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.‘Trudy, who is it?’ he asked.Vaux had noticed, too.‘Yes, who?’ he said.Trudy moved towards the woman, but then halted, as though scared.Vaux did not approach the woman either, but called out, ‘Madam, have we met? Arts Council? I see you’re a Carpaccio Vittore fan.Into the saintly, are you? He certainly had a way with that kind of stuff.I don’t mind it too much.’From the floor, Lionel Clode called out gamely: ‘Minister, I’ve often heard you remark of Vittore Carpaccio that, although he might not be all plus, he certainly was not all minus.“Paints saints” you epigrammed, I recall.’ He tried an appreciative laugh, but it was swallowed up by the formidable Hulliborn wainscoting.‘Leave it, Trudy,’ Lady Butler-Minton whispered.Lepage had never seen her other than full of confidence and strength, but even she sounded apprehensive now.Then, the woman abruptly turned away, and, without looking again at the Carpaccio, strode swiftly from the Raybould, her red and cream skirt and vermilion shoes flashing splendidly as she passed through a patch of sunlight from the window.‘No, no, please don’t go!’ Trudy cried.The woman took no notice, did not glance back.After that first small movement towards her, Trudy seemed transfixed, but then suddenly called, ‘Mrs Cray!’ in that meaty, well-bred tone.‘It is Mrs Cray, isn’t it? I must talk to you.’For several moments all the Vaux party were clearly dazed by her words.Then, astonished and even shaking a little, Lepage moved urgently to stand near Trudy.‘Mrs Cray? How can you know this? You’ve met her previously? Who has ever seen her? Hell, does she even exist?’‘I feel it.I know it,’ Trudy replied.‘Somehow.Eric gave fragments of description – the clothes style, the untroubled brow.’‘You can see the untroubled nature of her brow from here – from this distance?’ Lepage asked.‘Aren’t we talking about a chimera? This is absurd.’The Minister had joined the two of them and heard this moment of talk.‘Mere guess? Intuition?’ he asked.‘It’s not a subject to trifle with, you know.How foolish!’‘Totally inane,’ Li bellowed from the floor.‘Please, Director, stop her leaving,’ Trudy said.‘Don’t let her disappear.For once, she’s alone.Somehow, officials and protectors will close around her again and she’ll be gone.’Lepage said: ‘But—’‘Please,’ she cut in, ‘somehow I know this is our chance.’‘You could go yourself, come to that, damn it,’ Vaux told her.‘What’s wrong with your own legs, Trudy?’ Clode said.‘They look grand to me from here.’‘Somehow I can’t,’ she said.‘Too many sodding somehows,’ the Minister replied.‘Somehows are somehow running riot,’ Clode remarked.‘Very well, Trudy, I will,’ Lepage said.This was a girl who had lovely breasts which, although unfeelingly divided for the moment, by the harness of her shoulder bag, would obviously soon re-form as a very sound unit; and who possessed, in addition, a wonderful, chubby, compact arse surmounting slender thighs and bonny long legs, as admired also by Clode from a different angle.Plainly, there was a case for taking her seriously, even if she did seem to have gone gay.‘Mrs Cray could give the answers to so much,’ Trudy said.‘Take us beyond the speculative in some of our research.’‘Cray sounds a British name,’ Lepage said.‘Does she speak English?’ He did not wait for an answer, but ran down the Raybould and out on to the landing.From there he could see ‘Mrs Cray’ quickly descending the main staircase towards the revolving door exit, her skirt and shoes still giving occasional multi-coloured gleams.‘Mrs Cray!’ he yelled.He waved.Some museum visitors turned at the noise, but she didn’t.He made for the spiral staircase.With any luck he’d come out ahead of her.He got none of that luck, though.As he descended, he met Angus Beresford coming up.There was no room to pass.‘Go back, please, Angus.It’s an emergency,’ he said.‘What emergency?’ Beresford asked.‘Did I hear someone calling Mrs Cray? Wasn’t she to do with the Wall and Flounce?’‘Go back and let me through,’ Lepage replied.‘Is it concerning that flasher, Falldew, again? I thought I glimpsed him near Zoology (Mammals).’Lepage tried to push by, but Angus was too burly.‘It is to do with him again, isn’t it, George? Where? Let me deal with this.’ Now, Beresford did turn and started to descend.‘It happened where I said I saw him, did it?’‘Yes.’ Send Beresford somewhere else – anywhere else.At ground level, Beresford ran off to the left, making for Ronnie Acton-Sher’s department.Lepage went directly ahead, towards the revolving door and, as he arrived, saw the woman approaching across the foyer.‘Thank God,’ he said.‘What, sir?’ Keith Jervis said, on duty at this main entrance.‘Is it the matter of an incident?’‘No, no, I must speak to this lady, that’s all,’ Lepage replied.He spun around to face her.‘Who are you?’ she said.English, but possibly not her first language.‘Is it Mrs Cray?’ Lepage answered.‘Why are you pursuing me?’ she said.‘But you are Mrs Cray, aren’t you – Flounce, the Wall, the whippet, the air-sock?’ Lepage asked.‘Surely, there can’t be two such foreheads.’ She was about sixty, medium height, elegantly thin, though her face seemed a little doughy, almost frighteningly impassive, even though she obviously had her rats up.Of course, this deadpan-ism might have been inculcated on some training course.She tried to go around Lepage to the door, but he prevented this by moving in front of her.Enraged, she took a step towards Keith Jervis.‘Are you Security?’ she asked.‘Part-time only,’ Jervis said.‘This man is being exceptionally offensive.He is either mad or vile,’ she said.‘You must deal with him.Even call the police.’The Minister arrived and, a little later, Angus Beresford.‘I can’t find him now,’ Beresford said.‘Who?’ Lepage said.‘Falldew, of course.You said in Zoology (Mammals),’ Beresford replied.‘Is that skinny dick-swinger part of all this?’ Vaux asked.‘How the hell is he involved as well as “Mrs Cray” and so on? Does the Hulliborn really need such recurrent situations, Lepage?’‘Oh, I wouldn’t put it as recurrent,’ Lepage said.A class of school children with their teachers came in through the revolving door and formed up in the foyer, chattering and starting on their sandwiches and Kit-Kats.The woman would have used the confusion as a chance for slipping away – another skill she might have learned in undercover training – but Jervis prevented that
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