The five work the city thoroughly, varying the teams to disrupt their profiles to avoid easy recognition.

A bearded man with a clean-shaved man wearing dark blue waterproofs and stout walking boots one day will be two cleanly shaven men wearing checked shirts, jeans and trainers the next day. Hats are used to limit profile awareness. They are German with varying dialects. They are English and politely spoken. Some are French and display the typical nuances associated with that country. They are what they need to be.

Alpha and Bravo drink coffee in a café. It has been a long morning already and they spread the tourist map open on the table to idly peruse and quietly discuss the sights they should see next.

Bravo eats a cake. Bravo doesn’t actually like cake but it fits the profile so he eats the cake. Alpha hums softly as he flicks through the guidebook and glances between the pages and the map on the tabletop.

The café is either half-full or half-empty, depending on the way you view life. To the men, the café is at half capacity of occupancy, such is the manner in which they think.

Bravo ignores the door opening. His instincts tell him two people just entered but his training prevents him from immediately looking. Instead, he drops a crumb from his mouth on to his shirt and rolls his eyes as he brushes it off, giving him a plausible reason for glancing over to see two average-looking men walking to the counter. They look entirely normal. Average height. Average build. Short hair. They also look intensely worried. Like they’ve just had very bad news. One rubs the back of his neck and sighs deeply while the other orders two coffees in fluent German that bears a trace of an English accent somewhere within it.

‘Danke,’ the German man with the hint of English says at the counter as he takes the two mugs.

‘That footage was forty-six years ago,’ Malcolm says, rubbing his neck as they walk past the table.

‘Yeah,’ Konrad says. His tone is sad, worried. ‘Can’t believe we’ve actually met him . . . She was right to show us.’

‘Oh, definitely,’ Malcolm says emphatically. ‘You think Harry’s plan will work?’

They walk on down the café and the words are lost. Bravo eats his cake. Alpha thumbs through the guide.

‘Kaffee?’ Bravo asks in perfect German after finishing his cake.

‘Bitte,’ Alpha says amiably, also in fluent dialect-worthy German.

Bravo gets two fresh coffees and returns to the table. They converse quietly about the buildings, the area, the hotel they stayed in last night, the food they ate, the price of public transport.

Alpha pulls out his phone and thumbs the screen with a roll of his eyes. ‘Meine mutter,’ he says, as though ever so slightly irritated at having to write his mother a message.

‘Ah.’ Bravo smiles benignly.

Alpha writes the message.