The Davina Graham Thrillers: The Defector, The Avenue of the Dead, Albatross, and The Company of Saints

by Evelyn Anthony

Overview

The complete series starring the British female operative—from the international bestselling author and “powerful plotter of spy stories” (The Daily Telegraph).
 
The Defector: MI6 agent Davina Graham knows better. But she’s fallen hopelessly in love with the married KGB defector she’s been ordered to debrief. In exchange for information, Ivan Sasanov insists his wife and daughter back in the USSR must be brought to England and given asylum. But the KGB is already on to him—he barely escapes an assassination attempt. And now his wife has been arrested. With Sasanov’s daughter in imminent danger, Graham knows there’s only one way to save the family of the man she loves.
 
“Veteran romance-suspenser Anthony continues to sharpen her talents—and this East/West espionage . . . is one of her best.” —Kirkus Reviews
 
The Avenue of the Dead: The British-born wife of Edward Fleming, the US president’s assistant under-secretary of state and close friend, has appealed to the British ambassador for sanctuary. Elizabeth Fleming claims her husband tried to murder her because she found out he was passing information to the Russians. Though it was ruled an accident, his first wife died in a fire in their Mexico vacation home. To find out the truth, Davina Graham follows a labyrinthine trail from the inner circles of Washington, DC, to Mexico, where she will use herself as bait to trap an elusive criminal known as the Plumed Serpent.
 
“Solid and classy entertainment.” —Kirkus Reviews
 
Albatross: A mole high in the ranks of Britain’s Secret Intelligence Service has been feeding national secrets to the Soviets. Davina Graham goes undercover to root out the traitor, code named Albatross. Could it be her boss, Brigadier Sir James White, a twenty-year SIS veteran, months away from retirement? Humphrey Grant, White’s second-in-command, whose public persona conceals damning sexual secrets? Or John Kidson, the technocrat married to Graham’s beautiful, pampered sister? The MI6 agent must move quickly before time runs out for them all.
 
“If you like your spy stories to have a touch of class, you will enjoy Evelyn Anthony’s Albatross.” —The Sunday Times
 
The Company of Saints: Now the first female head of Britain’s Secret Intelligence Service, Davina Graham is taking a well-deserved holiday in Venice, when on the Grand Canal, the US Secretary of Defense and his daughter are blown up in a gondola. When more assassinations follow, Graham is convinced that Igor Borisov, the power-hungry head of the KGB, is behind the executions. Working with Intelligence agent Colin Lomax, her ex-lover, they uncover a shadowy organization called the Company of Saints, a private brigade of hired killers whose chilling end game is just beginning.
 
“Written and plotted with all the skill one associates with Ms. Anthony and readable as ever.” —The Irish Times

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781504056298
Publisher:	Open Road Media
Publication date:	10/16/2018
Series:	The Davina Graham Thrillers
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	1440
Sales rank:	833,113
File size:	4 MB

About the Author

Evelyn Anthony is the pen name of Evelyn Ward-Thomas (1926–2018), a female British author who began writing in 1949. She gained considerable success with her historical novels—two of which were selected for the American Literary Guild—before winning huge acclaim for her espionage thrillers. Her book, The Occupying Power, won the Yorkshire Post Fiction Prize, and her 1971 novel, The Tamarind Seed, was made into a film starring Julie Andrews and Omar Sharif. Anthony’s books have been translated into nineteen languages.
 
Evelyn Anthony is the pen name of Evelyn Ward-Thomas (1926–2108), a female British author who began writing in 1949. She gained considerable success with her historical novels—two of which were selected for the American Literary Guild—before winning huge acclaim for her espionage thrillers. Her book, The Occupying Power, won the Yorkshire Post Fiction Prize, and her 1971 novel, The Tamarind Seed, was made into a film starring Julie Andrews and Omar Sharif. Anthony’s books have been translated into nineteen languages.

Read an Excerpt

CHAPTER 1

The man sitting opposite Davina Graham lit a cigarette. He smoked Sub Rosa, the fattest and most expensive Turkish cigarette, made by Sullivans in Burlington Arcade. The name amused him and it had become his trade-mark. A capacity to deliver bad news with an ingratiating smile was another characteristic; crisis never disturbed that avuncular calm, and he had never been seen to frown or glare like other people when he was angry. In fact, Davina thought, looking at him, he showed no genuine human feeling at all. The bonhomie was as false as the friendly concern he showed his people when they had gone wrong. A cold-hearted, calculating bastard. Which was exactly what his job required. Unlike the fictional heads of the Secret Intelligence Service, he had a name which was known to everyone. He despised the schoolboy approach to espionage, with its penchant for initials and silly code words for obvious things.

He was Brigadier James White, and though she had worked for him for five years, and he knew her father well, he had never called her anything but Miss Graham. She looked at him steadily as he talked; he didn't frighten her because he had never fooled her either. She was used to men of his type; she neither admired nor disliked them. Like her, they had a certain job to do. Theirs was not a profession suitable for weaklings.

She had made her weekly report, and the Brigadier was considering, making comments, listening to her replies. He sat back in his chair, drew on the cigarette and exhaled the sickly smoke.

'So in your view, he's not too happy,' he said.

Davina nodded. 'That's natural enough; he's still disorientated by what he's done. I expected depression at this stage, but not restlessness.'

'And he's restless,' the Brigadier said.

'Yes. He tries to hide it from me, but I know the symptoms.'

'Not from personal experience, I hope?' he asked pleasantly.

'I'm not a restless type,' she said. 'I've proved that, I think.'

'Of course.' The smile widened and then was gone. 'If he's restless that's a bad sign,' he said. 'We'll have to think of something to make him happy. You'll have to think of something.' He paused for a moment, and then said casually, 'He's never asked for a woman. Could that be the trouble?'

'He's had every opportunity,' Davina said. 'He talks a lot about his wife and children.'

'Eight months is a long time for some men,' the Brigadier remarked.

'I'll see what I can do,' she promised.

'Use your own judgement, Miss Graham. Don't worry about expense or anything like that. If he's dissatisfied, he won't give us what we want. Thank you very much.' He bestowed his meaningless smile upon her, and bent over the papers on his desk.

She went out. As she walked down the corridor she looked at her watch. It was 5.48. It would take two hours to get down to Sussex at this time. Right in the middle of the rush hour. 'Damn him,' she said to herself. 'Why couldn't he see me earlier –'

'Hello, Davina.'

She had almost passed the man approaching her without noticing him. She looked up and stopped.

'Hello, Peter. What are you doing here? I thought you were living it up in New York.'

He was a tall, dark-haired man in his late forties; he wore spectacles and dressed untidily. He could have been a schoolmaster.

'So I was. But I'm back for what's laughingly called a spell of home duty. In other words they felt the job should go to a younger man.'

'And did it?' she asked.

'Come and have a drink; I'm on my way home,' he said. 'I need a shoulder to cry on. I'll tell you all about it.'

She hesitated for a moment, calculating the difference it would make to the drive down to Sussex if she spent an hour with Peter Harrington. Then she saw the look in his eyes. It was lonely and expectant. He'd been very good to her when she first joined. Things had changed now. She was on her way up, and he was on the way down ... A spell of home duty. She knew what that meant without seeing the need in his eyes. She had a shoulder, and he was more entitled to cry on it than anyone else she could think of at that moment.

'I'd love a drink,' she said. 'Where shall we go?'

'There's that pub in Queen Anne's Gate,' he said. 'It should be open by now. Should be pretty quiet too. We can talk.'

Davina slipped her hand inside his arm. 'Yes,' she said. 'We can.'

'Vodka and tonic?' he queried when she ordered. 'You never touched the hard stuff. It was always wine or sherry. What's got you into bad habits?'

'People change.' She smiled. 'I've learnt to like it.'

'You haven't changed,' he said, leaning towards her. They had found a table by a corner; the pub regulars were beginning to come in and cluster round the bar. Most of them were businessmen and secretaries stopping for a drink on their way to the commuter stations or the long crawl home by car.

'In fact,' he said cheerfully, 'you've got better-looking.'

Davina laughed. 'Don't be bloody silly,' she said. 'All I've got is older. But you're looking well. Tell me about the States. From what I heard you were doing very well out there.'

'So I was,' Peter Harrington said. 'I'd made a lot of contacts in the UN including a really top grade one – Rumanian, and another likely one in East Germany.' He broke off, and discarded the false cheerfulness. 'I was doing damned well, Davy, and all of a sudden I start getting sharp messages from London and then without a word of explanation I am recalled. I have to give my two contacts to my replacement. That really hurts; I take months of work and patience to get near them, and then this new man will come sailing in and take over.'

'Who is he?' she asked. He looked so downcast she repressed her irritation at being called Davy. Her parents intended calling their eldest child David. It was just their bad luck she turned out to be a girl. All they could do was feminize the name.

'A fellow called Spencer-Barr ... Jeremy Spencer-Barr. It sounded so bloody pouffy I thought here we go back to the old fairy days of Burgess and Maclean. But I was wrong. Have you met him?'

'Yes,' she said. 'As a matter of fact I have. It was nearly five months ago. He was trying to get my job. They thought a woman would do it better. So he got yours instead. ...'

'What did you think of him?' he asked. 'Honestly, I'd like your view. Naturally I'm prejudiced. And not just because he replaced me. It was the way he did it.'

'I can imagine,' she said quietly. 'I thought he was a conceited little pusher. Sharp as a needle. Unfortunately I also thought he was probably as clever as he said he was. I didn't like him, anyway. He won't do as well as you.'

'Thanks,' he said. He reached across and patted her hand.

She had the reputation in the department of being as tough as nails. Brilliant was the other word used to describe her. He had rather liked her when she first joined. She seemed a quiet girl, not very self-confident. He had always maintained that with make-up and a different way of doing her hair she would be rather pretty. But nobody had taken her on. There were too many attractive girls available for men to bother with one who was discouraging to say the least. But she had nice eyes; they were big and green, and there was such an expression of sympathy in them that he had to swallow hard.

'Thanks,' he said again. 'I'll get you another drink.' He pushed back his chair and hurried to the bar. Davina didn't want the drink, but she understood that he needed time to collect himself. He pulled his chair a little closer to hers when he came back.

'What are you going to do now?' she asked him.

He grimaced. 'I'm assigned to the Personnel Section,' he said. 'In other words White has sent me to the bloody Battersea Dogs' Home. Personnel –' He added a mild obscenity under his breath.

'You'll get out of it,' Davina said. 'You're too good to be wasted, Peter. Just hang on and keep your eyes open for a chance.'

'Tell me about you,' he said. 'I've followed your meteoric rise from afar. You've got Sasanov, haven't you?'

'Yes,' she said. 'I've got him. That was the job your friend Spencer-Barr was after.'

'Not surprising,' he said. 'It was a number one duty. I always said you were a clever girl, Davy. Congratulations. Am I allowed to ask how it's going?'

She shook her head. 'No,' she said. '... And don't call me Davy. I promise not to call you Pete in exchange.'

He grinned. 'Sorry. I forgot you didn't like it. Can I ask you what he's like, or is that contravening the Official Secrets Act?'

'I don't think so,' she said. 'Give me a cigarette, would you – I'll get some in a minute – thanks. What's he like? I've asked myself that nearly every day for almost five months. And I'm not near an answer. He's a puzzling man, Peter. He doesn't fit into any category. Sometimes I don't know whether he's playing a game with me, or whether I'm playing one with him. Only time will tell. ...'

'You'll win,' he said. 'No man in his right mind could resist you.' He grinned at her, and she laughed and shook her head.

'You'd be surprised how many have,' she said. 'God, look at the time. I've got to go.' She stood up and held out her hand. He took it and drew her towards him. He kissed her on the cheek.

'Thanks for the shoulder,' he said. 'Let me know when you're coming up and I'll give you lunch.'

'I will,' she promised. 'And don't worry ... I'll take you up on that lunch! Goodbye.'

He watched her till she pushed through the door and vanished into the street. She hadn't finished the second vodka, so he drank it down. Ivan Sasanov ... she had come a very long way indeed in five years.

'Poor Peter.' She said it under her breath, and swung the Ford Cortina out to overtake a lorry ambling in the middle lane of the motorway. There wasn't much straight driving down to her part of Sussex, and she made up what speed she could. But she never exceeded the limit. People like her were not allowed to appear in court or attract publicity in any way. 'Poor Peter,' she said to herself again, 'what a rotten way to treat him. ...'

After fifteen years of excellent service, the Brigadier had tossed him into the department contemptuously known as the Battersea Dogs' Home. His career was finished; in due time he would tactfully be retired, or persuaded by the indignity of his position to resign. It was heartless and typical of the Brigadier. People simply didn't matter to him. Only results. She frowned, thinking about the two important contacts Peter Harrington had made in the UN. One Rumanian and an East German. Months of patient work had begun to show promise, and he had suddenly been recalled. Jeremy Spencer-Barr would replace him.

'Not just because he is replacing me. It's the way he treats me.' She could imagine how a man like Spencer-Barr would trample Peter underfoot. When they had lunch she would ask him for more details. Spencer-Barr was a ministerial protégé, everyone knew that. He had arrived to work in the lower echelons of the Department, flourishing a first-class honours degree in economics and modern languages; he spoke French, German, Russian, Hungarian and Swedish with fluency and had a strong working knowledge of Arabic and Farsi. His reputation as an academic was brilliant; he had backed up his university career with a course in the Harvard Business School, where he had graduated top of his year, and served a four-year apprenticeship with one of the best- known merchant banks in the City. His uncle was an under-secretary in the Treasury, and the Minister who had personally recommended him to Brigadier White was his godfather and a close family friend. It was only natural that everyone who had come into the Department without such an august introduction, and with a less dazzling previous record, waited for the superman with suspicion and hostility.

She remembered him sitting in the Brigadier's office during the meeting to decide who should take over Ivan Sasanov. He was a rather small man, slightly built, with a smooth face and smooth fair hair that was a shade below his collar. He had excellent manners, but there was an arrogance about him which made him appear rude even when he was opening a door or offering her a chair. He had put his case for taking on Sasanov, and it sounded very difficult to fault. He had perfect Russian; he could insinuate himself into his confidence; he knew Russia, having travelled on a visa through Intourist with two separate parties in two years. He could play chess, which was Sasanov's hobby, and he was young enough not to be alarming.

Brigadier White had listened with his patient half-smile, nodded and said, 'Thank you, Spencer-Barr,' and then turned to Davina. 'Well, Miss Graham, what qualifications would you have that are better than Mr Spencer-Barr's impressive list? Do you speak Russian?'

'No,' she had answered. 'You know I don't. But Sasanov speaks English. I can play backgammon, but my chess is so bad that he can't help beating me. These are superfluous details, if you don't mind my saying so.' She had seen Spencer-Barr stiffen, but she went on without pausing. 'Three experts have been debriefing Sasanov since he arrived at the end of August, more than three months ago. In that time he hasn't given anything of real importance. Shutting him up with another man is just continuing the pattern on a more intimate scale. Which hasn't worked so far. I think a woman might catch him off guard.'

The Brigadier had said nothing for a moment; his two immediate subordinates were present at the interview.

It was Spencer-Barr who spoke first. 'If I may suggest, sir, Sasanov isn't the type of man to take a woman seriously. He would only think she'd been sent for a quite different purpose.'

'He might indeed,' the Brigadier said, and the two heads of department nodded and said 'Yes' together. Davina saw the young man's hand come up and smooth his glossy yellow hair. He thought he had won, and the gesture was irritatingly smug.

'Which strengthens Miss Graham's case,' the Brigadier said. 'She could well gain his confidence where even someone as talented as you, Mr Spencer-Barr, would fail. One question, however. If this extra dimension to your duties should be required, would you object, Miss Graham?'

'I wouldn't welcome it,' she said. 'But I would bear it in mind.'

They had all looked at her then, seeing her objectively as a woman who might tempt the most valuable Russian defector since Perekov. Her mind, trained in the tortuous reasoning of men like James White and his colleagues, followed the same route. If a beautiful or desirable woman had been introduced to Sasanov he would instantly suspect that her purpose was to seduce him; he would avail himself and tell her nothing. But Davina Graham didn't suffer from being either beautiful or desirable. If he did sleep with her in the end, it would be because she had involved him, and emotion, not sex, was the key that unlocked the door to secrets. The Brigadier could imagine a strangely tantalizing situation developing between the clever, intellectual woman and Colonel Ivan Sasanov of Russian Security.

She and Spencer-Barr had been dismissed and thanked, and the next morning she was given the job. The Brigadier's advice was simple.

'Get close to him, Miss Graham. By whatever means you can. But remember; you must never get involved with him yourself. I don't favour too close a relationship beyond the meeting of your mind with his. But if it should develop, which personally I think unlikely, I know you can cope with it efficiently. Good luck.'

'Thank you,' Davina had said, and shaken hands. She couldn't decide whether he'd said he thought a sexual relationship unlikely in order to reassure her or to spur her on. The word that really stung was 'efficiently'. He obviously thought her as inhuman as he was himself.

But that was nearly five months ago, and the dull cold winter months spent in the house in Sussex had gone by at the pace of a cripple climbing stairs.

It was April now, unusually mild and warm for the beginning of an English spring. The daffodils were out, waving their yellow heads in defiance of a late frost, and the countryside was burgeoning with fresh growth and buds eager to flower. She had left the short stretch of motorway behind and was nearing the turn-off towards Haywards Heath. The house was a mere twenty minutes away. She glanced at her watch and saw that it was nearly ten to eight. She had altered the times of meals, delaying everything by half an hour. Dinner was moved from seven-thirty to eight; it gave them time apart after the long walks in the afternoon and the ritual tea which Sasanov appreciated, with a samovar and little Russian wheat cakes. She always wore something different in the evening, if only a long tartan skirt and sweater or a pair of dark slacks. It was a lifetime's habit for her, and he seemed to adjust to it quite easily. They had a drink before dinner, and she made sure the wines were good and the food excellent. And then after dinner they played backgammon, since he was too good at chess to enjoy a game with a bad player, or they watched the television. And they talked. Millions of words over the last four months and two weeks, all of them recorded and sent away to be analysed. Experts examined their conversations like miners searching pans of grit for diamonds.

(Continues…)

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Excerpted from "The Davina Graham Thrillers"
by .
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Excerpted by permission of OPEN ROAD INTEGRATED MEDIA.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.

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Table of Contents

THE DEFECTOR,
THE AVENUE OF THE DEAD,
ALBATROSS,
THE COMPANY OF SAINTS,
About the Author,