‘Izba is old house in the country. Peasant house.’

‘A cottage?’

‘Yes, but very old. And such a house . . .’ He gestured at a thirties villa standing in a large garden. ‘This belongs to government?’

‘No, no. I’m sure it’s private. A private individual. I think I read somewhere that you can buy houses in Russia now.’

‘Yes – it is just starting.’

‘And land? Could you buy a farm, for instance?’

‘By no means. No land can be sold, except for gardens.’

The afternoon traffic was light and the fast lane was often clear, but I kept my speed down to eighty and let the BMWs whip past. I explained the system of number-plates: how S indicated the current year, just started in August, that next autumn there’d be a scramble for Ts, and that freaks paid huge sums for special numbers. Just at the right moment to illustrate my point, we were overtaken by a hell-driven Peugeot 205 with the number P1NTA.

We started to compare British and Russian special forces, and I asked about the base at Balashika.

‘It is home of our famous Dzerzhinsky division. That belongs to Ministry of Interior. They have many facilities at Balashika. Beeg strelbilshze.’

‘Barracks?’

‘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?’