The road, a cobbled cul de sac, was so out of the way that one of the lamp posts still bore an election poster. Some party activist had forgotten to remove the photo of a pinstriped politico grinning inanely. Ever since September, visitors to the street had been greeted by the meaningless slogan ‘Our Future is Strength’. I wondered if there was a law that compelled even the ugliest and most undistinguished politician to have his photo mounted on cardboard, and if there was a single person on our planet whose voting intentions had been swayed by an election poster. I debated the possibility of launching a readers’ opinion poll once all this was over. If I’m still in a position to. We had left the car around the corner rather than park immediately outside the address Frank had given me. My certainty that we were wasting our time grew stronger the nearer we got to the bungalow. ‘I don’t think this is the house you described,’ I said to Alina, who was waiting for TomTom to mark a tree.
