“Well, I always had this romantic notion that the BBC hired only the brightest and the best of our young British journalists. But frankly, if Jed Thomas is a typical example of the breed, I’m beginning to see why the Tory party feels it’s time the BBC started operating in the real world of market forces,” Sophie replied, stepping into the lift.

Lindsay grinned as she pressed the button. “I see what you mean. He isn’t going to do too well on Mastermind, is he?”

“It’s his lack of self-control I found so worrying. I suppose we can reluctantly assume he won’t persuade Andy to trot along to the police with him and tell them the truth?”

“No chance. Did you see the look on his face when I suggested it? He looked like I’d just asked him to jump out a tenth-floor window without a parachute. No, if anyone’s going to persuade Andy Spence that his only chance of avoiding being banged up in a police cell is to come clean, it ain’t going to be Jed.”

Sophie sighed. “Let me guess. We’re going off to talk to Andy?”

“Well, you don’t have to come along,” Lindsay said reasonably as she strode out of Pankhurst Tower and headed back towards the conference hall.

“Wild horses,” Sophie muttered as she followed.

Andy Spence was sitting on the platform next to AMWU’s president. He was leaning back in his chair, giving every appearance of listening to the delegate who was standing at the podium proposing a stultifyingly boring motion urging the union to protest strongly about the lack of human rights in Burma. Lindsay could just imagine the military junta quaking in their boots at the prospect of being condemned by the AMWU. Lindsay ripped a page out of her notebook and scribbled, “I have just come from Jed. I need five minutes of your time. I’ll be waiting in the corridor behind the stage. Lindsay Gordon.” She handed the note to Sophie and said, “Can you take that up to Andy? It’ll be a bit obvious if I do it.”

“Whereas most people here don’t know me from a hole in the ground,” Sophie finished. Lindsay waited till she saw Sophie slip up the stairs at the rear of the stage, then she went through to the corridor.

Sophie had only just found her when Andy appeared. He was wearing the scowl that had made dozens of newspaper managers wish they’d taken up a quiet, uncontroversial career in nuclear waste. His blue eyes looked as cold as an Arctic sky. “What’s the game?” he grated in a Glaswegian accent that fifteen years in England had done nothing to temper.

“Nice to meet you, too, Andy,” Lindsay said.