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the email. We don’t know exactly what’s in the message. But it’s to do with a government conspiracy. We’re trying to reveal the truth. We’re hoping the information we need is on your laptop.’
    Clara poured herself some coffee.
    The silence of the two men was making Matt uneasy. He glared at them. ‘Haven’t you looked?’ he asked.
    ‘ No, we’ll need time to recover the information. It’s unlikely to be a simple text message. It’ll need decoding. Our priority is to get the message and you out of the country.’
    Matt stopped rubbing his face and looked up at the girl. ‘Hold on a minute,’ he said, ‘I’m not coming with you. Take the fucking laptop and leave me alone.’ He looked around the room, seeing if there was an easy route of escape. The urge to stand, give these people the finger, and simply stroll out suddenly took him. But it passed almost immediately.
    Clara picked up a packet of cigarettes and shook one out. She lit it, took a deep puff, and blew the smoke over her shoulder. ‘It’s not that simple,’ she said, rolling the end of her cigarette round the rim of an ashtray. ‘You’re probably the only one who will understand the message. Besides, just because you hand the information over to us doesn’t mean you’re safe from our enemies. They’ll kill you just for having received the message. They won’t risk letting you go.’
    Matt’s stomach still ached. He forced some bread down with a swig of coffee. He had no idea what these people wanted from him. But he was in no doubt about what they were willing to do to get it. His head swam with the drugs and the stress. ‘Look,’ he said, ‘I’ve no reason to believe any of this.’
    At last one of the men spoke. It was Henric. ‘Matt,’ he said, ‘this might be a bit difficult to swallow, granted. But we don’t go round shooting people in the street for the hell of it, you know. This is important.’
    ‘ That’s right,’ Clara continued. ‘A lot of people are relying on us, and you. You’ll just have to trust us.’
    She took another puff on the cigarette and offered the packet to Matt. He shook his head. The candles flickered and cast large, dancing shadows of his captors on the walls of the kitchen. They looked menacing. The moon was shining through the broken windows and bathed the corners of the room in a silky glow.
    ‘ Are you sure this message is on my machine?’ Matt asked.
    ‘ If it’s not, we’ve already lost the battle,’ said Henric.
    ‘ Right now we just have to get you away from here,’ said Clara.
    Matt tried to remember the emails he’d received. He got a hundred messages every day. Clients confirming or chasing orders, new office regulations, suggestions from friends for sick or sad web-sites to visit and, of course, junk emails. Like most, he was spammed from every corner of the globe. Nothing of importance stuck in his mind. Nothing that would justify murder.
    ‘ Why was this message sent to me?’ he asked Clara. ‘I don’t want to expose government conspiracies. I know nothing about it.’
    ‘ You were chosen completely at random,’ the girl said. ‘That’s the whole point. It maximises the chances of this information being useful to people like us. The people, or person, who sent this message have most of the Western governments looking out for them. By choosing you, they were trying to prevent themselves, and us, being caught out. Even then, we nearly lost you to those bastards.’
    Matt was still confused. Clara noticed and said, ‘I don’t know exactly why it was you who was chosen. But now you’re part of this thing, whether you like it or not.’
    ‘ Those men you killed today. They were government agents?’ Matt asked.
    ‘ That’s right. I know it must be a shock – seeing those men killed. But believe me; they’d have no problem killing us. I’ve seen many friends killed by them in our battle for the truth. You saw for yourself today. Our friend was killed in order