Had they been in a pub?

No, assured Tommy. No, they definitely hadn't been in a pub.

But you have been drinking, suggested one of the policemen emerging from the interior of the mini with an almost empty bottle of Scotch in his hand.

A breathalyser test put it beyond all doubt. Tommy was taken to the station for a blood test. His protestations that he had not taken a drink until after the breakdown evoked the kindly meant suggestion that he should save it for the judge. The police doctor was occupied elsewhere looking at a night watchman who'd had his head banged in the course of a break-in and it was well after one A.M. before Tommy was released, a delay which was later to stand him in good stead. By this time it was raining heavily and constabulary kindness was once more evidenced by a lift in a patrol car going in the general direction of his home.

When the police approached him the next day at the Wheatsheaf Garage, his place of work, he assumed it was on the same business and his story came out again – perhaps a little more rounded this time. A quiet romantic drive with his fiancee, the breakdown, Brenda's departure on foot, his own frustration and the taking of a quick pull on the bottle to soothe his troubled nerves prior to abandoning the useless bloody car and walking home.

When he realized the true nature of their enquiries, however, his agitation was intense. The police took a statement, then went on to the bank. No one had heard of or seen Brenda since she left the previous evening, but there had been a couple of attempts to get her on the telephone earlier that morning, apart from Mrs Sorby's, that was.

By lunch-time, the police were taking things very seriously.