‘A sap,’ I said. ‘It’s stolen and it’s how I got here. Like I said, the job was off the books. And like you said, I’m in deep shit. Whoever pays the most gets the note. If you give them this, they’ll believe you, believe it’s really me selling.’

‘And the note? I can keep it?’

‘I like you, Sergei. But I don’t want to fuck you. So don’t try to fuck me. I keep the note. You keep the passport.’

‘OK.’ He slipped Doctor Mann’s identity into his back pocket. ‘And the price?’

‘Five million.’

‘Dollars?’

‘Pounds.’

He inhaled sharply across his teeth.

‘That is a very expensive hunch, Max McLean. It will make them take notice. Of that we can be sure. You want it in crypto, da?’

‘Yes. It has to be anonymous.’

‘Sergei will drink to anonymous.’ He filled the glasses for a third time. But I stopped him before he drank.

‘One more thing.’ His eyes narrowed and he nodded. ‘When this blows up, I’ll need a way out.’

I dipped my hand back into my coat pocket and put the strip of instant photos I’d had taken earlier that morning at the Gare du Nord on the table between us.

‘A passport?’

‘Yeah. Canadian.’

‘Canadian will take one week. Greek, Sergei can have tomorrow.’

‘Yamas,’ I toasted him in Greek.

Lukov raised his glass, too. ‘Yamas,’ he replied. ‘Finally those Hellenic sons-of-bitches are good for something.’ We drank down the rakia and both stood up. He extended his hand, and I took and shook it. ‘Noon, tomorrow. There’s a bar in the onzième. La Fée Verte.’ He winked at me. ‘The waitress there. Sochni dini.’ I shook my head and walked to the door. He pressed my hand again, serious this time, with a wad of folded euros. ‘In case you get hungry. I don’t want my collateral to get damaged.’

I thanked him and he showed me out, carefully, on to the street. A trickle of light crept into the courtyard through the open door. My temples felt tight from the alcohol and the intel.

‘You know, Max McLean,’ he said as I pulled up the collar of my overcoat, ‘you Irish have the same problem as us Bulgarians.’

‘Oh yeah,’ I said, ‘what’s that?’

‘Nobody ever knows which side we’re on.’

12

Goddamned Lukov. He was either an idiot or a genius.