Читать книгу A Divided Spy: A gripping espionage thriller from the master of the modern spy novel - Charles Cumming - Страница 11

Kell was at his flat in Sinclair Road within twenty minutes. He had been inside for less than five when his phone rang, a rare landline call that Kell assumed would be from Claire. The number was otherwise known only to SIS Personnel.

‘Guv?’

It didn’t take long for Kell to pick the voice. Born and raised in Elephant and Castle, then two decades in Tech-Ops at MI5.

‘Harold?’

‘The one and only.’

‘How did you get this number?’

‘Nice to hear from you, too.’

‘How?’ Kell asked again.

‘Do we have to do this?’

It was a fair question. With half a dozen clicks of a mouse, Harold Mowbray could have found out Kell’s blood type and credit rating. Now private sector, he had worked closely with Amelia on two occasions in the previous three years: Kell’s home number might even have come directly from ‘C’.

‘OK. So how have you been?’

‘Good, guv. Good.’

‘Arsenal doing all right?’

‘Nah. Gave them up for Lent. Too many pretty boys in midfield.’

Kell found himself reaching for a cigarette that wasn’t there. He thought back to the previous summer, sitting with Mowbray in a Bayswater safe house killing time waiting for a mole. Harold had known that Kell was in love with Rachel. He had come to the funeral, paid his respects. Kell trusted him insomuch as he had always been efficient and reliable, but knew that theirs was a professional relationship that would never transcend Mowbray’s loyalty to whoever was paying his bills.

‘So what’s up?’ he asked. ‘You selling something? Want me to buy your season ticket to Highbury?’

‘Keep up. Arsenal moved out of Highbury years ago. Been playing at the Emirates since 2006.’ It occurred to Kell that, save for a perfunctory exchange in Pret A Manger, this was the first conversation he had held with another human being in over twenty-four hours. The night before he had cooked spaghetti bolognese at home and watched back-to-back episodes of House of Cards. In the morning he had gone to the gym, then wandered alone around an exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery. Sometimes he would go for days without any meaningful interaction whatsoever.

‘Still,’ said Mowbray, ‘we need to have a chat.’

‘Isn’t that what we’re doing?’

‘Face to face. Mano a mano. Too long and complicated for the phone.’

That could mean only one thing. Work. Blowback from a previous operation, or a dangled carrot on something new. Either way, Mowbray didn’t trust Kell’s landline to keep it a secret. Anybody could be listening in. London. Paris. Moscow.

‘You remember that Middle Eastern place we used to go to on the American gig?’

‘Which one?’ ‘The American gig’ had been the molehunt. Ryan Kleckner. A CIA officer in the pay of the SVR, Russia’s foreign intelligence service.

‘The one with the waitress.’

‘Oh, that one.’ Kell made a joke of it, but understood that Mowbray was being deliberately obscure. There was only one Middle Eastern restaurant that both of them had been to on the Kleckner operation. Westbourne Grove. Persian. Kell had no recollection of the waitress, pretty or otherwise. Mowbray was simply making sure that their table wouldn’t be covered in advance.

‘Can you make dinner tonight?’ he asked.

Kell thought about stalling but was too intrigued by the invitation. Besides, he was looking at another night of leftovers and House of Cards. Dinner with Harold would be a fillip.

‘Meet you there at eight?’ he suggested.

‘You will know me by the smell of my cologne.’