‘Why should I? You certainly don’t look like an FBI agent. Do you have a badge?’

‘Back in Washington, yes.’

‘Well, that’s convenient,’ said Ed.

‘Ed,’ insisted Della, ‘you have to believe me. We’ve been trying to catch Shearson Jones red-handed for nearly two years. Now, we’ve got ourselves a chance.’

‘So why did you silence Dr Benson?’ asked Ed.

‘I had to. I didn’t want to, but I had to. None of the appeal money has been transferred to Shearson’s private accounts yet, and until that happens, he isn’t guilty of anything. He told me to keep Dr Benson quiet and that’s just what I did, in the most harmless way I could think of. I had to keep his confidence.’

Ed looked at her again. At the curly red hair, and the soft shining lips, and the huge breasts.

‘You’re an FBI agent?’ he asked her. ‘I don’t believe it. Eliot Ness always wore pinstripe suits.’

‘I was chosen for my looks. I worked on the Miami pornography scam a couple of years ago. It’s the kind of work I do best.’

‘I’ll bet.’

‘Ed,’ said Della, ‘you don’t have to believe me. But if you don’t, Shearson Jones could escape from this whole set-up scot-free.’

Ed closed his eyes for a moment. He knew what his urgent duty was: to stand up in front of those television cameras and tell as many people as possible what was going on. They were voters, and citizens, and human beings, and they had a right to know. Yet if Della was telling the truth and she did work for the FBI, it was equally important that he didn’t blow her carefully-arranged scam and warn Shearson Jones off. After all, she had actually given her body to Shearson Jones for the sake of a watertight arrest, and Ed wasn’t the kind of man who thought that was an easy or an offhand thing for a woman to do, even a woman like Della McIntosh.

He opened his eyes. Della was still looking at him intently.

‘I don’t know,’ he said. ‘I don’t know whether to believe you or not. If you’re really an FBI agent, why didn’t you tell me this last night?’

She gave an ironic smile. ‘I was always told that it was impolite to talk with your mouth full.’

‘I mean seriously.’

‘Because I wasn’t sure of you,’ she said. ‘I wasn’t sure how you were going to react. And because I was making love to you. That’s all.’

Ed said, ‘I don’t know if that’s enough. Not to convince me of what you are, anyway, and what you’re doing here.’ Della gave him a long, level look. ‘In that case, you’d better go out in front of those cameras and say just what your conscience dictates.’