So that, by Monday morning when he started work, the idea that someone from his own department would plot to have him killed was almost gone from his mind.

At that same time-10.30 on the morning of Monday, July 2, 1979-Sir Sydney Ryden was attending the regular weekly intelligence meeting. It is held in a small conference room on the first floor of 12 Downing Street. The room contained a long polished table, with eight chairs, four coloured telephones, some red leather armchairs, a fireplace with highly polished fire irons, and a small oil painting by Winston Churchill placed above the hearth. The only incongruously modern item was a machine with two ‘letter boxes’ in its top: a paper shredder.

Those present for the final part of the meeting were a deputy secretary of the Cabinet Office representing the Prime Minister, the coordinator of intelligence, Sir Sydney Ryden, and his opposite number, the DG of MI5.

The only important such person missing was the chief of GC HQ, the head of the department which obtains intelligence from orbiting satellites and radio monitoring. The reason for his absence was that nearly all his best hardware had been financed by the American government, an investment secured by the presence of American National Security Agency employees in the most sensitive posts in his department. The chief of GC HQ had departed early. He always did when the agenda included as a last item ‘non-electronic systems’. It was a polite way of asking him to leave the room. It was better that he did not know what was discussed, rather than have to feign ignorance to his American colleagues.

‘In the absence of any hard and fast evidence we have to assume certain things,’ said Sir Sydney Ryden as soon as the GC HQ chief had departed. ‘We must assume that a large body of documentary evidence has fallen into private hands. We have to assume that this material has not been noted, indexed, inventoried, photocopied or seen by the US State Department… ’

‘How can we be quite sure of that?’ said the man from MI5.

Sir Sydney turned and, raising a hand to press his hearing aid, scowled. The MI5 man seemed ready to cower under the threat of the upraised hand. ‘I have people there,’ said Sir Sydney Ryden. ‘We have scoured the State Department archives.’

‘Even the classified ones?’

‘What else would be of use?’ His voice was low and resonant.

‘Quite,’ said the MI5 chief, and was able to convey in that one syllable all his doubts that Sir Sydney Ryden had penetrated the secret archives of the US State Department.

‘We assume that the US government have no knowledge of it,’ continued Sir Sydney, glowering at his opposite number. ‘The material in question includes messages, telegrams, cables and conversations between various representatives of His Majesty’s government and the German leaders during the year 1940.’

The deputy secretary from the Cabinet Office looked at his watch. He had a great deal to do before lunchtime, and that included briefing the Prime Minister on this meeting. ‘I think we can all dispense with the euphemisms, Sir Sydney,’ he said. ‘We’re talking about the Hitler Minutes, aren’t we? We’re talking about the undated document headed ‘Framework for a negotiated settlement’ that was passed to the German Foreign Office… ’ he paused and wrinkled his brow, ‘via Stockholm, if my memory serves me correctly, in late May 1940.’

It was about time, thought Sir Sydney Ryden, that his colleagues started to share some of the nightmares that he had borne for the last few weeks. It was time for them to hear his worries. ‘How I wish that were all we were talking about, gentlemen,’ he said after a long silence. ‘But I can assure you that that dissertation of well-intentioned gobbledegook would never cause me to lose a wink of sleep at night. There would be no great difficulty in passing that off as a clever way of playing for time during the Dunkirk evacuation.’

‘What then?’

‘We’re talking about top level exchanges in which specific concessions were discussed. The map of Africa was to revert to its nineteenth-century colours: German East Africa, German South-West Africa, Togoland and the Cameroons would reappear. And the British government would support German demands for a return of the Caroline Islands, the Mariannes and the Marshalls.’ He bared his teeth. ‘ Samoa and German New Guinea would be transferred to them of course.’

‘My God,’ said the deputy secretary, Sir Sydney looked round the room, and was not disappointed with the horrified faces of the others There was little need to detail the cataclysmic portent of such revelations.

Relentlessly, Sir Sydney continued his grim story. ‘The whole of Ireland was to be placed under what was to be known as an Anglo-German administration-you know Winston’s feelings about Ireland of course-and Cork and Belfast were to become permanent German naval bases for a newly created German Atlantic fleet. The ships for this would of course have been ours… ’ He hurried on through the gasps of dismay and shouts of no. ‘Worldwide port facilities of the Royal Navy, from Hong Kong to Gibraltar, would immediately start refuelling and revictualling any German warships as required, as well as any merchantmen flying the German flag.’

The coordinator was flushed in the face by now. He clenched his fist on the table top. ‘If this is some sort of joke. Sir Sydney… ’

‘No joke,’ said the DG. ‘How I wish it were.’

‘And the PM has been told?’

‘She is particularly distressed about the Irish dimension,’ said Sir Sydney. ‘You can see how this could be manipulated by the Dublin government or by the IRA.’

‘Hardly any need for manipulation,’ said the deputy secretary with uncharacteristic bitterness. He was the youngest man there and felt that this was a legacy that his elders and betters should not have left for him.

‘And credit guarantees,’ continued Sir Sydney. ‘Several hundred million pounds sterling was to be advanced for German purchases from Canada and the USA. This to be backed by the British gold reserves already there. And Churchill most unwisely discussed the use that the Germans might make of elements of the French fleet.’

‘Oh, my God,’ said the MI5 man. ‘Every last bloody friend Britain has in the world would be enraged overnight if this sort of stuff was ever made public.’ He took off his spectacles and polished them with exaggerated energy. In spite of his distress, he could not help feeling some gratification that this had landed on Sir Sydney Ryden’s desk rather than his own.

‘Any rumours that we were prepared to hand over parts of Africa to save Britain would certainly stiffen anti-white attitudes about Rhodesia,’ said the deputy secretary.

Sir Sydney nodded. ‘It’s a political problem of the first magnitude. It’s containable if only rumours emerge-such rumours have surfaced several times over the past fifteen or twenty years-but if there was written proof… ’ Sir Sydney let it go.

‘Worse than Suez,’ said the deputy secretary, who was just old enough to remember that political upheaval. He had pencilled an elaborate maze all over his agenda sheet. Now he blocked off the beginning and end of it so that there was no way out.

‘Do you realize what this would do to our delicately balanced economy?’ said the coordinator. ‘Foreign investors would flee from sterling and the stock market would crash… the social consequences of that would be terrible to contemplate. The Kremlin is well provided with friends in our trade unions and on the shop floor who would welcome any opportunity for creating chaos.’

‘Our finest hour!’ said the coordinator. ‘Poor old Winston would be turning in his grave.’

‘I’m not sure you understand me,’ said Sir Sydney Ryden. ‘I’m referring to decisions in which Sir Winston Churchill played a major role. I’m referring to exchanges between Sir Winston and the German leader himself.’