“The passcode for your phone?”

“Yes.”

“I had a feeling.”

“Do you really not know it?”

She sighed and then recited it perfectly.

“I could have used your help earlier,” said Gabriel. “I had a devil of a time remembering the damn thing.”

“How long was the phone out of the Faraday bag?”

“Long enough.”

52

Petton Cross

On the western fringes of the Gloucestershire town of Cheltenham stands an enormous circular structure that resembles a stranded alien spacecraft. Known to those who work there as the Doughnut, the building is the home of the Government Communications Headquarters, or GCHQ, Britain’s signals intelligence service. Twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, its officers eavesdrop on sensitive communications around the world. Occasionally, however, they are assigned more mundane tasks, such as determining the approximate location of a mobile phone. This they can accomplish quite easily, provided the device is switched on and transmitting a signal.

Three veteran GCHQ officers were engaged in just such a search that evening. They were well acquainted with the phone in question. It was a secure device carried by the retired chief of Israeli intelligence, a man who over the years had worked closely with his counterparts at Millbank and Vauxhall Cross. As a matter of course, and despite assurances to the contrary, GCHQ tracked his device whenever it popped onto one of the British networks, though all attempts to penetrate its formidable defenses had proven fruitless.

In short order the officers were able to determine that the phone had returned to the United Kingdom two days earlier, that it had ventured as far afield as Land’s End in Cornwall, that it had spent a night in the ancient Roman city of Bath, and that it had gone dark at 1:37 that afternoon near Greenwich Park in southeast London. But finally, at 11:42 p.m., the phone awakened from its hours-long slumber and reattached itself to the network. Its stay was brief, slightly less than five minutes, but more than sufficient for the three officers to identify the location of the nearest cellular mast.

It was this small but vital piece of data that the overnight duty officer in Cheltenham, at 11:54 p.m., personally relayed to SIS chief Graham Seymour. Graham, who was still at his home in Belgravia, in turn delivered the news to Amanda Wallace of MI5. The two senior spymasters were in agreement that, for the time being, at least, they should continue to withhold the information from both their prime minister and the man who would soon succeed her, Home Secretary Hugh Graves.

They likewise agreed that this was an intelligence matter and not something that could be left solely in the hands of the police. Still, they could not possibly mount a rescue attempt without first alerting the chief constable of the local territorial force. It was Graham Seymour, shortly after midnight, who placed the call, waking the chief constable from a sound sleep. Their conversation was two minutes in length, unpleasant in tone, and characterized by a distinct lack of candor on Graham’s part. He refused to divulge even the barest details about the nature of the emergency and insisted on maintaining full control of the response. He required no assistance, he said, other than an unmarked car and a driver. Much to the chief constable’s surprise, he requested a specific officer for the job.

“But he’s a junior detective with absolutely no experience in this sort of thing.”

“If you must know, Chief Constable, we’ve had our eye on him for some time.”

And so it was that, ninety minutes later, Detective Sergeant Timothy Peel was sitting behind the wheel of an unmarked Vauxhall Insignia, watching a Royal Navy Sea King approaching Exeter from the east. It settled onto the helipad at the headquarters of the Devon and Cornwall Police at 1:47 a.m., and a single black-clad figure emerged from the cabin with a nylon rucksack over one sturdy shoulder. Head lowered, he hurried across the tarmac and dropped into the Vauxhall’s passenger seat.

“Timothy,” he said with a smile. “So good to finally meet you.”

*  *  *

He instructed Peel to make his way to the M5 and head north. At two o’clock on a rainy Wednesday morning, the motorway was empty of traffic. Peel was doing ninety, no lights or siren. His passenger was unimpressed.

“Does this bloody thing go any faster?” he drawled.

Peel increased his speed to triple digits. “Mind telling me where we’re going?”

“Petton Cross.”

It was a nothing little village near the border with neighboring Somerset. “Any particular reason?”

“I’ll explain when we get there,” replied his passenger, and ignited a Marlboro with a gold Dunhill lighter.

“Must you?” asked Peel.

He smiled. “I must.”

Peel lowered his window a few inches to vent the smoke. “It occurs to me that I don’t know your name.”

“With good reason.”

“What should I call you?”

“How about David?”

“David?” Peel shook his head. “Doesn’t suit you.”

“In that case, you should call me Christopher.”

“Much better.” Peel glanced at the rucksack. “What have you got in there, Christopher?”

“Zeiss night-vision field glasses, two Glock pistols, several spare magazines of nine-millimeter ammunition, a couple of secure phones, and a box of McVitie’s.”

“Dark chocolate?”

“But of course.”

“I’d kill for one.”

He fished the tube of biscuits from the rucksack and handed one to Peel. “Cornwall lad, are you?”

“Mostly.”

“Which part?”

“The Lizard.”

“Port Navas, by any chance?”

Peel’s head swiveled to the left. “How did you know?”

“A friend of mine used to live there. The old foreman’s cottage overlooking the quay. An art restorer by trade. A spy in his spare time.”

Peel returned his eyes to the road. “My mother and I lived in the house at the head of the tidal creek. We were neighbors.”

“Yes, I know. He told me the story one night when we were holed up in a safe house and the telly was on the fritz.”

“Where was the safe house?”

“Can’t seem to remember. But I do recall the fondness with which he spoke about the little boy who used to signal him with a torch from his bedroom window each time he returned to Port Navas. You meant a great deal to him, Timothy. More than you’ll ever realize.”