In my head I was treading water at the edge of a widening whirlpool. I didn’t want to get sucked down into memory. And yet even as I kicked away from the darkness and the tragedies of the past, I could feel my resolve weakening and the undertow grabbed me, hauling me back into that little room at HQ. It was November 1976 and I’d been part of Walt’s unit for six weeks. Already the excitement of the posting was beginning to wane. I’d been honoured to have been personally selected for the specialist unit reporting directly to the Ace of Diamonds but it didn’t take long to realize that Walt’s star had long since lost its shine and that anybody hoping to ride his coat-tails had better get used to being dragged through the dirt. I’d only actually seen him once since the approach was made. I’d served my time out in Tel Aviv and although the kids were in a nice boarding school at home, I was missing them terribly. More, Cranham was starting to feel that he wasn’t getting what he paid for. He’d made serious progress up the greasy pole in the preceding years and needed to be seen as the quintessential family man if his next promotion was to be formally approved, which meant that he needed me on his arm for the occasional photo opportunity, or at the very least, to ring the office once in a while and arrange a lunch that we wouldn’t actually take. My dissatisfaction must have reached Walt’s ears. He offered me a position within Operation Aletheia, the clandestine unit looking into matters that might jeopardize relations with our colonial cousins and keeping abreast of anything we needed to know in Central and South America. On the first day in the new post I was given a stack of newspapers and told to cut out anything that offered a hint of discord between Westminster and Washington. There was plenty to find. It was a little menial for somebody with a decade of experience, but I made it home at a sensible time and nobody seemed to wish me ill. Gradually I was given meatier jobs, scanning transcripts of clandestine recordings and wire taps made by GCHQ, or deep-diving into fiscal accounts of key personnel: friendlies, enemies and those who had yet to make up their mind. I spent my days in a little boxy office with a dead pot plant and a swivel chair with a missing wheel, but when Walt finally did make his presence felt, he made it clear that I’d been doing my job well and was ready to be involved in an operation that was, he claimed, a little bit more clandestine than I was used to. I didn’t have a moment’s misgiving. I’d known him since recruitment. He was one of the good ones; a decent person trying to keep on the right side of his conscience in an increasingly complex world. Chain of command dictated I do whatever he asked so I made it clear that I was at his disposal.