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about anything? – No.
    ‘Did you get on well with him, sir?’
    ‘Yes, very well.’
    ‘I believe there was a dispute concerning a drug trial a little while ago? Alkovin, produced by Parc-Reed Pharmaceuticals.’
    ‘Oh, that. Hardly a dispute, Superintendent. A minor professional disagreement.’
    ‘Tell me about it.’
    ‘There isn’t much to tell…’
    Garrett and Lyn Harvey listened while Ian explained how Leo Farleigh had approached him and Connie, then how they’d unsuccessfully tried to sell the idea to Somersby.
    ‘So the initial approach was made to you, Dr Saunders?’
    ‘To myself and Dr Flint, yes.’
    ‘Why was that, d’you think? I mean, why approach you and not the person in charge?’
    Saunders smiled again – he smiled rather a lot, Garrett noticed. ‘John was known for being rather… conservative when it came to drugs. Leo thought we’d have a better chance of persuading him between us.’
    ‘But it didn’t work out that way?’
    ‘No, it didn’t,’ Ian agreed.
    ‘Do you still regret that? The decision not to give Alkovin a trial?’
    ‘I do, as it happens. I think the drug has a lot of potential.’
    Garrett nodded gently. ‘What were you doing last night, Dr Saunders?’
    ‘Last night?’
    ‘Yes.’
    Ian looked him in the eye, said lightly, ‘Why ask me? Am I a suspect, Superintendent?’
    ‘For elimination purposes, sir. We’ll be asking all other parties the same questions.’
    Ian nodded slowly, said, ‘I was on call.’
    ‘So where would you have been, sir?’
    ‘At home, most of the time. But I was called in, once.’
    What time would that have been? Garrett asked. – About half past nine, Ian thought… ‘It was a Thrombocytopenia and the platelet count was so low that I thought I’d better come in.’
    He’d arrived at the lab at about ten to ten, looked at the film, checked that the appropriate blood products were being prepared and then gone to see the patient. ‘After that, I looked in at the lab again and then went home.’
    What time had he arrived home? – About half-past eleven.
    ‘Are there any witnesses to any of this, sir?’
    ‘Yes. Steve Lovell, the SO who called me in, will remember me in the lab, the sister on Malvern Ward ought to remember me coming to see the patient.’ He smiled again. ‘And my wife will remember me coming home.’
    ‘Did you know that Dr Somersby was playing skittles that night?’
    Ian blinked at the change of direction. ‘I did, as a matter of fact,’ he said slowly. ‘I asked him that day if he’d swap nights with me and he told me that was why he couldn’t.’
    ‘Why did you want to swap nights, sir?’
    ‘We’d been asked out to dinner at short notice by some friends.’ He gave him their name.
    Had he told anyone else about Dr Somersby playing skittles? – Well, his wife, of course, and their would-be hosts, but no one else that he could remember…
    Garrett checked over the details again, then let him go.
    Connie, when she arrived, expressed similar shock at the possibility of murder.
    ‘It was bad enough him being killed, but this…’ She looked up. ‘How’s Barbara – Mrs Somersby – taking it?’
    Pretty much as one would expect, Garrett told her, then asked her about the dispute over Alkovin. Unlike Ian, Connie bridled almost immediately.
    ‘You don’t seriously think that that has any bearing on his death, do you, Superintendent?’
    ‘That’s what I’m trying to ascertain, doctor.’
    She made an irritable gesture, then told him how Leo had approached them first because of Somersby’s old-fashioned attitude. Yes, she was sorry they weren’t doing the trial, but life goes on…
    ‘What were you doing last evening, Dr Flint?’
    ‘So I am under suspicion?’
    Garrett explained again that the questions were for elimination purposes and Connie told him that she’d been at home, nursing her son who had flu.
    ‘He’d come to stay with me for a few days. He began feeling unwell on Monday