The Mark of the Assassin

a try, Michael," Graham said. "Start talking, now!"
    "Fuck you," Michael said, pulling off his sweater to reveal the pair of
    rounds embedded in his vest. "Why don't we go back to London and do the
    debrief there?" he said, calmer now. "Because the French want a go at
    you first."
    "Oh, Christ," Graham said. "I can't talk to the bloody Frogs."
    "Well, since you've just landed in their jurisdiction, I suppose you'll
    have to."
    Michael said, "What are we going to tell them?"
    "The truth," Wheaton said. "And we'll just pray that they have the good
    sense to keep their fucking mouths shut."
    IN NEW YORK Elizabeth lay sleeping in the recovery room when her
    cellular phone chirped softly. A nurse stepped forward and was about to
    shut off the power when Elizabeth awakened and said, "No, wait."
    She pressed it to her ear, eyes closed, and said, "Hello."
    "Elizabeth?" the voice said. "Is this Elizabeth Osbourne?"
    "Yes," she croaked, voice thick with anesthesia. "It's Adrian Carter."
    "Adrian, where is he?"
    "He's fine. He's on his way back to London now."
    "Back to London? Where has he been?"
    There was only silence on the line. Elizabeth was fully awake now.
    She said, "Goddammit, Adrian, was he on that ferry?"
    Carter hesitated, then said, "Yes, Elizabeth. He was there on a job, and
    something went wrong. We'll know more when he gets back to the London
    embassy."
    "Was he hurt?"
    "He's fine."
    "Thank God."
    "I'll call you when I know more."
    THE CHOPPER TOUCHED DOWN at dusk on a Thameside helipad in East London.
    Two embassy cars were waiting. Wheaton and Michael rode in the first,
    Wheaton's drones in the second. They turned onto the Vauxhall Bridge,
    past the ugly modern building that served as the headquarters for mi-6.
    Michael thought, So much for George Smiley's veiled redbrick lair at
    Cambridge Circus. Now, headquarters of the Service had actually made a
    cameo appearance in a James Bond movie. "Your friend Graham Seymour is
    going to get a rough reception in that building in a few minutes,"
    Wheaton said. "I spoke to the Director-General from Calais. Needless to
    say, he's not pleased. He also gave me a piece of news that will have to
    wait until we're behind closed doors."
    Michael ignored the remark. Wheaton always seemed to take too much
    pleasure at the professional misfortune of colleagues. He had come up
    through the Soviet directorate, when Michael's father was senior staff
    at Langley, and had worked overseas in Istanbul and Rome. His job was to
    recruit KGB officers and Soviet diplomats, but he proved so inept he
    quickly received a series of dismal fitness reports, one written by
    Michael's father. Wheaton was transferred to headquarters, where he
    thrived in the backstabbing, patrician atmosphere of Langley. Michael
    knew Wheaton resented him because of his father, even though the lousy
    fitness report probably ended up saving his career. They arrived in
    Grosvenor Square. Wheaton and Michael entered the embassy side by side,
    Wheaton's men following. Michael had the strange feeling of being under
    arrest. Wheaton went straight to the secure teleconference room. Carter
    and Monica Tyler appeared on the screen as Wheaton and Michael sat down
    in plush black-leather chairs. "I'm glad to see you're all right,
    Michael," Monica said. "You've had a remarkably harrowing couple of
    days. We have a lot of ground to cover, so let's begin with the obvious
    question. What went wrong?"
    For ten minutes Michael carefully recounted what happened on the ferry:
    Awad, the Palestinian girl named Odette, the motor yacht, and the
    gunman. He described the shooting, the bullets passing through Awad's
    body into his vest. He described the explosion, and how the men on the
    boat provided covering fire for the gunman's escape. Finally, he
    described the last battle with Odette, and how Graham Seymour shot her
    to death. "What was Graham Seymour, an officer from MI-Six, doing on
    that boat in the first place?"
    Michael knew he could gain little at this point by lying. "He's a
    friend. I've known him a very long time. I wanted someone watching my
    back I could trust."
    "That's beside the point," Monica said, with practiced impatience.
    Monica, as a rule, disliked field operations and the officers who
    carried them out. "You included an officer from the service of another
    country without the approval of your superiors at headquarters."
    "He works for the British, not the Iranians. And if he hadn't been
    there, I'd be dead