‘You think anyone cares?’

‘Yes.’

‘It would do you good.’ Julie waited. ‘All right, so what do you want to do?’

‘Drown myself.’

Julie stood. ‘Come on. That isn’t your style. It’s a beautiful day. Let’s go for a walk.’

Kate had agreed that Stuart would have Fiona and Gus for three hours, so she and Julie had plenty of time to fill. They headed for the Rialto bridge, then the Ponte degli Scalzi by the station and then to the Campo Santa Margherita, finally coming back across the Ponte dell’Accademia. ‘You sure as hell do like to walk,’ Julie observed, once they had returned to the tourist hordes in St Mark’s Square. They had intended to catch a boat across to San Giorgio Maggiore, but they were out of time and patience and opted to go for a drink in Harry’s Bar instead, which was a mistake. ‘It would have been cheaper to be mugged,’ she concluded.

Stuart had agreed he would WhatsApp Kate with a place to meet in the vicinity of St Mark’s, but at two o’clock she still hadn’t heard from him. She sent him a message, but there was no reply. ‘What’s he playing at?’

‘Did you definitely say two?’

‘Definitely.’

They left the bar and went to wait in the square. Two fifteen came and went and then the clock tower crept past the half-hour. Kate messaged again: We can’t do this if you won’t keep to your word.

At two forty-five Kate started to worry in earnest. ‘Do you think we should call the office?’ she asked Julie. Kate’s bosses at MI6 in Vauxhall had concluded a meeting between a traitor and his children was not a matter for them to worry themselves with but had agreed to allow Julie to accompany her superior ‘just in case’.

‘Not yet. Give him another fifteen minutes before we start to panic.’

They watched the clock in silence, but a few minutes later, Kate’s phone buzzed. So sorry, didn’t see the time. Just finishing pizza. Could we meet in the Chiesa San Giuliano – a couple of minutes from St Mark’s?

All right, she shot back.

It was a short walk to the church and Kate asked Julie to wait outside. The interior was chilly and her breath hung in the air as she glanced around at the church’s baroque splendour. She could see no sign of Stuart or the children, so she walked up to the front of the nave and looked up at the giant oil painting of the Crucifixion on the wall beside her, a brooding, even foreboding window to a different, more spiritual age. She turned back to face the entrance. ‘Stuart?’

As she started to retrace her steps, she swung around to confront a shadow shifting in the corner of her eye. A man in a dark raincoat was pointing a Browning at her stomach.

2

HE HAD A lean, angular face, with severely acne-scarred skin. Two colleagues emerged from the darkness to join him, pistols hanging loosely at their sides. ‘What do you want?’ Kate asked.