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'Great, leave me here with my champagne,' Benny moaned. 'Second thoughts, Doctor, you do that.' She took another sip and gazed around the room. She was rather disappointed that none of the big celebrities were here.

Her intensive study of The Mirror over the last week meant that she knew exactly which pop stars and models ought to be at such a bash, but virtually everyone here was a politician or a scientist.

'I'm sorry to hear about the problems with your marriage,' a voice piped up nearby. Benny looked down. A little old woman in a red coat and hat was standing in front of her, clutching a handbag in front of her.

Benny swallowed a little more champagne. 'Heavens, word gets around, doesn't it?'

The old woman blinked at her through big round glasses. 'If it's any consolation, it sounds like it was al his fault.

And I loved Sense and Sensibility.' She disappeared back into the gathering, waving at someone with a TV

camera.

'Er yes ... me too!' Benny cal ed after her.

***

The Doctor bobbed through the crowds. He bumped straight into a man in a dark suit, stopping them both in their tracks. The man he had obstructed was in his late sixties, with thin white hair and an aquiline face.

'I know you ... ' the Doctor began.

25

'I should certainly hope so,' the man said, smiling a politician's smile. A couple of the people around him laughed nervously. They were all senior members of the government.

'Teddy Greyhaven. You were the Minister of Science in the nineteen-seventies. You oversaw massive government investment in science and technology.'

'I like to think that I kept the white hot heat of the technological revolution stoked up for a couple of years,' he said with mock-modesty. 'I'm Lord Greyhaven, now, though. I have very little influence nowadays.'

The Doctor's eyes narrowed. 'No, no. You wouldn't have.' He continued on his way, nearly colliding with the Home Secretary as he strode up to Greyhaven and his group.

***

Benny al owed the waiter to refil her glass. The Doctor had still not reappeared.

There was a tap on her shoulder and she turned.

'Hello stranger.' Eve Waugh was gorgeous in a halter-top dress that showed off her figure while keeping every inch of it swathed in powder-blue silk. The two women circled each other, looking each other up and down.

'I like your dress,' they said in unison, before laughing. Behind Eve, her cameraman was in his tuxedo, checking lighting levels.

'I can't interview you now,' Eve complained. 'That dress is strapless.'

'Is this some policy of the American networks that I should know about? Am I too rude for them?'

'In a way: when Alan does his standard head and shoulders shot, you'll look naked from the hat down.' Eve drew a line over her own chest with a finger by way of demonstration.

Benny glanced down at herself, a little self-consciously.

'Do you know anyone here?' Eve asked.

'I recognise just about everybody,' Benny said, looking back up, 'but I don't know any of them personally.'

'Do you know who that is? The black woman in the United Nations dress uniform?'

Benny peered across the room to the slight figure keeping close to the fire exit.

'Yes I do, as a matter of fact. That's whatsername ... Bambera.' Brigadier Winifred Bambera. Benny racked her brains, trying to remember when they had met - it had been outside Buckingham Palace, a couple of years in the future. 'She works for UNIT.'

At the mention of the name, Benny could have sworn that a couple of people around the room looked up.

'Really?' Waugh said seriously, 'Now, that particular organisation is one of my special hobbies. How much do you know about them?'

'Enough to know that we shouldn't discuss them too loudly in here. And enough to know that Bambera's here on business.'

'If she wasn't on business, she wouldn't be hiding that automatic pistol in her waistband. Maybe we'll carry on this conversation later? My hotel room?'

The Doctor materialised out of the crowd. 'I saw Ralph Cornish. He's over there, look, with his boyfriend.'