‘Maybe she’s shy,’ Cal replied, just to tease her.

‘Are you kidding me? She makes Garbo look like Mae West.’

‘Must be the hair.’

‘You know the question Mae asks? Well the gun’s in Metzer’s pocket.’

‘I’m just finishing my morning routine.’

‘No details please.’

‘And I think our man has just arrived. Ten minutes and I’ll knock at your door.’

Over breakfast Cal was given a written list of questions that Corrie thought he should ask, with Cal pulling out his fountain pen to make some alterations that changed the tone.

‘You got to sucker him, remember, be soft.’

‘After what we saw in that square last night that’s going to be difficult.’

‘It was never going to be easy.’

Next stop was a meeting with the Ice Maiden, who informed them that the leader had much on his plate – constant communications were coming in from Prague, other Sudeten towns and around the world – and he could only spare one hour at a time, but would do one in the morning and another in the afternoon.

‘It may take longer than that.’

‘Then more time will be found tomorrow.’

‘How’s your French?’ asked Quex as Peter Lanchester entered his office.

‘Not brilliant, sir.’

‘I have received this morning a communication from my opposite number in Paris, Colonel Gauché, the transcript of a conversation that was overheard between an external telephone and the chateau of a certain chap called Pierre Taittinger, dated August twenty-ninth, and it’s not about champagne.’

The paper was passed over and Peter looked at it, thinking it was much harder to read a foreign language than speak it, this as Sir Hugh continued.

‘Now it would be very easy for me to have this translated, as you know, but I think that might set running hares that would go in all directions, so as of now, I want this to be strictly between you and I.’

Having got well past the bonjours and bien sûrs, as well as a long screed, which he suspected was general conversation about the state of the world, one word hit him very hard.

‘La Rochelle,’ Peter said, ‘hardly requires translation, sir.’

‘No,’ Quex said in a dry tone.

Peter was looking at other obvious words, such as je pense par camion, but the one that was most striking was his own name and what he assumed was a description, as well as the fact that he, avec deux autres hommes anglais, would arrivent par train le trente août. Given those two facts, a watch on the railway station – La Rochelle did not have a mass of long-distance trains coming in – was all that was required to identify him.

‘The trouble is,’ Quex continued, ‘that though this tells us the communication came from outside of France, it does not say from where and it definitely does not identify the caller, who did not at any time use his name, and nor did Monsieur Taittinger.’

Peter went right to the top of the page, reading out the opening words, ‘Bonjour, Pierre, c’est moi. Which means the voice was known to him, well known.’

‘Precisely, and does it not also imply that it is one which is quite distinctive, given the interference on such lines?’

‘What do you think would happen if we shoved this under McKevitt’s nose?’

‘He would deny all knowledge of it, quite apart from the fact that as of this moment he’s in Prague.’ Seeing the surprise, Quex added, ‘To shut the station down.’

‘That puts him awfully close to Jardine.’

‘Who has, according to your latest communication, gone up to Eger to meet with Henlein.’

‘It’s called Cheb now, sir.’

‘Don’t be a pedant, Peter.’

Sir Hugh went into a deep study, with a face that implied it would be unwise to interrupt his thoughts, and judging by his expression they were not happy ones.

‘You sure this could not have come from something Jardine did, some mistake he made?’

‘I cannot see it, sir. When I met him he was very confident he had kept things tight; he is very experienced in that game and I can tell you he is a hard character to follow and impossible to tail over weeks without him spotting something.’

‘Say you are correct, what could be McKevitt’s motive?’

‘Guns for republicans in Spain, sir, he is visceral about that.’

‘Peter, he does not know they were for Spain, nor does he know that Jardine was involved, because if he did, I would know about it, for the very simple reason he would have been letting things slip to his political friends.’

‘I did not know he had any.’

‘I did, and if I’d had any doubt, I certainly found out only the other day.’

Peter Lanchester had a look of curiosity on his face, to which Sir Hugh was not going to respond; the fewer people who knew he had been given a wigging by the PM the better.

‘Let us speculate that where we had a suspicion we now have confirmation that your problems in La Rochelle stemmed from our own organisation, but that does not, even if it points us towards one person, nail it down and it has to be that before I can even think of acting upon it.’

‘How in the name of all that’s holy did he find out I was going to La Rochelle when the communication I sent was to you and for your eyes only?’ It was necessary to add quickly the only other person who should have seen it. ‘It’s certainly not your secretary.’

‘No, if Miss Beard was to be leaking secrets the whole nation would collapse. It has to be coded and decoded, does it not? It might be an idea to find out how long the cipher clerk in Paris has been in his job. For instance, was he there a decade ago when McKevitt was station chief?’

‘It could be this end, sir, he does tend to put himself about, I’ve found.’

‘Which means one of six people could have tipped McKevitt off.’

‘Only two are on duty at any one time.’

‘So we need the duty roster and a copy of your signal.’

‘Which as soon as we request it will alert whoever is the culprit, if indeed anyone is.’

‘I fear you are in for a tedious time, Peter, for to avoid that we must look through many days of transcripts to avert suspicion.’

‘I’ll need your written permission, sir. A lot of what I will be reading is bound to be outside my clearance level.’

‘As a way to seek to pass the buck, Peter, that was very neat, but not neat enough. I am far too old and far too busy to undertake such a task. Be so good as to fetch in my secretary and I will happily upgrade you.’

To get to the leader it was necessary to pass through the lobby, coming down the staircase that led to their rooms and taking the other up to the suite of offices where the leader worked, his the room overlooking the other side of the canopy.

Konrad Henlein was not as either Corrie Littleton or Callum Jardine expected, a strutting bully and obvious fascist. Every time Cal had seen a photograph of him he had been dressed in some kind of uniform and at some quasi-military occasion or a party rally. In his office he was dressed in a tweed jacket, twill trousers and was wearing a cravat in an open-necked shirt; he looked more like an English country gent than the leader of a rabid bunch of thugs.

That extended to his personality, which was mild-mannered and pleasant, his voice soft, with more than a tinge of Austrian in the accent. He smiled easily, and with his spectacles on, a rather bland face exuded a sort of schoolmasterly air. Thinking back to the report he had read, penned by Sir Robert Vansittart, it became clear why he had seemed to represent no threat.

Corrie, on being introduced, got an old-fashioned kiss on the back of the hand, Cal a manly handshake before they were invited to sit down in comfortable chairs in front of a set of large windows that looked out over the square.

What followed was a general set of enquiries as to the comfort or otherwise of travel by sea, air and car, as well as questions about America, Corrie’s replies translated by the Ice Maiden, which lasted until coffee was served.