‘One of the targets we shoot at on the range.’ With both hands I drew the silhouette of a man’s torso in the air.

For us, down in the back of the Here, the flight was routine and relatively short. After take-off the pilot climbed hard, under full power, to clear the mountains, and the vibration was enough to loosen your teeth. Then we levelled off, and I went up on the flight deck for a look at the terrain.

Beneath us a sea of snow peaks lay glittering in bright moonlight, with jagged ridges of rock running down from the summits in incredibly complex patterns. I plugged the end of my helmet lead into an intercom socket and said to the pilot, ‘Glad we’re not going out right here.’

‘Aye,’ he went. ‘You wouldna have much of a chance. Here’s our marker summit coming up already. See it?’

Dead on the nose of the aircraft a single snow-clad peak was rising from the horizon, slender and pointed. We seemed to be approaching it at a snail’s pace, then all at once loomed closer. While I was staring at it the plane tilted steeply to the left as the auto-pilot made our programmed turn.

Back in the hold, the head loadie signalled us to start getting our tandem rig on, and the two PJIs helped do up the straps, clips and buckles to the correct tension.

So, for the final few minutes, we stood strapped tight together, unable to sit down, barely able to walk. My pulse rate had shot up and my heart was pounding. I’d peed into the Elsan just a few minutes before, but already I had the feeling I wanted to go again. I tried to concentrate on controlling my breathing so that I didn’t hyperventilate.

On our own oxygen now, with masks in place, it was impossible to communicate any longer. In spite of the discomfort, there was time – too much time – for my mind to zip back to the fuck-up over France. The big difference now was that Pavarotti, poor bugger, was on the deck, in the hands of the Mafia, and had no chance of flying into me on the way down.

Either side of the tailgate the red warning lights flicked on. The head loadie gave me two fingers. I acknowledged them, and saw him hitch his own harness to a strop hanging from the wall. The tail opened, letting in a blast of searingly cold air. As the ramp settled into its horizontal position the guy motioned us forward, and with another well-anchored loadie steadying us from behind, we waddled to the edge of the abyss, a few inches at each step, stiff-legged as ducks.

One finger from the head loadie. One minute to go. Sixty seconds of sheer terror.