‘So how the hell are you going to do it?’
‘We’ll manage.’
‘You guys’ll manage?’ Ogden asked, unable to mask his cynicism.
‘Hear me out. First, let me stress that if anything should go wrong at any stage of this operation you’ll be protected from having any connection with it. I think that’s a most important point to bear in mind. Let me give you the opening scenario . . . The White House will commission a private British company to carry out a survey of the prison’s security.We will need a little help with aspects of the initial set-up phase but it’s very insignificant and in any case it would be an expected detail in setting up the evaluation. Then we get a man inside - and he escapes. If it looks like the game is up at any stage we say it’s just a part of the private security appraisal.’
‘You’re kinda missing one glaring point here, Barty. Styx actually is impossible to escape from. I’ve been down there. It makes Alcatraz look like a paper bag.’
‘We don’t think Styx is impossible to escape from.’
‘Houdini’s dead, Barty, and “Beam me up, Scotty” - you know, Star Trek - is fiction.’
Sir Bartholomew’s smile was like that of a father to a naive son. The truth was that he had no idea what the operation entailed and, like Ogden, believed the prison to be as he described. But he was ostensibly a salesman and on a good day he could sell ice to an Eskimo. ‘This private company will be getting a little bit of help, of course.’
‘You mean your SIS will do the job.’
‘One of those organisations, I suppose.’
‘You’re serious, aren’t you?’
‘I’m well known for laughing at my own jokes,’ the ambassador said, no sign of a smile on his face now.
‘So how are you going to do it?’
‘The plans have not been finalised but I’m told the operations department is very pleased with what they’ve come up with.’
‘I sure would like to see those plans . . . Look, I’ll be honest, Barty. I can maybe buy someone getting in. I never saw a study on that because, well, who would want to? But getting out? No. Not without help.’
‘Of course you can see the plans.’
‘I would have to approve every phase.’
Sir Bartholomew sighed. ‘Planning by committee is a recipe for disaster.’
‘That’s non-negotiable, Barty.’
‘OK, but let these chaps get on with it. They are rather good at it, you know . . . And bear in mind that any interference by your chaps is tantamount to culpability. It would only compromise the authenticity of the independent survey.’
A frown wrinkled Ogden’s forehead as he searched for pitfalls. ‘How long before the plans are ready?’
‘I’m told the latter phases are complete. The initial phase requires some input from your chaps.’
Ogden got out of his chair and went to the window. ‘As I said, should anything go wrong at any stage . . .’ said Sir Bartholomew.
‘Yeah, yeah, we’ll be covered . . . You guys just love your secret-service missions, don’t you?’
‘And you don’t, I suppose?’
‘You really think you can get a man inside that place and then out without assistance from the prison?’
‘Me? No.’
Ogden looked back at Sir Bartholomew quizzically.
‘I’m with you,’ the ambassador said.‘I think it’s impossible. But someone clearly thinks it isn’t. Point is, you have nothing to lose by letting them have a go and quite a lot to gain if they should succeed - don’t you think?’
Ogden looked back out of the window. ‘Assuming the plan has some merit, which I doubt, how soon could this “independent survey” be ready to kick off?’
‘I’m told within a week - depending on your contribution. ’
‘Do you at least have something for me to look at?’
Sir Bartholomew got to his feet,walked over to Ogden’s’s desk, took an envelope from his inside breast pocket, opened it and removed several mugshots of a man. ‘They want you to find someone in your criminal system who looks like this man. Any level of criminal will do, even a parolee. You have an estimated one point two million white males at various stages of the judicial process in this country. I’m sure you can find someone who resembles this fellow closely enough. I’m told it doesn’t have to be a perfect match. Just close.’
The Vice-President took the mugshots. ‘Who’s this guy?’
‘One of our chaps, I assume . . . Well,’ Sir Bartholomew said, before placing the empty envelope on the coffee table beside the photographs. ‘I’d better be off.’ He held out his hand.
Ogden shook it as he looked into the old man’s eyes. He smiled thinly as he watched the ambassador leave and then he looked down at the photographs.
The aide stepped into the doorway.
Ogden looked at him thoughtfully. ‘Cancel the meeting. Call the President’s office. I need to see him.’
Sumners was seated behind the desk in his small sterile office, reading a file on his computer monitor when there was a knock on his door. ‘Come in,’ he called out without looking up.
The door opened and John Stratton walked in. He was wearing a worn leather jacket and his hands were plunged deep in its cracked pockets. His hair was tousled and his face was covered in a dark stubble. His clear green eyes betrayed a cold contempt for the man in front of him.
Sumners looked up and his expression immediately darkened. The two men held each other’s gaze for a moment, Stratton winning the competition easily. ‘Would you mind shutting the door, please,’ Sumners said, going back to his monitor and hitting several keys.
Stratton casually pushed the door closed and looked around the room, his gaze resting on the single pleasant aspect of it: a small window with broad horizontal plastic shutters that partially concealed a splendid view of the Thames. The bottom of the window was too high for Sumners to see the river from where he sat. The half-closed shutters pulled down on one side at a careless angle suggested the civil servant was hardly interested.
The only wall decoration was a world map and a picture of the Queen. There were no family photographs on the desk. Stratton knew Sumners had a wife, or at least had had one a year ago. He was the selfish, callous, pompous type who didn’t bother with such trivial mementoes.
Sumners completed his typing and did his best to force a smile as he leaned back, determined to remain superior. ‘I see you’re still using the same tailor.’
Stratton studied the man he had grown to despise over the years, dismissing a curiosity he’d had before entering the room about whether Sumners had changed even remotely for the better since they’d last met. In Stratton’s early days as a member of the operations section he’d seen Sumners fairly regularly, as often as one would expect to see one’s SIS taskmaster in this business. That was about a dozen times a year in his case, which was more than most. But then, Stratton was used more than most in those days.
The last time he’d seen Sumners had been over a year ago during a mission neither man would ever forget. Sumners had been long overdue for a shot at the next rung up the ladder and his boss, unwisely in Stratton’s opinion, had bumped him up to operational commander. But things did not go well, to put it mildly, and within a few days he’d been relieved of his position. The significant rift that immediately developed between the two men was due to the fact that Stratton had played a pivotal role in that demotion. As far as Stratton was concerned Sumners had deserved it. He had been exposed as inadequate when the going got tough.
Only a handful of people outside the secret operation would have known the facts, though - a select few at the very top. Stratton was probably the only one who knew all Sumners’s shortcomings. Sumners was aware of that, too. He had been out of his depth and not only a threat to the operation’s success but also to Stratton’s survival, as well as that of others. Despite the mission’s positive conclusion Stratton had not been invited to take part in another SIS task since then. He suspected Sumners had had a lot to do with that.