Red Star Rising by Brian Freemantle Read Free Book Online Page A

which my team and I will identify—from the date the Russian electricians were allowed on to the premises supposedly to repair the faulty CCTV cameras. Their being allowed within the embassy is a breach of every security guidance and instruction with which every British embassy, particularly this one, is issued. The inquiry will need to see all the documentation, between whomever was involved and consulted, authorizing the Russian entry—”
    “I had authorization for everything I allowed to happen,” burst in a stuttering Reg Stout.
    Fish raised a hand against the outburst. “The involvement in any inquiry of my team and me will be strictly technical, fully identifying the extent of the penetration.” He nodded to the pinhead bugs. “From this moment, this embassy has to conduct itself in the belief that not one piece of electronic equipment is safe, and that includes private telephones in the apartments within this building, as well as all those in every office, and extends to all mobile and cell phones, the radio masts for whose transmission are on the top of this building. It is inevitable that other listening or monitoring devices will be detected. . . .” For the first time Fish included Charlie as he looked around the table. “The embassy is already under the sort of scrutiny the Foreign Office would do its utmost to have avoided. For this penetration to become public, on top of a murder in its grounds, would be a total catastrophe. It is only known about by those of us in this room. It must not, under any circumstance, go beyond.”
    “It’s already a disaster,” said Sir Thomas Sotley, more to himself than to others in the room.
    “Yes, sir,” agreed Fish, unsympathetically. “It is a complete and absolute disaster.”

    The only totally guaranteed bug-free apparatus was now in the embassy’s basement communications room, and Charlie stopped Harry Fish as he was about to enter the descending elevator.
    “I’m on my way down there, too,” announced Charlie, unsure if their long association, which had never developed into a friendship, would be sufficient for what he was going to ask. “But first I need a favor.”
    “We do very different jobs,” said the man, cautiously, letting the elevator doors close against him.
    “The Russians are trying to push me aside from the investigation,” declared Charlie. “I’ve got to prevent that happening, particularly after what you’ve just discovered.”
    “How?” asked Fish, holding back from any additional questions as he listened to what Charlie told him, shaking his head at the finish. “It’ll never work.”
    “I can make it work.”
    “I won’t swear any formal statements . . . let my name be used.”
    “Just be there, with me,” urged Charlie. “You won’t be identified.”
    “Twenty minutes,” insisted Fish. “I’ve already given London a contact schedule.”
    “Twenty minutes,” agreed Charlie. Nodding to the camera still slung around the other man’s neck, Charlie said, “Can I have the images of what I want?”
    “I hope to Christ I’m not going to regret this.”
    “You won’t,” promised Charlie, wishing he could be sure.
    It took them five minutes of Fish’s stipulated schedule to collect buckets, a spade, trowels, and plastic sheeting from the gardeners’ shed Reg Stout had earlier identified to Charlie, which ensured they got the necessary attention of the Russian grounds staff. Three stood watching when they got to where the body had been found, the newly turned soil filling the Russian-dug hole visibly different from that which surrounded it. Charlie demanded from one of them that their overseer be summoned and ordered the man to keep all the Russians not just away but out of sight of what he and Fish were about to do. Charlie, reluctantly, did thedigging, gouging a mark in the conference-hall wall with the spade edge, grateful for the effort Fish put into the apparent selection of dirt heaped onto the