Müller found herself thrown backwards, covered in blood and gore. Confused, at first she thought Jones had pulled the trigger, and that her own flesh and blood had splattered over her but that – miraculously – she had survived.

Then she realised the miracle was Tilsner’s shooting skills.

Despite the fact that Jones had her in a stranglehold, Tilsner had blown the British agent’s brains out with a single shot.

She stumbled, trying to wipe the mess away from her face and eyes.

Then another shot.

This time, it was the Stasi agent, head above the parapet, firing at Tilsner.

Then a third rang out, just a millisecond later – as though it was an echo.

She saw the Stasi man staggering backwards, clutching at his chest.

But he still had his gun in his hands.

He turned, still stumbling, and pointed it at Müller.

‘Give . . . me . . . those . . . doc—’

There was no need for a fourth shot from Tilsner. The man had sunk to the floor, the life drained out of him.

Then silence. Not even the sound of birdsong. Such a stifling silence, Müller could hear her own rasping breaths, slowly settling from hyperventilation.

Then she heard footsteps, someone dragging her to her feet. For an awful moment she thought it was Jones, somehow recovered from his injuries, but as she turned, she fell into the man’s arms.

It was Tilsner himself. She’d never been more pleased to see her deputy.

Slumped on the ground at one end of the bridge, in a pool of blood, his gun by his side, the Stasi agent who’d been posing as Jäger. She turned, and just a couple of metres from her, a near identical sight. The agent known as ‘Brian Jones’, lying with his brains blown to bits.

She let Tilsner hug her, let him kiss her, let him almost squeeze the life out of her.

‘I think I’ve gone too far this time,’ he said. ‘And we don’t have Jäger to clear up the mess.’

Just then, they heard a muffled cry from a crevasse below the bridge.

‘Help, help!’ A man’s voice.

And they knew whose voice it was.

Jäger’s.

This time the real one – not the fake.

Tilsner was soon climbing over the parapet, then easing himself down onto one of the rock outcrops. Müller moved over to the side of the bridge to watch him. Jäger was there below, in some sort of small cave or crevasse in the rock, having forced the material covering his face away from his mouth. But his hands were still tied behind his back, his feet bound together.

She watched as Tilsner sawed at the bindings with his penknife, finally cutting the Stasi Oberstleutnant free. Once Jäger had shaken himself down, both men climbed back up to the level of the bridge, and surveyed the scene.