“Maybe you are desperate. But you can’t trust this guy. Just because I’m the middleman doesn’t change anything. Jesus, for all you know I’m part of the same scam. You don’t know the first thing about me. How can you be sure that I’m not going to buy the photograph and then blackmail you myself? You can’t. That’s the thing about blackmail. It’s a dirty business. Everyone’s your friend right up until the moment they turn around and screw you.”

“You make a good point. But I have no choice but to take the risk.”

“Can I be blunt?”

“Be my guest.”

“Everyone in the world knows you’re queer. What of it? Does it affect anything? You’ve got your invitation to the royal wedding in Monaco. Has it crossed your mind that what you do in your bedroom really doesn’t matter to people anymore?”

“That’s true in France, perhaps. And Italy, certainly. But it matters a lot back in England. Homosexuality is a crime in my country and I should hate to be prevented from ever going back. Besides, there’s rather more to the photograph than just my being queer.”

I sat there smoking sullenly for several seconds.

“Ten percent. If I’m going to play agent I want a proper agent’s commission. Ten percent.”

“All right. Ten percent it is.”

“So tell me about the photograph.”

SEVEN

Before the war I worked for the British secret service,” said Somerset Maugham. “Mostly I was based in Geneva. But some of the time I was stationed in what was then Petrograd. I shan’t bore you with the details of my mission but I had a largish team of British agents under my control. Frankly, it’s always been a business that attracted homosexuals, because queers are used to living their lives in secret—at least in England, where to be homosexual can still draw a sentence of up to two years in prison. Being silent about who and what you are is second nature to English queers. Things haven’t improved a lot since the days of Oscar Wilde. That’s why so many queers like Isherwood and Auden went to Berlin in the twenties. Because it was a poof’s paradise. And a good reason why I live here. Anyway, that’s all by the by. I still have a lot of friends in SIS. Many of them, including Sir John Sinclair, the current head of MI6, were my agents. Besides, it’s not the kind of business you ever really retire from.”

I nodded grimly. “Don’t I know it? I’ve been trying to retire from the detective business for years now, but it keeps dogging me.”

“Yes. I am sorry about that.”

“I doubt it.”