She chewed on the breadsticks with the same enthusiasm with which she talked. Fenton, watching her and listening, didn't think research analysts were overwhelmed with invitations.
"There is much greater internal stability now. They've wiped out the Mujahiddin-e-Khalq. Very few bombs explode in Tehran. The Monarchist faction is gone. I accept that they are paranoid about opposition, and that'll last a bit longer, but if we break their isolation they'll get respectable quickly. The Americans forever bleat about state-sponsored terrorism when a bit of hush and encouragement will do a quicker job than a stick. We believe the importance of their guerrilla training camps is overemphasized. We think they offer more training in theological correctness than in bomb-making. Every time a bomb goes off in America they shout about Iran. Remember the knee-jerk accusation that Iran was responsible for Oklahoma City? Ouch… Remember every American commentator insisting that Iran had knocked TWA 800 into the sea. You… Remember, Iran had organized the attacks in Saudi, but it's nowhere near proven. We think they give encouragement, financial support, offer a safe haven to dissident groups, but that is way short of controlling them. The Americans need an enemy right now, Iran is available, but the facts don't support the need."
She was grey-haired, severely dressed, with only a small sterling-silver brooch for ornament, but there was a twinkle of light in her face.
"Of course, Iran has ambitions. Iran demands recognition as a regional power and believes she has the economic, cultural and military clout to deserve that status. The current leaders detest the image abroad of a pariah state, and they say they received no credit for a statesmanlike neutral posture during Desert Storm. They deny they export revolution. They say that all they export is oil, carpets and pistachio nuts. They say they practise good neighbourliness. At the bottom line they cannot afford to offend the West because the West is the purchaser of their crude, and without that revenue the country simply folds. Actually, they rather respect the British, admire us, give us credit where it may not be due. They have a saying, "If you stub your foot on a stone you can be sure an Englishman placed it there." London's awash with Iranian dissidents but they're alive, aren't they? They're not being shot dead and blown up. We don't think they want to offend us, quite the opposite. Believe me, the Shah was more neurotic about British intelligence and meddling than the present lot. The Shah said, "If you lift Khomeini's beard you will find printed under it, "Made in Britain'." Go to the trade fairs, go to the Queen's birthday party at our summer residence, you'll find great friendship for the British."
They ate pasta. The end of the Cold War had been a career disaster for Harry Fenton. He was of the old school at Five; a former tank squadron commander in Germany eyeballing Soviet armour, he had found it a straightforward move into counter-espionage when soldiering lost its glitter attraction. He'd been on major spy investigations and found that work totally fulfilling. But the bloody Wall had come down, the enemy was now to be treated as an ally and, after years of dogged resistance, he'd been shuffled to the Islamic Desk. For the first time since that move he felt a fris son of excitement.
"Another hoary old favourite is Weapons of Mass Destruction, which gets everyone in a proper lather. Our assessment goes against the grain. They're way behind in the production of a microbiological capability. Research facilities, yes, but they're not there. On the chemical front, and they have cause to develop such hideous weapons after the gassing the Iraqis gave them, they were making fast progress until five years ago. Then we don't know why everything seemed to stop. It was peculiar and I don't have the answer. They're back on track now but they lost several years.
"Top of the list for horror stories is the ayatollahs' nuke, makes the Americans wet their Y-fronts, but we think it's ten years away, that it was ten years away five years ago, that it'll be ten years away in five years' time. Yes, they have missiles for delivery, they can reach the Saudi oilfields, but they've nothing that matters to put in the warheads. Anyway, they're not idiots, they cannot compete on military terms with the Americans and they know it. They're not going to hit Saudi and get a bashing they can't defend themselves from. Is this a disappointment to you? God, look at the time! My little white neck will be on the block when I wobble in smelling of your booze as if it matters."
She nodded enthusiastic agreement when he pointed to the empty first bottle, then raised his hand to the waiter for another to be brought. She had lamb and he had veal.
"Bear with me. I'm getting there… As I said, the dissidents here are still alive. How long since we last expelled one of their lOs for sniffing round a target? Six years. OK, OK, there are plenty of disparate groups, factions of their intelligence agencies that are not under specific control, they moonlight, but not on a big one. Would they come into Britain and attempt to assassinate a guarded target? No. Absolutely not. Am I a kill-joy? But I would urge considerable caution on you in the event that my assessment is wrong. Please, if I am wrong, don't go into the pulpit and denounce that country because you would set back years of quiet diplomacy and cut the legs off those we believe are moderates. We're not dealing with school-brat vandals, who should be made an example of, but with a nation state we have to live with… Damn good lunch, thanks."
He walked back to Thames House and put his head round Cox's door.
He had, of course, a network of high-level contacts; he had been with a senior and respected official of Foreign and Commonwealth Office, and very illuminating it had been.
The eyes of Cox, the bureaucrat, beaded on him.
"Do they believe Iran is on the march, coming to Suffolk?"
"They don't, no and if they are on the march then the FCO pleads for a soft line."
"Difficult to take a soft line with an assassin."
Fenton boasted, "I've several more sources that I'll be milking. If there's more to know, I'll find it."
"The motivation that makes people fight in a holy war is that death does not represent the end of life for a human being…"
The words were in his mind. He had prayed for the last time that day, the fifth time, an hour and a half after dusk. He had slept well and was rested. He had eaten a small portion of the rice and boiled chicken brought him by the master. He had sat for many minutes on the lavatory in the corner of the cabin until he was satisfied that his bowels and bladder were cleaned, emptied, because that was important. He had stripped, washed himself with soap in the tiny shower cubicle that had been installed for the privacy and personal use of the master's wife. He had dried himself, then shaved.
"On the contrary, immortal life begins after death, and the kind of salvation that a man has in the next world is dependent on the kind of life he lives in this world…"
In his mind were the words of the ayatollah who taught at a college in the city of Qom. He stood naked in the cabin. The clothes he had worn when he had boarded the tanker off the port of Bandar Abbas, and on the voyage, with the wedding ring and the gold chain from his neck, were now folded in the cupboard with the chadors and rou push trousers left by the master's wife. He was a tall man, 1.87 metres. He was well muscled yet weighed only 86 kilos. His hair was dark, close, short-cut, but with a neat parting that he combed to an exact line. He was pale-skinned for an Iranian, as if he did not come from the Gulf but from the sunbathed countries and islands of the Mediterranean; it was a reason he had been chosen. The texture of his skin was the gift of his mother, along with the jutting chin and the determination. From his father, he took his eyes, deep-set, shrouded in secrecy. He was thirty-six years old.