‘The one with the sheep?’ he said, straightening his tie and shooting his cuffs in a well-practised movement. I looked at Ronnie, but she wasn’t about to help me with this one.

‘Angels, actually,’ I said. ‘But a lot of people see them as sheep.’

That seemed to satisfy him as an answer, and a grin spread across his face.

‘God, I am so sorry. What can you think of me? I thought… well, it doesn’t really matter, does it? There’s a chap… oh, never mind.’

There was more in this vein, but I just spread my hands wide to show that I quite understood and that I made the same mistake myself three or four times a day.

‘Will you excuse us, Mr Collins?’ said Philip, as he took hold of Ronnie’s elbow.

‘Course,’ I said. Philip and I were the best of pals now. They moved a few feet away and I realised it had been at least five minutes since I’d smoked a cigarette, so I decided to put that right. The bright anoraks were still hovering anxiously further. down the pavement and I waved to them to show that yes,London ’s a crazy place but they ought to go ahead and have a nice day all the same.

Philip was trying to make it up to Ronnie, that was obvious - but it looked as if he was playing the ‘I forgive you card’, instead of the much stronger ‘please forgive me’ one, which I’ve always found wins more tricks in the end. Ronnie’s mouth was twisted into a half-accepting, half-bored shape, and she glanced at me every now and then to show how tiring all this was.

I smiled back at her, just as Philip reached into his pocket and pulled out a sheaf of paper. Long and thin. An airline ticket. A come away with me for the weekend and we’ll have wheelbarrowsful of sex and champagne ticket. He handed it to Ronnie and kissed her on the forehead, which was another mistake, waved at Arthur Collins the distinguished West Country painter, and set off down the street.

Ronnie watched him go and then sauntered over to where I was standing.

‘Angels,’ she said. ‘Arthur Collins,’ I said.

She looked down at the ticket and sighed. ‘He thinks we should have another "go. Our relationship is too precious etc.’ I went ah, and we stared at the pavement for a while.

‘So he’s taking you toParis, is he? On the corny side, I’d have said, if it was any of my business.’

‘Prague,’ said Ronnie, and a bell rang somewhere in my head. She opened the ticket. ‘Prague’s the newVenice, according to Philip.’

‘Prague,’ I said, and nodded. ‘They tell me it’s inCzechoslovakia at this time of year.’

‘TheCzech Republic, actually. Philip was very precise about that.Slovakia ’s gone to the dogs and isn’t half as beautiful. He’s booked a hotel near the town square.’

She looked down again at the open ticket and I heard the breath stop in her throat. I followed her gaze, but there didn’t seem to be any tarantulas crawling up her sleeve. ‘Something wrong?’

‘CED,’ she said, snapping the ticket shut. I frowned.

‘What about him?’ I couldn’t see what she was getting at, even though the bell was still ringing. ‘D’you know who he is?’

‘He’s OK, isn’t he?’ said Ronnie. ‘According to Sarah’s diary, CED is OK, right?’

‘Right.’

‘Right.’ She handed me the ticket. ‘Look at the carrier.’ I looked.

Maybe I should have known it already. Maybe everybody knew it except Ronnie and me. But, according to Sunline Travel’s printed itinerary for Ms R. Crichton, the national airline of the newCzechRepublic goes by the letters CEDOK.

Fifteen

In war, whichever side may call itself the victor, there are no winners, but all are losers.

N. CHAMBERLAIN

So the two strands of my life met inPrague.

Praguewas where Sarah had gone, andPrague was where the Americans were sending me for the first stage of what they insisted on calling Operation Dead Wood. I told them straight away that I thought it was a terrible name, but either somebody important had chosen it, or they’d already had the writing paper done, because they refused to budge. Dead Wood is what it’s called, Tom.

The operation itself, officially at least, was a standard, off-the-shelf scheme to infiltrate a group of terrorists and, once there, to muck up their lives, and the lives of their suppliers, paymasters, sympathisers and loved ones, as far as was practicable. Nothing remotely special about it. Intelligence agencies all over the world are trying this kind of thing all the time, with varying degrees of failure.

The second strand, the Sarah strand, the Barnes, Murdah, Graduate Studies strand, was all about selling helicopters to nasty despotic governments, and I gave this a name of my own choosing. I called it Oh Christ. Both strands met inPrague.

I was due to fly out on the Friday night, which meant six days of briefing from the Americans, and five nights of tea drinking and hand-holding with Ronnie.

The boy Philip flew toPrague the day I nearly broke his wrist, to cut some high-powered deals with the velvet revolutionaries, and he left Ronnie confused and more than a little miserable. Her life may not have been a thrill-packed roller-coaster before I happened, but it wasn’t exactly a rack of pain either, and this sudden jerk into the world of terrorism and assassination, coupled with a rapidly disintegrating relationship, didn’t help to make a woman feel at her most relaxed.

I kissed her once.

The Dead Wood briefings took place in a red brick thirties mansion just outsideHenley. It had about two square miles of parquet floor, every third board of which was curling up with damp, and only one of the lavatories flushed properly.

They’d brought furniture with them, a few chairs and desks and some camp beds, and slung them round the house without much thought. Most of my time was spent in the drawing-room, watching slide shows, listening to tapes, memorising contact procedures, and reading about life as a farm hand inMinnesota. I can’t say it was like being back at school, because they made me work harder than I ever did as a teenager, but it was an oddly familiar atmosphere all the same.

I took myself down there every day on theKawasaki, which they had arranged to have repaired for me. They wanted me to stay overnight, but I told them I needed to take a few deep draughts ofLondon before I left, and they seemed to like that. Americans respect patriotism.

The cast changed constantly, and never dropped below six. There was a gofer called Sam, Barnes was in and out, and a few Carls hung around in the kitchen, drinking herbal tea anddoing chin-ups in the doorways. And then there were the specialists.