Native Shore part three

My publisher often jokes with me that current political events seem to be doing a very good job of promoting Native Shore.

As promised here is the final excerpt from Chapter One.

 

 

 

The DG then took a single sheet of paper and passed it across the desk. Pritchard thought it significant that the file wasn’t passed over. Barry gestured to Pritchard with his head to pick it up and read it, which he did. It was clear even at first glance to Pritchard that this was a written report on a recent discussion with the Office of the First Minister in Scotland. He knew from how it was written that it wasn’t the product of an electronic listening device. Clearly, Five had an asset in the room. The report was from a source called ‘Headtorch’.

Pritchard immediately knew why he was being shown this. Such an asset could yield product in the coming period that would be vital to his black op in Scotland succeeding. What Pritchard didn’t know was that Headtorch had been a long-term asset of Five. He was a high-flyer among the SNP hierarchy, and luckily for the Service, he was keen that his romantic ‘dates’ be kept under wraps. Fond of a single Islay malt himself, his romantic targets were treated to something a little more pharmaceutical. Special Branch was already aware of his extracurricular hobbies, and therefore it was just a matter of time before the trap could be sprung. The case was bang to rights, but it was signed off as a ‘No Pro’ by the office of the Procurator Fiscal. No Pro stood for “No Proceedings”. Someone had written in the margin of the file, “he is a very lucky man”.

However, the luck came at a price. The two female complainants never found out that there were, in fact, two of them. After the initial complaint, a real hard case of a female copper had been brought into Paisley Police Station to verbally batter the woman into submission. It was important that the case died there, and that the woman never knew that there was a second, almost identical complaint made against this man eighteen months earlier. This would have been enough to go forward to a full court case.

At the same time, Headtorch was being given a very different story. He was in fact told the truth; that there were two complainants, bang to rights, and that the testimony of the two women was enough to secure a conviction in front of a fifteen-person jury in a Sheriff Court in Scotland under solemn procedure.

Faced with these statements, he crumpled. As he blubbered about his life being over, the interviewing detective, who was in fact a Special Branch man, said that there might be a way out for him. Drowning, he grasped it. Since then, he had been a very valuable listening device inside the Scottish government and in the upper reaches of the SNP. After an initial period, his handler started to give him tasks, things to introduce. In the terminology of the Intelligence world, he was an agent of influence. During IndyRef One, he had been well placed to influence the currency position. People high up the food chain in Westminster realised that this was the Yes campaign’s Achilles Heel. Even with an able orator and debater like Alex Salmond, leader of the SNP and the First Minister of Scotland, if they did not address the issues around being an independent country but holding onto a currency issued by the Bank of England, it could prove decisive. And so it did.

The Agent of Influence as a technique had worked very well in the Northern Ireland conflict. It took a long time to get their people to the top of the Provos, but once critical mass had been achieved, the intelligence war had been won. It got to the point in the early nineties where there were more assets in senior Sinn Féin meetings than bona fide rebels! Of course, the assets would always think they were the only one in the room.

Headtorch was a good little boy and only once did he fail to report something. Luckily, GCHQ picked it up and he was hauled in. He was told that the sexual offence case against him could be reactivated. George Barry remembered reading in the report at the time that he looked as white as a very white thing. In fact, the robust Special Branch officer reporting to his MI5 contact said that “He made Casper the Friendly Ghost look like a fucking refugee!”

After that first Yellow Card offence Headtorch behaved himself and it didn’t happen again. The service owned him, and George Barry knew that his product would be highly useful to Pritchard’s black op. It would be shared with him on a need-to-know basis.

Pritchard looked up and said quietly, “Very impressive.”

George Barry smiled and nodded gently. He extended his hand indicating he wanted the report back. Pritchard handed it over. Barry put it in the folder and moved it over onto the pile that had the GRU target report. He reached into a desk drawer and pulled out another folder. He opened it and passed over a single plain A4 sheet with some names written on it. Pritchard scanned down them. He looked up at George Barry.

“Hmm, possible hit parade?”

“That would be my sense of it. Use your discretion, of course. They’re in ascending order of value, so I wouldn’t start at the top. I’d start at the bottom. Yes?”

“Understand fully, sir.”

“Jolly good.”

“Can I have a minute or two with this, sir?”

“Indeed. Scan and absorb. Obviously, we can’t be walking around with that in our pockets.”

“Of course, sir. Fully understood.”

Pritchard looked through the list. There were seven names on it. He tried to take a photograph in his head of each of them. He looked up at the head of MI5.

“I take it these suggestions are not entirely written in stone. Sir?”

“Merely suggestions. To give you a sense of where I see this going.”

“Indeed, sir. Indeed,” said Pritchard, handing back the piece of paper. Barry stood up and walked across to the shredder in the corner of his office.

 

 

 

 

Well now, I hope that you enjoyed that.

It is worth reiterating that what you’ve just read was written by your humble correspondent in the summer of 2018.

So, I think you will get my publisher’s joke.

Finally, massive thanks to all of you who have already got your signed copy of Native Shore.

The publisher is delighted and the author is humbled.

A second print run is on the cards much earlier than originally planned.

Míle Buíochas.

Native Shore will be available in bookshops shortly and I will post here when that happens.