In panicked improvisation they’d put him here, at No. 2 Serafimovich Street. It was an outlandish notion, passing off a housing project designed for the political elite at the cost of over fourteen million roubles as typical of the many communal housing projects being built. In contrast to the layout of most apartment blocks, with small rooms side by side, shared cooking facilities and outside toilets, this had only two large apartments on each floor. The living room alone covered one hundred and fifty square metres – a space that would normally have been home to several families. In addition to the extra space, the apartments were furnished to the highest specification, equipped with gas cookers, running hot water, telephones, radios. There were antiques and silver candlesticks. For a guest sensitive to inequality, Leo was troubled by the proximity of an extensive network of servants who provided residents with everything from laundry to cooking and cleaning. He had managed to persuade the other residents to allow the servants time off during Austin’s visit. They’d agreed, for no matter how powerful or wealthy a citizen, they feared the secret police as much as the poor, if not more. The previous occupants had hardly been ordinary citizens of the Soviet Union, including Communist theoretician Nikolay Bukharin and Stalin’s own children, Vasily Stalin and Svetlana Alliluyeva. The life expectancy of the occupants was perhaps even less than those living in the worst kind of deprivation. Luxury was no protection from the MGB. Leo had himself arrested two men from this building.

Having parked the car, Leo and Grigori hurried through the snow towards the grand entrance. Stepping inside, Leo unbuttoned his jacket, showing his identity papers which were checked against a list of those granted access to the building. They headed downstairs, into the basement, where a cellar housed a team of agents maintaining twenty-four-hour surveillance, technology that had been in place long before Austin arrived. Since these apartments were home to some of the most important people in Soviet society it was essential the State knew how they behaved and what they spoke about. Austin was staying five floors above, in an apartment wired with listening devices in every room. Among the surveillance team was a translator – one of three, working eight-hour shifts. In addition, an attractive female agent had been posted to the apartment itself, in a separate bedroom, ostensibly as the occupant. She was pretending to be a widow, prepared with a story about how her husband had died during the Great Patriotic War. According to their profile of Austin such a story would be particularly endearing. He hated Fascism above all else and had many times stated that the defeat of Fascism was largely a Russian victory, bought with Communist blood.