Suddenly Jim Taylor, leader of Party A, came on the air. ‘Stand by,’ he said. ‘There’s a vehicle coming up the road at high revs. What do we do? Hit it?’

‘Roger,’ Pat answered instantly. ‘Take it out. Other groups, close on target now!’

We burst out of the trees and ran towards the basement door. In seconds Paul had taped a line of det cord straight down the middle. We stood back, flattening ourselves against the wall.

‘Thirty seconds,’ came Pat’s voice. But before he could carry on the countdown the howl of an electronic alarm broke out from the front of the villa and wound up to a scream. At almost the same instant a brilliant flash split the night, and the thump of a 66 rocket exploding thundered up the mountainside, followed by the rattle of machine guns as Party A engaged the car.

‘Go! Go! Go!’ Pat screamed.

I turned my head away as Paul closed his clacker.

BOOM!

The door split in half and we pushed through the gap. As I went in I heard more rounds going down in the road-block.

The space inside was full of smoke or dust. Clouds of the stuff caught our torch beams and made it hard to see what there was in the room. Answer – nothing. Bare concrete block walls, bare cement floor, the room empty.

Another door at the back, steel, locked. It took Paul only seconds to make up another charge. Again we stood to one side. BANG! In the confined space, the shock buffeted us.

The second door swung open. Dust problems again. But this time through the haze I saw tubular steel storage shelves along one wall. On the floor at the foot of them was a long, dark heap. As my torch beam came on to it, part of the heap moved.

‘Pav!’ I yelled. ‘Keep still! You’re OK.’

In a flash I was kneeling in front of him. He and Toad were lying on their sides, head to head, their hands, behind backs, cuffed to the feet of the metal shelving. At first glance I thought Toad was dead – his eyes were shut and his face was white as chalk. When I put a hand on his cheek he felt as cold as a corpse. But at the touch his eyelids flickered.

One of the lads had bolt-cutters in his belt kit. ‘Give us a light while I cut these fucking chains!’ I shouted. I needn’t have yelled, because a torch came on right beside me – but my adrenalin was up and running.

‘OK,’ Paul said calmly, holding the light.