‘Nyet. Barracks is kazarma. Strelbilshze is ranges. Beeg ranges, beeg training area. Between town and forest. Town this side, forest this side. Only thirty kilometres from Moscow, to the east. All behind concrete fences.’

‘Fences?’

‘Walls. Concrete walls, two metres tall. From outside you see nothing.’

When I brought up the subject of the Mafia, he instantly became indignant and twisted round in his seat to look at me. ‘They keell everybody! Half the population has become what we call vor v zakone. That means “thief in the law”. In other words, creeminals.

‘They keell businessmen, bank managers, property men – anyone. Last year they even kill Larisa Nechayeva!’

‘Who?’

‘Nechayeva? Boss of Spartak football club. They shoot her in her dacha, her country house. Another woman with her. And why? Because she refused to pay them money. Also they kill Valentin Sych, ice hockey president.’

‘What’s the motive?’ I said. ‘Why kill all these different kinds of people?’

‘Marney!’ Sasha held up his right hand, rubbing thumb and forefinger together. ‘Marney, marney, marney! Everyone wants more. Always US dollars. Russian money no good. You know how we call it? Deregannye dengi or deregannye rubli. That means wooden money, wooden roubles. Throw it in the stove!’

‘But you’ve just had a revaluation. Didn’t they divide by a thousand?’

‘Konechno. Of course. Before, it was seven thousand roubles to one dollar. Now it is seven. But what is the difference? Prices are still crazy. No change.’

‘These murders – who’s carrying them out?’

‘Contract killers. Almost all. With one bullet, a man can earn half million dollars.’ He looked at me and went on in a soft, menacing, ingratiating voice: ‘Eemagine. You are manager of bank, big boss, yes? Somebody telephones. “Look, Meester Sharp, you should pay us some marney.” You tell them, “Get to hell.”

‘Another call. “You know, Mr Sharp, you are in danger. You need pratyection. We do not like you to be hurt. We can pratyect you. We can look after your family. But it will cost you: two per cent. Two per cent of bank takings – a lot of money.”

‘Again you say, “Get lost.”’

He paused, and when he went on, his voice was even more reasonable, more wheedling, more sinister.

‘A week passes. Another call. “Now look, Meester Sharp. Are you not concerned for your safety, for your little children, for their lives?”

‘“No,” you say.

‘“All right, then. Wait. Wait. Just wait.”

‘You think you are safe. Why? Because you have closed-circuit TV on your block. You have modern security system. You have former KGB on duty outside. But you are under terrible pressure – from your bosses to resist the threat, from the criminals to pay.

‘Then one morning you go out to your car. Sunny day. Very nice. Guards are sitting there. Only twenty-five metres to walk, but that is enough. BASH! Bang! The contract killer fires one shot from his car – finish.’