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.'They like to check up on me.I get calls, but stopped answering yesterday.So they think I've gone.'Dante turns to face his curious ally.'We have to do it tonight, Hart.You know that?' Hart swallows.'You'll be fine here on your own for an hour or so?' Dante asks.'Why? You can't leave.It's too risky.''Look mate, we need food.We both have to eat.No food and the smell of petrol is making me sick.' Hart looks at Dante, unconvinced.'There are plenty of people about.It'll be cool.I'll be out and back in no time.We're all right for now.''I don't know, buddy.They could be watching.Fetching the petrol was bad enough.They must know we're together.Get separated, get picked off, and then we're fucked before we get airborne in that crazy jeep.Maybe we should do it now.Just fuckin' do it now, while it's light.'Dante fishes the Land Rover keys out of his jeans and clips a Marlboro cigarette between his teeth.'Too much traffic.People would see the smoke.You want to get locked into a cell and have that thing come for you there?' He moves for the door and swings his leather jacket over his shoulders.'Anyone gets in my way, I'll drive over them.Stay cool.' He winks and leaves the lounge.CHAPTER FORTY-ONEHarry looks across a sea of expectant faces.Seated in a semicircle around the dais, in the expansive wood-panelled Parliamentary Hall, five hundred new postgrads are waiting.About to begin Masters degrees and PhDs, they look up at him from below the oil portraits of the old deans with dour faces, each worthy's name etched in bronze at the bottom of his frame.Tired wisdom above the eager, serious faces beneath.Harry smiles, sending his stare and welcome out and into the smells of antiquity, and the sounds of fidgeters, coughers, and bench scrapers.His head, mercifully, is clearer now.Two aspirin and a pint of orange juice have erased the damage inflicted by Dante's whisky, Arthur's story, and a night of interrupted sleep.He looks down at his notes and straightens the card on the top of a neat pile.In his mind, he straightens his thoughts too; he blinks quickly, inhales, clears his throat and thinks of the first line of his speech.The whole thing timed at twenty minutes.Honed after ten years as Proctor of the university.He says, more or less, the same thing every year to the assembled scholars.Final fidgets and hushed conversations subside.His lips part and so do the large wooden doors at the rear of the hall.They click open.Heads turn and Harry squints over the rims of his reading glasses in anticipation of watching sheepish late arrivals shuffle through.But no one enters the hall.Instead, a gust of cold air, wet with rain, hisses through the aperture and lifts introductory papers off the empty seats.'Looks like a restless spirit has come to hear your speech,' someone says, from the chairs behind him on the stage, where the staff sit.Harry turns, curious.It is George Dickell, Head of Careers, draped in his black academic gown.George laughs.Harry smiles, but with difficulty.Someone from the back row stands up and closes the door, the sound of their heels echoing to the ceiling, so far above.'I'll start again,' Harry says, a quaver in his voice.Did the staff notice? 'Ladies and gentlemen, I would like to begin this morning by welcoming you to St Andrews University, for the beginning of the Martinmas term.I hope my short introduction isn't as grim as the weather.' A ripple of titters passes through the rows of chairs, but soon falls mute.'Assembled behind me is a hand-picked regiment of crack troops –' Harry turns to nod at his colleagues '– the Chaplain, Head of Library Services, our Student Union President, and Careers Officer.' But no Hebdomidar.Where is Arthur? No call, no notice of absence.Did he go out to the cottage last night like a damned fool, with that damned fool Dante? 'They'll take a little of your time to introduce the various services of their offices.At St Andrews, I believe we offer the very best in support services to the postgraduate body.' He pauses.There appears to be a small commotion in one of the back rows.Someone at the corner of his vision stands up.They are tall, very tall.He takes another glance down at his notes to find the thread, to stop the stutter.But the far-off figure, which blends into the long curtains, fails to sit down.Harry clears his throat and peers out.A long arm stretches upward, as if to wave at him.From the back, now, where the rows are empty, and the grey light is lost in the gathers and folds of the dark curtains, a thin arm beckons.Harry swallows and says something about academic excellence.Wrong paragraph.There is a joke before that.He missed it
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