‘It’s too dangerous, Clarisse. I don’t want you to get hurt, which is what happens to people I am seen with. So go. Leave Arles. I couldn’t bear to see you . . .’ Dead was the word that so nearly tumbled from my tongue. ‘. . . in danger.’

She studied me through half-closed eyes, the way I’d seen her study surveillance photographs that I’d brought her in Paris, assessing their value. ‘Very well,’ she conceded, ‘I’ll go home to Paris.’ She gave an elegant shrug. ‘I’ve had enough of the stink of bullshit anyway.’

In return I found her a smile. ‘Good. At last you are seeing sense.’

But I would miss my boss, miss her a lot. I hugged her, but she had become stiff and unyielding, hurt by my desire to drive her out.

‘Can I do anything for you before I go?’ she asked.

‘I need four new tyres.’

‘On a Sunday? What happened?’

‘They’ve been stabbed.’

‘Merde!’

‘Exactly.’

She walked over to the telephone beside the bed. ‘I’ll work my charm on the manager.’

I was sure she would too.

‘Clarisse.’

She heard something in my voice that made her lift her head and look at me. ‘What is it, chérie?’

‘Does the CIA kill people?’

‘Yes, all the time, I imagine. This may be a Cold War, but it’s still a war.’

He was coming for me. Whichever side he was on.

CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

When wounded, human instinct is to hide. Or to fly to those we love to take care of us. I was wounded. I don’t mean my face. I mean inside. I could feel the drip, drip, drip of blood and I could hear the soft sobs of pain deep within my head.

I drove fast on my four new tyres, I drove to the only place on earth I wanted to be. I kept the car windows down so that the wind that whipped across the marshes could lay the taste of salt on my lips to replace the taste of betrayal. Every field, every stream, every stretch of woodland, they all held memories of André and now it all meant nothing. He had handed me to his enemies on a plate.

I tried to hate him, my own brother, whom I’d trusted with my life, but I wasn’t capable of it. If he was working for Soviet Russia, if it were true, then what was I? A cover story? Was I the smoke and mirrors? Was I supposed to distract the CIA watchers, the Bertins and Piquets of this world, while André got on with whatever it was he was doing?