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Back A Shadow Intelligence
Chapters (58)
  1. Cover
  2. Also by Oliver Harris
  3. ONE
  4. TWO
  5. THREE
  6. FOUR
  7. FIVE
  8. SIX
  9. SEVEN
  10. EIGHT
  11. NINE
  12. TEN
  13. ELEVEN
  14. TWELVE
  15. THIRTEEN
  16. FOURTEEN
  17. FIFTEEN
  18. SIXTEEN
  19. SEVENTEEN
  20. EIGHTEEN
  21. NINETEEN
  22. TWENTY
  23. TWENTY-ONE
  24. TWENTY-TWO
  25. TWENTY-THREE
  26. TWENTY-FOUR
  27. TWENTY-FIVE
  28. TWENTY-SIX
  29. TWENTY-SEVEN
  30. TWENTY-EIGHT
  31. TWENTY-NINE
  32. THIRTY
  33. THIRTY-ONE
  34. THIRTY-TWO
  35. THIRTY-THREE
  36. THIRTY-FOUR
  37. THIRTY-FIVE
  38. THIRTY-SIX
  39. THIRTY-SEVEN
  40. THIRTY-EIGHT
  41. THIRTY-NINE
  42. FORTY
  43. FORTY-ONE
  44. FORTY-TWO
  45. FORTY-THREE
  46. FORTY-FOUR
  47. FORTY-FIVE
  48. FORTY-SIX
  49. FORTY-SEVEN
  50. FORTY-EIGHT
  51. FORTY-NINE
  52. FIFTY
  53. FIFTY-ONE
  54. FIFTY-TWO
  55. FIFTY-THREE
  56. FIFTY-FOUR
  57. FIFTY-FIVE
  58. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

I had first met Joanna fifteen years earlier, in an anonymous central London building where eight intelligence service recruits had been invited for second-round interviews. They kept us sitting in a draughty room at the back of the ground floor for more than half an hour. I had been working the room, introducing myself to the other candidates, believing it was part of the test and already enjoying the new-found liberty of a fraudster. She spoke to no one. After half an hour she opened a window, perched on the sill then swung her legs over. Seven of us watched Joanna Lake lean into the flame of her lighter before exhaling smoke at the London sky.

When she turned up again at the IONEC – the Intelligence Officers’ New Entry Course – I was surprised by how glad I was. And friendships forged on the IONEC tended to stick. They’re some of the last you form with people who are allowed to have a foot both in your first life and your life in the service. We got put in different streams. She was more technically attuned, grasped the psychological aspect of operations better: propaganda, information warfare. Part of me still saw intelligence work as a quest for knowledge: to be at the dark heart of things, the one who knew what was actually going on. She found that endearing and naive.

We worked together only twice, briefly, once in Kiev, in 2005, once in Turkey, three years ago, when she handed over the agent, Mescaline.

I imagined her coming across the clip, somehow. Then sending it in the most secure way possible.

I uploaded it to a secure encrypted cloud account, deleted it from my emails, called an operational data analyst at GCHQ and requested a favour. I gave the Kazakh number, asked them to check the databases, see if it came up anywhere. GCHQ processed 600 million call events a day – networks tied to several thousand individuals of interest. It was a big net, finely meshed. I told them I was also going to email a screengrab and wanted to know if the face of the man in it connected to anyone on the system.

I watched the clip again. The room looked real. Was the other individual computer-generated? No books visible, one newspaper on a sideboard at the back – Kazakh; a word, image – nation; image – nation in shock. The plug sockets took two round pins. The other building, or continuation of the same building, visible from the window could have been anywhere. I enlarged the lighter in my hand. It looked like a dented Zippo given to me by a military officer in Bahrain. When did I last use that lighter? In Ukraine? With Joanna? For good CGI you needed multiple angles, to know the person from all sides. As far as I was aware, there were very few images of me available.