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discuss your former activities on our behalf with the firm that placed you in your post.”
    I should have seen this coming, thought Jerry, way back when he’d first met Andrei, that evening in the Dorchester, when the Russian said he was locked out of his room and Jerry had been sent up to let him in again. Andrei had given him a bottle of champagne from the minibar as thanks, which Jerry—strictly against the rules—had accepted, hiding it in his locker deep in the bowels of the hotel.
    Then the next night he had bumped into Andrei in the pub on South Audley Street where Jerry liked to unwind after working hours. And on the night after that. They’d become friends, which meant Andrei paid for all the drinks, the odd meal they’d had together, once even for a girl. When Andrei had made his offer of a cash retainer in return for information that was not much more than hotel staff gossip, it seemed a natural extension of his generosity.
    Yet now, three years later, it was coming home to roost. “Of course you must decide,” said the Russian Vladimir, with apparent indifference and no pretence of friendly persuasion.
    Jerry considered his options. There weren’t any. Brigadier Cartwright wouldn’t give him five minutes to clear his desk if he discovered he’d been taking cash on the side—even if it had been before Jerry joined the firm. Particularly when he discovered it was cash from a foreign government. With a black mark from the brigadier, Jerry would never find a cushy job again. He’d enter middle age reduced to being cheap hired “muscle.” As a bouncer in a nightclub if he was lucky. More likely in a pub somewhere, throwing out the drunks.
    “Okay,” he said at last, reluctantly. “But the money had better be good.”
    “Meet me here again in a week,” declared Vladimir. “The same time. I will give you your orders then.”
    “And the first payment,” said Jerry trying to extract some small satisfaction.

4
    L iz pulled the duvet up to her chin, stretched out her legs and reached out to switch on the eight o’clock news. She briefly wondered whether to get up and make a cup of coffee, and just as quickly decided against it. In all the years she had worked with Charles in Counter-Terrorism, she had never really relaxed, even on a Saturday morning. Counter-Terrorism operations came up suddenly out of the blue and needed a fast response. She was usually home late, often away from home altogether, but the sudden excitement, the tension, were what she had loved about the job.
    Admittedly her private life had become a mess. Her small flat in Kentish Town, once much loved, had become dowdy. Things broke down and she never had time to fix them; the tide of muddle had advanced inexorably. In the four months since she’d moved to Counter-Espionage everything had changed. The job wasn’t without interest, but the pace was slower, more nine to five.
    She had used her unaccustomed spare time to get her life in order. The peeling wallpaper in the bathroom had been replaced with tiles. The whole flat had been repainted and a smart new stainless steel washer-dryer had replaced the stuttering old thing she had inherited when she bought the flat. The goose-down duvet she was cuddling was bought on a whim, but was the most satisfactory of all her improvements.
    Now from the comfort of her bed, she contemplated the elegant new bedroom curtains and the uncluttered carpet and thought about the weekend ahead.
    Most of it would be spent with Piet. He was Dutch, an investment banker with Lehman’s in Amsterdam. Every third Friday he came to London for a meeting in Canary Wharf and he would stay in London for the weekend. Friday night he went out to dinner with his colleagues but at lunchtime on Saturday he would appear at the basement door in Kentish Town, clutching champagne or a bottle of perfume he had bought on his way through the airport, and he and Liz would spend the rest of the weekend together. This was an