“I’m glad to hear it. But you’ll have to be prepared to dirty yourself up a bit before we’re out of this present bit of bother. We can’t go on, Dickie, living under the threat of death by someone unknown for some unknown reason. I could have avoided Cambridge this weekend—just refused to play the game—but I’m not going to run from this for the rest of my life. I intend to face up to whoever this is!” The crisp soldier’s voice returned, and his eyes narrowed. “I’m intending to flush him out and deal with him—permanently. I warn you now. I’ve made my plans. I shall chuck him in the Cam or dump him on the doorstep of the police. The Cambridge Constabulary will find themselves scratching their thick heads again and filing him alongside Ernest with an ‘unsolved’ sticker on his big toe.”

“And what precautions have you taken for the evening, Oily? It doesn’t take a genius to work out that if someone’s gunning for us all, it’s not in the market square that we’re going to fall. Even General Sir Redvers Buller could have worked out that puzzler . . . given half an hour, the very best military advice and a pencil to chew . . . I doubt very much that your Edith, redoubtable lady though she be, would be capable of averting the full force of a professional assault—if that’s what’s planned.”

“You don’t know my Edith! Look here, how are you spending the evening? Why don’t you join me and the wife? Pop round after dinner. Eight-ish? We could play a game of bridge in our room or something while we wait him out. It’s just across the road from the police station, and I’ve alerted the hotel manager. He thinks I’m a rich eccentric and humours me, but that humouring extends to providing a guard in the corridor. Expensive, but probably worth it. Or we could go along together to the market at ten o’clock just for fun and sort this out ourselves once and for all. As of old!” Oily’s eyes gleamed with challenge. “I’m still fit, and I see you haven’t lost your survival skills. Under all that ‘I’m just a poor old tramp’ nonsense, there beats the heart of a man of war.”

“Thanks for the consideration, Oily, but I’ve made my arrangements. I’ve accepted to eat dinner this evening as the guest of a bunch of academic tosspots in a college retreat.”

“Eh? You? Why the hell?”