Gilbert Sedbon

Gilbert Sedbon and I met in 1967 in Berne where he had been sent from Paris to find Stalin's daughter Svetlana after her defection from the Soviet Union. She had gone into hiding somewhere in central Switzerland and the Swiss authorities had declared a news blackout - an irresistible challenge to Gilbert. Relying on his proverbial resourcefulness and enviable ability to make useful contacts, Gilbert hired a taxi to drive him around the Berne region and within a few days he had discovered Svetlana's whereabouts - in a convent at Beatenberg overlooking Lake Thun. Yet even enterprising Gilbert failed to get access - Svetlana had been granted a three-month Swiss visa on condition that she would abstain from all political activity, such as meeting the press, that followed shortly afterwards on her arrival in New York.

On our occasional subsequent meetings Gilbert always treated me with his customary courtesy and friendly cheerfulness, usually sharing a Calvados to which he had introduced me at the local "zinc" next to the old Paris office in rue du Sentier. Our last Calvados together was downed exactly a year ago, appropriately at a meeting of the Paris Dinosaurs on a river cruise boat moored below the Tour Eiffel. ■