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dressing-down, in police parlance.
    Merriman’s face was red and his eyes bulging. “You must be a complete bloody idiot, Powell. The girl’s boyfriend reported her missing last night, and it comes to light that you stayed at her flat on Friday night!”
    “There is a perfectly reasonable explanation—” Powell began, sounding defensive in spite of himself.
    “Sleeping with a girl half your age is hardly a reasonable explanation.” Merriman was sneering now. “I know your type, Powell. You’re a bloody disgrace.”
    Powell had to resist the urge to leap over the desk and throttle his superior. “With the greatest respect, sir, I did not sleep with her, and, in any case, what I do on my own time is my own business,” he said in a carefully controlled voice.
    “Well, she’s gone missing now, hasn’t she?”
    “Apparently she was followed from the pub on Saturday night—”
    “What’s it got to do with you?” Merriman snapped. “Look, Powell, if there’s anything untoward going on here, I’ll have you on the dab so bloody fast your head will spin. In fact I’m going to make it my life’s work. Now get out.”
    Powell did not remember storming out of Merriman’s office nor slamming the door behind him. Eyes fixed straight ahead, he brushed past Detective-Sergeant Black, who wisely refrained from saying a word, and secluded himself in his office. He spent the next hour chain-smoking and considering his options. Then he made a decision and rang Tony Osborne.
    “Tony, this is strictly on the q.t., right?”
    “What’s up?”
    Powell explained about Jill Burroughs and Merriman.
    “That’s the trouble with living in commuterland,” Osborne said disapprovingly. “Whenever
I
have a snootful, I simply stagger home to my garret in Soho, easy as you please.”
    “The thing is, Tony, I know your lads are looking into the girl’s whereabouts, but I’d like to do a bit of poking around on my own. It’s something I feel I need to do.”
    There was only a moment’s hesitation. “Be my guest, mate, only you didn’t hear that from me. And you’re on your own hook, right?”
    “Of course.”
    “By the way, Erskine, I’m off to Spain for a fortnight starting Sunday. Why don’t you stay in my flat—lookafter things while I’m away. You might find it, er, a little more convenient as a base of operations.”
    Powell didn’t know what to say. “Let me think about it and get back to you. And thanks, Tony, you’re a prince among men.”
    “Right. Cheerio then, mate.”
    Powell leaned back in his chair and contemplated the benefits of taking his friend up on his offer. A hiatus in Tony Osborne’s flat in Lexington Street might be just what the doctor ordered: a change of scene, a sort of mental holiday. And no bloody weeds to worry about. By way of rationalization, he reckoned that with the time he saved by not having to commute, he could devote another couple of hours to the job each day. Whistling tunelessly, he began sorting through the notes that Detective-Sergeant Black had left on his desk.
    Tony Osborne called back later that morning. “I hear through the grapevine that you’re working on the Brighton case.” He paused. “I see. Then you’d better get your arse down here
toot sweet
, mate.”
    A half hour later, Powell was sitting in Osborne’s Savile Row office. Superintendent Tony Osborne was a big man with very little hair, a flamboyant handlebar mustache, and a mind as sharp as a razor. He had started out as a constable in Soho, eventually graduating to the Drug Squad where he quickly earned a reputation as an eccentric. A common method of passing drugs from buyer to seller on the street is by mouth. Money changes hands, then an intermediary of the opposite sex transfers the drugs to the buyer by means of a rather involvedand sloppy bout of tongue wrestling. Not surprisingly, few undercover police officers are keen to take possession of the essential evidence in this manner. Osborne,