'Down to the country. I'm stationed near Cambridge, but I don't live in camp. I've hired me a grand little maison with everything that opens and shuts. We'll be there by a half after eleven, and you've hit the jack-pot with your wish. I mean to give you the night of your life.'

16.The setting of a trap

On that same Saturday, all unsuspecting of what fate had in store for Mary, Barney went to his lunch appointment with his Chief at the Army and Navy Club. The hall porter told him that he would find Colonel Verney in the smoking-room so, having parked his bag, he walked quickly up the splendid staircase. As it was a Saturday the big room, with its leather-covered sofas and scores of easy chairs, was almost empty. Verney was sitting at a table near a window with a pink gin and a pint of Pimm's in front of him. He made it a rule never to lunch alone, as he considered that to do so would have been wasting what often turned out to be the most valuable part of the day. On days when he had no appointment to lunch with officers in the Intelligence Departments of the Service Ministries, or senior Civil Servants, he always took one of his own young men to lunch at his Club, because doing so enabled him both to get to know them better and encouraged them to regard him as a friend as well as their master.

'Here's how!' he said, picking up the pink gin as Barney sat down. Barney reached for the Pimm's and grinned. 'What a memory you've got, Sir, to have ordered my favourite tipple.'

'It's just part of the Austin Reed service,' C.B. replied laconically. 'Talking of "service", Farnborough have fixed us up. About twice a week they send an aircraft down to Wales to facilitate the exchange of secret documents, personnel, special parts, and so on. They were sending one first thing tomorrow morning to bring back the American egg-head who is on a visit there. Instead, it is going to fly us down this afternoon and its pilot will remain there overnight. I said we'd be at Farnborough at three-thirty; so we've no need to hurry over lunch.'

While they ate a pleasant meal, they reviewed the extraordinary case of Otto Khune and his twin and, when they got to the cheese, rather gloomily contemplated the risk that would have to be run if Otto were allowed to hand over to Lothar the fuel formula in desolate moorland country at a spot that could be kept under observation only from a distance. But, as they rose from the table, they agreed that it was futile to attempt to assess how great the risk of Lothar getting away would be, until they were on the spot and could make a thorough reconnaissance of the proposed meeting place.