If you ever want to get your adrenalin going, try driving through Moscow at night with a nuclear bomb in the boot of a rickety, underpowered car. Every traffic light spelt possible disaster, every vehicle that overtook seemed certain to be full of Mafia gunmen bent on a hijack.

‘What we do not want,’ I said grimly, ‘is to be stopped by the fucking GAI with this lot on board.’

‘Nah,’ said Pavarotti. ‘They don’t seem to operate much in the centre – more out on the highways.’

Luck favoured us. With me map-reading we managed to avoid the cops and find the way, and soon came out on to the huge, level esplanade, where one can park and walk forward to look out over the city. Whinger, following at a distance, pulled up some fifty yards to our right, and a couple got out of each car to take in the sights.

The prospect was spectacular, I had to admit. Behind us, the monstrous skyscraper of the main university building towered into the sky, topped by a slender spire that gleamed golden in its spotlights. On either side of it the lower towers sprouted pinnacles, and hundreds of lighted windows made the campus look like a city on its own.

In front of us, immediately over the wall was a steep drop, with a couple of rickety-looking ski-jumps – not yet in use – poised over it. Below them, the centre of Moscow was laid out in a million more lights. It reminded me of the view from the top of Block B – except that here the illumination was far more varied and concentrated. Close in the foreground was a large stadium; farther out, the floodlit buildings of the Kremlin glowed magnificently. We could also see the White House. I remembered Sasha telling us of how it had been rebuilt after the coup: apparently the workers had stayed in the nearby Kiev Hotel, and their demand for whores was so phenomenal that busloads of extra women had had to be imported from out of town.

I glanced around. There were a few other people up here, but nobody close to us. Away to our right I could see Whinger and Rick, also looking over the wall, but correctly keeping their distance.

‘I feel that hepped up, I reckon if I jumped off here I’d fly,’ I told Pavarotti quietly.

‘Don’t try it, mate. You might just keep going, never come down.’

We admired the view for a few more minutes, then returned to the car and hung around some more. As usual at such moments, our watches seemed to have gone on strike.

But at last it was 9.45, time to head down.

‘Moving off now,’ I told Whinger over the radio.

‘Roger. I’ll let you get clear.’

Mal turned the car and started to back-track our route – but we were hardly under way before Whinger came through again with, ‘Watch yourselves. I think you’ve got a tail.’