"On the force, indeed!" Sandra thought. Selena knew damn well that Alan was a policeman-in fact, that was the only reason she had ever talked to Sandra in the first place-and her way of digging for gossip was about as subtle as a Margaret Thatcher pep talk.

"Not much," Sandra lied. "There's not much to know, really."

"That Dorothy Wycombe's been having a right go at Alan, hasn't she?" Selena noted, with so much glee that the lah-de-dah inflection she usually imposed on her Northern accent slipped drastically around "having a right go."

"You could say that," Sandra admitted, gritting her teeth.

"Is it true?"

"Is what true?"

"That the police aren't doing much. Now, you know I'm no women's-libber, Sandra, but we do get treated just a teeny bit unfairly sometimes. It is a man's world, you know."

"Yes. As a matter of fact, though, they're doing quite a lot. They've brought in a psychologist from the university."

"Oh?" Selena raised her eyebrows. "What's he supposed to do?"

"She helps tell the police what kind of person this peeper is."

"But surely they know that already? He likes to watch women undress."

"Yes," Sandra said. "But there's more to it than that. Why does he like to watch? What does he do while he's watching? Why doesn't he have a normal sex life? That's the kind of thing the psychologists are working on."

"Well, that's not much use, is it?" Selena observed. "Not until they've caught him, anyway."

"That's what I came to see you about," Sandra said, forging ahead. "They're worried that he might not stop at looking-that might be just the beginning-so they're really stepping up the investigation. They've already got enough information to know that he checks out his areas before he strikes, so he knows something about the layout of the house. He probably finds out when people go to bed, whether the woman goes up alone first, that kind of thing. So I suggested that it would be a good idea if we all kept our eyes open for strangers, or anyone acting strangely around here. That way we could catch him before he did any real harm."

"Good lord!" Selena exclaimed. "You don't really think he'd come around here, do you?"

Sandra shrugged. "There's no telling where he'll go. They've not found any rhyme or reason to his movements yet."

Selena's hand shook slightly as she poured more tea, and she bit her bottom lip between her teeth. "There was something," she started. "It was last week- Wednesday, I think-it startled me at the time but I never really gave it much thought later."

"What was it?"

"Well, I was walking back from Eloise Harrison's. She lives on Culpepper Avenue, you know, two streets down, and it's such a long way around if you go right to the main road and along, so I cut through the back here. There's a little snicket between the houses in the next street, you know, so I just go out of our back gate into the alley, then cut through the snicket, cross the street, do the same again, and I'm right in Eloise's back garden.

"Coming back on Wednesday, it was quite dark and wet, a nasty night, and when I cut into our back alley I almost bumped into this man. It was funny, I thought, because he looked like he was just standing there. I don't know why, but I think if we'd both been moving we'd have really bumped into each other. Well, it made me jump, I can tell you that. There's no light out there except what shines from the houses, and it's a lonely sort of place. Anyway, I just hurried on through the back gate and into the house, and I never really thought much more of it. But if you ask me, I'd say he was just standing there, loitering."

"Do you remember what he looked like?"

"I'm sorry, dear, I really didn't get a good look. As I said, it was dark, and what with the shock and all I just hurried on. I think he was wearing a black raincoat with a belt, and he had his collar turned up. He was wearing a hat, too, because of the rain, I suppose, so I couldn't have seen his face even if I'd wanted to. It was one of those… what do you call them? Trilbies, that's it. I think he was quite young, though, not the dirty-old-man type."

"What made you think that?"

"I don't know, really," Selena answered slowly, as if she was finding it difficult to put her instincts and intuitions into words. "Just the way he moved. And the trilby looked too old for him."

"Thank you," Sandra said, anxious to get home and make notes while it was all still fresh in her mind.

"Do you think it was him?"

"I don't know, but the police will be thankful for any information about suspicious strangers at the moment."

Selena fingered the plunging neckline of her dress, which revealed exactly the right amount of creamy skin to complement her peroxide curls, moon-shaped face and excessive make-up. "If it was him, then he's been watching us. It could be any of us he's after. Me. You. Josephine. Annabel. This is terrible."

"I shouldn't worry about it that much, Selena," Sandra said, taking malicious pleasure in comforting the woman for worries that she, herself, had raised. "It was probably just someone taking a short cut."

"But it was such a nasty night. What normal person would want to stand out there on a night like that? He must have been up to something. Watching."

"I'll tell Alan, and I'm sure the police will look into it. You never know, Selena, your information might lead to an arrest."

"It might?"

"Well, yes. If it is him."

"But I wouldn't be able to identify him. Not in a court of law, or one of those line-ups they have. I didn't really get a good look."

"That's not what I mean. Don't worry, nobody's going to make you do that. I just meant that if he's been seen in the area, the police will know where to look."

Selena nodded, mouth open, unconvinced, then poured more tea. Sandra refused.

Suddenly, at the door, Selena's face brightened again. "I keep forgetting," she said, putting her hand to her mouth to stifle a giggle. "It's so silly of me. I've got nothing to worry about. I live right next door to a policeman!"

III

Sunday afternoon at Gristhorpe's farmhouse was a great success, though it did little for Banks's emotional confusion. On the way, he was not allowed to play opera in the car and instead had to put up with some dull, mechanical pop music on Radio One-mostly drum-machine and synthesizer-to keep Brian and Tracy happy. It was a beautiful day; the autumn sky was sharp blue again, and the season's hues glowed on the trees by the riverbank. In daylight, the steep dale sides showed a varied range of color, from the greens of common grazing slopes to the pink, yellow and purple of heather and gorse and the occasional bright edge of a limestone outcrop.

Gristhorpe greeted them, and almost immediately the children went off for a pre-dinner walk while the three adults drank tea in the cluttered living room. The conversation was general and easy until Gristhorpe asked Banks how he was getting on with the "lovely" Jenny Fuller.

Sandra raised her dark eyebrows, always a bad sign as far as Banks was concerned. "Would that be the Dr. Fuller you've been spending so much time with lately, Alan?" she asked mildly. "I knew she was a woman, but I'd no idea she was young and lovely."

"Didn't he tell you?" Gristhorpe said mischievously. "Quite a stunner, our Jenny. Isn't she, Alan?"

"Yes," Banks admitted. "She's very pretty."

"Oh, come on, Alan, you can do better than that," Sandra teased. "Pretty? What's that supposed to mean?"

"All right, beautiful then," Banks growled. "Sexy, sultry, a knockout. Is that what you want?"

"Maybe he's smitten with her," Gristhorpe suggested.

"I'm not smitten," Banks countered, but realized as he did so that he was probably protesting too forcefully. "She's being very helpful," he went on quickly. "And," he said to Sandra, "just so that I don't get accused of being chauvinistic about this, let me put it on record that Dr. Fuller is a very competent and intelligent psychologist."