‘Thanks to a banker who takes your money but holds you in contempt, she located the black hole in your pension fund.’ Breitner winces. ‘She knew all about your disastrous investment in Albion and how you sicked it on your pensioners. She was going to shame you in public, hang you out to dry. She threatened to ruin you.’ I am starting to speculate, to busk. But I know Clare would never have kept quiet about any of this. She would always confront the villain, the bad guy. Like Dad, her hatred of injustice would have made her blind to the personal risks.

‘She humiliated you, even more than your fucking dog humiliated you.’

The car glides over Westminster Bridge. Through the tinted windows I see the Houses of Parliament and Big Ben lit up. Normally I feel pride at what the Palace of Westminster represents, a bulwark of democracy and freedom against the autocrats and tyrants. Tonight all I feel is how the thug opposite me has captured and corrupted so many of its occupants.

Breitner has his gaze clamped on me. Unblinking, unsmiling, a predatory beast biding his time before tearing me limb from limb. He leans forward and speaks with the precision of a barrister.

‘To be clear, neither I nor anyone in this motor vehicle ever met your sister or spoke with her.’

No emotion.

‘I didn’t say she spoke with you. But she spoke to people close to you, including Kendall. Word got back. You knew she was going to destroy you.’

‘Supposition. Hearsay. You are a better journalist than that.’

Streatham breaks his silence. ‘If you ever tried to run that story, Mr Breitner would take steps to ensure that you wouldn’t even get a job on a freesheet in the Hebrides.’

There is malice in his eyes, anger pulsing off him. He thinks he can intimidate me. He’s misjudged. When I am confronted with another man’s rage, my habitual response is to lash out. It’s not a good look.

‘Shut the fuck up, Streatham. I can sink all of you. You committed criminal fraud.’

‘You don’t have proof because it’s not true.’

‘Albion Super Highway and its colossal losses was transferred from your Cayman’s vehicle to the Media Corp pension fund, the two-billion-pound loss on your crappy bet shunted to your employees. That in itself would be of interest to the Serious Fraud Office. And then there is the little matter of Operation Lazarus, the takeover of Capital TV, on a false prospectus. Is there any mention of Scheme 1’s black hole in your offer document for Capital? No. There. Isn’t. When I publish, you are toast.’

I am glaring at Streatham as I say this, my jaw clenched. I have enough self-awareness to know that I look like a maniac. Streatham doesn’t like it. ‘Calm down, laddie. Calm down.’

Breitner is more composed. ‘These are unsubstantiated allegations.’