With the team of surveillance monkeys I had under me, I knew I had every reason to worry. They were all so good at losing things they could have made a fortune on the stage making members of audiences disappear – the only problem being that they would have been incapable of bringing them back. Since my press-ganging into MI5, I had never had people working under me and I didn’t like it. I understood now why most agents prefer to operate on their own; at least that way, if there are any screw-ups, you know who’s made them and what they are. But as I didn’t have wings on my back and jet-packs attached to my ankles, and there wasn’t always a handy telephone kiosk around to charge into, I had to use the services of others to be in three places at once for me. But if it looked as if anything interesting was going to happen, I wanted to be right there in the front line. I especially wanted to be there the next time Whalley met up with his chum in the dark Capri.

‘I’m on my way. Daphne going as fast as usual?’

‘Yes.’

‘Call me if she deviates. I’ll catch you up at the Porn Shop.’ Deviation meant turning off the motorway. Porn Shop was code for Oxford – derived from the Oxford colour of blue. Cambridge, with its lighter blue, was coded Cinema, implying soft porn. I hung up, and bashed my elbow on the edge of the desk. It was still sore as hell from where I had landed on it after being blown out of the taxi a week before.

I picked up the phone again, and dialled my home number. It rang on without being answered. After fifteen rings I hung up. I decided Gelignite couldn’t have got in yet. I buzzed down to one of the three night-operators who would have just come on duty. ‘Could you please ring my home in half an hour’s time and tell the lady that answers that I had to fly to Shannon to look at a weaving plant, and the plane’s got engine trouble, and I won’t be back until very late – and give her my apologies.’

‘Yes, Mr Flynn.’

I took the lift down into the underground car park, and walked over to my Jaguar. Her midnight-blue paintwork still managed to gleam under a heavy layer of London grime, and her wire wheels needed an energetic Sunday afternoon with a tin of spirit, a toothbrush and a duster, but they were going to have to wait a good while yet for that. Gelignite and the XK had no need to be jealous of each other: they both received an equal amount of neglect.