“Not entirely,” Alex replied. “I left that to Ms. Sands. These things are more effective when people follow their own instincts, and she enjoyed herself quite as much as you did.”

“Give her my thanks when you see her,” Roger said, drily.

“Oh, you’ll see her again, and she will be just as happy to see you as last night.”

“What do you want?” Roger asked again.

“First, I’d rather talk about what you want, apart from Ms. Sands, whom you have already won. What do you want, Roger? If I may call you that.”

“Call me anything you like.”

“Roger it is, then. There is an envelope on the table next to your chair,” he said. “Open it.”

Roger looked at the table, picked up the unsealed envelope and opened it. He found himself staring at a photo of himself and the French masseur. He grimaced in spite of himself, shoved the photo back into the envelope, and tossed it to Alex. “With my compliments,” he said. “It won’t do you any good.”

“I’m still looking for what you want,” Alex said. “If it’s what’s in the envelope, I can arrange that, too.”

“Certainly not. I was unconscious when that was taken.”

“Were you? Somehow, you seemed to be enjoying it. I have others, in other positions. Would you like to see them?”

“No.”

“A pity, they are quite artistic, in their way. The lighting is very good. It was certainly an interesting beginning to your holiday in France, wasn’t it?”

Roger didn’t reply.

“Well, now, we were talking about what you want,” Alex said. “Let’s see, you have your full pension and the monthly income from the trust your father set up for you, because he didn’t trust you to handle the money wisely. A difficult man, your father, eh?”

“You don’t know the half of it,” Roger muttered.

“So, you can live quite contentedly on your present income,” Alex said, “if you’re careful how you spend it. Perhaps if you shave a few drinks off your weekly consumption you could afford to continue seeing your shirtmaker every year or two, but not your tailor, of course. You’ll have to be very careful with your clothes. You could stop getting caught in the rain, that would help.”

“How long have you been following me?” Roger asked.

“For a great deal longer than you realize, Roger. You came to our notice for the first time when you began extorting your fellow officers, the gay ones, for career assistance. One of them was ours, you see. After that we followed you quite closely.”

Roger slumped a bit in his chair now.

“I must say, we were very disappointed when you were sacked from MI-6. We were expecting great things from you.”

“I’m sorry to disappoint you,” Roger replied sourly.