'Hang on.' Jane backed up to Information Packs: UK Contact Addresses For Member Countries and clicked on the blue title.

'There's your answer.' Bryant sat back, as smug as a cat.

'I don't see -' Jane began, stopping as she studied the office locations. The screen shone rectangles of cobalt on her eyes. 'Good God.'

'Victoria. The Strand. Muswell Hill Broadway. Puddle Dock. Red Lion Square. Vauxhall Bridge Road. St Martin's Lane. City Road. Bedford Street. Covent Garden.'

'It's a list of all the places Vince has visited in the night.'

'Do you see? Sebastian had to make Vincent carry out all the challenges alone. He needed him to unravel each of the clues in turn. I thought it odd that he should get rid of everyone who's been at the boy's side, and yet allow us to continue helping him.'

'I don't see how he could have stopped us -'

'With the resources at his command he could have done so very easily, but he didn't dare. We were making sure Vince reached each of his destinations. Besides, he didn't need to stop us.'

'Why not?'

'Because we couldn't be seen. Don't you understand? He only had to stop the ones who could physically be seen.' Bryant stabbed a bony forefinger at the air. 'Up there. All very clever.'

The revelation, such as it was, escaped her. 'I'm not sure I follow, Arthur.'

'The surveillance cameras. All those closed circuit television networks. All those security monitors busily cutting crime statistics in the capital. In the course of one night, Vincent Reynolds has been photographed at every single one of the official addresses of the members attending the conference. So if anything bad happens when it opens, guess who's the perfect scapegoat? And short of smearing his hands with blood, we've unwittingly helped to pin the blame on him.'

'But surely if something did occur, Vince could explain what's really been happening…'

'How? By relating some half-baked story about being persecuted through the night, with no one to back it up, not even us. After all, we haven't seen any of these supposed self-destructing 'notes' he's been finding, have we? No one will believe him, Jane. There's no evidence. The League is adept at covering its tracks. Even if he's kept the remains of the letters, they mean nothing by themselves. No wonder Sebastian was so careful in his selection of a dupe. A working-class man with a dodgy background! In his eyes, Vince is just the sort of person who would resent an organisation dedicated to ending immigration restrictions. How better to show that it's the will of the common people to remain an island? How better back up his inflammatory speeches with an "I told you so", to prove that the working classes are dangerous and must be controlled?'

'Vince is still out there collecting the details of the final destination. Won't Sebastian want to place him at the site?'

'Crikey, that's a thought. Does it specify the location on the EC schedule?'

Jane checked the screen. 'No. I don't suppose they would post the conference location in public view for security reasons.'

'Then we'll have to figure it out from the clue. Call Vince again.'

'Are you going to tell him about Sebastian's plans?'

'I have to. God, we owe him that.'

'Suppose he doesn't want to go on once he knows?'

'I don't think it will make any difference to him,' said Bryant. 'I mean. Would you stop now?'

He picked up the telephone receiver and dialled.

I CANNOT by the progress of the stars give guess how near to day, he thought, feeling like Brutus in his long night of torment before the death of Caesar. The rain pattered against the windows in ripples, a drenching cloak for an inhospitable world.

Sebastian felt that the false-fronted church, featured with such neat hypocrisy in Hogarth's painting, provided an appropriate setting for this latest envelope. Its discovery would wind Vincent up and send him off again like a little clockwork toy along a track. The poor lad had never supposed that there might be more than one level to the game. A pity really, for it reduced his status as a player.

Sebastian could afford to sit back and watch the fireworks. Rather more than fireworks, perhaps. The Semtex-derivative that Xavier's boys had planted was quite untraceable, thanks to the fact that it had been passed on a false (and very expensive) route through several different countries. An explosive device, the traditional choice of traitors from Guy Fawkes onward, classic and simple, a truly London weapon. It had been a stroke of genius to coat the envelopes in traces of the stuff so that by now it completely covered Vincent's hands and clothes.

A warm dark feeling grew within his chest. Prometheus was placing a spark to his kindling, about to bring fire to mankind once more…

Thanks to his careful planning, the coming day's events were now a foregone conclusion. Following the tip-off Caton-James was preparing to make, Vincent would be picked up and interrogated. The police would realise that the boy had no alibi for the night. They would discover that he could be placed at every single member's London address, with the proof neatly provided on ten separate videotaping systems.

Vincent could tell them of his challenge, but would be able to offer no proof beyond some indecipherable shards of paper (if he had managed to keep any of them) which only made him look more of a fruitcake. That had been another smart move, to use paper stolen from his apartment. He would take them to the Holborn chamber, and they would find nothing. He might even be able to lead them to their Chelsea headquarters, but the police would still find nothing. No doubt at one stage Vince would cite the death of his agent as proof of unseen forces at work, but here Sebastian had boxed clever. With admirable restraint he had avoided the obvious route of planting evidence that would incriminate Vincent in the murder – for how could the boy have been in two places at once? The videotapes that had filmed him through the night were time-coded. Instead, Xavier had been instructed to make his violence appear to be the result of a bungled burglary.

Then there was Harold Masters. The doctor might attempt to lodge some kind of complaint, but he had a history of attacking the League. Better still, he had a history of mental instability, having suffered a nervous breakdown in 1987. The only loose cannon was the girl, Pam, but she was presumably lost at sea along with the other one, Louie, and anyway her word meant nothing to anyone. Nobody really listened to people like that. No proof, no power, any of them. It was perfect.

Sebastian tipped back his chair and rooted around in his jacket for the Cuban cigar he had been saving. In a little over an hour the power of Prometheus would be fully restored. A gesture would have been made, and its effects felt. In time, there would be other gestures, just as successful as this. He exhaled a plume of blue smoke and permitted himself a small grim smile of satisfaction.

'I've got the ninth envelope,' said Vince, 'it was sellotaped behind a pillar at the other end of the church, the real front. Can you hear me? I'm having to shout because the rain's coming down so hard.'

'What does it say?'

'Hang on a minute.' He had trouble tearing open the plastic bag inside which the envelope had been sealed, and then managed to rip the foolscap sheet in his haste.

'Oh, great.'

'Well?'

'Listen to this little lot. You're going to need a pencil.' He looked back at the page.

The Challenge Of Decimus Burton

To keep this baby free from hurt,