I heard him trying to suppress a sob.

Anna would have been able to say something warm and cuddly, but I wasn’t built like that. I just let him have a bit more silence to wrap himself in.

It seemed to work.

‘Why did my BG do it, Nick? My dad didn’t trust many people, but he trusted … him.’

‘Mate, I honestly don’t know. But I aim to find out. Starting first thing tomorrow.’

‘Where will you find out?’

‘I’ve got a couple of addresses.’

‘Can I come too?’

‘Better not. Your dad always wanted me to keep you safe. And you’ll be safer here.’

Since neither of us was doing much sleeping, I took him through the drills instead.

16

I did it again the next morning.

We’d keep the shutters closed; it was more secure that way, and would make the place look like it was empty.

‘You can have your bedside light on. Catch up on your Dostoevsky. Or turn on the TV – but no volume. If you think someone’s trying to gain entry, don’t mess around. Get straight out of the bathroom window and leg it. Into the hedge first, then under the fence. The gap’s plenty big enough. I did it last night. How do you get to the ERV?’

His eyes lit up. ‘Along the treeline, into the back-streets, up to the railway track. The ERV is the recycling shelter …’

This was good. I needed him to do it instinctively. I needed it to happen before he had a chance to think himself out of it.

‘Where in the recycling shelter?’

‘Behind the bottle bank. I don’t come out for anyone except you.’

‘All sorts of people will be dumping stuff there. How will you know it’s me?’

‘You’ll knock three times, then three more, then say the code word.’

‘What’s the code word?’

His face fell. He looked like I’d just marked him down on his homework.

I grinned and put my hand on his shoulder. ‘We haven’t agreed a code word. It needs to be something only you and I know.’

He gave it some serious thought.

But I didn’t have all day. ‘I tell you what: who’s the main guy in Crime and Punishment? You know, the student in the shit?’

‘Raskolnikov.’

‘Let’s use him, yeah?’

He nodded slowly. ‘What does ERV mean, Nick?’

‘Emergency rendezvous, mate. It’s a safe place where you and I meet that nobody else knows about.’

He was putting a brave face on it, but I could see he wasn’t convinced. He gripped my arm. ‘Why can’t I come with you?’

I eased his hand away. ‘It’s a pain in the arse, but where I’m going there are no kids allowed.’ It was the first excuse that sprang into my mind: my stepdad’s stand-by when he was going down the local.

His lip quivered. ‘How long will you be?’ He was being as brave as his dad would have expected, but I knew a part of him just wanted to curl up and hope all this was going to go away.

‘I’ll try to be back soon. Way before last light. But if I’m not, don’t worry.’

I handed him a bag of stuff I’d picked up from a nearby Spar before he woke: water, Orangina, a croissant, a ham and cheese baguette.

I pointed at the room key and told him to double-lock the door when I’d gone, flip on the bar, and not to open it to anyone except me.

‘Same three knocks, then three more, then Raskolnikov?’

‘Spot on.’

I hung the Do Not Disturb sign on the outside handle. Then I plucked three hairs from the back of my head, gobbed on my fingertips and pasted them at intervals across the gap between the leading edge of the door and the frame. If they’d been disturbed by the time I got back, it wouldn’t necessarily mean that someone had lifted Stefan, but it would tell me that the thing had been opened and I needed to sort my shit out before going inside.

My first stop was a pharmacy, where I found a rack of black-plastic-framed glasses with +1 magnification. They’d give me a headache if I wore them too long, but I didn’t plan to. My next was a clothes store, to buy the sort of jacket people wear when they’re paying their bank manager a visit. I saw a matching blue beret on my way to the till, but I wasn’t aiming to turn myself into a cartoon Frenchman, just to cover up my head wound. I selected a blue baseball cap instead. Not the one with the Top Gun logo on the front: it wasn’t going to be that kind of party.

I picked up a Moleskine pocket-size notepad with an elastic fastener from a nearby stationery store. Writing anything down when you’re on a task can really fuck things up, but I still didn’t trust myself to hang on to detail that might help me sort things out. And if it was good enough for Hemingway, it was good enough for me.

The shiniest bits of Albertville had probably been thrown up a couple of decades ago, when it hosted the Winter Olympics. Until I reached the town centre, I got the impression that it had been chucked together from a random collection of trading estates.

The Banque Privée belonged to a more elegant world, and clearly had some history. I walked past it on the other side of the street, then ran through the usual anti-pursuit routines before making an approach. Known locations are always risky, and I had to assume that Mr Lover Man and his mates knew about this one. Tucked between two upmarket cafés, it was the sort of place where you didn’t get through the entrance until the people inside had taken a really good look at you.

‘Quoi?’ A staccato voice addressed me in French from a highly polished brass grille beneath a security camera.

I tilted my head towards it and told whoever was listening that I was English, that I was here in connection with Mr Timis, and I needed to see Mr Laffont.

The front door was made from the same kind of glass as the rear windows of Frank’s Range Rover. One glance at my reflection was enough to tell me why they’d hesitated to invite me in. But there was a soft buzz and it opened to my push.

The foyer was a riot of beige and gold topped off with a crystal chandelier that would have made Glen Campbell a very happy bunny. There wasn’t a cashier in sight. It wasn’t the kind of set-up where you dropped by to deposit your pocket money. You either transferred it electronically or delivered it in a bulletproof attaché case handcuffed to a man mountain with wraparound sun-gigs.

A blonde in a neatly tailored suit chose to ignore the slight bleep that sounded as I walked through the metal detector housed in the inside door frame. She offered me a formal welcome and indicated that I should take a seat.

I tore the first page out of my Moleskine and scribbled the number I’d given my gnome in Zürich over the phone last night. ‘Please give this to Mr Laffont.’

She rotated on one stiletto heel and disappeared up a sweeping, deep-pile-carpeted staircase. The security cameras were as discreetly positioned as possible, but I knew Laffont would already be examining me closely on his monitor.

Blondie materialized again ten minutes later, so I’d obviously passed the first test. ‘Monsieur Laffont is expecting you.’

I didn’t ask how.

She guided me to the first-floor landing, where a pair of massive Oriental vases flanked the entrance to a suite the size of a parade ground.

Almost everything about the man who rose to greet me from behind the world’s biggest mahogany desk was grey. His hair, his immaculately trimmed moustache, his suit, the eyes that glinted behind his rimless spectacles. He offered me his hand, but I wasn’t sure I could reach it. Then I realized he was just waving me towards a nearby chair – the sort you only ever saw in palaces or museums.

He opened the proceedings once I’d put down my day sack and we’d both sat. ‘Monsieur … er …’

I had no idea which of my names Frank had given him, or whether I wanted to tell him anyway, so I just took off my glasses and told him I was a business associate of Mr Timis and needed his help.