Numfon stood on the spot.

"Run, you silly cow," said the WPC.

Numfon looked back, then started to walk away. She was bawling.

Margaret pulled the WPC inside.

"What's your name?" she asked, leading her through into the living room.

"Jane McDowell," said the young woman.

"Would you like a cup of tea?" asked Liz.

"No, thank you," said the WPC, a.s.sessing the situation.

What she saw, on the floor, was a pile of toy guns. Then she looked at the guns the hostage takers were holding. First Bee's, then Liz's and, finally, turning her head round as far as it would go, at Margaret's.

"Is this some kind of sick joke?" she said.

"Gag her," said Margaret.

"We can talk," said the WPC.

"Now, why would we want to do that?" asked Bee, before placing a strip of tape across Jane McDowell's mouth.

The phone rang, was answered.

"They want to know what else we want," said Bee.

"Tell them 'World Peace'," said Margaret.

"We want World Peace."

Bee listened.

"He says, 'Don't we all?'"

"No, we don't," said Liz. "That's the whole point."

"World Peace, now!" shouted Bee, into the receiver. "Stop the violence."

She clattered it back on to the phone.

"So, Optimus Prime," began Margaret. "What should we do with the policewoman?"

Optimus Prime looked at the dark uniform.

"She hasn't got a gun," he said.

"No," said Bee. "But we do."

"Is she a real policeman?"

"I don't know," said Liz. "What do you think?"

"I think she's not a real policeman because a real policeman wouldn't just surrender and come in like that. They would fight and stop you."

"I think you're right, Optimus Prime," said Margaret. "I think she's just pretending to be a policeman."

"That's a very naughty thing to do, isn't it?" said Bee. "Really bad."

The WPC looked about in panic.

"Go on," said Bee. "Shoot her with your laser."

Optimus Prime hesitated.

"She deserves it," said Liz.

The boy stood up and pointed the laser at the WPC's face. Then, making a shoom-shoom sound, he fired off two zaps straight between the eyes. A red light glowed faintly on Janet McDowell's forehead; the thing's batteries were going.

"Good boy," said the hostage-takers. "Well done. Fantastic."

Optimus Prime smiled a sideways smile. He did not look towards his father.

"Into the kitchen," said Margaret.

She and Liz bundled the WPC through the door and slammed it shut.

Two minutes later, Liz re-emerged, a smudge of blood on her left forehead. She was holding a carving knife.

"Margaret says you can finish her off, if you like."

Colin looked through the doorway, and saw the black-stockinged legs of Janet McDowell lying on the wood-effect lino of the kitchen floor. They twitched, once, twice.

Bee took the knife and went into the kitchen, leaving Liz to watch Colin and Optimus Prime. The father was trying to say something, making an anguished humming sound. He had known Janet McDowell since she was a baby. He had several times slept with her mother.

"Did you kill the woman?" asked Optimus Prime.

"Yes," said Liz.

"Why did you kill the woman?"

"Because there was no other way."

This didn't satisfy Optimus Prime, but he had no more questions.

Liz, holding her toy gun, went across to the window and gazed out. Then she began to turn her head towards Colin, so the first shot ripped her left ear off. The second, coming almost immediately, took away the top half of the head to which the ear had been attached.

In the kitchen, Margaret and Bee only had time to look up from the WPC's blood-wet body before the window shattered and Bee's left temple exploded.

Margaret dived to the ground, pushed the kitchen door open and crawled through into the living room.

She could hear the back door collapse as the police battering ram smashed through it.

Optimus Prime was curled foetal on the sofa; Colin had managed to stand up, intending to hop across to his son.

Margaret stood in the middle of the room, legs apart, pointing the toy gun defiantly at the doorway.

The first policeman through took her out with a shot to the chest, then finished her with three to the head.

"It's alright, son," he said to Optimus Prime, who had been spattered. "You're safe now."

THE MASQUERADE.

Sarah Rayne.

I SELDOM ATTEND parties unless I think they might be of use in my career, so it was all the more remarkable to find myself attending this one. This reticence is not due to shyness, you understand, nor to a lack of self-confidence I value myself and my attainments rather highly. But I have always shunned larger gatherings the chattering, lovely-to-see-you, how-are-you-my-dear, type of event. Loud music, brittle conversation, ladies air-kissing one another and then shredding each other's reputations in corners. Not for me. My wife, however, has always enjoyed all and any parties with shrieking glee, telling people I am an old sobersides, and saying with a laugh that she makes up for my quietness.

But here I was, approaching the door of this house whose owners I did not know, and whose reasons for giving this party I could not, for the moment, recall.

It was rather a grand-looking house there was an air of quiet elegance about it which pleased me. One is not a sn.o.b, but there are certain standards. I admit that my own house, bought a few years ago, is well modest, but I named it "Lodge House" which I always felt conveyed an air of subdued grandeur. The edge of a former baronial estate, perhaps? That kind of thing, anyway. My wife, of course, never saw the point, and insisted on telling people that it was Number 78, halfway down the street, with a tube station just round the corner. I promise you, many is the time I have winced at hearing her say that.

This house did not appear to have a name or a number, or to need one. There was even a doorman who beckoned me in; he seemed so delighted to see me I felt it would be discourteous to retreat.

"Dear me," I said, pausing on the threshold. I do not swear, and I do not approve of the modern habit of swearing, with teenagers effing and blinding as if it were a nervous tic, and even television programme-makers not deeming it always necessary to use the censoring bleep. So I said, "Dear me, I hadn't realized this was a fancy-dress party. I am not really dressed for it-" You might think, you who read this, that someone could have mentioned that aspect to me, but no one had.

"Oh, the costume isn't important," said the doorman at once. "People come as they are. You'll do very nicely."

He was right, of course. Dressed as I was, I should have done very nicely anywhere. I am fastidious about my appearance although my wife says I am pernickety. Downright vain, she says: everyone laughs at you for your old-fashioned finicking. I was wearing evening clothes one of the modern dress shirts the young men affect, with one of those narrow bow ties that give a rather 1920s look, and I was pleased with my appearance. Even the slightly thin patch on the top of my head would not be noticeable in this light.

Once inside, the house was far bigger than I had realized; huge rooms opened one out of another and the concept put me in mind of something, although I could not quite pin down the memory. Some literary allusion, perhaps? It would be nice to think I had some arcane poet or philosopher in mind, but actually I believe I was thinking of Dr Who's Tardis. (Pretentious, that's what you are, my wife always says. We all have a good laugh at your pretensions behind your back.) There were drinks and a buffet, all excellent, and the service Well! You have perhaps been to those exclusive, expensive restaur ants in your time? Or to one of the palatial gentlemen's clubs that can still be found in London if one knows where to look? Then you will have encountered that discreet deference. Food seemed almost to materialize at one's hand. I was given a gla.s.s of wine and a plate of smoked salmon sandwiches straight away and I retired with them to a corner, in order to observe the guests, hoping to see someone I knew.

The term "fancy-dress" was not quite accurate after all, although a more bizarre collection of outfits would be hard to find anywhere. There was every imaginable garb, and every creed, colour, race, ethnic mix every walk of society, every profession and calling. Try as I might I could see no familiar faces, and this may have been why, at that stage, I was diffident about approaching anyone. It was not due to my inherent reticence, you understand: in the right surroundings I can be as convivial as the next man. This was more a feeling of exclusion. In the end, I moved to a bay window to observe, and to drink my wine it was a vintage I should not have minded having in my own cellars. Well, I say cellars, but actually it's an under-stairs cupboard containing several wine-racks bought at our local DIY centre. It is not necessary to tell people this, however, and I always remonstrated with my wife when she did.

By an odd coincidence, the wine seemed to be the one I had poured for my wife quite recently, although I have to say good wine was always a bit of a waste on her because she never had any discrimination; she enjoys sugary pink concoctions with paper umbrellas and frosted rims to the gla.s.s. Actually, she once even attended some sort of all-female party dressed as a Pina Colada: the memory of that still makes me shudder and I shall refrain from describing the outfit. (But I found out afterwards that Pina Colada translates, near enough, as strained pineapple, which seems to me very appropriate.) But on that evening we had been preparing to depart for my office Christmas dinner, so I was hoping there would be no jazzily-coloured skirts or ridiculous head-dresses. It's a black tie affair, the office Christmas dinner, but when my wife came downstairs I was sorry to see that although she was more or less conventionally dressed, her outfit was cut extremely low and showed up the extra pounds she had acc.u.mulated. To be truthful, I would have preferred to go to the dinner without her, because she would drink too much and then flaunt herself at my colleagues all evening; they would leer and nudge one another and I should be curdled with anger and embarra.s.sment. Those of you who have never actually walked through a big office and heard people whispering, "He's the one with the s.l.u.tty wife", can have no idea of the humiliation I have suffered. I remember attending a small c.o.c.ktail party for the celebration of a colleague's retirement. Forty-three years he had been with the firm and I had been asked to make the presentation. A silver serving dish had been bought for him I had chosen it myself and it was really a very nice thing indeed and a change from the usual clock. I had written a few words, touching on the man's long and honourable service, drawing subtle attention to my own involvement in his department.

You will perhaps understand my feelings when, on reaching the hotel, my wife removed her coat to display a scarlet dress that made her look this is no exaggeration like a Piccadilly tart. I was mortified, but there was nothing to be done other than make the best of things.

After my speech, I lost sight of her for a couple of hours, and when I next saw her, she was fawning (there is no other word for it) on the Chairman, her eyes glazed, her conversation gin-slurred. When she thanked him for the hospitality she had to make three attempts to p.r.o.nounce the word, and by way of finale she recounted to four of the directors a joke in which the words c.o.c.k and tail figured as part of the punchline.

The really infuriating thing is that until that night I had known absolutely and surely known! that I was in line to step up into the shoes of my retiring colleague. I had been pa.s.sed over quite a number of times in the past (I make this statement without the least shred of resentment, but people in offices can be very manipulative and the place was as full of intrigue as a Tudor court), but this time the word had definitely gone out that I was in line for his job. Departmental head, no less!

And what happened? After my wife's shameless display at the retirement c.o.c.ktail party they announced the vacancy was to be given to a jumped-up young upstart, a pipsqueak of a boy barely out of his twenties! I think I am ent.i.tled to have been upset about it. I think anyone would have been upset. Upset, did I say? Dammit, I was wracked with fury and a black and bitter bile scalded through my entire body. I thought you lost that promotion for me, you b.i.t.c.h, but one day, my fine madam, one day . . .

Nevertheless, I still looked forward to that year's Christmas party. I had always counted the evening as something of a special event, so before we left, I poured two gla.s.ses of the claret I kept for our modest festivities, setting hers down on the low table by her chair. She did not drink it at once that was unusual in itself and it should have alerted me, but it did not. I remember she got up to find my woollen scarf at my request, and then, having brought it for me, asked me to go upstairs for her evening bag. She knows I hate entering her over-scented, pink-flounced bedroom, but she sometimes tries to tempt me into it. I have learned to foil her over the years: the room makes my skin crawl and her physical importunities on those occasions make me feel positively ill. It was not always so, you understand. I fancy I have been as gallant as any man in my time.

So, the evening bag collected as hastily as possible, I sat down with my wine although it was not as good as it should be. There was a slight bitter taste it reminded me of the almond icing on the Christmas cake in its tin and I remember thinking I must certainly complain to the wine shop. I set down the gla.s.s, and then there was confusion a dreadful wrenching pain and the feeling of plummeting down in a fast-moving lift . . . Bright lights and a long tunnel . . .

And then, you see, I found myself here, outside the big elegant mansion with the doorman inviting me in . . .

It was instantly obvious what had happened. The sly b.i.t.c.h had switched the gla.s.ses while I was getting her evening bag. She realized what I was doing perhaps she saw me stir the prussic acid into her gla.s.s while she pretended to find my scarf, or perhaps she had simply decided to be rid of me anyway. But whichever it was, I drank from her gla.s.s and I died instead. The cheating, double-faced vixen actually killed me!

It seems this house is some sort of judgment place, for the doorman came back into the room a few moments ago and said, "Murderers' judgments" very loudly, exactly as if he was the lift-man at a department store saying, "Ladies' underwear".

Are these oddly-a.s.sorted people all murderers then? That saintly-looking old gentleman in the good suit, that kitten-faced girl who might have posed for a pre-Raphaelite painting? That middle-aged female who looks as if she would not have an interest beyond baking and knitting patterns . . .?

Having listened to fragments of their talk, I fear they are.

". . . and, do you know, if it had not been for the wretched office junior coming in at just that moment, I would have got away with it . . . But the stupid girl must go screaming off to Mr Bunstable in Accounts, and I ended in being convicted on the evidence of a seventeen-year-old child and the bought-ledger clerk . . . Twenty years I was given . . ."

"Twenty years is nothing, old chap. I got Life and that was in the days when Life meant Life . . ."

". . . entirely the auditor's own fault to my way of thinking if he hadn't pried into that very small discrepancy in the clients' account, I shouldn't have needed to put the rat poison in his afternoon tea to shut him up . . ."

". . . I always made it a rule to use good old-fashioned Lysol or Jeyes' Fluid to get all the blood off the knitting needle and they never got me, never even suspected . . . But that man over there by the door, he very stupidly cut costs: a cheap, supermarket-brand cleaner was what he used, and of course it simply wasn't thorough enough and he ended his days in Wandsworth . . ."

". . . my dear, you should never have used your own kitchen knife, they were bound to trace it back to you . . . An axe, that's what I always used, on the premise that you can put the killing down to a pa.s.sing homicidal maniac what? Oh, nonsense, there's always a homicidal maniac somewhere I've counted six of them here tonight as it happens matter of fact I've just had a gla.s.s of wine with a couple of them . . . Charming fellows . . ."

Well, whatever they may be, these people, charming or not, I'm not one of them. I'm not a murderer. This is all a colossal mistake, and I have absolutely no business being here because I did not kill my wife. I suppose a purist might argue that I had the intention to kill her, but as far as I know, no one has yet been punished for that, although I believe the Roman Catholic Church regards the intention as almost tantamount to the actual deed- And that's another grievance! I may not actually have attended church service absolutely every Sunday, but I never missed Easter or Christmas. As a matter of fact, I rather enjoy the music one gets in a church. (Once I said this to my wife hoping it might promote an interesting discussion, you know but she only shrieked with laughter, asked if I was taking to religion, and recounted a coa.r.s.e story about a vicar.) But I have been a lifelong member of the Church of England and I should have thought as such I would have been taken to a more select division. However, there may be a chance to point this out later. Presumably there will be some kind of overseer here.

It's unfortunate that for the moment I seem to be shut up with these people with whom I have absolutely nothing in common. And all the while that b.i.t.c.h is alive in the world, flaunting her body, drinking sickly pink rubbish from champagne flutes. Taking lovers by the dozen, I shouldn't wonder, and living high on the hog from the insurance policies . . . Yes, that last one's a very painful thorn in the flesh, although I hadn't better use that expression when they come to talk to me, since any mention of thorns in the flesh may be considered something of a betise here. They'll have long memories, I daresay.

But I shall explain it all presently, of course. There's bound to be some kind of procedure for mistakes. I shall stand no nonsense from anyone, either. I did not kill my wife, and I'm d.a.m.ned if I'm going to be branded as a murderer.

I'm d.a.m.ned if I am . . .

TAKE DEATH EASY.

Peter Turnbull.

Monday.

In which in the sultry month of August in the golden Vale of York, a loathsome man with a loathsome machine makes a loathsome find, and a woman fulfilled becomes a woman haunted.

HIS NEW TOY, she thought, said it all. And it said the end, after ten years it was the end, as, eventually, she knew it would be. No more hiding from it, or from him. It astounded Sandra Schofield that it had taken her ten years to "see" her husband, to see that she had been worshipping a myth. They had met at university, both students of English literature. She had immersed herself in her course, entered into the spirit of it, and had obtained a great enrichment from it and had been awarded a lower second. She could have got a 2:1 her tutor said, but her old problem of tending to write unfinished sentences had been her downfall, so a 2:2 it had to be. Gary Schofield who liked being called "Gaz" as he had been in primary school, also on the same course, had been awarded a First. She a.s.sumed that he had had the same att.i.tude to the course as she, and whilst she had taken a modest 2:2, he on the other hand had taken an impressive First and you don't get better than that. She could only respect him. She respected him further when with his First he went to teach in an inner city school, while she had gone to teach in a traditional genteel girls' grammar school where the pupils want to learn and school discipline is not an issue. The truth emerged slowly, and two children and ten years later it was inescapable. It emerged because of a comment here, an att.i.tude there, and its emergence was hindered by her initial refusal to believe what she was hearing. It was for example his boast, his boast, that their second year Shakespeare paper consisted of questions on either King Lear or Julius Caesar, and that Lear being a minefield when it came to examinations, and Caesar being a simple play by comparison, he had gone in knowing nothing at all about Lear, had not even read Lear that year, but had depended solely on his knowledge of Caesar, of which he knew so much. She on the other hand had familiarized herself with both plays, read both, read all the critics on both. She had taken the lesser degree. And that's how he had done it; examination technique, not as she had thought, academic brilliance. Not cheating by any means, but there was something cynical and exploitative about it. When she realized that, Sandra Schofield realized that after all her husband just would not thrill to three words, or even three lines of Shakespeare. And the throwaway remark by which she learned why he had taken a job in the inner city school: inner city schools are not expected to produce good results anyway, so there's less pressure on the teaching staff. So while she stayed up until midnight marking the homework of her pupils who were going to become doctors and lawyers, he spent the evening in front of the television or in the pub in the village because inner city children don't do homework. Set as much homework as you like, it won't get done. After ten years to settle in the harsh North of England out of devotion to her new husband who would not leave Yorkshire, she realized that her husband was a lazy, cynical, self-centred, emotionally immature individual. She grew to find him loathsome. And his new toy said it all.