‘That’s my point. They believe we’re not going to up our offer unless we’re convinced they’ll come part of the way to meet us. But no farther. So they slip the tasty morsel about their bottom line under the counter, prompting us – they hope – to up our offer without them having to say across the table that they’re lowering theirs. Their aim is to persuade us that that’s the only way to get a deal. And you can bet your bottom dollar that they then bag our offer, thank you very much, and go on bargaining for a little bit more, and a little more, and a little more, until we’re close to what they’ve demanded all along. Or, if we refuse to keep upping our offer and threaten to walk away, they can simply accept the halfway house offer we’ve already been tricked into making. Which they might genuinely be prepared to accept anyway but they don’t want us to know that because then we’d only offer half of a half, if you see what I mean.’

‘So you think we should play it back at them?’

‘Got it in one.’

‘The FCO will never agree. Too risky, too complicated, too much smoke, too many mirrors.’

‘But if we get it to the foreign secretary and the prime minister they might. Might. Politicians – even in this government – are generally less risk-averse than their officials.’

‘But it’s all surmise, Charles. Nice idea, has a logic of its own but it only works if your premise that it’s a game being played against us is right, and you can’t be certain of that. It’s plausible, I agree, but it’s still only surmise.’

‘That’s where Cheltenham can help. If you can get authority to put Timber Wolf properly on tap we might learn enough to be sure. It should be possible even with our own legal advisor involved now that we can truthfully argue that Timber Wolf could be a threat to British economic well-being. That’s within the scope of our and Cheltenham’s statute.’

‘All right. But if we run it back at them, who runs it? You or Gareth?’

‘Ideally Gareth. He has the established relationship. If we can get clearance for that. And if we can’t, if he has notionally to go abroad or falls under a bus or whatever, I’ll be his stand-in until he notionally returns. But that may raise suspicions, so it’s better him.’

‘Can you trust him? He’s already shown you can’t in the way he reports it and now with the money. He’s a thief and if or when he comes to realise you know it—’