‘Listen, it’s all very well talking about a free press,’ Suvorin continues, as though answering an inaudible accusation, ‘but what kind of freedom would you have if those people come to power? They’re brainwashing the nation’s youth with their lies. Who says the system we have is perfect? Not me. But change isn’t simple. You don’t pick up and discard political systems like they’re a bunch of old LPs at a yard sale.’ Suvorin wipes his mouth with a paper napkin and changes the subject. ‘I have a more inspiring theme to raise with you, young man.’

Nicolas feels something in him rise with excitement. A man like Suvorin, with good news, for him?

‘The only question is, are you ready for an adventure?’

‘Always, sir.’

‘That’s what I want to hear. My guy in Ashkhabad has come down with something. It’s not incurable, but he’s going to be out of action for quite a while. I can’t stress enough the importance of boiling the water out there before you drink it. Anyway, things are getting interesting in that whole area. It’s a great story: Britain and Russia duking it out for control of the region. There’s plenty of reporters keen to go, but I wanted to offer it to you first.’

‘India had always felt like my destiny.’

It’s a long, wearisome journey by rail to the Caspian Sea and then overland through the deserts of Central Asia, but Nicolas wakes up each morning at whatever godforsaken whistle-stop or dusty caravanserai and thinks: the best thing in my life is happening now.

Coming back to this kind of work after a break, he feels close in spirit to MacGahan, he enjoys it more than he remembers, and he notices how good he is at it. He’s quick and organised and has the gift of winning people’s trust at once. Doing satisfying work and being appreciated: the secret of life seems simple.

Another thing restores his sense of well-being. The British he meets are the most insufferably smug, complacent, patronising and presumptuous tribe of fools he’s ever met. Furthermore, where other conquerors at least perpetrate honest pillage, the British he encounters constantly claim to be acting in the best interests of their subject nations, as though they are the world’s strict parent. It takes no prophetic gift, Nicolas thinks, to see that this is an unsustainable hypocrisy.

Nicolas finds a deep enjoyment in holding this entire group of people in contempt. Furthermore, it stabilises his somewhat shaky Russian identity.

On a trip to Simla, he meets a precocious young jingo called Something – Rudolph, Rudiger? – Kipling, who tells stories in funny voices and whose eyes grow moist when he toasts the Queen. Sitting next to him, Nicolas feels invincibly and proudly Russian. Whatever in him is still Jewish or non-Slav shrinks to a tiny pencil-point.