‘I’d like to walk back a few paces,’ the foreign secretary said. ‘I obviously understand that the allegations about the prime minister’s Russian connections first surfaced in the leadership election and have been a thorn in his side ever since, but I seem to recall that when I asked you about them in our first meeting here, you said that there was nothing to the charges and the case was closed.’

Sir Alan leant forward in his chair. In Kate’s experience, he liked to dominate politicians and clearly felt uncomfortable at the expanse of wood between them. On reflection, perhaps that had been Meg Simpson’s thinking. Kate’s respect for her crept up a notch. ‘In the end, the evidence we had was not conclusive.’

‘Walk me through it from the beginning.’

‘Kate recruited a young nanny called Lena Sabic to help us plant a bug on a super-yacht owned by Igor Borodin, who used to be the head of Russia’s Foreign Intelligence Service and is – or was – a close friend of the Russian president. We planned the operation because we knew that Igor likes to keep in touch with what his successors are up to and has been in the habit of inviting them to join him on his yacht. The operation was Kate’s idea and it was one of the most successful of the past decade. We managed to record a meeting of Russia’s most senior intelligence officials, who were discussing our former prime minister’s prostate cancer before it was known to anyone back here, including us. The way in which they were discussing the leadership election that would ensue from his resignation suggested to us that one of the candidates to replace him was working for the Kremlin.’

‘I have not received a transcript of that conversation?’

‘We closed the file.’

‘Not to me.’

‘I’ll send it across later.’

Meg rewarded him with a thin smile. ‘In any event, I assume that once the prime minister had declared his prostate cancer and resigned, that reinforced your notion that the conversation you recorded was genuine.’

‘Yes.’

‘So how did you proceed?’

‘We began an investigation into the candidates.’

‘All of us?’ There was a twinkle in her eye. ‘Even me?’

‘Once the contest narrowed to Imogen Conrad and the prime minister, we focused our attentions there.’

‘Perhaps it was me the Russians were referring to all along and I just didn’t make the final cut.’

Sir Alan didn’t smile back at her. ‘Perhaps.’

‘And what did you find?’

‘Nothing conclusive, but a great deal of circumstantial evidence that James Ryan was recruited by the Russians as an agent many years ago, probably while he was an army officer in Kosovo. Kate’s deputy, Ravindra, followed a lead to Geneva and may have uncovered details of the payments the PM has received over the years, but he was found hanging from the ceiling of his flat after his return. We later discovered that the woman he had gone to see in Switzerland – a former secretary to one of the Russian president’s lawyers – had been killed and dumped in a wood.’