You always expect people in wheelchairs to look wasted so it was a shock when Woodville-Gentle arrived plump, pink and smiling. Or at least most of his face was smiling. There was a noticeable droop to the right-hand side. It looked like the aftermath of a stroke but I saw that he seemed to retain full movement in both his arms – although with a noticeable shake. His legs were concealed by a tartan blanket that fell all the way to his feet. He was clean-shaven, well scrubbed and he seemed genuinely pleased to see us which, in case you’re wondering, is another square of the suspicious behaviour bingo card.

‘Good Lord,’ he said. ‘It’s the fuzz.’ He noticed Lesley’s mask and did an exaggerated double take. ‘Young lady, don’t you think you’re taking the concept of undercover work just a tad too seriously? Can I offer you tea? Varenka is very reliable with tea, providing you like it with lemon.’

‘As it happens, I’d love a cuppa,’ I said. If he was going to play louche upper crust I wasn’t beyond doing cockney copper.

‘Sit, sit,’ he said and gestured us to the pair of chairs arranged by the dining table. He wheeled himself into position opposite and clasped his hands together to keep them still. ‘Now you must tell me what brings you bursting through my door?’

‘I don’t know if you’re aware of this, but David Faber recently went missing and we’re part of the investigation into his whereabouts,’ I said.

‘I can’t say I’ve ever heard of a David Faber,’ said Woodville-Gentle. ‘Is he famous?’

I made a show of opening my notebook and flicking back through the pages. ‘You were both at Magdalene College, Oxford at the same time, from 1956 to 1959.’

‘Not quite correct,’ said Woodville-Gentle. ‘I was there from 1957 and while my memory is not what it was I’m fairly certain I would have remembered a name like Faber. Do you have a photograph?’

Lesley pulled a picture from her inside pocket, an obviously modern colour print of a monochrome photograph. It showed a young man in a tweed jacket and authentically wavy period haircut standing against a nondescript brick wall with ivy. ‘Does it ring any bells?’ she asked.

Woodville-Gentle squinted at the picture.

‘I’m afraid not,’ he said.

I’d have been amazed if he had, given that me and Lesley had downloaded it off a Swedish Facebook page. David Faber was entirely fictitious and we’d chosen a Swede because it made it extremely unlikely that any of the Little Crocodiles would actually recognise him. It was just an excuse to poke our noses into their lives without alerting any practitioners, if there were any others, that we were after them.

‘It was our information that he was in the same social club at Cambridge,’ I flicked through my notebook again. ‘The Little Crocodiles.’

‘Dining club,’ said Woodville-Gentle.