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In 1971, in Toronto, there was Henry Jackson, an economist, another case of a defecting Russian agent under an assumed name.

Later that year, the Israeli Consul-General in Istanbul. The Turkish People's Liberation Army had claimed credit for that.

Then came one of the most spectacular affairs of all. His killing of the Italian film director Mario Forlani, at the Cannes Film Festival. The Black Brigade in Rome, the Fascist answer to the Red Brigade, claimed credit. They'd threatened Forlani on a number of occasions because of a film he had made ridiculing Mussolini.

'So he isn't some Marxist fanatic,' Morgan commented.

'You mean the Cannes business? That was a hell of an affair. The French had the hotel Forlani was staying at guarded like Fort Knox. Garde mobile all over the place. Plainclothes security men inside. Everybody was staying there. Half the uncrowned heads of Europe, most of what counts for stars these days in Hollywood. John Mikali, the pianist, Sophia Loren, David Niven, Paul Newman and God knows who else.'

'And he pulled it off in the middle of that lot?'

'What happened was simple. Forlani appeared from his apartment on the fifteenth floor with three girl friends to go down to dinner. There were two policemen on his door, another on the lift.'

'And?'

'The Cretan simply materialized at the end of the corridor, shot him twice in the heart with a handgun, at that range, mind you. Was away through the fire door like a flash.'

'And no trace?'

'Vanished off the face of the earth. The French police turned the place inside out, but they didn't get a thing. Most of the celebrities left that night. Couldn't get away fast enough. It caused one hell of a stink.'

'Then?'

'It's in the file. Killed Helmut Klein, the East German Minister of Finance who was visiting Frankfurt University last November. The campus was under heavy security. He holed up with a girl called Lieselott Hoffmann who, it later transpired, was a Baader-Meinhof sympathizer. She took in a rifle under orders of the Red Army Faction. Was told to hold it for pick-up.'

'And the Cretan turned up?'

'After dark and wearing that damned hood of his.'

Morgan examined the file again. 'According to this, Klein emerged from a reception at the Director's home just after ten. The Cretan got him from three hundred yards using an image intensifier. One hell of a shot.'

'Then cleared off. The girl was caught trying to dispose of the gun. Most of the details emerged during her interrogation. Seems he'd given her what he gave the maid at the Hilton in Berlin and she was another who didn't seem to mind. She was sprung from a prison van en route to gaol by a combat squad of the Red Army Faction.'

'And totally disappeared?'

'Until she was arrested in London in February of this year working in a boutique. Claimed she'd married a gentleman called Harry Fowler, a waiter from Camden Town, only he can't be found. It would, of course, have made her a British citizen. The Germans want her back, both East and West variety. Naturally, the civil liberty groups here want her kept. She's at a special remand centre at Tangmere, near Cambridge. A source of considerable embarrassment to the Government.'

'I can imagine.' Morgan read on in silence for a moment. 'This psychologist's report on the girl is really quite excellent. Who did it?'

'A woman called Riley. Dr Katherine Riley. An American. She's a fellow at one of the Cambridge colleges. She's been allowed to visit the Hoffman girl regularly.'

'Why?'

'It's her field, terrorism. She's interviewed nearly every well-known European terrorist in prison, when they've allowed her to. Wrote a book about it eighteen months ago called The Terrorist Phenomenon.'

'I remember now,' Morgan said. 'I read it.' He reached for a cigarette. 'By my reckoning, our friend has knocked off around a dozen very important people in just under three years. That's quite a score.'

'And he doesn't take sides.' Baker said. 'The Cretan peasant