The sun was setting over Istanbul as Will walked through the Turkish city’s Grand Bazaar. The place was a vast warren of alleys, streets, and covered walkways-some pedestrian, others strewn with heavily laden cars and trucks carrying goods to and from the multitude of shops on either side of the routes. He was surrounded by the sounds of street vendors calling to crowds of shoppers, car horns, distorted transistor radios playing Ottoman folk music, and a nearby mosque giving the aksam call to prayer. Despite being winter, the air felt warm and was thick with the smells of kebabs, gozleme pancakes, roasted vegetables, simit bread, and spices. He passed shops selling clothes and fabrics, tea, dried fruits and nuts, kitchenware, backgammon sets, cinnamon, turmeric, and guns.
As he pushed his way through the crowds, the sound of the call to prayer grew nearer and soon he was by the front entrance of the small sixteenth-century Rustem Pasha Mosque. Muslim men and women were lined up outside, queuing to enter the beautiful building. He watched them for a while before scanning the route he’d just covered. The place was a throng of bodies, jostling, moving into and out of shops, stopping, and walking. There were too many people for him to be sure that he wasn’t being followed. But he looked anyway, just in case someone looked out of place.
Someone like a twenty- or thirty-something man or woman who could move fast if needed.
Someone whose posture suggested a heightened alertness to his surroundings.
Movement from one shop front to another that was too rapid and had no shopping pattern.
Anything about someone that just looked wrong.
He walked quickly away from the mosque toward the Bosphorus. Streetlamps, shop and residential lights, and car beams were being turned on as dusk fell. The sprawling city became bathed in an electric glow, below a clear sky with a sickle moon and stars.
Reaching the Eminonu docks, he stopped close to the traffic-laden Galata Bridge and waited. The Bosphorus was busy with brightly illuminated ferries, some berthing, others crossing the channel or heading up it to Asia. A gentle sea breeze ran over his face, and for a moment Will enjoyed the sensation. He checked his watch.
He saw the tram; his senses sharpened.
It was one of the modern Bombardier Flexity Swift fleet: two long carriages with concertina breaks halfway along that enabled them to bend with the curvature of the tracks. It was slowing down. Will hurried to a ticket kiosk and bought a token that would allow him to take the tram three stops to Yenikap? station. The tram stopped in front of him. Inside, it was at half capacity.
He walked along the aisle of the front carriage and took a vacant seat next to a middle-aged man. He hoped the journey would take no more than ten minutes. Any longer, and he would risk compromising the person he’d come to meet.
His name was Luka, an SVR officer stationed in Istanbul whose presence in the city was fully declared to the Turkish intelligence service, Milli I?stihbarat Tes?kilat?. But even though his job required close collaboration with the MIT on issues of mutual Russian-Turkish concerns, that did not stop them from covertly following him everywhere he went.
He’d known Luka for three years, during which time the Russian officer had often passed Will secrets. Luka wasn’t a double agent; he was more complicated than that, and by his own admission he gave Will only information that he believed would foster better relations between West and East. Will knew that most of what Luka told him was lies, but occasionally he would produce a gold-dust truth that served both him and MI6.
Not that Luka knew he was talking to MI6. As far as he was concerned, Will was called Emile Villon and was an officer of France’s Direction Generale de la Securite Exterieure.
As the tram pulled away, Will turned to the man next to him.
Luka smiled, then spoke in fluent French. “My friends are in the carriage behind us.”
The MIT surveillance detail.
Will returned his gaze to the front of the tram and responded in the same language. “Problem?”
“I don’t think so. But you never know. They can be… nasty fellows when they want to be.”
The tram followed the Turkish coastline. The evening was picturesque, though Will barely registered his surroundings, instead visualizing the rear carriage, knowing they were out of sight of the MIT team but also knowing they could be reached within seconds. “What’s your view on current Russian-American relations?”
Luka answered with a trace of sarcasm in his voice, “You’ve come all this way to ask me that?”
“No, but I’ll benefit from your opinion.”
“Opinion?”
“Insight.”
Luka was silent for a moment. “Relations are shit.” He placed a hand on the back of the seat in front of him, exposing an expensive Cartier watch. “Read the papers.”
“I have, but they don’t tell me what you know.”
“And you think I will?”
“I think you’d like to.”
The tram stopped at Sirkeci station, alongside the Marmara Sea. Both men were silent as people got onto and off the carriage. Two elderly ladies sat in the seats in front of them.
Luka stared at them before muttering, “Tomorrow morning the U.S. ambassador to Moscow will be summoned to the Kremlin to explain why the United States has pulled out of the economic talks with Russia. No doubt the ambassador will counter that Russia is taking a provocative stance by attempting to aggressively position its oil pricing while at the same trying to obtain a lead role in the WTO.” As the tram pulled away, the noise within the carriage increased, but he kept his voice quiet. “The summons will have achieved nothing other than creating more paranoia, more anger, more distrust, more… shit.”
Will chose his next words carefully, constantly aware that he had to be very careful with Luka. The slightest wrong word would be fed back to the SVR and could cause untold damage. “What would happen if there was an incident in Russia-an act of violence, maybe a bomb or several bombs detonating?”
Luka was silent for ten seconds before asking, “Is that going to happen?”
Will shook his head. “Not that I’m aware of. But America’s petrified that a terrorist act could prompt Russia to jump to the wrong conclusions-maybe think it was a U.S. strike.”
“America should be scared of that possibility. Russia’s the twitchiest it’s been in living memory.”
The tram pulled into Cankurtaran. More people got off than on, leaving the carriage a third full. Will desperately wanted to look over his shoulder to see who was behind him. Time was running out; he had to get off at the next stop. “I have a favor to ask.”
Luka laughed quietly. “Today’s agenda seems a little one-sided.”
Will ignored the comment. “I need a name-an arms dealer, preferably someone who specializes in military blueprints. Must be an SVR or FSB asset and currently active.” He added, “Can you do a bit of digging to see if someone pops up with that profile?”
“I don’t need to. I already have a name.”
Will waited.
But Luka said, “Why should I give you that information? You’ve given me nothing today.”
“What do you want?”
Luka placed a hand on Will’s forearm. When he spoke, it was as if he was thinking aloud. “It would be interesting to know the French government’s stance if tensions between my country and America were to increase.”
Will’s mind raced. He had absolutely no idea what the answer was. But Luka would expect Emile Villon of the DGSE to know. “You need this answer by-?”
“The same time you need the identity of the SVR asset.”
Shit.
The tram was slowing. Yenikap? station was in view.
If Will gave him an answer, his information would almost certainly influence Russia’s view of France. But he had to say something. “France is openly a staunch ally of America, though privately it’s neutral.”
“If a situation arose, France wouldn’t stand in our way?”
Will hesitated. “No.”
Luka nodded slowly. “And the rest of Europe?”
“That information’s above my pay grade.”
“I doubt that.” Luka removed his hand.
The tram stopped.
People started to get off.
Will remained motionless. His heart raced. “Please. It’s all I can give you.”
Luka sighed. “Otto von Schiller. German. Lives in Berlin.”
“How can I get to him?”
“That’s all I can give you.”
Will stood to leave but stopped as Luka raised a finger.
“Some of our generals would love those bombs to go off. It would give them the opportunity they’ve been waiting for.”