“I’ve had a brilliant idea!” Lucas North suddenly announced. If he was expecting rapturous applause at this, he was disappointed.

“If it has anything to do with stealing a train, no matter what size, you had better think again immediately,” Harry Pearce muttered.

“If you’re about to suggest something to do with a cake, it can wait till later,” Ros Myers grumbled.

“Not ‘if’, but ‘how many’,” Adam Carter interjected, “although the answer is still later!”

Jo Portman simply pretended she hadn’t heard anything and continued to stare at her computer screen.

But Malcolm looked up and said, “Go on then, what is your idea?”

Lucas huffed. “At least one person is taking me seriously. Anyway, Malcolm, it’s like this. So far we’ve been looking for Kovalik in all the places we’d expect to find him: the embassy, the big hotels and clubs known to be frequented by his associates. We’ve watched his wife, his kids, his chauffeur. It’s possible he’s gone abroad, but for various reasons that’s been discounted. Which means he must be hiding somewhere in this country.”

Malcolm nodded. “And there’s been no activity to suggest this was unexpected, so we presume whatever he’s doing is with the agreement, and probably under the instructions, of his government.”

“Agreed. But what if he went off the radar as arranged, but either he had a secondary plan which no-one was aware of, or something has happened to him, but that won’t be known until he misses a check-in?”

“You may have a point,” Harry agreed. “And if that’s the case, how do you suggest we proceed?”

“That’s where my brilliant plan comes in. And no, the misappropriation of trains is not involved, nor are any cakes. At least not for now.” Lucas paused, “Cakes that is. I don’t think we’ll need a train. I suggest we drop hints that we know what Kovalik’s up to and wait to see who jumps and where. My understanding is that we don’t want him, we can’t arrest him, and trying to turn him would be too risky, so, if he’s spirited out of the country, it will be no loss to us.”

“And where do we drop the hints?”

Lucas grinned. “We leave a message in the dead letter box we’ve been monitoring. By my calculation it’s about at the end of its life anyway. Plus we believe it was set up by Kovalik, so will add authenticity.”

“Excellent!” Harry said. “Right, there’s no time like the present. Lucas, draft the message and I’ll approve it. Then Jo can drop it off. And we can sit back and wait for the fireworks to start. Thank you, Lucas, this time you really have had a brilliant idea!”

Harry departed back to his office and Ros muttered, “Wow, high praise!”

At which point Harry turned and said, “Just don’t let it go to your head!”