Silence.

I risked a quick sideways glance round the bottom of the bar.

Back towards me, a man, wet, naked except for swimming trunks, was kneeling at the side of Peace's coffin. His head was cocked to one side and a rubber tube led from his head to the steel cylinder. A stethoscope! Like a veterinary surgeon sounding the heart of some strange creature, the man placed the stethoscope against the metal. I could almost hear his breathing. As if the instrument were not functioning properly, he slipped the earplugs off and put his ear-face sideways to me-against the coffin. Still not satisfied, he went to the head and listened again. I heard the faint hiss of his breath. I craned round the bar. It could not have been his breath, for the man was standing, every nerve alert, looking down at the coffin. He was muscular, sun-tanned, and I saw thrust into his belt, the walnut butt striking against the Whiteness of his belly, a Colt. 38 Detective Special., He moved slightly and the gun clunked faintly against the steel. He must have been as taut as I was, for he wheeled round on the empty room. I jerked my head back._ Colt Special! That was the gun used by American police, the FBI and detectives, a beautiful little weapon with a stubby barrel and a lethal s t r i k e . I h a d s e e n, t o o, s o m e t h i n g t h a t a l a r m e d m e – t h e hammer of the Colt had been hocked, to enable a quick draw f r o m a s h o u l d e r – h o l s t e r. W h o e v e r i t w a s k n e w h i s w a y around with guns.

I peered out from behind the bar. The man had dropped the stethoscope and now leant with his chest across the glass w i n d o w . I h e a r d h i s r a p i d b r e a t h a s h e t h r u s t d o w n o n a s c r e w d r i v e r. H e w a s u n s c r e w i n g t h e p a n e l t o g e t a t t h e corpse!

Loyalty to Peace, devotion, admiration, grief at our unhappy parting, made me blind. That anyone should desecrate Peace's body, in front of my eyes…