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me lean on you. I liked that, it took nerve.”
    Colonel Hayburn put an arm round her shoulders and they staggered towards the railway terminus. He seemed happy again, now that the weather had cleared. He waved vaguely to the three men and climbed into the passenger seat of Emma’s Lotus Elan.
    “Where are we going?” he demanded.
    “To your regimental barracks,” she sighed.
    Hayburn talked all the way back, incoherently, but he meant well. He tried to tell her that she was initiated into the Werewolves and that he admired her spirit. He liked to encourage spirit when he saw it. He was going to make her an important person in the movement, because she had spirit. That sort of thing.
    “I mean, Emma, you mustn’t think we’re a lot of boy scouts. We’re a bloody serious organisation. Did I tell you we’ve seven million pounds at our disposal? I mean, that’s money, old girl. But that isn’t all. The seven million pounds is in solid gold, things like that. It isn’t in bloody pound notes. But we can make our own pound notes in a few weeks time. Did I tell you that? We shall soon have the presses that Hitler used to run off British currency during the war.”
    “I bet your bank manager calls you sir,” said Emma. Hayburn stared at her morosely as she turned left into the parade ground. “You aren’t the fluffy, submissive type, are you? What does it take to make you swoon?”
    Emma squealed to a halt beside the guard room door feeling distinctly faint. The car next to her was a green Speed Six Bentley, 1929 vintage.
    “Why not come in for a drink?” asked Hayburn. “It’s only half past three.”
    “That’s a nice idea.”
    “Good lord,” said Hayburn. “Really?”
    She pushed the files carefully under the driving seat and then helped Hayburn out of the low slung car. He was affected by the cold air. Eager to promise her power in the Werewolf revolution and anxious to make a pass at her, but he was having enough trouble remembering to act soberly. A colonel never sings first world war songs.
    “What the bloody hell’s going on?” he demanded as he fell through the door. “Don’t you people know that it’s half past three?”
    There were twenty or thirty people in the officers’ mess, half of them apparently policemen, and one of them dead. He was under a white sheet in the middle of the floor.
    “Colonel Hayburn?” asked a superintendent. “I’m afraid there’s been an accident. One of your men has been murdered.”
    “One of my men?” he mumbled. “What was he doing in the officers’ mess?”
    “A captain, actually. Name of Flamborough. Did you know him?”
    “Course I did. I’m the colonel. Knew old Freddie well. How did he cop it?”
    “I’m afraid he was strangled.”
    “Silly bugger. How can you strangle someone — I mean, he must have lost a fight or something. Unless he was drunk. I want a full report on this incident.” Emma sidled away while he was talking to the superintendent. She had seen the debonair character lounging in the corner with Cynthia and smoking a panatella. She was looking forward to meeting him.
    But he looked up as she approached. “Mrs. Peel,” he said superfluously, “we’re needed.”
     

Girl in a hot pink dress
     
    Steed looked up from the dining table and smiled. “While you’ve been living, going to parties in fancy dress and gadding about with Colonel Haystack, I’ve been doing a little research.”
    Emma nodded patiently. “The name is Hayburn. And I still don’t understand how you were on the scene of the crime last night.”
    “I stumbled across the Werewolves when a despatch rider was killed down the lane. And the more I thought about it,” he said complacently, “the more dubious it seemed. Sol pottered about. I spoke to his commanding officer, who denied knowing what a Werewolf was, and that convinced me that he knew quite a bit. After all, ask most innocent people what is a Werewolf and they’ll start telling you about the