Echo

as a bloody ferret.'

'You sound as if you admire him.'

'I do. The guy has balls. Mind, I don't like him much-few people do-but he doesn't lose sleep over trifles like that. Women love him, which is all he cares about. He's a randy little toad.' He gave another chuckle. 'Rich men often are. Unlike the rest of us, they can afford to pay for their mistakes.'

'You always were a cynical bastard,' said Deacon affectionately.

'I'm dying of liver cancer, Mike, but at least my cynicism remains healthy.'

'How long have you got?'

'Six months.'

'Are you worried about it?'

'Terrified, old son, but I cling to Heinrich Heine's dying words. 'God will forgive me. It's His job.' '

Barry Grover held the snapshot of James Streeter under the lamplight and examined it carefully. 'It's a better angle,' he said grudgingly. 'You'll have more chance of making comparisons with this than with the other one.'

Deacon perched casually on the edge of the desk, looming over Barry in a way the little man hated, and planted a cigarette in the corner of his mouth. 'You're the expert,' he said. 'Is that Billy or not?'

'I'd rather you didn't smoke in here,' muttered Barry, poking fussily at his 'In the interests of my health please don't smoke' notice. 'I have asthma and it's not good for me.'

'Why didn't you say so before?'

'I assumed you could read.' He shoved a folder against Deacon's hip in an attempt to dislodge him from the desk, but Deacon just grinned at him.

'The smell of cigarette smoke is preferable any day to the smell of your feet. When did you last buy yourself a new pair of shoes?''

'It's none of your business.'

'The only color you ever wear is black and, believe me, if I've noticed that then the whole damn building's noticed it. I'm beginning to think you only have one pair which probably explains your asthma.'

'You're a very rude man.'

Deacon's grin broadened. 'I suppose you were out on the razzle last night? Hence the lousy mood.'

'Yes,' lied the little man bitterly. 'I went for a drink with some friends.'

'Well, if it's a hangover I've got some codeine in my office, and if it's not, then buck up for Christ's sake, and give me an opinion on this picture. Does it look like Billy to you?'

'No.'

'They're pretty alike.'

'The mouths are different.'

'Ten million buys a lot of plastic surgery.'

Barry took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes. ' 'If you want to identify someone, you don't just compare a couple of photographs and dismiss anything that doesn't fit as plastic surgery. It really is a little more scientific than that, Mike.'

'I'm listening.'

'Lots of people look like each other, particularly in photographs, so you have to examine what you know about them as well. It's quite pointless finding similarities in faces if one belongs to a man in America and the other to a man in France.'

'But that's the whole point. James went missing in nineteen ninety, and Billy didn't surface at a police station until 'ninety-one, with his fingers like claws because he'd been burning off his prints. It's certainly possible that they're one and the same.'

'But highly improbable.' Barry looked at the photograph again. 'What happened to the rest of the money?'

'I don't follow.'

'How could he become a penniless derelict within months of having his face altered by plastic surgery. What happened to the rest of the money?''

'I'm still working on that.' He interpreted Barry's expression correctly as one of scathing disbelief, although as usual it looked rather silly on the owlish face. 'Okay, okay. I agree it's improbable.' He stood up. 'I promised to send that snapshot back today. Do you have time to make a negative for me?'

'I'm busy at the moment.' Barry shuffled pieces of paper around his desk as if to prove the point.

Deacon nodded. 'No problem. I'll find out how Lisa's placed. She can probably do it for me.'

After he'd gone, Barry drew his own full-face photograph of James Streeter from his top drawer. If Deacon had seen this version, he thought, there'd have been no stopping him. The likeness to Billy Blake was extraordinary.

Purely out of curiosity, Deacon phoned Lowndes Building and Development Corporation and asked to speak to someone about a block of flats they'd converted on the Thames at Teddington in 'ninety-two. He was given the address of the flats, but was told there was no one available to discuss the mechanics of the conversion. 'To be honest,' said a flustered secretary, 'I think it may have been Mr. Merton who saw it through, but he was sacked two years ago.'

'Why?'