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resident in the hope of obtaining some clues.
    ‘In an investigation such as this one time is your enemy, Harry. At the moment it’s on our side. She can’t have gone too far. You checked out the London stations and airports, didn’t you?’
    ‘There’s been no sighting of her. Nothing. But a woman like that has to have friends. She could be hiding out right under our noses, or they could have driven, sailed or flown her out of the country by now.’
    All the while Harry and his superior were talking, Harry kept his gaze on a silver-framed photo of Olivia standing on his desk. She was incredibly beautiful, like fire and ice. She had a classicalaristocratic English beauty with a seductive flame that burned bright beneath. He had taken the photograph from on top of the piano in Olivia’s drawing-room at Albany on Piccadilly, one of the smartest, most exclusive addresses in London.
    ‘Sir, we’re dealing here with anything but a common criminal,’ Harry observed. ‘It’s the privileged classes we’ll be dealing with and my guess is they’ll close ranks. Lady Olivia’s friends and relations and the anglophile Arabs who surrounded the prince will be more of a hindrance than a help. We’ll be out on our own on this one. Co-operation will hardly be the name of the game.’
    ‘That’s why you were assigned this investigation. You know how to deal with that sort. You can be unorthodox but you never overstep the mark. Run this case any way you like, I’ll give you as much assistance as I can and fend off the press as much as is possible.’
    With that the commissioner rose from his chair as did Harry. The two men shook hands and the commissioner left the room. Harry sat down again. He took the silver-framed photograph in his hands and studied Olivia’s face for a considerable time. He drew her into his subconscious, wanting to carry her with him. He hoped to achieve a sense of her, to get into her head, think the way she would be thinking, predict how she would react to being on the run, so that he could pre-empt her movements and track her down.
    Within hours the crazies as well as the Good Samaritans would be calling in with sightings of Lady Olivia. Every last one of them would have to be followed up. If only one per cent of the calls was genuine luck was on Harry’s side. He rang the ward room and asked for two young detectives, Joe Sixsmith and Jenny Sullivan.
    They entered the room together. The three of them had worked well as a team before. Sixsmith and Sullivan were familiar with this new breed of detective of which Harry was the best New Scotland Yard had to offer. They were somewhat in awe of his crack investigative mind, his posh voice and knowledge of the English aristocracy and how it works. Behind his back fellow officers referred to him as The Gent, because of his public school and Cambridge education, his Savile Row suits:hound’s-tooth, grey flannel; blue fine cotton shirts; the subtle burgundy silk tie, and always the tiny white orchid in his lapel.
    Computer literate, he was able to use that together with his agile, enquiring mind and impressive range of contacts. Sixsmith and Sullivan had never met anyone quite like Harry Graves-Jones and they used him as an inspiration to rise that little bit higher in their work. They respected him as a man and loved him as a master detective.
    ‘Anything I should know?’ he asked his assistants now.
    ‘No further developments,’ said Joe Sixsmith.
    ‘Jenny, I want more men on the house to house. Extend the search to Knightsbridge, Belgravia and Chelsea now. If our lady’s still in London she’ll have sought refuge in one of those areas. A hundred men on the streets – see to it. Each hour that goes by is to her advantage. Any sightings, I want to know about them immediately. I’m going to lunch at my club – Joe, you can drive me.
    ‘Jenny, I want you to try the Bond Street shops. Enquire about her and anyone who habitually accompanied her. Find