The cell was very quiet. There were telephones ringing in the offices along the passage, and boots sounded constantly over the bare boards.

'Shut that door,' Colonel Belyak told one of the militiamen, 'and stay on guard outside.' He swung his head to look at Gromov, wanting to tap into his thinking, but Gromov had his eyes on me.

'In the case of Zymyanin,' he said, 'you had witnesses against you on the train.'

'They were lying. But please remember that I just told you I can deliver the actual perpetrator if there is time.' I gave it a beat. 'When I last talked to him — ' I checked my watch — ' forty-two minutes ago, he was making plans to set another bomb.'

Colonel Belyak was first. 'Where?'

'I can't tell you. He thinks he knows where the other two generals are, and he still means to kill them.'

'Do you know where they are?' Gromov asked quickly.

'No. I asked him but he refused to tell me.'

Belyak: 'Who is this man?'

I looked at my watch again. 'With respect, gentlemen, you will have to use your heads. I can't give you this man if we stay here talking. Nor can you hope to stop another tragedy like the one on the Rossiya, with further loss of innocent lives. The responsibility is yours.'

Silence came in again. It was warm in here with so many bodies, and the sweat was beginning to run on me. The thread was still intact, but I'd have to go on playing it out in the hope of drawing them with me, and there'd be a lot of strain.

'Why should we release this woman?' the Colonel asked.

'Because she's done nothing. She — '

'That's beside the point. Why do you want her released?'

'She's been traumatized by the whole thing and — '

'The "whole thing"?'

'Velichko's death.' He was right: I'd stopped choosing my words and we couldn't afford misunderstandings. 'You may consider it beside the point that you're holding an innocent person here and putting her through further suffering but I do not. The release of Tanya Rusakova is my only condition, but if you don't meet it I won't deliver the agent into your hands. But of course he could have left his base by now.'

They didn't react, wouldn't be hurried. If I finally got them with me, one of them would look at his watch. It hadn't happened yet.

'Are you in love with this woman?' Gromov asked me.

'No.'

'She's remarkably attractive.'

'Yes. I wish I had time in my life to fall in love with every attractive woman I meet'

I'd been listening for her voice in the building: she couldn't be far from here because she'd be in a cell too and this was the detention area. All other things being equal, a woman's voice carries more clearly than a man's. I'd heard nothing.

Gromov looked at the Colonel. 'Is this man your prisoner or mine?'

'He's mine at this point but I'm willing to hand him over. I don't want him.'

Wasting time.

'Yes,' I told Belyak, 'you do.'

He watched me with his black polished stones.

'Explain.'

'The agent is a former militia officer, major's rank. He was sacked for persistent drunkenness and killing three men on the firing range by culpable negligence. Since then he's been taking on clandestine operations, one of which has so far included the death of Zymyanin on board the Rossiya and the bombing of the train and the shooting of General Velichko here in Novosibirsk. If you don't pull him in as soon as you can, your head's going to be on the block and the people of Russia are going to lose a great deal of faith in their militia, whose job it is to protect the peace. The people of Russia are in a touchy mood these days.'

Another vehicle pulled up in the forecourt of the building and I felt the thread in my hand grow taut as the door banged open and boots clattered along the passage. I'm here to demand the release of my sister, Tanya Amelia Rusakova, and to make a foil confession in the death of General Gennadi Velichko.

I waited.

'Why have you decided to betray this agent?' Colonel Belyak asked.

'I've been considering it ever since he bombed the train. He took innocent lives. It's not my way. He needs stopping now, or God knows what he'll do.'

Boots tramping. I'm no good at waiting, doing nothing.

The gallant Captain Rusakov.

'All right,' Gromov said. 'Tell us where we can pick up this man.'

'I'll have to take you to him.'

'Why?'

'He's violent. If you put him in a trap he'll try to shoot his way out.'

Boots tramping, passing the door, not stopping.

'Others have tried that too,' the Colonel said.

'Look,' I told him, 'you can go in there with as many men as you like but you'll end up with a messy operation and get half of them killed unnecessarily. Or you can take me with you and I'll talk to him first and set him up for you and there'll be no bloodshed; I can promise an elegant, copybook operation, which I would think is more your style.'

I waited again, watching the Colonel and the Chief Investigator in turn, seeing first one and then the other start looking at his watch, seeing it again and again in my mind, but only there.

A cell door slammed shut along the passage and the boots sounded again.

Belyak opened his mouth but Gromov was first — 'What is your connection with this agent?'

'We were collaborators.'

'In what?'

'The same clandestine operation.'

'Its purpose?'

'To sabotage the Podpolia.'

That got a reaction, as I'd known it would. The hardline communist underground was known to exist and the Russian and Commonwealth police, militia and MPS were known to be smoking out its leaders, but some of its leaders were firmly ensconced in the Russian and Commonwealth police, militia and MPS, which made things difficult. I'd glanced from Gromov to Belyak when I'd said what I had, but couldn't catch anything: they were both trained to remain deadpan whatever was in their minds.

Gromov or Belyak could well be a member of the Podpolia, unknown to the other, but it didn't make any difference: each of them had a job to do and he'd get a great deal of kudos within his department if he could pull in the man who had bombed the Rossiya, whether he was in the underground or against it. The charge against him would be one of mass murder.

'You believe, then,' Gromov said,' that General Velichko was in -

'Yes.'

'And you would furnish me with a full accounting of both your own actions and your collaborator's, once he is taken?'

'A full accounting, in the expectation of leniency for myself.'

The Colonel looked across at Gromov again.' We should confer,' he said.

'I agree.'

Then Belyak looked at his watch.

'I'm glad to see, Colonel,' I told him,' that you're aware of the passage of time. It's critical, as I've warned you.'

Gromov opened the door of the cell and the Colonel followed him out and the door banged shut again, the look-through panel vibrating in its runners. The militia sergeant had come to attention when his colonel had gone out; now he was standing at ease. He'd been sorry, I knew, to hear I was ready to give a full accounting of my actions; he would have preferred orders to tear it out of me, word by word as the blood came running. I thought of talking to him, asking how the sweet peas were coming along, but he wouldn't have answered me: I was a dog brought in here from the streets, and he didn't talk to dogs. It would have been pleasant to stand up and stretch my legs, and have him order me to sit down again, and refuse, and give him the excuse to drive his fist into my diaphragm, so that I could parry the blow to the left and open him up and go in with some fast centre-knuckle jabs to paralyse the major nerves and finish up with a back-fist to stun the pineal gland and take him gently onto the floor. It would have relieved the tension in me and I could have used that, but of course it wouldn't have done any good because when they came back, the Colonel and the Chief Investigator, they'd have thought I'd been losing my temper, and wouldn't have trusted me anymore.