They spent two days going through the procedures over and over again, until Monk was touch perfect. Then Danny left, for whatever world of silicon chips he dwelt in.
By the end of the third week at Castle Forbes, all the instructors pronounced themselves satisfied. Monk saw them leave.
“Is there a phone I could use?” Monk asked that evening as he, Ciaran, and Mitch sat in the drawing room after supper.
Mitch looked up from the chessboard where he was being trounced by Ciaran and nodded toward the telephone in the corner.
“A private one,” said Monk.
Ciaran also raised his head, and both former soldiers looked at him.
“Sure,” said Ciaran, “use the one in the study.”
Monk sat among the books and hunting prints in Lord Forbes’s private den and dialed an overseas number. It rang in a small frame house in Crozet, south-central Virginia, where the sun was low over the Blue Ridge Mountains, five hours behind Scotland. Someone answered at the tenth ring and a woman’s voice said, “Hello?”
He could imagine the small but cozy living room where a log fire would burn through the winter and the light always gleamed from the surfaces of her cherished, highly polished wedding furniture.
“Hi, Mom, it’s Jason.”
The frail voice rose with pleasure.
“Jason. Where are you, son?”
“I’ve been traveling, Mom. How’s Dad?”
Since the stroke his father had spent much of his time in his rocking chair out on the stoop, staring at the small town and the forested mountains beyond where, forty years earlier and able to trek all day, he had taken his firstborn son hunting and fishing.
“He’s fine. He’s dozing on the porch right now. It’s hot. It’s been a long, hot summer. I’ll tell him you called. He’ll be pleased. Will you be coming to visit soon? It’s been so long.”
There were two brothers and a sister, long gone from the small home, one brother an insurance adjuster, the other a real estate broker along the Chesapeake, his sister married to a country doctor and raising a family. All in Virginia. They visited frequently. He was the absent one.
“Soon as I can make it, Mom. That’s a promise.”
“You’re going away again, aren’t you son?”
He knew what she meant by “away.” She had known about Vietnam before he got word he was shipping out and used to call him in Washington before the foreign journeys as if she sensed something she could not possibly know. Something about mothers ... three thousand miles and she could sense the danger.
“I’ll be back. Then I’ll come visit.”
“Take care of yourself, Jason.”
He held the phone and stared through the windows at the stars over Scotland. He should have gone home more often. They were both old now. He should have made the time. If he came back from Russia he wo
uld make the time.
“I’ll be fine, Mom, I’ll be fine.”
There was a pause, as if neither knew what to say.
“I love you, Mom. Tell Dad I love you both.”
He put the phone down. Two hours later Sir Nigel Irvine read the transcript at his home in Dorset. On the following morning Ciaran and Mitch drove Monk back to the Aberdeen airport and escorted him on the southbound flight.
He spent five days in London, staying with Sir Nigel Irvine at the Montcalm, a quiet and discreet hotel tucked away in a Nash terrace behind Marble Arch. During those days the old spymaster explained in detail what Monk should do. Finally, there was nothing more but to say good-bye. Irvine slipped him a piece of paper.
“If ever that wonderful hi-tech communications system goes down, there’s a chap here who might get a message out. Last resort of course. Well, good-bye, Jason. I’ll not come to Heathrow. Hate airports. I think you can do it, you know. Yes, dammit, I really think you might.”
Ciaran and Mitch drove him to Heathrow and took him as far as the security checkpoint. Then each held out his hand.