Bret was still waiting to hear the name but he responded to his cue. He got to his feet and said, 'Yes, I must be going.'

'I believe your driver is in the kitchen, Bret.'

'Eating? That's very civil of you, Sir Henry.'

'There's nowhere round here for a chap to get a meal.' Sir Henry pulled the silk cord and a bell jangled somewhere in a distant part of the house. 'We're in the wilds here. Even the village shop has closed down. I don't know how on earth we'll manage in future,' he said, without any sign that the problem was causing him great stress.

'It's a magnificent old house.'

'You must come in summer,' said Sir Henry. 'The garden is splendid.'

'I would like that,' Bret responded.

'Come in August. We have an open day for the local church.'

'That sounds most enjoyable.' His enthusiasm dampened as he realized that the D-G was inviting him to be marshalled around the garden with a crowd of gawking tourists.

'Do you fish?' said the D-G, shepherding him towards the door.

'I never seem to have enough time,' said Bret. He heard his driver at the door. In a moment the servants would be in earshot and it would be too late. 'Who is it, sir? Who is Mrs X?'

The D-G looked at him, relishing those last few moments and anticipating Bret's astonishment. 'Mrs Samson is the person in question.'

The door opened. 'Mr Rensselaer's car is here, sir.' Sir Henry's butler saw the look of dismay on Bret's face and wondered if he was not well. Perhaps it was something about the food or the wine. He'd wondered about that Montrachet: in the same case he'd come upon a couple of corked bottles.

'I see,' said Bret Rensselaer, who didn't see at all, and was even more surprised than Sir Henry thought he would be. All sorts of thoughts and consequences were whirling round in his mind. Mrs Bernard Samson. My God! Mrs Samson had a husband and young children. How the hell could it be Mrs Samson?

'Goodnight, Bret. Look at all those stars… It will freeze hard tonight unless we get that rain those idiots on the TV keep forecasting.'

Bret almost got back out of the car. He felt like insisting that he should have another hah an hour to discuss it all. Instead he dutifully said, 'Yes, I'm afraid so. Look here, sir, we can't possibly give Bernard Samson the German Desk in view of what you've told me.'

'You think not? Samson was the only one to get across alive the other night, wasn't he?'

'Yes, that's right.'

'What bad luck. It was the other one – Busby – we needed to talk to. Yes, that's right: Samson. No proper schooling of course, but he has flair and deserves a shot at the German Desk.'

'I was going to make it official tomorrow.'

'Whatever you say, Bret, old chap.'

'It's unthinkable with this other business on the cards. From every point of view… unthinkable. We'd better give the desk to Cruyer.'

'Can he cope?'

'With Samson as an assistant he'll manage.' Bret shifted position on the car seat. He began to think that the D-G had planned all this, knowing that Bernard Samson was about to be promoted. He'd invited Bret out here to dinner just to prevent him appointing Samson and thus threatening the prospect of the big one: putting Mrs Samson into 'The Kremlin'. The cunning old bastard.

'I'll leave it with you,' said the D-G.

'Very well, sir. Thank you. Goodnight, Sir Henry.'

The D-G leaned into the car and said, 'Oh, yes. On that matter we discussed: not a word to Silas Gaunt. For the time being it's better he doesn't know you're a party to it.'

'Is that wise, sir?' said Bret, piqued that the D-G had obviously passed it off as his own idea when talking to 'Uncle' Silas.

The D-G knew what was going through Bret's mind. He touched the side of his nose. 'You can't dance at two weddings with one bottle of wine. Ever hear that little proverb?'

'No, sir.'

'Hungarian.'

'Yes, sir.'

'Or Romanian, or Croatian. One of those damned countries where they dance at weddings. Get started, old chap. You've got a long journey and I'm getting cold.'

Sir Henry slammed the door and tapped the roof of the car. The car moved away, its tyres making loud crunching noises on the gravel roadway. He didn't go back into the house, he watched the car until it disappeared round the bend of the long drive.

Sir Henry rubbed his hands together briskly as he turned back and went indoors. All had gone well. It would need a lot of tough talking to get it all approved, but Sir Henry had always been good at tough talking. Bret Rensselaer could do it if anyone could do it. The projections were convincing: this was the way to tackle the German Democratic Republic. And it was Bret's idea, Bret's baby. Bret had the right disposition for it: secretive, obsessional, patriotic, resourceful and quick-witted. He cottoned on to the fact that we couldn't have Samson running the German Desk while his wife was defecting: that would be a bit too much. Yes, Bret would do it.

So why did the Director-General still have reservations about what he'd set in motion? It was because Bret Rensselaer was too damned efficient. Given an order, Bret would carry it out at all costs. The D-G had seen that determination before in rich men's sons; over-compensation or guilt or something. They never knew where to stop. The D-G shivered. It was cold tonight.

As the car turned on to the main road Bret Rensselaer sank back into the soft leather and closed his eyes to think more clearly. So Mrs Bernard Samson had been playing out the role of double agent for God knows how many years and no one had got even a sniff of it. Could it be true? It was absolutely incredible but he believed it. As far as Mrs Samson was concerned, Bret would believe anything. Fiona Samson was the most radiant and wonderful woman in the whole world. He had been secretly in love with her ever since the day he first met her.

Kent, England. March 1978.

'We live in a society full of preventable disorders, preventable diseases and preventable pain, of harshness and stupid unpremeditated cruelties. 'His accent was Welsh. He paused: Fiona said nothing. 'They are not my words, they are the words of Mr H. G. Wells.' He sat by the window. A caged canary above his head seemed to be asleep. It was almost April: the daylight was fading fast. The children playing in the garden next door were being called in to bed, only the most restless of the birds were still fidgeting in the trees. The sea, out of sight behind the rise, could be faintly heard. The man named Martin Euan Pryee-Hughes was a profile against the cheap net curtains. His almost completely white hair, long and inclined to waviness at the ends, framed his head like a helmet. Only when he drew on his curly pipe was his old, tightly lined face lit up.

'I thought I recognized the words,' said Fiona Samson.

'The Fabian movement: fine people. Wells the theorist, the great George Bernard!… The Webbs, God bless then – memory. Laski and Tawney. My father knew them all. I remember many of them coming to the house. Dreamers, of course. They thought the world could be changed by writers and poets and printed pamphlets.' Without looking at her he smiled at the idea, and she could hear his disdain in the way he said it. His voice was low and attractive with the sonorous call of the Welsh Valleys. It was the same accent that she'd heard in the voice of his niece Dilwys, with whom she'd shared rooms at Oxford. The Department had instructed her to encourage that friendship and through her she'd met Martin.

On the bookshelf there was a photo of Martin's father. She could see why so many women had thrown themselves at him. Perhaps free love was a part of the Fabian philosophy he'd so vigorously embraced when young. Like father like son? Within Martin too there was a violent and ruthless determination. And when he tried he could provide a fair imitation of his father's famous charm. It was a combination that made both men irresistible to a certain sort of young woman. And it was a combination that brought Martin to the attention of the Russian spy apparatus even before it was called the KGB.