The Spanish Game

34. House of Games

I sleep for thirteen hours straight, beyond Sofía’s leaving, beyond check-out at the hotel. It is the middle of Tuesday afternoon by the time I wake up, as if from a coma, wrapped in a warm sweat of deep relaxation. For a long time I simply lie in bed staring at the bad paintings on the walls, enjoying a rare sensation of total restedness. Kitson asked me to call him with an update on the Sofía situation, but I run a bath first and order coffee and scrambled eggs from room service before dialling his number.

‘Best if you come direct to the safe house,’ he says, ‘the flat in Tetuán.’ He texts the address to my mobile.

Kitson’s team have set themselves up in a cramped apartment block in Barrio de la Ventilla, about two kilometres north-west of the Kia towers. I take the Line 10 metro two stops beyond Plaza de Castilla to Begoña, where I hail a cab and instruct the driver to loop anticlockwise around the Parque de la Paz en route to Vía Límite. There’s no surveillance problem, but I walk the last two blocks just to be certain and arrive a short time after five o’clock.

‘Sleep well?’ Kitson asks as he greets me at the door.

‘Like Sonny von Bülow,’ I reply, and he smiles, ushering me into the flat.

Four spooks – two men, two women – are gathered around a small Formica-topped table in the kitchen. I recognize two of them immediately: lead on Macduff, and the woman from the tyre garage near Moby Dick. All four look up from cups of tea and smile, as if at an old, familiar friend.

‘You’ll all recognize Alec Milius,’ Kitson says, and I’m not sure if this is just small talk or a dig at my counter-surveillance technique. Either way, I’m irritated by it; it makes me look second-rate. Macduff is the first to respond, rising from his seat to shake my hand.

‘Anthony,’ he says. ‘Good to meet you.’

I was expecting something altogether different, a voice to match the bustling military gent encountered at the Prado, but that was obviously cover. Anthony has a scrambled accent – Borders, at a guess – and is dressed in stonewashed jeans with a black Meat Loaf T-shirt. Tyre lady is next, too boxed in at her seat to be able to stand, but honouring me with a look of real admiration as she stretches to shake my hand.

‘Ellie,’ she says. ‘Ellie Cox.’

The other man is Geoff, the woman, Michelle. The latter is under thirty and on secondment from the Canadian SIS. Kitson mentioned running a team of eight, so the other four must be out tracking Buscon. I am offered tea, which I accept, and sit down on a low pine bench at the head of the table. To my surprise all of them look a little bored and washed-out, and there’s a strange end-of-term atmosphere to the gathering. If they are suspicious of me, they do not show it; if anything, they seem grateful to welcome a new face into their world, somebody unknown whom they can analyse and work out. Bottles of gin and mineral water and Cacique are lined up along a narrow shelf above Ellie’s head, with cans of baked beans, some Hob Nobs and a pot of Marmite peeking out of a cupboard near the cooker. Geoff has a British car magazine open on the table in front of him and spills a little milk on it as he pours my tea. Plates and mugs are drying on a metal rack beside the sink and behind me there’s a clothes horse swamped in laundry. It must be a tight squeeze living in here with four colleagues; they must get on each other’s nerves.

‘So you’re the ones I’ve been seeing in my rearview mirror?’ I ask, an unplanned joke that successfully breaks the ice.

‘No. That was just Anthony and Michelle,’ Kitson replies, and we chat amicably together for five minutes until he says, ‘Alec, come with me next door,’ and one by one they nod and quietly go back to their cups of tea. Geoff opens the car magazine, Ellie sighs and plays with her mobile phone, Macduff picks at his ears. It’s like the end of visiting hours in a hospital. I am led down a short corridor to a bedroom at the rear of the apartment with clear views over the distant Sierras. When we have both sat down in chairs next to a television by the window, Kitson takes out a pad and a piece of paper and asks what happened with Sofía.

‘She has nothing to do with it.’

He looks understandably suspicious, as if I’m protecting her. ‘Nothing?’

‘Nothing. It was a misunderstanding.’

‘Enlighten me.’

Once again I have to admit a professional failing to Kitson. This is becoming a habit.

‘Buscon must have spotted me following him back from the Irish Rover. He put some of his government friends on my tail and threatened Sofía when they found out about our affair.’

‘What do you mean, “government friends”?’

‘I don’t know for sure. Men involved in the dirty war. Guardia Civil, CESID, Mercenaries Are Us. Buscon left the package for Sofía under the name Abel Sellini. She picked it up thinking it was connected to her work and found this inside.’

I pass the note to Kitson. He has difficulty translating the Spanish, so I do it for him.

‘Can you be sure this is from Buscon?’

‘Who else could it be from?’

Kitson’s expression hints at infinite possibilities. He looks faintly annoyed, as if I have let him down one too many times. ‘So there’s a chance that they could still be following you?’

The logical sequence of events would certainly imply a serious threat to the integrity of his operation. If Buscon had me watched long term, there’s a risk that one or more of my meetings with Kitson was compromised.

‘They’re not following me,’ I assure him, with as much force and sincerity as I can muster. ‘I’ve been clean every time we’ve come into contact.’ Thankfully, Kitson seems to accept this.

‘And Sofía?’

‘She was very upset. I told her that the note was from some Russian property developers.’

‘Mafia?’

‘That’s certainly what I was hinting at.’

‘And she believed you?’

‘Yes.’

At this point a phone rings in Kitson’s pocket. He checks the read-out and frowns.

‘I have to take this,’ he says, and leaves the room in order to do so. Ellie comes in after a minute, ostensibly to offer me more tea, although I suspect that she has been asked by Kitson to make sure that I don’t snoop around. There’s a framed photograph next to the bed, shot in middle-class black-and-white, a sharp-eyed woman whom I take to be Kitson’s wife holding two small children. This must be where he sleeps. The shirt he wore to our last meeting at Colón has been dry-cleaned and is hanging near the window and there’s a carton of Lucky Strike lying on the floor. I’m rubbing the bruise on my knee when he returns to the room and asks me to come back in the morning.

‘Something’s come up. I’m sorry, Alec. A lead on de Francisco. We’ll have to finish this thing tomorrow.’

But it’s another seventy-two hours before we are able to meet again. I go back to the safe house the next day, only to be told that Kitson has been ‘unavoidably detained’ in Lisbon. Geoff and Michelle are the only members of the team at home and we share a genial cup of instant coffee at the kitchen table while I recommend bars in La Latina and an Indian restaurant where they can get a half-decent chicken dhansak.

‘Thank God for that,’ Geoff says. ‘Christ I miss a good curry.’

That night, doubtless while the two of them are flirting over sag aloo at the Taj Mahal, I join Julian in an Irish pub near Cibeles, at his invitation, to watch a football match between Real Madrid and Manchester United. United lose and I find that I am pleased for Real, consoling Julian with an expensive shellfish dinner at the Cervecería Santa Barbara in Alonso Martínez. Otherwise the time passes slowly. I try to rest as much as possible, to go to the cinema and relax, but my sleep is corrupted by nightmares of capture, vivid small-hour screenings of torture and abuse. A private doctor in Barrio Salamanca prescribes me some sleeping pills and I have blood work done for peace of mind, the results of which come through as clean. It’s noticeable over this period that Zulaika has not published anything in Ahotsa about the dirty war and I wonder if SIS have silenced him, with either threats or a bribe. Nor is there news about Egileor, or any fresh developments in the killing of Txema Otamendi.

Finally Kitson calls and pulls me in at lunchtime on the 25th. We go immediately to his bedroom and it is just as if nothing has changed in three days. He is wearing the same clothes, sitting in the same chair, perhaps even smoking the same cigarette.

‘I’ve been doing some thinking,’ he says. ‘You’re not going to like it.’

I see that his expression is very serious. This is the thing I have dreaded. He has brought me here to cut me out. SIS has reflected on events and decided that I have made too many mistakes.

‘Go on.’

‘I think it would be best if you stopped seeing Sofía. Monday night was your last night together. OK? You work for us now. No more off-piste activities. It’s just too dangerous.’

I agree immediately. If that’s all he wants, if that’s all it takes to win this thing, I’ll do it.

‘It also makes sense in the light of what I’m about to discuss with you, but we need Anthony in here before I can do that.’

Right on cue there’s a knock at the door. Kitson says, ‘Yes,’ and Macduff enters the room. I had no idea he was even in the flat. When I came in, Geoff and Michelle were on their own in the sitting room eating bowls of cereal and watching Friends on DVD. How did Macduff know to come in at exactly that moment? Was he listening from another room?

‘That’s odd,’ Kitson tells him, voicing my own doubt. ‘I was just coming to get you. Been eavesdropping, Anthony?’

‘No, sir.’

He sits on the bed. He is slimmer than I thought, about five feet ten. Strange to hear a man in his late forties refer to Kitson as ‘sir’. What are perceived as his weaknesses that he should have been overlooked for promotion?

‘Have you seen the news?’

It takes me a beat to realize that Kitson is talking to me. ‘No,’ I reply, and he leans over and switches on the television. Macduff mutes the sound with a remote control which he has picked up off the floor. A gameshow is ending on Telemadrid.

‘Two bars in the Basque country were shot up at dawn today,’ he says, ‘one in Bayonne, the other in Hendaye. On the French side.’

I can feel Macduff’s eyes studying me as he waits for my reply. In the absence of a specialist, am I regarded as the resident expert on ETA and the GAL? He wants to know how good I am, how quickly I can analyse and react to this new development. For the first time I feel a sense of pressure from one of Kitson’s team and realize that I have something to prove.

‘Bars used by ETA?’

‘That’s what they’re saying,’ Kitson replies.

The link is obvious. ‘Then it’s a new front in the dirty war. The GAL regularly shot up bars and restaurants on the French side in the 1980s, targeting terrorist exiles. They’re employing the same tactics. Anybody hurt?’

‘Nobody. It was pre-breakfast.’ Kitson has one eye on the television, waiting for the evening news. ‘An old man drinking coffee got a shard of glass in his hand, the barman in Hendaye felt a bullet buzz past his head.’

‘Sounds nasty. Who speaks Spanish?’

Neither of them understands my question.

‘I mean, where are you getting your information? Who speaks Spanish well enough to understand the news?’

‘Geoff,’ Macduff replies. They both look a little sheepish, as if it’s embarrassing that the two most experienced members of an SIS task force in Spain are not fluent in the local language. ‘A Basque journalist went on TV claiming that one of the cars involved in the shooting had Madrid number plates.’

‘Did you get his name?’

Kitson has to flick through the pad. He has trouble reading his own handwriting. ‘Larzabal,’ he says finally. ‘Eugenio Larzabal.’

‘And you say he was a Basque journalist?’

‘For Gara, yes.’

I say that I have never heard of him and take the name down in some notes of my own, trying to look professional. ‘What about Zulaika?’

‘What about him?’ Kitson asks.

‘Have you been following him? Do you know if he plans to go into print with the dirty-war story?’

‘Zulaika is going to keep his mouth shut for a week or two. That’s been arranged.’ So they did get to him. ‘But he’s not the only journalist in Euskal Herria. A kidnapping, a murder, a car with Madrid plates. It all starts to add up. Somebody somewhere is going to make the same sort of links. And once that happens, we’ll be playing catch-up.’

‘You mean you’ll have to tell the Spanish authorities what you know?’

‘I mean they’ll probably already know as much as we do.’

I try to gauge the operation from a political perspective. How does SIS gain from failing to report the existence of the new GAL to the Aznar government right away? Perhaps Kitson’s superiors care nothing for the legitimacy of the Spanish state, only for the terrorist networks that can be traced by pursuing Buscon. The dirty war is a sideshow in which I am a bit-part player. But then Kitson says something to challenge that assertion.

‘Over the past few days we’ve been looking into Javier de Francisco’s background, trying to get a fix on his motives. Anthony’s come up with a plan.’

This is Macduff’s cue. He’s more deferential in front of Kitson, less self-assured than he was on Tuesday with the others. Sitting up straighter on the bed, he gets the nod from his boss and embarks on a well-rehearsed monologue.

‘As you know, Alec, Mr de Francisco is the secretary of state for security here in Spain, to all intents and purposes the number two at the Interior Ministry under his old friend Félix Maldonado. Now if what you were saying last time is correct, senior figures in ETA believe he may be organizing this dirty war against them.’ Kitson sniffs and turns in his chair. As I think was explained to you last time, we don’t have the manpower here to embark on a full-scale investigation of whatever elements in the Spanish government may or may not be up to.’

‘Not yet, anyway,’ Kitson says, an interjection which would suggest that discussions are ongoing in London over the possibility of ramping up the size of his operation. That can only be good for my career.

‘Now, it may come as a shock to you to learn that, as a result of their work at G8 summits, EU delegations and so forth, SIS keep files on all senior government personnel with an impact on British affairs.’ Macduff lets this sink in, and seems confused when I do not appear more surprised. ‘I’ve developed what I think is a good idea of how we might gain access to some of the information flowing into and out of the Interior Ministry.’

‘You mean blackmail? You mean you have biographical leverage with de Francisco?’

‘Not as such.’

There’s a short pause while both men look at one another. I can feel myself being dragged into something amoral.

‘How are you feeling, Alec?’ Kitson asks. ‘What do you think you’re capable of?’

The question wrong-foots me. Why would Kitson ask something like that in front of a colleague? He must know that I’m still not properly recovered from the kidnapping.

‘What do you mean?’

I look at Macduff. He looks at me. Kitson lights a Lucky Strike.

‘Here’s the situation. There are any number of ways we can find out information about an individual or group of individuals from an intelligence perspective. I don’t need to list them for you. However, mounting an operation of any scale against a government minister is fraught with difficulty. As of this moment, not even our own station here in Madrid is aware of my team’s presence on Spanish soil. In order to get comprehensive technical coverage of de Francisco we would have to alert the embassy in order to get the right kit smuggled out to us in a diplomatic bag.’

‘And you don’t want to do that?’

‘I don’t want to do that.’

It’s obvious where this is going. They want to get me on the inside. But how? ‘So what are the alternatives?’ I ask.

Kitson takes a long drag on the cigarette. ‘Well, if we had Francisco’s phone numbers we could call Cheltenham and get them on a hot list, but that would alert GCHQ…’

‘… which you don’t want to do…’

‘Which we don’t want to do. Yet. So that’s where you come in. That’s why I need to know how you’re feeling.’

‘I feel fine, Richard.’

Macduff looks at the floor.

‘Really?’

‘Fine.’

This is not strictly true – how could it be, after what happened? – but I give my reply an ironic emphasis which effectively shuts down the discussion.

‘OΚ then. The thing is, you speak Spanish. You know Madrid. And you’ve done this sort of work before.’

‘You mean JUSTIFY?’

‘I do mean JUSTIFY, yes.’

And there’s the rub. Kitson has been very smart. He knows that after what happened with Katharine and Fortner I felt ashamed and ruined, as if nothing would ever wipe out the stain of treachery that led to Kate and Will’s deaths. He knows that all I have ever wanted was a second chance, to do it right, to prove to myself and to others that I was capable of success in the secret world. However, just in case I get cold feet, just in case he has read me wrong, he is going to pitch me in front of a colleague. That way it will be difficult to refuse. Kitson knows I won’t want to look like a coward in front of Macduff. He grinds out the half-smoked cigarette.

‘To get to the point, we wondered how you’d feel about becoming a raven.’ Macduff explains the term unnecessarily, perhaps because he has mistaken the look of surprise on my face for ignorance. ‘That is, somebody who sets out to seduce a target for the purposes of obtaining sensitive information.’

‘You want me to sleep with Javier de Francisco?’

This makes both of them laugh. ‘Not quite.’ Kitson scratches an arm and presses out of his seat. ‘Anthony is going to conduct some research of his own over the next ten days into the possible structure of the dirty war. We’ve already traced what looks like a link between secret Interior Ministry accounts and Luis Buscon. But meanwhile we’d like you to forge a relationship with one of de Francisco’s personal assistants in an effort to discover how far up the food chain this operation against ETA really goes.’ He is standing by the window now, looking directly at me. ‘That will happen in tandem with our ongoing surveillance of Buscon, which we cannot ignore. Now if it’s decided that the conspiracy has infected the upper levels of the Aznar government, then that obviously has an impact on our alliance with Spain. Any information you gather will go back to London and will be acted upon. But without your help we don’t have the resources to attack this thing.’

It appears that I have no choice. A shallow part of me just wants to find out what the PA looks like.

‘There’s just one problem,’ I tell him.

‘What’s that?’

‘You guys share a lot of intelligence with the CIA. I don’t want them knowing where I am. If I come up with useful intel, I don’t want my name on any reports that might find their way to Langley.’

Macduff looks momentarily confused but Kitson sees where I’m coming from.

Alec, as you can imagine, bringing up your name with the Cousins isn’t something we are in the habit of doing. JUSTIFY is an episode in the relationship between our two great nations that both of us, I am sure, would rather forget.’ A little grin here, almost a wink. ‘The CIA’s contempt for you is certainly equal to, if not in excess of, your contempt for them. Neither Anthony nor myself nor anybody on my team has any intention of involving the Agency in what’s going on out here.’

It’s strange to hear Kitson speak so plainly of my reputation within the CIA.

‘So this is why you wanted me to stop seeing Sofía? Because of this girl?’

‘Part of the reason,’ he admits. ‘It would only complicate things if you continued to see her behind Julian’s back.’

The familiar use of Julian’s Christian name makes me edgy, as if Kitson and Church have become friends. In my darker moments I still fear the revelation of a conspiracy between them. Nevertheless I remain light and co-operative.

‘Well, I don’t know whether to be flattered that you think I’d be capable of pulling off something like this, or offended that you see me as an amateur gigolo.’ There’s an awkward pause while both of them work out whether or not they’re supposed to laugh. Kitson does so; Macduff hedges his bets and produces a weak grin. ‘If she’s de Francisco’s PA, how do you know she’s not involved in the dirty war herself?’

‘We don’t. They’ve certainly known each other long enough. And if she is, that’s something that you’ll need to find out.’

I meet Kitson’s eye. He’s willing me to do this.

‘Well, it’s probably something I could look at.’

I haven’t begun to think through the consequences. Sex for information. Seduction for revenge. I can make jokes about gigolos in front of them, but the truth is that this is grim and seedy.

‘Good,’ Kitson says. ‘Now for the bad news.’ From an envelope beside the bed he produces a series of photographs of the girl. My reservations intensify. ‘As you can see, we’re not talking about Penelope Cruz.’

The woman in the photographs is very tall and thin, with a long nose, limp, straight hair and a pointed chin. Not ugly, exactly, but certainly not someone who would ordinarily draw my eye on Gran Vía. What am I letting myself in for? Is it too late to turn back? I should just abandon this whole thing and go back to my life with Endiom. The girl is past what most Spaniards would regard as marriageable age and dresses in a manner that can only be described as conservative. On gut instinct, however, I know that I’ll be able to win her over. She looks unhappy. She looks insecure.

‘What’s her name?’

‘Carmen Arroyo.’

‘And how much do you know about her?’

‘We know a lot.’