among them. And when he drove off the ship at Calais and followed the Toutes Directions signs, he was even more confused. Presumably Glodstone was crossing on the next ferry. Or was he going to Boulogne or even sticking to his original instructions to travel by Ostend? Slymne turned into a side road and parked beneath a block of flats, and, having considered all the permutations of times of ferry crossings and destinations, decided there was only one way to find out. With a sense of doom, Slymne walked back to the office and was presently asking the overworked clerk in broken French if he could trace a Monsieur Glodstone. The clerk looked at him incredulously and replied in perfect English.
'A Mr Glodstone? You're seriously asking me if I can tell you if a Mr Glodstone has crossed, is crossing or intends to cross from Dover to Calais, Dover to Boulogne, or Dover to Ostend?'
'Oui,' said Slymne, sticking to his supposedly foreign identity, 'Je suis.'
'Well you can suis off,' said the clerk, 'I've got about eight hundred ruddy cars crossing on the hour by the hour and thousands of passengers and if you think '
'Sa femme est morte,' said Slymne, 'C'est tres important...'
'His wife's dead? Well, that's a different matter, of course. I'll put out a general message to all ferries...'
'No, don't do that,' Slymne began but the man had already disappeared into a back office and was evidently relaying the dreadful news to some senior official. Slymne turned and fled. God alone knew how Glodstone would respond to the news that he was now a widower when he'd never had a wife.
With a fresh sense of despair Slymne scurried back to his car and drove wildly out of Calais with one over-riding intention. Whether Glodstone arrived at Calais or Boulogne or Ostend he would still have to come south to reach the Chateau Carmagnac, and with any luck would stick to the route he'd been given. At least Slymne hoped to hell he would, and since it was the only hope he had he clung to it. He might be able to head the swine off and the best place to start would be at Ivry-La-Bataille. The place had the sort of romantic picturesqueness that would most appeal to Glodstone and the hotel he had booked him into there was Highly Recommended in the Guide Gastronomique. As he drove through the night, Slymne prayed that Glodstone's stomach would prove his ally.
He need not have been so concerned. Glodstone was still in Britain and had worries of his own. They mostly concerned Peregrine and the discrepancy between his appearance, as altered by dyeing his hair dark brown, and that of William Barnes as depicted on his passport. The transformation had taken place in the London hotel. Glodstone had sent Peregrine out with instructions to get some dye from a chemist and had told him to get on with it. It had been a bad mistake. Peregrine had been booked into the hotel an unremarkable blond and had left it sixteen hours and ten towels later, looking, in Glodstone's opinion, like something no bigoted Immigration Officer would let out of the country, never mind allow in.
'I didn't tell you to take a bath in the blasted stuff,' said Glodstone surveying the filthy brew in the tub and the stained towels. 'I told you to dye your hair.'
'I know, sir, but there weren't any instructions about hair.'
'What the hell do you mean?' said Glodstone who wished now that he had supervised the business instead of protecting his reputation as a non-consenting adult by having tea in the lounge. 'What did it say on the bottle?'
'It was a powder, sir, and I followed what they said to do for wool.'
'Wool?'
Peregrine groped for a sodden and practically illegible piece of paper. 'I tried to find hair but all they had down was polyester/cotton mixtures, heavy-duty nylon, acetate, rayon and wool, so I chose wool. I mean it seemed safer. All the other ones said to simmer for ten minutes.'
'Dear Lord,' said Glodstone and grabbed the paper. It was headed 'DYPERM, The Non-Fade All-Purpose Dye.' By the time he had deciphered the instructions, he looked despairingly round
