“As a matter of fact he had received some information, though of course I did not know of it at the time. He got a message one day telling him that his wife had been kidnapped and smuggled out of the country; she was said to be hidden away, in one of the islands off the coast of Norway I think it was, in comfortable surroundings and well cared for. And with the information came a demand for money; a lump sum of £2,000 was to be paid yearly. Failing this she would be immediately restored to her family.”

The Journalist was silent for a moment, and them began to laugh quietly.

“It was certainly an inverted form of holding to ransom,” he said.

“If you had known my aunt,” said the Wine Merchant, “you would have wondered that they didn’t put the figure higher.”

“I realise the temptation. Did your uncle succumb to it?”