"A search through the newspaper's files. I want to know if there have been any other newsworthy incidents at Launde Abbey, specifically in the period between four and fifteen years ago."

Simms looked thoroughly disgruntled. "Typical of my luck. Mrs Mandel, if you had come in here asking for anything else we could have obliged. But that is out. Sorry."

"Your files can't be that confidential," she said. "I only want to see what was previously reported."

"It's not a problem with confidentiality. You don't understand. I want to help, but…" He waved a hand at the Marconi terminal on his desk. "We no longer have that data in our memory core."

"That seems very odd."

"Not really, just unfortunate. Look, we were an actual newspaper until 2005, black ink on real paper, then we switched to broadcasting on the local datatext channel, same as all the other regional newspapers. We leave features running for forty-eight hours, but the news items are updated every three hours if need be. It's a good system, any cybofax can receive it. We can turn over a lot of data, cover anything from stories like Edward Kitchener's murder to the results of village flower shows, and never have to worry about capacity the way they did with paper. Any conceivable piece of information which local people would be interested in is available. Naturally, with that volume of data, everything was stored in a lightware memory." His jaw tightened. "Then some bastard hotrod went and crashed it all when the PSP fell. They actually went and left a message which said it had been done because we were part of the Party's propaganda effort. Jesus, if they knew what we went through to get stuff past the PSP's editorial approval officer. We might not have been out there physically fighting the People's Constables, Mrs Mandel, but we did our bit. It's not bloody fair! Who the hell are they to sit in judgement?"

"So there's no local record of the PSP years at all?" Eleanor asked.

"No. We've got a complete microfiche library of newspaper issues from 2005 dating back to about 1750, some copies go back even further than that, would you believe. And we now have a triplicated lightware memory of the last four years. But there's a thirty-five year gap between the two, and no way on earth of plugging it. It's bloody disgusting. That's our local history they killed."

Eleanor consulted Gabriel, who was frowning thoughtfully. "I only knew about the hotrods crashing the Ministry of Public Order mainframe," she said.

"How about you, Mr Simms?" Eleanor asked. "You covered the area in that time. Do you remember anything happening out at Launde Abbey?"

"I was in Birmingham when the PSP rule started. I didn't come back here until seven years ago. But no, I can't remember anything. Kitchener himself got the occasional mention, of course. Some of the scientific papers he published were contested by other scientists. Frankly, there were more important issues at the time. We didn't give him a lot of coverage. What type of incident were you looking for?"

"I don't know." She rose to leave. "By the way, our deal stands."

"Thanks."

"So as a final favour, could you tell me if there is anywhere else we could go that might have records of that period?"

"It pains me to say it, but you might try our rivals, the Rutland Times, or the Melton Times, possibly even the Leicester Mercury"

CHAPTER TWENTY

Jon Nevin showed his card to the lock, and the bolts clicked back.

"Thanks," Greg said as he walked into the cell. There was no response.

Back to square one, he thought. He pretended be wasn't bothered by the detective's attitude.

Nicholas Beswick was sitting cross-legged in the middle of his cot. He opened his eyes as Greg came in, but made no attempt to move.

The boy had undergone a profound change in the last three days, there was no sign of the angst-burdened student Greg had interviewed at the start of the inquiry. He ordered a secretion from his gland, and examined the smooth cadence of Nicholas's thought currents. Again there was virtually no trace of the old jittery mind.

Maybe it was a good thing, that earlier Nicholas would have been crucified under cross-examination by a professional prosecutor. But Greg couldn't help thinking that if the boy had changed so drastically once…

"I don't know who is the most unpopular at this station right now," he said, "you or me."

Nicholas favoured him with a sly smile, a welcome from one conspirator to another. "It's me. You only irritate them. I disgust them."

"Yeah. What you did this morning was a bit over the top, wasn't it? Sending your sister as well as your parents. You upset Eleanor, you know."

"Exactly how many qualms should a condemned man own? I need you, very badly. There is nothing I wouldn't do to reach you."

"Jesus."

"I know what you're thinking. He's changed so much, attitude-wise. If he's done it once, could he do it twice? That's right, isn't it?"

Greg grinned, and pulled the single wooden chair into the middle of the cell, straddling it saloon style, with his elbows resting on its back. "You really have got a brain in that head of yours, haven't you?"

"Not good enough to think me out of here."

"That's a fact, and no messing."

"But you're going to work on the case again, aren't you? Mum said you were. She came back at lunchtime, her and Emma. I didn't know my parents were going to bring Emma with them. She's a lovely girl, we get on really well. Can you think how they're going to treat her at school after this? God!"

Just for a moment the old Nicholas peeped through, insecure and desperate.

"Yeah. I'm still on the case. There are a couple of ambiguities that are bothering me. But, Nicholas, if I clear them up and you still look guilty, an army of weeping relatives isn't going to bring me back."

"I understand. I'm grateful, really. You're the only hope I've got. Lisa Collier is just going through the motions."

"OK. Tell you, the way it is, Vernon Langley and the prosecutor are going to nail you with that knife we found. Everything else is circumstantial, and I'm sure Lisa Collier will do her utmost to crush any testimony Eleanor and I provide for the prosecution. But that knife… I'm still not entirely convinced you didn't do it. I saw you."

Nicholas brightened. "I had one idea: a doppelganger, a tekmerc who underwent a total plastique reworking to look like me. If one of the others had seen him walking about in that guise they wouldn't have thought anything of it. And I never used to say much, so they wouldn't expect him to talk to them. Just blush and walk on, that's what I normally did."

"Yeah, plausible. Except Eleanor and I watched you go back to your room after you hid the knife and burnt the apron."

"Oh."

"I want to ask you some more questions. Do you want to get Lisa Collier to sit in?"

"No. I don't think I can dig myself any deeper in, can I?"

"There is that. OK, first: did Kitchener ever mention an incident that happened a few years ago?"

"What incident?"

"That's my problem. I remember seeing some news item about Launde maybe ten or so years back, but I can't remember what it was."

"No, nothing comes to mind. Kitchener always had so many complaints about the past, people he knew, politicians he'd argued with, the other professors back at Cambridge, that kind of thing. His entire life was one giant collection of incidents, really."

"Yeah, I suppose it was. Well keep thinking about it; if anything does spring to mind get Lisa Collier to contact me at once. OK?"

"Yes."

"Right, now you're sponsored by the Randon company, aren't you?"

"Yes, they pay me an allowance, more like a salary actually, eight thousand New Sterling a year for the whole time I'm at Launde. Can you believe that much money? I sent two thousand back to Mum and Dad; they really struggled to help when I was at Cambridge, and I don't spend much at the Abbey, you see. Then there's a fund for any equipment I need for projects. Within reason, of course. But I never used any of that, most of my research was data simulations, the Abbey's lightware cruncher was enough."