At the height of the Cold War, Chief Inspector Troy of Scotland Yard, assigned to both protect and spy on Khrushchev, investigates the killing of a Royal Navy diver and begins to suspect that one of his own colleagues may be responsible.

A novel set before, during, and after World War II follows the loosely parallel lives of an Austrian cellist, Meret Voytek, whose orchestra becomes part of the Hitler Youth, and Hungarian physist Karel Szabo, who is recruited by the Americans to help build the atomic bomb.

"It's London, the swinging sixties, and by all rights MI6 spy Joe Wilderness should be having as good a time as James Bond. Alas, his postings are usually rather unglamorous, but thankfully he has a knack for doing well for himself even in unpromising situations. In divided Berlin, he smuggled coffee into the East, a rather profitable racket until he had to transport something else-a spy. After an aborted mission on Berlin's famous "Bridge of Spies,"...