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standing beside the drinks-table, no more than a couple of yards from the door, raised the index-finger of her non-drinking hand to signify her identity.
    'Could I have a quiet word with you, madam?' asked Sergeant Lewis.

8

    Madame, appearing to imbibe gin and It in roughly equal measures, yet manages to exude rather more of the gin than of the 'it'
    (Hugh Sykes-Davies, Obiter Dicta)

    Inside the Manager's office, situated at the head of the first flight of stairs, Morse found his attention almost immediately drifting towards the large drinks-cabinet which stood to the left of the high-ceilinged suite of rooms wherein Mr Douglas Gascoigne, a bespectacled, intelligent-looking man in his early forties, sought, and sought successfully, to sustain the high standards of service expected from his multi-starred establishment. Early photographs, cartoons, diplomas, framed letters, and a series of pleasing watercolours, lined the walls of the main office, above the several tables on which VDU screens, print-out machines, telephones, in- and out-trays, fax machines, and file-cases abstracted from surrounding shelves, vied with each other for a few square feet of executively justifiable space. As in the St John's Suite, the curtains were drawn, this time across the window behind Gascoigne as he sat at his desk, concealing the view of the Ashmolean facade upon which, though from a higher elevation, Mrs Laura Stratton had gazed so very briefly some three hours earlier.
    'It's just' (Gascoigne was talking) 'that we've never had - well, not in my time - anyone actually dying in the hotel.'
    'Some thefts, though, I suppose?'
    'Yes, a few, Inspector. Cameras left around - that sort of thing. But never anything so valuable . . .'
    'Wonder why she didn't leave it in your safe, sir?'
    Gascoigne shook his head: 'We always offer to lock away anything like that but—'
    'Insured, was it?'
    'Mr Stratum' - the Manager lowered his voice and gestured to the closed door on his right - 'thinks probably yes, but he's still in a bit of a daze, I'm afraid. Dr Swain gave him some pills and he's still in there with one of his friends, a Mr Howard Brown.' And indeed Morse thought he could just about hear an occasional murmur of subdued conversation.
    Lewis put his head round the door and signified his success in securing the appearance of Mrs Sheila Williams. Gascoigne got to his feet and prepared to leave the two detectives to it.
    'As I say, just make use of any of our facilities here for the time being. We may have to keep coming in occasionally, of course, but—'
    'Thank you, sir.'
    So Gascoigne left his own office, and left the scene to Morse. And to Sheila Williams.
    She was - little question of it - a most attractive woman, certainly as Morse saw her: mid-thirties (perhaps older?), with glistening dark-brown eyes that somehow managed to give the simultaneous impression of vulnerability, sensuality, and mild inebriation.
    A heady mixture!
    'Sit down! Sit down! You look as if you could do with a drink, Mrs Williams.'
    'Well, I - it is all a bit of a shock, isn't it?'
    'Anything suitable in there, Lewis?' Morse pointed to the drinks-cabinet, not without a degree of self-interest.
    'Looks like he's just about got the lot, sir.'
    'Mrs Williams?'
    'G and T - that would be fine.'
    'Gin and tonic for the lady, Lewis . . . Ice?'
    'Why dilute the stuff, Inspector?'
    'There's no ice anyway,' muttered Lewis.
    'Look,' began Sheila Williams, 'I'm not myself in charge of this group. I do liaise with the group and arrange speakers
    and so on - but it's John Ashenden who's the tour leader.'
    Morse, however, appeared wholly uninterested in the activities of Mr Ashenden: 'Mrs Williams, I'm going to have to ask everyone in the group what they were doing between about four-thirty and five-fifteen this afternoon - that's between the time Mr Stratum last saw his wife and when he got back from his walk with, er, with Mrs Brown . . .'
    As Sheila tossed back the last of her G