Her note-case shook in his hand. ‘There isn’t much here,’ he said.

‘Isn’t there?’ she said. ‘They’ll cash a cheque downstairs. I’ll write one. You’d better have something in hand.’

When he had gone she went into her bedroom, sat in front of her glass and examined the precarious mask she still presented to the world.

Kenneth, yawning and sweating, went in febrile search of Mr Sebastian Mailer.

IV

‘It’s the familiar story,’ the tall man said. He uncrossed his legs, rose in one movement, and stood, relaxed, before his companion who, taken by surprise, made a laborious business of getting to his feet.

‘The big boys,’ said the tall man, ‘keep one jump ahead while their henchmen occasionally trip over our wires. Not often enough, however.’

‘Excuse me, my dear colleague. Our wires?’

‘Sorry. I meant: we do sometimes catch up with the secondary villains but their principals continue to evade us.’

‘Regrettably!’

‘In this case the biggest boy of all is undoubtedly Otto Ziegfeldt who, at the moment, has retired to a phoney castle in the Lebanon. We can’t get him. Yet. But this person, here in Rome, is a key man.’

‘I am most anxious that his activities be arrested. We all know, my dear colleague, that Palermo has most regrettably been a transit port. And also Corsica. But that he should have extended his activities to Naples and, it seems, to Rome! No, assure yourself you shall have every assistance.’

‘I’m most grateful to you, Signor Questore. The Yard was anxious that we should have this talk.’

‘Please! Believe me, the greatest pleasure,’ said Il Questore Valdarno. He had a resonant voice and grand-opera appearance. His eyes melted and he gave out an impression of romantic melancholy. Even his jokes wore an air of impending disaster. His position in the Roman police force corresponded, as far as his visitor had been able to work it out, with that of a Chief Constable.

‘We are all so much honoured, my dear Superintendent,’ he continued. ‘Anything that we can do to further the already cordial relationship between our own Force and your most distinguished Yard.’

‘You are very kind. Of course, the whole problem of the drug traffic, as we both know, is predominantly an Interpol affair but as in this instance we are rather closely tied up with them—’

‘Perfectly,’ agreed Valdarno, many times nodding his head.

‘—and since this person is, presumably, a British subject—’

The Questore made a large involved gesture of deprecation: ‘Of course!’

‘—in the event of his being arrested the question of extradition might arise.’

‘I assure you,’ said the Questore, making a joke, ‘we shall not try to deprive you!’

His visitor laughed obligingly and extended his hand. The Questore took it and with his own left hand dealt him the buffet with which Latin gentlemen endorse their friendly relationships. He insisted on coming to the magnificent entrance.