‘Good, good. More of the same, please. And keep tabs on Mr MacCleod. He’s like a cockroach, indestructible.’

Melissa leaves his fogbound office bemused. Is the cloak-and-dagger stuff really necessary?

She goes to her desk, checks her emails – lots of comment from friends on her blog – and starts work. After a while she sees the editor leaving his office and heading for the stairs, and ten minutes later she calls him. He is in his car somewhere by the sound of it.

‘Don’t speak, Melissa, just listen. In your blog you should hint that Tubal’s is in financial trouble and that, you have heard, is why Artair did not receive his grant. You say unnamed sources have suggested that Tubal and Co. have some financial difficulties and that is the reason the charitable donations have been cut, including Mr Artair MacCleod’s. But you rejoice that this dynamo of our local culture will be repeating his renowned production of The Wind in the Willows at Easter, and so on.’

‘Mr Tredizzick, why exactly do you want me to do this?’

‘What we have is dynamite. But it is a fact of journalism that it is far less dangerous to report on what’s already in print, in this case on a blog, than to make allegations yourself. I have an old colleague from Fleet Street who is going to help us get the ball rolling. And then there will be utter mayhem. A firestorm.’

‘Do we want a firestorm, Mr Tredizzick?’

‘Melissa, these people, as we now know for certain, have misappropriated some hundred millions of other people’s money and – like my old employer Robert Maxwell – have placed pensions and people’s investments in jeopardy. My guess is they are planning to sell the bank and in the meanwhile they are fiddling the figures. And we – thanks to you – have a chance to stop them doing this. We’re not talking about some little crook who can’t pay his school fees and has dipped into the client account. This is a massive fraud. And behind it is a family so grand that they believe they are untouchable. We’ll see. OK, run your blog by me first. I want it by six tomorrow. All right?’

‘Yes, fine.’

‘Don’t be nervous. This is a big moment.’

‘I know.’