'There isn't anyone else,' he said.

'Pelt? Sortese? Vine?'

'There isn't anyone else capable.'

'So I'm your last shot.' Not a question but he answered it.

'Yes. You've got to understand -'

'So you've come down to the only psychopath you can think of who might say yes to your bloody suicide run.'

'You've got to understand that I find myself in an invidious position. I have virtual instructions from the prime minister' – he turned this way, that, the energy coming off him, palpable, his aura burning with it – 'to go for Sakkas and bring him down, and in my living memory the Bureau has never refused a mission coming directly from its commander-in-chief.'

His guard down now and I admired that: other men would have sheltered behind their authority. 'So you accepted it,' I said. 'This one.'

Look, anybody can make a mistake, even the Chief of Signals. Faced with virtual orders from the head of state he'd refused to believe he couldn't find a shadow to take this one on, and when the door of No. 10 had closed behind him he'd been committed.

'Yes. I accepted it.' He swung towards me. 'Should I have?'

'Oh for Christ's sake, I can't tell you the answer to that yet; it's too soon.'

'Take your time. Take all the time you need.'

And enough rope.

'This is why you're here personally,' I asked him, 'in Moscow?'

'Of course.'

'I don't quite see why it's so bloody obvious. You could have signalled me personally in Paris. Or sent an emissary.'