into overkill. He went back to the living-room and called Flint.
'We've got a problem,' he said before the Inspector stopped him.
'You've got problems, Wilt. Don't include us.'
'Yes, well we've all got problems now,' said Wilt. 'She's in the bathroom and she's locked the door and the way things sound she isn't going to come out.'
'Still your problem,' said Flint. 'You got her in there and you get her out.'
'Now hold on. Can't you persuade those two goons...'
'No,' said Flint and ended the discussion. With a weary sigh Wilt went back to the bathroom but the sounds inside didn't suggest that Gudrun Schautz was any more amenable to rational persuasion than before, and after putting his case as forcibly as he could and swearing to God that there were no Israelis downstairs he was driven back to the telephone.
'All I want to know,' said Flint when he answered, 'is whether she's down with Bonnie and Clyde or not. I'm not interested in...'
'I'll open the attic door. I'll stand where the buggers can see I'm not armed and they can come up and get her. Now will you kindly put that suggestion to the sods?'
Flint considered the offer in silence for a moment and said he would call back.
'Thank you,' said Wilt and having pulled the bed away from the door lay on it listening to his heart beat. It seemed to be making up for lost time.
Two floors below Chinanda and Baggish were edgy too. Eva's arrival, far from quietening the quads, had aroused their curiosity to new levels of disgusting frankness.
'You've got ever so many wrinkles on your tummy, Mummy,' said Samantha, putting into words what Baggish had already noticed with revulsion. 'How did you get them?'
'Well, before you were born, dear,' said Eva, who had crossed the Rubicon of modesty by hobbling naked into the house, 'Mummy's tummy was much bigger. You see, you were inside it.'
The two terrorists shuddered at the thought. It was bad enough being stuck in a kitchen and hall with those revolting children without being regaled with the physiological intimacies of their pre-natal existence in this extraordinary woman.
'What were we doing inside you?' asked Penelope
'Growing, dear.'
'What did we eat?'
'You didn't exactly eat.'
'You can't grow unless you eat. You're always telling Josephine she won't grow up big and strong unless she eats her muesli.'
'Don't like muesli,' said Josephine. 'It's got sultanas in it.'
'I know what we ate,' said Samantha with relish, 'blood.'
In the corner by the cellar stairs Mrs de Frackas, in the throes of a stupendous hangover, opened a veined eye.
'I shouldn't be at all surprised,' she mumbled. 'Nearest thing to human vampires I've ever met. Whoever called it babysitting? Some damned fool.'
'But we didn't have teeth,' continued Samantha.
'No, dear, you were tied to Mummy by your umbilical cords. And what Mummy ate went through the cord.
'Things can't go through cords, mummy,' said Josephine. 'Cords are string.'
'Knives can go through string,' said Samantha.
Eva looked at her appreciatively. 'Yes, dear so they can.'
The discussion was cut short by Baggish. 'Shut up and cover yourself,' he shouted throwing the Mexican rug from the living-room at Eva.
'I don't see how I can with my hands tied,' Eva began, but the telephone was ringing. Chinanda answered.
'No more talking. Either...' he said before stopping and listening. Behind him Baggish
