In camp the atmosphere was no less frenetic. Everybody from the CO down came at me saying, ‘Where have they put it? How do we find Barrakuda?’ They seemed to think that because I’d been in Moscow, I must be an expert on the Chechen Mafia. They couldn’t take in the fact that I knew nothing about the organisation’s London dispositions.

Also, people were naturally worried about the safety of our guys still at Balashika, and kept asking questions about the situation there. All I could say was that, if they stayed inside the camp, they’d be OK.

After an hour’s further debrief the boss at last realised that I was out on my feet, and told me to get my head down. He saw that there was nothing further we could do until we got some definite leads. So it was that at 0030 British time, 0330 Moscow time, 0430 Grozny time, and the end of the world by my biological clock, I eventually had a hot shower, lay down in my room in the sergeants’ mess and passed out.

The next I knew, someone was shaking my shoulder. ‘Get up, Geordie,’ a voice was saying. ‘On your feet. They’ve seen him.’

‘Who?’

‘Barrakuda.’

‘Ah, Jesus! Where?’

‘Central London. A police surveillance team saw him go into one of the flats they’ve had staked out.’

I blinked and stared at my watch: 6.15. ‘What happened?’ I croaked.

‘He came in a taxi, carrying a small hold-all.’

‘OK,’ I said. ‘I’m with you.’

Tired as I was, I knew I had to go, because I was the only person in England who’d set eyes on Orange.

Half an hour later I was heading back towards the capital, a member of the SP team, kitted out to take part in yet another hit. I knew all the other guys well enough to fit in, and as I’d recently finished commanding an SP team for nine months, we all spoke the same language.

As usual, our orders were unwritten but absolutely clear: our primary task was to recover Orange, but our scarcely less important aim was to silence Barrakuda and anyone found with him. If we got the bomb back and took out the immediate Mafia cell, the whole saga would become deniable. Anything the Chechens might say could be discredited. The operation was to be carried out as quickly as possible.

As our Range Rovers hurtled up the M4 at a steady 100 m.p.h., I noticed that the traffic seemed very light, and realised belatedly that this was Sunday.

In less than two hours we had reached a small warehouse in Notting Hill that had been taken over as a forward mounting base: the wagons drove straight in, out of sight, and the guys tumbled out to get their kit sorted.