‘How far is it to Udi?’

‘We have all the facilities you need here . . .’

‘I need to get to Udi now!’ I said, banging my hand against the bed and making the bottles rattle on the shelves.

It must have come out stronger than it had in my head, because his eyes were wide now, through the slits.

‘Please calm yourself,’ he said. Then, slowly, reaching for the right words to pacify me: ‘What medication have you taken?’

‘A tablet of Benzedrine you had lying about.’

The white mask stared back at me.

‘You are joking, I hope?’

‘No,’ I said, ‘I’m not joking. Because in’ - I checked Akuji’s Longines - ‘around three hours and forty-five minutes’ time, something very bad is going to happen in Udi, and I need to be there to stop it. I need to be alert until then. After that—’

‘After that you may die,’ he said. ‘There’s no telling what Benzedrine could do to your system right now. And please put the gun away - soldiers threaten us all the time, and we’re accustomed to standing our ground. You can threaten me all you want, but I can’t let you leave here. It’s just not safe.’

I started laughing then. ‘Safe?’ I spat at him. ‘Half an hour ago you told me I might have caught this disease from rat shit, and there are rats in here, for Christ’s sake!’

‘I know. Unfortunately, they were here when we arrived. They were attracted by the smell of amputated limbs. But I didn’t mean safe for you - I meant for everyone else. Your condition is probably highly contagious.’

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘I didn’t think you just liked masks.’

I walked towards him and pulled it down. A neat beard failed to hide that he was barely out of his teens.

‘What’s your name?’ I asked.

‘David.’

‘David what?’

‘David Kanu.’

‘Born here and educated in the States, I presume? Wanted to come back to help out?’

He nodded. A trickle of sweat travelled down his left cheek.

‘Can you drive, David? Do you have access to a car?’

‘Why?’

I gestured to the body lying on the bed. ‘Do you know this man?’

‘No,’ he said. ‘He turned up in his car and asked if I had a British patient here. I said I had and he—’

‘I mean do you know who he is?’

‘Yes, of course.’

I waited for him.

‘Colonel Ojukwu. The head of the Biafran army.’

‘Wrong,’ I said. ‘He’s an impersonator, name of Akuji. And, like me, he’s a British agent. How far are we from Udi?’

‘Sixty or seventy miles.’

‘Right. Well, sixty or seventy miles from here, in a very short time, someone is going to try to kill the British prime minister. Do you understand?’

‘We have a telephone,’ he said. ‘You could call your embassy.’