She took a look at the room service menu and picked up the phone. “Good evening Miss McMasters,” came the instant reply. “Welcome to the Ritz Carlton. How can I help you?” She ordered a club sandwich, was persuaded to add a portion of “fries” and chose an ice cream dessert to follow. Within ten minutes, there was a knock at the door, and the tray was brought in and laid carefully on the table at the window, with the bright lights of Orlando spread out beyond.
This is the life, thought Marina!
Next morning, after a good sleep, jet-lag meant that she was wide awake by 5 am. After making a cup of tea and relaxing with the TV news for a while, she decided it was time to go in search of breakfast. After taking the lift to the reception area, she first discovered the parade of shops, including two with women’s wear, that indicated that they would be open at 8 am. Then she found the breakfast buffet with its range of familiar and less familiar choices. After a selection of fruit and yogurt, she went back again to try the Belgian waffles with strawberries and maple syrup. It was all so tempting, but there were also new clothes to try on shortly.
She was the first customer in the shop, and she explained that her luggage had been lost somewhere en route from the UK and she needed a couple of new outfits for some business meetings. A very helpful assistant brought out several options to choose from and Marina soon found two which suited very well, together with the necessary accessories. Her new credit card worked, and she then found a small suitcase in a neighbouring shop, reasonably priced, which she might also need, and she returned to her room to get dressed for “work”.
She was just about ready when the phone rang. It was Joe calling from reception to say that he was ready to go, and he added, “Bring your bags down with you because we’ll be checking you out before we move on to the next stage. Is that OK?”
Marina tried hard not to sound too disappointed to be leaving her luxury room so soon; she did as she was asked as quickly as possible and then went down to meet Joe. He had already dealt with the check-out desk and signing for her room – and Marina realised she had no idea what such luxury had cost the CIA! Then, taking her new luggage, he led her out to the waiting car. Marina wondered anxiously, and not for the first time, “What next?”
The car soon left the city streets and headed past a series of hoardings attracting traffic to the various Disney locations before reaching the residential suburbs and then a less developed area with fruit farms and eventually a gated entrance with the sign reading “United States Government: Camp Orchard”.
After being checked briefly by the security guards, they drove another half mile through what appeared to be apple orchards to reach a large building in traditional plantation house style, with white columns either side of the elegant porch and steps. At the door, they were met by Sally-Ann Waters, who greeted “Mary” warmly with a welcome to Camp Orchard. It all seemed surprisingly relaxed and friendly.
“Would you take Miss McMasters’ luggage to Block C?” she instructed Joe, briskly. “She will be in room two and bring the key back to me in the conference room.”
Sally-Ann then described some of the features of the house to her visitor as they walked through the elegant hallway and corridors to reach a room which immediately looked more formal and business-like, with its conference table and chairs plus a range of electronic equipment and computer screens. There were two men waiting there who were introduced as the Director of Camp Orchard, Charles Rooney, and the Head of Research, Robert Chilton – both looking relaxed in jeans, cowboy boots and button-down shirts.
“Hi, Mary,” said the Director. “Call me Chuck. It’s great to have you here. We’ve had a full briefing from London, so we know all about you, and we don’t need to go into all that anymore. We just want you to enjoy your time with us and make a few new friends – and maybe learn a few useful things, as well. You’ve already met Sally-Ann, of course, and she will stay in contact with you for anything you might need to know. Bob, here, is in charge of the group you will be joining later. Any questions, Mary?”
“Nothing I can think of now,” replied Marina. The Director said, “Good luck,” and left the room. Joe arrived with the room key, which Sally-Ann handed over with a brief “see you later”, and she departed, as well.
“Right, Mary,” said Robert Chilton, without wasting any time. “We’ve got a small group of six new agents in training here – two gals and four guys – and they started just yesterday on a four-week language course in basic Russian. We’ll join them a bit later. They’re a good bunch, five American ex-servicemen and one from Canada, and they’ve done nearly six months with the department, covering a variety of training courses here and overseas. They are all destined to join our Russian section in DC very soon and need to have an understanding of the language, like you. Do you have any Russian yourself?”
“Not really,” she replied. “My family came from Russia two generations ago, and they have all become pretty well anglicised. I suppose I‘ve picked up a few words here and there but nothing that would be useful.”
“We use a mixture of methods here, Mary, starting with some basic classroom sessions to learn about grammar and reading and pronunciation. Then you will go on to the language laboratory where there will be sessions of conversation with recordings and playback until you find yourself feeling quite familiar with hearing and understanding the Russian voice. Then, by the third week, we will have the entire group talking nothing but Russian to each other – you will be surprised how quickly it catches on. You’ll be dreaming in Russian before you know it. The final stage is to have you all reading and understanding documents in Russian. How does that sound?”
“Pretty terrifying, but I suppose it works.”
“OK, then let’s go to meet the group and the instructor in charge.”
22.
A BOMBSHELL!
Back at the MI5 headquarters in London, Tom Spencer called his team together again.
“I want to take a closer look at Victor Peters,” he began. “I went to his home to meet him yesterday, and he had all the right answers. But I think he may be hiding something. He certainly has some links with the Russian embassy and may turn out to be an informer, even before his daughter got mixed up with Aldanov.”
The meeting went on to review their work to date, and the lawyers confirmed that the case against Aldanov was coming together well but that it would need extremely convincing evidence from Marina for it to stand up in court. His past history with GRU in Moscow did not suggest any involvement with the UK until he reported his online contact, and he clearly thought he could enhance his reputation by following up his honey trap in person.
The agents who had been digging into Marina’s past reported that they had not come up with anything to suggest that she had any nefarious ambitions. In fact, among all her friends from schooldays onwards, none of them knew about her Russian background or that she had any special interest in politics or international affairs. Previous boyfriends had found her to be serious-minded, quite reserved and certainly not flirtatious, and they had all been surprised to read the story in the news about her contact with the Russian. It had seemed “out of character” for her to follow up a relationship for so long, even one at a distance.
Tom listened to the reports from around the table and emphasized that when Marina returned from the trip to the US, they would need to spend time preparing her evidence carefully. Then he surprised the meeting with a bombshell.
“Now, this is only an idea at this stage,” he confided, “but the Foreign Office have asked us to consider whether Aldanov might be a suitable candidate for an exchange deal for one of our diplomats who is under house arrest in Moscow because they suspected him of some undercover activity. If they bring charges against our man, it could be a bit embarrassing for the FO, and they think a swap might be a way to pre-empt some future problems.