“So here we both are, at headquarters. I am not even a regular officer! Past my youth too: too old — too fat! — to go trundling after bad people. But there are so few of us with any experience, and the matter is so very sensitive and at the same time so very important. All hands on deck, and those with experience, well, one likes to do what one can, doesn’t one? For Queen and country; for the good of the state. I am sure you will understand. My remit, I am afraid, is near-absolute. I can quite literally do to you whatever I wish. Ghastly, when one thinks about it. I prefer not to.”

All this the man recites quite fluently and without any menace, his chubby hands folded together high on his chest. For the first time I see that he is wearing sleeve protectors that run black from wrist to elbow. For some reason, this detail bothers me just as his gloves did before. How different is it, I wonder, from a butcher donning his apron before stepping into the abattoir?

“We had your ship searched, Captain. The cargo, it appears, is entirely in order. None of the custom seals have been meddled with and all the contents match up to the inventory you filed with the authorities. There are a number of pieces of illegal technology on board, but all these are listed and licenced: as long as they remain on board, there can be no objection. The logbooks are in order and chart your ship’s recent voyages without any obvious anomaly. Your private ledger is similarly unremarkable, though it contains a receipt for a very sizable amount of money made out to you by the Behrens Bank of Rotterdam. Now this would be entirely your business, if it were not suspected that the money in question originates in England and was, in fact, paid to you by Lady Catherine Naylor acting as the legal signatory of her husband, Baron Archibald Naylor, and with the Behrens Bank acting only as middleman. One may well say, however, that a man may accept money no matter where it comes from. It is noted that it was paid into your private accounts rather than the company who has ownership of the ship. You are a rich man, Captain van Huysmans. I congratulate you.