‘Belize City,’ he said, raising his voice above the drone of the engines. ‘Father Seneca. He made it all the way to the rendezvous. Big D’s. I think some of what he saw made his nose bleed a little. I was sorry to hear he didn’t make it back. What you’re providing, what you claim – you realize it flies in the face of all official explanations for what happened, you understand that, yes? You’re asking the Crown to make a decision that flies in the face of all national interests and jeopardizes our relationship with our closest allies.’

‘I must be naïve,’ said the Texan. ‘I was brought up believing that America was a force for good. Damn the cost. Damn oil and politics and keeping your enemies close. People are dying. People are being forced off their land. Every decent citizen is finding their name on the lists of the death squads and disappearing without so much as a whisper of outrage from the international community. Britain has a chance to stand up for what’s right. I was told that your patron understood these things – that he was somebody my people could trust. I don’t fear for my own life but those who work with me, who risk their lives, who’ve seen their …’

And then he stopped. I’d like to tell you that he said something that explained the sudden, jolting silence. But one moment he was talking and the next all I could hear was the sudden, terrible silence. Then the Englishman shouted, something indecipherable and filled with a terrible rising panic. I heard a woman shriek. Then there was just the dreadful rush and screech and crunch of metal upon metal. Then silence.

I knew what I’d heard. I’d been mute witness to a catastrophe. In my mind I think I probably pictured a meeting in the rear of a wagon: the sudden squeal of tyres and then the carnage of a fatal plunge into some deep ravine. But I couldn’t be sure. Nor did I have anybody to ask.

I sat in the dark, heart thudding, and took comfort in procedure. I did as I was instructed. I transcribed every word of it, fountain pen moving over page after page of plain paper. It took up half the book and my arm was aching when I was finished but I’d got every word down. Then, as bid, I removed the recording from the device. I wrapped it in the tartan blanket and placed it, as instructed, in the little crevice beneath the big marble tomb. I dismantled the wireless. Placed the transcript in the pocket of my coat. And I went home.