Triple (novel)

The book's prologue describes a chance meeting of several people in Oxford University in 1947. The main character is Nathaniel "Nat" Dickstein, a victim of experimentation in the Nazi concentration camps who later becomes an Israeli agent; also the American Alan "Al" Cortone, of Italian origin, whose life Dickstein saved in Sicily; and the Russian chessmaster David Rostov, who subsequently joins the KGB. The three go together to a sherry party given by Professor Ashford, who teaches Hebrew Literature at Oxford. Dickstein, who is studying under Ashford, is in love with his Lebanese wife Eila, but there are rival suitors. Another guest, Yasif Hassan, of Palestinian origin, has an affair with Eila, as later seen in Professor Ashford's garden. Ashford's daughter, Suza, also makes an appearance. In the first chapters Pierre Bourg, the head of the Mossad, finds out in 1968 that Egypt is building a nuclear reactor in the Western Desert, in order to produce a nuclear bomb.