‘Not really,’ he said, ‘but we’ll leave it for now. Let’s get some coffee.’

He called Mrs Kemp and she took their order.

*

‘Now let’s get on to the girl. Keep your voice down, Eaton, because I don’t want her to hear. We need to find Klara some sort of foster family. Someone very discreet. I did wonder whether Sunny might be interested in taking her on. She doesn’t have children of her own and she seems to have developed something of a bond with the girl. And the language would help, obviously.’

‘Plenty to talk about.’

Wilde frowned. Eaton seemed evasive.

‘I suppose a temporary alternative would be a boarding school. She speaks very good English.’

‘Our boarding schools can be pretty unforgiving places for foreigners, as you probably discovered yourself at Harrow, Wilde. A German accent probably would not go down well at present. But look, let’s wait until Cashbone gets here, shall we? It’s his operation. Anyway, I still want to hear the whole story from you – and he might as well hear it at the same time.’

Wilde knew Eaton too well. He might not always be able to read the MI6 man, but he could sense when he was holding back.

‘Something else on your mind?’

Eaton ran his hand across his forehead. ‘Actually, Wilde, there was something – might be nothing. An E-boat entered territorial waters off the east coast. It was engaged by one of our corvettes and was sunk. The thing is, she was actually heading back out to sea at the time. It’s possible she dropped an agent off first.’

‘An E-boat?’

‘Yes, I made the connection, too. I had heard from Harrison in Stockholm about your to-do with an E-boat in the Baltic. Also, I checked with the police around Southwold, the closest town to the little naval battle. A car was stolen that night, and it has since turned up abandoned in London. Call me paranoid, Eaton – but it’s my job to be paranoid.’

‘Any survivors from the E-boat?’

‘Most of the crew. But they’re saying nothing.’

‘Well, I’d certainly like to talk to them. Where are they?’

‘The captain’s at Camp 020, the crewmen are in transit to a PoW camp. But no, you can’t talk to them. Look, Wilde, I’m worried that whoever was trying to get to the girl in Germany has followed you here. That’s all you need to know. This is why I didn’t want you to call Lydia just yet. It’s not beyond the bounds of possibility that they have worked out who you are through your connection with Jim Vanderberg. I doubt they have the means to put a tap on your home telephone and I’m pretty sure they can’t know about this place but . . . Well, better safe than sorry.’