He knew that his explanations sounded hopelessly inadequate. He heard himself stumbling from one feeble objection to another. ‘I can’t disprove it of course, sir. It might be true. I mean, it’s all sort of logical but I mean it’s not based on anything.’

‘On the contrary,’ said Dr Ackrington and his very mildness seemed to Dikon to be most disquieting, ‘it is based on the man’s character, on the circumstances surrounding him, and upon the undisputed fact that no body has been found.’

‘It sounds so sort of bogus, though,’ Dikon floundered about through a series of slangy phrases which he was quite unaccustomed to use. ‘I mean it’s the kind of thing that they do in thrillers. I mean he wouldn’t know there was going to be all that chat at the concert about the girl who fell in Taupo-tapu. Would he? And if he didn’t know that then he wouldn’t know about the scream keeping the Maoris away.’

‘My good fool,’ said Gaunt, ‘can’t you understand that the scream was introduced because of the legend? An extra bit of atmosphere. If he hadn’t heard the legend and the song he wouldn’t have screamed.’

‘Precisely,’ said Dr Ackrington.

‘Well, Mr Bell?’ asked Falls.

‘Yes, that fits in, of course, but I’m afraid it all sort of fits too neatly for me. As if it was concocted, don’t you know? Like china packed too closely. No lee-way for jolts. I’m afraid my objections are maddeningly vague but I simply cannot see him hiding a disguise in an extinct geyser and tossing his boiled shirt into a mud pot. And then going off—where?’

‘It is highly probable that a car was waiting for him somewhere along the road,’ said Ackrington.

‘There’s a goods train goes through at midnight,’ suggested Smith. ‘He might of hopped on to that. Geeze, I hope you’re right, Doc. It’d give you the willies to think he was stewing over there, wouldn’t it?’

Mrs Claire uttered a cry of protest and Ackrington instantly blasted Smith.

‘Cut it out, Bert!’ advised Simon. ‘You don’t put things nicely.’

‘Hell, I said I hoped he wasn’t, didn’t I? What’s wrong with that?’

‘If you are not satisfied with Dr Ackrington’s theory, Mr Bell,’ said Falls, ‘can you suggest any other explanation?’