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another shook his head and then as two of the men stood on either side, looking up and down the street, the third man was right up against the door—what was he doing—fiddling with the lock? Then suddenly Doris saw the door open and the next minute all three men had slipped inside, and the door closed quickly behind them.
    Doris sat there, astonished, briefly wondering if she had seen the men or just imagined them. Nonsense, she told herself, my body’s getting old but I’m not going cuckoo. She had never spoken to the bookshop owner, didn’t even know his name, but someone was breaking into his shop. Or maybe not—maybe they were friends. Didn’t look like it. Up to no good, at this time of night she was sure. Plotting, she wouldn’t be surprised, like so many of these young men. She shuddered at the thought, and it was from a sense of duty as well as concern that she got up and dialled 999.
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    Inside the shop the three men worked quickly. Two went upstairs, and, making sure the curtains were tightly drawn, searched with a torch until they found, at the very back, a square trapdoor in the ceiling which gave access to the loft. Standing on a chair, one of the men pushed away the trapdoor and hoisted himself up with a boost from the man below, who then handed up to him a small tool case. Holding his torch low so it wouldn’t accidentally send light outside, the man in the attic examined the beams until he found one directly above a corner of the large room below. Within sixty seconds he was drilling, a slow process since the drill was underpowered to keep its decibel level low.
    Suddenly his colleague was standing below the open trapdoor, speaking urgently. “That was Special Branch. The local police have had a call from a neighbour, someone across the street. She saw us entering.”
    â€œBugger. What are they going to do?”
    â€œThey want to know if we’re done in here. There’s still time to leave before the car gets sent.”
    â€œNo. I need at least ten more minutes.”
    â€œOkay, I’ll tell them.”
    He went away and the man in the attic resumed drilling. He had just come through the beam and was about to put the probe and microscopic camera gently down the hole he’d drilled when his colleague came back. “The car’s on its way, but they know we’re here. They’re going to go and speak to the neighbour who called. Apparently it’s some old lady.”
    â€œOkay. That shouldn’t be too much of a problem.”
    And ten minutes later, having carefully brushed away the sawdust made by his drill, and carefully closing over the small drilled hole with filler, the man jumped down and, getting up on the chair, replaced the trapdoor. “I’m done up there. Anything else need doing?”
    His colleague shook his head. “I’ve got two mikes in—one’s in the plug in the corner, and the other’s in the back of the VCR.”
    â€œHave you checked them with Thames?”
    â€œYes, they can hear them loud and clear. Come on.” They went downstairs and collected their other colleague, who had put three listening devices in place, one above the inside of the shop’s front door, another in the owner’s small office, and a third in the stockroom in the back. Now even the faintest whisper made on either floor would be heard in Thames House.
    Across the street, Doris Feldman poured hot water onto a tea bag for the nice young policeman who had rung her bell. He knew all about the strange goings-on across the street, and had even suggested they might want her help. She didn’t see the same three figures slip out of the front door of the bookshop and disappear into the night. But by then Doris was no longer worried.

7
    P eggy Kinsolving had met Geoffrey Fane only once before, when he had spoken at her induction course when she first joined MI6 a year or so