'What you are saying is that you cannot move openly against him?' the Doctor asked.

'Yes, Doctor. A full investigation has already been initiated, but it will be low profile. You understand we do not want this news to get out just yet.'

'So you're saying that the investigation won't target Fostel specifically?'

'No.'

'But we have no idea what he intends to do with Susan when he's finished with her.'

'I'm sorry, Doctor.'

'Then I cannot continue to advise you on the Ship,' the Doctor replied bluntly.

'I understand,' Draad said sadly. 'All I can do is repeat that, officially, my hands are tied.'

Ian caught the subtle nuance in Draad's words. 'And unofficially? Suppose we find your proof. Better yet find Susan. Will you turn a blind eye?'

'I cannot let... excuse me, aliens take our law into their own hands.'

'We do not intend a rampage through your city,' said the Doctor. 'We would want Captain Lant's help anyway... if he's agreeable. He can ensure we do not overstep reasonable bounds. If we simply take Susan back from Fostel with the minimum of fuss, he can hardly make a public complaint, can he?'

'I'm willing if you give the word, Mayor,' Ben said.

Nyra said quickly: 'I want to help as well, Mr Mayor.

Susan is not fully recovered. Even if she's not been harmed physically, this sort of mental trauma may cause problems. I should be there to give medical a.s.sistance if required.'

Ben gave her a quick nod of approval and she flashed a warm smile back.

The mayor looked at them thoughtfully. 'Would you need to involve anybody else?' he asked Ben.

'Just my driver and a couple of men from the Wallguard I can trust.'

'All right. If the rest of you would withdraw I must speak to Captain Lant alone.'

When the doors closed Draad said: 'I wanted to speak to you anyway, Captain. I understand you've been spending some time in the Outer Zone. I a.s.signed you as escort to our guests and to see if you could find the Doctor's missing key.

Neither of these duties should involve chasing after ghosts.

Yes, I've heard about your researches.'

'The lead I was following was connected with the deceased NC2 who stole the Doctor's key,' Ben explained.

'As for ghosts, I did see something unusual in the zone while I was helping Chesterton search for his friend, but we had to break off our investigation when your call came through.'

'What did you see?'

'I'm not sure, sir. I wouldn't like to commit myself until I've investigated further.'

'Well, the safe recovery of Miss Foreman takes precedence over everything else for now.'

'Yes, Mayor.'

'You appreciate, if it emerges the Church is responsible, the situation must be handled with the utmost delicacy. The minimum of disturbance and nothing public.'

'I understand, sir. But if it comes to a choice between Miss Foreman's safety and that of her captors, what should I do?'

Draad looked at him levelly.

'Then, Captain, I should expect you to uphold the law.'

Ben emerged to find the others waiting for him somewhat impatiently.

Making calls on his pocket phone as he went, he led the way to a small conference room. They seated themselves at the long table in front of a multi-screen display wall.

'The mayor has instructed Monitor to give us unlimited and unrestricted access to all criminal files and public databases from here,' Ben explained. 'All the information that is available to the regular force is at our disposal.'

Several screens lit up on the wall displaying maps and strings of data updates. Ben scanned them rapidly.

'Apparently the regulars have just found the fake limousine the kidnappers used to take Susan from the hospital.' He saw the others look hopeful and added quickly: 'No trace of Susan, I'm afraid. The car was abandoned here.'

A point on the map of the city centre lit up. 'It'll be examined but it looks as if any biotraces were very thoroughly flushed.'

'How was the car found so quickly?' Ian asked.

'We have traffic cameras monitoring and recording all the main Inner Zone roads and junctions. The system caught the car after it left the hospital until it entered a blind spot and never came out.'

'A "blind spot"?' Ian asked.

'Somewhere outside traffic-camera range... underpa.s.ses, minor junctions shielded by intervening buildings, small off road parking bays, that sort of thing.'

'So Susan was transferred to some other vehicle, probably before the car was abandoned,' the Doctor said.

'Probably, but they wouldn't be stupid enough to make the transfer where they could be seen. The car pa.s.sed through three other blind spots before it got there. The switch could have taken place at any one of them. Tracking down and eliminating all the vehicles that also pa.s.sed through those points at about the same time could take days.'

'No doubt that is the procedure the regular investigation will follow,' said the Doctor dismissively. 'However, we start with the a.s.sumption that this Fostel was responsible. If that is so, where might he have taken her?'

'Not to his own residence or the cathedral,' Ben said.

'That would be too blatant even for him. The home of a Believer perhaps, or some commercial building. The Church does own a number of properties around the city.'

'Can we see them?'

Monitor displayed a map of the Inner Zone with Church properties highlighted in red. Apart from the cathedral, the bishop's palace and two other churches, there were over twenty lesser buildings.

'It'll still take too long to check them all,' Ian said. 'That's a.s.suming he hasn't had Susan taken to the Outer Zone.'

'Fostel stays close to the Ship like everybody else,' Ben said. 'Besides, he's on the council and knows any unauthorised vehicle leaving the centre would stand out among the dummy cars.'

'Dummy cars?' Nyra asked.

She didn't know about the deception, Ben realised. 'I'll explain later,' he promised.

'Let us stay with the possible locations we have for the moment,' said the Doctor. 'If our suspicions are correct we can perhaps reason backwards. Is there any correlation between vehicles observed close to any of these specific places and vehicles that intersected the path of the bogus car in any of the blind spots you mentioned?'

Ben's respect for the old man's intellect rose another notch. 'Yes, of course!'

'As confirmation, the same vehicle may have been seen leaving the same location prior to the time of the kidnapping as well as returning there after the transfer,' the Doctor added.

'Monitor: run an index scan according to the pattern the Doctor suggested. If you have no positive index match go for closest vehicle-type match.'

'There is a light goods transporter that fulfils these requirements, Captain,' Monitor replied promptly. 'It was recorded entering the junction of Eleventh Avenue and orbital four thirty-five minutes before Susan Foreman was abducted.

It left the junction three minutes after the car presumed to be carrying Miss Foreman pa.s.sed through. From this junction there is access to a parking bay that is not currently covered by traffic surveillance cameras.'

'Based on average traffic flow and the observed times of the limousine either side of the junction, was there time for it to have entered the bay?' Ben asked.

'There is a discrepancy of one minute and fifteen seconds between the observed travel time and average projected time over the same distance,' Monitor said.

'That sounds promising. Who owns the vehicle?'

The details flashed up on a screen and Ben read them off.

'The owner is a declared Believer. He used to run a health club in a building on the edge of the Inner Zone that's leased from the Church. The club closed almost a year ago.'

'That has to he it,' said Ian. 'How quickly can we get there?'

'We've got a few preparations to make first,' said Ben.

'Don't worry, I'm sure nothing further will happen to Susan for now. After taking all this trouble Fostel is going to want to question her personally. Just in case he tries to slip out of his palace in the middle of the night we'll have a watch put on it, but I'd guess he won't move until the morning at the earliest.

We'll have Susan safely out of there before he arrives.'

The Doctor contained his evident impatience and concern with a visible effort and merely nodded. He glanced across at an equally silent Ian.

'I'm sorry, Chesterton. This interferes with your search for Barbara.'

'Curton's crew are still on the job,' Ian said lightly. 'I'll get back to it once we find Susan.'

Ben looked at him curiously. He'd spoken quickly and easily, though his face was lined with worry. Was Ian privately losing hope of finding Barbara alive?

Chapter Twenty-One...You Are Nothing.'.

The cage, just high enough to allow Barbara to sit upright, pitched and swayed crazily, throwing her from side to side.

As she clung grimly to the padded bars she swallowed hard once again, partly to fight down growing motion sickness, but also in an attempt to make her ears pop. They had not recovered from the vacuum effect that had sucked her along the monstrous, improbable hose-pipe and dropped her into this dimly red-lit s.p.a.ce. Apart from the mechanism for aligning the end of the hose with the sliding doors on the roofs of a row of cages, the rest of the interior was quite featureless.

With a sudden painful click the pressure in her ears equalised and she could hear properly again.

'I'm Plaxander Vendam!' a man was shouting from a cage further along the row. 'My father's Lord Vendam! When he hears about this...' the voice faded uncertainly for a moment, then: 'Orm? If this is one of your tricks it's gone far enough!'

Barbara couldn't see much of him through the intervening bars, but he sounded frightened beneath his angry words. She was surprised to find that, now the initial shock had worn off, she herself felt puzzlement at her predicament rather than fear.

She'd had so many brushes with death over the last few days that perhaps she was learning to take the consequences in her stride.

There was a groan from the next cage. Through the bars she could just make out Susan trying to sit up.

'Oh... that was awful,' Susan said weakly. 'I thought it was a gigantic snake... I saw it eat you!'

'It was those two "eyes" that made us think of snakes, together with the hissing,' Barbara said. 'Maybe that was the idea. It was just a glorified vacuum-cleaner built into some sort of vehicle. Are your ears all right?'

'Just about. Who's that shouting?'

'I don't know. We haven't had time for introductions.

h.e.l.lo?' she called out to the man.

He ceased his angry demands and peered through the bars at them. Barbara saw wild eyes set in a young face.

'Who are you?' he demanded. 'Do you know who's responsible for this?'

'Sorry, we're just as much in the dark as you are. We're strangers in this city.'

'NC2s!' he said dismissively.

'What are NC2s?'

He looked at them more intently, his anger diminishing slightly. 'You're not the two alien women? The s.p.a.ce travellers? I thought one of you was in the hospital.'

Susan and Barbara exchanged puzzled glances, and Susan said: 'I think I was, briefly. How do you know about us?'

'They broadcast an interview with your companions.'

'They did? They're both all right?' Susan asked anxiously.