The Millennium Secret

By David Tolfree

This fast-moving political thriller about conspiracy, intrigue, terrorism and murder takes the reader back from the late 1990s to the political upheavals in the 1930s that led to the Second World War and the momentous 1945 Manhattan Project at Los Alamos in the US. In 1999, Paul Cane, a freelance investigative journalist, uncovers secret documents in a Cotswolds cottage written by a dead nuclear physicist which reveal the existence of a secret organization named the New Order that is bent on world domination. It is conspiring with al-Qaeda to destroy New York and London on the eve of the millennium.

Cane accepts an invitation to an international press conference at the White House in Washington where he is duped by the CIA into working with them. At the conference Cane meets Valerie Day, who eventually becomes the love of his life. Since the documents Cane possesses contain the coded names of leading members of the New Order, he becomes their murder target. With the help of US agents and a veteran nuclear scientist, he embarks on a mission to discover their identities and the secret behind the millennium bomb plot. With the threat of destruction of two capital cities and millions of lives at risk, it’s a race against time to find the bombs and those responsible.

This exciting story with its many characters has twists and turns that will hold the reader to the last page. It has a tentative connection to the 2022 Russian attack on Ukraine.

What is the Millennium Secret?

Who are the real conspirators?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Troubador Publishing Ltd
• Release date: Oct 13, 2022
• ISBN: 9781803134086

David Tolfree

David Tolfree is a retired chartered physicist with over fifty years of experience in applied nuclear research and technology exploitation. David has over 185 publications including articles in journals, books, newspapers and conference proceedings, and has co-authored several books. His first fictional novel, The Millennium Conspiracy was published in 2012 and has been followed by several sequels.

Book preview

Contents

CAST OF MAIN CHARACTERS

PROLOGUE

HISTORICAL REFERENCES

ACRONYMS AND ABBREVIATIONS

CAST OF MAIN CHARACTERS

On the Eve of the Millennium

2 Minutes to Midnight – 31st December 1999

Guests were gathered in the Ministry of Defence building overlooking the Thames with a window view of the new Millennium Wheel. They were there to witness the British Prime Minister operate a switch to fire a laser beam at a target near the Wheel that would initiate its turning and a firework display exactly at midnight to herald in the new millennium.

‘Tonight is a very special night. The last one before the new millennium. I want to thank you all and those out on the river for the efforts you have made to make this a memorable evening. From all of us here in Britain to people throughout the world, we wish you a happy and wonderful new century of peace and prosperity.’

Glasses of champagne were being handed around and a joyous atmosphere permeated the room. Meanwhile, the Queen was sailing down the Thames to light a millennium beacon afloat on a barge, which would then trigger off a string of gas-powered beacons across the country. People in the room started to sing as the midnight moment approached, everybody in the room started chanting the traditional countdown to midnight.

TEN-NINE-EIGHT-SEVEN-SIX-FIVE-FOUR-THREE-TWO-ONE

Instantaneously, a burst of blinding light

emanated from the base of the wheel

PROLOGUE

November 1998

The old man sat back in the well-worn black leather armchair and switched on the table light to read a book. It had been a particularly cold November day. Old Cotswolds cottages lacked the amenities of double-glazing and central heating systems unless they had been modernised. A crackling log fire added warmth and gave off a therapeutic scent, but there was still a chill in the room. After many years the occupant had adapted to the lack of comforts offered by more modern dwellings to be found in the towns. He enjoyed the safe seclusion that the cottage gave him.

Dr Henry Fellows was a retired physicist in his early eighties but still retained an athletic posture. At Cambridge, he had won many medals for sport. Back pain and walking difficulties were offset by an active brain which enabled him to continue taking an interest in world events. He was highly intelligent and had recently completed his memoirs – a written account of his life’s work, which he knew could never be published. An event that had led to the deaths of some of his colleagues and friends had troubled him all his life. He owed it to them to leave a written record. The dark secrets he possessed could not be taken to the grave; one day someone might want to act on the information and the truth would then be known. At the very least it would allow some gaps in the history of the last fifty years to be filled. Official historians sometimes distort history, either purposely or through a lack of access to information that has been locked away in government files, often wrongly classified as secret or top secret to cover up mistakes and bad decisions made by politicians and generals.

Henry Fellows was one of two people still alive who had been members of the British team who participated in the Manhattan Project during the Second World War. He had witnessed the detonation of the first atomic bomb on 16 July 1945 in the Alamogordo Desert of New Mexico. Like many others, including Robert Oppenheimer, who led the project, he was not proud of the legacy of death, destruction and fear it had brought upon the world. But, as a scientist, he believed the realisation of atomic energy was one of the most outstanding scientific and technological developments of the twentieth century. Its controlled use eventually resulted in an efficient clean source of energy, now used by many countries. Unfortunately, for many years after the war, it was the creation of the atomic bomb, rather than the beneficial use of atomic energy, that turned the public mind against it.

Countries that were the victors of the Second World War, namely the United States of America, the Soviet Union and Britain, vigorously pursued nuclear research programmes with weapons development as their primary objectives. These fuelled the Cold War which, for over four decades, produced political insecurity and instilled fear in millions of people. Paradoxically, the atom bomb provided security for those nations who possessed it but was seen as a threat by others. It had preserved an uneasy peace and prevented large-scale wars since 1945.

After the short Suez War and the oil crisis that followed, an urgent need for an alternative source of energy that did not rely on oil stimulated the development of nuclear power reactors. These were also necessary for the production of weapons-grade uranium and plutonium so the technology required became highly developed.

At the end of the Second World War, suspicious of Britain’s ability to keep secrets from the Soviet Union and uncertainty about the security of Europe, the US Government decided not to share its atomic weapons’ secrets with Britain, even though British scientists contributed to the Manhattan Project. In 1947, UK Prime Minister Clement Attlee and his cabinet, therefore, gave the go-ahead for a British independent atomic weapons programme. Henry Fellows was appointed to be the Chief Scientist and Deputy Director of Britain’s first top-secret atomic weapons research establishment at Halborn. He was later promoted Director after the mysterious death of the first Director in 1959.

As a young man at the University of Cambridge, Henry Fellows had been one of the founding members of the International Brotherhood Society of Scientists which was originally inspired by a group of German Jewish scientists who were contemporaries of Einstein. They fled to Britain from Nazi Germany in the late 1930s. One was David Simons who became a friend and colleague of Fellows. Together, they recruited other like-minded scientists. They wanted to prevent the disastrous situation that was enveloping Europe at the time from reaching over to Britain. Most of the able atomic scientists left Germany after the Nazis came to power thus depriving them of the capability of developing an atomic bomb. The Brotherhood became a secret organization dedicated to preventing dictators like Hitler from using scientific discoveries for evil purposes. In 1938, it was financed by a wealthy English benefactor and became a Foundation. A charter was drawn up, which required its members to take a secret oath of allegiance and seek advisory positions in governments and companies in their respective countries so they could exert a positive influence on policy decisions.

After the war broke out on 3 September 1939, David Simons went to the US; and later, together with Henry Fellows and Paul Fields, another British physicist joined the US Manhattan Project at Los Alamos. At the site of the detonation of the first atomic bomb in the Alamogordo Desert of New Mexico known as ‘Trinity,’ they were to make a discovery that would change their lives.

After the war, the International Brotherhood Foundation became successful in many of its objectives. Its membership grew in the US and Europe. Unfortunately, power corrupts and some members, driven by self-interest and profit, joined a breakaway group known as the New Order. Fellows and Simons were aware that under the umbrella of their Foundation this group flourished. The group had a strict code of secrecy so nobody knew the names of its members or associations. It distorted the original aims of the Brotherhood Foundation in the same way that extremists and fundamentalists do with religions. The purpose of the New Order was to infiltrate governments and powerful multinational companies to exert influence and eventually take control. Like the Italian Mafia and secret bodies, it used threats, intimidation and even murder to achieve its aims. Unfortunately, some of the original members who formed the Brotherhood Foundation joined the New Order with the promise of riches and power.

It was a fire started by the agents of the New Order at the Halborn Atomic Weapons Research establishment in 1959, resulting in the deaths of four colleagues, which had the most devastating effect on Fellows. Important devices and secret documents were stolen that threatened the security of Britain’s hydrogen bomb project. Fellows felt responsible since he was the New Order’s target. After discovering Fellows was a member of the Brotherhood Foundation, the UK Government gave him an ultimatum, be prosecuted for breaching the Official Secrets Act or let it arrange his fake death and retirement under a new identity.

The government announced the death of Fellows in a car accident. His new identity listed him officially as Malcolm Walker, a retired bank manager. Money was given to him to buy a cottage at Bisley, a small village tucked away in the Cotswolds. This gave him a refuge that offered him life anonymity. Very few people knew where he lived; a precaution necessary for his survival, but one day he knew his enemies would find him and it would be the end.

***

As Malcolm watched the flames engulf the wood in the grate, he thought of the only two women in his life. One was Dr Susan Woods, a brilliant mathematician, whom he had brought over from the US to work at Halborn. She had become his close friend and confidante and with three others was a victim of the fire at the establishment. The other was Ruth Goodman, his only living relative. She was the daughter of his niece, who died with her husband in a tragic car accident when Ruth was only twelve. Since then, Henry had supported Ruth, paid for her boarding school education and helped her gain a place to study classics at his old college in Cambridge. She was an intelligent girl and wanted to be a teacher after she graduated.

During Ruth’s visit in the summer, Fellows told her about his life’s work. Until then she had known very little about the old man. He told her about the Brotherhood Foundation, his wartime experiences working on the Manhattan Project, the incident at Halborn in 1959 that resulted in the deaths of his scientists and why he was forced by the government to resign and assume a new identity. He told her that on his death she would be the sole beneficiary of his will. She would inherit all his possessions, including the cottage, his diaries and papers relating to his work. The papers were in a bank deposit box for safekeeping and he gave her a key for it. Among the papers, there was a coded list of names of people who had been members of the Brotherhood and others who were the members of a Cabal that controlled the New Order. He believed the New Order was now the most powerful secret organisation in the world and was, in some way, involved with an al-Qaeda terrorist group that was planning something big. He also told her that on his death she was to send all his papers to Professor David Simons, who lived in Tucson, Arizona. His address was in the files. But he omitted to tell her that handwritten copies of some of the documents were also hidden in the attic space of the cottage.

The fire was burning itself out and it was late. The old man was getting tired. Easing himself out of the chair, he checked the locks on the doors and windows, drew the thick curtains and went upstairs to bed. He normally liked to write in his diary or read before going to sleep but there was little to write about these days. He finished reading the last chapter of his book and switched off the bedside light. With an image of Ruth, and particularly her loving smile in his mind, he drifted into a shallow sleep.

The Night Intruder

It was late and the rain had just stopped when the BMW coasted quietly up to the cottage which was set back from the road. The car stopped and parked on the roadside, close to a gate that opened onto a grassy path leading to a cottage. The driver walked up the wet path and entered the cottage through the front door using a special passkey. She slipped silently into the darkened room. The first task was to find the fuse box that controlled power to the cottage. It was in a cupboard located near the kitchen. Once the power was cut, the task could be carried out before the occupant could see anything. The intruder’s eyes narrowed as she saw light coming from the dying embers of a fire in the grate. Sensing a movement in the bedroom she immediately switched off the power. Concerned that the element of surprise may have been lost, she moved into the shadows of the living room.

Professional killers have an instinctive advantage over their unsuspecting prey. Her instructions in the contract were clear. There was to be no violence, no struggle or physical signs of unnatural death. A fee of half a million dollars bought that level of commitment. It was more than was usual for a relatively unknown person. Assassinations of presidents, prime ministers, chief executives and well-known entertainers commanded more than a million, but retired bank managers were not normally in that league. She didn’t know who Malcolm Walker was, or the value of the knowledge he possessed, but it was not her concern. In addition to the killing, she was told to locate and destroy certain documents that he possessed.

Walker was awakened by the muffled sound of footsteps. For an old man, his hearing was still quite acute. It was usually quiet on a winter’s night in that part of the Cotswolds so even the slightest sound was discernible. Still half-dazed, he sat up in bed and stared into the darkness. He always left the bedroom door slightly open to allow fresh air to circulate; it also helped to alleviate a fear of claustrophobia. Suddenly, he went cold; he sensed that someone was in the house. Burglaries in that part of the countryside were rare but the police recently reported some in the area. Fumbling for the bedside light, he pressed the switch but nothing happened, there was only darkness. He felt his pulse racing out of control and his heart beating as though it would burst. Adrenaline was filling his veins but fear immobilised his body. He could see and hear nothing but felt that someone was nearby.

Opening the door wide, he crept down the stairs into the living room; the dying embers of the fire were still visible and provided some light. He went to a drawer in a desk on the far side of the room where he remembered a torch was stowed. He pulled it open and fumbled for it. Then, just as he was about to withdraw the torch, he felt a searing pain in the back of his head. It felt like a hot needle had been plunged into his brain. For an instant, everything went white, like he was being blinded by an intense light. Turning swiftly around, his sight returned for a split second to see a tall black figure looming over him. He just caught its outline, then everything started to fade. He levered himself to his feet and staggered towards the door. He had a sinking feeling that he was leaving the world, going somewhere else. He could just make out an outline of the room, his head was spinning and everything was going fuzzy. He tried to move but every muscle seemed to seize up. He collapsed onto the floor, no longer able to support himself. The light faded away as the life drained from his body. The mark of the hypodermic needle was barely visible in the hair at the base of his neck. Only an experienced person looking would find it.

The intruder checked that nothing had been disturbed. She summoned all her strength to drag the body back upstairs and into the bed. The victim was supposed to have been asleep when the lethal drug was administered to avoid any signs of a struggle but she had misjudged the situation. The death would look like a heart attack; a hybrid of the drug succinylcholine injected into the body would not be easily traced. Fifty years of development had perfected one of the best murder weapons ever devised. She methodically removed any signs that someone had entered the room, no fingerprints, no DNA for forensics. Since there was no motive, the death would look natural, so there would be no reason for a post-mortem. She searched the cottage for the papers but didn’t find them. However, she did take a letter addressed to Ruth Goodman from an old desk drawer. After checking all the rooms, she left the cottage, failing to notice in the dark, the concealed hatch leading to the attic.

The intruder hoped her paymasters would be pleased with the night’s work. The documents had not been found so the task was not complete. If she lied about it, who would know? But there was her professional pride, she had never failed. They always paid into her Swiss bank account within a day of receiving telephone calls. The line was highly secure. Her encrypted messages were deleted automatically shortly after they were received so could not be traced. She had no contact with a person, only a recorded voice. On this occasion, she would not make the telephone call until she had visited Ruth Goodman but the death would be reported so it would be expected. It was possible, just possible, that Ruth Goodman had the documents. If so, the contract could be completed

Olga Petrovitch, or R2 as she was known, had become a rich woman; her KGB training had paid off. Her new employers were honourable people. They gave her total anonymity and guaranteed protection because she was the best. She didn’t care about the people who were the designated targets so long as the payments were made. Her paymasters had never let her down; she knew the penalty if she failed. It was the thirteenth contract, but she wasn’t superstitious. Before she left the cottage, Olga switched the power back on. Having worn gloves, no fingerprints or DNA would be found in the cottage. As she left and walked along the path back to her car being careful not to leave any footprints, an uncomfortable feeling came over her. Was it an ill omen? She didn’t know that the man whom she had just was murdered knew her father who was also murdered at the Trinity site in the Alamogordo Desert of New Mexico in 1945. The rain had stopped and a clear night sky displayed a full moon as the black BMW slipped quietly away from the cottage and drove towards the M4 motorway.

THE

DISCOVERY

CHAPTER 1

Recollections

October 1999

The directions that our lives take are more often determined by chance events than by plans. Looking back, it all started with an early morning phone call. It woke me up when I didn’t want to be woken up. Its incessant ring abruptly ended my pleasant dream. I was half asleep when I switched on the bedside light and reached out for the phone. For many years the telephone had been part of my toolkit. It was often my sole companion, my personal friend, my connection to the outside world, so calls couldn’t be ignored. I didn’t like early morning calls. They often brought unwelcome news. Callers living in other time zones across the world are often oblivious to such inconveniences.

The last two weeks of my life had been mine, not dictated by a diary of meetings, travel schedules or other people’s agendas. I returned from Kuwait a month back after a gruelling experience and spent the first two weeks writing a report for my American client. I did offer to fly to New York to present the material to him but since he didn’t respond I was glad to continue with my recuperation. My agent, Robert Carville, had already received the money for the work I did in Kuwait so I assumed that was it. The cheque, less Robert’s exorbitantly high commission, would be in the post. But for many years Robert had served me well so I didn’t mind. He acted as a buffer to people who wanted me to carry out crazy assignments. Over the years, we had become good friends and I was one of his best clients.

Since my return from Kuwait, I had suffered headaches and bouts of depression. My doctor told me I had been close to a mental breakdown, probably caused by the unfortunate events that took place on the last days of my visit to that country. Fortunately, HM Government had rescued me from a possible long prison sentence in Kuwait’s terrible jails. Governments only do such things when they need something in return so I knew there would be a payback. At the time, the relief of being free and able to return home numbed my thoughts about what might arise in the future. The arrest by the Kuwait police was justified as a huge mistake and although I received no official apology, being back in England was enough, so I decided not to pursue it further.

My doctor recommended a long holiday. A temporary escape from the real world to recharge my batteries. Before taking a holiday, I thought a good night out at one of London’s best nightclubs, followed by sex with a beautiful woman, preferably of Anglo-Saxon origin, would initiate my road to recovery. It had been my weakness for attractive women and the sexual indulgence that was partly responsible for me being arrested in Kuwait and put in jail. At the time, I believed that my journalistic success in Kuwait, recognised by the large fee paid by my client, allowed for some carnal pleasures. Unfortunately, alcohol numbs the brain and memory becomes the first casualty. I remembered the food and drink and an attractive brunette in my room but what followed was a little hazy. Pity I didn’t remember it all. I seemed to be developing a habit of sleeping with beautiful women only to find they had abandoned me the next morning.

Before I could answer the call, the voice of my agent Robert bellowed in my ear. ‘Paul, it’s Robert. I’m in New York. Sorry to call you at this early hour but I have some sad news. Abdel Salam has been killed in some sort of car accident in Kuwait City. It’s not clear what happened but I think he was murdered. You had better know before it’s made public. You will appreciate the implications.’

Before I could say anything, I heard that click, which meant someone had just tapped into the call. Robert must have heard it too. ‘I will call you again later,’ he said and rung off. I knew at that moment that my chance of having a peaceful vacation had ended.

The assignment in Kuwait had been won by Robert, against serious competition. As a freelance investigative journalist, I had worked on previous assignments in Israel and Iraq during the Gulf War and gained a reputation for on-the-spot reporting. The war had been over for eight years but problems in the Gulf area remained. Rumours of another war and the increased activity of extremist terrorist groups were worrying many governments and oil companies. It was pushing up the cost of crude oil, with dire consequences for nations like ours that relied on Middle East supplies. Some people said that the Iraq war was about oil. That was partly true, but the rise of dictators like Saddam Hussein and fundamental Islamism was the more serious underlying issue. The Iraq army was the largest in the Middle East and Hussein’s insatiable desire for power and unrelenting rejection of the UN’s resolutions after he invaded Kuwait on 2 August 1990 had made the Gulf War, known as Desert Storm, inevitable. In addition, the Islamic faith was being subverted by extremists who wanted to establish new global totalitarianism. They were becoming active in many countries with significant Muslim populations.

Robert had been approached at a business meeting in New York by Richard Houseman, the new CEO of the American Gulf Oil Company. He wanted someone with knowledge of the Gulf region to give an independent assessment of the region’s political stability and economic viability. His concern was to protect the company’s billion-dollar investments in the region. My name came up in a conversation with Houseman who had read my articles in the Global Economist, a monthly international journal to which I was a regular contributor. I did a series of reports on the Middle East, warning about the growing threat of terrorism. An increasing number of well-funded groups from different religious factions were becoming active against the West. They were filling the political vacuum produced after the end of the Cold War. This time, after the occupation of Afghanistan, the Russians were now the enemy. It was ironic that our old Cold War enemy, who we criticised for invading Afghanistan, was now being targeted by Muslim fundamentalists in their country.

Robert had called me to say Houseman’s proposal would be a wonderful opportunity to make a lot of money. I think he meant for himself, with agent’s fees at twenty per cent. If I agreed, he would arrange for a contract to be signed and then set things up. It meant, of course, I had to do all the work. For me, money was not the priority but raising my profile with a large multi-billion corporate in the US was an opportunity not to be missed. There were risks but anything worth doing has risks. I did not know then how great they would be. If I had, I would have walked away and you would not be reading this story.

I agreed to sign a contract with the American Gulf Oil Company for a fee of three hundred thousand dollars plus expenses, payable two weeks after delivery of a study report on Kuwait and the Gulf region. It may seem like a lot of money but for a large multi-national oil company it was a speck on their budget. Anyway, it was the going rate for such market intelligence. Robert would use one of his contacts in Kuwait to set up a series of one-to-one interviews with prominent Arab businessmen from the region. The schedule was tight and there were penalty clauses in the contract. Failing to meet delivery dates would cost me a lot of money. Normally I didn’t like such clauses but the risks seemed minimal. I also had to sign a confidentiality agreement giving exclusive rights to the company for all the information that I acquired. It seemed strange that a Middle Eastern oil company required the information so urgently.

There was extreme competition in the region for new business contracts. Companies were offering incentives to the many Sheiks who controlled the money. Kuwait and the Emirate states of Dubai and Abu Dhabi had embarked on rigorous infrastructural development. Oil, the black gold of the Gulf, was their currency. Those with foresight saw investment in infrastructure as an imperative safeguard for the future if the need for oil was reduced when alternative sources of energy were developed. The Gulf region has the largest oil reserves in the world but political, ecological and economic issues make the sustainability of demand and supply filled with uncertainty.

Abdel Salam was a well-respected journalist and contributor to the news network Al Jazeera. Robert and I had met him on some occasions at conferences. Educated at Oxford and with a Harvard MBA, he was one of the new breeds of journalists on which the region now depended for effective contact with the outside world. He became our colleague and friend; he was the eyes and ears of the Gulf but his high profile also made him enemies.

Kuwait City had been rebuilt since the devastating occupation of the Iraqis who had ransacked it eight years previous. Most of the 600 oil fields set on fire by the retreating Iraqi military had been made operational, thanks mainly to American expertise. The continued development of the State and the region depended on further inward investment and political stability.

My thoughts turned to Abdel and his family. If he had been murdered, I felt partly responsible, having involved him in my study. I was concerned about why he was killed and by whom. He knew the risks of helping us and was probably being watched by his enemies. It was believed the Iraqis and Iranians had spy rings in the country. Abdel had found a lot of prominent businessmen for me to interview. It had been a difficult job to overcome their natural suspicions but they were still grateful to us for liberating their country so were willing to help.

I tape-recorded the interviews and copied them onto a CD using a specially designed analogue to digital converter I had acquired from a UK film company. I could then copy them into my laptop computer. My laptop had, like my mobile phone, become my indispensable travelling companion. It was one of a series of new portable machines that were now becoming available. They were scarce and expensive in the UK so I had to get Robert to buy one in the US, it was made by Hewlett Packard. I wanted an IBM computer but none were available as the company had concentrated on building larger main from computers, having failed to foresee the massive market for portable computers.

The revolution in information technology enables journalists to upload reports with photographs and video clips to their main offices immediately after they have been acquired. With access to a satellite dish, quality material can be transmitted instantly. A good example was bringing the Gulf War into people’s living rooms as it happened. Unfortunately, it became like a soap opera, whetting appetites for the next bulletin or instalment, making the horrors of death and destruction look like a video game being played out in the safety and comfort of the home. I watched live as the first cruise missiles plummeted from the dark sky onto their unsuspecting targets in Baghdad, lighting up the surrounding landscape with their massive explosive warheads. At first, it was surreal but when it became a nightly event then reality kicked in. Hundreds, maybe thousands, of innocent people were being killed, not knowing why and defenceless to do anything about it.

I showered, dressed, switched on my computer and went online. While the hard disc was whining away, I partially opened the window blinds to look outside. My flat was on the fourth floor of an apartment block in the fashionable Knightsbridge district of London with a panoramic view of Hyde Park and the Serpentine. Directly below, the view of a well-maintained paved courtyard was always the same. Many of my neighbours were politicians, senior company executives and high-level civil servants who wanted a degree of seclusion and didn’t want to mix socially. The security system made it almost impossible to gain unauthorised entry into the building. CCTV cameras monitoring every walkway were viewed by a guard who sat inside the building on a twenty-four-hour watch. People could be seen entering or leaving the building.

My father, Sir John Cane, a wealthy banker and commodities dealer, died with my mother in a tragic car accident on the M4 eight years previously. I was the sole heir to their estate, which included the flat in Knightsbridge. Fortunately, my inheritance provided me with sufficient income to live in style in London. My social and business lives were kept separate. Some of my friends were suspicious of my wealth and thought I received income from drug dealing or some other criminal activity. Close friends knew my circumstances so didn’t need to concern themselves with such questions. I had many girlfriends like any unmarried thirty-year-old would have, but most of them had marriage plans. When I perceived that point had been reached in our relationship, we parted company since I valued my bachelor’s state. So far, all my relationships had been platonic. I had yet to fall in love with the ideal woman. I wasn’t sure how I would know but my friends informed me that I would when she appeared in my life. My assignments usually took me overseas so I could not devote the time and dedication necessary to make a lasting relationship work. At present, I enjoyed the hunt rather than the conquest. But one day I might become the hunted. That’s a challenge I would like.

I was destined to work in my father’s company after graduating from Oxford but to his disappointment, I studied history and languages, primarily because they were my best A-level subjects. Travelling extensively with my father to Egypt and Israel during school holidays helped me to develop my language skills and knowledge of the Middle East. Perhaps I had inherited a certain gene from a distant Jewish relative on my mother’s side of the family. Writing and solving mysteries were my real passions so I became interested in investigative journalism. Sherlock Holmes was my favourite detective. I became the editor of my college newspaper and took part in all university debates. In my finals, to the surprise of my tutor and friends, who believed my drinking, gambling and womanising would finish me, I did gain an upper-second BA degree in history.

After graduating, to gain practical experience, I worked for a local newspaper but, after a disagreement with the editor, decided to set up my own office as a freelance journalist, relying on work from my friends and acquaintances in the newspaper business. Reluctantly, my father did support me, so, unlike many other aspiring journalists, I did have the benefit of a private income.

At first, I had to be content with mundane commissions. The lucky break came early when, through a chance meeting in London, I met up with my old university acquaintance Robert Carville. He had established a successful agency in the US for journalists and consultants in Middle Eastern affairs, with offices in Washington and New York. He had been successful in attracting wealthy clients, generally large investment companies seeking expert journalists. The deteriorating situation between Israel and its hostile neighbours, and the threatening posture posed by Iraq were of great concern to many American and British oil companies with investments in the region. Both before and after the Gulf War, a demand existed for experts with knowledge of the area who could speak the language and were willing to go there to acquire local knowledge. Governments and their embassies were not forthcoming with information about what was going on in the region owing to the sensitive political situation and the vested interests of the major powers. The war and the escalating price of oil had political and economic repercussions throughout the world.

I had friends and contacts in Israel so I did some reporting for several prominent newspapers and TV channels during the Gulf War. Robert obtained some contracts for me from American newspapers and journals, including the prestigious New York Times. I went to Iraq at the end of the fighting to report on the aftermath. The devastation and death everywhere left a lasting impression on me. Now, many years after the Gulf War, new players were emerging in the region and instability was again threatened.

Only a small number of people knew my address, and my telephone number was ex-directory. The innovations in communications technology were making it increasingly difficult to remain anonymous. Most of my work was confidential to clients and success depended on keeping their trust and information safe. The encryption software on my computer helped to ward off hackers. It had been given to me illegally by a retired CIA operative whom I once did a favour for in Iraq. I think it originated from MI5 in Britain.

I switched on my computer to re-check some data files and then went online. There were no important emails. Robert rarely used emails; he preferred the telephone. He was one of a band of people who, although clever enough to understand it, resisted new technology and preferred to use traditional methods. I think it goes deeper; some people prefer to talk than to write. In his profession that was a more valuable asset.

My computing was interrupted by an international telephone call. I anxiously picked up the receiver assuming it was Robert again, only to hear a woman’s voice.

‘It’s Atiya, Abdel’s wife.’ She sounded distressed.

‘I have to tell you that Abdel was killed today in a car accident but no one was to blame.’

She repeated it several times as though someone was telling her to say it. She didn’t sound like a wife in grief. I thought I could hear a muffled noise in the background. Because of my friendship with Abdel, her message was brief and not very friendly. Before ringing off she told me the funeral would take place that day in private with only family attending. It was a Muslim tradition to have a funeral very soon after death.

I wondered why she kept insisting it was an accident and why the call was so short. She was unlikely to know that Robert had already told me about Abdel’s death. It was clear she was not alone when making the call. Something strange was going on. I needed to speak to Robert again to get more information.

I returned to my computer and continued to check the Kuwait files. Somewhere amongst them might be a clue to Abdel’s death. I had concerns about the security of the files when my computer was left in the hotel room in Kuwait City after my arrest. My tapes were in a secure place. I re-checked my data files on the hard disc and the website when at the airport in Kuwait. My sense of relief was short-lived when after further checks I discovered someone may have accessed the files. But only the CIA or MI6 could break the encryption code.

In New York, it was still very early in the morning. I decided to call Robert anyway on his mobile phone but he didn’t answer so I left him a message to call me back.

The light was breaking through a cloudy sky, reminding me it was only seven o’clock in the morning. Making myself a black coffee and some toast, I started to recall the events that took place in Kuwait one month back.

CHAPTER 2

Incident in Kuwait

September 1999

It was an evening in late September when Robert called me to say he was flying to London and could I meet him to discuss the prospects of a new assignment in Kuwait. I had just completed writing a series of articles for a journal so needed some work. My girlfriend and I had just split up. She found a pop star more exciting than a journalist. It wasn’t a serious relationship, more physical than anything else, so the parting was mutual. I was, therefore, ready for a new