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train began a series of doleful, unexplained stops, first in the middle of empty fields and then in the dispiriting fringes of West London. Unconsciously, he began grinding his teeth.
    “Well,” said the clergyman, “if our new Socialist government decides to nationalise the railways the Great Western will deserve everything that’s coming to them.”
    Forrester glanced up from his papers. “There are in fact times when the railway services between Oxford and London,” said the clergyman, “put me in mind of the more lurid passages in the Book of Revelation.”
    Forrester found himself smiling, realising that the man was trying to help, and answering in the same vein. “I wouldn’t be surprised,” he said, “if the Beast with Seven Heads isn’t the chairman of the board.”
    “Certainly the sandwiches on sale at the Oxford Station café could easily have been made by the Great Whore of Babylon,” said the clergyman. As if stung by the gibe, the train started again, wheezily.
    “Haven’t I seen you in my churchyard? Just yesterday, I think. I was considering asking you to come in out of the cold – except it’s not much warmer inside these days.”
    “Yesterday?” said Forrester, and then remembered. “Yesterday I was best left alone.”
    “Ah,” said the clergyman. “My name is Glastonbury, by the way. Vicar of St. Mary the Virgin.”
    “Duncan Forrester. Barnard.”
    A concerned look came over Glastonbury’s face.
    “I was so sorry to read about your loss,” he said, and when Forrester stared at him blankly he held up a copy of that morning’s
Oxford Mail
. Forrester felt as if he’d been kicked in the stomach; since the moment he’d woken he’d not given a thought to Lyall’s death. Suddenly it all came rushing back: the Icelandic readings, the body in the snow, Haraldson, Barber – and the probability that the murderer was one of his closest friends.
    “I’m so sorry,” said Glastonbury. “I didn’t mean to upset you. It’s just that I knew your Master before the war. I feel for the poor man with this happening right on his doorstep, so to speak.”
    “Yes, it’s a rotten business,” said Forrester. “How did you know Professor Winters?”
    “I used to edit a little magazine, and he wrote for it sometimes.”
    “Really? On the sagas?”
    “Not really. We dealt with cultural subjects, very high-minded. Whither Western Civilisation, that kind of thing.”
    “Whither indeed,” said Forrester.
    “Yes,” said Glastonbury, “whither indeed.”
    Glastonbury looked out of the window again. “My goodness, we actually seem to be arriving.”
    Forrester peered into a solid mass of thick yellow fog augmented by plumes of steam from waiting engines. Paddington Station echoed with the clang of carriage doors and dropped steamer trunks, while incomprehensible voices boomed from invisible loudspeakers high above in the rafters as Forrester stuffed his papers back into his briefcase.
    Glastonbury got to his feet and began pulling his case down from the rack. “Do drop in to the church the next time you’re nearby. If I’m not there, feel free to knock on the vicarage door. Depending on the time of day, there may be some very bad sherry available.”
    “Thank you,” said Forrester with a grin. “I may well take you up on that attractive offer.” And then, even before the train had come to a stop, he was on the platform, moving as fast as the crowd would allow.
    The fog inside the vast canopy of the railway station, illuminated fitfully by overhead lights, muffled Forrester’s footsteps and blanketed the murmur of the throng, lending the whole place an air of vast conspiracy. Porters’ trolleys piled high with crates and suitcases rattled past him as he wove his way through the crowds, hoping that, hours before, Clark had fled through here on his way out of the country.
    * * *
    As Forrester left the train in London, in Oxford, about a mile from the college, Arne Haraldson was