Opening paragraphs...................

My name is Bruno Salvador.  My friends call me Salvo, so do my enemies.  Contrary to what anybody may tell you, I am a citizen in good standing of the United Kingdom and Northern Ireland, and by profession a top interpreter of Swahili and the lesser-known but widely spoken languages of the Eastern Congo, formerly under Belgian rule, hence my mastery of French, a further arrow in my professional quiver.  I am a familiar face around the London law courts both civil and criminal, and in regular demand at conferences on Third World matters, see my glowing references from many of our nation's finest corporate names.  Due to my special skills I have also been called upon to do my patriotic duty on a confidential basis by a government department whose existence is routinely denied.  I have never been in trouble, I pay  my taxes regularly, have a healthy credit rating and am the owner of a well-conducted bank account.  Those are the cast-iron facts that no amount of bureaucratic manipulation can alter, however hard they try.
-John le Carre, The Mission Song