Taylor read it twice, to be sure she hadn’t imagined it. There’d been no reference to Quadrant in any of the Ascension Island documents she’d seen. And there was no mention of Ascension Island on the Quadrant website when she checked. She searched through all her files on Ascension until she saw one entry in the archive of subcontractors, coinciding with the relevant period. March 10, 2018: Ten-year lease on research facilities attached to Ascension Island auxiliary airfield, including the former European Space Agency observatory, granted to QAR Services Ltd. QAR had taken over management of the facilities, which included the contract for overseeing their modernization and expansion. When she looked up QAR Services on a business database it came up in full as Quadrant Astrophysical Research Services, a subsidiary of Quadrant Space Technologies.

Taylor brought up her map of the island and found the relevant facilities. Did this explain the hostility to her project from Gabriel Skinner—if, as seemed to be the case, he was close to Payne, and therefore close to Quadrant? Either way, it didn’t explain what Quadrant was up to.

Intelligence work revealed the world as layers of knowledge. MI6 divided responsibility geographically, but you never had full oversight of a territory, just projects, and projects sometimes collided. The airfield lease had been signed off by her predecessor. Possibly they had seen no cause for concern: The island was full of contract-run facilities. Taylor must have seen reference to QAR Services in the handover notes without it meaning anything to her, either. She would never have had cause to look into them if GCHQ hadn’t decided to expand their involvement on the island.

She brought out the surveillance photo of Kane on Ascension. Fed through to a facial recognition company via Quadrant. Did that mean they had their own security on the island, checking out newcomers? She read through the various lists of staff and personnel who’d gone over since the lease was signed, but those employed directly by QAR Services would be exempt from a visa, so not necessarily show up on records. She didn’t see anything that looked like private intelligence officers. Finally, Taylor ran Quadrant through the MI6 database and got a result that made her stop. On February 1 last year, someone in the building had input an agent report that contained a reference to both “Quadrant” and “Ascension Island.” These were the keywords listed in the directory, from staff officer DX/3372. It had never surfaced in her own files.

The report was classified as a top security document, which meant it was accessible only via the Cleared Access Archive. This itself signaled its importance. The archive was used for the most sensitive casework, known as “YZ” cases: information too confidential to put on the shared data system. Access was through nominated terminals in a secure room, and required clearance from at least regional controller level. Which meant she was senior enough to take a look.