was perhaps still there, but he was not, and he knew he would never see or hear from his son again.
Sumners sat behind a desk in his tiny office on the tenth floor of MI6 headquarters on the south side of the Thames, a stone’s throw from Vauxhall Bridge.The one window overlooked the river and was some consolation for the size of the room, which was, in fact, not exceptionally small for the building. His boss’s office, on the floor above, was only marginally larger and did not have a view.The room was clean, tidy and as lacklustre as one might expect for a civil servant’s office.
Chalmers walked in without knocking, placed a file on Sumners’ desk and left without either men saying anything, which was quite normal. On the surface, life in the firm hadn’t changed for Sumners. From a psychological point of view, he had dealt with his situation back in Israel and succeeded in putting it behind him. Two months had passed since that horrible day on board the C130 on the tarmac of Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion airport but, as time went by, he thought about it less and less. Even the presence of Chalmers and his boss evoked few memories of that day, other than perhaps the slightest of fleeting images. It was simple enough for a man like Sumners to put it out of his mind. He had taken the logical approach and reasoned that he was never going to get another crack at running a field operation, and it was wise to believe so for the healing process to take effect. To that end he re-accepted his long-time role as a desk officer - and a damned good one at that - and continued to exert the confidence and authority he had enjoyed before the incident, which was considerable. A handful of people in the building might have had an inkling of what had taken place, but the majority would not. If it had been a major scene and Sumners had lost control and thrown a wobbly then perhaps that much of the story might have got out. But since it was a top-secret operation, explaining Sumners’ little moment would require far more detail than would be deemed acceptable. Sumners was as aware of that as anyone and it aided his rehabilitation.
There was a knock and Sumners asked the caller in without looking up from his computer monitor until the door opened, whereupon he instantly stopped what he was doing and stared at his visitor. There was, of course, one person who would always remind Sumners of his folly, and as he walked into the room the memory of that day, as well as the intense embarrassment and implications of his character flaws, came flooding back.
Stratton looked remarkably well, which was not a surprise since he had not been involved with work since Jerusalem save for a couple of debriefs where the debriefers came to him. After two days in Israel he flew home, and a week later was walking around looking normal. In less than a month he went on his first long jog and a week after that his first workout in the gym. A Navy surgeon had told him that he could expect to be barred from diving but that would depend on how well his lung healed, and in the same sentence he suggested an operational necessity might supersede such a barring unless he was drastically impaired. He had spent much of his time off kicking back in the South of France, enjoying the quiet off-season, eating well, exercising and catching up on his reading. He should have been feeling depressed considering his mindset throughout the operation and the months prior to it, but the explosion and the injury had been a kind of cleansing. For reasons he could not precisely put a finger on, Stratton felt better than he had for a long time and the nearest explanation he could find was that he was more in control. Walking into the MI6 headquarters only confirmed the feeling. No one he passed in the labyrinth of corridors knew him, although there was a glance and a subtle nod from two senior-looking suits as he walked through the high-security entrance that suggested they knew who he was and approved of him. A few months prior, had he walked into Sumners’ office, much as he hated it he would have felt as if he had his cap in his hand. Now