He paused by the telephone, which rested on a small table near the front door. The concierge had not seen him enter the block; he ought to be able to find a way of leaving unseen. He had not left fingerprints on anything except perhaps the doorbell, which could be wiped. The last people to have seen Gareth alive would be Timber Wolf and Tessa Mountfield, who would no doubt be able to give good accounts of themselves. It wasn’t as if the Office owed Timber Wolf any loyalty, anyway.

Only Sonia knew Charles was there. He could safely tell her what had happened and then decide whether to report in full when he returned to London, with all the legal ramifications that might ensue, or whether to omit any mention of having seen Gareth and await announcements in the Belgian press of the suicide of a visiting British diplomat.

Or he could do what was right and proper: ring the Belgian police and tell them exactly what had happened, minus the spying. Gareth would be presented as a senior official known to have a drink problem and suspected of undergoing some sort of breakdown, the balance of his mind presumably disturbed. Charles, as colleague and old friend, had followed him to Brussels to try to persuade him to seek treatment. During their conversation Gareth had got drunk and then abruptly shot himself, his last words being something like, ‘I’ve had enough of everything.’ There would be a deal of administrative to-ing and fro-ing but nothing seriously problematic. It would probably reach the press that the chief of MI6 was the key witness and conspiracy theorists – perhaps including a disappointed Tessa Mountfield – would make much of it. He could live with that.

On the other hand, when Timber Wolf and his masters realised that Charles knew where Gareth was hiding and was in touch with him they might suspect they were being sold a pup, and so mistrust the secrets they had been so pleased to have discovered. That, in turn, might jeopardise the chances of a Brexit deal.

Charles hesitated by the phone.

Chapter Fourteen

‘Seems to have worked, or be working,’ said the foreign secretary, pulling at his earlobe as he glanced at a paper on the desk before him. ‘So far, anyway. Latest from the negotiations is that both sides are inching towards agreement like a pair of suspicious sloths.’

They were not in the Foreign Office but in the foreign secretary’s smaller, panelled office in Parliament, one of several in corridors behind the speaker’s chair. There was no private secretary, just him, Robin Woodstock and Charles. ‘You did the right thing in Brussels,’ he continued, glancing up at Charles. ‘Don’t you think, Robin?’

‘Not sure about right in the larger sense,’ said Robin. ‘That’s beyond my pay grade. But what he did worked, so it’s right in that sense.’

‘And the lawyers are happy?’