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gutters.
    He was paralyzed by the sheer horror of it.
    A cyclist came racing around the corner, skidded, slewed across the road and hit him, knocking him over. He was bruised and his skin torn, his chest for a moment unable to move, to draw in breath. With difficulty he gasped in air at last and straightened very slowly to his knees, dizzy and aching.
    An old lady was hurrying towards him, her face creased with concern.
    “Are you alright?” she asked anxiously. “Stupid boys. They’re going much too fast. Didn’t even stop. Are you injured?” She offered her hand to help him up, but she looked too frail to take any of his weight.
    He stood upright, surprised to find that apart from being thoroughly wet from the gutter, he was actually not damaged. His jacket sleeves and his shirt cuffs were sodden with rainwater, dirty grey, his trousers the same. There was a tiny red smear of blood on his palm where he had scratched it.
    “Yes, I think I’m all right, thank you,” he replied. “I was standing in the way, I think. Just … staring …” There was nothing left of the images of blood, just an ordinary asphalt road with puddles of rain gleaming in the last of the sunset. He wouldn’t tell Hank about this. As he had always said, most supernatural phenomena were just over-excited imaginations painting very human fears onto perfectly normal situations.
    Nevertheless when he saw Hank later on, having washed, changed his clothes and had a very good supper, he found him also unusually concerned.
    “Can you work out why we can’t photograph this scroll yet?” Monty asked as they sat with late coffee and an indulgence of After Eight mints.
    “No,” Hank said candidly. He gave a slightly rueful smile. “For once, logic eludes me. I can’t think of any reasonable answer. I imagine there’s an explanation as to how those three men knew of the scroll at all, when you didn’t advertise it. I suppose since they knew you had it, it wasn’t a great leap to track down poor Roger. Monty …”
    “What?”
    “We have to settle this issue straight away. I don’t think I’m being alarmist, but if they’d kill Roger for it, they aren’t going to accept a polite delay from you.”
    The increasing darkness that had been growing in Monty’s mind now suddenly took a very specific shape. Heat raced through him as if he felt flames already.
    “I’ve no idea what price to put on it,” he said desperately. “I wish I’d never found the thing. Sergeant Tobias said she’d have her father come and look at it some time this week. What if they won’t wait? Or won’t pay what he says it’s worth? I suppose I should tell the Greville Estate solicitors, shouldn’t I?”
    “No,” Hank replied after a moment’s thought. “From what you told me, Roger bought the books as a job lot at auction. They belong to his estate, not the Grevilles. But you’re right, I don’t think you can wait until a valuation is put on the scroll. That could take quite a while, especially if it really is what the scholar claims it is. That would actually make it almost beyond price.”
    “Then what the hell can I do?” Monty demanded. “Give it to the British Museum?”
    Hank bit his lip. “Do you think the bishop, or Mr. Garrett will allow you to do that? Who do you think killed Roger?”
    Monty shut his eyes and ran his fingers through his hair. “I don’t know,” he admitted. “One of them, I suppose. Hank, what can I do?”
    Hank sat for a long time without answering.
    Monty waited.
    Finally Hank spoke, slowly and very quietly. “I don’t believe we can wait, Monty. I don’t know what this scroll is, but I do know it has great power. Whatever is in the scroll itself, or in what various men believe of it, that power is real, and it is very dangerous. Roger is dead already. I believe that we need to end the matter long before any experts can run their tests and verify it. For a start, I don’t think the bishop, or whoever he is, is