Maxwell's Revenge (6 page)

Maxwell looked up at the sound of her voice and clambered to his feet. ‘I won’t hug you, heart. I seem to be covered in sick. Just like the Light Brigade at Varna. Of course, that was cholera. Christ knows what this is.’

‘Max,’ she said. ‘I was so worried.’

‘I left a message,’ he said. ‘With the desk sergeant.’

‘You might as well have told the cat. Not
our
cat, of course,’ she said. ‘He always passes things on. I mean the station cat.’ Her lip trembled. ‘I was just so worried, when I got here. Ambulances. Dead bodies with your jacket on them.’ Regardless of vomit traces she hugged him tight.

‘Sssh,’ he said, rocking her and stroking her hair. ‘Sssh, I’m all right. Thanks to your egg and cress.’

She pulled away and became professional again. ‘It was in the food, then, you think?’

Sylvia stood up. Bernard Ryan had drifted off
again, but was about to be loaded up and taken away by a paramedic. She flexed her knees and leant against a table. ‘I’m getting a bit old for this lark,’ she said, smiling at Jacquie. ‘Yes, we’ve pinned it down to the prawn cocktail, we think.’

‘That explains that, then,’ Jacquie said. Too many loose ends at this stage could be a disaster.

‘Explains what?’

‘A woman in the foyer was saying she had eaten one. Oh, but that means it can’t be the prawn cocktail …’

Maxwell dismissed Freda with a wave. ‘She’s been eating council leftovers for years. She’s probably immune to any poison yet invented. Anyway, the buffet was a general free-for-all, but the cocktails were only for SLT and candidates. There were a few spare and Mel from Business took one for herself and one for her TA. However, the teaching assistant is allergic, so Mel polished them both off, rather than put the spare one back.’

‘How do you know all this?’

Maxwell coughed discreetly. ‘Just asked a few questions, used my eyes, Heart of Midlothian,’ he said. ‘It did people good to chat while we were sorting out the walking wounded from the … well, the others. Mel had laughed about her cocktails, because Diamond had made a big thing about the PE department being greedy, but apparently she said there was no one like a Business Studies teacher when it came to getting
a deal.’ He looked more sombre than the story seemed to warrant.

‘Is it Mel who died?’ she asked him, hand on his arm.

‘Yes,’ he said. ‘She died really quickly. She collapsed so fast that no one really had a moment to get to her. Diamond and the rest were throwing up and sort of drooling and behaving oddly before they went down, but she just fell over and died. Sylv realised straight away it was poison – it was all too quick just to be a bad prawn.’

Davies had moved to the door and was taking names as people were either wheeled or walked away. Now only Jacquie, Maxwell and Sylvia were left and he joined them. Jacquie introduced him to the nurse and he brightened.

‘A professional. Brilliant. Can I ask you to give me a statement straight away, Mrs Matthews, while the memory is clear?’

‘Wait, Bob,’ Jacquie said. ‘I think it would be best if you interview Mr Maxwell and I will interview Sylvia. Just to keep it a bit more professional, do you get my drift? But before that, we need samples. Are SOCO on their way?’

‘I’ve called it in,’ Davies said, ‘and they’re on their way.’ He looked at Maxwell. ‘All we have to do is swab Mr Maxwell, and I think that would more or less do it.’

Maxwell looked down at himself ruefully. ‘I do feel a bit … grubby,’ he said. ‘Do you mind if I find
something else to wear, have a shower perhaps?’

‘Well …’ Davies had no mind to help Maxwell feel more comfortable.

‘What if the poison can seep in, through his pores,’ Sylvia put in her four-pennyworth. ‘After all, we don’t know what it is and you don’t want that on your conscience, surely, Mr Davies.’

‘Could it?’ he asked her, as the nearest thing to an expert he had handy.

She shrugged. ‘Who knows? And I must say, I could do with a change of clothing myself. It’s easy for me, I have my home clothes in my office.’ She turned to Maxwell. ‘What are you going to wear, Max?’

‘I’ll see if the PE Department can kit me out in a little Lycra number, or failing that, there’s always the Drama Club costume collection. I’ll find something. I’ve always fancied that glitzy concoction they made for Herod in
Superstar
a few years back.’ He raised an eyebrow at Davies. ‘May I?’

Davies sighed. ‘Knock yourself out,’ he said, hopefully. ‘I’ll find us a couple of offices,’ he said to Jacquie. ‘I’ll see you when you’ve finished scrubbing Mr Maxwell’s back,’ and he turned on his heel and left, keeping his dignity by a whisker as he nearly slipped in a pool of something indescribable.

‘Bitter,’ mused Sylvia.

‘Wanker,’ replied Jacquie, and Sylvia bowed to her better judgement and went off to change.

Jacquie caught up with Davies outside Diamond’s office. The school was strangely quiet, now that all the sirens had gone. The kids were being taken inside, class by class, to be signed out and sent home. There wasn’t time to send a letter with them and anyway, what could it have said? The governors were the lucky ones. They had been poised to attend the interviews in the afternoon and now they were being contacted to take the brunt of the media piranha-tank frenzy as the news broke generally. By the time all the kids were home and the garbled half-truths had been semi-digested by shocked parents, the story would involve at least three armed gunmen, a pride of man-eating lions and a Viking funeral pyre afloat on the swimming pool, so the phone calls would be fun at least. Both Thingees, morning and afternoon Receptionists, braced themselves.

‘Bob,’ Jacquie said quietly. ‘Do you have some sort of problem with Max?’

‘No,’ he said truculently. ‘No more than anyone else.’

‘Only, you seem to be a little bit rude, all things considered. He and Sylvia kept things ticking over in there, while they waited for help to arrive. Who knows, they may have saved lives.’

‘Yeah, yeah,’ Davies said. ‘Course they did. Man on white horse, everyone step aside. Mighty Mouse is here to save the day. Oh, yeah.’

Jacquie took a step back. ‘I don’t often threaten this, Bob, and I’ve never actually done it. But when we get back to the station, I will be putting in a complaint to Henry about your attitude today. Here we are, riding a breaking wave that could still drown us if a kid starts feeling icky, and you are letting personal prejudices hamper the investigation. Meanwhile, I’ll interview Sylvia Matthews in the Head’s office. I will also ring the nick and get a squad car to come and collect Mr Maxwell. Henry can interview him there.’

‘I’m doing that interview,’ Davies shouted. ‘Don’t try and sideline me, Jacquie. I get enough of that at the nick, Jacquie this, Jacquie that.’ He stood at bay, red in the face and ready for action.

‘That’s enough.’ Jacquie grabbed a startled Paul Moss by the arm as he tried to sneak past
without listening. ‘Mr Moss, I want you as a witness to this conversation.’

‘Oh, umm, Jacquie, I don’t think so …’ he stammered. ‘Police business, I expect, isn’t it?’

‘It was,’ Jacquie said. ‘But now it’s personal. I am relieving Detective Sergeant Davies from his duties at this crime scene, the reason being that his attitude is not conducive to the professional coverage of the site. If he refuses to leave of his own free will, I would like you to go and phone this number,’ she passed him a card, ‘and speak directly to DCI Henry Hall.’

They stood there, a triptych of tension. Jacquie still had hold of the card which was also in Paul Moss’s grasp. Davies stood with feet apart, knees locked, aggression in every pore, staring at them both. Then, the tension broke.

‘Fuck you,’ Davies spat. ‘You’ll be sorry, Jacquie,’ and he stormed out, knocking a Year Seven to the ground in the doorway.

Picking the child up and dusting her down perfunctorily, Paul Moss said mildly, ‘Nice chap. Are you all right, Annie?’ It was the kid’s second day at her new school. Teachers chucking up and falling over. Policemen knocking her about. Could it get any more exciting? Junior school was never like this.

‘The best,’ muttered Jacquie as Annie ran for the Great Outdoors. ‘Sorry you had to see that, Mr Moss.’ Like all teachers’ WAGs, she
automatically reverted to formality when a student was around. ‘May we talk in private?’

‘Of course. I suppose we could use Diamond’s office,’ Paul said. ‘He won’t be there at the moment, that’s for sure,’ and he headed that way.

‘Perfect. I’m interviewing Sylvia in there shortly. But with that little contretemps, things need to change and I don’t have time to make it happen. Could I ask you to help?’

‘Of course.’ He opened the door to the Headteacher’s office. Inside, it had an unreal feel. Not only was the school on the other side of the door almost silent, the last few students having finally gone home or shoplifting, whichever was the more tempting, but the room itself seemed to be holding its breath. The chair was pushed back from the desk and a pen lay on a pad, abandoned as the time for lunch had come round. Diamond’s coat hung on the back of the door, his car keys were tumbled on the desk. Jacquie and Paul felt like voyeurs, looking in on the private life of a man who was in no position to complain. In fact, the police person inside Jacquie was shouting it may even be a potential crime scene, if he died. She shook herself free of that thought. No point in meeting trouble halfway; she knew that if trouble wanted to meet you, it would wait in a doorway and jump out at you when you were least expecting it. She walked purposefully behind the desk and moved the pen and pad
aside. She pulled up the chair and sat down.

‘Right, Paul. Oh, have a seat.’

He was looking round. He turned to her with a shudder. ‘This feels peculiar,’ he said. He normally sat in that chair once a year, when having to explain his decidedly average GCSE results to the Headteacher. In fact, he was due there next week.

‘Murder makes everything peculiar,’ she replied and watched his face drain of colour.

‘Murder? I think we all assumed … oh, I don’t know. A bad prawn?’

‘I think it would have to be a very bad prawn, don’t you, Paul? A prawn with a sub-machine gun, for example. A member of staff is dead already and many others have been whisked off to the General, sirens going.’

He looked ashen and finally subsided into a chair. Then, ‘What do you want me to do?’

‘I want you to ring Henry Hall, as I asked. As soon as you’ve done that, I’d like you to find Max and warn him he will be going to the nick for his interview, nothing serious but DS Davies is no longer available.’

‘Is that what you call it?’

‘For now. Who knows, by tonight it might be me on gardening leave. We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it. Then, unless you have urgent teacherly things to do, I’d be grateful if you could sit down and try to jot down your
recollections of where everyone was in the few minutes before the first person collapsed, and any impressions you got. We’ll be asking everyone to do this, but Max always says that historians make the best witnesses.’

‘So …?’

‘So, you’re a historian, Paul, aren’t you?’

‘Yes, of course. But not like Max.’

‘I know that, Paul. Just do your best.’ She hadn’t meant to be condescending; it just came out that way. A bit like Jack Shaffer’s words in Maxwell’s favourite Western –‘Tell him no man should be ashamed of being beaten by Shane.’ It was just how it was. And Paul Moss knew it, too. He stood up to leave and the door behind him flew open and caught him a nasty one on the back. ‘Ow.’

Thingee Two stood in the doorway, her hand to her mouth. ‘Oh, I’m sorry, Mr Moss. I was looking for Mr Maxwell. Is he in here?’ She looked around, aimlessly, as if he was perhaps on a shelf, or under the desk.

‘No,’ Jacquie said. ‘He’s getting changed. Can we help you?’

Thingee was in a cleft stick. She knew that Jacquie was Maxwell’s Other Half, as the Ladies of the Office had it, but never knew what to call her. She settled for nothing and spoke to Paul Moss instead. ‘Oh, Mr Moss, it’s just that we’ve had County Hall on the phone. It’s about, well,
you know, all the stuff that happened at lunch.’

‘Yes,’ Paul said. ‘I thought they’d be involved sooner or later. What did they want? They don’t think it’s Mr Maxwell’s fault, surely?’

‘Oh, no,’ said the girl. ‘Not at all. They’ve looked through their records and found that Mr Maxwell is the senior teacher not … umm, ill.’

Paul Moss thought about it for a moment. ‘Yes, I suppose he is. So what?’

‘Well,’ said Thingee, looking round with big eyes. ‘That means that he’s the Headteacher.’ She wasn’t ready for the reaction her words got, as Paul and Jacquie collapsed in helpless laughter. She backed out of the door and raced back to her office, where telephones rang off their hooks and people were a bit more normal.

‘I’m what?’ Maxwell, scrubbed and smelling sweetly of Timotei and Dove, stood looking rather dumbfounded. He had never really thought of himself as Headmaster material and it was true that, wearing lilac tracksuit bottoms in size Absolutely Tiny and an orange tracksuit top in size Simply Enormous, he didn’t look like it either.

Jacquie wiped her eyes and coughed to regain her composure. ‘The Headmaster. Acting, of course.’

‘Of course. I can act being a Headmaster, no problem. Damn sight better than Legs, anyway. I think my style will be something like John Gielgud in
Forty Years On
. Puzzled, but well meaning. With just a threat of Robert Newton as Dr Arnold.’ A strange light came into his eye. ‘I wonder whether I will have full powers?’

Paul looked askance at Jacquie.

‘You’re embarrassing Paul, Max,’ she chided him, still smiling.

‘No, no, not
those
powers. I mean full Headmasterly powers. Hiring. Firing. Expulsion. Ordering things.’

Paul Moss shrugged. ‘I should think you’ll have at least day-to-day powers; ordering, obviously.’ He looked at his department member and smiled. ‘Firing, only when necessary, I should hope. Remember who your friends are.’

Jacquie gave a final chuckle. ‘Well, dearest,’ she said, pecking him on the cheek. ‘Well done on your sudden elevation. May I use your office to interview Sylvia, Acting Headmaster?’

‘Why don’t you do it in here …? Oh, I see. Ha, yes, of course you may. I’ll get off to the nick then. Can you give me a lift, Paul?’

‘There’s a car coming for you,’ the Head of History said. ‘I rang earlier.’

‘A car?’ Maxwell grinned. ‘I like the sound of that. Will it be a stretch limo, do you think? Or a Roller.’ The distant sound of a dying siren came filtering through from the drive at the front of the school.

‘Sounds like a squad car,’ Jacquie said. ‘And from the sound of the siren, I suspect that Davies has put the boot in with his cronies already. Never mind. Off you go and interview Henry.’

‘Isn’t he interviewing me?’

‘To begin with, I expect,’ she said wryly. ‘I’ll
see you later. I promised Helen we’d pop by.’

‘All right, snookums, see you later. And, Jacquie, I’ll see you at home.’ The bonhomie was lost on Paul Moss. He flung open the door and was almost punched in the face by a police driver, hand raised to knock on the door. ‘Don’t worry, officer, I’ll come quietly.’ And out he went.

‘That’ll be the day,’ Paul and Jacquie said in unison.

‘I heard that,’ came his plaintive cry as the door swung shut and peace came briefly to the Acting Headteacher’s Office.

Jacquie smiled at Paul Moss. ‘If you should happen to bump into Sylvia, could you get her to come in here?’ she asked. ‘If it’s not for a minute or two, that would be good. I still have residual tremors from seeing Max’s jacket across the feet of a dead body.’

He patted her shoulder and left.

The squad car driver had indeed been briefed, if inaccurately, by Davies. He bundled Maxwell unceremoniously into the back seat, doing that thing policemen do with people’s heads to avoid allegations of brutality later, and set off at a blistering pace for the nick. As instructed, he took the most twisting route the RAC could devise and Maxwell was black and blue, as well as orange and lilac, by the time they reached
Leighford Police Station, where Henry Hall waited in his eyrie.

Maxwell was bustled through reception and into Interview Room One, a setting with which he was very familiar, having spent a good few hours in it, over the years. He waited patiently, drumming his fingers on the scarred table top, testimony for future archaeologists to a strange, probably totemic habit which involved making small random burns on the Formica, but which had clearly fallen into disuse for some reason, lost to time, in the mid Noughties. He was mulling over this scenario when the door opened and an apologetic head poked itself round the door.

‘Mr Hall apologises, Mr Maxwell, for the misunderstanding, but would you like to come with me up to his office?’ The police person looked about six and had curls and big blue eyes like Shirley Temple, but Maxwell had learnt from his own beautiful and ingenuous Jacquie that appearances could be so very deceptive. He merely doffed his missing hat, gathered up the folds of his Simply Enormous top and followed her meekly. If she found his dress at all eccentric, like a well-trained police person she gave no sign.

As they turned a corner in the top landing, they were met by a scarlet-faced Bob Davies, who shouldered them aside and slammed out
down the emergency stairs, relabelled by some wag ‘Smokers This Way’.

‘Excuse us,’ Maxwell called after him. He really didn’t care what Bob Davies thought of him, but he objected to his treatment of a female colleague. Political Correctness was not one of Maxwell’s hobbies, but once a public schoolboy, always a public schoolboy, and rudeness was never left unremarked or, if possible, unpunished.

‘Don’t worry about me,’ said his guide. ‘Davies is an ignorant pig and we just ignore it. He’s a bit of a dinosaur. Watches too much
Life on Mars
.’

Brontosaurus Maxwell decided she meant one of the meat eaters and let it go. Leaning round him she pushed open Hall’s door. ‘Mr Maxwell, sir,’ she said and ushered him in.

Hall stood up and waved Maxwell to a chair. Maxwell was unused to such relative civility even from the ever-urbane Henry Hall and the surprise must have shown on his face.

‘Thank you for the invitation,’ Hall began.

‘The …? Oh, the invi
tation
! You’re welcome of course, Henry. And the family, of course. We’ve decided on the more the merrier since Jacquie’s mother seems intent on inviting everyone we’ve ever queued behind in Sainsbury’s. Oh,’ he added hurriedly, ‘not that you fall into that category, of course. You’ve interrogated me under caution too many times for that to apply. Which brings
me,’ he said, half standing and trying to make the tracksuit bottoms conform a little more to his needs by hauling at the crotch, ‘which brings me – do excuse me, by the way, Henry, there wasn’t much on offer in the Lost Property Cupboard – to our business in hand. Do you have any news of the people at the hospital?’

As always, Maxwell had caught Henry Hall on the back foot. The eyes gave nothing away behind the dead lenses of his specs. ‘Ermm, we have had a bulletin, yes.’ If Maxwell hadn’t known Henry Hall so well, he would have suspected an attempt at a John Major impression, but no, that was just his usual voice. ‘There is no change at the moment, and they are trying to find out the poison so that they can administer an antidote, should there be one.’ He looked down at a piece of paper on his desk. ‘Let me see, yes, Mr Diamond is still unconscious, but has stabilised and is not on any form of support.’ Maxwell knew that Mr Diamond
always
needed support, but now was not the time to be flippant. ‘Mr Ryan is rather more serious and is in ICU being helped with his breathing. Who else …? Yes, a Mrs Bevell is also on ICU but the effects of the poison have been superseded by a pneumothorax, whatever that might be.’

‘I believe it means that she has a damaged chest in some way. Air is leaking in and so the lungs can’t inflate properly.’

Hall looked up from his bit of paper and adjusted his glasses. ‘Mr Maxwell,’ he said flatly, ‘will you ever cease to amaze me?’

‘I sincerely hope not, Henry. I just happen to know because I tested Jacquie on her first aid and that happened to crop up. But the question remains, however did she get one of those from being poisoned?’

‘I don’t know, but I think I’ll ask.’ Hall reached behind him and pulled a dog-eared phone number list off the wall, sending a drawing pin pinging into oblivion. He leafed through it and finally found the number he needed and punched it in to the phone. He looked vaguely through Maxwell as he waited for an answer. ‘Hello? Yes, may I speak to the senior nurse, please? Oh, is she? Well, perhaps you can help me. It’s DCI Hall here, Leighford CID. I am enquiring about injuries sustained by a …’ He shuffled his papers and found the name, ‘Mrs Bevell.’ He listened for a moment, then said, ‘Yes, but we don’t know how that happened, when it seems to be a case of poisoning. Oh, how unfortunate. Yes, thank you.’ He put the phone down and almost smiled. But then again, no. Henry Hall never did that.

‘What caused it, then?’ Maxwell was agog. ‘Was it an additional attempt? Should we be looking at the people in the dining hall?’

‘No,’ Hall said. ‘Apparently, Mrs Bevell
needed CPR and when the paramedic tried, he found that it was beyond him.’

‘That’s dreadful. Wasn’t he trained or something?’ Maxwell’s high horse was whinnying close at hand.

‘No. Her breath was so bad that he just couldn’t do it. Following guidelines, he did chest compression and broke two ribs. One turned inwards and caused the pneumothorax. She hasn’t said much, the poison is still in her system and also, of course, she has assisted breathing, but she has mentioned that she will be suing.’

Maxwell nodded. ‘I have met the lady. I’ll be a witness. For the paramedic.’

‘That bad?’

‘At least. What about the others?’

‘Miss Mackenzie and Miss Smollett are in recovery, but expected to be in for some time. Mrs Maitland has a broken leg – she’s going down to theatre shortly. A couple of bumped heads going home soon …’ He tapped the papers and looked up. ‘That’s it.’

‘That’s it?’ Maxwell was appalled. ‘I’m appalled, Henry, that you can say that. People hospitalised, unconscious, one person dead. Surely, you don’t usually deal with these sorts of numbers. It’s like the Blitz all over again.’

Hall had the grace to look shamefaced, if only slightly. The war was something his mother had told him about. ‘It seems major, Mr Maxwell,’
Hall still found that any other form of address stuck in his throat, ‘but we still don’t know whether this is deliberate or accidental.’

‘I don’t see how it can be accidental,’ Maxwell said. ‘They went down like ninepins.’

‘That’s why we need to speak to you,’ Hall said. ‘As an experienced, if you don’t mind the term, observer of wrongdoing, we thought … that is,
I
thought, that you might be able to give us some insight.’

Remembering Bob Davies’s expression on the landing, Maxwell hazarded a guess. ‘I assume Sergeant Davies doesn’t think I can help.’

‘Sergeant Davies thinks you
did
it, Mr Maxwell,’ Hall said, cutting to the chase. ‘He
always
thinks you did it. That’s why he is suspended from now until his review board.’

Maxwell rocked back in his chair and was immediately sorry as his tracksuit bottoms bit deeper. ‘That’s rather draconian of you, isn’t it, Henry?’

Hall steepled his fingers and looked at the man before him. In his motley, he hardly seemed someone in which to confide. But Hall knew that the mind was razor-sharp, the intuition honed on the same stone, and that his compassion was sometimes his only weakness. He decided to confide in him. ‘He has a bit of a problem with you, Mr Maxwell,’ he said, then paused. ‘Before I go on, I need hardly say that this is confidential?’

Maxwell waved him on with the flap of a sleeve, some ten inches beyond the end of his fingers. As Acting Headmaster, it was body language he would have to employ more often from now on.

‘He has been a problem for some time and has had counselling for his attitude to women. Jacquie in particular seems to get under his skin, and the fact that you and she are a couple seems only to make it worse. He came into my office straight from Leighford High, ranting about Jacquie and unprofessional behaviour, which I knew at once was not likely to be true. He sent the police driver to get you, inadequately briefed, so that you were treated like a suspect. He arranged for you to be left in an Interview Room. But basically, he is a loose cannon, so intent on promotion that he has made it impossible by his behaviour. So please don’t worry about him in this investigation.’

‘Henry,’ Maxwell said, ‘I have to think of Jacquie here. If it makes a problem for her …’

‘Mr Maxwell,’ Hall said patiently, ‘If I had a pound for every time you have brought Jacquie to the edge of suspension I would be a rich man, so don’t let’s say things we clearly don’t mean. This subject is closed. Now, please tell me what your impressions were in the dining hall when the collapses began.’

‘Well, firstly, I didn’t eat there,’ Maxwell
said. ‘Not really. I had a jelly thing with what they claim to be fruit in it. My main lunch was sandwiches from home.’

‘Why?’

‘I like sandwiches from home. Egg, as it happens.’

‘No, I mean, why, when senior staff seemed to be involved, were you not included?’

How long had Hall got, Maxwell wondered, when both of them had a murder on their hands, to even begin to understand the subtle knifings of staffroom politics? Maxwell was a maverick, a misfit. He stepped aside for no man and made no concessions. The Powers That Be never invited such people willingly to their junkets. ‘I was,’ was all he settled for, ‘although I am not part of the SLT.’

‘But I understand from Leighford High that you are Acting Headteacher.’

‘News travels fast. I am, but only, like Bruce Willis, because I am the oldest man standing.’

‘So why did you not join the others for the buffet?’

‘So I am a suspect?’ Maxwell leant back and regretted it all over again.

‘No, but I just want to get the picture straight.’

‘Well, firstly, I hate these pseudo-elegant things at school. They use outside caterers who are average at best, frankly deranged at their worst.
If I tell you that the sandwiches were cranberry and Brie, heavy on the cranberry, I think you will get the general gist.’

Hall, who, like Maxwell, preferred his sandwiches to be the kind that evoked nursery school memories, shuddered slightly.

‘Secondly, I had, as it happens, seen the prawn cocktail jobbies laid out on a counter in the kitchen the day before, when I failed to have my Roast Lunch. I’m not much of a stickler for food hygiene, Henry. If I find a faded M&M down the sofa, that M&M is mine, believe me. I put it down to having parents who had known rationing. But even I am none too keen on the thought of seafood lurking around at room temperature for all of twenty-four hours. At least. That can’t be right. Plus, they were being delivered by a man who I believe to be a raving maniac. He is Oliver Lessing, uncle of Dierdre; you probably have a file on him this thick.’ He held up his hands, about two feet apart. Hall shook his head, but made a note. ‘And, I believe that the redoubtable Freda, dinner person of this parish, had one of the cocktails and is living yet.’