Tomorrow's ghost

was Army widow to Army widow now, sister to sister in misfortune although separated very nearly grand- daughter-grandmother in years.

Nannie nodded. 'Yes, he did.'

'I thought so.' Frances let the answer appear to confirm what might have been an intelligent guess, it would never do to reveal how much she knew about RSM Hooker and his lady, from the Butler file.

Unfortunately, Nannie didn't seem disposed to enlarge on the relationship. It was depressing to find that even the home-and-dry ground was still hard going.

'In the Lancashire Rifles?' There was no way Nannie could let that misapprehension go by, she had to correct it.

'No, dear -

No, dear! That 'dear' had been dearly bought, even haggled over, but she had it at last.

'No, dear. Mr Hooker was a Mendip - the Royal Mendip Borderers. The Colonel came to us in Korea, from the Rifles.' The nose moved elliptically between then, half correcting and half confirming. 'And he was a captain then, of course, when he came to us.'

(To us. It was still us after more than a quarter of a century, the family us of RSM

Hooker's long-time widow; it could have been us with the Widow Fitzgibbon just as easily, if she'd indicated the need; they would probably have found her another subaltern if she'd indicated the need - probably given the poor sod his courting orders, they were old-fashioned that way; even as it was there was often something waiting for her in the accumulated post at the cottage, like the regimental newsletter, and always a Christmas card.)

(Even Nannie here in front of her was a proof of the durability of the system: all those years after Korea - us in Korea, when Nannie had never been within five thousand miles of the place - Butler had remembered the widow of the RSM of his adopted regiment when he'd needed someone for his girls.)

'Of course - I understand now.' Frances nodded wisely, and decided to change the subject again. She had the vague memory, from one of Robbie's attempts to explain how the army had been reorganised - massacred - in 1970, that the Mendips had been swallowed up in the Somerset and Cornwall Light Infantry. But it really was a vague memory, and it wouldn't do at all to exhibit a lack of military knowledge in such an area, when there was nothing more to be gained there.

She glanced around her. She could ask about this library, which had more books in it than ever Colonel Butler could have read. But that question would sound too obviously chatty, even though she genuinely wanted a quick answer to it; and she could get the answer easily enough for herself, though not so quickly, simply by looking at those books - always providing she remembered how completely Paul had mis-read the ones by her own fireside.

Better to get down to business, that was something Nannie would accept without suspicion.

'Now, Nannie ... what I have to do - is to decide what sort of break-in this has been.

This is because ... of the kind of work the Colonel does.' She gave Nannie half a smile.

'It's a precaution, that's all - a sort of double protection, in addition to what the Police provide.'

As soon as she'd said it, she wished she hadn't, because in the circumstances of those open drawers and missing christening mugs it was gobbledygook, and from the slight lift of the eyebrows, over those grey eyes it was quite clear that Nannie knew it was, too.

Then the eyebrows went back to normal, and the half-smile was returned.

'Yes, dear - I understand that,' said Nannie. 'The Colonel has been through the routine with me. You don't need to explain. If it's all right you sign a form and give it to me, and the Police carry on a normal investigation.' She nodded helpfully.

It occurred to Frances that she hadn't got a release with her. Maybe Detective-Sergeant Geddes had one - maybe he had a whole pocket full of them. But it really didn't matter now that Nannie was on her side.

It didn't seem to matter much to Nannie either, suddenly; she had her sang-froid back, though it was a subtly- altered coolness, now a benevolent neutrality more concerned with Frances than herself, even to the extent of accepting that garbage about double-protection without irritation.

Just as suddenly Frances felt ashamed of what she'd done, what she'd had to do. It wasn't lying about Robbie - the ring, that little circle of white gold, wasn't with him, it was in the bag on her shoulder, to be used as necessary; she simply hadn't bothered to put it on today, it hadn't been important - if there was deceit there, it didn't matter because it betrayed nothing of value. But deceiving Nannie was something different.

'And it is all right, dear,' said Nannie solicitously. 'You don't need to worry. Because this is just ... an ordinary robbery, the constable said so.' She nodded. 'He said there have been two others just like it this morning.

'But of course ... of course, you have your job to do, and so you must talk to the constable for yourself, dear. But I've been all over the house with him - the constable thought the burglar didn't have very long in the house, because Mr Rodgers was cutting up the elm in the home pasture, and he came back to the workshop to get the bushman-saw at 9.15 - the constable thinks the burglar saw him coming, and that scared him off...'

Nannie piled non-event on non-event in an attempt to reassure the young Widow Fitzgibbon that there really was nothing to worry about in Brookside House, banking up the coals-of-fire on the widow's head.

'Thank you, Nannie.'

'The Colonel could come back tonight. He does try to be here as often as possible, you know ... though as tomorrow is the llth he'll be off early if he does come - '

The telephone on the desk pealed out, cutting her off in mid-flow to Frances's overwhelming relief.

'I'll take it - ' Frances was halfway to the desk before Nannie could react.

She lifted the receiver.