Broker, Trader, Lawyer, Spy - Eamon Javers [101]
Nick has a good reason to be cautious. Now in his early forties and just beginning to show specks of gray in his military-cut hair, he is one of the top corporate surveillance operatives in London, and thus in the world. He knows how far people will go to win in the corporate spying wars, and he knows that if he’s identified, his lucrative career could be over.
Today London is the crossroads of western corporate executives, Russian oligarchs, oil-rich Middle Eastern sheikhs, and the troops of lawyers, aides, drivers, bodyguards, and bag carriers who hang around them. This neighborhood, Mayfair, may be the dead center of corporate spying. Mayfair exudes money. Bentleys and BMWs cruise the streets. Billion-dollar hedge funds set up shop in elegant townhouses, many of which display small signs letting passersby know which kings and notable members of British royalty once lived on the premises. In spring and summer evenings, the neighborhood’s pubs spill out into the streets, with expensively tailored young lawyers and financiers toasting one another’s success. Buckingham Palace is just a short walk across the park from here.
Because the money is in Mayfair, the spies are here, too. Nick is sitting just a brief walk from several of the most important spy firms in the world, including Hakluyt, whose own townhouse headquarters and small brass nameplate understate its global reach, substantial fees, and world-class corporate connections.
Surveillance operatives hate talking to a reporter, even when they’ve done everything they can to ensure that their comments will never be matched with their identity. Nick No-Name says he’s agreed to this interview only because it’s been arranged by one of his most important clients, a man who thinks nothing of paying Nick as much as $30,000 to place some of the world’s highest-powered corporate executives under surveillance. It’s a good living: A top operator in London can earn as much as $200,000 per year.
“If my colleagues knew I was here talking to you,” says Nick, “I wouldn’t say I’d be ostracized, but they’d be upset. There’s no good reason for a surveillance man to talk to a reporter. I’ve never done it before. Nothing good can come of it.” Maybe his colleagues have him under surveillance right now? “No, I’m clean at the moment,” Nick says matter-of-factly. “I’ve got a man in here.”
Which of the people in the bar is Nick’s “man?” There are two young women at a far table, looking over a map of London and comparing notes. There’s a bespectacled, balding gentleman reading a newspaper over a late-afternoon lunch. And several waiters in maroon suits glide into and out of the room. Nothing seems at all out of the ordinary. But then just as Nick sits down at the table facing a window overlooking an interior courtyard, a workman puts a large sheet over the window, blocking sunlight and the view to the outside. Maybe it’s a surveillance-related precaution; maybe it’s just routine maintenance. Nonetheless, Nick has cased the room. Satisfied that he’s in control of the situation, he agrees to sketch his life story, explaining how he came to be one of the world’s most effective corporate spies.
NICK JOINED THE British army right out of school, and he says his superiors in the army noticed that he had a certain potential. He’s sharp, he’s attentive to detail, and he handles weapons well. His commanding officers steered him toward a career in the special forces, where he became a trained killer and a master of weapons and tactics. More important, Nick says he learned how to match his response to the situation. Sometimes, it is far better not to kill—to defuse a situation long before it becomes violent. And that’s a far more nuanced skill