always on the most secure lines? How many whispered conversations in corridors between panicked politicians and civil servants desperate to cover their backsides? I mean Jesus, Reni!’ I break out. ‘A young man who has lived and worked among you in Berlin, loves your language and your people and considers he has a German heart. Not some lowlife mercenary, but a real thinking man with a crazy mission to save Europe singlehanded. Didn’t you sense that about him when you played Maria Brandt for him?’
‘I played Maria Brandt suddenly? What on earth gave you that stupid impression?’
‘Don’t tell me you handed him to your number two. Not you, Reni. A walk-in from British intelligence with a shopping list of top secrets?’
I am expecting her to protest again, to deny, deny, as we have both been taught to do. Instead of which, some kind of softening or resignation overcomes her and she turns away from me and consults the morning sky.
‘Is this why they fired you, Nat?’ she asks. ‘For the boy?’
‘In part.’
‘And now you have come to rescue us from him.’
‘Not from Ed. From yourselves. What I’m trying to tell you is that somewhere along the line between London, Berlin, Munich, Frankfurt and wherever else your masters confer, Shannon’s offer to you wasn’t just blown. It was intercepted and taken up by a rival firm.’
A flock of gulls has settled beneath us in a single swoop.
‘An American firm?’
‘Russian,’ I say, and wait while she continues with great intensity to observe the gulls.
‘Posing as our Service? Under our false flag? Moscow has recruited Shannon?’ she demands for verification.
Only her small fists, clenched on her knees for combat, betray her outrage.
‘They told him that Maria’s refusal to accept his offer was a delaying tactic while they got their act together.’
‘And he believed that shit? Dear God.’
Again we sit in silence. But the protective hostility in her has drained away. Just as in Helsinki, we are comrades in a cause, even if we don’t admit it.
‘What’s Jericho?’ I ask. ‘The mega-secret codeword material that made him flip. Shannon only read a small part of it but that seems to have been enough for him to come running to you.’
Her eyes are wide on mine all the time, as they were when we made love. Her voice has lost its official edge.
‘You don’t know Jericho?’
‘Not cleared for it. Never was, and by the look of it, never will be.’
She has dropped off. She is meditating. She has entered a trance. Slowly her eyes open. I’m still here.
‘Do you swear to me, Nat – as a man, as who you are – that you are telling me the truth? The whole truth?’
‘If I knew the whole truth I would tell it to you. What I’ve told you is all I know.’
‘And the Russians have convinced him?’
‘They’ve convinced my Service too. They made a pretty good job of it. What’s Jericho?’ I ask her again.
‘From what Shannon told me? I am to tell you your own country’s dirty secrets?’
‘If that’s what they are. I heard dialogue. That was the nearest I could get. A super-sensitive, high-level Anglo-American dialogue conducted through intelligence channels.’
She takes a breath, closes her eyes again, opens them and fixes her gaze on mine.
‘According to Shannon, what he read was clear proof of an Anglo-American covert operation already in the planning stage with the dual aim of undermining the social democratic institutions of the European Union and dismantling our international trading tariffs.’ She takes another deep breath and continues. ‘In the post-Brexit era Britain will be desperate for increased trade with America. America will accommodate Britain’s needs, but only on terms. One such term will be a joint covert operation to obtain by persuasion – bribery and blackmail not excluded – officials, parliamentarians and opinion-makers of the European Establishment. Also to disseminate fake news on a large scale in order to aggravate existing differences between member states of the Union.’
‘Are you quoting Shannon, by any chance?’
‘I am quoting near enough what he claimed was the introductory foreword to the Jericho document. He claimed to have memorized three hundred words of it. I wrote them down. At first I didn’t believe him.’
‘Do you now?’
‘Yes I do. So did my Service. So did my government. It seems we possess collateral intelligence that supports his story. Not all Americans are Europhobes. Not all Brits are passionate for a trade alliance with Trump’s America at any price.’
‘But you turned him down nevertheless.’
‘My government prefers to believe that