Free The Volunteer by Michael Ross Page A

“It’s nothing personal. You should see how many people break cover before they even get to us.”
    When I got home to the kibbutz, I didn’t tell Dahlia about what had gone on in the cell. She wasn’t in love with the Office to begin with, and I didn’t want to sour her view further. As for my son, he probably didn’t understand why I couldn’t stop hugging him: while being interrogated, I’d had visions of being locked up until he was a teenager.
    In the end, I decided not to quit, so I went back to Tel Aviv and embarked on more advanced training—firearms, martial arts, and complicated exercises involving special forces units, helicopters, and boats. I learned about commercial cover (how to travel to foreign locales undercover as a businessman), and did an intensive course in international commerce. In all, my training took a full year.
    Then one summer afternoon in 1989, I returned to my apartment to find a good-looking man in his early fifties sitting in my living room. “Hi, Rick,” he said. “I’m Avi, the head of Caesarea, and the fact that you are meeting me is a good sign.” Being the head of the unit, he knew all about me although I had never met him before.
    I stood dumbfounded, with a look that probably said “how’s that ?”
    â€œI’m the man who not only accredits you as a combatant, but also authorizes your deployment overseas,” he said. “You’ve finished your training. Welcome to Caesarea.”

4
DEPLOYMENT
    A brave heart and a courteous tongue. They shall carry thee far through the jungle, manling.
    RUDYARD KIPLING
    C over is an intelligence agent’s air and water. Without a credible alternate identity, an agent simply cannot operate in the field. An agent’s identity documents receive the same reverential treatment that devout Jews give to Torah scrolls. Passports are the most valuable specimens, but driver’s licenses, national ID cards, and credit cards are also useful. The more documentation a spy has—even a library card or gym membership can help in a pinch—the more legitimacy and protection he or she will enjoy. Mossad field personnel are trained to be obsessive about their documents. To this day, I often get an uncontrollable urge to stop what I’m doing and run a discreet physical check to make sure my wallet and personal effects are in the appropriate pockets. Getting your wallet snatched is traumatic whatever the circumstances, but for an intelligence officer, it can spell disaster. When I was working for the Mossad in Africa, I carried two wallets. One contained about thirty dollars and some throwaway identification—a decoy to be hauled out if I was mugged or shaken down by a crooked cop. The other was my real wallet, safely tucked in a Velcro-sealed compartment attached to my clothing.
    But documents are just the beginning. They may tell people who you are, where you live, and what you do for a living, but eventually you have to open your mouth and talk. And the personality you project has to match your supposed identity. That means getting the vocabulary and diction right, as well as the clothing, food preferences, mannerisms, and grooming.
    Even a single wrong word choice can betray you. I once heard a story about a German spy clad in a U.S. army uniform who’d infiltrated Allied positions during the Second World War. His downfall came when he drove his Jeep up to a U.S. fuel depot and asked for a tank full of “petrol.” Urban legend? Perhaps. But there’s a lesson in it either way.
    Refining your cover to the point where you can fool true experts means becoming something of an anthropologist, or at least a connoisseur of national stereotypes. If a spy’s adopted identity is British, he may tend toward politeness and a reserved persona. If Irish, he might spin his drinking companions a soulful tale or two while quaffing a Guinness (served warm, if he