Knight was still pretending to examine the phone on Donovan's desk.
"You got kids, Alex?" asked Donovan.
"I haven't been blessed yet," said Knight with a straight face. He pushed his black-framed spectacles further up his nose.
"Probably best," said Donovan. He looked at his watch.
"I've got to make a call."
"Landline here's okay," said Knight.
Donovan picked up one of his mobiles.
"Nah, I'll use this."
Knight nodded at the mobile.
"You know they can key into those, even the GSM digitals?"
"Yeah, but only if they know the number. I'm going through Sim cards like there's no tomorrow."
Donovan took the phone into the back garden, padding over the grass in his bare feet. He called Underwood at the number where the detective had said he'd be. It was a public phone box about half a mile from Underwood's flat in Shepherd's Bush. Underwood answered immediately.
"I'm late for work," the detective complained.
"What did you find out?" asked Donovan.
"He's an art dealer, known to us. Thought to be receiving, but never been proved. Just whispers. To be honest, it's a resources thing. Take too much time and effort to target him. There are bigger receivers around. He's got a legitimate business that makes money, I think he just dabbles with stolen stuff. There's a couple of drugs busts, but both were small amounts of cannabis and he was warned both times. String of motoring of fences but he's still got his licence. Just."
"No chance that he's one of yours?"
"He's not a registered informer, and they're all registered these days. No registration, no case, you know that."
"Cheers, Dicko."
"What's the story on this guy?" asked the detective.
"He's sold some paintings for me, that's all. I had him around the house and I just wanted to be sure he was clean."
Donovan thanked the detective and replaced the receiver. Donovan hadn't expected any revelations from Underwood. He had a sixth sense where undercover agents and grasses were concerned, and Jamie Fullerton hadn't set off any alarm bells. He was a bit too keen, but that was no bad thing. He'd certainly done a great job selling Donovan's paintings and delivering the bank drafts to Rodriguez. Fullerton's drug-taking was a potential problem, however. The last thing Donovan needed was to be caught anywhere near a Class A drug.
Donovan gulped his tea in the kitchen, then took the back off the mobile phone and took out the Sim card. Donovan took the card upstairs and flushed it down the toilet before shaving and showering. When he went back downstairs he was wearing black jeans and a Ralph Lauren blue denim shirt, the sleeves rolled up to his elbows.
Knight was in the sitting room working on the phone there.
"Soon be done downstairs, Den."
"All clear?"
"So far. You sure they're looking at you?" . "No doubt." Donovan nodded at the black box that Knight was attaching to the phone.
"They're foolproof, yeah?"
"For the standard surveillance stuff, yeah. Money-back guarantee. And the hook switch gizmo is infallible. Your worry would be if it were spooks and they were watching you through satellite or microwave relay. Cops or Customs couldn't do that, but Six and Five could. That wouldn't show up this end."
Donovan pulled a face. Since MI6 and MI5 had been allowed to switch their attentions to drug running and money laundering in addition to their standard national security remit, there was every chance that the spooks would be on his case. Not that it mattered. He always regarded all landlines as suspect, with the exception of randomly chosen public call boxes.
"Do you want me to show you the portable MRF detector?"
"Sure."
Knight went over to his suitcase and took out a blue and white box. He opened it and slid out a white polystyrene moulding inside which was a grey plastic box the size of a beeper, with a belt clip on one side. There were three jack points on one end and a digital display on the other. Knight removed a rechargeable battery from the polystyrene and tossed it to Donovan.
"Charge it up overnight. Charger's in the box. They say it'll last five hundred hours, but that's when it's on stand-by. Figure on forty-eight hours, so that's six days at eight hours a day."
"I should call you when Robbie needs help with his maths homework."
Knight took a second battery out of his jacket pocket and inserted it into the back of the detector. He went over to Donovan and clipped it on to his belt, then took a length of cable with a jack plug on one end and a thin Velcro strap on the other. He gave the strap to Donovan and told him to thread it through his shirt sleeve and to run the strap under the band of his Rolex. While Donovan ran the wire up his sleeve, Knight slotted the jack plug into the detector and switched it on.
When he'd finished hiding the strap under his watch band, Donovan rolled down his sleeve. The wire couldn't be seen and the strap was pretty much hidden.
"Clever," said Donovan 'but does it work?"
Knight went over to his suitcase and took out a small tape recorder and switched it on. He motioned for Donovan to come closer.
"Do I have to keep my arm out or anything?" he asked.
"Nah, just walk normally. It should pick it up within six feet or so."
Donovan took another step forward. Then another. When he was two paces away from Knight, the box on his belt began to vibrate.
"Yeah, there it goes." He took a step back. The vibration stopped. He moved forward and it started again.
"Excellent."
"It's even more sensitive to listening devices," said Knight. He clicked the tape-recorder off and put it back in the suitcase. He took out a much larger black box, this one the size of a telephone directory, and two small speakers.
"Now this you'll like," he said. He placed the box and speakers on the coffee table and ran a power lead to the nearest socket.
"Acoustic noise generator. White noise, all frequencies. It'll absolutely render every type of listening device useless, providing that you're closer to the speakers than you are to the bug. Switch it on and sit close to it, keep your voice down and the white noise will swamp what you're saying."
"Downside is, they'll know that I'm trying to keep something from them," said Donovan.
"Not necessarily," said Knight, flicking a small red switch. A red light glowed and the room was filled with a static-like noise. Knight turned a white plastic knob and the volume increased.
"They're more likely to think they've got a technical problem. Vary it. Turn it down when your conversation's innocuous, turn it up when you're secret squirrel. It'll drive them crazy." Knight stood up.
"Right, why don't I sweep the downstairs, show you the weak points, then I'll fix the phones upstairs."
He took a portable RF detector from the suitcase. It looked like a small metal detector with a circular antennae on one end that was the size of a table tennis bat. He showed Donovan how to switch it on and how to read the LCD, then ran it along the skirting board. Donovan was already familiar with the procedure: he'd often swept the villa in Anguilla himself.
The phone rang. Donovan walked over to the sideboard and picked up the receiver, automatically checking the lights on the monitor. The green light was on. Safe to talk. It was Robbie. Donovan expected him to apologise for running out of the house, but Robbie had something else on his mind he'd left his sports kit behind and he was supposed to be playing soccer that afternoon. Donovan said he'd take the kit to school for him and arranged to meet Robbie outside the gates at half past twelve.
They called it the Almighty. Major Allan Gannon wasn't sure who had named the secure satellite phone system, or when, but now it was never referred to by any other name. The briefcase containing the Almighty sat on a table adjacent to Gannon's desk when he was in his office at the Duke of York Barracks in London, a short walk from the up market boutiques of Sloane Square, and went everywhere with him.