I waited for a moment before replying, trying to work out which bits of what I was hearing were being laid out as a script and which might, just possibly, have the ring of truth.

‘There were foreign soldiers,’ I said.

He waves his hand. It wasn’t something to concern myself about. ‘He had lots of connections,’ he said, airily. ‘Always knew how to turn a fellow’s head. An excellent analyst, in his time, though never a true team player. Very much his own man, which might have been quite an attractive quality back when the world was a simpler shape but no place for that in today’s Service. If there were foreign soldiers on English soil, that would be cause for a diplomatic incident and after the Falklands, there’s no appetite for that.’

‘You have the transcript – the recordings, everything that was picked up at GCHQ …’

‘Human error, I’m afraid,’ he said, spreading his hands. ‘Some issue with the recording. I wish I knew enough to explain it. Suffice to say, there’ll be an enquiry. Heads will roll.’

I lay back against the pillows. I had so many questions but knew with absolute certainty that I wouldn’t get anything close to an answer.

‘Cranham,’ I said. ‘Is he …?’

‘Hale and hearty,’ smiled the DD. ‘A little shaken. Dreadfully upset to hear that his darling wife was in a minor car accident on her return from a committee meeting near Lucerne. Broken collarbone, quite banged up. He seemed genuinely distraught.’

‘He saw me,’ I said. ‘He must have seen.’

‘People see what they want to, in my experience,’ he said. ‘Take your son and daughter. I see their similarity to their father. I do not see the uncanny resemblance to the gentleman with whom you were briefly engaged in a dalliance not long after you completed your basic training. I’m sure your husband sees also that which he wishes – as do his grateful family, so keen for children to further the Hemlock line. You’ve been such an asset to that family.’

I held his gaze. Watched him shell the pistachios. Thought, briefly, of the man called Heron and our all-too-brief romance in the winter of ’71. Walt was right – Cranham had indeed been overjoyed at the idea of being a father, even if he found the children to have a little bit too much of a gypsy-look to ever truly pass muster.

‘He wasn’t wrong, was he?’ I asked. ‘Our mutual friend. The things we do, the alliances we forge, the people we persuade to risk their lives – none of it’s in service of a greater good. It’s in service of what’s good for the ruling classes in our little pocket of the world.’