Silence again. Both men waiting, watching, listening, each afraid to betray his position to the other. They could just keep playing this cat-and-mouse game until someone got hit, either by design or by chance, with their opponent’s bullet or their own. Ben didn’t like the odds much.

Neither did his opponent. There was a sudden rush of footsteps and a furious metallic clatter as Hacker raced to find the ladder and started wildly clambering up it. Ben fired at the sound and his blind shot howled off an aluminium rung. He fired again. But Hacker was leaping up the ladder like a scalded wildcat and he made it to the top before Ben could get a fix on him. In two bounds Ben was at the foot of the ladder and ready to storm up after him, but a hail of gunfire blasted down all over the inside of the chamber, bullets bouncing everywhere and forcing Ben to dive away from the ladder, roll and take cover.

In the next instant he heard the scrape of the ladder being withdrawn, and then the echoing clang of the iron trapdoor being slammed back down and the bolt being kicked home. More muzzle flashes lit up the mouth of the chamber as Hacker jammed his pistol muzzle through the iron grid and loosed off another five rounds. Ben came back at him with two, three, four return shots, aiming behind the flashes. Hacker’s gunfire ceased. Ben heard running steps escaping.

Then nothing. He was alone again down here in the subterranean blackness, with the sudden silence and the sweetish tang of burnt powder mingling with the stench of the dungeon. He patted himself all over for injuries. In the heat of combat you could take a hit without even realising it. He was unhurt. Ben allowed himself a grim momentary pleasure at the rising enemy casualty toll. The score stood at three dead Dishonourables, plus a fourth incapacitated with a knife wound. The colonel would be happy. He’d be even happier by the time this was over.

But it was a long way from over. Ben was still at a serious tactical disadvantage because now Hacker was heading back up there to go after Grace, and Ben was trapped down here with two corpses and unable to do a damn thing to help her. Not good.