‘Oh dear is right, mate, I think you could potentially go even further than oh dear, it’s pretty much bordering on what a pity.’ Once more, it was Karl’s voice and style, but not his tone. He wasn’t playful; he sounded bitter, exhausted. ‘That’s us losing a major client and I’m on my knees to his management who have maybe twenty of our other big clients, and if all of those go away, that’s us absolutely on the floor, mate, because someone couldn’t keep their mouth shut.’

Despite the pointedness of the final phrase, it was impossible for James to believe the direction this was heading in. ‘But you don’t think – you can’t think it was me. I wouldn’t, I would never—’

‘Nobody else was driving him, though, eh?’ Karl stuck out his right palm, rhetorically. ‘The whole point with Elton was, you were the only one on him, so we didn’t have the risk of someone dropping the ball, because I knew with him there was always the chance of something going tits-up, so I put what I thought was my best man on it …’

‘I am your best man,’ said James, loathing how pathetic a claim this sounded. He shifted his weight; the wooden chair felt capable of giving up and dropping him onto the floor, to mirror what was about to happen to his life. ‘I would never, I swear I would never …’

‘There’s no one else,’ said Karl. ‘Only you ever had the pick-up details, the destinations. They’re all in the article. That’s what the manager said. I had this fucking guy on the phone at half five this morning. Nobody could have known these sort of details except the driver, he said. And what was I meant to do?’

‘Well, what – what, I mean, what are we going to do?’ James asked. They had sorted plenty of things out before, after all. But Karl wouldn’t look at him. He drank down his coffee and wiped his lips; his hand went into his pocket for a Rizla. He got to his feet and James grabbed his arm, restraining him.

‘Karl. Please. I’m sure we can – we can somehow …’

‘Somehow what? Somehow destroy every copy of the paper in existence? Plus the internet?’