'That's where they were hiding him,' said Dicky. 'The bastards had us dangling on a string.'

'They are family,' I said mildly.

'He's on some damned vendetta,' said Dicky angrily, but a warning look from Bret calmed him.

'Why is he there, Bernard?' Bret asked me.

'He's been moving heaven and earth to find out how his wife died,' I said. 'He's upset; he's not entirely rational.'

'But why are the Stasi and the Bezpieca playing along with him?'

'Are they doing that?'

'Come along, Bernard,' said Bret. 'You know how these folk operate. They are helping him. I'm asking you why.'

'They want to monitor him, I suppose. George has money, and money talks in the intelligence game. It's what makes the wheels go round. George can afford the best. He employed "Tiny" Timmermann to go over there and find out how his wife died. Tiny was a pro, a tough old-time CIA man who burrowed his way right into the Smersh compound in Magdeburg. Tiny was worth his pay. How would we feel if some joker was employing some capable rent-a-spies to come digging in our vegetable patch?'

Bret nodded. There was no need to draw a diagram for Bret, but Dicky made sure I didn't come out of the story unsullied. 'And the Stasi blew the top of Tiny's head off and left him for you to find. Except that you misidentified the corpse and played right into their hands.'

Bret ignored Dicky and said, 'If George was giving the other side a headache wouldn't they just blow him away?'

'No,' I replied. 'Not in Poland, and George knows that. George has a brother, very influential, very pally with the army regime in Warsaw. With things getting tough for commies everywhere these days, Normannenstrasse need all the help and good will they can get from the Poles. None of them are going to be cheering when George sends pensioned-off CIA men to probe their secrets — it sticks in our throats too, doesn't it? But they probably figure that the way to counter a crazy man like George is to cosy up to him; to help and advise him, and make George a good friend.'

'Quite a turnaround,' said Dicky. 'How would they start on that one?'

'They go to George and say don't waste your money on private investigators who just make trouble for everyone. We are just as interested in getting to the truth about Tessa Kosinski as you are. Let us prove to you that we are not bad people.'

'But the Brits and the Yanks are bad people.' Bret finished the story for me. 'Drip by drip they poison his mind against us. Yes, I'll buy that one. Patience and planning: that's always been the Moscow method, and it's the way all their stooges do it. While we run around in a constant panic, putting Band-Aids on wounds that need major surgery, our opponents are screening and recruiting university students who will be agents of influence in twenty years' time.'

I said, 'Is this an official abandoning of the theory that George ran away because the stock market crashed?'

Dicky, who had been clinging to that theory for some time, decided that his best course of action was to throw a spanner into the works. He said, 'Bernard believes Tessa Kosinski is still alive.'

Bret didn't ask me if that was what I thought. He looked at me and said, 'George Kosinski has been told that a contract killer named Thurkettle killed his wife.' He finished his drink and waited for me to respond. Looking up, he said, 'No reaction, Bernard?'

'Told?' I said. 'Who told him?'

Bret responded to that question with one of his own. 'Could he be persuaded to come back?'

'George Kosinski?' I said.

'As you convincingly surmise, the Stasi and their Bezpieca buddies will be playing with him. We hear stories that they may have promised to finger Tessa's killer for George, and we wouldn't like that. I don't want anyone standing in the dock in Warsaw facing murder one, and making headlines in a trial that has a feature role for Fiona's sister. The Department couldn't handle that kind of exposure. We'd have busloads of Japanese TV crews sorting through our shredder bags, and airing talking heads of your Portuguese help.' A pause. 'Do you hear me, Bernard?'

I said, 'And George has been spotted?'

Rupert spoke. 'By one of our people.' Did I hear a measure of reservation?

'Someone who knows George Kosinski?' I asked him.

Dicky interposed: 'It's a positive identification. There can't be two people who look like George Kosinski.'

'Three Warsaw purchases for which George Kosinski's Visa card was used,' said Rupert, looking at me quizzically. 'Two high-priced restaurants and a man's shop.'

'Sounds like George,' I said. I was flattered that they were all regarding me as the person who had to be convinced, but then I saw that this was because I was going to be the idiot who returned there, trudging through the snow and ice, and resuming the goose chase for a man who'd already demonstrated commendable skill at hiding.

'Okay,' I said. 'I'll go to Poland, if that is what it's all about. Can I have authority to look at all the Berlin monitoring traffic?'

'Anything you want; make a list,' said Bret. 'When would you plan to be in Warsaw?'

'Right away, Bret,' I said, not without a touch of sarcasm. With Christmas only days away I felt a resentment at the way I was being steamrollered.

'Good,' he said, and got to his feet and went to rip open another can of chilled Pepsi, giving me a mangled kind of smile in passing. 'You'll have diplomatic cover, but Copper will be de facto case officer. Can you hold still for that, Bernard?'

'Okay.'

'Diplomatic cover,' said Bret. 'You won't be deniable; so play safe.' He held his glass, and the rum bottle, high so that he could accurately measure the amount of booze he was pouring.

'Play safe,' I said and nodded. That summed up the top floor's win-without-risk philosophy. Do the impossible but play safe.

'Copper will keep in touch with Dicky,' said Bret. 'Do as you are told and don't argue.'

'Could you top this one up too, Bret?' I said, holding out my empty glass.

*

Rupert gave me a lift home in his rented Ford when he heard I had no car. He was staying with his sister in Fulham. He said that Mayfair was on his way, and took me right to my door. I noticed him studying the quiet grandeur of the portals of my apartment block but he didn't comment like everyone else in the Department, he knew it was Fiona's legacy.

'Thanks for the ride home,' I said. I looked at my watch. It was two o'clock in the morning.

'So you lost one of your people? I'm sorry.' Rupert, suitably unemotional, was staring ahead through the windscreen at the nocturnal comings and goings in the busy street.

'How did you hear?'

'Cruyer and Rensselaer were talking about it before you arrived.' He had never abandoned that Oxbridge habit of referring to his equals by their family names.

'Oh,' I said. 'I wonder why they said nothing to me about it.'

'Cruyer's frightened of you.'

'That will be the day.'

'I was at Oxford with him. I knew him well in those days. He's always dreaded people making a fool of him.'

'Do I do that to him?'

'At times you do it to everyone.'

'Oh dear,' I said.

A taxi cab swerved and pulled to the curb ahead of us. An elderly couple emerged. The man cut a dignified figure in evening clothes, the woman in shiny furs. I recognized them as our long-married next-door neighbors. The man dug into his pocket to pay off the cabby. The woman slammed the cab door with an intemperate display of strength. Then, as they passed us, they resumed some bitter argument, their faces contorted with anger. I found something exceptionally gloomy in this demonstration that time brought no mellowing of marital strife.

'There are photos,' said Rupert. 'They decided not to show them to you. Photos of George Kosinski. My people took them four days ago. You want to see them?'