Just before the lunch break on Tuesday, de Payns’ second day of steward training, the door to the hotel dining room opened slightly and Jéjé’s head looked in.
‘What’s up?’ asked de Payns, as he slipped out the door. ‘Day release for good behaviour?’
Jéjé laughed. ‘Boss wants to see you, mon pote, not me.’
Jéjé drove him across Paris, and when de Payns entered the antechamber to Briffaut’s office, Margot told him they were waiting in the SCIF, the sensitive compartmented information facility. She walked him around the corner, took his phone and shut the door behind him. Briffaut sat at the head of the oval table, Marie Lafont to his right and Lars Magnus, the head of BER–Europe, to his left.
As de Payns took a seat, Lafont pushed a file across to him.
‘Lotus is still ours, until we know otherwise,’ said Briffaut, the file open in front of him but his eyes fixed on de Payns. ‘I want him active, so I need you to hand over to Jim.’
‘I’m in Monaco on Monday next week,’ de Payns reminded him. ‘I’m still in steward training.’
‘Where are you up to?’ asked Briffaut.
‘Silver service. Serving green beans without dripping butter on the guest.’
‘Okay, you passed with flying colours,’ said Briffaut, looking at his watch. ‘I need you in St Petersburg before the weekend.’
De Payns nodded, holding his tongue.
‘I know it’s short notice,’ said Lafont, peering at him over her half-glasses, ‘but given the way this is coming together, we need to keep Lotus productive.’
‘I’m sure,’ said de Payns. ‘You’ve tested him?’
‘He responds to the LICLAN protocols,’ said Briffaut, referring to the maintenance of the liaisons clandestines protocols that allowed the Company to communicate with its sources and OTs. ‘There’s no indication he was part of the Degarde murder.’
‘So, Lotus thinks it’s business as usual?’
‘We’d like that answered,’ said Briffaut. ‘Marie’s people have gone over the product and the realistic scenario is that Lotus wasn’t aware of what was in the last package.’
De Payns frowned. ‘Are you saying that he didn’t understand what he was dropping to us?’
Briffaut shrugged. ‘Or he didn’t look?’
‘Lotus is a pure mercenary,’ said de Payns. ‘I assume he looks at everything he traffics and ensures the best stuff goes to whoever pays the most.’
‘Which would be France,’ said Briffaut, causing the others to laugh. The daily meal allowance for OTs in the field was 15.20 euros, and reimbursement required physical receipts.
‘Let’s say that Lotus is a useful idiot,’ said Lafont, ‘but we still want to maintain the channel to whoever is feeding him the product, because there’s been a development.’
De Payns cocked an eyebrow.
‘Templar and Jéjé just got back from Georgia,’ said Briffaut.
‘I see,’ said de Payns, leaning back in his chair. ‘Following Lotus?’
‘And Andrei Lermatov,’ said Lafont, pushing another file across the table to de Payns. ‘He’s a second secretary of cultural affairs, Russian embassy in Tbilisi.’
In other words, Lermatov was SVR, Russia’s foreign intelligence service.
De Payns flipped open the folder and scanned the file and the photo. ‘What did they see over there?’
‘Clandestine meeting between Lotus and Lermatov in Vake Park, behind the big football stadium in Tbilisi,’ said Briffaut.
‘Who made the drop?’
‘Lermatov handed Lotus something then was driven to the Russian embassy,’ Lafont said. ‘Lotus went to the airport and took a flight to Kiev.’
De Payns nodded. ‘So, Lotus is feeding us great product, but it’s coming from the Russian services?’
‘We’re trying to work out what it means,’ said Lafont. ‘It could be nothing, because Lotus takes from many sources and he sells to various clients. An SVR officer in Tbilisi could simply be another one of his sources.’
This was plausible, de Payns thought. SVR mid-level employees trying to augment their meagre salaries were the source of a lot of product to the Occidental services.
‘Of course,’ continued Lafont, ‘there are factions in the Russian services and one of them might want us to know what’s going on in the Med.’
‘Factions?’ echoed de Payns.
‘Some of the general staff are locked into the Putin ecosystem; others are sworn to Mother Russia,’ said Lafont. ‘Even our own armed forces have groupings based on a world view.’
‘There could also be an economic angle, perhaps competing oligarchs,’ said Magnus, whose background was economic analysis. ‘If you look at Lermatov’s sheet, he came from the energy desk, and his previous postings were at embassies in Riyadh and UAE.’
‘Meaning?’ asked de Payns.
‘That’s what we have to establish,’ said Lafont.
‘And you want Jim Valley running Lotus?’ asked de Payns.
Lafont nodded. ‘You did the original Lotus handover to Degarde. We’d like you to do it the same way with Jim.’
‘Why St Petersburg?’
‘Jim is in Moscow,’ Briffaut explained. ‘Given Lotus operates in Eastern Europe, St Petersburg makes sense for everyone.’
De Payns didn’t like the rush. ‘Does Lotus know about Degarde?’
Briffaut shrugged. ‘That’s your bag.’
‘And you want me in there on Friday?’
‘At the latest,’ said Lafont.
■
‘The Homsis are coming over Saturday night,’ said Romy, sipping at her riesling as she leaned against the kitchen counter. ‘We’re bringing Charles back here after Oliver’s soccer game, and then Ana and Rafi will come over for dinner around five-thirty.’
Romy knew her husband hated having guests in the house, but they were both still tense after the Saint-Lazare incident, so in the interests of fostering a normal family life, de Payns swallowed his objection.
‘That sounds great,’ he said.
‘They won’t stay long—just a quick meal and a glass of wine,’ said Romy, shifting her weight. ‘Ana is so good with the school run, we have to return the favour where we can.’
De Payns nodded. ‘Of course, it’s fine.’
‘You’ll be with Patrick’s team at Université Paris Cité, and I’ll take Oliver and Charles for their game at Charenton.’
De Payns smiled. The idea of Oliver suiting up and running onto the football field was a thrill. He would have liked to take Oliver to buy his first pair of boots, but Romy had seen a sale on when she was shopping with the boys a couple of weeks ago, so she’d bought them then.
There was an awkward silence between them and de Payns cleared his throat. ‘I’m going to see the doctor at work.’
Romy looked at him, a neutral face. ‘Briffaut’s orders?’
‘His strong suggestion,’ said de Payns. ‘Which is sort of the same thing.’
He looked past her, trying to avoid landmines, but Romy kept her eyes on him.
‘I thought the doctor could end your career?’
‘She can advise medical leave,’ said de Payns, ‘which means no more field work. I’d return as a manager.’
Romy’s face shifted from neutral to positive. ‘You should take it.’
‘I’m not ready for that yet.’
‘I am.’
They stared at one another, and then de Payns turned to the stove, where a pot of water was boiling under a colander, awaiting a pile of broccoli. ‘I’m going to see her, take it from there.’
Romy pushed past him, scraped the chopped broccoli into the colander in one motion and adjusted the heat. ‘Are you asking my opinion, or are you making an announcement?’
‘Your opinion,’ said de Payns.
‘Sort yourself out,’ she said. ‘That’s my opinion.’
‘I’ll try.’
‘The boys are growing up, Alec,’ she said. ‘What will you say to Oliver when he sees you creeping around the apartment with a gun? He’s a light sleeper, you know that.’
De Payns looked away. He’d grown up in an unhappy household, with a French father who didn’t know how to love his English mother. He wanted to be so much more for his own boys, and his wife. ‘I’ll see the doctor.’
‘When?’ she asked, with a challenge in her voice.
‘Well, I’m away Thursday and Friday,’ he said. ‘And all of next week, so—’
‘Fuck, Alec!’ she said, the landmine fully detonated.
‘I’m doing my best,’ he said.
‘Get the boys out of the bath,’ she said, no longer looking at him. ‘Pyjamas on, devices off.’