Such people knew their job and they would not be daft enough to assign one very obvious tail — and to find out what? The only thing could be the location of the weapons with a view to seizing them, which meant they had to be as aware of his intentions as his passenger.

‘Where is my cargo, Peter?’

‘Not a clue, old chap.’

‘Take a guess,’ Cal responded with obvious impatience.

A sideways look showed Peter smiling. ‘The last place I had it pegged for certain was at the railhead in Marans.’

‘From which you deduced what?’

‘Seemed an obvious place to transfer to the road, old boy, given it runs all the way to a major port on the Bay of Biscay and the trains running into said port are risky when it comes to being searched — which could be bad news if your manifest and papers don’t pass muster. All it would take is the opening of one case to establish you are not shipping tractor parts.’

‘Not a barge?’

‘No,’ Peter admitted ruefully when he realised what he was being told. ‘You fooled me on that one.’

‘La Rochelle was no more than presumption, then?’

‘I flatter myself when I admit the answer to that is yes. With you involved and Spain the destination it had to be a Biscay port and Nantes and Bordeaux are too big, while Rochefort, the only other alternative, is an active naval base and too risky.’

‘Will you stop being so damn smug and deduce what would happen if the French knew as much as you?’

‘I have no indication that they did.’

‘That’s not what I asked, but if they had they would not need to chase us around the countryside, would they?’

The answer came with a languor that riled Cal. ‘You refer, of course, to the Johnny who I assume is still following us.’

‘You know, Peter, sometimes your sangfroid can be a pain in the arse. Now do me a favour and use your not-inconsiderable brain. I am reasoning that whoever is following can’t be official. Discuss.’