Killing the Lawyers

Zak said, "Mary always closes it before she gets into bed. She reckons the night air is bad for her."

The master bedroom looked out on the front. As Joe stood there a car pulled into the drive and a man got out and looked up at him.

"It's Dad," said Zak, waving. "Best go down and say hello."

"Hang on. We're not done," said Joe sternly. "This one?"

That's Eddie's. My kid brother. Shouldn't bother about him, he's more or less retired from direct human contact. If it's not on the Internet, it's not worth messing with."

Joe opened the door. A boy of about eleven or twelve was sitting in front of a computer which had a screen so packed with data that even at this distance it made Joe's head whirl.

"Hi, Eddie, this is Joe," said Zak.

The boy didn't look round but ran his fingers over the keyboard. The screen blanked then filled with the word HELLO!

That's the most you'll get," said Zak, pulling Joe away. "Unless he decides you're electronically interesting. He hardly acknowledged me when I got back, then Christmas morning among my prezzies I found a print-out with details of my last drug test plus those of every other top-flight woman I was likely to come up against."

"Is that useful?" said Joe.

"No, but it's amazing," said Zak.

As they came down the stairs, Joe heard a man's voice saying, "So what's he doing in my bedroom?"

Zak ran lightly into the lounge and said, "Hi, Dad. My fault. I was showing Joe the house and we were just admiring the view."

"Of the houses opposite, you mean? Strange tastes you've got, girl."

Henry Oto was a tall athletically built man with a square determined face. Zak had got his height and her mother's looks. Her sister had got her mother's size and her father's looks. You never know how the genes are going to come at you, thought Joe.

He knew from the papers that Oto was a senior prison officer at the Stocks, Luton's main jail. Remember, no escape jokes.

He said, "Hi, Mr. Oto. I'm helping Zak out, fetching and carrying, you know."

Oto said, "Fetching and carrying what?"

Joe shrugged and looked to Zak for help. Clearly her father lacked her mother's courteous acceptance of the vagaries of her daughter's new lifestyle. That's what came of associating with criminals.

Zak said, "You don't want your finely tuned daughter straining her back picking up her holdall, do you?"

Oto said, "Can't see how you're going to break records if you can't carry your own gear." But he was smiling fondly as he said it and Joe guessed that Zak had always been able to twine him round her little finger.

To Joe he said, "Haven't I seen you before, Mr. er ... ?"

"Sixsmith," mumbled Joe. "But just call me Joe, Mr. Oto."

Joe had always tried to keep his face out of the papers, even on those few occasions when they wanted to put it in. Not much use in being a PI if everyone seeing you said, "Hey, ain't you that PI?" But a photo had appeared recently in connection with one of his cases and presumably Oto took a special interest in anything to do with his prospective customers.

Mrs. Oto said, "I'd better go and see to our meal. Mr. Sixsmith, if you'd like to stay ... ?"

"No, thank you kindly," said Joe. It was doubtless a token offer but the woman didn't make it sound token. He gave her a big smile then turned to Zak and said, That everything for now?"

That's right. I'll see you out."

She followed him into the hallway. Starbright was standing there. No one else in the house seemed to pay him the slightest attention so Joe didn't either.

"Has that been any help?" said Zak.

"I'm working on it," said Joe.

The front door burst open and Mary came in. She didn't speak but gave Joe a look of fury and ran up the stairs. There was no trace of a limp.

Zak said, "So what now?"

"Don't know," said Joe. "All I can do is keep prodding. You want me to go with it?"

Keep it simple, keep it honest. It wasn't so much a strategy as an inevitability.

She said, "Of course I do. You can contact me here or down the Plezz."

Starbright said, "You in for the night, Miss Oto?"

"Yes, I think so."

"You change your mind, you've got the number."

The two men went out through the door which Mary hadn't bothered to close.

"Give you a lift?" said Joe.

"Once a day's enough. Anyway, I've got my own wheels, boyo. And they'll get me where I want a sight quicker than yours."

Joe thought this remark was merely auto-macho till he saw the Magic Mini. It was almost completely boxed in by Mary's Metro and Oto's Cavalier.

"Oh shoot," he said. He turned back to the house to get one of them to move but a noise made him look round.

Starbright had stooped in front of the Metro and was lifting its front wheels off the ground. He took two paces backwards and set the car down.

"Get yourself out of that now, can you?" he said.

"Yeah, sure. Thanks a lot."

"Can't have you hanging around, can we? Places to go, people to report to. Old friends to see."

How did he manage to make everything he said sound like a threat or an accusation? wondered Joe as he watched the Welshman roll away like a boulder down a hillside.

As he got into the car he glanced up at the house. Mary Oto was watching him out of an upstairs window.

He waved.

She didn't wave back.

Eight.

"Right, Sixsmith, just give me it straight," said Butcher.

Joe gave it straight. She listened intently, not interrupting. When the mood was on her she made a great listener.

Joe was very fond of Butcher, but there was nothing sexy in it. Not that she wasn't attractive in a cropped-hair-no-make-up kind of way, and she had the great advantage of being shorter than he was. But she didn't press his button. Maybe it was the cheroots that did it. Keeping company with someone who put out more smoke than Mount Etna wasn't his idea of a turn-on. But he admired her superior intelligence, delighted in her capacity to make him feel witty, valued her judgement, and was deeply moved by the way she cared for her clients.

She'd mock him mercilessly if he even hinted it, but when push came to shove, he'd go to the wall for Butcher.

She said, "Joe, you must be a great pain in the arse to the police and I must say I've got some sympathy with them."

Joe said, "Hang about. I didn't do these killings."

"No, you just keep finding the bodies."

"Anyway, why so het up, Butcher? Or do you reckon someone's taken Mr. Shakespeare's advice and you could be next?"

He pointed at the notice on her wall.

She said, "Sixsmith, I knew these people."

"Sorry," he said. "But I didn't get the impression you were very close to Potter, and Sandra lies didn't come across as a big buddy either."

"What do you mean? She mentioned me?"

"No, but when I said you'd sent me, she sort of looked like I must be damaged goods."

For a second he thought Butcher was going to speak ill of the dead but she reduced it to, "Yes, Sandra was a great advocate of market forces. You're quite right, of course. We weren't great buddies, any of us. But like I told you, me and Pete had once been pretty close, and I couldn't get him out of my mind last night. Then when I came back and heard about Sandra

For a second she looked like a forlorn fifteen-year-old, then she must have caught an expression of sympathy on Joe's face because she puffed out a great veil of smoke and said, "Also, one person I'm very fond of is Lucy, Felix Nay-smith's wife, and it does seem to me that if someone's declared open season on the firm, then Felix could be in danger too. So I rang the cops to make sure they'd worked it out too."

"And had they?"

"In a manner of speaking. That idiot Chivers is still holding the fort

"I thought Willie Woodbine's holiday company had gone bust and he was on his way back?"

That's right," said Butcher, a smile lightening her sombre expression. "But it seems there's some problem about airport fees and the plane's having difficulty getting off the ground. Anyway, when I managed to get hold of Chivers he got very shirty and told me that it was all in hand. Mr. Naysmith had been fully informed."

She did a good imitation of the sergeant being pompous, making Joe smile.

"So he set your mind at rest?" he said.

"Like a line of coke," she said. "I thought I'd ring their cottage up on the Wolds. Couldn't find the number and as they're ex-directory I had a hell of a job getting it out of the exchange'

"How'd you manage that?" interrupted Joe, following Endo Venera's advice never to miss a chance of acquiring specialist knowledge.

"The usual way. Lies, bribes and blackmail," said Butcher cagily.

"Just the kind of thing the Law Society expects from its members," said Joe. "How come you're getting up such a head of steam over this guy?"

"Not the guy. I don't even like Felix all that much. But Lucy's different, and she's had a lot of trouble ... her nerves were sort of shot a little way back, and I was concerned how she'd react to the news that some old friends and colleagues had been murdered."

"Colleagues? She a lawyer too?"

"No, but she was a legal secretary at Poll-Pott till she got married. Anyway, I finally got through to her. It was quite incredible, I'm thinking about putting in an official complaint about that moron Chivers. They'd gone out for a meal about an hour after Felix had spoken to Peter on the phone, the call you overheard. Got back in about eleven. Chivers had clearly given up trying to reach Felix by then and he probably forgot all about him this morning with the excitement of finding you yet again hanging around a body. So Felix turned up at Oldmaid Row at noon for the meeting he'd arranged with Peter and walked straight into the middle of things. Can you imagine it? They were close friends from way back at university, him and Peter. Drinking buddies, played in the second row together, that sort of thing."

"Violinists?" suggested Joe.

"Rugger!" snapped Butcher. This isn't funny, Sixsmith. It really shook Felix up. And when they told him about Sandra too ... well, he rang Lucy back at the cottage in a hell of a state. The one good thing is that being cast in the role of comforter means Lucy's taking it all pretty well. It often works like that."

"Like when you get drunk with a mate," said Joe. Then seeing that the analogy was not impressing Butcher, he hastily added, "She heading back home to hold his hand, then?"

"No. Felix has got the car, remember? He's going to head back up to Lincolnshire when the police have finished with him. It's just a couple of hours."

"And is he getting any protection?"

"Allegedly, though what that means coming from a turnip-head like Chivers, God knows. Still, he should be well out of the way back up there in the cottage. And even if he calls in at home, they've got a house almost directly opposite Willie Woodbine's on Beacon Heights, so they've probably got a whole task force permanently on duty there. Anyway, we might be overreacting. Two episodes don't make a serial."

They do till someone writes The End in big letters," retorted Joe.

"Cheer me up," said Butcher. "But it's still hard to believe."

That anyone could go gunning for a firm of lawyers? Why not? Spend your life messing with criminals, you're bound to make some enemies."

They didn't do that stuff," said Butcher. They're high-profile commercial, big corporate accounts mainly, not the kind of groups who work out their grudges physically."

"Anyone can get physical if you hit them in the pocket," said Joe. "It's called market forces. It would be interesting to check out who they've been giving bum advice to."

"Yes, it would," said Butcher sternly. "And it's an interest you'd do well to leave entirely to the police. Especially when no one's paying you to poke around. Sixsmith, what the hell is that?"

Joe had pulled his handkerchief out of his pocket. With it came a photograph which fluttered on to the desk, facing Butcher. He turned it round and examined it. Sandra lies, Peter Potter and their three other partners stared back at him.

"Oh shoot," he said. "I must have stuck it in my pocket when I was round at Ms Iles's place."

"You mean you stole it from the scene of a murder?"

"No, it was an accident," he answered indignantly. "I suppose I'd better give it back."

She shook her head, closed her eyes and said, "I shall deny ever having said this, but no, in the circumstances I'd just stick it on the fire. The less explaining you have to do the better."

"Fair enough," said Joe. "Matter of interest, I know Potter and lies, but not the others. Who's the nice old gent with the white hair?"

"You get one out of three," said Butcher. "That's Darby Pollinger and he's neither nice nor gentle. He's the senior partner and he eats widows and orphans for breakfast."

"And the guy with the whiskers?"

"Victor Montaigne. Half French and wholly freebooter. Known in the business as Blackbeard the Pirate."

Subtle these lawyers, thought Joe. Which left the blond Aryan as Naysmith, the living half of the second-row partnership. He stuck the photo back in his pocket.

That's it then, I hope," said Butcher. "Some of us have work to do."

"All of us. Thanks, Butcher."

"For nothing, unless you've stolen something," she said. "Get out of here."

Joe had been tempted to tell her about Zak, but that was paid work and also he felt he'd already slipped over the bounds of client confidentiality in his conversation with Hardiman. In any case, Butcher probably wouldn't be all that sympathetic. Watching people running, jumping and throwing things she rated a waste of time only slightly less culpable than watching people kick balls. As for the Plezz, her indignation became almost a medical condition when she started on about the waste of public money and the incentive to local-authority corruption involved in the project.

Merv was the man to turn to if you wanted the sporting inside track. He loved games of all kinds, and worshipped the ground Zak Oto ran on.

Seeing Merv gave him an excuse to go to the Glit. Whitey indicated he had no objection, which was not surprising. Here he was a star.

Dick Hull said Merv hadn't been in yet. Leaving him to draw his Guinness, Joe went out to the lobby phone and, using the Sexwith flier he had in his pocket, he dialled Merv's mobile. No answer, which didn't surprise him. Merv's electronic equipment tended to come from nervous men in pub car parks after nightfall, and they didn't offer extended care contracts.

Now he tried Merv's home number.

It chimed different from what he remembered, but that didn't surprise him. Merv was a natural Bedouin, moving from oasis to oasis, which in his case were marked not by the presence of palm trees but widows of independent means. Whenever he moved in, he always imagined permanency, but it never worked out that way. Presumably he was still with Molly who had the dyslexic daughter in stationery, but there was no absolute guarantee.

"Yes?" snapped a voice in his ear.

It was male and not Merv. Time to box clever. Merv owed him, but that was no reason to drop a friend in the clag.

"I'm ringing on behalf of my firm to say that if you ever felt in need of a confidential enquiry service

Even as he began his ingenious cover-up, it occurred to him he could be in a fix if this guy tried to employ him to check up on his woman who was being balled by Merv ... "Who the hell is this?" demanded the man.

"My name's Joe Sixsmith," he said. "Look, if this is a bad time ..."

"Bad time, of course it's a bad time, you bastard. How did you get this number? Did the police give it to you?"

The man sounded even more agitated than a bit of unwanted cold-calling should warrant.

"No, why should they ... ? Look I'm sorry, perhaps I got a wrong number, who am I talking to here?"

"This is Naysmith, Felix Naysmith, who the hell did you think it was? The police told me about you, Sixsmith. What the hell do you want?"

"Oh yes, Mr. Naysmith," said Joe, completely bewildered. "From Poll-Pott? I mean, from the law firm ... what are you doing there .. ? I mean, just where are you, Mr. Naysmith?"

"At home, of course. Are you drunk, or what? And what is it you want?"

"Well, just to talk, perhaps we could meet, I thought it might help or something," bur bled Joe, trying to get his act together.

"You did, did you? Can you hold on a moment. There's someone at the back door."

Joe's mind which, like a small lift, had strict passenger limitations, was suddenly crowded with thoughts.

By what amazing coincidence had he managed to mis dial and get through to Felix Naysmith's home? And why was the guy there when his wife was expecting him back in Lincolnshire?

And who on a dark midwinter's night went prowling round the rear of a house to knock on the back door ... ?

At last the surplus weight was dumped and the lift went shooting up his cerebrum.

"Mr. Naysmith!" he yelled. "Don't open that door!"

But it was too late. He'd heard the bang as the phone was dropped on to a table, and now he could hear distantly a bolt being drawn and a door opened, then Naysmith's voice saying, "Good Lord, what the hell are you doing here?" And then the sound he most feared, which was no sound at all for a long amazed second, then the silence violently broken by a confusion of noise, gaspings, groanings, scufflings, broken words, choked-off cries ... "Joe, my man. Not doing the heavy breathing to the nurses' home, I hope!"

A heavy hand clapped on to his shoulder. He looked up to see Merv's beaming face satelliting above him.

There were questions to ask but not now.

He thrust the phone into the taxi driver's huge hand and cried, "Merv, dial 999, tell them to get round to the Naysmith house on the Heights, tell them it's urgent."

Then he was off. What was it Butcher had said? Opposite Willie Woodbine's house ... well, he knew that, having been there once for a party which had gone off, literally, with a bang. Should mean the Rapid Response Unit would get their fingers out, but no guarantee. On the Rasselas, RRU meant Really Rather U-didn't-bother-us. So, time for the lone PI to ride to the rescue!

The Mini's engine snarled as if it had been waiting all its long life for this moment.

But even breaking speed limits and shaving lights couldn't turn a fifteen-minute drive into less than twelve and as he hit the hill which (along with the property prices) gave Beacon Heights its name, he saw he'd been maligning the police. Up ahead the frosty night air was pulsing with blue. Which was good. Except that some of the strobe was coming off an ambulance. Which was bad.

A stretcher was being lifted into the ambulance. He ran the Mini up on to the pavement and hurried forward.

"What's happened?" he demanded as he forced his way through the small crowd of spectators. "Is Naysmith dead?"

"Don't know. What's it to you, anyway?"

The man responding was a crinkly blond, in his thirties, beautifully tanned or heavily made up, and wearing a dinner jacket. A butler maybe, thought Joe. Then he checked out the teeth and upgraded his guess. Anyone could wear a bow tie but only money in the bank got you teeth that looked like Michelangelo had chipped them out of Carrara marble.

"I'm just worried, is all," said Joe.

It occurred to him that most of the spectating men were dinner jacketed and their accompanying women were wearing fancy evening gowns which displayed a lot of rapidly goose-pimpling flesh. Presumably there'd been a top-people's party in one of the neighbouring houses, but good breeding hadn't stopped them pouring out to enjoy a spot of ghoulish gawking.

"Don't live round here, do you?" said the man with the authority of one who did.

"No," said Joe. "Just passing through."

"Or just coming back to the scene of the crime, eh? Hold on. I think you'd better have a word with the constabulary."

Joe, realizing nothing useful was likely to pass between those twinkling teeth, had taken a step away in search of higher intelligence. Now he felt himself seized by the collar and dragged up till he stood on his toes. If he'd paused to think, probably good sense would have made him decide against a physical reaction. Or even if he'd opted for it, the intervention of the thought process would have meant he got it all wrong. But indignation blanked his mind, leaving plenty of uncluttered space for the exercise of pure intuition.

In a move of which Mr. Takeushi must have been the source, but whose execution by this least cpt of his pupils would have amazed the old judo instructor, Joe jumped in the air, transferring all his weight to marble-tooth's arm. The man staggered forward, bending under the sudden burden, and Joe, reaching back over his shoulder with his right hand, seized him by the bow tie and brought him flailing through the air in a very effective if slightly unorthodox hip throw.

The women screamed in terror, or delight; the men made the kind of indignant baying noises by which good citizens since time began have indicated their readiness to become faceless cells in a lynch mob; and Joe looked anxiously down at the recumbent man, his mind full of fear that he might have incidentally dislodged one of those perfect teeth.

"You OK, mate?" he said.

The man had difficulty in replying, mainly because his tie was half strangling him.

Joe stooped to loosen it, saying, "Always use a clip-on myself. Lot safer."

Then he felt himself seized again and dragged upright. Any inclination he had to resist died when he saw it was two cops who'd got a hold of him and a moment later he heard Sergeant Chivers's familiar voice cry, "I don't believe it. Twice may be coincidence but three out of three's too good to be true. Bring him inside!"

"Shall we cuff him, Sarge?" said one of the uniformed men.

"Cuff him?" said Chivers. "You can kick him senseless for all I care. Only don't let anyone see!"

Nine.

There was good news.

Felix Naysmith wasn't dead.

And there was bad news.

He'd been badly beaten about the head and was in such a state of shock, he'd been unable to say anything about what had happened. He certainly hadn't said anything to confirm Joe's story.

"Ring the Glit," said Joe. Talk to Merv Golightly. All I came here to do was save the guy's life."

He tried to sound persuasive but he wasn't at the best angle for persuasion. Chivers had put him in what must be Naysmith's study, sat him at a huge leather-topped desk, then handcuffed his right hand to the desk leg so that he was forced to lean forward and rest his head on a large blotter.

"Sixsmith, you've gotta learn to tell better lies," said Chivers.

"Chivers, you gotta learn to keep better laws," said Joe. "This is illegal restraint, you know that?"

"Sue me," said Chivers.

The door opened and a head appeared.

"Sarge, there's a gate in the garden fence where it boundaries the wood and they think they've found a recent print."

"Great." He stooped down and pulled off one of Joe's slip-ons. "Let's see if it matches this. Don't go away, Sixsmith."

He was seriously out of order, of course, and it was all the worse because Joe suspected that he knew not too deep down in his shrivelled heart that he had as much chance of pinning this on Luton's finest black PI as he did of making

If

Chief Constable. This was mere ritual humiliation which he could get away with because there was nothing Joe could do about it.

Or perhaps there was. From his snooker player's viewpoint Joe could see the smooth silhouette of an answer phone at the extreme left edge of the desk. Reach that, ring Butcher, get her down here to witness his illegal imprisonment, and he could possibly get Chivers by the legal short and hairies.

He swung his left arm and touched the machine. Unfortunately the actual phone was at its left edge. He strained to reach the few extra inches, the ball of his thumb pressed a button and suddenly a female voice with a backing of "Santa Rock' was screeching in his ear.

"Feel loose! It's Wilma. We're just having the greatest time here on the beach and I thought I just had to ring and say HI! Hope all your troubles are behind you and that you're having the happiest Christmas of your lives. Ring me soon. Bye-eel"

He'd started the message tape. He worked out that 'feel loose' was Australian for Felix and Lucy who had narrowly missed being woken in the early hours of Christmas morning.

He started searching blindly for the stop button then changed his mind. Could be something significant on the tape. And besides, what else did he have to do just now?

He settled down to listen.

Next voice was male, local, blurred with booze.

"Can you send a cab to the Queen's, mate? Quick as you like ... oh bloody hell, Trace!"

There was a brief vomiting sound then the phone went dead. Some other poor sod who had been misled by Merv's flier. Not that any sane taxi driver would agree to pick up a fare at chucking-out time from the Queen's notorious Xmas Rave!

Several bleeps indicating calls but no messages left. More misled revellers. The drunk's voice again Still waiting at the Queen's, you gonna be long? Then another couple of seasonal greetings, this time English and presumably at civilized times. Then, still slurred, but with sleep now as much as drink -Where's that sodding taxi? How long you gonna keep us waiting?

More bleeps. Another seasonal message, this time referring to Boxing Day. Joe hoped the drunk and Trace had made it home. Still more mess ageless bleeps. A woman leaving a message for Lucy which included the sentiment Thank God Christmas is over!" so presumably the twenty-seventh or -eighth.

And then a man's voice. He didn't recognize it straight off, which wasn't surprising as last time he'd heard it, it had been raised in anger. Now it was quiet, but with restrained emotion. Perhaps worry?

"Felix, tried you at the cottage but no reply. I'll try again but this is a fail-safe in case you're on your way back to town. That business, you know what I mean. Well, it's looking urgent. If possible I'd like to meet in the office tomorrow to check it out. If you hear this before I reach you, ring me straight back. I'm at the office now, it's four thirty. I'll hang on till six, then I'll head for home. Do ring. It really is urgent."

Food for thought there, but no time to digest it. The tape was still running. Couple more no-messages, then a woman's voice, young, irritated, "Mr. Naysmith, this is Freeman's, your stationery order is ready. Please ring us to make arrangements for collection at your convenience." Nice to know not all the business world ground to a halt between Christmas and the New Year. A man's voice, East End accent and again very irritated Naysmith seemed to have the art not uncommon in lawyers of getting up noses Where you been? The wheels are coming off of this thing. I pay for service, I get nothing, you get nothing. Ring me! Another satisfied customer. Joe had had a few like that who felt that buying a bit of your time meant they had freehold on your soul. Another couple of bleeps then nothing more. The tape reached its end and rewound itself. Time to renew his efforts to get hold of the phone and summon Butcher.

He stretched, strained, got two fingers on the phone, tried to pull it towards him then it rang. His hand jerked in shock, the receiver fell off its rest.

"Hello! Hello!" Joe shouted.

He strained his ears to catch the reply. The voice sounded familiar.

"Can you send a cab to the Queen's? And listen, mate, last time you kept me waiting forever."

Oh shoot! thought Joe. Not much chance of getting assistance from what must be the most optimistic idiot in Luton. Still, it was all he had. But before he could try to open negotiations, the door burst open and into the room burst a wild-eyed, haggard-faced, unshaven creature in a baseball cap and a flowered T-shirt which made the Magic Mini look like a model of Puritan restraint.

"Chivers!" it bellowed.

"In the garden," said Joe, who believed in being helpful to madmen, particularly when chained to a desk.

"Joe Sixsmith? Is that you?"

The man sounded amazed but nowhere near as amazed as Joe as he squinted up at the newcomer and said incredulously, "Mr. Woodbine? Is that you?"

Any doubts he had vanished next moment when Sergeant Chivers appeared, snapped to attention and said, "Hello, sir. Welcome home."

"Welcome?" snarled Detective Superintendent Woodbine. "I spend three hours sitting in a motionless plane in a temperature in excess of one hundred degrees because my travel company omitted to pay airport fees before it went bust. I get diverted for reasons not yet clear from Luton to Manchester, I finally arrive home wanting nothing but my own bed and about three days uninterrupted sleep, and what do I find on my doorstep, which I am unable to reach because of the crush, but more flashing lights and wailing sirens than I'd expect at a major incident. Sergeant, explain. And it had better be good."

Chivers began to explain. When he got to the attack on Naysmith, it said much for Woodbine's humanity that concern for his neighbour temporarily overcame his own fury and fatigue.

"Felix attacked? My God. Is he going to be all right?"

"Can't say, sir. I've got Doberley at his bedside."

"And what about Lucy? How's she?"

"Sir?" said Chivers, meaning never mind how's she, who's she?

"Still up at their cottage in Lincolnshire," said Joe, squinting up at the superintendent.

Thank God she wasn't here," said Woodbine. "She'll have been told, I presume?"

"Thought it best to hold back till we got definite word from the hospital, sir," said Chivers. It was a pretty good lie. Joe would have nodded appreciatively if nodding had been possible with his head resting on the blotter.

Woodbine was regarding him with a frown.

"Joe," he said. "Just what the hell are you doing here?"

"Came to try to help Mr. Naysmith," said Joe. "It was me who raised the alarm."

Woodbine glanced at the sergeant for confirmation and got a vigorous shake of the head.

"Yes, it was," said Joe indignantly. "If I hadn't got Merv to ring you

"Alarm was raised by Constable Forton who I'd put on watch outside Mr. Naysmith's house, sir," said Chivers. "He saw a light flashing on and off in the hallway and went to investigate. Getting no reply at the front door he went round the back and found the kitchen door wide open and Mr. Naysmith lying injured on the floor."

"And the flashing light?"

They've got like a swing door from the hallway to the kitchen, one of them that open either way like they have in restaurants, and the struggle must have banged up against it several times so the kitchen light showed intermittently in the hall."

"Good job Forton was awake," said Woodbine. "So, Joe, I still don't understand why you're here. And for God's sake, you may be knackered, but you can't be as knackered as I am. If I can stand up to talk, so can you!"

"Can't," said Joe. "I'm chained to the desk."

"What?" Woodbine peered down then straightened up, his face taut with anger.

"Sir," said Chivers, desperately pre-emptive. "Sixsmith was observed outside acting suspiciously and when one of your neighbours tried to effect a citizen's arrest, Sixsmith started an altercation and threw him to the ground."

"One of my neighbours? Which one?"

Tallish gent, in his thirties, thick fair hair

"Lovely teeth," said Joe. "He was giving a party."

"Sounds like Julian Jowett. And you say Joe threw him? But he used to be in the SAS."

"Did he?" said Chivers. This confirms my suspicion that Sixsmith here's a lot more expert at the martial arts than he lets on ..."

"Please, Willie," said Joe, deciding it was time to get familiar, 'if I promise I won't hurt the sergeant, can I be unlocked now?"

Woodbine said, "Sergeant," and Chivers reluctantly unlocked the cuff.

"That's better," said Joe, massaging his wrist. "Though I don't think I'll ever play the spoons again."

"Joe, no jokes, not even if you know any good ones," said Woodbine. "Just tell me what you are doing here."

Joe told him, keeping it simple. Woodbine glanced interrogatively at Chivers who reluctantly confirmed that yes, there was a phone in the kitchen where Naysmith had evidently been having a snack meal; yes, it had been hanging off its hook; and yes, he would check to see if there'd been a 999 call from the Glit, and also whether Joe had been there at the time he said.

The sergeant left the room. In the silence that followed, a voice from the phone on the desk could be heard. Woodbine picked it up, said, "Soon as possible, sir," and replaced it.

"Some idiot wanting a taxi," he said. "Now, Joe, one thing you didn't say was why you were phoning Felix Naysmith."

That had been part of keeping it simple. Even with Doubting Chivers out of the room, Joe felt uneasy about producing the remarkable coincidence of Merv's mis dialled number. But Willie had shown he trusted him and in Joe's book, trust given deserved honesty returned.

"How'd you get the number, by the way?" said Woodbine casually. "From the book, was it?"

It was tempting to say, "That's right," and let it go. But he put temptation aside and began, "Well, actually..." when something in the superintendent's casual tone tugged at his inner ear. If the answer, "That's right," was satisfactory, then it wasn't a question worth asking, was it? Which, if it was, meant, "That's right," would be some sort of giveaway. Like for instance if Naysmith's number wasn 't in the book. "How did you get this number?" the lawyer had asked angrily when he realized who he was talking to. Implying, not out of the book. And he knew from Butcher that being a smartass lawyer he kept his holiday cottage number ex-directory, so he probably did the same with his home number to keep anxious clients out of his domestic space. Which good neighbour Willie would know ... which meant the suspicious so-and-so was laying little traps in case Joe had something to hide.

So much for trust! OK, he didn't have anything to hide in the sense of anything worth hiding but what he did have, he'd keep hidden just for the hell of it!

He said, "I got it from Butcher, she's a big friend of Mrs. Naysmith's," and had the pleasure of seeing Woodbine wince as he always did whenever the belligerent little brief was mentioned. He went on, "We were talking about the Nay-smiths and she said Naysmith was probably going to drive back to Lincolnshire tonight and I got to thinking later, what if he didn't? He'd be really vulnerable down here by himself and with you away, I wasn't sure it would be covered, so I rang just to make sure ..."

Lie to the cops by all means, but no harm in buttering them up at the same time.

That was real thoughtful of you, Joe," said Woodbine. "So tell me what happened when Felix answered."

Joe told him

"You're sure he said, What the hell are you doing here?" like he knew whoever it was at the door?"

"Certain," said Joe. "Look, there's something queer going on at Poll-Pott. There's this message on his answer machine ..."

He scrolled through till he got to Potter's message. As it was playing, Chivers came in, nodding surlily at the super which meant Joe's alibi panned out.

"Have you heard this, Sergeant?" asked Woodbine aggressively.

"Yes, sir. One of the first things I did when I got here," said Chivers rather to Joe's disappointment. "Just confirms what Mr. Naysmith told us when he turned up at Oldmaid Row this dinnertime. He got the message when he accessed his answer machine, like he does from time to time when he's away, and he rang the office to see if he could catch Mr. Potter. That was the call Sixsmith eavesdropped on..."

"Hang about," protested Joe. "Weren't no eavesdropping. Couldn't help hearing ..."

"OK, Joe," said Woodbine placatingly. "And the call wasn't finished when you finally left the office, right? So what did Mr. Naysmith say he and Potter discussed in the rest of the call, Sergeant?"

"Maybe we should talk outside, sir," said Chivers, looking significantly at Joe.

"OK," said Woodbine. "Joe, you wait here."

Typical, thought Joe. Cops want to know what you know before you know you know it. But their own secrets they nurse to their bosoms like Zak with Whitey.

"Where else would I go without me shoe?" he said, waggling his red-socked toes.

"So what's happened to your shoe?" asked Woodbine wearily.

Chivers said, "Took it to check out a print, sir. The garden backs on to Beacon Holt and we reckon the assailant left his car over on Swallowdale Lane and came through the wood, which was how he managed to get into the back door without Forton spotting him."

"Pity he didn't walk up the front path like most killers do," observed Joe.

"OK, Joe," reproved Woodbine. "Sergeant, did the shoe match the print?"

We all know it didn't, thought Joe, else Chivers would have had me stretched on the rack by now.

"No, sir."

Then see Mr. Sixsmith gets his shoe back. Joe, I won't be long."

"Better not be," said Joe. "I got a date."

It was a lie. Christmas had been a date-free zone for Joe. Beryl Boddington, the nearest he had to a 'steady' had taken her little boy Desmond to visit her parents in Portsmouth for the holidays. He had an open offer from Merv to 'fix him up' any time he felt like it, but an earlier experience of a Merv fix, involving a fun-loving blonde with an undisclosed and pathologically jealous sailor husband who docked a day early, had left Joe unnerved. His Aunt Mirabelle was given to declaring that if only Joe would find himself a nice girl and settle down, she would die happy. Merv had suggested, cruelly, that Joe should ask for this in writing. But Joe loved his aunt and secretly (especially when he was with Beryl) did not altogether disapprove of her ambition. And yet... and yet... he felt that there were things he wanted to do with his life that domestic bliss would put out of the question.

What they were precisely, he wasn't sure. And the fact that Beryl had never shown the slightest inclination to let their pleasantly fluid relationship solidify into something more permanent meant that he couldn't really think of himself as nobly self-denying.

He turned to more profitable lines of speculation, such as, how the shoot had he contrived to deck Marble-Tooth Jowett of the SAS? It was no use. He couldn't remember a thing about the technique he'd used. If he tried to boast about it down the Glit, all he'd get was a boom of belly laughs. Still, it was nice to think that deep inside there was a Fighting Machine waiting to get out. Nicer still would be to find a detective down there.

He stared at the desk blotter. Endo Venera had done great things with blotters. What you needed was a mirror. He stood up and held it to a glass-fronted photo on the wall. The blots remained steadfastly blot-like. Perhaps things were arranged differently in America. He let his gaze pass through the glass on to the picture itself. No comfort there for a man whose heart was dangerously near his sleeve.

He was looking at a wedding group. It was Peter Potter's wedding with best man Naysmith smiling at his side. All the other increasingly familiar faces from Poll-Pott's were there too. It had been a windy day and hands were grasping at toppers and grey tails were flapping, giving an attractively unposed air to the photograph. Victor Montaigne, black whiskers spread wide by the breeze, looked as if he'd just stepped off his quarter deck, though beside him Darby Pollinger looked as calm and unruffled as if he'd been sculpted out of painted marble. Peter Potter, a smile on his face, was saying something to his bride whose long blonde tresses were being blown around her face like a second veil. But you could tell she was laughing back and her wide clear eyes alone were enough to make her look beautiful.

How did she look now, he wondered, the widow of a day? And most painful of all to contemplate was Sandra lies. He'd only seen her twice in the flesh, once when she'd attacked him and once when she'd been dead. But paradoxically it was this still image of her, gorgeous in a pink dress and smiling broadly as she clung on to her hat in a gusting breeze, that made him most aware of her as a young vibrant woman cut off in her prime.

He turned away and tried to focus on the rest of the room. There were other photographs, several of sporting teams with the two big men, Potter and Naysmith, always side by side. In fact, it was a pretty sporting kind of study, with an oar high up across one wall and a stuffed fish on another, with rods, reels and lines everywhere, plus a practice putting cup on the carpet and a bag of golf clubs standing in a corner.

Endo Venera would probably have taken the opportunity of going through the desk drawers, but Joe's thoughts were elsewhere. Why the image of a dead woman should so affect him he didn't know. None of this had anything to do with him. No one was paying him, he'd only become involved by accident and the clever thing was to follow Butcher's advice and put as much space between himself and the investigation as possible.

But he felt involved. Personally and seriously. Ain't no such thing as an accident, his Aunt Mirabelle and Sigmund Freud were agreed on this at least, though they parted company on their explication of the thesis. But whether he was here because of some Higher Purpose or whether it was just another fine mess the working of his own subconscious had got him into, he knew he was definitely involved and he'd like some answers.

The door opened and Woodbine came back in. He looked a wreck.

Joe said, "I'm really sorry your holiday got messed up."

Being a hard-nosed cop, he peered at Joe in search of irony, but finding nothing there other than genuine sympathy, he sighed and said, "I'd rather have been on point duty at Market Cross during rush hour in a thunderstorm."

"And Mrs. Woodbine, is she well?"

It was as diplomatically phrased as he could manage. Joe had met Georgina Woodbine and knew from personal experience what it felt like to be within the penumbra of her wrath.

There was a moment of shared awareness, then Woodbine said, "As well as can be expected. OK, Joe. Sorry you got caught up in this lot. You can push off now. Unless you've got any ideas you'd like to run past me?"

One thing about Willie Woodbine, he didn't let pride or prejudice get in the way of pragmatism. Joe, he'd come to realize, got to places that normal CID methods couldn't reach, and the superintendent had no objection to hitching a free ride.

Time he learned to pay for his ticket, thought Joe.

"None I can think of," said Joe. "Maybe if you told me what Naysmith said they talked about on the phone, it would get me started."

"They just arranged to meet," said Woodbine unconvincingly.

"Was that all? Not much help then. All I can think of is, maybe you ought to get some protection arranged for Darby Pollinger and Victor Montaigne."

"I think Sergeant Chivers has got that one worked out," said Woodbine, implying by his intonation even Sergeant Chivers. "No problem. Mr. Montaigne's away skiing in the French Alps. And Mr. Pollinger's got the kind of house that our Crime Prevention Unit visits to pick up tips."

"But you will be wanting to talk to them?" "Very likely, Joe. Very likely. Anything else you want to say before you go?"

"Only, welcome home, Willie," said Joe Sixsmith.

Ten.

Beacon Heights had returned to its customary peace and quiet when Joe emerged.

The police vehicles were still there but no longer pulsating light or sound. The SAS neighbour's guests had all gone back to their party. There was a bedroom light on in the Woodbine house, but it snapped off as Joe watched. Presumably Georgie Woodbine had unpacked, cleaned up, and was now going to catch up on her beauty sleep.

"Spare room for you tonight, Willie," said Joe. "You OK, Whitey?"

There was no reply as he got back into the Mini, and he recalled that he'd left the Glit in such a rush he'd completely forgotten about Whitey under his stool at the bar.

"Oh shoot! I'll kill that Dick Hull if he's let him get stoned again!"

He started the car and set off down the hill.

It really was ghost-town time out here in the posh suburbs, hardly any traffic even, just him and that motorcyclist a couple of hundred yards back.

As he retraced his route into town, he noted that the guy on the bike kept pace with him. So what? If he was going downtown too, this was the route to take. But even when he left the quiet suburbs behind and got into a bit of slow traffic on the urban freeway, the guy didn't take the chance to show off the advantages of a bike in these conditions and weave his way forward through the drift, he still hung back two or three cars behind.

Funny, thought Joe, and took a turn off the freeway half a mile before his purposed exit.

The bike headlight followed.

Joe crossed a light at amber, did a sharp left, came up close behind a VW Polo which had just pulled out of a driveway, hit the brake, reversed into the same driveway and killed his lights.

Thirty seconds later, the motorbike reared past. He just had time to glimpse its red-helmeted rider, bulky in leathers, before it vanished up the street in pursuit of the distant lights of the Polo.

At least he assumed that was what it was doing. Or maybe he was just getting paranoid.

Anyway, he was glad he had an excuse to go to the Glit.

Two excuses, in fact, but one of them, Merv the Taxi, was nowhere in sight.

The other, Whitey the Alcohol, was on public display, curled up around the cash till, snoring.

The manager, Dick Hull, anticipating Joe's indignation, said, It's OK, I got to him before he went too far. You can't blame folk, Joe. When it comes to bumming drinks, he could make a Rechabite relent."

"I know," sighed Joe, who was the world's leading expert on the cat's poor-old-me-no-food-nor-drink-has-passed-my-lips-in-twenty-four-hours act. "Merv not here?"

"Had to go and pick someone up. Said he'd be back."

"Fine. Hey, I left a Guinness on the bar when I had to rush off. What happened to it?"

For answer, Hull looked at the sleeping cat.

"Shoot. Draw me another, will you, Dick?"

He went to the phone and took out the crumpled handout. Merv's home number appeared as 59232332. He riffled through the phone book to check. Here Merv's number was given as 59323223. So God was just after all. Dyslexic Dorrie hadn't just got his name wrong, she'd misread Merv's number too.

He returned to the bar, drank his stout and pondered these things to the inspirational accompaniment of Gary singing "When I'm On I'm On'. Whitey stirred in his sleep, opened a half-hawed eye, looked at Joe, and closed it again.

Joe sighed deeply. Dick's claim that he'd got to Whitey in time was delusive. This was a very drunk cat whose delicate balance could only be disturbed at considerable risk.

"Joe, you're back. How'd it go? Did the fuzz get there in time?"

It was Merv, his expressive face combining delight at seeing Joe, concern about the emergency call, and lustful pride in the presence on his right arm of a luscious smiling woman. She was in her forties perhaps, with natural red hair tumbling over her shoulders, dark-green eyes, a broad handsome face and a solid but shapely figure. She warmed you up just looking at her.

"Yeah. In fact they were on the spot so didn't need the call, but thanks all the same. What are you drinking? And your friend ... ?"

"Joe Sixsmith, Molly McShane. Molly. Joe."

"Joe, I've heard such a lot about you," she said, taking his hand. Hers felt soft and warm, and so did his after a little while. Her voice was unaffectedly husky with an Irish lilt in it and her gaze caressed where it touched.

"All good, I hope," he managed.

She gurgled as if he'd said something genuinely witty, then added, "And I see your kidneys are in the right place as well as your heart, I'll follow your good example."

Tint?" he said.

"Does it come in anything less?" she asked seriously. Then laughed and said, Tint'll be fine."

He got the drinks in and took them to the table where Merv had led the woman.

"You'll join us, Joe?" she said.

"Don't want to play gooseberry," said Joe. "But I would like a quick word, Merv. About that hand-out-'

"Hey, Joe, business in business hours," interrupted Merv quickly. "It's been a long hard day. I'm here to unwind."

"Well, OK, but it won't take a moment

"Joe, no. Bell me tomorrow, OK?"

Molly was rising.

"Don't be such a stitch, Merv. I'm off to the ladies. Man who won't talk business at night has no business talking dirty in the afternoon."

They watched her move away.

"Nice lady," said Joe.

"I think so. Joe, I'm sorry, but thing is, it was through her I got those hand-outs done, and I didn't want to upset her by sounding like I was pissed off about the cock-up with the number. I mean, folk don't like it when you seem to be throwing a favour back in their face, do they? Our relationship's pretty good at the moment and I'd hate to upset the balance, know what I mean?"

Joe knew exactly. Sensitive plants, women. Once they took it into their heads to be offended, no use pleading either truth or lack of malice.

Then something else about Merv's words of wisdom struck him, something so blindingly obvious it should have been drawing blood long before.

"You said the cock-up with the number not with my name! You know about it already! That was why you were so keen to run around collecting those hand-outs back in. Not because of any embarrassment to me, but because your friend's daughter had got your telephone number wrong!"

"Now, hang about, Joe. Of course I was worried about getting your name wrong, but at least any prospective client could still get a hold of you. But my phone number was all they had and it really pissed people off, trying to ring through and getting nowhere. Word soon gets round, that Merv Golightly, he's not reliable

"Word is right," said Joe. "And I'll be the main one spreading it from now on in. You took fifteen quid off me!"

"I offered you a refund."

"And like a mug, I said no. I've changed my mind."

"Hell, Joe, no way you get two bites at my cherry!"

"What on earth are you boys talking about?" asked Molly, who'd returned unobserved.

"Just a little bet we got going," said Joe. "How's that lovely daughter of yours, Molly?"

"You know Dorrie?"

"No, but Merv was just telling me about her. Well, thank you, Merv."

The taxi driver was counting three five-pound notes into his hand.

Joe pocketed them, stood up and said, "Nice to meet you, Molly. Have a nice night."

"You too, Joe."

He went back to the bar, downed his drink and called, "Whitey! Move your butt."

Slowly the cat unwound itself, rose, stretched, and was sick into the cash register.

"Oh shoot," said Joe. "Let's get out of here."

On the way home, he found he was acutely aware of motorbikes. He couldn't swear that any one of them was the same that had followed him (perhaps) from the Heights but he was feeling nervous. No reason, of course, but when had reason ever done anything for him? Bad way for a detective to think maybe, but it was consulting his feelings that kept him healthy. So instead of parking in his usual spot in the dark cul-de-sac of Lykers Lane, he left the Mini under the bright light shining outside Aunt Mirabelle's block and walked the quarter mile to his own. There had been a time when such a stroll across the Rasselas Estate might have been fraught with peril, but things had changed since the establishment of the Residents' Action Group under the dynamic leadership of Major Sholto Tweedie, not to mention the dynamic lieutenancy of Aunt Mirabelle.

The major's ambition was for an environment in which a naked virgin clutching a bag of gold could ramble round unmolested. Joe didn't qualify in any particular, but, despite a certain built-in prejudice against the rule of an ex-colonial militarist, he had to admit that the lighting worked, the graffiti was minimal, and the only disorderly conduct to disturb the peace came from Whitey who, refusing or unable to walk, sat on his shoulder, howling defiant challenge at everyone they met.

He quietened down as they entered Joe's block and got into the lift which, under the major's rule, was no longer used as either a waste chute or a urinal. And when they reached the sixth floor, he jumped down from Joe's shoulders and ran along the corridor towards their flat, purring.

Then suddenly he stopped, crouched low with back arched and tail fanned, and started his I'm-going-to-tear-your-heart-out snarl again.

"OK, I'm coming, I'm coming," said Joe, at first putting it down to mere impatience. But when he caught up with Whitey at the door, he realized there was something really bothering him.

Could be a dog has passed this way, or another cat, pausing in the doorway to leave its mark.

Could be there was a bulky biker in a red helmet lurking inside to do him wrong.

Carefully he inserted the key, turned it slowly and pushed open the door.

"Anyone there?" he called.

Not the cleverest words he'd ever uttered, he acknowledged, but at least it would give any intruder notice that this was no unprepared victim he was dealing with, but a fully primed Fighting Machine.

But no way was this same Fighting Machine going to step into an unlit flat. He stretched forward his arm, and curled his hand round the jamb in search of the light switch.

Behind him, Whitey, who like all the best commanders had decided his role was to offer encouragement and advice from the rear, let out a piercing scream.

Not much encouragement there, thought Joe. And if there was anything of advice, it was something like, Don't do that you dickhead!

Or perhaps, Instead of straining your eyes and ears to pick up shape or sound in that darkness, why don't you stop holding your breath and take a deep sniff

He took a deep sniff and started coughing.

Gas! The place was full of gas just waiting for a spark to turn it into an incendiary bomb!

He jerked his finger back from the light switch like it was red hot.

Then, taking a step back, he took his pen clip torch out of his jacket pocket, switched it on, drew in the kind of breath he used for Figaro's "Largo al factotum' and plunged into the room.

The breath held till he got the gas fire turned off, opened the big window in the living room and stepped out on to the tiny balcony where he drew in another huge draught of cold night air.

Admission of human frailty had never been a problem for Joe and he was willing to accept full responsibility for culpable carelessness until he went into the kitchen to check the cooker and found all the taps turned fully on.

"Know what I think, Whitey?" said Joe. "I think someone's trying to off me."

The cat, persuaded that his life was now no longer in danger, began a bitter complaint about the freezing temperature produced by having all the windows wide open.

"Shoot," said Joe. "Go to bed if you want to get warm. I'm going to have a gas bill so big the directors of Brit Gas will be able to give themselves another million-pound bonus!"

Eleven.

Despite everything Joe had a good night's sleep.

He usually did. Rev. Pot (which is to say, the Reverend Percy Potemkin, Pastor and Choirmaster of the Boyling Corner Chapel) had once told him he was blessed with something called negative capability, which seemed to mean he didn't get hassled by stuff he couldn't understand. A cracked skull or a dodgy curry might give him bad dreams, but mere attempts on his life by person or persons unknown were rarely allowed to trouble the quality time between his goodnight cocoa and the Full British Breakfast.

At seven forty-five the next morning, bacon, eggs, sausage, mushrooms, tomatoes and fried bread safely disposed of, he relaxed with coffee and a slice of toast doubled in thickness by Aunt Mirabelle's home-made marmalade.

There are few finer stimulants of digestion, both in the belly and in the brain, than chunky marmalade and under its beneficial influence Joe reviewed his current problems, starting with Merv's phone number on the hand-out. It was of course an amazing coincidence that it had got misprinted as Naysmith's number, but after a lifetime stumbling over amazing coincidences and finding most of them could in fact be easily explained, Joe wasn't about to waste too much marmalade on that.

Next was the question of who was killing the lawyers, which was none of his business in the business sense, but when you tread in dog dirt, before you start cussing, better ask yourself if the Lord might not have nudged you for a reason.

Would he ever grow out of thinking Mirabelle-type thoughts? he wondered. No matter. The old lady sometimes spoke sense. So it was his bounden duty to direct the mighty machine of his marmalade-lubricated mind at the Poll-Pott puzzle.

Here he was spoilt for theories. Well, he had two anyway. One was that someone in the firm was on the fiddle, Potter had got a line on him or her and summoned Naysmith to a conference to work out how best to proceed. Of course, anything that Potter had said on the phone would already have been passed on to the police except maybe if Naysmith didn't want to finger a colleague till he was certain. Well, he'd found out the hard way how dangerous it was keeping things to yourself! Obvious candidates for the fiddle must be the surviving partners, except that Montaigne was sliding down an Alp and Pollinger would hardly rob his own firm. Would he? Anyway, you didn't cover your tracks by killing off all your partners, you laid a trail that led right to your own feet! So someone else in the firm maybe, not a partner, but a clerk, say, or better still an accountant. Useless speculation without a list of personnel and their responsibilities. So turn to theory two, which on the whole he favoured, recognizing the homicidal thoughts his own treatment by Penthouse Assurance had roused in his peaceful breast.

Someone who'd been messed about by Poll-Pott couldn't wait for the Law Society's complaints procedure and decided the simplest thing was to off the lot of them! In which case, the thing to do was keep a close watch on the survivors at the same time as going through the records with a fine-tooth comb till some disgruntled nutter popped out.

With neither theory being beyond Woodbine's grasp, or even Chivers's, sensible thing to do was forget both of them till the Lord gave another nudge, and turn to the last question on his list.

Which was, who the shoot was trying to kill him?

The reason this came last wasn't any exaggerated humility. Though free enough from ego still to enjoy a mild shock of surprise whenever he happened to get something right, Joe's deep-rooted belief in the sanctity of life definitely included his own. The trouble was, he felt so little urge to harm anyone else that he found it hard to imagine why anyone should want to harm him. And when he found his list of people he might have offended headed by Aunt Mirabelle for not having managed a third helping of her Christmas pudding (which was so richly dense, if it had gone into orbit it would have been a Black Dwarf), he abandoned rationality and switched the problem to his subconscious.

All that happened was that Mirabelle was joined by Sergeant Chivers, with Rev. Pot, whose last choir practice he had skipped, lurking in the background.

Marmalade had failed. He got up to make himself another cup of coffee. As he waited for the kettle to boil, his mind turned to the accident with the office kettle the previous morning.

Accident? Suppose that had been deliberate too? One shot at your life could be a haphazard spur-of-the-moment thing. Two suggested serious and dedicated purpose. "You and me have got to take good care of ourselves, Whitey," he said.

The cat, who was an equal-opportunity eater, paused in the task of cleaning marmalade off his whiskers and bared his teeth. Could be that he'd just got a piece of rind stuck, but it looked like the sneer of someone saying, "Nobody's after me, buster."

"Maybe not," said Joe. "But where would you find another mug willing to work his fingers to the bone so you could enjoy the Full British Breakfast?"

Which reminded him, the one problem he hadn't bent his mighty mind to that morning was the one he was actually getting paid to solve.

There were only two days till Zak's big race, and bigger decision.

Supposing (which was not unlikely) he hadn't come up with anything by then, which way would she jump?

Her business. His was to try and get a line on who was behind the threats. The obvious explanation which, like in the dead lawyers' case, he saw no reason to ignore, was a gambling coup. The odds against Zak losing an exhibition race at the official opening of a new pleasure centre in her home town must be astronomical, so well worth a fix. And these days the whole world was your betting shop. A sudden surge of Malayan money on Oxford sinking in the Boat Race would have the Dark Blues checking their hull for limpet mines. So Zak's fixer didn't need to be some guy going into William Hill's with a suitcase to collect his money, it could be some laid-back business man in Bangkok whose winnings were transferred electronically to his Swiss account.

That would be way out of his league, of course. And Zak, who wasn't stupid, must know that. But still she'd hired him, despite the fact that the best he could hope to do was ferret out any local or personal domestic links.

Only possible explanation was Hardiman's. She was scared the cops would point the finger at someone in her own family. If that was the case, time for some straight talk. Endo Venera might enjoy creeping around dark alleys but Joe liked to work out in the open.

He said, "Come on, Whitey. Time to go."

It was eight twenty when he reached the Oto residence, still early but not so early that the bulky figure of Starbright Jones wasn't there before him.

"Sleep in, did you?" enquired the Welshman.

"Sleep out, did you?" said Joe, staring at the man's crumpled black jacket and pants. "What happened to the tracksuit?"

"She's not running round the streets talking to useless wankers today," said Starbright.

Joe worked this out as he rang the bell and decided not to take offence. Man who'd thrown Jowett of the SAS had to keep his temper in check.

Eddie answered the door. He examined Joe for a moment then called over his shoulder, "Zak, it's your gumshoe."

Thought you only spoke computer," said Joe.

The boy didn't respond, not even facially, but turned and went up the stairs.

Zak came out of the kitchen with a bit of toast in her hand. Joe was pleased to see it was coated with chunky marmalade. Not Mirabelle standard, but solid enough.

"You're early," she said. "Take your coat off or you won't feel the benefit."

"You don't know my Aunt Mirabelle, do you?" he asked as he hung his donkey jacket in the hall. "By the by, thought you weren't telling your family I'm a PI."

"What? Oh, Eddie. Little creep tracked you through his computer, presented me with a print-out of your life history last night."

"Shoot," said Joe. "Who'd put me on record?"

"You'd be surprised. Have a coffee?"

She was moving back to the kitchen but Joe said, "No, hold on. Something I've got to say. Did Eddie tell the others?"

"That you're a PI? No. He likes to impress, but he's no snitch, not unless provoked. Why?"

"Just like to be sure how subtle I've got to be when I start to investigate them," said Joe.

She frowned at him and said, "What the hell do you mean?"

"Come on," said Joe. "It's what you want, isn't it?"

"No," she said angrily. "It's bloody well not."

"OK, I'm sorry, let me put it another way. Smart girl like you gets threatened, you know the only sensible thing to do is call the cops. But a smart girl like you also works out that if you wake up with a note on your pillow, chances are it was put there by someone living in the house. The note in your locker, that could be anyone, but the note on your pillow

"Could be an intruder," she protested.

"I checked this place out," said Joe. "With the alarm primed and the doors and windows locked, Santa Claus must have a hard time getting in. This is why you hired me, isn't it? If the cops find one of your family's involved, then it's out of your hands. But if I find anything, it's you who make the decision what to do about it, right?"

She bought a few seconds by chewing the rest of her toast.

"I don't believe any of my family would get mixed up in something like this," she said finally.

"In that case, there's the phone, ring the police. I'll have that coffee while we're waiting for them to arrive."

He went through into the kitchen and sat down at the table. Zak followed a moment later. She unhooked a mug from the wall, filled it from a cafetiere and banged it down in front of him. He studied the list of ingredients on the marmalade jar.

This is OK," he said. "But try my Aunt Mirabelle's and you'll knock a whole second off your eight hundred time."

"But would I test positive?" she said.

"Could be. Where's your mum and Mary?"

He'd noticed the Cavalier had gone but the Metro was still outside.

"Mary likes to sleep late when she's on holiday. And Dad drops Mum off at work when he's on days."

"Your mum's got a job, has she?"

"She does some book-keeping. Just mornings. Used to be full time but now things are easier, she don't really need to work at all. Only she's like me, independent."

Joe turned his coffee stagnant with sugar then said, "Didn't hear you independently ringing the cops out there."

"You want an affidavit saying you're right or what?" she snapped.

"Well, I'd have plenty of room for one of those," he said, grinning.

After a while she grinned back and said, "OK, so I suppose I should be pleased I'm not wasting my money on a dumbo. You're right. I'm worried in case it turns out Mary, or Eddie, is mixed up in this."

"You didn't just think to ask them?"

"Listen, if they're frightened enough to leave that note, then they'd be too frightened to give me a straight answer," she said fiercely.

"What makes you think they'd be frightened?"

"What other explanation would there be?" said Zak. "Someone must be really squeezing them hard. If it is one of them, I mean. Which basically I hate myself for even suspecting."

Joe could think of one or two other reasons why either of her siblings could have got involved in this caper, but he saw it as no business of his to chip away at her shining, if rather naive, faith. Not unless he had to.

He said, "Could be one of them was simply conned into leaving the note. Thought it was a joke, or a love letter or something."

Her eyes lit up with hope.

"I never thought of that," she said. "I must be really thick."

"No. Just worried. Let me talk to them. I need to if I'm going to earn my money."

She thought a moment then said, "You're right, of course. Go ahead. But whatever you say, don't mention the threats. No need for anyone else to get worried."

She couldn't bring herself to believe they might know all about the threats already. He hoped she was right.

They won't feel a thing," he promised. I'll start with Eddie. By the way, I noticed you only put him and Mary in the frame."

She didn't understand for a moment, then she said disbelievingly, "You don't mean Mum or Dad? Come on, Joe! That's so way-out, I couldn't even have nightmares about it! Listen, we're OK now, Mary's earning and I'm starting to pull it in, but they really had to work hard to bring us up the way they wanted. Everything was for us, nothing for themselves. This house, when we moved here Dad was just a junior officer, something like this was way out of his range. But Mum worked full time then. Dad moonlighted in his time off, and the only reason why was they wanted to live in the Grandison Comp. catchment area. OK, the government makes a lot of noise about parental choice, but living on the spot makes a hell of a difference. So I can tell you for certain, either of them would rather chop their hands off than do anything that would hurt any one of us."

She was magnificent in her fierceness. Put this into her running, thought Joe, and they were right, she was going to be a world-beater.

He said, "Sorry, just asking, no offence."

But as he went up the stairs he was working out ways in which a passionate and protective parental love could be twisted to produce an apparent betrayal.

He tapped lightly at Eddie's door and went straight in without waiting for an answer. The boy, as anticipated, was crouched before his screen. Without looking round he said, "Give me a minute, OK?"

"Sure," said Joe, his eyes drawn irresistibly to the cork bulletin board which stretched along one wall. There in the middle of it in glorious colour was a familiar face. His own!

He went closer to examine it and saw that it was surrounded by a print-out which lived up to Zak's description of it as a life history. There was stuff about himself which he'd long forgotten. At first he was too interested to be indignant. Also there were some laughs here, such as the words QUERY: SUBVERSIVE? alongside the account of his presence on a trip made by the Boyling Corner Choir to a Singfest in Potsdam before the reunification. Also a list of KNOWN ASSOCIATES which included both Butcher and Beryl Boddington, neither of whom would be flattered by the description.

But there were also details of his financial standing (if a perilous teetering between survival and insolvency deserved such a highfalutin phrase) which disturbed him, and an analysis of his medical condition which made him resolve to go on a diet.

He turned away to find Eddie watching him.

"Where'd all this come from?" he demanded.

The boy shrugged, a touch smugly.

"It's all out there to pick up if you know where to look," he said vaguely.

Try a bit of technical flattery, thought Joe.

"You must have had to hack into half a dozen systems at least," he said.

"No. Just the one."

This was really disturbing. It was bad enough to think that there were all these agencies all over the place who recorded the bits about you that were relevant to their needs and functions. But for someone to think it worthwhile to collect together all these bits was downright sinister.

"So which one was that?" he asked.

The boy shrugged again and did not speak.

Joe changed tack.

"You realize this is against the law," he said sternly. "You could be fined, jailed even. Have your gear confiscated."

He wasn't sure about this last, but thought it might be a good lever.

Ill The boy said, "So what're you going to do? Fetch the fuzz?"

"Maybe," said Joe.

"Off you go then. Only this stuff won't be around by the time you get back."

I'll take it with me then," said Joe, offering to tear the print-outs off the wall.

That case, how're you going to prove you got it here?" said Eddie. "From what I read between the lines, you're not the kind of PI the police are going to take the word of, are you?"

"So maybe I'll just ring the cops from here and invite them round," said Joe, becoming irritated by this smartass kid.

"Don't think Zak would like that," said the boy.

Not just smartass, but smart. Joe knew, and did not resent, that smart folk could run rings round him. Only choice was to scare them or lull them and as he didn't have the torso or the temperament for being scary, he'd better start lulling.

"No, she wouldn't," he agreed. "What she would like is for you to give me a helping hand, Eddie. She's got a spot of trouble which is why she's hired me."

"And here's me thinking you were her financial adviser," said Eddie.

Perhaps he should have gone for scary, thought Joe. Offer to push his face through his monitor so he could start seeing both sides of the question.

Instead he laughed and said, "No way. With you and your box of tricks in the house, I guess she can have the best up-to-date financial advice she wants."

"She could if she wanted it," agreed the boy.

"But she doesn't?" said Joe. "I'd have thought she'd have jumped at the chance."

"She can please herself," said the boy indifferently.

Joe observed him keenly. Smart folk still had feelings which sometimes they weren't smart enough to hide. Beneath this indifference he felt an undercurrent of resentment. Of what? Zak's success and high profile? Zak's top place in the family pecking order?

The boy was picking his nose, and suddenly this naive gesture stopped Joe from over complicating things. This was a kid, bright, certainly, but a long way from mature. Maybe all he resented about his beautiful and famous big sister was that she still treated him like a troublesome kid brother going through the computer-nerd stage. All this stuff he kept on digging out, the drug-test results on her competitors, Joe's own background, all this was Eddie's attempt to impress her. He thought she was great and all he wanted in return was a recognition that he was sort of special too.

This didn't mean that he couldn't have been conned or coerced into dropping the note on her pillow. But coming in hard on that might drive him deeper into denial as he realized just how much it had bothered Zak.

Joe said, There's something you could do which would really please your sister. Could be it's too hard, so don't be afraid to say you can't manage it."

"What?" demanded Eddie.

This race Zak's running at the Plezz, there's probably a book on it.."

"Betting, you mean? It'd have to be on who's coming second then!"

He spoke with such proud confidence Joe was convinced that whatever else he knew, he had no idea about the threat to Zak. Perhaps the thing to do was let him have full details so that if he had been conned into leaving the note, he'd come out with the truth. But Joe was hog-tied by his promise to Zak.

Joe said, "Any chance you could find out which bookies are offering odds, what they are, and who's betting on what? I should warn you, this is likely to involve organizations outside the UK, maybe even in the Far East."

"You mean Clacton?" said the boy with the scorn of one for whom the remotest quarters of the globe were but an e-mail number away. "I'll need to work at it. Since that scam in the States where someone hacked into a bookie's system and programmed his bet to register the winning horse's number the second the race finished, most of them have really gone in for deep protection."

"So how'd this guy get caught?" asked Joe, interested.

There was an objection, upheld. The computer had already printed out the list of winners on the disqualified horse. Now it put the new winning number into the system, printed a new list, and this guy's name was still there. So they checked."

"He could have said he backed both horses."

"No. Just the one bet registered. His own fault. If it had been me I'd have fixed it so that any change because of disqualification registered as a separate bet. The guy didn't think it through."

He turned back to his keyboard. Joe left the room thinking, this boy could eventually rule the universe. If they let him have a computer in his prison cell, that is.

As he crossed the landing to the stairs, the bathroom door opened and Mary came out. She was wearing only bra and pants and Joe's gaze ran down the athletically muscled body to the mass of scar tissue round the left knee.

"You want I should take the rest off so you can get a really good look?" she snarled.

"Sorry. I didn't mean to ... I came up to see Eddie ..."

"Prefer young boys, do you? In that case what are you staring at?"

"Sorry," repeated Joe, turning his head and peering out of the landing window. "Look, I wonder, would you mind, maybe we could sit down and have a bit of a talk

"If this is your subtle technique for getting into my pants, I suggest you go back to the correspondence course."

"No, really, I meant downstairs when you're ..."

"Decent? You want to talk, talk now."

She opened her bedroom door and went inside.

Joe didn't move. She turned round and said impatiently, "You coming in or what?"

As she spoke she undid her bra.

"Oh shoot," said Joe Sixsmith. And heard the door slam behind him as he hurried downstairs.

Twelve.

Later he decided he should have called her bluff. This had been a pretty unsubtle way of avoiding his interrogation and a PI in the true tradition wouldn't have let himself be fazed by it. Would have gone into the bedroom and watched her getting dressed. Or, if she'd insisted on playing the game all the way, bedded her, then started asking questions.

But it was a tradition he didn't yet belong to. And though the picture of himself bouncing away on top of Mary Oto was not altogether displeasing, the picture of the door opening and Zak finding them at it was.

"How did you get on?" Zak asked when he joined her in the sitting room.

"Spoke to Eddie. Nothing," he said.

"Didn't imagine there would be. And Mary?"

It came out casual but he thought he detected a something. It wasn't surprising. Mary, angry and resentful that her own sporting career had been nipped in the knee, must be Number One Internal Suspect.

He said, "Bumped into her on the landing but it didn't seem a good time to talk."

There might never be a good time," said Zak, frowning. "Mary's a pretty private person."

Joe imagined those brown bombs slipping out of their cradles and thought, Yeah, private like a B-29 over Tokyo.

Out of the window he could see Starbright still looming by the gate.

He said, "How long's Jones been with you?"

"Starbright? Just since I came home a couple of weeks back. Douglas fixed it. I thought it was over the top at first,

me having a minder. I mean, in the States, I'm just another college jock, but when I got off the plane and saw the cameramen and reporters, I was glad when Douglas came out to meet me and said he'd fixed for me to be taken care of."

"That's the sort of thing agents do? Thought they just made money."

"Maybe he thinks of it as protecting his investment," said Zak.

"Been with him long?"

"Week short of three years," said Zak.

Joe noted the precision but couldn't think of any reason why it should be noteworthy.

"He specializes in sporting personalities, I hear."

"That's what he's into. Couple of snooker players, a jockey, a golfer, all on the way up like me."

"You ain't on the way, you're up there already," said Joe gallantly. "Seems to me it's Mr. Endor who's on his way up."

"Well, thank you kindly," she smiled. "But I've got to start winning the big ones, know what I mean? An agent can't sell a wannabe."

"He got you Bloo-Joo, didn't he?"

Bloo-Joo was the brand name of a bottled blueberry juice which claimed to be additive free and full of natural vitamins. According to the ads it was the last thing Zak drank before a race and the first after, the implication being that it helped her energy level to peak.

That's right." She smiled reminiscently. "One of the first things Doug did. He saw me drinking the stuff and asked if he could have a taste. His exact words were, "Jesus! You mean you drink this stuff and don't get paid for it? We'll have to see about that." Then he waited till I won a couple of races and set up a meeting."

"You mean when you say you'd drink it even if you didn't get paid, it's true?"

"Joe, I don't tell lies," she said seriously. "And the one thing I can't stand in other people is when they're not straight with me. I give my trust and I stay loyal. But once I find I'm being messed around, that's it. Doug's done good by me so far and when he said I needed a minder, I didn't argue. And as usual he was right."

"You think so?" said Joe, a little piqued at feeling lectured at by someone who was still only a kid. "From what I've seen, looks like pretty easy money to me. I mean, they ain't exactly camping on your lawn."

"No, and you know who that's down to? Starbright. When I first got back they were crawling all over the place, trying to get candid snaps, offering bagfuls of money for stories about my sex life on campus. It took Starbright two days to raise that siege. I don't know how he did it, but I reckon I might have headed back Stateside if he hadn't been around. Though the way things are working, maybe that wouldn't have been such a bad idea."

"Maybe," said Joe. "Get the impression your ma doesn't much like him."

"You've noticed? Thing is, Mum's a bit of a racial bigot," said Zak.

"Your mother?" said Joe indignantly. "She seems like a lovely lady."

Zak burst out laughing.

"Joe, you should travel more. You'd soon find the world is full of nice guys and lovely ladies who would torch their can seats if they thought your black ass had sat there. Works both ways. But in fairness to Mum, it's only Welshmen she thinks should be forcibly repatriated. One nearly got Dad fired from his job a few years back. That set up the prejudice. When Starbright first appeared, she tried to be nice to him. But when he refused to sit and eat with us, she took offence. I tried telling her it was because he was vegetarian, but she wouldn't wear it."

"Starbright vegetarian?" said Joe incredulously. "You can't look like that without eating whole bullocks!"

"You should see his lip curl if you offer him a smoky bacon crisp," said Zak.

"No, thanks. So he doesn't come into the house much?"

"Just when he brings me home. He likes to make sure no one's lurking."

Then he takes off for the night?"

"Only if I'm not going out. And only since he sorted the tabloids. First few nights, he patrolled about just to discourage the local paparazzi who thought I might be into stripping off without drawing the curtains. Not necessary any more since he found a couple and spoke to them sternly. But if I need him, I just ring him on his mobile and he's here in no time."

"He knows how to use a phone?" said Joe. Then added guiltily, "Sorry. That was stupid."

"I noticed. OK, time I was on the road. Busy day ahead. Abe's promised me a real going over. Then I promised Doug I'd give him an hour ..."

That'll be an hour and six minutes," said Joe.

"Sorry?"

"He's an agent, isn't he? He'll want his ten per cent."

She gave him the rather tired smile of one who'd heard all the agent jokes and said, "Anyway, Joe, what I'm saying is, what with knocking hell out of my body and knocking hell out of Douglas, I'm going to be too tied up to keep you company

That's OK," said Joe gently. "You see, not much use me hanging around the only person I don't suspect, is there?"

"What? Oh yeah. Sorry. Now it's me being stupid."

"But I'll see you safe to the Plezz," he added.

"Great. With you in a sec."

He heard her run upstairs. He went out into the hall and started to get into his donkey jacket. Then he paused, thought, took it off and hung it up again.

Zak came down the stairs a couple of minutes later looking unhappy.

"You've been talking to Mary?" Joe guessed.

"She thinks you're some sort of perv, after our Eddie," said Zak.

"I don't think so," said Joe. "But she knows I'm not a baggage handler."

He stooped to pick up Zak's holdall which lay in the hallway and gave a little stagger.

"See what I mean?" he said.

That brought the smile back to her lips and they went out together.

Starbright didn't make such a meal out of getting into the back of the Mini this time and they were quickly on their way.

After they'd been going a few minutes, Zak said, "Joe, your coat! You've forgotten it. You'll catch your death."

"Couple of laps with you will warm me up," said Joe. "I'll drop by and pick it up later."

It was, he thought, about as insouciant as you could get without flaunting an ebony cigarette holder and calling yourself Noel, but his gaze met Starbright's in the rear-view mirror and he read deep distrust in those sharp little eyes.

At the Plezz he insisted on carrying Zak's bag through to the changing rooms where Starbright said, "I'll take that now," and plucked it from Joe's sweaty grasp with one finger. Then he went into the changing room.

Joe said, "Is he an honorary lady or what?"

It's OK," said Zak. "I'm the only one using this place in the mornings. The Spartans don't get in till late afternoons, early evenings. Starbright just likes to make sure everything's clear."

The Welshman emerged.

"OK," he said.

"See you, Joe," said Zak.

"Same time as yesterday?" said Joe.

"I'll be ready at the same time," she said. "Hope you might make it a bit earlier."

Crack goes the whip, thought Joe. But, shoot, a man would have to be mad to object to being whipped by such a cracker!

He nodded at Starbright and walked away. He'd just reached the end of the corridor when he heard his name called.

He turned and saw Zak emerging from the locker room.

She was holding a red envelope between the thumb and index finger of her right hand.

"I didn't want to mess up fingerprints this time," she said.

"Good thinking," said Joe, wondering what the shoot she imagined he was going to do with any prints he found, even if he had the faintest idea how to set about finding them.

He took the envelope with exaggerated care, inserted a pencil under the flap and tore it open. Then, still using the pencil, he extracted the postcard inside. Unfortunately as he got it out, the card slipped and fluttered to the floor which rather ruined the Great Detective routine.

Avoiding looking at Starbright he stooped and picked it up. It was another cat postcard, showing five of the creatures gnawing at bones on a platter. The message was written in the same neat round hand.

GET SHERLOCK OFF THE CASE. OR WE WILL.

"They're getting worried," said Joe, feeling both flattered and disturbed.

"So am I," said Zak. "What do they mean, or we will?"

"Maybe they're going to make me a better offer," he said. Then, seeing that she didn't think it a joking matter, he went on, "It's OK, really. They're just huffing and puffing. What are they going to do?"

But in his mind he heard the bang as his electric kettle threw him across the room and he smelled gas.

"What are you going to do, Joe?" she asked, regarding him with a trust which like the message was both flattering and disturbing.

I'll talk to Hardiman, check if there's been anyone hanging round. I'll need to show him the note, that OK?"

"Yeah, sure. He's got a right to know," she said.

Because you're seriously thinking about throwing the race? wondered Joe.

He said, "See you later," and headed along the maze of corridors till he came to the director's office. The door was ajar. He knocked, an ill-tempered voice called, "What?" and he went in to find Hardiman glowering at him from behind a mound of paperwork.

"Oh, it's you. If this is just social, I'm up to my armpits ..."

"It's professional," said Joe.

"Whose profession? Mine or yours?"

"Both. Something you ought to see. Zak found it in her locker. Which was locked."

He handed over the note, adding, "There's been others."

"Following up the phone call, you mean? This why she hired you? She should have told me."

"Perhaps. I'm telling you now. Anybody seen hanging around looking suspicious recently?"

"Joe, you've seen what this place is like. Full of workmen. Plus there's the Spartans who've been training here nights. Could be one of them's pissed off at Zak's success. Some people hate it when someone else makes the grade that they missed out on. That's what it sounds like to me, good old-fashioned spite."

Was the man's determination to play this business down suspicious? wondered Joe. Time to press hard and see if anything gave.

"Well, I take it a bit more serious than that, Jim. There's been other things."

"Such as?" said Hardiman sceptic ally

"Can't say," said Joe.

"What? Oh, not that client confidence crap again. Listen, Joe, word of advice. If you really think you've stumbled across something criminal, then wouldn't it be in everyone's interest including yours to bring in the professionals?"

A lesser man might have resented the implications of both stumbled and the professionals.

Joe said mildly, "Zak is adamant. No cops."

Hardiman said, "Perhaps it's time you reminded her, she may be big enough to run her own life now, but if I get convinced anything's likely to happen that could have repercussions for the Plezz, then I won't ask anyone's permission to bring in the fuzz."

His face set hard with determination and his nose seemed to swell, reminding Joe uncomfortably of the teenage Hooter's capacity to inspire terror by his mere presence.

"I'd prefer if you did the reminding," he said.

Hardiman relaxed and laughed.

"Still the same old Joe. Weaving and ducking at the first sign of trouble. No need for me to warn you about looking after your own interests. Now if you don't mind, I got work to do."

He turned dismissively to his piles of correspondence.

Joe walked away pondering these things.

What he wanted to concentrate his mind on was an in-depth PI analysis of Hardiman's suspect rating, but all he could think of was his same old Joe crack. What the shoot did he expect a fourteen-year-old kid, small for his age, to do when set upon by the school heavy? Run? He wouldn't have got five yards. Fight? He wouldn't have lasted five seconds. So he'd offered the soft answer and if it hadn't always turned away wrath, it had at least sometimes transmuted a kick in the goo lies into a cuff round the ear.

But cuffs and kicks were no longer on the options menu, at least not publicly, and on the whole he preferred Hardiman's mistaken belief that the old school relationship still survived to the hearty pretence that they'd once been great mates.

As for the man's suspect rating, could be all that stuff about a spiteful Spartan was a version of his own feelings trotted out to throw Joe off the scent. Which would make his threat to call in the cops a bluff. Or a double bluff ?

It was all very confusing to a guy who had to make up his own answers to The Times crossword puzzle then invent clues to fit them. Perhaps he ought to listen to Hardiman's advice and start thinking about his own interests. These people were threatening him. Get Sherlock off the case. Or we will. No, more than threatening, trying to kill him! Except, of course, that the threat had come after the attempts, which even a crossword-challenged PI knew was not the usual order of things.

Maybe there were some shady big boys in the background who were using a mole to plant the notes, and the latest note was really aimed at the mole so that if, as hoped, Joe's tragic death in an accident had made the headlines that morning, the mole wouldn't immediately blame his or her employers. Resenting Zak's success enough to make you conspire in her humiliation didn't necessarily mean the mole would go along with murdering innocent parties.

Was he being too clever or just not clever enough? Either way it had a depressing effect which only a strong injection of caffeine could cure. He headed for the cafe. Still no food in sight but the coffee machine was bubbling. He poured himself a cup, took a seat, drank deep, then leaned back and closed his eyes.

"Hi, Joe. This a private cloud or can anyone sit under it?"

He opened his eyes to see Doug Endor smiling down at him.

"Anyone who's crazy," said Joe. "Pour yourself a coffee and pull up a bed of nails."

For a chirpy Cockney sparrer, the agent didn't seem to have much to say. For several minutes they sat in silence, drinking coffee. The track below was deserted. A few workmen moved among the spectator seating, checking numbers, while others were taking down some scaffolding under the press box.

Then Zak and Abe Schoenfeld came out on the track and everyone stopped what they were doing.

The runner and trainer trotted together down to the first curve where they paused and went into a discussion.

"Bends are the key indoors," said Endor. "Outdoors, longer your distance, less they matter. Indoors, whatever you run, you spend as much time leaning sideways as you do standing straight."

"Hardiman says these are good bends," said Joe.

"That's like saying a bog what don't suck you under first time you step on it is a good bog," said Endor. "You ever see Zak run, Joe?"

"Only on the telly."

"In the flesh is something else. There she goes now."

Zak was taking her tracksuit off. She stood at the starting mark. A word with Schoenfeld, a momentary crouch, then she was away. Joe felt a lump in his throat. Poetry in motion seemed a tired old cliche when the papers used it, but what else could they say? She did four circuits then came to a halt and went back into discussion with the coach.

"Shouldn't bother with a race," said Joe. "Folk would pay just to watch her run by herself."

"I like that, Joe," said Endor. "Fink we could use that. Probably get you a royalty."

"I'm sorry?"

"Commercials, Joe. Always on the lookout for a catchy phrase."

"You mean Bloo-Joo?"

"No, they're small beer, small purple beer, ha ha. They got Zak when she was up and coming. Now she's up, or close to it, they'd need to pay ten times the money for half the time, you with me? It's the new generation of deals I'm talking about."

"Like Nymphette?"

"What you know about Nymphette?"

"Something about doing clothes as well as scent and stuff."

Endor laughed and said, "Scent and stuff. I love that. They're the classy end of the young cosmetic market, Joe, and next year they're branching out into the snazziest range of casual wear you ever saw. And they're hot to have Zak fronting up their sales campaign."

"So it's all set up?"

"We're just arguing decimal points," said Endor confidently. "That ain't just poetry in motion you see down there, Joe, that's a bestseller on the hoof. Zak is going to be seriously rich."

"And you too, I suppose?" said Joe.

"I take my percentage, yeah," said Endor. "Why not? Labourer's worth his hire, right? But I gotta work for it, believe you me. Not like being a lawyer, say, where you can be a millionaire just sitting on your hands and watching the clock tick up a pony every minute."

"Don't tell me about lawyers," said Joe fervently.

"You sound like you got trouble," said Endor. "Anything I can help with?"

An agent offering free help? Maybe there's hope for world peace after all, thought Joe.

But no harm in telling the man about his problem with Penthouse Assurance. He still had their insulting cheque in his pocket, and though events since he got it had tended to sideline his indignation, he was still determined not to sit under their cavalier treatment. Except he hadn't got the faintest idea what to do next.

They're trying it on," said Endor after he'd heard the story.

"Listen, Joe, what you want to do is go along there, front it out with them, let them see that you're not going to roll over, know what I mean? The difference between what they've given you and what you're claiming is peanuts to them. Let them see you'll fight 'em all the bleeding way and they'll soon up their offer."

"You reckon?" said Joe. "Trouble is, like you just said, lawyers cost a fortune, even ordinary lawyers. Penthouse'll take one look and know that I don't have the kind of money to put at risk in a court case, 'cos if I did, I wouldn't be getting so het up about this deal anyway!"

"You don't have to have the money nowadays, Joe," said Endor. "This new legislation means we're going to be like the Yanks. You can cut a deal with a lawyer that means no win, no pay."

"You sure?" said Joe doubtfully.

"Certain," said Endor. "Anyway, it's worth a try. You can do anything if you don't let the bastards grind you down. Look at me. Started with nothing, now I'm farting through silk. All down to hard work and clear thinking. Set yourself a goal and go for it, Joe. Like Zak before a race. She don't just fink she might win, she's bleeding sure she's gonna win!"

They sat in silence for a while, watching Zak flow round the track beneath them. Endor might be a Cockney blow-bag, thought Joe, but that didn't mean he was stupid. On the contrary, Joe guessed he used his self-made kid act to lull you into a false assessment. He glanced at his watch. His grand plan was at some point to head back to Sycamore Lane on the pretext of picking up his donkey jacket and having a casual chat with Mrs. Oto. But she wouldn't be back till after lunch, which Joe proposed taking in Daph's Diner which wasn't a million miles from Penthouse Assurance.

He finished his coffee and rose.

"You'll have to excuse me," he said. "Got a date with my insurers."

Thirteen.

The Penthouse Assurance building was a monument to the affluent eighties, rising like a lighthouse out of a sea of lesser commercial development, much of which had clearly drowned in the depths of the post affluence depression. But Penthouse had survived and prospered and its dayglo concrete seemed to create a kind of force field which left it untouched by the squally rain.

All the visitors' parking spots were full, so Joe slipped the Magic Mini into a four-space bay marked CHAIRMAN, between a wine-coloured Bentley and a white Merc. How the shoot could one man come to work in four cars anyway?

The foyer was tastefully carved out of pink marble with artificial windows through which streamed artificial sunlight. Better than real windows through which you could see real rain? wondered Joe. Not that there was a shortage of your actual water here. Down one high wall ran a cascade tinkling into a fern-fringed pool in whose depths gleamed silver and gold.

Joe smiled at the receptionist and said, "Thought they'd have got a mermaid."

For a moment she almost smiled back, then recalling the dignity of her position she said, "Can I help you?" in a tone which didn't sound optimistic.

"I'd like to see Mrs. Airey in your Claims Department, please."

"Is she expecting you?"

"If she's got any sense," said Joe.

The receptionist let this pass and went on, "Because I know she's very busy. Perhaps I could get one of our claims clerks to ..."

"No," said Joe, who wasn't a naturally assertive person but knew that with certain types, like Jehovah's Witnesses and shop assistants keen to sell you an expensive tub of gunge to clean the shoes you just spent your last farthing buying, you had to be unwaveringly firm. "Has to be Mrs. Airey."

"Well, I'll see ... it is about a claim, is it?"

Nor was Joe a naturally sarcastic man, but at times the temptation was very strong.

"No, it's about a crime," he said, taking out one of his dog-eared cards and laying it on the desk. "I think she can help with my enquiries."

The young woman did not look persuaded but she picked up her phone and spoke into it. Then, after a moment's listening, she said, "Mrs. Airey says to go on up. Fourth floor. Room seventeen."

"Thanks," said Joe, smiling again, in a conciliatory manner. He didn't like having to lean, even if ever so gently, on kids guilty of nothing more than a slight lack of manners.

Mrs. Airey was a different kettle of fish. Despite the fact she was so thin even her ear lobes looked anorexic, you could lean on her till your shoulder ached without getting any movement.

Knowing from experience there was no room in that narrow ribcage for a heart, Joe aimed his puny attack straight at the wallet.

"This is offensive," he said, waving the cheque. "I've got a notarized statement from my mechanical adviser testifying to the first-class condition of my car plus affidavits from collectors' clubs confirming its market value."

That pretty well exhausted his legal jargon.

Mrs. Airey smiled and said, "Naturally we'd be interested to see them, Mr. Sixsmith, but I doubt if they will materially change our assessment."

"Oh, you'll be seeing them all right. In court."

"In court?" She stopped smiling without actually starting to quake in her boots. That's your prerogative, of course, but you must be aware that in civil cases the plaintiff, if he loses, can end up being responsible for the defence costs as well as his own, which may themselves be considerable. You would be well advised to think hard before embarking on such a perilous course. Unless you have private means."

Meaning, man who can't afford a decent car certainly can't afford justice.

"Oh, I've been well advised," said Joe, getting angry. This new law which says British lawyers can do like the Yanks and take on no-win-no-fee cases, that's going to apply here. And no fat cat lawyer's going to take that risk without he reckons he's on a certain thing!"

He sat back to observe how Endor's ploy was working out. Mrs. Airey hadn't yet fallen off her chair.

"Really?" she said. "And may I ask which law firm takes such an unlikely view of things?"

Joe guessed that the Bullpat Square Law Centre wouldn't send her reaching for her smelling salts. So he heard himself saying, I've consulted Messrs Pollinger, Potter, Naysmith, lies and Montaigne of Oldmaid Row."

She was giving him an oddly doubting look. OK, so she'd read the papers and knew that Poll-Pott were short a couple of names from the team sheet, but so what? Premier-division outfit like that could surely rustle up an international-strength reserve side.

"And they advised you to go ahead?" she said, incredulous this side of politeness.

He hadn't actually told the lie direct so far, but now he was in too deep to back off.

That's right," he said, adding on the sheep-as-a-lamb principle, They were real enthusiastic about my chances."

"Well," she said, rising from behind her desk and offering her hand and an almost sympathetic smile. "In that case, Mr. Sixsmith, we'll see you in court."

As he stood waiting for the lift, he tried to reassure himself it had gone OK. So she hadn't caved in and offered to renegotiate, but she wouldn't, would she? Not before she'd tossed it around with her legal eagles. Then, he hoped, they'd decide it wasn't worth the risk of losing and offer a settlement.

The lift arrived. He got in. Instead of going down it continued its upward journey to the top floor. When the door opened, you could tell just by the different quality of the carpet that this was where the high fliers roosted. A hard-faced young man with Security written all over him got in and leaned his finger on the Door Open button. You came this high, you got an escort, thought Joe. Hard Face was giving him a what-the-hell-is-this? look. Joe said, "I was on my way down," by way of explanation. Hard Face didn't reply, but his unblinking gaze signalled, better you should have stepped out of a window.

Voices were approaching, presumably belonging to the important people the lift was being held for.

One was saying, "Like I say, this is a matter which requires the instant attention of the board. Some may be impressed, like me, that you have come in person to offer your reassurance. Others, I'm afraid, may find even more cause for alarm in that. Goodbye, Darby. We'll be in touch."

"Goodbye, Harold."

Harold, Joe could now see, was a short breathless man who didn't look happy. And Darby he knew, from his picture at least. Darby was Darby Pollinger, founder and headman of Poll-Pott.

Maybe he was having trouble with his motor too, thought Joe.

But he knew that wasn't the answer. That lay in Mrs. Airey's reaction when he said Poll-Pott had advised him he had a case. No wonder she'd found this hard to believe. He'd bet his pension if he had one that Penthouse's legal advisers were none other than Poll-Pott!

Pollinger's gaze hardly touched Joe as he entered the lift, but he felt like he'd been fully registered.

In the foyer Hard Face held the main door open for the lawyer. Joe rushed forward before he could close it, said, Thanks, my man. Hey, you ought to get someone to call a plumber, all this water running down the walls," and got out with only minor damage to his trailing ankle.

A step behind Pollinger, he followed his exact path to the managing director's bay. There the lawyer paused with his hand on the door handle of the Merc.

"It's Sixsmith, I believe," he said.

"That's what I believe too," said Joe.

Pollinger slid into the driving seat, reached over and opened the passenger door.

"If you have a moment to spare, I'd appreciate a little conversation, Mr. Sixsmith," he said.

Joe looked down at the soft leather seat. He'd got into worse messes than this.

"Why not?" he said.

It was nice in there. He kept the interior of the Magic Mini as clean as he could, but it still ponged faintly of oil and takeaways and (don't even think it, but too late! Whitey's disgruntled face had already appeared at the Mini's window) cat.

Nothing here though but the intoxicatingly elusive smell of money.

"First things first, Mr. Sixsmith," said Pollinger. "Could we just remove the very faint possibility that you are following me?"

"Shoot!" exclaimed Joe indignantly. "Why should I be doing that? I was in there on private and personal business."

"Yes, I believe you. I did not think it possible that you would be so obvious if I were under surveillance."

Joe looked carefully to see if there was space for an implied even before the you, but found none.

"Well, you're not. Not by me anyway. Why would you think you might be?"

"In view of what's been happening recently, I should have thought that was obvious. Protection or suspicion, take your choice."

Joe digested this then said, "I get you. But either or both, that would be a cop job. I only work at what I get paid for."

"From what I have heard, that's not strictly true, Mr. Sixsmith," said Pollinger. "Who, for instance, paid you to go round to poor Sandra's flat? Or Felix's house?"

"I thought he was in trouble," said Joe.

"Which he was. That was good hearted of you. And Sandra, did you think she was in trouble too?"

"No," said Joe, who found lying so uncomfortable that he didn't bother with it except as a last resort. "I thought she might have been the one who killed Mr. Potter."

"So for the sake both of helping a fellow human in peril and of advancing the cause of justice, you were willing to inconvenience if not endanger yourself without pay? This is a degree of virtue I rarely encounter in my profession."

"Maybe you should spend some time down Bullpat Square then," said Joe.

"Oh yes. The redoubtable Ms Butcher. Who was responsible for getting you involved in this business in the first place, so the police inform me."

That's right. And if she'd checked her facts, I wouldn't have got involved. And I still think it was pretty irresponsible once Potter realized I was talking about Penthouse

It occurred to Joe that maybe complaining about the professional standards of the murdered lawyer to his partner and probably friend was not the seemliest thing he'd ever done.

"You mean that when you explained your problem to Peter, he did not at once say there was a conflict of interest?" completed Pollinger. "I regret that, Mr. Sixsmith. What did he say?"

"Said I was wasting my time, I had no case."

"Perhaps, in fact almost certainly, that was his honest opinion and he merely wanted to save you from further inner turmoil and external expense. Let us hope so anyway. De mortuis

This was one very cool guy, or very cold, Joe wasn't certain which.

He said, "So I'm right, you do represent Penthouse?"

Pollinger said, "Yes. Normally a company of their size would have developed their own legal department by now, but Harold Duhig and I have seen our businesses grow side by side over the years and know each other too well to separate. Until now."

"You got problems with him?" said Joe, ready to sympathize with anyone who was suffering at the hands of Penthouse.

"I think rather he has problems with us, Mr. Sixsmith."

Pollinger closed his eyes and seemed to enter into a kind of trancelike state which would have had his family sending for the doctor and his doctor sending for the drug squad.

Joe, being in neither state of relationship, waited for him either to recover or pitch forward on the steering wheel, but was glad when he opted for the first.

"To recap then, Mr. Sixsmith, you are not in a client relationship with anyone connected with this case?"

"You mean, am I getting paid? I told you already. No."

"In that case perhaps I could retain your services?"

"To do what?"

"Why, to help a fellow human being who may be in peril, and to advance the cause of justice, of course," said Pollinger, smiling. "I realize you do both of these for free, but the extra I would require for my money would be total confidentiality."

That's what all my clients get, this side of the law."

"Excellent. Then put this under your hat and keep it there. I regret to say that there may be some discrepancies in some of our client accounts."

"You mean, someone's been on the fiddle and that's what these killings are about?" said Joe, delighted at this confirmation of his own theory. "You spoke to Nay smith, did you?"

"Naturally. I was at the chambers when he arrived for his appointment with Peter. Poor chap. He was really shocked. They were very close, you know."

"Yes, second row," said Joe impatiently. "What did he say Potter said to him on the phone?"

"Not a lot, unfortunately. It seems that just before Christmas Peter had stumbled across an inconsistency in the movement of certain client funds. He'd mentioned it to Felix but had decided not to bother me with it till he had more information. Presumably he'd found something more and wanted Felix to double check."

"So no names?"

"Evidently not."

"Suspicions?"

Those I will keep to myself for the moment. You see, Mr. Sixsmith, if it turns out the killings and the embezzlements are connected'

"If?" interrupted Joe. "You got reason to think different?"

"When you've worked in the Law as long as I have, you don't jump to conclusions, Mr. Sixsmith. Post hoc and propter hoc are two very different things."

Joe took his word for it and said, "So someone with a grudge, maybe?"

"A possibility. But as I was saying, my accountant's investigations which have already thrown up some irregularities, will certainly lead us to the perpetrator of the financial crime. I would prefer to discover this person had nothing to do with the killings."

Yeah, you can hush up thieving but not murder, thought Joe.

"So who's lost money apart from Penthouse?" he said.

"I never said Penthouse had lost money," reproved Pollinger. In fact, until the full audit is complete, it's difficult to locate any losses precisely. The skein is tangled and the situation fluid, if you'll forgive my mix of metaphors. If as seems likely funds have been moved around so that no particular depredation could be spotted at one time, then the question of the precise locating of losses becomes complicated."

"You mean like if I nick a fiver from you, then a bit later I put a fiver in your wallet that I've nicked from someone else, whose fiver is that?"

"I wish my accountant could put things so plainly," said Pollinger, smiling.

"Maybe you should change them. How come they didn't notice something funny was going on?"

"A good question. Their pre-emptive answer is that any irregularities must have occurred since the last annual audit. If they turn out to be wrong, I shall of course be delighted to sue them. In fact, that would solve a lot of problems."

"You mean, they could be held responsible for the losses?"

"For all that have occurred since the audit, certainly."

He nodded with pleasure at the thought. Vampires,

thought Joe. As long as they've got someone else's big fat vein to suck, they're happy.

"So why, if you don't know yet who's lost what, have you been visiting your old chum at Penthouse?" asked Joe.

"When two lawyers get killed and a third is attacked, rumours soon start circulating, Mr. Sixsmith. You'd be amazed at the number of calls I've already had, vibrant with sincere condolence rapidly modulating into equally sincere concern about the state of our finances. People can be so self-centred."

"So you went to Penthouse to deal with these rumours?" persisted Joe.

"No. There's another problem there," admitted Pollinger. "You see, we are of course insured against losses of this kind. All law firms need to be."

Joe worked on this for a while then began to chuckle.

"You mean it's Penthouse you're insured with? So if they've been ripped off they could find themselves paying out money to cover their own losses?"

"You have a gift for the simplistic precis," said Pollinger. "Harold Duhig is not happy."

"I bet. Piece of advice, Mr. Pollinger. Next time you go to see your friend, take a sledgehammer, 'cos getting what you're due out of Penthouse is like getting blood out of a stone!"

Surprisingly this seemed to cheer Pollinger up immensely.

"I see we are going to get on famously, Mr. Sixsmith," he said. "My curiosity was already aroused when your name kept cropping up in the accounts I received of the police investigation. Could it be pure chance, I wondered. Then when I saw you in the lift'

"I'd been described?" interjected Joe.

"In general terms," said Pollinger evasively. "But your car more unmistakably. No, your involvement here is more than pure chance."

"You don't look like a superstitious man to me, Mr. Pollinger," said Joe.

"And you're right. I'm not. The chance I refer to is an accepted area of modern scientific theory. Anything can hap pen. But if it keeps on happening, then it is removed from the realm of accident and someone posits a law."

"You're losing me," said Joe.

"On the contrary, I am hiring you."

"But to do what?" demanded Joe.

To find out who has murdered two of my colleagues. Also there is a great deal of money missing. I should like to know where it has gone."

Ah, thought Joe. The money. He'd put the deaths of his colleagues first, but it sounded like a close call.

"But where do you want me to start?" he asked.

"Start? Man, you're so far in, I suspect you could hardly find your way back! You will need to talk to all our staff, of course. Mrs. Mattison, our office manager, is ideally placed to give you an overall view. I've asked her to come in tomorrow morning to help sort out this mess. I'll tell her you'll call."

"Yes, sir," said Joe. "Am I just going to talk to her or ... ?"

"You mean, is she suspect? Everyone of them is suspect, Mr. Sixsmith, till you find out different, or they get killed."

Shoot! thought Joe. This guy wasn't just icy cold, he was permafrost!

"Mr. Naysmith didn't get killed, just beaten up," he probed. "But you don't think he's a suspect, do you?"

"Felix?" said Pollinger thoughtfully. "It's my understanding you yourself alibi'd him?"

"Yeah, well, I overheard Mr. Potter talking to him on the phone and the cops confirmed the call was from Lincolnshire."

"And poor Peter got killed within minutes of your leaving him. So, unless you're a terribly unreliable witness, Mr. Sixsmith, that seems to let him off the hook. But you'll still want to interview him, I daresay. Now, is there anything else we need to discuss?"

"We haven't talked about my rates," said Joe diffidently.

"Worried about working for a man whose firm is likely to have suffered substantial losses? Quite right. Take this on account and let me know when it has run its course. Good day now. I feel better for knowing you are on the case."

Joe slid out of the rich comfort of the Merc, clutching the bundle of notes Pollinger had produced from his wallet. The Merc moved silently away. Joe opened the door of the Mini and Whitey let out an angry howl which diminished as Joe flapped the notes in his face.

"I got the only cat in the world that recognizes the smell of money!" said Joe. "Let's count this lot then head to Daph's Diner to celebrate!"

Fourteen.

Daph's Diner gets a cautious recommendation in The Lost Traveller's Guide for the depth and nutritional qualities of its hot bacon sandwiches.

With the casual indifference to expense of a man who's got eight hundred quid tucked down his Y-fronts, Joe ordered two and a pot of tea. Someone had left a copy of the Bugle at his table. He used the thick Property Market supplement as a fat-absorbent tray for Whitey's sandwich after checking he was out of the sight line of the counter. Daph, a formidable young woman with a second-class honours degree in art history and a realistic attitude to its attendant job opportunities, was unreliable in her attitude to animals on the premises. Last time a customer complained, she'd thrown Joe and Whitey out, but the time before it had been the amazed customer who ended up on the pavement, closely followed by her jam doughnut.

Satisfied they were unobserved, Joe took a mouthful of sandwich and read the front-page account of the attack on Felix Naysmith. There was no mention of Sixsmith Investigations. He didn't know whether to be pleased or put out.

"OK if we sit here? It's a bit crowded today," said a female voice.

"Sure," said Joe, looking up.

Recognition was simultaneous.

"It's Merv's mate, Joe, isn't it?" said Molly McShane.

"It is, it is," said Joe stimulated to a hearty mock Irishness by this life-enhancing presence. "Sit down, please. A great pleasure."

He meant it. Even against the glitzy background of the Glit she had shone. Here in the sage and serious surroundings of Daph's, she burnt like a beacon, dazzling his eyes so much he hardly noticed her companion at first. When he did, he guessed this had to be Dorrie, the dyslexic daughter. She was a younger version of Molly, though yet to burst into full flame, with a willowy figure where the elder woman's was voluptuously full, and her hair cropped short where the other's cascaded in a rich red Niagara. And if she had her mother's joyous smile, she wasn't about to show it.

There was a third member of the group, a child in a push chair To Joe, who was no judge, it looked about three and rather bonny, but maybe this was only because it was asleep.

"Joe, this is Dorrie, my daughter Doreen, that is. And my lovely little granddaughter, Feelie."

"Pleased to meet you," said Joe.

Feelie kept on sleeping and the mother grunted something which politeness required him to understand as, "Me too," but the message coming from her expressive face was, I may have to sit next to this plonker, but I don't have to enjoy it. She positioned the push chair between herself and her mother, sat down by Joe, picked up the Bugle and started reading.

Molly's mouth tightened for a moment then she said pleasantly, "Now isn't it grand to get the weight off your feet? Dorrie, my love, what is it you fancy?"

"I don't want nothing to eat," said the girl in a voice which had something of her mother's lilt with a strong admixture of local Luton. There's a sodding cat making a mess down here. Christ knows what you could catch."

"He's with me," said Joe. "We're leaving shortly. Molly, can I fetch you something from the counter before I go?"

"Joe, you're a real gent. I'll have a hot chocolate and a Danish. Dorrie, what'll you have?"

Without looking up the girl said, "Cappuccino," making it sound like a Latin oath aimed at Joe.

This attitude was hard to take from someone who'd caused him considerable embarrassment by getting his name wrong on the hand-out. OK, so the poor kid was dyslexic and in any case Merv's writing was like a ball of wool after Whitey had finished with it. And OK again, she didn't know she'd got it wrong, seeing as the besotted Merv hadn't felt able to tell Molly what had happened. But none of this excused rudeness. Good manners cost nothing, said Aunt Mirabelle, but bad manners can be real expensive.

So what am I going to do? thought Joe. Pepper her cappuccino?

Maybe Molly would give her a good maternal dressing down.

When he returned to the table this is exactly what seemed to be taking place, but as he picked up on the exchange he realized it was nothing to do with him.

"She's your granddaughter, for God's sake!" snapped the girl.

"Yes, and I love her. And I look after her every hour that God permits when you're at work. But this week you're off and I've got other things to do. You can't just spring this on me, Dorrie. Why didn't you say something earlier?"

"Because I didn't realize earlier. Please, Ma. Just for an hour or so."

Her voice was low and pleading. She did it well and Joe could see Molly was on a hiding to nothing.

"OK, but just an hour. After that I've got to ..."

Thanks, Ma," said Doreen with the supreme indifference of the young to the independent existence of their elders. "I'll pick her up in an hour. Two at the most."

"Dorrie!"

But she was gone. A lovely mover, observed Joe. And animation had turned up the flame a therm or two. Man could do worse than warm his hands on her in a cold spring, happy in the knowledge that, come winter, with luck she'd have achieved her mother's furnace glow.

"Dorrie had to go then?"

"Yeah. Says she's sorry, something she just remembered

"No sweat," said Joe. "I just fancy a cappuccino. I brought the little girl a choc bar, that OK?"

"Why not?" smiled Molly. "Dorrie would play hell, but you don't stay, you can't play, right?"

"Right," said Joe handing over the bar.

With a Whitey-like sensitivity to the presence of a treat, the child had woken up. She looked around as if making up her mind to take an instant dislike to Daph's, then saw the choc bar in her grandmother's hand, grabbed it, and began to pull off the wrapping.

"Clever," said Joe.

"Bright as a button," said Molly proudly. "She goes to the council creche and they say they've never seen one like her."

"I can believe it," said Joe. "You must be a great help to your daughter, Molly."

It was a casual, not a probing, remark but it got him a probing look till Molly was satisfied he wasn't trying to nose in on her family.

"Yes, I do what I can," she said. "It's no easy thing bringing a child up by yourself, I should know if anyone does. I work mornings, which means most afternoons I can pick the darling up from the creche at lunchtime and take care of her till Dorrie gets home from work. Some evenings too I go round. Girl needs a social life. But so do I, so I can't be on tap all the time. Which is why I got the hump just now when Dorrie suddenly decided to take off. I mean, the place I work is closed this week, and her place too, so we're both off and I thought we could have a nice morning round the sales together, then suddenly it's the baby-sitting again without warning. You need to lay down guidelines in a relationship, Joe. You'll mebbe find that out if you ever get married."

"Merv told you I'm single then?"

"I asked him. Always check out the good-looking men, says I. So there's the two of you, both footloose and fancy free. Well, to be sure, there's bound to be as many single fathers around as single mothers, only not a lot of them get landed with their babbies!"

"No need to worry about Merv, Molly," said Joe. "If he had any responsibilities you'd know about them 'cos he's not a man to duck out of them."

"I wasn't worried, Joe," she said, turning her gaze full beam upon him. "But I like the way you defend your friend first before you defend yourself."

"Didn't know I was being attacked," said Joe.

"I believe you. Merv says you're the hones test man he's ever known. Bit of a drawback in your line of business, I'd have thought."

"Why so?" said Joe. "My line is finding out the truth of things and I don't see how honesty gets in the way of that."

"No, I don't suppose it does," she said. "How much do you charge, Joe?"

"Well, that depends," said Joe, surprised at the direct question.

"On who's paying, you mean?" She smiled. "So how much would you charge a poor widow woman?"

"Don't know any poor widow women," said Joe. "But there's a special rate for gorgeous grans. What's on your mind?"

"Well, it's probably nothing at all, just too many tabloids and the telly, but it's little Feelie here."

"Not getting into bad company, is she?" said Joe, smiling at the little girl who was looking with wide-eyed fascination at Whitey. The cat, who had finished his sandwich and could detect the consumption of food at a range of a furlong, was standing with his forepaws on the child's chair, studying her chocolatey lips with green-eyed greed.

"Not unless that beast of yours is a man-eater," said Molly.

"No, it's OK," said Joe as the girl reached out a brown-stained hand which Whitey licked with relish. "He loves chocolate, but hates undercooked meat. So what's the problem?"

"Well, like I say, I look after her regularly while Dome's at work, and if the weather's dry, I often take her for a walk in Bessey Park which is right opposite my flat. And a couple of times recently, more than a couple in fact, I've noticed this woman watching us."

"Watching? How do you mean?"

"How do I mean?" said Molly with some irritation. "I mean, she was watching. How many ways can you do that?"

"Well, through binoculars, maybe. Or hiding in a bush. Or following you close behind. With a smile on her face. Or muttering to herself like she's crazy. Or ..."

"OK, I'm with you. She'd be sitting in the park when we arrived. There's a little pond there, you know it? I'd take a bit of bread to feed the ducks and she'd be sitting there'

"Feeding the ducks?" interrupted Joe.

"No. Just sitting."