Why on earth did they need him anyway? he wondered. The instructions didn’t explain any of that. He was annoyed at how little the instructions explained. He had been left to guess at what was going on.

But then he decided he was just making excuses to himself. Now that the plan was a reality, it was suddenly more frightening than he had anticipated. He continued to read carefully. When at last he turned to the final page of instructions, something caused him to frown.

At the bottom of the page in bold, enclosed in a red text box, was an advert for water-damaged rugs. Above the box was a note in large, bold text:

“Publish this advert in the usual way. Do not wait for the next date in the cycle. Publish immediately, with no alterations.”

Why would he have to do that? And did they expect him to copy this into the paper without even knowing what it said?

He spent thirty minutes decrypting the message hidden in the advert. It read:

“Continuing with plan as stated. Contact now only required if Ocyen or Vesna.”

He sat back and stared in disbelief at what he had decrypted. There should be no need for this message. What was going on? What on earth was this supposed to achieve?

Above all, why would Mitchell ask him to use code words, albeit encrypted, in his message? Perhaps it would be safer, now that he had the software, and now that Mitchell was dead, not to send any more messages at all?

But he had no choice. It was an instruction from his handler. He had to follow whatever instructions he was given. He logged in to his Evening Times account and bought a full-page advert for water-damaged rugs, for sale to trade only.

◆◆◆

Richard remembered Eddie’s prophetic words. He hoped they weren’t true:

“The thing is, push comes to shove, you won’t have the bottle, Richard. It won’t be as easy as you think.”

He was back in Eddie’s kitchen. Back breathing in the smell of chip fat, hearing the bittersweet jingle of a distant ice cream van making its way through the Council Scheme. Just Eddie and him, sitting on greasy wooden chairs either side of a small, fold-down table. It was the first meeting to discuss his plan.

He cringed to remember his lame, though sincere, reply: “What about when we threw the newspapers in the river?”

“Oh sure, that was you. It was all your idea. But that was just opportunistic. If I remember right, you were a bit drunk, staggering down the road with yer pals when suddenly the opportunity presented itself. One in the morning, big pile of Telegraphs, no one around but us.”

“Fair enough. It’s just an example.”

“Here’s ruh hing. What effect did it huv? No effect oan anythin’. Even if you’d stoapped the entire production of the Telegraph fur ivvur, what effect would that huv? Some sort ae sabotage is not goannie help us. Society’s stroanger ran nat.”

“I don’t agree. There’s a thin skin of civilisation. Scratch the surface and things get ugly. Take me for example. You always say that I’m pretty middle-class, and you’re right. But the thing is, I’m not happy. The thing is, there are thousands, maybe millions, of people like me. If someone could trigger something… get the people to wake up… who knows what could happen?”

◆◆◆

He had to be careful. This was all about detail. He checked everything again. The software pack really did look as though it had come from the dev team in Chennai. No difference at all, unless maybe the sequence numbers weren’t genuine?

Well they wouldn’t be unless they had managed to get fully qualified and capable programmers into Chennai.