Peter’s thin lips came as near to smiling as he permitted himself. ‘More law means more sin, as St Paul observed. It must have been easier when you joined and the Service didn’t officially exist, so didn’t get caught up in all this stuff.’

‘It was. And what about the Welsh? They must be an ethnic minority, surely? But we’re never asked to monitor them.’

‘You’re not Welsh yourself by any chance?’

‘No but Gareth is. Though he counts for two.’

They had laughed, including Gareth.

Not much chance of laughter this morning, Charles reflected as they took their places. He and Gareth had not spoken since the interview but there was no obvious change in Gareth’s manner. He was as businesslike as usual and – also as usual – mildly but respectfully flirtatious with Pauline, the HR director. Charles observed this while thinking of Gareth’s mistress in Brussels and of his wife Suzanne. He didn’t suspect Gareth of designs on Pauline – too old and too plump – but could imagine him thinking that a little gentle flirtation might be a cost-free entry into her good opinion, so long as he didn’t take it too far. Or maybe he just couldn’t help himself, with any woman. When his and Gareth’s eyes met Gareth nodded in friendly greeting, as usual. That too was politic, Charles thought, doing the same.

The meeting went as it usually did. Peter explained at length why everything was difficult, Pauline described problems with recruitment and retention, the director of IT and cyber spoke of the dire need for upgrades, Ian, the director of intelligence and analysis – Sonia’s boss – spoke of the need to improve training and standards, Gareth stressed the importance of impressing on the Treasury examples of intelligence reports or covert actions that had saved public money. Charles announced that he was soon to meet the heads of MI5 and GCHQ to agree a coordinated approach to the Treasury. Each head of agency was to go along with a proposal for pooling resources that could be presented as efficiency savings; he asked each directorate to come up with one suggestion before the next meeting. He also asked Peter to contrive frequent reasons to talk to the young Treasury official responsible for the single intelligence vote and to get her over to Smith Square so that she could meet staff and see the results of cuts.