The old stone house at Le Val stood on the site of an even older manor dating back to medieval times. During its history the place had been a farm, one of the many that dotted Ben’s peaceful rural area. But in its modern incarnation, since Ben and his old friend Jeff Dekker had bought the property as a base for their then newly founded business, the house stood hidden from the quiet country road at the end of a long track guarded by high gates and surrounded by an impenetrable wire mesh fence that enclosed the whole sizeable acreage like a military base.

The need for such an impressive level of security was down to the nature of the work that went on there. Le Val was designated as a tactical training facility, which meant that Ben, Jeff, their associate Tuesday Fletcher and the small, hand-picked team of employees were involved in teaching some highly specialised skills to delegations of military, police, security and VIP protection personnel who travelled from all over Europe and beyond to learn from the best teachers in the business.

What made the Le Val team so uniquely qualified to pass on such expertise was, in large part, the military background of its two principal founders. Ben had spent well over a decade serving in theatres of war all over the world with 22 SAS, the British army’s most elite special forces regiment, working his way up to a final rank of major before he’d quit to go freelance, locating and rescuing kidnap victims held for ransom. Jeff’s career had been on the naval side, an equally long stint with the Special Boat Service, the SAS’s waterborne counterpart. Between them, Ben and Jeff had a wealth of tactical experience second to none – not to mention the almost supernatural skills brought to the table by the redoubtable Tuesday Fletcher, ex-army sniper extraordinaire.

The training facilities at Le Val included two firing ranges, a so-called ‘killing house’ modelled on the one used to train SAS troopers in the finer points of close-quarter battle, an extensive cross-country area over which they practised evasion and survival techniques, a track and skid pan where defensive driving skills were sharpened up, and more besides. Almost from Day One, their teaching courses had been in such demand that there was a waiting list a mile long and the place was nearly always buzzing with activity.