‘You won’t mind if I do.’ Eritas waddled over to a chiller cabinet, pulled out a dimpled pub glass and a bottle of ale, popped the cap and poured himself a foamy pint. Ben wondered how many of those a guy would need to guzzle down in a day to get that fat. Eritas heaved his monster body over to a double-wide sofa nearby and threw himself down into it. The Magnum revolver rested in his lap, ready for use in case Ben and Wolf suddenly decided to attack him. He swallowed a gulp of beer and smacked his lips.

‘Quite a place you have here,’ Ben said.

‘I have to say that I wasn’t initially too sure about inviting strangers into my home. But my big sis liked you, and she prides herself on being a fine judge of character.’

‘Your sister?’ Ben had to look hard to see the family resemblance, but it was there. He guessed that Georgie Seaward must be about ten years older than her brother.

Eritas nodded. ‘As you’ve probably gathered, she emailed me Anthony Abbott’s book manuscript the moment she read it. It quite blew her away, needless to say, though nothing can shock me any more. Unfortunately, she’s married to an ass who would have happily buried his head in the sand and the book with it, if she hadn’t acted quickly.’

‘And then we turned up,’ Ben said.

‘Which allowed my quick-witted sister to seize the opportunity of speaking to you. Otherwise, with Abbott conveniently bumped off, the whole thing could easily have died with him.’ Eritas took another slug of beer and wiped his mouth with the baggy sleeve of his kaftan. ‘This could be the start of a beautiful friendship, gentlemen. For far too long, the scourge that is the Pandemonium Club has been allowed to continue its legacy of evil and murder. I’ve spent years gathering information on them. The moment might finally have come to bring them down.’

With surprising agility, their host twisted himself around on the sofa, reached behind it and dragged out the crate into which Ben and Wolf had put their phones and Abbott’s laptop. ‘Time to take a peek at what you’ve brought me. Which phone has the alleged video evidence on it?’

‘Mine’s the silver one,’ Wolf said. ‘And it’s not alleged. It’s the real thing.’

‘Then I presume you must be Mr Wolf, who captured the footage?’

‘You know who we are,’ Ben said. ‘But we still don’t know a lot about you.’

Eritas made a gesture of acknowledgement. ‘My apologies if I let my enthusiasm run away with me. I suppose I do owe you some background information about myself. My real name is Jasper Shelton.’

‘And Georgie was Georgie Shelton,’ Ben said.