'Our KGB colleagues have wide-ranging powers. Security, intelligence, counter-intelligence, border controls, political crimes, fraud, corruption and drugs have become a very big worry for the Soviets.' He didn't want to go into detail about the drugs. It was a vital part of the operation: it ensnared Stinnes as a trafficker and Tessa Kosinski as an addict, but the D-G would get very jumpy if he knew everything about the drugs.

'Stinnes,' said the D-G. 'Has he given us any decent material since going back there?'

'He's playing both ends against the middle. He feels safe from arrest by us, and safe from his KGB masters too. That's what led him into his drug racket I suppose. He must be making a fortune.'

'I think I see what you have in mind: some drug-running gangsters engage in a shoot-out and Fiona Samson disappears.'

'Precisely. That's why we have to time events to coincide with the shipment of drugs. When Stinnes brings the consignment of heroin from the airport we'll bring Mrs Samson to one of his contact points on the Autobahn – still in the DDK of course – and have Samson there waiting for her. Stinnes will believe it's simply a rendezvous to tranship the drugs. We'll supply a vehicle: a diplomatic vehicle would be best for this sort of show.'

'And send Samson to get her?'

'Yes. But not Samson alone. Deserted husband and errant wife reunited after all that time: a recipe for trouble. I'll have someone else, someone calm and dependable, there to make sure it all goes smoothly.'

'And you say we have to bring in this American fellow? Couldn't we do it with our own people?'

Silas looked at him. 'No, Henry, we couldn't.'

'May I ask why, Silas?'

'The American has had dealings with Stinnes already.'

'Drug dealings you mean?'

Silas hesitated and suppressed a sigh. He didn't want to go into details. There would be problems getting everyone there. They would all have to be told a different story and Silas hadn't yet worked it out. Like the rest of them in London Central, Sir Henry had only the barest idea of what went on in the field. Silas had been closer. 'Let me give you an idea of what's entailed, Henry. We will have to have a body there to substitute for Mrs Samson, the body of a youngish woman. I don't propose we take a dead body through the checkpoints, especially not in a diplomatic vehicle, because if something happened the publicity would be horrendous. We'll also need to leave there a skull with the right dentistry. We don't want the Russians to start asking why there is an extra skull so the body will have to be decapitated. Decapitated on the spot.'

'So how will you get the body there?' said the D-G still puzzling over it.

'The body will walk there, go there, drive there… I'm not sure yet.'

'You mean alive?' Sir Henry was deeply shocked. His body stiffened and he sat bolt upright. 'What woman? How will he do this?'

'Better you don't ask, Henry,' said Silas Gaunt gently. 'But now you see why we can't use our own people.' He waited for a moment to let the D-G regain his composure. 'Bernard Samson will be there of course, but we'll use young Samson simply to bring his wife out. He will see nothing of the other business.'

'Won't he…?'

'The American sub-contractor will stay behind and make sure the evidence is arranged to tell the story we want the Soviets to believe.'

'And you'll deal with this American direct?'

'No, Henry. I think that would reveal the Department's participation too obviously. I'll use a go-between. There is a fellow named Prettyman whom Bret uses for rough jobs. He's done a couple of things for us in the past. Very able, although not quite right for what I have in mind. I shall use him as a contact. No one will be told the full story, of course. Absolutely no one.'

'As long as you think you can manage this end.'

'Without Bret Rensselaer looking over my shoulder, you mean?' Silas pulled a face. 'We've managed this long.'

'I'll be glad when it's all done, Silas.'

'Of course you will, Henry. But we two old crocks have shown the youngsters a thing or two, haven't we?' They exchanged satisfied smiles.

There was a knock at the door and Mrs Porter brought tea for them. Tea was an elaborate affair at Whitelands, thanks to Mrs Porter. She arranged it on Silas' little table and the D-G pulled a chair up to it. There was buttered toast and honeycomb and caraway seed cake that only Mrs Porter could make so perfectly. That seed cake took the D-G back to his schooldays: he loved it. She poured the tea and left them.

For a few minutes they happily drank their tea and ate their toast like two little boys at a picnic.

'What was the truth about Samson's father?' the D-G asked as Silas poured more tea for them both. 'The real story, I mean. About the two Germans he was supposed to have shot?'

'Well, that's going back a bit. I…'

'There's no harm now, Silas. Brian Samson is dead, God rest his soul, and so is Max Busby.'

Silas Gaunt hesitated. He'd kept silent so long that some of the details were forgotten. At first the D-G thought he was going to refuse to talk about it, but eventually he said, 'You have to remember the atmosphere back in those days when Hitler was newly beaten. Europe was in ruins and everyone was expecting Nazi "werewolves" to suddenly emerge from the woodwork and start fighting all over again.'

'I remember it only too well,' said the D-G. 'I wish I could forget it. Or rather, I wish I were too young to have been there.'

'The Americans had no real intelligence service. Their OSS people were wasting their time looking for dead Nazis; Martin Bormann was at the top of the list.'

'Berchtesgaden. It's coming back to me now,' said the D-G. There was some sort of trap?'

'They had captured a Nazi war criminal named Esser – Reichsminister Esser – in a mountain hut near Hitler's Berghof. There had been a lot of Reichsbank gold found in that neighbourhood. Tons and tons of it was stolen by middle-rank US officers and never recovered. After they took Esser away, the Counter Intelligence Corps kept the hut – it was a house, really, a rather grand chalet in fact – kept it under observation. Martin Bormann's house was between Hitler's Berghof and this place they found Esser. The story was that there was penicillin and money and God knows what else hidden there for Martin Bormann to collect and get away to South America. It was all nonsense of course, but at the time it didn't seem so unlikely.'

'What was Brian Samson doing, there in the American Zone?'

'He was responsible for a prisoner from London: a German civilian named Winter,' said Silas. He offered the seed cake.

The D-G took a slice of cake. 'Winter, yes, of course.' He bit into it and savoured it like old wine.

'Paul Winter was a Nazi lawyer who worked for the Gestapo and who seemed to have an unhealthy amount of influence in Washington… a Congressman or someone. There was a tug of war between the State Department who wanted him released, the US Army who wanted him jailed, and the International Military Tribunal who wanted him as a defence lawyer. Meanwhile we had the blighter locked up in London.'

'He had an American mother: Veronica Winter. Her other son went to America and came strutting back in the uniform of a US Army colonel. Reckless people, Americans, eh? He wasn't even naturalized.'

'Very pragmatic,' said Silas, unwilling to make such generalizations.

'I seem to remember that the mother came of a good family. I heard that she'd died of pneumonia in one of those dreadful postwar winters. She was a friend of "Boy" Piper. Sir Alan Piper who was the D-G at one time.'

'Yes, "Boy" Piper was the one who sent me there to sort it out for the Department.'

'Go on, Silas. I want to hear the story.'

'There's not much to tell. The wife… Winter's wife that is, sent her husband a message…'