'Fit and well?'

'Do you want to send someone over to see him?' she asked.

'We have someone at Checkpoint Charlie. Shall we agree to do that while we go on talking?' I asked. She looked at Moskvin. He gave an almost imperceptible nod.

'Very well. And Comrade Stinnes?' said Fiona. I looked at Bret. The exchange was Bret's worry.

'We have him here in the hotel,' said Bret. 'But you must nominate one of your number to see him. One. I can't let you all go.' Good old Bret. I didn't know he had it in him, but he'd pipped that one on the wing.

'I will go,' said Fiona. Moskvin was not pleased, but there was little he could do about it. If he objected, she'd send him and then she'd still have a chance of speaking to me in private.

Erich Stinnes was in a suite along the corridor. Frank's men had virtually abducted him from Berwick House waving authorizations and a chit signed by Bret in his capacity as chairman of the committee, a position which technically he still held. But I took us to an empty suite next door to the one where Stinnes was being held.

'What's the game?' said Fiona. She looked around the empty rooms; she even rummaged through the roses looking for a microphone. Fiona was very unsophisticated when it came to surveillance electronics. 'What is it?' She seemed anxious.

'Relax,' I said. 'I'm not going to demand my conjugal rights.'

'I came to see Stinnes,' she said.

'You came because you wanted a chance to talk in private.'

'But I still want to see him,' she said.

'He's down the corridor waiting for us.'

'Is he well?'

'What do you care if he's well?'

'Erich Stinnes is a fine man, Bernard. I'll do what I can to prevent his dying in prison.' Stinnes feigning illness was a part of their plan. That became obvious now.

'Don't worry,' I said. 'We both know that Erich Stinnes is as fit as a fiddle. He'll go home and get his chestful of medals.'

'He's a good man,' she said, as if convincing me of it was important to her. She didn't deny that he was fit. His sickness was all part of the scenario – Fiona's touch no doubt; a way to give Stinnes an easier time.

'We haven't got time to waste talking about Stinnes,' I said.

'No, you've come to talk about your precious Werner,' she said. Even now that she'd left me, there was still an edge of resentment in her voice. Did all wives fear and resent the friendships that had come before marriage?

'Wrong again,' I said. 'We have to talk about the children.'

'There's nothing to talk about. I want them for a holiday. It's not much to ask. Did Tessa speak to you?'

'She did. But I don't want you to take the children.'

'They're mine as much as yours. Do you think I'm not human? Do you think I don't love them as much as you do?'

'How can I believe you love them the way I love them when you've left us?'

'Sometimes there are allegiances and aspirations that go beyond family.'

'Is that one of the things you're going to explain to little Billy when you take him round the Moscow electric stations and show him the underground railway?'

'They're my children,' she said.

'Can't you see the danger of taking them with you? Can't you see the way in which they'll become hostages to your good behaviour? Isn't it obvious that once they're there you'll never again be allowed to come West all together? They'll always keep the children there to be sure you do your duty as a good Communist and return East as every good Soviet citizen must.'

'What of their life now? You're always working. Nanny spends her life watching TV. They're shunted from your mother to my father and back again. Soon you'll take up with some other woman and they'll have a stepmother. What sort of fife is that? With me they could have a proper home and a stable family life.'

'With a stepfather?'

'There is no other man, Bernard,' she said very softly. There will be no other man. That is why I need the children so much. You can have other children, dozens of them if you wish. For a man it's easy – he can have children until he's eighty – but I'll soon be past the suitable age for motherhood. Don't deny me the children.' Like all women she was tyrannized by her biology.

'Don't take them to a country which they won't be able to leave. Fiona! Look at me, Fiona. I'm saying it for your sake, for the children's sake, and for my sake too.'

'I have to see them. I have to.' Nervously she went to the window, looked out, and then came back to me.

'See them in Holland or Sweden or on some other neutral ground. I implore you not to take them to the East.'

'Is this another one of your tricks?' she said harshly.

'You know I'm right, Fi.'

She wrung her hands and twisted the rings on her fingers. Her marriage band was there still and so was the diamond I'd bought with the money from my old Ferrari. 'How are they?' It was a different voice.

'Billy's got a new magic trick and Sally is learning to write with her right hand.'

'How sweet they are. I got their letters and the drawings. Thank you.'

'It was Tessa's idea.'

'Tess has grown up suddenly.'

'Yes, she has.'

'Is she still having those stupid love affairs?'

'Yes, but George is reading the riot act to her. I think she's beginning to wonder if it's worth it.'

'What's the trick?'

'What trick?'

'Billy's.'

'Oh! You cut a piece of rope into two halves and then make it whole again.'

'Is it convincing?'

'Nanny still can't work it out.'

'It's in the family, I suppose.'

'I suppose so,' I said, although I wasn't sure what sort of trickery she was referring to, or whether she meant my sort of trickery or her own.

'Will they arrest me if I come to England on my old passport?' she asked.

'I'll find out,' I promised. 'But why not see the children in Holland?'

'You'd better not become an accessary, Bernard.'

'We are conspiring together right now,' I said. 'Which of our masters would tolerate it?'

'Neither,' she said. It was a concession, a minuscule concession, but the first one she'd made.

'I miss you, Fi,' I said.

'Oh, Bernard,' she said. Tears welled up in her eyes. I was about to take her into my arms but she stepped back from me. 'No,³ she said. 'No.'

'I'll do what I can,' I said. I don't know exactly what I meant and she didn't ask; it was no more than an abstract noise that intended comfort and she accepted it as such.

'They won't let Werner go,' she said. She looked around the room, anxious about being recorded.

'I thought it was agreed.'

'Pavel Moskvin has the power of decision. He's in charge of these negotiations, I'm not.'

'Werner did nothing of any importance.'

'I know what he was doing. The Miller woman's been under permanent surveillance since last week. We were waiting for Werner to make contact.'

'The Stinnes operation is all washed up. It's finished, discredited, done for. What Werner said to the Miller woman is of no importance.'

'Keep calm. I know. But I'm under orders.'

'No Werner, no Stinnes,' I said.

She said nothing, but her face was white and tense and she was breathing in that way she did when stress got too much for her.

I said, 'Moskvin killed the little MacKenzie kid in the safe house in Bosham.'

She shrugged.

'What did he have to do that for?' I persisted. 'MacKenzie couldn't swat a fly without reciting the Miranda warnings.'

She looked at me and gave a deep sigh. 'You'll have to take him out, Bernard.'

'What?' I said.

Petulantly and with a gabbled haste that was not typical of her she said, 'You'll have to take him out – Moskvin.'

For a moment I was speechless. Was this my wife speaking? 'How? Where?'

'It's the only way. I've got Werner down to the bus park at Checkpoint Charlie. I told Moskvin that you might want to see him waving to be sure he was fit and well. That was before you got Moskvin's agreement to your sending your man over there.'