“Visitor, boss,” he growled. Blaine had been seated on his bed, but rose to his feet, facing Dennis.

“What’s this I hear about you, Mr. Henshall? Seems you’ve taken a right shine to Selina. She saw you driving past the house.” Blaine took a step closer, his tone jocular but face set like stone. “Now why would you do a thing like that? Can’t think your employers would be too thrilled…”

“She must’ve made a mistake.”

“That right? She got the make of car and the color: green Vauxhall Cavalier. Ring any bells?”

“She’s made a mistake.”

“So you keep saying. I know I told you plenty of men come to fancy her, but they don’t all go to your extremes, Mr. Henshall. You been following her? Watching the house? That’s my house, too, you know. How many times you done it? Cruising past… peeking through the curtains…” Blood had risen to Blaine ’s cheeks, a tremble entering his voice. Dennis realized that he was sandwiched between these two men, Blaine and Chalmers. No other warders around.

“You a bit of a perv, Mr. Henshall? Locked in that room of yours, reading all those love letters… give you a hard-on, does it? No wife to go home to, so you start sniffing around other men’s. What’s the Governor going to think about that, eh?”

Dennis’s face creased. “You thick bastard! Can’t even see what’s under your nose! She’s out there spending all your loot, shacking up with your pal Fred. I’ve seen them. Now she’s sold the house and she’s clearing off. You just had your last conjugal visit, Blaine, only you’re too stupid to see it!”

“You’re lying.” Beads of sweat had appeared on Blaine ’s forehead. His face was almost puce, and his breathing sounded ragged.

“She’s been conning you from the minute you walked in here,” Dennis rushed on. “Telling you she’s hard up when she spends rolls of cash in every clothes shop in town. Goes shopping with Fred, in case you didn’t know. He carries her bags, carries them all the way into the house. He’s in there for hours.”

“Liar!”

“We’ll soon find out, won’t we? You can call home, see if the line’s been disconnected yet. Or wait for her next visit. Trust me, it’ll be a while coming…”

Blaine ’s hands went out, and Dennis flinched. But the man was hanging on to him, not attacking him. All the same, Dennis cried out, just as Blaine slumped to his knees, hands still gripping Dennis’s uniform. Chalmers was yelling for help, running feet approaching. Blaine choking, clutching at his chest now as he fell onto his back, legs writhing. Then Dennis remembered: old ticker isn’t what it used to be...

“I think it’s a coronary,” he said, as the first of the warders rushed in.

The Governor had asked for Dennis’s version, which he’d had time to think about. Just passing… stopped to chat… next thing, Blaine ’s collapsing.

“Seems to tie in with Chalmers’s version,” the Governor had said, to Dennis’s relief. Of course, Blaine might have other ideas, always supposing he made it.

“He going to be all right, sir?”

“The hospital will tell us soon enough.”

Rushed to the Western General, leaving Chalmers in the doorway of the cell, looking stunned. His only words: “I might not be seeing him again…”

Dennis retreated to his office, ignoring knocks at the door: other warders, wanting to hear the story. He took out the photograph of Selina in her pink bikini. Maybe she’d get away with it now, get everything she wanted. And Dennis would have helped.

And she might never know.

It was nearly going-home time when another call summoned him to the Governor’s office. Dennis knew it would be bad news, but when his boss spoke, he got the shock of his life.

“ Blaine ’s escaped.”

“Sorry, sir?”

“He’s fled the hospital. Looks like it was a setup. A man and a woman were waiting for him, one dressed as a nurse, the other an orderly. One of the escort team has a concussion, another’s lost a couple of teeth.” The Governor looked up at Dennis. “He tricked you, tricked all of us. Bastard wasn’t having a heart attack. His wife and another man came visiting today. Probably making final preparations.”

“But I…”

“You entered the picture at the wrong moment, Henshall. Because an officer was there at the time, we took it that bit more seriously.” The Governor returned to some paperwork. “Just a bit of bad timing on your part… but a major bloody headache for the rest of us.”

Dennis staggered back to his office. It couldn’t be… it couldn’t be. What the hell…? He sat dazed until well past going-home time. Drove home as if by remote control. Slumped into his chair. The story was on the evening news: dramatic escape from hospital trolley. So that had been the plan all along… sell the house and make a clean break, either as a couple or with Fred in tow. Fred: accomplice rather than lover. Scheming with Selina to set her husband free. He took out the copies of her correspondence with Blaine, reading each one through, looking to see if there was anything he’d missed.

No, of course there wasn’t. They could have made plans each time they met. Always the chance of being overheard, of lips being read. But that had to be the way it was. Nothing more or less to it… Dennis couldn’t face sitting here a moment longer, surrounded by her letters, her photos, his senses flooded by memories of her: the shopping trip, her house, her clothing…

He walked to his local bar and ordered a whiskey with a lager chaser. Downed the whiskey in one gulp, shaking the remnants into the beer glass.

“Hard day, Dennis?” one of the regulars asked. Dennis knew him; knew his first name anyway. Tommy. He’d been drinking here for as many years as Dennis had. All Dennis really knew about him were his first name and the fact that he worked as a plumber. It was amazing how little you could know about someone. But there was a third thing: Tommy liked quizzes. Quizzes and puzzles. He was captain of the bar’s Pub Quiz team, and there were trophies behind the bar as proof of his prowess. He was busy right now: tabloid open at the “Coffee-Break Page.” He’d completed both crosswords and was working away at something else. Selina and her crossword puzzles.

Crosswords… and what was the other thing Blaine had said: acrobatics?

“Tommy,” Dennis said, “is there a word puzzle called an acrobatic?”

“Not that I know of.” Tommy hadn’t bothered looking up from his paper.

“A word like that then.”

“Acrostic, maybe.”

“And what’s an acrostic?”

“It’s when you’ve got a string of words and you take the first letter from each one. The cryptics use them a lot.”

“The first letter from…?”

Tommy looked ready to explain further, but Dennis was already heading for the door.

I miss your hard-ons. See, Paul, I’m totally, absolutely lovestruck!

And embedded in it, the word “hospital.” Dennis stared at his work, the work of several hours. Many of her letters contained no hidden messages. Those that did hid them within raunchy passages, presumably to stop anyone noticing them because-as Dennis had been-they’d be too busy reading and rereading the saucy bits.

Helping Elaine at Riddrie tomorrow. Perhaps ring our Bill, lift Elaine’s morale?

While Dennis had been wondering about the identities of Elaine and Bill, speculating on their relationship, Selina had been sending another message: “heart problem.” She’d suckered him. He’d never suspected a thing.

Fred’s off up north. (Denise isn’t talking to him-and not keeping sober!)

“Found it. Thanks.”

Found what? The cash, of course: another bundle of Blaine ’s cash. He eked it out to her a bit at a time, his way of ensuring she stuck around, or didn’t blow it all at once. His letters to her contained messages showing where the money was hidden. Little stashes all over the place. Blaine ’s were clumsier than Selina’s. Maybe Dennis would have spotted them, if he hadn’t been more interested in her.