Games Traitors Play

65

‘Tell me something,’ Primakov said. ‘What ever made you think you could trust them? After all they’ve done to you?’

‘I put my faith in the Vicar,’ Marchant said.

‘A mistake your father never made.’

They were driving back towards Madurai in Primakov’s car. A thick glass partition divided them from the front, where a Russian driver sat without expression. It was evident that he couldn’t hear their conversation. Marchant wasn’t surprised that Primakov had turned up at the airport. More worrying was his lack of concern that Dhar’s mother was now in US custody. Marchant had told him the whole story: Fielding’s assurances about Lakshmi Meena, how the CIA had agreed for Shushma to be taken to the UK. Primakov had been particularly interested in Fielding’s role, asking Marchant to repeat exactly what he had said. Marchant had been happy to tell him. He no longer knew where his own loyalties lay, let alone Primakov’s.

‘Did you know that she was working at the temple?’ Marchant asked.

‘Of course.’

‘Why didn’t you do more to stop the Americans from taking her?’

‘Like you, we had heard she was bound for Britain. I was also a little under strength. Valentin is in the Apollo hospital.’

Marchant didn’t believe him. Moscow could have drawn on more resources to stop Shushma’s departure. But for some reason they hadn’t.

‘Her son won’t be happy,’ Marchant said, trying to steer the conversation towards Dhar. The only thing he knew for certain was that he needed to see him, discuss their father man to man, brother to brother. Primakov had avoided referring directly to Dhar before, but it would be hard not to now.

‘It will confirm his worst fears about the West,’ Primakov said.

And then Marchant began to see things more clearly. Primakov hadn’t flown to Madurai to prevent Shushma’s exfiltration: he wanted to be sure that she was taken. It was the one act that could be guaranteed to get under Dhar’s skin. Whatever the Russians had planned for him, it suited them if Dhar’s blood was up.

‘A son will do anything for his mother,’ Marchant offered.

‘Rage is important. It can persuade others to take you seriously. People who had their doubts.’

For the first time, Primakov looked at Marchant with something approaching knowingness in his moist eyes. Was it a sign at last? A part of Marchant no longer believed Fielding’s reassurances about Primakov’s loyalty to London. The Russian wouldn’t give him anything because there was nothing to give. His brief was simply to keep the jihadi fires stoked in Dhar’s belly, and to persuade Marchant to help his half-brother. There was no hidden agenda, no resurrection of old family ties, no belated clemency for his father. But somewhere inside him, Marchant still hoped he was wrong.

‘Are you angry, too?’ Primakov asked.

‘Wouldn’t you be? I promised Shushma I’d look after her, only to see her renditioned in front of me by James fucking Spiro.’

Even as Marchant spat out the expletive, a sickening feeling had started to spread: a realisation that he had been manipulated, that actions he thought were his own had actually been controlled by others. Rage is important. It can persuade others to take you seriously. People who had their doubts. He was the one raging now, against Fielding, Meena, Spiro, the West. And it would be music to Moscow’s ears.

He closed his eyes. Christ, Fielding could be a cold bastard.