I’d arrived in good time for the meeting but the harridan kept me waiting just long enough for me to be ushered in five minutes late. Talbot was sitting in a captain’s chair, low-backed and leather-studded and mounted on casters. He’d pushed himself away from the desk and was sitting in the centre of the high-ceilinged office; a row of books and files along one wall and three large filing cabinets against the other. There was a small window across which he had installed some dark blinds and the walls were painted in an unpleasant shade of green. It didn’t have much personality, but then, neither did its occupant. He was stick thin, and his thinness was further emphasized by the penchant for pinstripe suits and the curious sucked-in nature of his gaunt, angular features. He had a sort of jaundiced look about him – a yellowness to his skin and a darkness beneath the eyes. He always seemed to have unnaturally wet lips; two slivers of fresh liver twisted into a scowl upon the taught parchment of his skin. He was wreathed in cigarette smoke, one hand warming a brandy, the other holding a sheaf of shiny, crinkled paper, his eyes moving over line after line of something marked ‘Top Secret’. He gave an audible tut as I entered. Motioned towards the desk with a slight inclining of his head. The light reflected off his scalp, winking through from behind prison bars of dyed black, swept-back hair. I followed his gaze to the brandy bottle and the glass beside it. Politeness dictated I join him in an afternoon livener so I poured myself a humble measure. I turned to find that he had extricated himself from the chair and was standing uncomfortably close – several inches taller than me and his eyes still lingering on where my backside had been a moment before. He showed no signs of embarrassment. He had no reputation as a ladies man but I do seem to remember some unpleasantness with an Embassy secretary that proved expensive. He wasn’t the worst of them, not by any means, but there was still an unspoken feeling among most of the men at HQ that the women were there to be looked at, pawed at and competed over.

‘You’ve been playing away,’ he said, adopting a headmasterly tone and wagging his finger at me. ‘I’m sure you’ve got it all prepared in your mind, my dear, but we can save ourselves a lot of time if you accept that “no” is the best response you’re going to get here today.’

He glanced down at the document in his hand. It had been marked for his eyes only and contained the merest details of what Walt had told me in the crypt the night before. The way he held the paper suggested that he didn’t even like to be touching it.