‘I’m delighted to welcome you to this’ – she peered at her clipboard – ‘ “We are Family” initiative. This is the first time we’ve opened up our charming training location to non-Security Service personnel. Welcome to our world.’

As Mrs Moulage launched into a description of the initiative I watched her talk. None of the people listening as she trotted out buzz words like ‘caring communication’, ‘social cohesion’ and ‘circle of trust’ would have any idea as to just how impressive this woman was. The only nod to the fact she wasn’t exactly your normal pensioner was her outfit. An emerald green silk trouser suit. Beautifully cut. And undoubtedly Christian Dior.

The Dior Dame.

Deadly, driven and always dressed in Dior. She may have been given this nickname by a scathing Cold War-era pack of Russians but she loved it. She took to scrawling DD in red lipstick across the foreheads of kills she wanted to lay claim to.

Mrs Moulage was not her real name. Rumour had it she grew up in Birmingham – there was talk of abusive foster families, a difficult time on the streets and a trail of dead men who all had it coming, but no one really knew. Somewhere along the way she came to Eight’s attention and became Mrs Moulage, an elegant, well-dressed assassin who spoke with no discernible accent and had no discernible problem with even the most violent of undertakings. No one ever knew if there was, or ever had been, a Mr Moulage – or whether the name just fitted the persona she adopted.

Supposedly semi-retired, she now ran a crematorium in South London called Requiem. As well as being a legitimate business, which apparently ran a tidy profit, Requiem was also where all the bodies Eight needed disposing of would end up. There was also talk that even now Mrs Moulage was sometimes activated for certain missions. I wasn’t surprised. Finding her next to a dead body, no one would even think to suspect the delicate, grey-haired old lady of being anything other than a traumatised witness.

The Dior Dame was someone everyone had an opinion on. Vicious, violent, uncontrollable, dangerous.

I thought she was fucking fabulous.

We were instructed to go to our designated tables. I wondered if Mrs Moulage knew who I was. The Rat among the Sheep. Was there something about me that shone? That would make it clear that we shared a secret? That I was just like her?