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notice. It could be any time within the next three or four weeks. Just be ready.'
    He wrote a telephone number on a scrap of paper and raised his glass. 'To a long and profitable partnership,' he said.
    'No, Dinah, to a short and profitable one. Make no mistake, this is a one-off job, there'll be no repeat fees. I'll be in touch.'
    Back outside, I pulled on the waterproofs and crash helmet and drove back to Earl's Court where I dumped them with the bike behind a busy service station and walked to the flat. Three down, one to go.
    I'd gone to a lot of trouble to find Dinah but it had been worth it, and now I had three in the bag and all I needed to complete the set was a woman. Not just any woman but one who would sleep with a man for money, and do a few other extra little tasks for me. Got it in one, I was after a prostitute, but the last thing I wanted was a woman who looked like a whore. That would have been a dead giveaway, like 37 using a plastic maggot to catch a wily old pike. No, what I needed was something luscious, a tasty morsel that the old predator would fall for hook, line and sinker.
    Bleached hair, heavily rouged cheeks and thick eyeliner were out, she'd have to be young, intelligent and enthusiastic, but a professional. The sort of girl you'd be happy to see marry your brother, if you had a brother and if he was the marrying kind. My brother, David, isn't. And he never will be.
    So, step one, find your whore. That didn't appear to be a major problem, they're not hard to find in a big city. Or in a small town come to that. In Glasgow you'll find them around Blythswood Square, huddling on street corners waiting for a lift to the nearest multi-storey carpark where lusts are satisfied, almost, for as little as ten pounds. Birmingham, Manchester, Bristol, they've all got their red light areas, and what the hell I was in London which has more whores per head of population than anywhere else in Britain. One of the growth industries, servicing the foreign tourists and visiting businessmen.
    There was no way I was going to go kerb crawling around St. Pancras or walking through Soho on the off chance that I'd bump into the perfect pro to complete my gang of four. The only thing I'd pick up that way was an infectious disease. Doctor, doctor, I think I've got Hermes. Don't you mean Herpes? No, I think I'm a carrier. I'd been lucky getting Iwanek so I was pretty impressed with the power of advertising. At a local newsagent, not the one who'd got me Professional Soldier, I picked up a couple of guides to what's on in London and also managed to find a contact magazine, 'Middle-aged executive with own house and understanding wife seeks young blonde with big breasts for friendship with a view to unnatural sex', you know the sort of thing.
    The contact magazine was worse than useless and went straight in the bin. One of the London guides had a series of adverts for massage parlours and private masseurs that 38 looked more promising, some of them offering a rub down in private apartments, discipline in your own home, a few were even in Arabic.
    Five seemed hopeful, three in the West End, one in the City and another south of the Thames. I rang them all and the Kennington number was answered by a man so that was a definite non starter. The other four sounded like the same girl, a treacly deep voice, stroking the back of my neck and tickling me under the chin, all could fit me in, when did I want to come round, what was my name, they looked forward to seeing me.
    Despite the personal nature of the adverts the three in the West End were all massage parlours, the only privacy was in the form of tiny cubicles and a production line of girls in bikinis and sweat, cold eyes and warm hands. I didn't bother revealing I was a reporter, I just left.
    The girl in the City turned out to be five feet four, long blonde hair and blue eyes and living on the tenth floor of one of the tower blocks in the Barbican complex. She was in her late thirties