It was nine in the morning the following day. Beatrix and Faulkner were laid up in the Freelander outside the compound where Duffy lived. Beatrix was watching the guards through the windows of the SUV. They were smart and alert, too wise to the risks of guarding high-value targets in a place like Basra to take their eyes off the ball, even for a moment. A direct attack could only lead to bloodshed, and she didn’t want that. Not yet.

Faulkner had his smartphone in hand. He had called Pope overnight with a request for details on Mrs Sascha Duffy. Pope had passed the query on to the spooks at GCHQ, and they had assigned it with urgent tasking. The vast amount of data that they scraped from the internet was poured into endless data farms, but their automated scripts had interrogated those servers at lightning speed until they found what they were looking for.

A number had been texted to Faulkner and was waiting for him when he awoke.

“Ready?”

“Do it.”

Faulkner dialled the number.

The call rang twice and then connected. Faulkner had it on the speakerphone.

“Hello?”

“Is this Sascha Duffy?” Faulkner said.

“Yes. Who is this?”

“My name is Doctor Miles Farrow. I’m calling from the al-Jamhourua Hospital in Basra. It’s about your husband.”

“Bryan?”

“Yes, madam.”

“Oh my goodness. Is he alright?”

“I’m afraid he’s been quite badly hurt, Mrs Duffy. I don’t know if you’ve seen the news today, but there was a bomb . . .”

“Badly hurt? What does that mean?”

“He’s unconscious. We don’t think he’s in immediate danger, but you should probably come to the hospital as soon as you can. Do you know where we are?”

“Yes, I was there a month ago. A friend . . . oh, my goodness. I’ll come right away. Which ward is he in?”

“He’s in ICU, madam.”

“Thank you.”

Sascha Duffy rang off.

They waited. All they needed to do was to get her out of the gated compound, away from the security.

It didn’t take long.

Sascha hurried out the front door and got into the Audi TT that was parked on the drive. Beatrix had wondered whether she would usually travel with a guard, but if she did, she was in too much of a hurry today to worry about it. She reversed off the drive and sped up to the lodge with the armed guards inside. She exchanged a quick few words, the gate slid to the side and she accelerated quickly away.

Faulkner pulled into the traffic behind her. They headed to the middle of town and the al-Jamhourua hospital.

“She’s going to come off here,” Beatrix said, pointing to the slip road that fed off the main route.

Faulkner fed revs to the engine and picked up speed.