The John Milton Series: Books 1-3 Read Online Free PDF

carriage. The train hushed into another brightly lit strip of platform, and Milton saw the name slide past his gaze: Samhung. They were heading west, away from the centre of the capital.
    The woman who had been to his left disembarked, and Su-Yung slid across until she was alongside him. Milton waited for the female guard to raise her signal.
    “Did you see anyone?”
    “No,” Su-Yung said. “I do not believe that we were followed. But we must be careful—the police are everywhere.”
    “Where are we going?”
    “Away from here,” she said as the train crept forwards into the tunnel. “You must trust me.”

Chapter Eight
    MAJOR KIM SHIN-JO was concerned. Alone in his office at the airport, he placed the picture taken at the airport of Peter McEwan face up on the desk in front of him and then slid it eight inches to the left. In its place, he laid out the picture from McEwan’s file that Captain Yun Jong-Su had emailed him. There were some similarities between the two pictures—hair and eye colouration, the height was similar, both wore glasses—but that was as far as it went. Yun was sure: the Peter McEwan who had arrived at Pyongyang Airport that afternoon was not the same as the man who had visited six times previously.
    Whoever this new man was, he was not who he professed to be.
    Kim was prey to the usual lurid terrors that he knew would befall him if he failed the state. The price of failure was well known and not open to negotiation: total humiliation followed by exile if he was lucky. Execution was possible, depending upon the consequences of the failure. If he had been responsible for allowing an enemy spy into the Fatherland, and if that enemy spy was responsible for some grand, awful statement against the Revolution, perhaps during tomorrow’s grand parade…
    Kim willed himself to remain calm as he picked up the telephone and called his man at the hotel.
    “Comrade Major, I was about to call you. The Englishman has left the hotel.”
    Kim felt a tiny flutter of panic. “What?”
    “Ten minutes ago.”
    “Was he followed?”
    “Two men on foot and two by car.”
    “Why? Did anything happen?”
    “He ate his dinner.”
    “Alone?”
    “Yes, sir.”
    “Was he contacted?”
    “Not in his room. He did very little: he had a drink, relaxed on the bed, looked out of the window. Nothing I would consider to be unusual.”
    “Radio the men now. He is to be arrested. At once.”
    “Yes, Comrade Major.”
    Kim replaced the receiver. He prayed it was not too late.

Chapter Nine
    THE TRAIN stopped at Pongwha Station. Milton checked the platform and saw nothing. As the doors whispered shut and the train pulled away again, Su-Yung tapped him discreetly on the leg. Milton followed the direction of her gaze. Outside, two men in military uniform were questioning the passengers who were queuing to exit the platform. They were throwing out a dragnet for him.
    The final stop on the Chollima line was Puhung. It was the most impressive station yet: chandeliers were spaced at regular intervals along the high, vaulted ceiling, and marble floors seemed to have been polished to an even higher sheen than before. The train pushed up against the buffers, and the doors opened. Milton followed Su-Yung as she disembarked and then quickly scanned the platform: there was no sign of the police. Another large mural of Kim Il-Sung looked down on them.
    They followed the crowd to the exit and waited to board the escalator. The station was over one hundred feet below the surface, and their slow ascent took five minutes. Revolutionary music was piped through an array of tinny speakers. There were no hoardings, no displays, no advertisements for new theatre productions or alcohol or upcoming films, only frescoes of the great victories of the Korean people since the Day of Liberation, in the bold, awkward, cartoon style of Soviet realism.
    Milton caught himself as four men, two from the military and two from the police, descended