I stopped in a few bars to soak up some ambience, which came in tall, straight glasses with ‘Budweiser’ written on the side, and watched to see how the modern Czech walks, talks, dresses and disports himself. Most of the waiters assumed I was German, which was a fair enough mistake to make considering the city was heaving with them. They travelled in groups of twelve, with back-packs and huge thighs, and strung themselves out across the street when they walked. But then of course, for most Germans,Prague is only a few hours away by fast tank, so it’s hardly surprising that they treat the place like the end of their garden.

I had a plate of boiled pork and dumplings in a cafe by the river and, on the advice of a Welsh couple at the next table, took a stroll across theCharlesBridge. Mr and Mrs Welsh had assured me that it was a spectacular construction, but thanks to the thousand buskers draped over every yard of parapet, all of them singing Dylan songs, I never saw any of it.

I found lodgings eventually at the Zlata Praha, a tatty boarding-house on the hill near the castle. The landlady gave me a choice between a big dirty room or a small clean one, and I chose the big dirty one, thinking I could clean it myself. After she’d gone I realised how silly that was. I’ve never even cleaned my own flat.

I unpacked my things, lay down on the bed and smoked. I thought about Sarah, and her father, and Barnes. I thought about my own parents, and Ronnie, and helicopters and motorcycles and Germans and McDonald’s hamburgers.

I thought about a lot of things.

I woke at eight, and listened to the sounds of the city hauling itself up and taking itself to work. The only unfamiliar noise came from the trams, clattering and hissing their way across cobbled streets and over the bridges. I wondered whether I should stay with the Hawaiian shirt or not.

Bynine o’clock I was in the town square, being pestered by a short man with a moustache offering me a tour of the city by horse-drawn carriage. I was supposed to be swayed by the quaint authenticity of his conveyance, but on casual inspection it looked to me extremely like the bottom-half of a Mini Moke, with the engine taken out and shafts for the horse where the headlights used to be. I said no thank you a dozen times, and fuck off once.

I was looking for a cafe with Coca-Cola umbrellas over its tables. That was what they’d said. Tom, when you get there, you’ll see a cafe with Coca-Cola shades over the tables. What they hadn’t said, or hadn’t realised, was that the Coca-Cola rep had been quite fantastically conscientious around these parts, unloading his umbrellas on twenty or so establishments in a hundred yard radius of the square. The Camel Cigarettes rep had only scored twice, so he was presumably dead in a ditch somewhere while the Coca-Cola man was receiving brass plaques and a personalised car-parking space at headquarters inUtah.

I found it after twenty minutes. The Nicholas. Two pounds for a cup of coffee.

They’d told me to go indoors, but it was a beautiful morning and I felt like not doing what I was told, so I sat outside with a view of the square and the passing Germans. I ordered coffee, and as I did so I saw two men emerge from the cafe and sit down at a nearby table. They were both young and fit-looking, and both wore sunglasses. Neither of them looked in my direction. They’d probably been inside for an hour, getting themselves nicely positioned for the meeting, and I’d gone and spoilt everything.

Excellent.

I adjusted the position of my chair and closed my eyes for a while, letting the sun get in amongst the crow’s feet. ‘Master,’ said a voice, ‘a rare and special pleasure.’

I looked round and saw a figure in a brown raincoat squinting down at me.

‘This seat taken?’ said Solomon. He sat in it without waiting for an answer.

I stared at him.

‘Hello, David,’ I said eventually.

I knocked a cigarette out of its packet while he signalled a waiter. I glanced over at the two Sunglasses, but they were looking as far away from me as possible every time I turned.

‘Kava, prosim,’ said Solomon, in what seemed like a pretty handy accent. He turned to me. ‘Good coffee, terrible food.

That’s what I’ve been putting on my postcards.’

‘It’s not you,’ I said.

‘Isn’t it? Who is it then?’

I kept on staring. It was all most unexpected. ‘Let me put it this way,’ I said. ‘Is it you?’

‘Do you mean is it me sitting here, or is it me you’re supposed to be meeting?’

‘David.’

‘It’s both, sir.’ Solomon leaned back to let the waiter unload the coffee. He took a sip and smacked his lips with approval. ‘I have the honour to be acting as trainer for the duration of your stay in this territory. I trust you will find the relationship a profitable one.’

I nodded my head in the direction of the Sunglasses. ‘They with you?’

‘That’s the idea, master. Not one that they like very much, but that’s all right.’

‘American?’ He nodded.

‘As apple pie. This operation is very, very joint. Much jointer than we’ve had it for a long time, as a matter of fact. A good thing, all in all.’

I thought for a while.

‘But why didn’t they tell me?’ I said. ‘I mean, they knew I knew you, so why didn’t they tell me?’

He shrugged.

‘Are we not but teeth on the cogs of a gigantic machine, sir?’

Well, quite.

Of course, I wanted to ask Solomon everything.

I wanted to take him right back to the beginning - to reconstruct all that we knew about Barnes, and O’Neal, and Murdah, and Dead Wood and Graduate Studies - so that between us we’d be able to triangulate some kind of position in this mess, and perhaps even plot a course out of it.

But there were reasons why I couldn’t. Big, strapping reasons that stuck their hands up at the back of the class and wriggled about in their seats, forcing me to listen to them. If I told him what I thought I knew, Solomon would either do the right thing or the wrong thing. The right thing would, very possibly, get Sarah and me killed, and, very certainly, wouldn’t stop what was coming. It might postpone it, get it replayed on another pitch at another time, but it wouldn’t stop it. The wrong thing didn’t bear thinking about. Because the wrong thing would mean that Solomon was on the other team, and when you come right down to it, nobody knows anybody.

So, for the time being, I shut up and listened while Solomon ran over the fine print on how I was expected to pass the next forty-eight hours. He spoke fast but calmly, and we covered a lot of ground in ninety minutes, thanks to him not having to say ‘this is real important’ every other sentence, as the Americans had done.