'Well, let me know if you change your mind, Sylvy.'

'I won't change my mind, Bret.'

'I didn't know you disliked the Brits so much, Sylvy. Why do you live here?'

'I don't dislike them; I said I don't trust them. London is a real nice place to live. But I don't like their self-righteous attitude and their total disregard for other people's feelings and for other people's property. Do you know something Bret, there is not an Englishman living who hasn't at some time or other boasted of stealing something: at school or in the army, at their college or on a drunken spree. All of them, at some time or other, steal things and then tell about it, as if it was the biggest joke you ever heard.'

Bret stood up. Bernstein could be sanctimonious at times, he thought. 'I'll leave all this material. I've read it all through. I don't want it in the office.'

'Anything you say, Bret.'

Bret brought out his wallet and counted out twenty fifty-pound notes. Bernstein wrote 'one thousand pounds sterling' on a slip of paper without adding date or signature or even the word 'received'. It was the way they did business.

Bret noticed the freshly cut leather on the toe of his shoe and touched it as if hoping it would heal of its own accord. He sighed, got up and put on his hat and coat and began thinking of Fiona Samson again. He would have to face her with it, there was no alternative. But he wouldn't do that today, or even tomorrow. Much better to get her off to Berlin.

'This guy Pryce-Hughes,' said Bret very casually as he stood near the door. 'What do you make of him, Sylvy?'

Bernstein was not sure what Bret wanted to hear. 'He's very old,' he said finally.

Bret nodded.

West Berlin. September 1978.

The afternoon was yellowing like ancient newspaper, and on the heavy air there came the pervasive smell of the lime trees. Berlin's streets were crowded with visitors, column upon column, equipped with maps, cameras and heavy rucksacks, less hurried now as the long day's parading took its toll. The summer was stretching into autumn, and still there were Westies here, some of them fond parents using their vacations to visit draft-dodging sons.

Her day's work done, Fiona sighed with relief to be back in their new 'home'. There was a bunch of flowers, still wrapped in paper and cellophane, on the hall table. It was typical of Bernard that he'd not bothered to put them into a vase of water, but she didn't touch them. She took off her hat and coat, checked to be sure there was no mail in the cage behind the letter-box nor on the hall table, and then examined herself in the mirror for long enough to decide that her make-up was satisfactory. She had aged, and even the make-up could not completely hide the darkened eyes and lines round her mouth. She flicked her fingers through her hair, which had been crushed under the close-fitting hat, then took a breath and put on a cheerful smile before going into the drawing room of her rented apartment.

Bernard was already home. He'd taken off his jacket and loosened his tie. Shirt wrinkled, red braces visible, he was lolling on the sofa with a big drink in his hand. 'What a mess you look, darling. A bit early for boozing, isn't it?' She said it loudly and cheerfully before seeing that Bernard's father was sitting opposite him, also drinking.

Despite her flippant tone, Mr Brian Samson, still technically her superior in the office, frowned. He came forward and gave her a kiss on the cheek. 'Hello, Fiona,' he said. 'I was just telling Bernard all about it.' If it did anything, the kiss confirmed her father-in-law's feelings about upper-class wives who came home and reprimanded their husbands for making themselves comfortable in their own homes.

'All about it?' she said, going to one of the display shelves above the TV where by common consent the mail was placed until both of them had read it. There was only a bill from the wine shop and an elaborate engraved invitation to her sister's birthday party. She'd seen both pieces of mail but examined them again before turning round and smiling. Since neither man offered to get her a drink she said, 'I think I'll make some tea. Would anyone like tea?' She noticed some spilled drink and took a paper napkin to mop it up and then tidied the drinks tray before she said, 'All about what, Brian?'

It was Bernard who answered: The Baader-Meinhof panic, as they are now calling it.'

'Oh, that. How boring. You were lucky to miss it, darling.'

'Boring?' said her father-in-law, his voice rising slightly.

'Much ado about nothing,' said Fiona.

'I don't know,' said her father-in-law. 'If the Baader-Meinhof people had hijacked the airliner and flown it to Prague…' Ominously he left the rest unsaid.

'Well that would have been impossible, father-in-law,' she said cheerfully. The signal that came back from Bonn said that Andreas Baader committed suicide in Stammheim maximum security prison a year ago and the rest of them are in other prisons in the Bundesrepublik.'

'I know that,' said the elder Samson with exaggerated clarity, 'but terrorists come in many shapes, sizes and colours; and not all of them are behind bars. It was an emergency. My God, Fiona, have you been to Bonn lately? They have barbed wire and armed guards on the government buildings. The streets are patrolled by armoured cars. It's not boring, Fiona, whatever else it may be.'

Fiona made no concession to her father-in-law. 'So you don't want tea?' she said.

'The world is going mad,' said Samson senior. 'One poor devil was murdered when his own godchild led the killers into the house carrying red roses. Every politician and industrialist in the country is guarded night and day.'

'And complaining because they can't visit their mistresses, or so it said on the confidential report,' said Fiona. 'Did you read that?'

'What I can't understand,' said her father-in-law, ignoring her question and holding Fiona personally responsible for any delinquency attributed to the younger generation, 'is the way in which we have people demonstrating in favour of the terrorists! Bombs in German car showrooms in Turin, Leghorn and Bologna. Street demonstrations in London, Vienna and Athens. In favour of the terrorists. Are these people mad?'

Fiona shrugged and picked up the tray.

Bernard watched but said nothing. Throughout the world 1977 had seen an upsurge in the terrorist activities of religious fanatics and assorted crooks and maniacs. People everywhere were expressing their bewilderment. The older generation were blaming everything upon their children, while younger people saw the mindless violence as a legacy they had inherited. Bernard's wife and his father provided a typical example of this. Any conversation was likely to degenerate into an exchange in which they both assumed archetypal roles. Bernard's father thought that Fiona had too many airs and graces: too rich, too educated and too damned opinionated, he'd told Bernard once after a difference of opinion with her.

As Fiona went to the kitchen she delivered a Parthian shot: 'In any case, hardly a suitable cue for panic, father-in-law.'

Bernard wished she wouldn't say 'father-in-law' in that tripping way. It irritated his father, but of course Fiona knew that only too well. Bernard tried to intercede. 'Dad says it was the Russian message ordering the Czechs to keep their airfield open all night that did it. We put two and two together and made five.'

Fiona was amused. 'At this time of the year hundreds of East Bloc military airfields are working round the clock. This, darling, is the time of their combined exercises. Or hasn't that military secret filtered back to London Central yet?'

She wasn't in view but they could hear her pouring the hot water into the teapot and putting cups and saucers on a tray. Neither man spoke. The animated discussion they'd been having before Fiona's arrival had been killed stone dead. Brian looked at his son and smiled. Bernard smiled back.