AS pathologist Dr Donald Ducky Mallard in American crime drama NCIS, former TV heartthrob David McCallum knows all about death.
Over the past eight years he has worked out the cause of hundreds of homicides in the hit Five show.
Some people think I must get depressed, confronted with all this death, says David, 76, whose soft American accentpstill retains a hint of his native Glaswegian.
Truth is, I leave all that violence, misery and heartache at the studio door. I would never allow details of an NCIS story to stay with me and ruin my home life.
But there is one death that continues to haunt David a personal {tragedy he will probably never be able to shut out of his mind.
The actor who shot to stardom as dashing blond-haired secret agent Illya Kuryakin in the 1960s cult TV drama The Man From U.N.C.L.E regards the loss of his adopted son Jason as the worst event in his life. Until now, David has always refused to talk about Jasons {accidental drugs overdose in 1989.
But 21 years on, he feels the time is right to open his heart about the child he {describes as the apple of my eye.
My abiding regret is that I wasnt there for him during the time leading up to his death, says David, sipping from a glass of water in the lounge of a London hotel. David and Jasons adopted mum, the actress Jill Ireland, had divorced years {earlier and David had moved from California to New York. He said: I lost touch with and {control of what was happening there.
Jason got in with a certain type of people within showbusiness and there was a drug culture going on. Despite the best efforts of Jill, he couldnt be saved. He became part of that drug {culture and it killed him.
David had two other sons by British-born actress Jill and two more children by second wife Katherine Carpenter, 65, a New York interior designer and former model.
But he admits that Jason only 26 and an expectant father at the time of his deathp had a special place in his heart.
Jason came from left field, smiles David. You love your own children, of course you do, but you have a rough idea what to expect {because they are genetically similar to you.
That wasnt the case with Jason. He {surprised and delighted us and he was one of the most {wonderful people you could ever hope to meet.
I had some fantastic times with him and his lasting legacy is a son, Tory, who has become friends with my sons.
I didnt know Jason had posthumously become a father until a card arrived in New York a few months after his death. It was from a young woman who had been living with him, telling me they had a son.
Hes in his early 20s now and I hope he turns out to be as fine a person as his dad. David and Jills decision to adopt Jason came during one of the most troubled times in the actors life.
He said: Jill lost a baby as we went to Germany, where I was making the movie The Great Escape, and she got talking to Neile, wife of my co-star Steve McQueen, about the possibility of adoption.
The Great Escape was the movie on which actor Charles Bronson met Jill and and began a love affair that led to Davids {marriage crumbling.
He walked away from the London-born actress with, as he puts it, nothing more than a case of 1959 Chambertin Burgundy wine and a tube of toothpaste.
Importance
The following year Jill married Bronson and they stayed together until her death at the age of 54 from breast cancer in 1990.
David says: Its true I would {probably still have been in California and in Jasons life had Jill and I not got divorced but there are only so many times you can say If only.
If only the Romans hadnt taken over from the Greeks, if only my wife Katherines brother hadnt been killed in Vietnam when he was 20the whole thing quickly {becomes ludicrous and can drive you mad.
Little wonder that David {regards the {remaining {members of his family as being of utmost {importance. He says: Theres my son Val, a studio {musician in Los Angeles.
Vals brother Paul is a studio photographer in LA while from my {marriage to Katherine there is Peter, an {advertising {executive, and Sophie who worked in real estate before {raising a family.
Between them, they have given David six grandchildren. The actor, who looks 20 years younger than his 76 years with a full head of hair, is ready to give them {advice on an acting career. But he warns that you need that little bit of luck, that special TV series or film, to really get noticed just like he did in The Man From U.N.C.L.E.
David had appeared in minor movie and TV roles when at the age of 29 he landed the part of Russian agent Kuryakin alongside Robert Vaughns suave spy Napoleon Solo. Suddenly David, with his blond mop, got the same {adulation as The Beatles.
He said: It raised my profile, gave me a springboard to {other work, but I wasnt necessarily thinking about that when I was in New York Central Park and had to be airlifted to safety by {mounted {police because there were women trying to rip my clothes off. And then there was the time in Louisiana when the police had to intervene before I got torn limb from limb.
But of course there was a side of me that loved all that adulation and being called The Fifth Beatle.
Mind you, he adds, grinning at the memory, Id sort of been {pre-warned. When I was 10 my mother took me to a {fortune teller on Hampstead Heath and the woman said By the time you are 30 you will have broken a million hearts. I came bouncing out of the tent saying Mum, Im going to break a million hearts by the time I am 30. She {reminded me when my U.N.C.L.E fan mail {suggested I {probably broke a few hearts along the way, though Im not sure it amounted to a million.
Now David is a star all over again as Ducky Mallard, who in this weeks {episode of NCIS Navy Criminal Investigative Service tries to find out how a secret agent died during a poker game.
And he still gets fan worship but its a lot different to the days of U.N.C.L.E. Usually someone sidles up to him in a {supermarket and starts discussing the finer points of dissecting a corpse.
David says: I suddenly realise that the debate has gone on way too long for me to say Actually, you know, Im not really a pathologist, Im just pretending.
I come away from the frozen peas {section feeling ever so slightly fraudulent though at least I havent embarrassed or let down the person Ive been speaking to.