The Sting on the Bridge

London, September 1978. Thursday, 6 pm, the bus stop at the south end of a bridge over the Thames. Emil Dorev, a writer exiled from an Eastern Bloc country and a broadcaster on the international service of a London radio station, felt a prick behind his thigh while waiting for his bus.

That night the fever came. The doctors thought it was flu. Four days later, Emil died in hospital, aged 49.

At the autopsy, a government laboratory found a metal sphere smaller than a pinhead in his thigh. The government of Emil's country called his broadcasts treason.

Three people crossed Emil's path that evening. One of them carried death hanging from an arm.

The bridge's south end at dusk, with a red bus stop, black cabs and the Thames.