Above the Norwegians was a large digital display screen, which, as far as Luke could see, was just a stream of code. Clearly, he had entered a different world here in Cheltenham.

‘Yes, we’re a twenty-four/seven operation here,’ announced Pullover, when they were all gathered in one place. ‘We normally operate on a shift system around the clock, but this week is – how can I say it? – somewhat out of the ordinary. A decision was taken at our daily leadership meeting yesterday morning to declare Svalbard “an event”. That triggers a certain response, so you’ll see a lot of extra bodies in here today.’ He swept his arm around the darkened operations room where every chair was occupied.

‘So … Svalbard …’ He rubbed his hands together, as if somehow relishing the challenge presented by the horrors that had taken place in the Arctic. ‘Well, I can tell you, it didn’t come out of the blue. Along with our Norwegian friends …’ he nodded to the group of smartly dressed visitors ‘… we’ve been aware of covert Russian activity there for some time. But this event is of a wholly different magnitude. Today we’ve been asking ourselves: who has the capability to do this? Who was in that vicinity at almost exactly this time two days ago? Well, thanks to some fast work by our friends in Oslo we already knew the name of the victim who died in the hut – Yevgeny Vasiliev. And thanks to Mr Carlton here, we now know his parent organization in Moscow.’

Luke felt everyone’s eyes turn towards him and he caught one of the Norwegians squinting and ever so slightly frowning. It was a brief but uncomfortable moment and Luke did what he often did at times like this: he discreetly rubbed the stump of his missing finger where a Taliban bullet had taken it off at the joint.

‘Porton Down,’ continued Pullover, ‘are still working on exactly what poisoned him. Our task here is to find out who poisoned him and why.’

Luke found himself chewing the inside of his cheek in impatience as he listened to this. Nearly an hour had passed since he’d stepped off the train and on to the platform at Cheltenham and so far he hadn’t learned a damn thing. Was this session going to be just a long list of rhetorical questions or was this man actually going to provide some answers? Otherwise they might as well get the first train back to London. He admired their thoroughness, of course, but he wished they’d get to the point. He looked across at Jenny to see if she shared his impatience, but, as usual, her expression gave nothing away. Good skills, he had to give her that.