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'We study mostly,' Ralph said.

it's OK, you don't have to convince me,' Bartok said, i know being a student's no free ride.'

Well, that's all right then,' Tommy said.

Bartok said, i just thought you were all like, uh you know, like, friends?'

'We are all like, uh you know, like, friends,' Meg said mockingly.

Tommy said in his most languid Hugh Grant voice, 'That doesn't mean we know where the leggy blonde and the guy with the shaved head are at any particular time.'

Bartok nodded. 'Any more than you knew where Joan Cox was,' he said.

'At any particular time.'

'Nasty,' Meg murmured.

'That wasn't our fault,' Ralph said.

'Nobody's fault,' Bartok agreed. 'People do what they do. Something I needed to ask you. Something I forgot when we chatted before.'

'Now we get to it,' Tommy said.

'Anybody for a refill?' Bartok offered.

Meg said, 'Let's hear what you want first.'

'The séance in Norswood. How did you know about the dead girl you were trying to contact?'

'What do you mean, how did we know about her?'

'Are you investigating that one too?' Tommy asked.

Ralph said, 'You don't think we had something to do with it do you?'

'It was years ago,' Bartok said. 'When she was killed you’d have been about the same age as she was.'

I don't understand the question then,' Ralph said.

'It's simple enough. Where did you hear about her? Who told you about her?'

Tommy drained his glass and plonked it back on the tray. 'Same again then please, since you're offering.'

'Joan Cox suggested the séance didn't she,' Bartok suggested. 'So was it her who knew about the murder? Was it her who mentioned it first?'

'I don't remember. Another pint would probably help my memory,' Tommy said and looked at Meg. 'I don't remember. Do you remember who mentioned it first?' He glanced at Ralph and smiled. 'Or was it you, Ralph? I think it might have been you actually. I think it was Ralph.'

It was Josh,' Ralph said very positively. 'I remember we were talking about psychics and the power to reach beyond the grave. And the purpose of doing it anyway. I think it was Josh. Yes, I'm almost sure that's who it was.

It was Josh.'

'The one with the shaved head,' Meg supplied.

'Yes,' Bartok said. 'I wonder how he knew about it.'

'You'll have to ask him that,' she said.

When he turns up,' Bartok said, getting to his feet. 'Same again all round is it?'

I do love a man with money,' Meg said. There is no such thing as an unattractive rich man.'

'What do you have to read to get into your line of work?' Ralph asked.

Bartok shrugged. 'Recruitment ads?'

'You don't have to be a graduate then?' Ralph said. 'I got the impression you might be a graduate.'

Bartok gathered up the glasses. Self-taught,' he said. Waiting table, all that sort of thing. All entirely self-taught.'

Tommy said, 'An autodidact in fact.'

'No,' Bartok said. 'I know nothing about cars.'

Chapter Thirteen

It seemed to Leela that they had been walking too quickly for too long a time. She was beginning to think it was taking much longer to cover the distance to Doctor Ghostbuster Bazzer Hitchins' laboratory than it should.

Something about what they were doing was wrong.

They were not lost. She knew she had remembered the way correctly. She knew this was the correct way she had remembered. They were not lost.

She had accurately followed her memory of the trail. She knew where they were. She knew it was where they were supposed to be. They were not lost. And yet and yet they did not seem to be getting to where they should be getting.

The student, Chloe, whose behaviour had been agitated when Leela first saw her but who seemed calmer now, did not appear to have noticed what was happening to them. From the way she kept glancing back over her shoulder she was still thinking about her imaginary walking corpse, but she was not as afraid of it as she had been.

Leela stopped walking and stood looking back in the direction Chloe had been glancing. For the briefest moment she