Sublime

He felt quite cheerful; he always felt good after he’d fired someone: it was cathartic. He smiled at Rajamani’s assistant: a pretty girl; she would have to go too, unfortunately. Quarry took a pre-Christian view of these rituals: it was always best to bury the servants with the dead master in case he might require them in the next world.

Lancelot frowns. ‘We’re not going to the Department?’ ‘Ah, no,’ says Marlowe. He clears his throat. ‘As I said, there have been one or two changes.’ ‘Such as?’ ‘Well, the whole sector’s been privatised. Musty old intelligence agencies broken up and sold to US private equity firms. That sort of thing. The services previously provided by the Departme

Dennis Edmonds.

The inciting

The Service had a long and honourable tradition of women dying behind enemy lines, but was less enthusiastic about placing them behind important desks.