‘I suppose I have no option but to find out what they want.’

Lydia stood back to let him pass. ‘They’re in the kitchen, drinking the last of our coffee. I’ll let them introduce themselves.’

He lifted up his son and handed him to Lydia. ‘Go with Mummy, Johnny.’

She plonked the boy on her hip. ‘Just remember, Tom, whatever it is they want, say no. You’ve done your bit. You’re a college professor again. And a husband. And a father. And don’t forget, we’ve got Doris babysitting tonight and we’re going to the cinema.’

‘Of course.’

‘It’s Judy Garland’s new film.’

‘Message received and understood.’

‘Really? Well, that would be a first.’

*

Three men were sitting at the kitchen table with cups in front of them. It was a spacious room, with plenty of light from a large window and a good-sized table in the middle of the tiled floor. Despite the presence of an American refrigerator, however, the place was looking a little sad and unmodernised. Paintwork was peeling and nothing had been done about it in the war years. In fact the whole house was a little like that; comfortable but a bit shabby. Much like England itself.

The visitors at the table had obviously been talking but fell silent as Wilde entered the room. Two of them rose to their feet. Only Philip Eaton remained seated, but that was excusable. His left leg had been badly injured in a road incident in the last year before the war, and he had also lost his left arm. He looked frail. Wilde nodded to him but didn’t smile.

‘Hello, Wilde.’

‘Eaton, this is a surprise.’ Not a pleasant surprise. Wilde was not at all pleased to see him. Above all else, he wanted nothing to disturb his new-found peace.

‘Forgive us for turning up unannounced, old man. But I’m afraid this is all rather urgent. Do you know Allen Dulles? He’s OSS like you.’

Wilde turned his attention to the man indicated. Of course, he knew the name and he knew plenty about him; they had had dealings at a distance, by wire and encrypted messages, when Wilde was working at Grosvenor Street in London and Dulles was heading the Office of Strategic Services bureau in Switzerland. Wilde knew that during the war Dulles had run agents deep within the Reich, gathering intelligence and causing varying degrees of disruption among the Nazi high command.

The fact that the war was over didn’t mean an end to intelligence-gathering, however. Wilde knew that Allen Welsh Dulles – known to close colleagues as AWD – was now in charge of the OSS in the American sector of Germany, ensuring that the Nazis stayed beaten.

He had heard a great deal about Dulles’s reputation. His brilliant mind, his attention to fine detail and his honest dealing were legendary. So, too, was his less respectable side: his philandering and his cruel neglect of his wife.

He never even bothered to make much of a secret of that.