept on smiling as he shook her hand, “and I like your shades. I wish I’d thought to bring mine.” She stepped closer to him. “Lovely sunshine yet it’s a bit nippy, don’t you think?

How was your flight? Ours was terrible. There’s a storm blowing over France, probably in Germany by now to be fair, that wasn’t fun to fly through at all!

Clear skies all the way across Turkey for you guys, so I’ve been told.”

Ilya grimaced before shaking his head.

“We have business to do and no time for chit-chat.” He half turned back towards the aircraft he’d come off. “I’m going to bring them off now; you do the same with those you have flown here too.”

He’d turned back towards her as he said that. Sophie noticed how relaxed he kept himself, how at ease he was with all of this. There was no smile and the sunglasses refused to allow her to read his eyes.

What she wanted to know was what he really thought about all of this.

“I’ll get them moving.” She said that as she turned away herself and headed to the bottom of the jet-way.

Mike was still with her, sticking close as ordered.

“He didn’t want to be friends.”

Sophie shrugged her shoulders. “Maybe next time.”

At her direction, the passengers started to came off the Voyager.


That aircraft, a converted Airbus-330, could carry a lot of people. Yet, a light load had been placed aboard before the flight to Cyprus left with less than two dozen passengers taken. Under half of them would be leaving the aircraft here while the others, Sophie and Mike included, would be flying home with some new passengers.

Leading the way was one of the security team. Behind him came the Russian spies, those who’d for quite a few years had been pretending to be Britons while living in the UK committing espionage, and two little kids too. One of the latter was carried by the former: his mother, Sophie knew. They all came down without any fuss, trailed by another security officer.

“That’s your connecting flight over there.” She pointed towards the Tu-214 unnecessacarily before calling out towards the other Russian. “Ilya!” He raised his head, looking across at her.

“We’re not worrying about passports & visas, are we?” Her question was one of jest.

Ilya gave a dismissive wave with one hand as a reply.

Two doctors, a nurse & an orderly, all further NISS employees, came out behind the first group though they weren’t getting on that Russian aircraft just as Sophie’s security team had no intention of doing so either.

“You know what to do.” Her comment this time was to them. The nurse smiled in reply though her colleagues’ attention was on the those coming out of the Rossiya jet into the sunshine.

No security people led the way out of the Tu-214. Instead, a Russian doctor and two of his own orderlies were first down the steps. Carefully, ever so carefully as how Sophie saw it, the attendants for that doctor carried a Briton down.

She knew him by sight. Ian Goodwin was his name, a former colleague of hers who’d spent the past two years in Russian custody after being caught spying against that nation despite all denials to the contrary.

Sophie also knew how ill he was reported to be and could see that. How pale he was, how frail too. While the Russian spies stood waiting, he was handed over to Sophie’s people. There were medical documents that were also exchanged while the lead doctors, cancer specialists from both countries, also briefly spoke while Mike listened.

He gave Sophie the thumbs up to acknowledge all was as it should be.

Two women came off the Tu-214 afterwards, neither in the best of shapes in how they looked. Each was escorted out. One needed physical help while the other was near dragged down the stairs.

Sophie’s attention was on the younger woman first. She was a Russian national, a spy of theirs who’d last year defected to the UK and then been later recaptured. The story was one which Sophie knew well. Svetlana Danilova had glassy eyes, a staggered walk and looked certain to throw up. When she spoke, telling Mike that she’d been on a Voyager the year before leaving from another military airbase, the clarity there was in stark comparison to her physical appearance.

At Sophie’s nod, one of her security people took charge of Svetlana and, gently, led her towards that aircraft.

The second woman was shouting. A Russian had her by the arm, leading her down and saying nothing in reply to her tirade. She swore at him and then at Ilya when they were on the ground. Sophie swallowed a smile at the unpleasant name he was called, one repeated to Sophie’s security officer who took charge of her. Another pair of passengers from the Voyager were now behind Sophie now, both of whom were likewise only here for a quick visit.

The first wore no uniform though the second did. They were officers from London’s Met. Police. The plain-clothes copper placed Alicia Manningtree under arrest, declaring that she was on sovereign British soil as he did so. There was another explosion of anger in reply, one with more name calling, that was directed against the uniformed policewoman who handcuffed Britain’s former prime minister. She declared that her extradition was illegal and wouldn’t hold up in a UK court. Manningtree shouted that she was innocent too, making sure that she had the attention of everyone listening.

Her eyes meet Sophie’s momentarily. There was no recondition there. She appeared not to know who Sophie was.

How strange that was…

Manningtree should have recalled her. They’d met at least ten times when Sophie briefed the then PM and others at Downing Street over intelligence matters. This morning though, Sophie seemed to have been forgotten.

That wouldn’t last long at all, not when they were flying home together and Sophie had her people all up in Manningtree’s business.


All the Russians went back on their aircraft.

“Goodbye, Ilya.” Sophie’s last attempt at conversation with her opposite number brought forth only the briefest, faintest smirks in return.

Onto the Voyager had gone the Britons. Goodwin and the medical people first; Manningtree and the two coppers who had her in their custody after them. Svetlana, the lone Russian leaving home rather than going back there, had also been led aboard. Sophie trailed her, watching her wavy, unnerving walk and wondering what she’d been drugged with.

Mike was the last of them inside the aircraft. “You know I’ve been to Cyprus before, don’t you, Sophie? I did the whole Ayia Napa thing as a twenty year-old. Now I’ve been back here and swapped prisoners with the Russian S.V.R.”

Sophie had no idea how to reply to that.

She poked him with a finger in the back instead.

“I’m coming, I’m coming now.” His reply was rueful as the sunshine left his face.

She did a head count inside the passenger cabin. Certain beyond doubt that, no one had been left behind, Sophie still did that check regardless.

That was just how Sophie was.

Finding the senior RAF flight officer, Sophie told him what he was waiting to hear.

“We’re all ready to go home.”


The Tu-214 flew away first, climbing out over the Med. and turning for Turkish airspace and then Russia over the horizon too.

Right behind it went the Voyager. Manningtree caused a vocal disturbance aboard but that wasn’t unexpected by those flying with her. More of that was anticipated back home.

When the UK was reached, and after all had been de-planned once more, there would be a longer debrief for Goodwin, Svetlana and Manningtree too. Sophie would be supervising all of that, finishing the task set for her to make the Cyprus Exchange. All had gone as it was meant to but there was still so much more to all of this than just the swap made. First there would be some talking done on the plane.

[Leander]

Two – Uncultured

A couple of hours into the return flight, as they neared home, Sophie had her lead debriefers visit her one at a time in the back of the aircraft. Mike was called to see her first.

“Is Ian as bad as he looks?”

“From what the doctors are saying – well… what they aren’t saying to be fair –, he doesn’t have long left.” Mike confirmed the news about Goodwin that Sophie hadn’t wanted to hear. “It would seem that everything we got from the Russians about his condition previously checks out.

That cancer is going to kill him, soon too.”

“Damn.” It was sad news to have confirmed. Goodwin had always been a bull of a man, someone with no fear in him. Sophie had thought that not the best for someone in his line of work, where caution and trepidation should always be there, yet he’d always been a star at whatever he’d done.

Going into Russia on his last mission, to try and meet an agent there when the danger of capture was as real as it had turned out to be, had been typical of him. Russian captivity hadn’t broken him, neither the interrogations he would have gone through. Pancreatic cancer was going to finish him off though.

“Seeing his family the moment he lands is what is mostly on his mind, Sophie.”

“That I can understand.” She truly did. Nonetheless, what was important to NISS was what he had to say. “Did he confirm what we thought? Was he betrayed by Fedor?”

“He was.”

“Bugger. I wouldn’t have seen that coming.”

“Neither did he.” Mike grimaced. “He’s still mad at the whole thing. Fedor turning him in like he did hurt him.”

“You’ve been over the whole thing with Ian, yes? From being arrested to the moment of release back in Cyprus?” Sophie moved the conversation on to what they were here for.

“Yes, I’ve gone through everything with him just as you wanted, even with the doctors fussing around him.”

“When we get back,” so she explained, “there’s a good chance he goes straight into palliative care. Ian will be doped up and it’ll be harder to get him to remember everything. I know I’ve had you rush now, and that seems unfair on Ian considering how ill he is, but we need to know it all.”

“I understand.”

“Are you missing Cyprus yet?”

He pulled a mock sad face. “Yes.”


Mike went back to Goodwin. They were at the front of the aircraft and, from the middle, Sophie brought Jasmine to her next.

“How’s our only Russian doing?”

“She says that she’s worried she’ll be targeted once in the U.K again. I’ve tried to placate here but, and I’ll be honest with you Sophie, I’m not having much success with that.”

“We knew Svetlana would be difficult. You read the same psych report as I did, Jasmine: she’s beyond paranoid. Now, we know that what happened happened, but that isn’t going to occur again.”

“I’ve told her this.”

Jasmine looked exasperated.

From everything that Sophie knew about Svetlana, that was to be expected though.

“Is she still all messed up? Do we have any idea of what the Russians gave her?”

Jasmine shook her head. “Mike sent down one of the doctors he has up front to give her a quick look over. Whatever exactly they gave her, the doctor called it a ‘pacifier’. It’s physically slowed her down. There are bruises on her wrists and ankles from long-term restraints. She wasn’t cuffed nor bound when on that Russian jet so they drugged her instead.”

“Her reputation is one of lashing out.”

“Yes, it certainly is.” Jasmine said that then smiled afterwards. “Only against people who deserved it, so I’ve been told.”

“I’d have to agree.” Sophie recalled all the people whom Svetlana was known to have killed with her bare hands. None of them didn’t have it coming. “We need to make sure she is properly medically assessed once we’re back on the ground. Make that a priority, Jasmine. We don’t know what the Russians gave her to keep her calm and what the side effects might be.”

“I will.”

“You’ve been talking: running through the debrief with her, yes?”

“Absolutely. The drugs haven’t taken her memory from her. I’ll got a lot already and there’s sure to be more to come. She’s confirmed what we suspected about our former colleague Debbie.”

Jasmine started to stand up from the seat she was in next to Sophie but then paused and sat back down.

She looked hesitant.

“Yes?”

“I’ve got a question…”

“Ask away.”

“Why,” Jasmine began, “did they agree to hand her back? It doesn’t make sense to me. I know they wanted their own spies back, and we gave them more than they gave us so that could be argued to have been a deal sweetener, but Svetlana doesn’t make sense to me. Goodwin does, even Manningtree does in its own way. But, Svetlana?”

“Honestly, I don’t know for sure.” Those were the same questions that Sophie had asked of her own boss. “They know we got so much out of her the first time and on one hand she’s spilled her guts already. Still, she knows more since the first time around of their operations: her kidnap as a good example. If I had to guess,” and she was, “I’d say they sent her to us to make trouble, just like they did with our former prime minister too.”

“Now her transfer, I really don’t understand.”

“She upset their president, that we know. But she’s been sent to make trouble too.” Sophie was certain of that. “Talking of our V.I.P guest, tell Harriet and Amber to come through next will you? Together too, please.”


“She doesn’t like my jewellery.” Amber touched her face when she sat down.

“Oh, yes?”

Harriet explained. “It’s the nose ring. Manningtree says that she doesn’t believe it is fitting that a professional intelligence officer serving her country should be wearing one, especially the type Amber has.”

“She always was a snob.” Sophie had long thought that of Manningtree.

“I’m a rocker with a nose ring but my name isn’t Nona.”

Beaming a wide smile, Amber stared at Sophie waiting for a reaction to that. Harriet shook her head as she looked at the cabin floor briefly before asking a question.

“I take it you don’t know the song?”

“Does she?” In reply, Sophie jerked at thumb in the direction of Manningtree.

“I doubt it. Anyway,” Harriet was back to business, “she hasn’t shut up. Damn, that woman has a lot to say. None of it is useful at the moment though. All we’ve got from her is a bellyful of indignation, political commentary and proclamations of innocence.”

“And, a comment on my nose ring too.”

“Did you expect much more at this early stage?”

“No, we didn’t.” Amber answered for Harriet there, concentrating now fully on her job rather than her pride. “Still, it’s a lot to have to listen. We left Phil and Stu up there when we came back here and they can hear all that she has to complain about.”

“How about the others with her too?”

“The two coppers from the Met. are seated behind her. To the left, and also in front, are those pair of lawyers from the C.P.S and the Ministry of Justice. She’s barely spoken to anyone but Amber and I, ignoring the others. The M.o.J woman tried to engage her in conversation when Manningtree started banging on about the legality of what happened today but she got shouted down.”

“I heard the racket.” That Sophie had. So too had likely the heavens.

“I tell you something, Sophie. She’d going to get a further unpleasant surprise when we reach Brize Norton. Manningtree has been going on about how she cannot be legally held due to her extradition not being lawful. It was explained to her that it wasn’t an extradition at all, that Russia expelled her due to her visa expiring and flew her to British sovereign territory, but she isn’t listening to any of that.”

“Well…” Amber had something to add. “She did address the expulsion.

According to her, Koskhin tried to bed her. When he didn’t get what he wanted, he threw her out. Manningtree dismisses the idea that its all about that interview over the situation in Belarus that she gave without permission, ripping his regime’s actions there a new rear hole, and says its all personal.”

“You know what she called him? Nekulturny.”

There was a twinkle in Harriet’s eye when she added that to what Amber had said.

Such a reason, the blaming of a personal matter between Manningtree and Koskhin where she called him ‘uncultured’ – it would have stung more in Russian than it would in English – for the former’s expulsion, didn’t come came as that much of a shock for Sophie to hear.

Her briefing on Manningtree, the first one back when the opening effort was made to get Russia to hand over Britain’s ex-premier, had been concerned with how she had upset the Russian president no end with that now infamous secret interview. The actions of Russian soldiers in Belarus that Manningtree had condemned were just as brutal as Koskhin’s reaction where he was so willing to hand her over. In fact, he wanted to do it some time ago, long ahead of the UK legal system getting ready to prosecute her once they had her back.

Yet, like Svetlana, though in a different way, Manningtree was well known for getting on the wrong side of people. Russia’s president was reportedly a touchy – in both senses of the term – guy.

“It might be true.” Amber sounded convinced. “When she used the Russian word, she looked embarrassed, like she wasn’t supposed to know any Russian. I doubt she’ll do that again for it might poke holes in her innocent victim charade.”

“Maybe, it is, maybe.” Sophie didn’t know either way. She wasn’t sure if she cared either. As to the rest, she wasn’t sure on that either.

“Anything else for us?”

“No, Harriet. Get back to her. Go save poor Stuart and Philip from our third passenger.”

Left alone again, Sophie pondered on all that she’d heard about Goodwin, Svetlana and Manningtree. She glanced out of the window at the cloudy skies, looking for a glimpse of the ground or sea below. That eluded her. The RAF flight officer in charge came by, looking briefly back over his shoulder with annoyance towards Manningtree shouting in the middle of the passenger cabin.

“Thirty minutes, ma’am.”

His reply was to her question as to when they’d reach the UK.

In half an hour, Sophie would be back on the ground. She’d be bringing Manningtree home to face justice, giving Goodwin somewhere to die in comfort and providing safety for the frightened Svetlana.

Her job would be far from over though.

[jemhouston]

Good one

[Timbo W]

Very much been enjoying these Leander

[Leander]

Very much been enjoying these Leander

I'm enjoying writing them.

Good one

Thanks.

[Leander]

Three – Square Peg

The police convoy crossed through South London, going up major roads and causing all sorts of traffic disruption as it did so. There were motorcycles ahead and on the flanks with their drivers stopping traffic at intervals. High speed police pursuit cars travelled towards the front and rear of the convoy. Each was going far slower than they could yet at a moment’s notice, the powerful vehicles would certainly be able to speed up. A pair of 4x4 Land Rovers, painted black with tinted windows, were in the convoy. They had no markings denoting them as belonging to the Metropolitan Police though. Inside each, armed officers were carried and they wore body armour and face coverings. There was a helicopter up above. It stayed close to the convoy at times, moving ahead to check on reported obstructions from the perfect vantage point at others. Finally, two prisoner transport vans were present. There was a lone prisoner in only one of them though anyone seeking to break her free from custody wouldn’t know which she was carried within.

Alicia Manningtree was on her way to face British justice in the form of her first court appearance.


The convoy moved past Clapham Common northwards. It was approaching the heart of London after coming from Surrey and near the edges of Heathrow Airport. HMP Bronzefield was one of the few high security prison for females in the country. Women prisoners held on ‘restricted status’ – Category A in all but name – were detained there. It was privately run and there had been discussion held before the arrival of certainly the most high profile prisoner ever to be held there as to whether she should go to a Ministry of Justice facility. Those were only Cat. A prisons built for men though. Another idea had been to send Manningtree to a military facility, something too rejected. The sitting government had many times made public statements supporting private prisons and so the inconvenience and worries over her detainment had to go ahead at Bronzefield for political reasons. Nonetheless, armed police had been deployed there for guarding purposes and this convoy wasn’t one with any private sector involvement. The nation state was prosecuting Manningtree and they were bring her before a judge.

Past the common, a small red van moved forwards after the police motorcycles had gone past. The driver had deliveries to make and no time to mess around. He nearly made a mess of his underwear when guns were pointed at him by men who looked like soldiers. It was a mistake by him and an overreaction by the police. They were on their guard though and that man was lucky he at once complied with shouted instructions without doing anything foolish before the men with guns took no chances.

The convoy soon reached the Elephant & Castle. There was a big roundabout there as part of a major route for traffic across London. Cars and vans tried to edge forward despite the police directions to keep them still. This time no guns were drawn though there was a lot of shouting and some threats too. Drivers backed off. Bus passengers and pedestrians joined them in starring at the police convoy but also at the helicopter low over their heads.

Just up the road from the roundabout was Inner London Crown Court. That place of justice was usually busy with important cases though the expectation would usually have been that a matter such as the one of R v Manningtree would have been dealt with at the Old Bailey up in the City of London. However, emergency building work was underway there though due to a recent partial structural collapse and so the historical Sessions House near the Elephant & Castle (in not much better shape to be honest) was in use. Manningtree had already appeared via a video link from Bronzefield before a magistrates court. That was only a formally, one to tick the necessary legal boxes.

Her appearance today was the big deal that quite a number of people had been waiting for.


Anyone hoping for anything dramatic to occur would have been disappointed though. There was a short appearance by the country’s former prime minister, one where she only spoke briefly to confirm her personal details. The Crown laid out charges with her barrister answering those with the assertion that he would be contesting those on behalf of Manningtree. The judge set a date for a future hearing, one where pre-trial issues would be discussed.

There were few people within the courtroom itself. A handful of journalists were there though there were no photographers nor cameramen. Still, sketch artists were fast to reproduce images of her. No politicians were present. Invited spectators not with the media were in attendance and a couple of those were believed by the journalists to be spooks from NISS. That couldn’t be confirmed beyond doubt though.

The prisoner was put back in the vehicle in which she had arrived. The convoy reassembled, including the helicopter which had stayed overhead throughout. Back to the Elephant & Castle the motorcycles, pursuit cars, 4x4s and prisoner transport vans went. There was more traffic disruption there and all the way back to Surrey. Photographers on their own bikes, Britain’s own paparazzi, followed behind it too.

Relative calm returned to Sessions House in the aftermath.

*

Caitlin Green was at Sessions House when the convoy arrived and then later departed afterwards. The journalist with the National newspaper who had the security correspondent role wasn’t one of those given entry into the court where Manningtree was. She didn’t even get sight of the accused traitor either. Caitlin had ground her teeth in frustration at that but there was a consolation prize for her.

Square Peg agreed to talk with her.

The barrister who went by that soubriquet, Gemma Brookslane, was a former university friend of her mother’s. In the line of work which Caitlin was in, relationships like that mattered. Readers wouldn’t have a clue of course, but so much of what made it into print actually came down to connections rather than journalistic adventurism.

A condition for the talk by Square Peg – she revelled in that name; she refused to fit into any round holes – was that it was all off-the-record. Caitlin knew that her mum’s old pal had fought tooth and nail to be assigned the role of defending barrister for Manningtree. Understanding why she couldn’t name her ‘anonymous source’ wasn’t something that Square Peg could give her though. It was a case of she’d only talk under the condition on anonymity or not talk at all. Caitlin had given way to the older woman’s wish.


“Remember, there’s a code of conduct I must follow, Caitlin: and I have a reputation to protect too. What I say to you now cannot be attributed to me now and not after the trial is done with either.”

“Got you.” Caitlin nodded. She had understood the first time that Square Peg had said such a thing too. “Now, I’ll start with this: what are your views on the Crown’s case?”

“It’s one which, from the outside, looks strong. I’ll give them that. They have all of their so-called evidence, witnesses and such like. Manningtree’s own actions in doing what she did – making a run for it when in Saint Petersburg, saying all that she did when in Moscow – are quite damming. The case against her isn’t about her latter actions: it’s the treason that they’ve charged her with. That’s where the weakness is.”

“How so?”

“This is a spy case, this is all a matter of national security. There will be evidence presented by the Crown which came from sources which they won’t want to reveal. I’ll rip into all of that. Some of it will get teased out of them but they won’t want to reveal much.

That’s how the Crown will lose this case.”

“It’s an interesting strategy, but, one which I know others have tried to use before. It hasn’t one which has brought defendants much success in the past.”

Caitlin’s role at the National had her cover other espionage cases. The matter with Manningtree was, naturally, extraordinary but that didn’t mean that it would go different from others. In recent years, faced with the tidal wave of Russian spying that had been detected, where they had Britons committing treason on their behalf, the government and the Crown had worked around such difficulties. Issues that MI-5 & MI-6, now the National Intelligence & Security Service, didn’t want revealed in open court had been put into the public arena regardless.

“We’ll have to see about that, won’t we?”

There wasn’t any doubt in Square Peg that Caitlin could detect. She was a confident woman. A feted campaigning barrister, she was long used to fighting the British legal system from within… and winning too. R v Manningtree was the perfect case for her to fight. Square Peg had jumped over other King’s Counsels to get it and was apparently eager to fight it out, her own way too.

“What’s your personal view on Manningtree? Between you and me, is she guilty or not?”

“Our former prime minister has her enemies. They are in Whitehall, in the media, over at the monstrosity known as N.I.S.S and here in the building behind us too. They will want to get their revenge on her for all that she has done throughout her political career and then afterwards when she ended up in Russia. She was a populist and we all know how the establishment doesn’t like her sort, don’t we? They’ve framed a narrative, one which Manningtree herself only added to, of her complete guilt. A fair trial for her is out of the question.”

“You didn’t answer my question though.” Caitlin wasn’t about to allow Square Peg to get away without giving a proper answer.

“The defence which I will lead is that she has been framed. I always give it my all for those I represent.”

Still, she hadn’t gotten her answer! “Guilty or innocent?”

Square Peg frowned, looking down over the top of her thick, ugly glasses down at the shorter Caitlin. “I’m not going to answer that one.”

Caitlin was beaten. She could have continued to press the issue but that might easily cut this whole matter short. Remembering what her mother had told her about her former university co-student, the short temper that Square Peg had and the tendency to storm off, Caitlin reluctantly moved on.

“There’s been many arguments about her expulsion from Russia and how she ended up in British custody in Cyprus. Will that be a leading point of your defence?”

Square Peg shook her head. “Unfortunately, not. It was legal: just. At least legal in Russia considering their president had his rubber stamp parliament change the law the very day beforehand. Manningtree’s subsequent arrest in Cyprus is thus a moot point because she was on British soil at that point.”

“There are these murder charges that the Netherlands and the United States wish to…”

“Manningtree,” Square Peg cut Caitlin off, “is not being charged in a British court for that alleged offence. The Americans and the Dutch have weak, dare I say useless evidence, on that alleged matter. I correct myself: preposterous lie. The whole thing is absurd. Manningtree done nothing of the sort that they are saying. It’s all a rumour vicious, one designed to make sure that they get her if not here, then afterwards elsewhere.

“There are reports of a videotape though.”

“I’ve been told there was a fake made, Caitlin, and that the C.P.S don’t have it, have never seen it, and are aware that such a tape, if it exists, its an A.I. deep-fake.”

Caitlin doubted that the whole story about Manningtree killing an American citizen in Holland when she was younger was a lie. Just because there was weak evidence, it certainty didn’t make it untrue. They way she understood the whole thing, it was that murder, one which the Russians had videotaped, was the blackmail that had been used to force Manningtree into treason. It was real. However, the video, not a fake as alleged, had never been discovered and its existence was officially denied.

Square Peg wasn’t going to give her any more than that though so she moved on.

“What sort of timescale are we looking at for the trial here?”

“I don’t think we’ll see anything moving fast, not after today anyway.” Square Peg was shaking her head again. “The Crown will delay things.

We’ve got a general election coming up this year and this matter is politically dynamite. They won’t want to start the trial before that and have it take place during campaigning. No one at the C.P.S can be sure exactly when the current government will go to the country so they will wait. Now, once the election is called, then I’ll know a timescale for when it will start: right after polling day.

It’ll be a long trial once it gets going. This is no open-and-shut case. You’ll be looking at covering this for two months, maybe three, Caitlin. Oh, and it’ll be up at the Old Bailey by then too.”

While Square Peg had been giving her answer, Caitlin had been distracted by noise coming from out on Newington Causeway. That busy road, which linked the Elephant & Castle to Borough, had a crowd of people standing on the pavement. They were being kept back from the gates of Sessions House by the police though making their presence felt vocally. Caitlin couldn’t hear what exactly they were chanting though was sure that it was in support of Manningtree.

The woman still had her supporters, despite everything she’d both done and been alleged to have done as well.

“What are your thoughts on the committed defenders of Manningtree? There’s a lot of people, not just here,” Caitlin jerked a thumb at the noisy crowd, some of whom were now blowing whistles, “who have stood by her throughout. They too claim that she has been framed and do not believe a word that both the government and the intelligence organisations have been saying.”

“Sometimes, it’s hard for me to believe that Alicia Manningtree was the most popular political leader this country has had in a long time.” Square Peg looked rueful. “A great national forgetting has taken place.

Now, there were always those against her. I’m talking of the snotty illiberal elites, the type who work at your ‘paper, its readers too. Those sort were always opposed to her. Regardless, she was popular everywhere else. What she did for so many people here, and in Pakistan too where she led the world in the response to that tragedy, made her what she was. After her fall, and I’d repeat what I said earlier – her own actions in staying in Russia of all places –, that all changed. So many turned their back on her with the pretence that they never did support her expressed so violently. Their voices are loud and many.

Out there though, here and without making a fuss, there are countless many who have stuck by her. They believe in her. They believe she is innocent and a victim of a conspiracy. They too are defamed, called names for their faith in Manningtree. Regardless, they keep the faith.

It’s just too bad that the establishment will be trying her, judging her too, rather than those who can see through all of the lies.”

There was the answer which Caitlin had been seeking earlier.

Without saying so directly, Square Peg affirmed her belief in Manningtree’s innocence. Caitlin’s mother had told her that on matters of politics, not law, Square Peg was a certifiable nut. The truth was now before her daughter’s eyes.

In spirit, Square Peg was one of the mob out there.


Leaving Sessions House soon afterwards, Caitlin took the short walk up to the Underground station at Borough. She had her recording (made with her interviewee’s knowledge) of what had been said. Mentally putting all of that into an article, she headed for the Tube. It would be one that would give no overt hints as to who the words had come from yet she didn’t expect that educated readers would have to do much guesswork as to who had said all that Square Peg had.

Shaking her head at the belief in Manningtree’s innocence that someone so smart as Square Peg could actually have, in direct opposition to the glaring evidence of guilt, Caitlin was glad to be away from such a zealot as her mother knew.

[jemhouston]

You might have to be crazy to be the defense counselor.

[Leander]

You might have to be crazy to be the defense counselor.

And wanting too to fight the establishment, putting that ahead of her client!

[Leander]

Four – Dirty Trick

The city of George Town lay on Penang Island, to the west of the Malay Peninsula. Debbie Smith’s great grandfather had died there in 1941 during a Japanese air strike as part of the Second World War. With an interest in history, especially her own nation’s colonial past, her trip to George Town was an item on the itinerary that was her world tour which she had no intention of missing. The former spook was only there for a day though. Debbie cut short her trip almost as soon as she arrived. There’d been a notification on her phone with a Google Alert having popped up. Her mother’s name was within several news stories coming from back home in Britain. There had been a car accident with the retired director general of MI-5 – an organisation which no longer existed – left ‘gravely wounded’ in hospital. The BBC, the Guardian and the National all had the story; so too Reuters. It wasn’t making the headlines and was instead being treated as part of the Manningtree case which Debbie had been following, but it was of utmost importance to her.

She made a secure call to one of her cousins, Ray, with whom she was closest to among the various family rifts that Debbie was a part of. He didn’t sound himself. There was pain there for his aunt, someone whom Debbie knew Ray was attached to, and that was what she told herself was wrong with his voice. Ray confirmed the accident and that Elizabeth Smith likely didn’t have long to live.

“Come home and be with your mum, Debs.”

She told him that she would.


Using her Irish passport (a real one, just not one that should have been issued to her), Debbie flew first to Kuala Lumpur. To reach Malaysia’s capital, she was using the name Rosie Moran and she did so again when flying on to Hong Kong. She’d travelled halfway across the world using boats and trains, never an aircraft, yet took two in one afternoon. Flying for Debbie was a horrendous experience yet she thought only of her mother.

There was a lawyer in Hong Kong, someone whom she’d done business with before. Luo Cheng had a car meet her at that territory’s fancy airport and brought her to his office. He expressed sympathy at the news about her mother and then gave her privacy when she opened her lock-box. Debbie removed various items from it and returned the key to Luo.

She used the bathroom before leaving his office. Now she was Hannah Maguire, who looked different from how she had beforehand and also carried a passport issued by the New Zealand authorities: another one she wasn’t supposed to have.

“Have a safe flight.” Such were the parting words from Luo.

There was a long delay before she could get a flight but, finally, Debbie was back in the skies again. Bad weather when coming out of Hong Kong made Debbie grip her seat’s handrails, turning her knuckles white.

A young South Asian man, a rather attractive one at that, offered her a few comforting words: “Only a bit of turbulence. Don’t be alarmed, it happens all the time and we’ll be fine.”

Now, the airplane might have crashed, smearing her as paste on the ground when it did so in her worst imaginations, yet her mother was in that terrible way back home. She tried her best to do as he said and not be deathly concerned about an imminent disaster on the way to the UK.

Debbie willed the Cathay Pacific plane on faster. She didn’t want to get there before her mother’s time was up.


Back at the final airport which Debbie had left behind her, a man who’d followed her from that lawyers office, after a message from Luo had confirmed her arrival, made a call.

“She’s flying home. Ahmed is on the plane too.”

He hung up after that two sentence comment, not waiting on a reply that wasn’t due to come. The call was one traced and recorded at various locations. The Americans and the Chinese were aware of it though not what it was all about. Britain’s GCHQ, an organisation which was holding onto its independence from being subsumed into NISS by the skin of it’s chief’s teeth, also intercepted what was said.

It was understood there though for what it meant.

As to the man at the airport, a NISS spook with many years of MI-6 service behind him, Scott Gibbons was busy afterwards with his phone still in his hands.

He changed the pages of more than a dozen news sites back to their original form.

They’d been edited elsewhere with a short paragraph or a couple of sentences added into existing stories. Those pages would only been shown in selected parts of the world too: South East Asia and China. The hi-jacking of internationally available news sites was something he’d been involved with before. It was simple for Scott to do though, the switching on and off of those ‘new’ pages’, yet had been rather complicated for GCHQ to get set up in the first place.

Down the memory hole the lie that had been told went afterwards, all of it aimed at one particular person who had now flown away.

Scott left the airport and went back to his office. His six-person NISS station here in Hong Kong had other work to do with Debbie Smith now flying and the box from her lawyers office – supplied by Luo for a fee – also going by air freight too. What would happen afterwards was no longer his responsibility.


She actually slept on the plane. Her copy of the latest Mick Herron book unread.

Waking up, Debbie remembered that flight to Prague long ago. Grace had slept on that plane.

Grace.

Grace, whom Debbie had murdered.

Debbie forced the memory of her friend, someone whom she had had no choice but to kill, from her mind.

She thought instead of her mother.

Debbie was doing so as the announcement came that that they were nearing London. The man seated beside her had something more to say to her.

“I’m Ahmed, by the way; it’s been nice flying with you.”

Debbie flashed him a smile but had nothing to say in return.


Passport control was a long process. Debbie had that New Zealand passport, one making her a Commonwealth citizen, but entry into the UK wasn’t easy. She kept calm despite the nerves that she had when it came to being detected by the systems in place to stop her entry using someone else’s identity. There were ways around the biometric checks and she was making use of a clever trick there.

Ahmed stuck close to her, making her feel a bit uncomfortable by his attention.

She’d had several love affairs since travelling and he could have been one of them should things have been different. But this wasn’t the time for any of that.

“Welcome to Great Britain.”

After all of the queues, and the checks that she’d bypassed too, Debbie heard those words. She was past the UK’s last line of defences against those which Britain didn’t want to grant entry to.

Holding her passport in one hand, dragging a suitcase by its extendable handle with the other, she set about leaving the airport.

Then a woman appeared in front of her, someone who wasn’t supposed to be there at all.

“Mum!?”

*

Ahmed and two men in uniform who had stepped out from among the crowds to take her arms lead her towards a room off a corridor. Debbie’s mother followed them with her daughter looking back at her several times, trying to convince herself that this was all real.

The door was locked by another woman once they were inside, someone whom Debbie recognised from her MI-5 days yet couldn’t put a name to the face.

Her mother sat down in a chair by the door, meeting her stare, but saying nothing.

“Welcome back to the U.K, Miss Smith?”

“I know you, don’t I?”

“Yes, you do. I’m Jasmine, we did a couple of training courses together back in the day. I’ve spent some time recently with someone you might know and thought you’d never hear of again: Svetlana.”

“What is going on here?”

Debbie asked that of Jasmine but was looking at her mother – a wholly uninjured woman, someone certainly not at death’s door – when she spoke.

“We’ve been hoping you would return home for some time. We had to use some encouragement to get you here. And you’ve helped us too, using the passport you did. You could have flown in on your own to be honest.”

Debbie took her eyes off her mother and redirected them towards Jasmine.

“That,” she spoke with as much malice as she could, “was a dirty trick.”

She was thinking of all those news articles, how too her cousin hadn’t sounded himself…

…because that wasn’t Ray, was it?

Now Ahmed spoke up: “You’re a traitor who is going to face responsibility for what you done, Debbie.”

Debbie put her face in her hands, telling herself not to cry. Her mother’s fingers touched the back of her hand. Opening her eyes, Debbie say that her mum was crouching down in front of her.

“You utter disgrace.”

With a slap, and the furious look that came with it, their mother-daughter relationship ended there.

And Debbie started talking. She’d been caught and so would tell them what they’d brought her back to Britain to confess.

[jemhouston]

And the walls kept tumbling down.

[Leander]

And the walls kept tumbling down.

She's got a story to tell indeed.

[Leander]

Five – Relief

“Tell us when it all started.” Jasmine began the debrief.

“Go back to the beginning.” Adding to his colleague’s remark was Ahmed, the attractive guy from the plane.

“You want it all?”

“Yes, that’s what a debrief is, Debbie: you know this.”

“Okay, okay.”

They were in a room without windows, somewhere underground. Back when MI-5 had been what it was, there were interrogation rooms like this in secure sites such as Ealing and Tooting across London’s suburbs which she knew of. Debbie had been taken here hooded in the back of a van. The drive had been long. She didn’t think she was in the capital any more. NISS was huge with places surely all over the country.

“So…?” Ahmed was impatient.

“I was a teenager.” Debbie started where they wanted her to, back at the very beginning. “My best friend at school was Sasha Wainwright. She had an older brother, Mike, and he had a friend from university: Vanya. I checked him out years later and I ran Vanya down. He wasn’t nineteen as he said and he wasn’t Ukrainian either.

Piotr Vladimirovich Osipov, a G.R.U field operations guy, an Illegal in Britain at the time. He was twenty three too, not long fresh out of training.”

“You and he had an…” Ahmed looked like he was struggling for the right words. “… intimate relationship?”

“Does that offend your sensibilities? Get over it. He cannot get in trouble now, not after all of this length of time. Plus, he’s dead now anyway. He got killed by real Ukrainians in the war.

Let’s not worry about it anyway. I knew he was older. He wasn’t my first boyfriend either. I’m okay about it all.”

Debbie saw Jasmine turn up her nose at that before the woman had a question. “He told you he was Ukrainian?”

“Sasha’s brother did. What did I know of the difference? Back then, like everyone else, the Ukraine wasn’t a thing that people was aware of. If someone told me they were Russian, I wouldn’t have made the connection with the Ukraine either.

We were together – lovers, Ahmed – and he was an older guy who I was quite attached to. I was infatuated. I wanted to impress him and so I told him what my mum did for a living.

It was stupid with reflection, but didn’t seem so dumb then.”

“Did you mother know about him?”

“No, of course not.”

“Why ‘of course not’?”

“I didn’t tell her anything. I was a teenager full of insecurities. I kept things from her all the time. She didn’t know I drank, smoked cannabis and had an older boyfriend.”

Weren’t these people teenagers once themselves?

“How did you know about your mother’s job?”

“My father told me, maybe a couple of years beforehand. I’m sure you two know that he was a drunk, right? That was why my mum was divorcing him. I can only assume he told me as part of a play to get me to turn against her: ‘your mum’s an untrustworthy spy, Debbie’.

I think that was how he said it.”

“Your father died when you were fourteen.” Jasmine was looking down at some paperwork, which Debbie guessed was her NISS file.

“They didn’t kill him.” She said that as empathically as she could, looking Jasmine straight in the face. “The Russian’s didn’t whack him.

It was a car accident. He drove drunk a lot. I remember being a kid – eight or nine, maybe ten; something like that – when he had a smash with me in the car. I don’t know the details, but he covered it up so my mum didn’t find out he was drinking.”

“They could have got him out of the way. The game might have been to remove a father figure so Vanya could slip in.” They way that Ahmed said the last bit of that, with a grin on his face, barely hiding the innuendo, made Debbie give him a hard stare. She almost told him where to stick it, she wanted to smack him in the face too.

Instead, she took a deep breath and turned back to Jasmine.

“My dad drank, okay? They targeted me with Vanya meeting Mark and using him and Sasha to get to me, yes. But they didn’t assassinate my dad.”

“Let’s move on.” Jasmine waved her hand, dismissing the issue. “So, you and Vanya?”

“Vanya…” Debbie rolled her eyes at memories of him. “I told him about my mum. He’d said that his father back home in Kiev was in their government’s security service. We had spies for parents in common, you see.

It was me who suggested that I could be useful. I was the one who talked about a fee for information that maybe his dad might find he wanted to pay for. I was greedy for cash, angry at my mum and threw out what was a wild idea. It was crazy yet I was greedy.

And… it went from there, easier than I thought it might.”

Never had Debbie said anything like that aloud. She’d thought about it all, putting the pieces together over the years. Now, it was all said and out in the open.

“What,” Jasmine asked, “did you give them? You cannot have known much.”

“Little things.” They had been too, at the start. “I thought my mum was M.I.Six, not Five. I had this idea that she was some sort of female James Bond: I was a kid with a big imagination. I just told them stuff that I overheard, things that I knew about her travels. I let Vanya and a friend – some I never saw again, someone I don’t to this day know who he was – into the house. They planted a bug, I think, in my mum’s home office.”

“What did they pay you? How much each time?”

“When I was first doing it as a teenager?” Jasmine nodded back to Debbie’s returned question. “Not much. Fifty pounds or hundred pounds each time I did something. I always wanted more.”

“And where did the money go?”

“Nice clothes, drink, weed, taxis: that sort of stuff. I blew it all as fast as I got it, never on anything important in the long run. Just what I wanted then and there.

I had a good time. I enjoyed what I was doing. I liked getting paid for it. None of it mattered in the long run as far as I was concerned. I told myself that I could stop it at any time and was right too.”

“When did it?”

“When I was eighteen. Vanya and I broke up: he was a cheating git who wouldn’t keep his flies buttoned up. I found out right before I went off to university, before I left home and was no longer in daily contact with my mum.”

“And no one replaced Vanya?” Ahmed asked that with disbelief.

“No.”

“Really?”

“Really. I was at uni. I moved on. No longer was I helping Vanya’s supposed Ukrainian father any more.”

“But you were thoroughly compromised. They would have gathered evidence of what you did before to ensure that you helped them again.”

“Yeah, I know that now.” Debbie said that to Ahmed with regret. “But I didn’t at the time. I was still a kid, wasn’t I?”


They had a short break. Debbie was given a cup of tea. It was warm, not hot, and in a paper cup.

They weren’t giving her anything to use as a weapon… yet she wasn’t Svetlana, was she?

Ahmed left the room for a few moments again after bringing the cuppa in and it was just Jasmine there. Debbie thought of something she hadn’t mentioned before.

“I forgot to add something.”

“Yes?”

“You asked about the things I did when I was a teenager for Vanya. He once gave me two hundred pounds to take some pictures on my phone of what came out of my mother’s work bag. I didn’t even look at them: I just snapped away.

You said leave nothing out and I’m trying not to.”

“Okay.” Jasmine made a note of that in her notebook yet Debbie was well aware that this was all being recorded. The video cameras in the room weren’t hidden.

Ahmed returned once more and they got back to the debrief.

“After Vanya and you broke up, you went off to university. Law, wasn’t it? And there was no contact with him again?”

“Nope.”

“When did it all start again then? After you’d done your degree?”

“Right before I finished.” Debbie told Jasmine. “It was just before my finals. I was approached in the main library late one night. A girl, well… a young woman, calling herself Valentina, got talking to me. I thought she was in to me, if you get my meaning, because she was acting odd.

But she was a Russian spook.”

“What happened with that?”

“She laid it on thick. Valentina – I’ve tried to discover since who she really was, like I did with Vanya, and have had no luck – told me the truth about Vanya. She explained he was Russian and I’d been spying on my mum for Moscow, not Kiev. She said she wanted me to continue once again after uni. Valentina knew that I’d talked to my mum about following her into Five and urged me to do that.”

“Did she threaten to expose you?”

“Yes and no. It wasn’t said. There was talk of money, by me, and she said about things going bad for me with the authorities if not. They had their kompromat and were using it.”

“How,” Ahmed asked, “was your relationship with your mother by that point? You said you’d talked about joining the Security Service – how did that happen?”

“We were closer than we’d ever been. The conversation had come up the Christmas beforehand where she’d pushed me to make a decision on what to do after uni. I’d gone right off the idea of being a lawyer despite being about to finish my degree.

My mum said I could do what she did. In general outlines, she told me how she spent her days and said I had the ability to do it too.”

“And Valentina knew of this conversation?”

“I don’t know how, but she did yes.”

“And so you said yes to your mother...”

“I did.”

“… and then yes to Valentina too?”

“I did.”

“Was she your handler afterwards?” Jasmine was now back asking the questions.

“No, that was Olga. It was she who I had dealings with once the process started to get me into Five and for the first few years I was there.

I passed the vetting and the training. My mum cleared open the way for me but I still had to work for it. Throughout it all, Olga was there. I got a monthly stipend from her. It wasn’t much and I spent it fast. I did stupid things but no more drugs and no more boyfriends for a few years.”

“And you were in Vetting yourself at first?”

“Three long, boring years of that duty! I hated it.”

“And then some time with the Watchers too?”

“They always wanted new faces, especially for their activities following Russians about. It didn’t work out for me with them though. Olga thought it would bring her much more than I ended up delivering. The irony of me watching Russians looking for them contacting Britons didn’t escape me before you ask.”

“What information did you pass to Olga when with Vetting and then as a Watcher?” Jasmine ignored that last remark, one Debbie had directed towards Ahmed anyway.

“Not much.” With a rueful grimace, Debbie remembered her handler always asking for more than she could give. “Olga wouldn’t pay me much either. The stipends had turned into pay-for-goods and I wasn’t giving them much. She suggested I take a transfer to Ops Support.”

“And that was where you had more access to more intel. that the Russians wanted, yes?”

“It was. By then, I was in a relationship with my boss, Alastair Harman.

It was a declared one, so that we wouldn’t get in trouble for the inter-office ‘romance’. From him I got more intel. than I ever thought I would. There was pillow talk, as you’d call it, but more than that, every chance I got, I’d get into his phone through a wireless hacking app when mine was placed next to his.”

“And more money too?” Jasmine prompted.

“Yes.” Debbie remembered Olga encouraging that relationship, saying that it would be fruitful for them both for Debbie to get involved with that older man who ran MI-5’s operations support department. “They paid me a lot for what I got. I had a new handler soon too: Tatiana. She told me what was going to happen with my mum getting the promotion that she did.”

“You knew beforehand?” That seemed to surprise Jasmine.

“I don’t know how it all went down, but Tatiana and the G.R.U put my mum in as director general. They were behind whatever operations disaster befell Bill Lloyd and caused his resignation. It was a set up to get my mum in at the top.

Of course, she didn’t know. No one did, apart from the Russians.”

Ahmed, who’d been glaring at Debbie as she described her treason, playing the bad cop to Jasmine’s good cop, whispered something in the other spook’s ear. Debbie willed herself not to lean forward and try and listen.

Instead, she finished her tea. She could only imagine that what she was saying about how Elizabeth Smith had ended up heading MI-5 was news to them. It had been something she’d been thinking of during that opening break: something to tell them and see if it could be used to her advantage.

“We know all about the Russians’ hand in the displacement of Lloyd.” Ahmed looked mighty pleased with himself when he told Debbie that.

“We’re going to talk about more that later.” That sounded ominous from Jasmine. “For now though, let’s move to Manningtree.

What did you know?

What did you do?

How were you involved?”

Debbie crumpled the paper cup in her hand.

“That bloody woman!”

And so she moved on to talking about Manningtree next.

*

“I had nothing to with Manningtree.”

Ahmed gave Debbie an entirely disbelieving look.

Jasmine meanwhile had a question: “Why not?”

“I worked with the G.R.U and Manningtree was an S.V.R operation.”

“You worked for the G.R.U,” Ahmed pointed out what he looked like he considered quite the distinction, “rather than with them, Debbie.”

She didn’t take the bait. Instead, Debbie just met his stare.

“How did your involvement start then? With the investigation, I mean.”

“My mum,” an image flashed before Debbie of her mother’s face right after she’d slapped her daughter, “put me on it at the start. She wanted me in there to funnel information direct to her because the tasking was, overall, a Six issue with Five providing support.

I was excited about it all if we’re being honest. I knew it would get me out and about, playing spy.”

“And you told your Russian handler straight away?”

“I tried to.”

“What do you mean?”

“Tatiana had vanished. I couldn’t get hold of her. I left a message at a dead drop and saw that it hadn’t been serviced when I checked for a reply.”

“Did you think she’d been caught or was worried that she might be being watched?”

“Yes.” Debbie remembered that time well. “So I did nothing further to try and contact her at that point and instead worked the Manningtree thing.”

“Did you know it was the S.V.R that had the prime minister under their influence?”

She shook her head at Jasmine before answering. “I thought it was G.R.U and so I might have been exposed. I kept my head down and worried a lot.”

“Did you actively sabotage the investigation into Manningtree?”

“Yes, I did.”

“Can you explain?”

“I didn’t get in the way of anything that pointed towards the proof for several weeks. I did however hide something concerning Svetlana.”

“Which was?”

“A previous relationship of hers I uncovered, someone – somewhere to be honest – she might run to if needed.”

“But Prague was different wasn’t it?”

Debbie let out a sigh. “Ah, so you know then?”

“It has been figured it out. You were the one who tipped off the Russians about that chap who flew head-first out of a window, weren’t you?” Ahmed had rejoined the conversation.

“Yes. I thought that if they got to Pishvanov, then I was certainly done for. I sent an emergency signal, through a cut-out, to a back up that Olga had once told me to only use in the direst of emergencies. Prague felt like that situation had come about.

Yet I didn’t know at that point that Manningtree already knew: that wasn’t on me.”

“The Canadian P.M. told her.”

“Which,” Debbie made clear to Ahmed, “wasn’t something I was at that point aware of.”

“Did you think,” Jasmine took back over the debrief, “those you were working with then had any suspicion that you might have been the leak? We know that they were reporting the possibility of such a thing. I even read your report back to your department head where you yourself warned of the leak. You were covering it up, I guess?”

“You want me to talk about Grace Miller, don’t you?”

“I do.”

“Get me another cup of tea, please: more sugar this time. Then I’ll tell you what happened there.”


More tea was delivered. Debbie told them that soon enough she’d need a loo break and so they let her go before they started talking again. Jasmine came with her to a room which gave Debbie the creeps. She was certain that the entire toilets were covered with video and audio surveillance.

It was an uncomfortable experience.

Back in the interrogation room, one with one-way mirrors on three sides of it, she gulped down her cuppa and waited for them to begin all over again. Ahmed, standing by the door, had her file in his hands, while Jasmine sat opposite her across the low table.

“These Russians that you talk of – your handlers – do you know their names? You call them Valentina, Olga and Tatiana, but those are cover names aren’t they? What do you know about them?”

“And Georgy too.”

“You haven’t mentioned him.”

“Are you sure?” Debbie believed that she had.

“No.”

“Oh, he was above Olga and Tatiana. He’s someone you really should talk to if you get the chance because I don’t think I was the only one he had supervision over people running.”

“Why do you think that?”

“He always knew more than I told him. He had others, but I don’t know who.”

“Back to those names?”

“I have no idea. It was only ever Vanya who I ran down. I worked hard to do that, to understand who he was. The others though… I just don’t know.”

Ahmed gave her another one of his disbelieving stares.

“You did mention a cut-out though?”

“I did.” Debbie proceeded to tell Jasmine who that was. “She’s Megan Fryatt, a real Brit, not one of those posing as one like those lot recently expelled and swapped for Manningtree. Her maiden name is Hobbs and she’ runs Hobbs Bakery – a quite nice shop too – at Notting Hill Gate, just across the road from the Russian Embassy.”

“I’ve been in there.”

“Lots of people going to and from the embassy go there. Megan has been working for the G.R.U for a good long time. She’s a ‘post office’ and gets paid for it.

Did you go in there when you were a Watcher? I did, following a visiting diplomat who had a sweet tooth.”

“You sent your signal to Tatiana through Megan?” Jasmine’s questions continued: she hadn’t answered what Debbie had asked about her own intelligence officer career.

“No, I sent that to Georgy through Megan.”

“And then both Wrexham and Prague happened because of your emergency message?”

She nodded: “Yes, that was all on me. I know you’re not going to believe me, but I felt bad, still do, about the people from Six who got killed in that attack against Svetlana.

I never wanted that to happen.”

Looking up at Ahmed as she said it, her suspicions about what his face would be showing were confirmed. He had no faith in what she was saying about her feelings of guilt. Jasmine remained unreadable, surely the better spook of the two.

“And so we come to that evening at your flat in Finchley now.”

“Yep…” Debbie thought she knew what was coming.

“Did you lure Grace there to kill her?”

“Absolutely not!” She was surprised at the allegation. “I was having an evening in. I was about to stream and binge watch the newest season of Slow Horses when she turned up to talk.”

Everything detail about that evening Debbie remembered perfectly.

“What did she want to discuss?”

“She’d been talking that day about the leak on the assignment. My answers weren’t the best and I wasn’t very helpful. To be honest, I was in a bit of a bad mood. That wasn’t on Grace yet I was rather short with her. There was no way that she was going to catch me, so it wasn’t that, but it was the lying to her that made me short with her. We were friends, see, and because I was hiding something so big, and the mood I was in too, I was all over the place.

I said something, something I shouldn’t have known, and she picked up on my slip of the tongue.”

“Which was?”

“I said ‘Wrexham’ when talking about the Russian guys who failed to kill Svetlana.”

“And Grace realised you knew something you shouldn’t have?”

“Yes. I knew it was going to take her a few moments to put it all together, but there wouldn’t be much time for me. So I did what I did. I left the room and when I came back, it was written all over her face that she knew the truth.”

“Was there a confrontation?”

“I told her I was sorry.”

“And,” Ahmed rejoined the conversation, “you shot her in the face?”

This time she didn’t glance up at him. Her eyes remained fixed on Jasmine’s.

“Yes, I did.”

*

Relief swept over her with that confession.

More than it had been when finally talking aloud when it came to Vanya and how all of this had started, Debbie had finally gotten off her chest what she had done when killing her friend. She was sitting here admitting treason, and now murder too, activities which for her would mean the most severe punishment, but she felt good at having said what she had.

The eating away at her insides that keeping all of that bottled up had caused was over with. It was out in the open.

Asked by Jasmine about what happened with the disposal of Grace’s body and the covering of Debbie’s tracks too, she explained all of that at length. Georgy had people who helped with that. Ahmed asked for a certain details and she told him what he wanted to hear. He had no more evil looks in him.

It came to Debbie while she was talking where she remembered Jasmine from.

The spook had told her when they were back at Heathrow that they’d met on a training course several years past. Debbie had taken loads of them. Part of that was to further her career, part to help her avoid detection for as long as she had. Jasmine had been with her on Advance Tradecraft, a month-long activity that was interesting, informative and also fun.

Something else fun had been the Firearms Handling course too, a time which Debbie remembered while sitting here confessing her treason when Jasmine asked about the gun that she had used to murder Grace.

“The gun – a shiny Glock Twenty – came from Ryan Danby,” Debbie told Jasmine, “and cost quite a bit. You know who he is, right?”

“Major smuggler – drugs, weapons & people too – and leader of an Organised Crime Group active in the Home Counties.” It was Ahmed who confirmed that identity.

“He does business with the Russian mafia but also, whether he knows it or not, has contact with the G.R.U as well.”

“Danby’s dead: he was killed in a gangland hit last month.”

“He deserved it.” Debbie hadn’t know Danby had been murdered but she wasn’t going to be one to mourn his loss. “I wouldn’t rule out a Russian assassination. He was greedy and always asked too many questions.”

“Why did you buy the gun? Where is it now?”

“Well… I didn’t bring it back through Heathrow with me, did I?” The question was rhetorical. “I threw it in the River Medway, near the estuary close to Chatham, right before I left the U.K.

I got it not long after my mum put me on the Manningtree investigation. As I told you, I was worried that might affect me. Having the gun gave me ‘options’ in case things went wrong.”

“You shot Grace with it.” Debbie nodded. “And another Six employee, Eleanor Jenkins too?”

“No, I did not.” As direct as possible, Debbie refuted that allegation.

“How did she die then and what was your involvement?”

Jasmine still remained unreadable; Debbie didn’t know if she was being believed here.

“I was working Eleanor. She was pretty dim overall, stupid in fact. She was on the edges of the investigation at first. Grace had her sent to the house in Wrexham where they were hiding Svetlana. We had lunch after her first few days there, meeting back in London, and I teased the information out of her.

When the shooting happened, and Svetlana did her crazy lady routine, I thought Eleanor had been killed there. Tatiana shot her beforehand though and held onto the body to dump it alongside Grace’s after that incident happened. Personally, I was looking to frame Eleanor, make her a patsy, but Tatiana, or more likely it was Georgy making the decision, decided to kill her.”

“We’re going to move on now to Svetlana’s capture. How did that happen?”

“I said before that I found out something about Svetlana earlier on that I kept from Grace and those others looking into Manningtree: you remember?” Jasmine nodded back at her. “We were running down that identity Svetlana had been using when first in the U.K as part of the cut-out to Manningtree.

I discovered a boyfriend, Noah, who had a house near Maidenhead in Berkshire. It was just an educated guess on my part, but when I heard she was running, I believed she’d go there. She did. It turned out she had a buried box of treasure: identities, even a gun in the box too. Another Glock, would you believe it? I’d been watching the big house – it was quite the country pile – and she arrived with a man.

After taking him hostage, I surprised her and drove off with the two of them in that chap’s car.”

“That was the same day as what went on in Pakistan occurred, wasn’t it?”

“Yes.” Something else Debbie remembered with great clarity. “It was that day, indeed.

Svetlana had picked a fool to hide out with. She’d been with him a couple of days and he had a hero factor. What a woman she was to save! He cried when I first snatched them both but he got mighty brave in the end.

I had to shoot him. He came at me with a piece of iron, one he’d sharpened to a point too. It was him or me.”

Debbie’s memory of that particular incident wasn’t as clear because of how fast it all happened and the shock yet she considered what she had done to be justified.

“And Svetlana?”

“Once I had the gun on her, and especially after she saw me use it, she was as quiet as a church mouse.”

Which had been a change for her indeed.

“And then you handed her over to the Russians?”

“I did. Georgy came for Svetlana, he took away the body of that chap Lee too, and paid me for the prize. The G.R.U wanted her back and I gave her over.”

“What was the fee?” Ahmed perked up again.

“A suitcase full of cash. One million pounds in total.”

“Which,” Jasmine was back with the questions, “you retired on? That was enough for you in the end?”

“I did. I was out. I did worry for a bit that they weren’t going to pay me, let alone let me go, but they did. My mum was on ‘gardening leave’ from Five by that point too. What other value did I really have to them?

Georgy kept his word.”

Smiling, Ahmed stepped forward to stand behind Jasmine. He looked straight down at Debbie.

“You want to know something funny, Debbie? It was they, those Russians whose honour you seem to value so highly, who tipped us off as to where to find you?”

She shook her head. “No, you lie.”

But he didn’t.

[Leander]

Six – Team Meeting

Sophie gathered her team of debriefers together. They met at one of the main facilities of NISS, Vauxhall Cross, the former MI-6 HQ where the Security Secretary had his office too, several weeks after the Cyprus Exchange had taken place. She had Jasmine go first, fresh back from several days out in Barking at an interrogation facility where a traitor was being held.

“Congratulations again, Jasmine, on a job well done. Getting Debbie Smith to talk so fast is something to be admired.”

“Thanks.” A yawn came with that reply. “Sorry.”

“It’s been intense, yes?”

A solemn nod. “It has been. We did the first session with her getting it all out: from where it started to where it ended. Afterwards, we’ve gone back through her story in pieces. Details have been gone over, inconsistencies probed. We pulled her this way and that way, trying to catch her in a lie.

What Debbie has given us though looks to be the entire truth. She was ready to give it up and has been honest so far too. I couldn’t have done it without Svetlana though: more than just the nod in the right direction, it was her insight into Debbie that allowed us to break her first.”

“Svetlana is one of a kind, that she is.”

“Is she doing okay?”

“Yes.” After the flight back to the UK, where Jasmine had spoken to her on the plane, Sophie had transferred Svetlana to other personnel allowing one of her key people to target Debbie. “Some of the stories she has about her custody when the Russians had her and things that I really wish I could unhear. They did their worst. Still, she’s still got the fire in her belly, eager for revenge.”

“And is she safe?”

“That she is.” Sophie left it at that.


She wasn’t about to go into any more details concerning the Russian defector. The last time that Svetlana had been in the UK, two attempts were made on her life: one coming far more closer than the other. Svetlana had believed – correctly as it had turned out – that the Russians then seeking to kill her had British help. She’d run from a safe house, attempted to flee overseas on her own, only to be kidnapped by an MI-5 officer (Debbie) and sold to the Russians where she had suffered the most outrageous of treatments at their hands.

Jasmine and the others that Sophie had with her this afternoon at the distinctive office building beside the Thames were people that she trusted explicitly. Nonetheless, Sophie wasn’t prepared to talk about where Svetlana was. Losing her a second time around, even if this time the Russians had handed her over willingly, was not going to be risked no matter how much faith Sophie had in her gathered colleagues.

Svetlana was being protected, just like the other witnesses that NISS was shielding from harm too.


Speaking to Mike next, Sophie asked after Ian Goodwin’s health.

“It’s sad to see, Sophie.” Mike looked drained. “The doctors are now saying a fortnight at the most. Ian is doped up and can no longer really talk about what went on. My team has been through everything with him multiple times now.

We’ve gotten everything out of him that we can.”

“I’ve been making sure all of that has been passed on to Moscow Station. There is nothing more to be learnt there then?”

“No, there isn’t.”

“Okay. What I want you to do is to move to assist Harriet and Amber starting next week. Obviously leave someone with Ian, until then end that is, but we’re going to have to move on.”

“I’ll do that, yes.”

The cancer was finally going to finish off Goodwin. Sophie knew the man just as well Mike did. It was upsetting to hear of his impeding demise but expected. The celebrated career spook, with a penchant for undercover work right at the deep end of it all, the Russians had let him go because he was at death’s door. Sophie expected that nothing of any real value had been gained from his debrief, nothing that the Russians considered would have harmed them after such a length of time.

Getting Goodwin home so he could die with his family had been the right thing to do, she knew that, yet the win for Britain there hadn’t been that great overall. Such thinking was cold she told herself, but realistic.

As to Mike and his people, those NISS officers would be working on the Manningtree case.


“We’re going to have to let you down.” Amber said.

“Jasmine,” Harriet looked over at her colleague, “has had all of the luck that we haven’t.”

Sophie asked a redundant question: “She won’t give you the confession still?”

“Nope.”

“She won’t.”

Both of them made apologetic faces.

“But, she’s still blathering on her innocence nonsense?”

Harriet confirmed that with a nod first and then an answer: “That she is. We’ve tried to make use of that, to get her talking and disprove our ‘allegations’, but Manningtree just will not play ball with us on that. It’s the same as it was on the plane. Innocence. Framed. Illegal extradition. Those three things time and time again.”

“She has stopped with the negative comments about my facial jewellery though.”

Sophie couldn’t help but smile at Amber’s – poor – attempt to put a good spin on things.

“Keep trying,” she told them, “we’ve got everything from the first investigation to use against her plus what details we’re getting from Debbie too. I know that’s not much at this time,” she looked over at Jasmine, “but everything helps.

When she cracks, and I’m choosing to believe that she will, then the debriefing goes into full swing. Our focus will not be on helping the Crown’s case against her, which we will by extension, but rolling up everyone who ever had anything to do with her treason. There is so much we still do not know.

She didn’t do this alone: there are more traitors out there we have yet to find.”


Colin Proctor was another attendee at the team meeting.

“How are our two other protected witnesses doing?”

“Both are happy. They’re tucked up tight and secure with no one bothering them.”

Proctor, a former Met. Police detective sergeant, was relatively new as a spook. NISS had recruited a good number of ex-coppers such as himself, men and women joining the ranks of one of the largest intelligence services in the Western World. Svetlana wasn’t his responsibility, but Meredith Wells and Siobhan Rice were.

“We gave Meredith a video call with her mum for her birthday. It cheered her up because she’s been rather despondent recently. The contact bounced off more servers than I have fingers, so it was secure on her end. Meredith still wants to get on with things though. The waiting for her court appearance is turning out to be longer than she believed it would be.”

“That’s not up to us. She understands that, yes?”

“I’ve made her well aware.” Proctor explained that to Sophie. “The C.P.S. is ready when its ready. She’s smart enough to know there’s a political factor on when Manningtree’s trial start date goes ahead. It’s just that she does like waiting.”

“I’m guessing she would prefer to remain a witness than a co-defendant though?”

Proctor grinned. “Oh, yes.” He looked for a moment that he was going to let out a little laugh. “It’s the same with Siobhan too. We had a good chat the other day. Now, of course, she’s a different story when it came to what she did. Siobhan was talking about her father and she’s still glad she got her revenge against Manningtree for what she sees as his murder. The fact that she broke all sorts of laws doing so doesn’t bother her.”

“Barton’s death isn’t we can tie to our former prime minister though.”

“No… just like we can not link her directly to the deaths of two young aides who she was bedding, like she was Meredith too. But we know she had them killed, as she did with Siobhan’s father.

Is the Crown still not moving forward with those particular charges?”

“They aren’t.”

Sophie wished that the C.P.S would go after Manningtree for being a party to those murders – two former Downing Street aides and her foreign secretary – but it wasn’t up to her.

“I’ll keep them safe. Manningtree herself though… now that’s something I’m glad I’m not involved with.” Proctor said that with great relief.

Sophie could only sigh.


Missing from today’s team meeting was the lead officer who was assigned to keep a physical eye on Manningtree while she remained held on remand in prison. Amber and Harriet had made multiple visits to HMP Bronzefield yet there were NISS security personnel – colleague’s of Proctor’s – who were working alongside the prison authorities and the police concerning the holding of the country’s #1 prisoner.

The lead officer, John Randolph, wasn't here due to an overnight incident.

There had been a prison guard, one employed by the private company which ran Bronzefield, arrested by the police whom Randolph was currently debriefing. The guard had been one of those assigned to be in close contact with Manningtree’s custody. He’d been vetted by NISS and deemed to have been trustworthy. Such a miscalculation was on Randolph because that guard had fallen for the charms of his charge and been attempting to smuggle in a concealed mobile phone to her. Randolph was all over the guard, trying to figure out whether there was more to it than it initially seemed where the former prime minister had lured him into a scheme.

What was she up to? How Sophie would have liked to have known.

Outside of Bronzefield, there were protesters who were now a regular occurrence. The first crowds of supporters of Manningtree had been seen when she had appeared at Inner London Crown Court. The Surrey prison was where they were now showing up, holding banners and chanting for her release.

The whole thing had come from nowhere. After her effective defection to Moscow, Manningtree had lost the backing of seemingly the entire country. No one had wanted to be associated with her, least of all claim she was innocent and needed to be released. All that had changed once she was back in the UK. The nutters had come out of the woodwork. The crackpots and the deluded had formed a bloc online at first. Sophie had recalled what she’d said on the plane flying back from Cyprus about her thinking of the Russians forcing Manningtree out to cause trouble in the UK. They’d gotten their wish…

…but maybe arranged it that way?

Online unrest had turned to the physical crowds. The guard didn’t appear to be linked to them but Randolph was trying to discover if he too had been radicalised by the big bad internet.

Lead cheerleader for Manningtree’s defenders was now Lisa Payne, a one-time Cabinet colleague. She’d been chief secretary to the treasury and resigned after Manningtree had fled the country with her stated public reason being her opposition to NISS. The service which Sophie served and Payne opposed was more than just a merger of MI-5 & MI-6. It had the mission of protecting the country more than both former organisations had ever done with a ‘snoopers charter’ to investigate all sorts of threats to the country. Payne had taken up that banner of opposition at first, including attacking the close links with the Americans upon NISS being formed. Anglo-American relationships in the intelligence field were currently at a nadir – a boon for Moscow everyone knew – and Payne had redirected her activities once Manningtree was back in the country. Conspiracy theories were her current obsession.

She was calling for her former boss’s release. Sophie knew that other NISS staff were all over Payne, plus those who might want to do something foolish and try to free their hero. Her own remit wasn’t that woman, nor the nutters, but their presence couldn’t be ignored while doing what she was in seeking to uncover further instances of Manningtree’s treason.


Sophie moved the meeting on after Proctor’s remark.

“Harriet, did you ask Manningtree about the videotape?”

“As with anything else, she wouldn’t address the subject directly. She waved her hand at me, shooing my question away, muttering about A.I deep fakes too.”

“I had an idea…”

“I’m all ears, Amber.” Sophie was willing to listen. The matter of the unconfirmed videotape which had Manningtree commit her murderous crime all those years ago, which the Russians had used against her as the centre piece of their kompromat, was vital to all of this.

“We could have one made: a fake of our own, using what we have been told of it’s contents. We show it to her, tell her she’s caught. I know, I know, she’ll say it’s fake, but she might blurt out something foolish.”

“There’s a good chance she’s seen the original.”

Harriet said that before Sophie could.

“I’d think she has.” Sophie actually believed it was certain that Manningtree had seen the real recording made all those years ago in an Amsterdam hotel room where an American boy had died at her hands. “I’m liking the thinking outside of the box approach though.”

“That tape,” Mike added his input, “isn’t just being hunted by us though. The media are looking, so too foreign intelligence services for their own gain.”

“I’m aware of that. So too is the boss and her boss.” Sophie pointed at the ceiling, denoting the politicians far up above them. “They have colleagues of ours out looking for it too.”

How that was all going though, Sophie had absolutely no idea.

[jemhouston]

And that's why it's called The Great Game.

[Leander]

And that's why it's called The Great Game.

The Greatest Game.

[Leander]

Seven – Walking Back The Cat

Caitlin was a woman in the public eye. Her position as a journalist with a national UK newspaper, where most of her content was read online, attracted all sorts of negative attention. From London to Lagos to Lima, there was a global audience. That didn’t mean that those far afield read all that she had to write, nor paid attention to it much, but they knew who she was. Her picture was out there and she was that dreaded thing to what appeared to be countless men worldwide: a woman with an opinion.

Messages would be sent to her… hell, there’d even been a couple of old-fashioned letters. So few of those were worth paying attention to. From the flattering to the weird to the damn offensive, the harassment was at times ceaseless. It was because she often didn’t check her messages for some time, and ignored most of them, that she missed Paul MacDonald’s first attempt to get in touch with her.

His follow up was thus done in person.


“You don’t mind if I sit here, do you? There’s nowhere else.”

Without waiting for her to respond, the man who’d intruded upon her lunch sat down at her table. Caitlin’s eyes caught sight of a few other chairs empty in the busy coffee shop: what he said hadn’t been entirely true.

“Erm… Oh, I guess so.”

He hadn’t waited. His coffee cup was down first before he took his seat next to her.

She took a moment to take him in. He was in a smart suit, nice shoes too. In his mid forties, the Liverpudlian had sandy-coloured, thinning hair. His glasses were thick, just like the ’tash he had too. There were bags under his eyes. He looked tired. No, worn down, under whatever pressures were his behind his strained face.

The man took out his phone and stared at that rather than back at her.

Caitlin was in Paddington, around the corner from her office. Some days she had lunch at her desk, though mostly she went out to her or another place around the corner which she liked too. Her salad was finished, and her coffee nearly so. Caitlin drained what was left of her drink and then put her phone in her bag.

“You’re Caitlin Green, aren’t you? You write for the National?”

Clearly, he hadn’t just been looking for somewhere to sit. No, he’d been looking for her.

She stood up. “If you know who I am, you can email me or call my office.”

“N.I.S.S has all of your communications bugged, your mobile too. In fact, that’s been turned into a speaker for them – a Hot Mic they call it – so I waited until you zipped your bag shut before I said anything.”

“Who are you?” She remained standing beside him, her eyes on him while his were on the street outside. “What do you want?”

“I tried to email you, though I did sent something innocuous to make contact. Perhaps that’s why you didn’t get back to me.

Please sit down, will you?”

She didn’t.

“I asked who you were.”

“Neil MacDonald. I was not that long ago with the Secret Intelligence Service, working the Manningtree investigation.” After his name, what he had said next had been spoken quietly. There were people nearby. They either had their heads in their phones, earbuds in, or weren’t paying anyone but themselves any attention. Still, she’d noticed he hadn’t broadcast everything to them all.

She sat down, pulling her chair closer to his.

“Don’t put the handbag on the table: remember what I said.”

Cautious, fearful of bag snatcher, Caitlin placed it in her lap instead.

“Look, I’m sorry for the cloak-and-dagger approach.” He didn’t look apologetic. “As I said, I’ve been trying to get in touch yet there’s surveillance on you.”

“On me, really?” She made an effort to sound disbelieving.

“What do you think N.I.S.S has that big budget for? You were talking to Manningtree’s barrister recently. You’ve been probing the story from all angles, looking at the investigation that I ran back before she buggered off to Russia. They’re all over you, believe me on that.”

“Okay.”

She was still unconvinced. Caitlin had colleagues prone to conspiracy theories about state surveillance of them and their activities, yet she had never believed anyone would be bothered monitoring her. If it was anyone watching her, it would be this MacDonald character, someone who said he was once with the now defunct MI-6.

“When we were looking in Manningtree,” after having a sip of his coffee, he was talking quietly again, “I worked with Paul Philips and Grace Miller. You’ve heard their names, haven’t you? But not mine?”

“I know those names, but, yes, not yours.” Caitlin’s sources had admitted what they knew had gapping holes unfilled.

MacDonald briefly turned to her, smiling tightly. “I messed up. Ultimately, I was the one responsible for the failure to get Manningtree at the first time of asking. Six got rid of me in the aftermath of her being exposed in public and I don’t blame them for that.”

Caitlin nodded along as he spoke of his misfortune, noting the guilt that was written all over his face.

“I’ve spent many months walking back the cat,” he continued on with what he had to say, “and trying to figure out how what went wrong did. There was someone that the Russians had on the inside of the investigation all along, a young woman reporting to them and thus making sure we were always chasing our tails.”

Again, Caitlin paid attention. She was eager for details though. These brush strokes of a story weren’t enough for her. MacDonald could be a fraud, someone wasting her time.

“They arrested her last week: using a false passport to re-enter the country after she’d been abroad was the charge. I exposed her though, I turned my former colleagues onto her. Settling accounts with her had to be done.”

“What is it you wanted to talk to me about, Neil? Is there something you have come here to tell me?”

“What do you know about what happened in Prague?”

She shook her head. “Not that much. Some things though.” Details of that were sparse among her sources behind the basic outline.

“Have you heard the name Sergey Pishvanov?”

This time she gave him a nod. “He’s the Russian who went head first out of that window. Pishvanov said he had a copy of the infamous videotape for sale but it’s location died with him.”

MacDonald turned towards her, his chair squeaking. He had some more coffee then took off his glasses to clean them with a wipe from his pocket. When they went back on, he wore a foul look.

“That was all a lie. Pishvanov is still alive. He’s still got the tape too.”

*

Caitlin was in Cork two days later.

She’d flown to Ireland, where MacDonald said Pishvanov could be found, with the blessing of her editor… only after she’d badgered him immensely to allow for that.


Returning from her unexpected meeting with a new source, she’d walked into his office to find Isabel, a fellow journalist, a colleague she despised, jumping out of her editor’s lap. Isabel had a ‘reputation’ around the office, one finally proved to Caitlin by witnessing that incident. Once Isabel had left the room, Caitlin’s editor had started to cut off what he had believed she was going to ask. No, there was no money for the pay rise she was asking for. The National was being sold and until the new owners took charge – reported to be Chinese, according to what Caitlin had read from competitor’s coverage; staff at the National weren’t being told anything like that – there would be no decisions made. Short of money all the time, in need of a pay rise after two years of freezes, Caitlin had no hope of one despite asking the day beforehand. The time for a rise would be before a sale, not afterwards. That wasn’t what she’d come to talk to him about though.

He’d been dismissive of MacDonald, questioning if he was a phony up to no good. Going to Ireland – another country! – was out of the question. There was no money in the budget for that. Caitlin had talked him round though. She was good at that. Isabel had her charms, ones which Caitlin wasn’t going to copy, but her editor was still a journalist at heart. After she’d laid out what MacDonald had said alongside what else she knew, details she hadn’t brought to his attention before, her editor had relented. There was a discretionary budget. It would be a no-frills trip, Caitlin had been told, and she’d better come back with something otherwise he’d be getting it in the neck, and her too.


There was an address which MacDonald had given her, a house outside the city. Ireland was full of foreign-born nationals with cities such as Cork packed, a situation that had caused a housing crisis, one only increased after Ireland had entered the Schengen Area of open borders. Pishvanov had a whole one to himself though, something which Caitlin, who had a tiny one-bedroom flat in New Cross whose walls seemingly conspired to crush her, was immensely jealous of from the outside.

She rang the doorbell, planning in her head what to say while she waited.

The front door opened quickly, long before she could finish that preparation.

“I’ve come about the videotape, Mister Pishvanov.”

He shook his head. “I’m not Pishvanov. Pishvanov is dead.”

“Ah…” She went along with the pantomime she’d been told by MacDonald that he liked to play. “So, you’re Kolya then?”

“Are you a spy? What’s your name?”

“Caitlin Green. I’m a journalist with the National.” He raised a questioning eye at her. “That’s a London newspaper.”

“Reporters say they are spies and vice versa, I think.”

His accent had at first been distinctly Russian; now it was a curious mix of English and Irish. Yeah, this guy was odd.

“Can we talk about that videotape?”

“We go for a walk. I won’t have you in my house. It won’t be my house for much longer, I’ll have to leave it pretty soon considering you’ve turned up here, but no spy who says she’s a journalist is coming inside.

Wait here: two minutes.”

He closed the door before she could say anything in opposition to all of that. Caitlin stood on the doorstep, wondering if he was in fact going to come back out. She started to consider what to do if that proved an unfortunately accurate reading of the situation.

Alas, once more he surprised her.

Pishvanov came fast out of the house: “We walk, me and the lady who says she is from the National. Keep up: I move fast.”


He refused to have a conversation while they walked. He mentioned a park and said that there they would talk. A cigarette was offered to her without words. She refused so he puffed away himself. Pishvanov walked briskly, Caitlin struggling at first to keep up before finding her pace.

It only took a few minutes to reach the park.

“Who told you where you might find Pishvanov?”

“A man in London.” Caitlin opted to not name MacDonald.

He shook his head. “I will have to move now. People come looking for Pishvanov, they find me, decide I am him, and then all sorts of drama erupts.”

“Is that what happened in Prague, Kolya?”

“A spy or a journalist? Whichever one you are, that you are. Both ask too many questions.”

For a moment, Pishvanov reminded Caitlin of her favourite uncle: the one who said she always asked too many questions in the very same manner that like her walking companion this afternoon did.

“I told you, I’m with that newspaper.” Following his lead, she sat down on the bench besides which he had stopped them both. “So… you were going to tell me about Prague?”

“Was I now?”

“Yes.”

“Caitlin Green: what a lovely name. Caitlin Green who wants to know what happened that night in Prague at the nice apartment I had there, somewhere else I had to leave due to those who keep come looking for someone I am not.”

The man was exasperating. He was exactly as she had been told, but that didn’t make it any better. Caitlin silently fumed at him but wasn’t ready to give up, not at all.

“The way I heard it,” from MacDonald’s story back in that London coffee shop, “you were ironing that night. A shirt, I was told, yes?”

He smiled. Pishvanov looked like he was recalling a good memory. “My favourite shirt that was, one which I wouldn’t trust the girl who came weekly to clean and do housework to touch.

They came through the door fast but not quick enough. Two of them, both barging in foolishly without any regard that I could defend myself. I unplugged the iron, wrapped the electrical cord around my wrist, and attacked them before they could understand what a mistake they made.”

“Two hitmen and you had just an iron?” Caitlin asked with incredulity.

“Of course!” He laughed, a real belly laugh, as if he was a man with twice the bulk he had. “You could kill someone with one of those pretty shoes you’re wearing. You’ve just got to know how… and be mentally prepared to do it.

I clobbered one with the iron first, catching him on the side of the head. The second one was fumbling with his gun and I burnt the back of his hand first. Then I pushed it into his face. Oh, I can remember the smell now. And I can hear his screams too as his flesh sizzled. I went back to the first one, beat his head in until I could see his brains – such as they were –, then returned to the second hitman. He begged for his life. I burnt his face some more, dragged him by his ankles to the window doors and threw him out off the balcony.”

All while smiling, Pishvanov had related his tale of a double murder. He lit another cigarette afterwards, his eyes looking up at the cloudy sky above them.

“I don’t understand how what happened afterwards could have. How was that man confused with you? I don’t just mean straight away, but in the aftermath. The Czech Police, British M.I.Six, the Russian intelligence service… they all said you died.”

He laughed again, not as fully as before though. “I cut a deal with the S.V.R. They would have just kept on sending killers, better ones in the long run I knew. I gave them Pishvanov’s secret videotape and they let me go. They covered it all up.”

“Really? I’m not believing this to be honest.”

“They know that I am not Pishvanov and they got what they wanted. I agreed to leave, to make no more trouble.” He looked pretty pleased with himself.

“Things don’t happen like that.” She shook her head. “I don’t buy it.”

He flicked his unfinished cigarette away. “You do what you want, you think what you want. It is what happened. I think our conversation is done.”

“I think you kept a copy of the tape. Can I see it?”

“Pishvanov entrusted me with the video. I only had one and I gave that to the Russians so they would stop sending killers after me. If I had another, I would have tried to sell it though it wouldn’t be worth as much now as it was before.

But,” he turned to stare right at her, his hand holding her wrist briefly, “there is no second copy. Perhaps the Russian Government will put the video on the internet: I’m surprised that they haven’t yet. As to me, I have nothing.

Now, Caitlin Green, go back to London and your newspaper, or your spy H.Q, whichever one you come from, and, please, don’t try to track me down again.”


It wasn’t as if Caitlin hadn’t been sufficiently warned.

MacDonald had told her back in London that Pishvanov lived in cloud cuckoo land. He would pretend he was someone named Kolya, the retired spy had said, and tell you some wild stories too. There was a second source that Caitlin had, one who’d been feeding her information before MacDonald had approached her in that coffee shop. Her knowledge of Pishvanov was second hand too and while not as detailed as that of MacDonald, it had been accurate enough: the man was mad and he’d give away nothing.

Pishvanov had told her to leave yet it was he who did so. He got up, straightened his tie – he’d put that on before he had come out of his house – and then left her on the bench. She watched him walk slowly but purposefully across the park before finally disappearing from view. Remaining where she was, Caitlin considered what he had told her.

None of it she believed. The story about the assassins whom he said he had attacked and killed sounded like a cheap riff off of another story she’d heard. There’d been a Russian defector in the UK, a woman was all the information that Caitlin knew about that defector’s identity, who had used various household objects to eliminate a pair of killers. Pishvanov had stolen that tale! His deal with the Russians was just as unbelievable. Even if it wasn’t, of course he had a copy of that videotape.

Her editor had asked her why she wanted it, so too had MacDonald. The answer was simple: she wanted the world to see it. Finding it and getting the images broadcast were driving her at the minute. As to Pishvanov, he was the nightmare that there had been the warnings about. Caitlin sat contemplating another way of getting her hands on that tape.

Another question came to her as she did. It wasn’t one for the now gone Pishvanov, but for herself. What am I missing here?

[Leander]

Eight – Alicia Manningtree Is Innocent

The (self-appointed) campaign field coordinator invited her into his office.

“Mandy, this way.”

They’d just had a handshake. Amanda Cunningham was reflecting upon his soft hands as she followed his lead. Jamie Hazelnut – she was going to have to stop calling him ‘chief nut’ in her head – walked fast and she had to adjust herself to keep up with him. His office was down one corridor then another, deep with the third floor suite of offices in this building on the edge of Uxbridge.

It was ever so quiet and she could hear the echoes of her heels on the floor in the unexpected near silence of what should have been a busy place.

“We’re changing everything around here soon enough,” Jamie turned briefly to look at her as he spoke, “and moving the reception and waiting area over to the other side. It’s been chaos since we moved in here.”

He’d already turned his back to her as he carried on leading the way. “It’s all good,” she told him, “I’m just glad to be here.”

“And I am to have you too. Here we are.”

Finally, they were inside.

“Where can I sit, Jamie?”

“Of course: go right ahead.” He lifted a stack of books off the chair on the other side of his desk. “Here you are.”

He sat down himself, smiled at her as he moved some papers around his rather cluttered desk.

“It’s nice to meet you in person Mandy Kirby.”

Jamie was calling her by a name that wasn’t hers but that was to be expected. Amanda Cunningham was an NISS field intelligence officer with years of experience at domestic political counter-subversion: the enemy. On the other hand, Mandy Kirby was a retired GP office assistant with a range of far-out political views offering her services as a volunteer administrator for a political activist campaign which had all the hallmarks of Russian state astroturfing.

“It’s just not the same over Zoom, is it?”

Another smile, one as soft as his hands. “I agree completely.” Whether he did or not, she couldn’t read the truth there. “But we finally meet and that can only be a good thing.”

“I’m ready to get started.”

“Which is a good thing,” he was repeating himself, “for me to have to hear, I tell you that. As per our agreement, you won’t be in here much but I do have an office for you. It’s not going to be anywhere as comfortable as the one you have at home but…”

“You haven’t seen my flat!” Amanda smiled as she interrupted him.

“…but, as I said, things are changing here. The campaign is growing and I need your help, Manningtree does I should say, to keep up with it all. Whatever time you can spare to be here, rather than working from home, I’ll be glad to see you in the building.

This place will be a madhouse and it needs admin. attention.”

There was a phone ringing in a distant office, one that went unanswered. That was the only sound that Amanda could hear. Jamie was saying that the campaign offices were going to be busy in time but she was struggling to believe him.

“So, as we discussed, the job role will be…”

This time it was he interrupting, the man who had a lot to say: “What it will involve is going to be different from what you’ve done before in many ways yet, at the same time, probably the same.

My focus is keeping the campaign activists on-message. That means when they gather to protest in person but also their online activities too. We’re facing such a strong opposition lined up against us and that requires me to be busy, on the move too.

The Uxbridge office here will coordinate all London-based activities and this is, of course, Lisa Payne’s base of operations as well.”

“Does she come her much?”

Amanda asked that with a forced excitement in her voice. She actually had no intention of spending any time with that woman who was the public face of the campaign to highlight the alleged innocence of her former Cabinet colleague.

“Yes and no. Anyway,” he turned back to what he’d been saying, as Amanda saw that Jamie liked interrupting people but not having that done to himself, “it’s just pure office tasks. As I said, we’re increasingly putting more effort into the offline activities with the coordination from here. That means I’ll need your assistance in various roles.”

He’d told her nothing!

Amanda was mightily glad that she wasn’t really working for him.

Imagine if this was her first day at a real job!

She’d been nodding along and gave him another smile once he’d finished talking about what was, in short, nothing at all. Amanda knew what he’d need her to do and that was perfectly within her capabilities.

“I saw Lisa speaking last night at that event up in Birmingham.”

“The boos that came were from plants put in the crowd from those working to keep Manningtree locked up.” Utter confidence came with that assertion from Jamie.

“I didn’t pay any attention to the boos. The boots though.” Amanda grinned, aiming for the vapid, air-headed look she was trying to pull off. “I really like them. Just like our former prime minister, Lisa has some style.”

Payne had been wearing faux leather knee high boots when talking to a crowd of Manningtree supporters in the Midlands the previous evening. She was too short and had looked ridiculous in them. Amanda’s professed admiration was all part of her act though, one that needed Jamie to not think much of her intelligence while at the same time being assured of her dedication to the cause.

“Lisa is the brightest star we have. With her at the forefront, soon enough Manningtree’s innocence will be accepted as fact and a great injustice overturned.”

Once more, Jamie expressed what she was sure were his true beliefs there.

“I,” Amanda lied, “couldn’t agree more. Now, let’s go see this office of mine. I’m sure that it’s not as bad as you think!”

Amanda – Mandy to those whom Jamie would into introduce her to – got busy.

*

Before coming to Uxbridge, before applying for the volunteer role, one which someone else had gone for yet inexplicitly found themselves will all sorts of problems in making an application, Amanda had been briefed on how it all had begun. There’d been a social media post made almost a year ago by a woman out in Worcester, Manningtree’s old constituency. It had been just the single sentence, one which had brought with it immense later engagement.

Alicia Manningtree Is Innocent !!!

Russian bots were responsible for much of the later amplification of the claim though initially it had been real people online who had copy-pasted the same statement and put it out everywhere. They were those who believed that Manningtree was being framed by Britain’s security services, just as the former prime minister was saying from Moscow. The funny thing was – well… Amanda found it amusing anyway – that the original poster hadn’t been serious. She was someone who actually despised Manningtree. It had been an ironic joke. The same woman had written previous posts, one which no one had paid any attention to, claiming that her cat self-identified as a vegan velociraptor and the assertion that anyone who claimed that the moon was made of cheese was a liar because it in fact consisted of a giant cauliflower in the sky.

After it had gone viral, then came the nefarious attention paid to it from abroad. NISS and GCHQ had traced back the activity in getting the first post, and the subsequent ones too, plenty of attention. The Russians had their dirty fingerprints everywhere. Conspiracy theories about Manningtree had been rampant beforehand yet with that simple statement, they had a message to centre upon. No matter what rabbit holes the deluded believers went down, they all started from that point: that Manningtree was innocent. And the Russians kept on pressing the matter with their help in getting it shared, retweeted and reposted.


Jamie was one of the first few hundred people putting the message out everywhere online. He’d been on message boards as well as social media. He’d even spoken to the traditional media in an interview which hadn’t been broadcast but which NISS had seen had seen. He wasn’t in contact with any Russians, nor was anyone else in the campaign that had sprung up to free Manningtree, one which he was helping in a major way to coordinate. Payne wasn’t a willing participant in whatever end goal the Russian scheming was all about. Nonetheless, he was one of their pawns: a willing idiot in it, all without his direct knowledge of that.

There were Russian exiles in the UK. Such people hadn’t even gone home after Koskhin had taken power there and an amnesty had been declared for opponents of his dead predecessor. Which, truthfully, wouldn’t have been a good idea for most of them anyway because the leopard hadn’t changed its spots. For many years, long before Manningtree had come on the scene, many of those exiles had been involving themselves in British politics. They’d been using their financial weight to advance their own interests, doing so with dubious regard for the legalities of doing so. Scandal had threatened again and again, never quite coming to pass. They’d kept their heads down when she’d been exposed for what she was, never being tied publicly to her because there was no clear link. They were enemies of Moscow and she was linked to Russia. All of that aside, NISS and the British Government were well aware that many of the exiles weren’t telling the truth about where their loyalties really lay.

Some of them were tied into doing Moscow’s bidding, willingly or not.

Russian money was suspected of being used to help the campaign to recognise Manningtree as innocent. It was being funnelled through deniable sources, where Britons themselves were being made use of, all at the direction of Moscow. This was known but had yet to be proved.

Amanda was part of the effort to get solid confirmation on that.


Her cover was foolproof. She was using a ‘cold body’: a false identity not just made up on the spot but one cultivated over time. It was one of many created by MI-5 for the future use by its officers working undercover in the UK. The cold body had an entire life ready for someone to make use of. All it needed was someone to slip into it to make it warm. Mandy Kirby was in every way that was checkable a real person. She was someone who it could be ‘proved’ was who she said it was. It wasn’t just about having a checkable history of employment, residence and bill payments, nor just a valid passport & driving license too, but real people were standing by to vouch for whom Amanda was claiming to be too. There was an online presence going back decades, one tweaked recently yet not even that much.

Jamie would have run a basic check on her – he’d be trying to keep the enemy out – yet Amanda and her superiors had paid more attention to making sure that the Russians, should they take a nosy look, find her to be all that she said she was as well.

She had security just in case. There were Watchers on her and her flat: one that she’d moved into a week beforehand yet supposed had been living there for two years. They were watching in case anyone was watching her. Working for MI-5 and now it’s NISS replacement, Amanda had long ago taken to heart the mantra ‘just because you’re paranoid, it doesn’t mean they aren’t out to get you’.

Her mission in taking the role at Uxbridge – which, she had said upon first being given the task was one heck of a far-out-of-the-way-place to be running a campaign from – wasn’t one which Jamie and others would be on their guard against. Amanda wasn’t going to be in and out of that office seeking to sabotage what they were doing. The Security Secretary himself might have wanted that done, and had hinted at such an action to the prime minister, but NISS hadn’t sent her there to do that. The task allotted was for to be gaining information from the inside. GCHQ had already done their own remote black bag job in cracking the campaign’s computers. She’d be talking to people, being nosy with a friendly face. There would be a lot to find out. It would take time yet it was all perfectly doable, just with patience.

That would start with Payne – whom Amanda did intend to avoid directly – and discovering just who was at the front end of the donation funnel to her to keep this place, and others like it, getting up and running.


On Amanda’s first day, she dealt with that admin. It was easy and something that Jamie could have done himself. She sent emails and made phone calls. There was a venue being hired for another event, this one in Lincoln, and there needed to be confirmation of the timings for not just the speakers but to get prep. work inside done and then a clean up done afterwards as well. Stewards were going to be used and there was cooperation with the local authorities to make sure that the event went off safely. Amanda was in contact with two printing firms as well, checking on the progress of orders made by the campaign for leaflets and also banners for further events with less profile than the planned one in Lincoln. There was some liaising to be done with the contractors who were due to transform the suite of offices in Uxbridge as a final task.

Everywhere in all of that there were links to be investigated. Money was coming in to make all of this happen with the sources to be looked into deeply.

On her way out, Amanda ran into ‘little nut’: Jamie’s deputy. Shorter than him and just as dedicated to it all, so her briefing had told her, Amanda had a quick chat with Justine Sullivan.

“Everyday we win over more people, Amanda. Every single day there are those out there across the country who are reminded why the supported Manningtree in the first place.” With sparkling eyes, Justine meant every word of it.

“I feel already to be excited to be a part of this.” Amanda wasn’t lying… it was just that her part in it all wasn’t what Justine could imagine.

“Vindication is coming.” She was nodding her head like a crazy woman. “Manningtree’s innocence will be there for all to see. And do you know what will happen at the end of that process?”

Amanda had a good idea of what Justine was going to say but played dumb. “What?”

“With Lisa out front on the attack,” Justine spoke admiringly of Payne, someone whom Amanda had heard others in the campaign had misgivings about when it came to that woman’s intentions, “Manningtree will be back in Downing Street.”

The willpower in Amanda, along with all of her training and intelligence work experience, kept her from laughing out loud. There’d been a special law passed in Parliament last year to expel Manningtree from her position as an MP – she’d refused to quit – and the woman was on trial for the most egregious case of treason that the UK had ever faced. Her crimes, ones including alleged murder, were known about across the country and the whole world too. She’d allowed herself to be a meatpuppet while on Russian state television to share the worldview of the Kremlin.

The last place that Manningtree was ever going to be was back in Downing Street.

“This,” Amanda told her new colleague with as much false honesty as she could muster, “is what we’re all working to achieve.”

[jemhouston]

Like the detail you put in the chapter.

[Leander]

Like the detail you put in the chapter.

Thank you.