'Samson?' said the D-G. 'You mustn't be hard on him. I blame myself really. Bret Rensselaer always said we should have told Samson the truth.'

'I never thought I'd hear you say that, Henry. You were the one who…'

'Yes, I know. But Samson could have been told at the end of that first year.'

'There's nothing to be gained from a post-mortem,' said Silas. There was a tartan car-blanket over him, and every now and again he pulled at it and rearranged it round his legs. 'Or is this leading up to the suggestion that we tell him now?'

'No, no, no,' said the D-G. 'But when he started prying into the way the bank drafts came from Central Funding, I thought we'd be forced to tell him.'

Silas grinned. 'Trying to arrest him when he arrived in Berlin was not the best way to go about it, D-G, if you'll permit me to say so.'

That fiasco was not something the D-G was willing to pursue. He got to his feet and went to the mullioned window. From here there was a view of the front drive and the hills beyond. 'Your elms are looking rather sick, Silas.' There were three of them; massive great fellows planted equidistant across the lawn like Greek columns. They were the first thing you saw from the gatehouse, even before the house came into view. 'Very sick.'

Suddenly Silas felt sick too. Every day he looked at the elms and prayed that the deformed, discoloured leaves would become green and healthy again. 'The gardener says it's due to the frost.'

'Frost fiddlesticks! You should get your local forestry fellow to look at them. If it's Dutch elm disease they must be felled immediately.'

'The frost did terrible damage this year,' said Silas, hoping for a reprieve, or at least reassurance. Even unconvincing reassurance, of the sort the resourceful Mrs Porter his housekeeper gave him, was better than this sort of brutal diagnosis. Silas pleaded, 'You can see that, Henry, from the roses and the colour of the lawn.'

'Get the forestry expert in, Silas. Dutch elm disease has already run through most of the elms in this part of the world. Let it go and you'll make yourself damned unpopular with your neighbours.'

'Perhaps you're right, Henry, but I don't believe it's anything serious.'

'There are still a lot of unanswered questions, Silas. If the time has come to pull her out why don't we just do it without ceremony?'

Silas looked at him for a moment before being sure he was talking about Fiona Samson. 'Because we have a mountain of material that we can't use without jeopardizing her. And when finally she comes back she'll bring more material out with her.'

'We've had a good innings, Silas,' said the D-G, returning to the chintz-covered armchair where he'd been sitting, and giving a little grunt as he dropped into it.

'Let's not cut and run, Henry. In my memory, and privileged knowledge, Fiona Samson has proved the best agent in place the Department has ever had. It wouldn't be fair to her to throw away what is still to come.'

'I really don't understand this plan to keep her alive,' said the D-G.

Silas sighed. The D-G could be rather dense at times: he'd still not understood. Silas would have to say it in simple language. 'The plan is to convince the Soviets she is dead.'

'While she is back here being debriefed?'

'Exactly. If they know she's alive and talking to us they will be able to limit the damage we'll do to them.'

'Convince them?' asked the D-G.

'It's been done in the past with other agents.'

'But convince them how? I really don't see.'

'To give you an extreme example; she is seen going into a house. There is an earthquake and the whole street disappears. They think she's dead.'

'Is that a joke, Silas? Earthquake?'

'No, Director, it is simply an example. But the substitution of a corpse is a trick as old as history.'

'Our opponents are very sophisticated these days, Silas. They might tumble to it.'

'Yes, they might. But if they did, it would not be the end of the world. It would be a set-back but it wouldn't be the end of the world.'

'Providing she was safe.'

'Yes, that's what I mean,' said Silas.

The D-G was silent for a moment or two. The Americans are going to be dejected at the prospect of losing the source.'

'You don't think they guess where it's coming from?'

'I don't think so. Washington gets it from Bret in California, and by that time anything that would identify her is removed.'

'That business with Bret worked out well.'

'He took a dashed long time before he understood that I couldn't have called off that arrest team without revealing the part he played in running Fiona Samson.'

'I didn't mean that, so much as the way he went to convalesce in California.'

'Yes, Bret has organized himself very well over there, and using him as the conduit distances us from the Berlin material.'

'I shouldn't think Fiona Samson submits anything that would identify her,' said Silas. He never handled the material and there were times when he resented that.

'I'm sure she doesn't,' said the D-G, to indicate that he didn't directly handle the material either. 'She is an extremely clever woman. Will you use Bernard Samson to pull her out?'

'I think he should be involved,' said Silas. 'By now I think he guesses what is going on.'

'Yes,' said the D-G. 'That's why you want to bring her home, isn't it?'

'Not entirely,' said Silas. 'But it is a part of it.'

'The Soviets would leave someone like that in place for ever and ever,' said the D-G.

'We are not the Soviets,' said Silas. 'Are you feeling all right, Henry?'

'Just a palpitation. I shouldn't have smoked that cigar. I promised my doctor I would give them up.'

'Doctors are all the same,' said Silas, who had abstained and sniffed enviously while the D-G went through a big Havana after lunch.

The D-G sat back and breathed slowly and deeply before speaking again. 'This business… this business about switching the corpse. I don't see how we are going to handle that, Silas.'

'I know of an American… A very competent fellow.'

'American? Is that wise?'

'He's the perfect choice. Free-lance; expert and independent. He's even done a couple of jobs for the opposition…'

'Now wait a moment, Silas. I don't want some KGB thug in on this.'

'Hear me out, Henry. We need someone who knows his way around over there; someone who knows the Russian mind. And this chap is on the CIA's "most wanted" list, so he'll not be telling the story to the chaps in Grosvenor Square.'

Sir Henry sniffed to indicate doubt. 'When you put it like that…'

'Persona grata with the KGB, unconnected with the CIA and arm's length from us. The perfect man for the job. He'll take on the whole show for a flat fee.'

'The whole show? What does that mean?'

'There will be blood spilled, Henry. There's no avoiding that.'

'I don't want any repercussions,' said the D-G anxiously. 'I'm still answering questions about the Moskvin fracas.'

Silas Gaunt painfully lowered his feet to the floor and leaned across to the table to find some bone-handled knives in the cutlery drawer. He put three of them on the table and picked them up one by one. 'Let me improvise a possible outcome. Body number one; slightly burned but easily identified. Body number two; badly burned but identified by plentiful forensic evidence.' He looked at Sir Henry before picking up the third knife. 'Body number three; burned to a cinder but dental evidence proves it to be Fiona Samson.'

'Very convincing,' said the D-G after a moment's reflection.

'It will work,' said Silas, grabbing the knives and tossing them into the drawer with a loud crash.

'But isn't someone going to ask why?'

'You have been following the reports about Erich Stinnes and his drug racket?'

'Drugs. It's true then?'