Resurrection, p.1
Resurrection, page 1
Also By David Gilman
The Englishman series
THE ENGLISHMAN
BETRAYAL
RESURRECTION
Master of War series
MASTER OF WAR
DEFIANT UNTO DEATH
GATE OF THE DEAD
VIPER’S BLOOD
SCOURGE OF WOLVES
CROSS OF FIRE
SHADOW OF THE HAWK
Standalone novels
THE LAST HORSEMAN
NIGHT FLIGHT TO PARIS
Dangerzone series
THE DEVIL’S BREATH
ICE CLAW
BLOOD SUN
MONKEY AND ME
RESURRECTION
David Gilman
An Aries book
www.headofzeus.com
First published in the UK in 2023 by Head of Zeus Ltd, art of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc
Copyright © David Gilman, 2023
The moral right of David Gilman to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act of 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.
This is a work of fiction. All characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
9 7 5 3 1 2 4 6 8
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN (HB): 9781801108041
ISBN (XTPB): 9781801108058
ISBN (E): 9781801108072
Head of Zeus Ltd
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5–8 Hardwick Street
London EC1R 4RG
WWW.HEADOFZEUS.COM
Contents
Welcome Page
Copyright
Dedication
Epigraph
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
Chapter 40
Chapter 41
Chapter 42
Chapter 43
Chapter 44
Chapter 45
Chapter 46
Chapter 47
Chapter 48
Chapter 49
Chapter 49
Chapter 50
Chapter 51
Chapter 52
Chapter 53
Chapter 54
Chapter 55
Chapter 56
Chapter 57
Chapter 58
Chapter 59
Chapter 60
Chapter 61
Chapter 62
Chapter 63
Chapter 64
Epilogue
Author’s Notes
Acknowledgements
About the Author
An Invitation from the Publisher
For Suzy
Human blood is heavy; the man that has shed it cannot run away.
African proverb
Prologue
The full moon sat low on the desert horizon; its light dressed the corrugated sand dunes in veils of shadows. A night breeze scudding across the sand broke the stillness, eroding and reshaping dunes into another landscape.
The man’s skeleton stared upwards into the moon’s glow. His head hinged back into the nape of his neck as his mouth, the jawbones cracked, seemed to scream silently at the night sky. The flying jacket was well preserved but bore no insignia, no identification, nothing to link him to any deeds committed in the often squandered name of justice and truth. The dead pilot sat immobile, his shoulder holster split and worn by the ravages of the desert heat, but the service-issued Colt .45 still nestled snugly against his ribs. The obligatory round held in the chamber. Always ready. That had been part of his life – always knowing the back door in any building, ever the professional. His sweatshirt and cotton trousers were tattered, exposing the taut, age-blackened skin, like oiled canvas stretched across his bones. The aviator glasses that once shielded blue eyes from the altitude’s glare as he soared across the African sky had been knocked from his face by the impact. The bubble canopy had been lost at three thousand feet and his helter-skelter ride down to earth had ripped free his cap. He’d cursed when he felt gravity pulling it free. Bitched and screamed. Because of all things he didn’t want to lose the best damned baseball cap ever to come out of his team’s winning season. He’d fought blurring vision – pulling himself back to consciousness against the G force of the falling plane... the plane... Sweet Jesus, she was more than a machine... she was his... he trusted her with his life, and she’d always done as he’d asked.
She screamed with him as they plunged in a vertical dive towards the desert below.
His hands still gripped the control stick from his final determined effort to bring up the nose of the plane. And he’d done it. In the last moments, yelling in triumph, he’d levelled off, then settled down on to the arid ground of a land waiting for victims. His shattered legs at the rudder controls and splintered fingers were evidence of the force of that landing. Had the impact not snapped his neck, death from the shock of his injuries would have claimed him before that nightfall thirty years ago.
The dune rose forty feet above the floor of the desert. At its base, the breeze had brushed aside sand and exposed the fuselage and its long-range tanks. The aircraft’s glistening metal reflected a dreamer’s moon. The wind increased, shifting more sand from the cockpit, open to the elements. The P51 Mustang still embraced the man, cradling him, human and machine fused in spirit. The pilot and his mission were now alive only in other men’s memories. Men who feared what lay hidden in that wasteland. The worn leather attaché case was manacled around his left wrist, tucked next to his crushed legs. It held a document men would die for. Information about two names. One a spy and traitor. The other the vital link to him.
Raglan.
1
Edwardes Square in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea lies just off Kensington High Street. It is a wealthy area, even by London standards. The Georgian houses, four storeys including a basement, sell for eye-watering amounts.
A man gazed down into the dimly lit square from a top-floor apartment. He was half-naked, a towel wrapped around his midriff. At sixty-seven, his hair was still thick enough to be slicked back from the shower he’d taken after making love to the woman who lay sprawled asleep on the bed behind him. He liked to watch the streets, especially at night when shadows might reveal a concealed watcher. John Barton’s senses, honed over years of intelligence work, would alert him to anything untoward. He wasn’t on his home turf, but he liked the neighbourhood. Wealth always encouraged a far more attentive patrolling by the police and that helped keep unfriendlies away. God knew there were enough of them still around. He lit a cigarette as he watched a police tow truck lifting a Porsche. To park in these car-choked streets, you needed a resident’s parking permit. No permit – no park. The flashing blue lights illuminated a form, barely visible to the untrained eye. Beyond the iron railings securing the private park in the square, a man was standing back in the latticed moon shadow under the trees. Unmoving.
The old spy glanced across the far side of the square as the tow truck finally manoeuvred the offending Porsche down the narrow street. The watcher remained in darkness. Barton looked up with an unromantic eye at the full moon as the woman in the bed turned over, felt for him and then restlessly belly-flopped into a new sleeping position. They had spent the evening together at a book publishing launch. Over the years, his name had found its way on to many such invitation lists. The London Game. See and be seen. He did not play it often, but at times it was a distraction and could be a helpful cover when the former MI6 officer wanted to meet people others thought long dead, but who lived in exile under witness protection. The woman was a wealthy widow who had inherited her husband’s publishing company. Old friends, they would meet occasionally, have sex and lie in what he ruefully referred to as past-their-prime splendour – soft flesh warm from mutual exertion, happy to be enfolded in the luxury of her lavish apartment and the tenderness their ages afforded them. He envied her untroubled slumber. He was sleeping less these days. Too many memories forcing their way into his consciousness, distorting his dreams. And the insistent voice in his unconscious demanding he get the explosive new information into the right hands. Now. The information that was typed and pressed into the envelope in his suit’s br east pocket, hanging neatly on the back of the bedroom door. How far would he get with his subterfuge? Much depended on him leading his enemy astray.
The book launch had been the perfect place for the envelope to be passed to him. But if the watcher below was following him, and knew what he carried, then he must have seen the handover from Barton’s old contact the night before. Barton’s contact, a Russian friend in exile here, had warned him the old enemy was closing in. And since then, his friend had not answered his phone.
His lover half raised her head, muttered something and turned over again. He stubbed out his cigarette and sighed. The approaching dawn did not herald a bright new day for him; all it promised was a dull glow as befitted a tired man. Barton was very tired. He’d served his country thirty years and more. A double first at Cambridge meant politics had beckoned, but the Service had been more seductive. Had remained so for all these years. First an active field officer and then the inevitable slow decline to sitting behind a desk with an occasional lecture to bright young things keen to join the Service. Old foes often shared the same fate. Some came over to his side. Some became friends. His had been a solitary life – a woman married to a spy needed exceptional qualities; sadly his wife did not have them, and after three childless years she had divorced him. The final papers had arrived when he was neck-deep in trying to calm the slaughter during another small war in Africa. A long time ago. No regrets. He had lost touch with his wife, but he had maintained contact with his old networks and now, unexpectedly, they had yielded treasure. Pure gold. And, he admitted to himself, a frisson of panic at what could be exposed. His memories flared with a passion he had all but forgotten how to feel: in recent years he had buried his emotions as deeply as the secret consumed by the desert. A secret now resurrected.
He glanced at the sleeping woman. Now he had a chance to serve his country again. One last roll of the dice. Others wanted what he had, and they would kill him to retrieve the envelope in his suit pocket and the information it contained. His journey was coming to an end, but at least he would go out with dignity, and in a worthwhile cause. The new day would probably be his last. There was no better death than to sacrifice oneself for love. And he loved his country.
2
Barton decided to lead his followers towards the Secret Intelligence Service building at Vauxhall Cross. Time was short. The book launch and the lovemaking had been a safety barrier for a few hours. He could walk to Vauxhall Cross and the MI6 HQ – it was only a brisk hour – but that route would give his pursuers opportunities to pull him into side streets. He wanted them to be identified, if possible, and while street cameras were plentiful, those in the London Underground would suit his purpose better.
It took him fifteen minutes to reach High Street Kensington Tube station. He did not try to give whoever followed him the slip, but used the crowds as cover, though he knew full well how easy it was to be killed by lethal injection, particularly in a busy thoroughfare. It was still his best chance of getting as close as he could to his friends in the Service. And the closer he got, the more urgent those following him would become. If they were experienced agents, they would wonder at his naivety, perhaps thinking that he did not know he had been compromised, which was why he had not used his fieldcraft to avoid them. If they were simple-minded thugs like so many in Russian military intelligence, which these men would be, they would not question his actions. Barton needed to lead them astray.
Four stops later, he alighted and walked to the Victoria line platform. One more train connection and he would be within sight of what many MI6 officers referred to as Babylon-on-Thames: his old office, MI6 HQ. He’d barely got his seat warm in the new building back in ’95 before he was put out to pasture.
Doubt crept in. Would those following him let him get so close to his destination? The answer came moments later as he approached the platform and saw there were a few people left standing there as a train pulled away. There would be another in two minutes. Long minutes. Three men boxed him in. One at either end of the platform, another ambling towards him. They looked no different from many other tourists. Jeans, a rainproof jacket, a small daypack. A map folded in a hand. Nothing out of place. Except for their concentrated look of intent. They would expect him to make a run for it. The man approaching him was in his thirties and bearded; he was four metres away.
‘I’m too damned old to run back up those steps,’ said Barton.
The man faltered, surprised perhaps he had been identified. He stepped closer. He nodded. ‘All right,’ he said, without fuss or threat. ‘You know what we want.’
Barton nodded and unbuttoned his overcoat, his hand reaching for the inside suit pocket. ‘Your accent. Chechnya or Georgia? I’m not sure.’
The man extended his hand, wanting the envelope. ‘Does it matter?’
‘No,’ said the old spy, ‘but I like to keep my ear in.’
The man grunted, uncertainty niggling him at Barton’s behaviour. The older man stood fearlessly in front of him. ‘Georgia,’ he said.
‘Good to know,’ said Barton, who had not yet tugged free the envelope. The longer he delayed, the sooner the next train would arrive and with it the usual throng of people.
The Russian frowned. ‘When we have what we want, you can go.’
The former MI6 officer had faced desperate men before. This one was getting agitated. Enough to kill him there on the platform? Perhaps not with anything as brutal as a knife or gun: more likely a poison. That was the Russian method of choice for killing in a crowded place. Yet there was no sign of anything in the man’s hands. Barton’s chances were improving every minute. He had chosen his position carefully. When he first arrived on the platform, he’d looked up into the security camera to identify himself and then turned his back so that the man would face the lens. His hand came free from his pocket but did not hold the envelope.
‘You were careless. There were a dozen places you could have taken me. I’m a few minutes away from my people. You won’t stop me now. Not here. New at this, are you? My old KGB chums would turn in their grave.’
The sound of an approaching train and a sudden influx of passengers on to the platform gave him a flicker of hope. It was important that these men believed that what he had was worth fighting for. If he had been running these agents, he would have the three men on the platform and a fourth unseen. The ghost. Barton had to make them work for it. He waited as a throng of passengers surged on to the carriage. He shoved the man aside and shouldered his way on to the train. Platform man tried to barge his way forward, but the crowds blocked him, and the doors closed. Barton edged his way into the centre aisle, gripping the overhead bar. A minute later, as the train rolled along the curved tracks, he felt the scratch on his hand. He turned, saw a face close to his shoulder. The stranger’s eyes met his. Expressionless. Barton tried to push through the passengers, but moments later he fell. A heart attack. He looked up as the stranger waved a hand at the alarmed passengers. Heard the words I’m a doctor. Felt his coat being pulled open, hands on his chest, knew that they would retrieve the envelope. Barton smiled. Job done.
The train bore him into his own dark tunnel.
3
Three days later a slim, fit-looking man in his fifties, with close-cropped greying hair, stood in front of the French Foreign Legion’s Quartier Capitaine Danjou basic training camp just over three kilometres from the medieval town of Castelnaudary in the south of France. The town lay at the foot of the Pyrenees, had one main street and a couple of budget hotels. Maguire looked no different than any other passing tourist who had been driving on the Route de Pexiora and pulled over in the sunshine to watch the immaculately dressed legionnaires on their parade square. He wore jeans, a thin-knit dark lambswool sweater and padded jacket and had a satchel bag over his shoulder. The taxi driver who’d brought him from Toulouse Airport joked that the cut-off age for the Legion was thirty-eight in case he was thinking of signing up. With a glance in the rearview mirror, he saw what he took to be a flicker of amusement in the man’s eyes, but his face remained impassive. Maybe he had spoken out of turn and the man had a son who served. During the hour’s drive, he spoke warmly of the legionnaires just in case he had caused offence. On reflection, the cab driver reasoned that the man looked as if he could have spent thirty years in the Legion himself. Best to shut up and drive.
