“Yeah, right,” said Bob. “So what is it really? Got yourself a job as a shop-window dummy? Is that why you weren’t in yesterday?”

“I was working yesterday. In the music business.”

“Sure you were, Pooley. Well, just give me your slip and your stake money and then you can be off about your business.” And Bob laughed in a most unpleasant manner.

“Oh, I haven’t come in here to place a bet,” said Jim. “My betting days are done. My ship has at last sailed into port and I just popped in to say goodbye, before I sail away for ever.”

“And now I know you’re winding me up. So pay up and piss off, why don’t you.”

“I was just wondering if you had any change.”

“That’s more like it,” said Bob. “Need a couple of pence to make up a quid, do you?”

“No, I just need something a bit smaller. For the taxi.” Jim pulled from his pocket the big wad of twenties and gave it a casual thumbing.

Bob’s eyes bulged most horribly at the sight of all this money. “Where did you get that?” he asked in a low and troubled tone.

“Oh, this?” Pooley thumbed a little more. “Just petty cash, actually. Could you let me have four fives for a twenty?”

“I could,” said Bob, his eyes now locked on Pooley’s wad. “I could, but …”

“But?” Jim asked.

“But that is a very large amount of cash you’re carrying there, Jim. Don’t you think it might be advisable to keep it somewhere safe? Perhaps I might look after it for you.”

“Did you say large amount?” And Pooley laughed. “Well, it might be a large amount to you, Bob. But it’s nothing to what I shall be making over the next few months. But if you can’t give me change I’d better be getting along.”

And Pooley turned to leave.

“Hold on, there!” cried Bob. “There’s no need to rush off just yet.”

“Can’t hang about,” said Jim. “More than my job’s worth. People to see. Business to do. Backers to vet.”

“Backers to vet?” asked Bob.

“It’s my job,” said Jim. “To vet backers who want to put money into a nationwide tour of a major new rock band.” He turned back and grinned at Bob. “I have to check their credentials.”

“And what do you know about stuff like that?”

“Well, Bob.” And here Pooley winked. “Actually I don’t know anything about it, but the deal is that anyone who invests in the band will double their money within six months.”

“Bollocks,” said Bob. “I don’t believe that.”

“And why should you?” said Jim. “You’ve never heard the band play—”

“The only music I like to hear is the sound of the bookie’s piano.” Bob gestured towards his cash register. “Ding ding ding, it goes.”

“Well, I’ll leave you to it, then. Goodbye.”

“No, stop a minute, Jim.” Bob had a bit of a sweat on now. He knew that he would never forgive himself if he let Jim escape from the shop with all that cash in his hand. He had always considered Jim’s money to be his money. And he couldn’t have his money walking out of the door. “Tell me about this band,” he said. “Do you have a tape or something?”

“I think it’s a videotape,” said the constable, handing Inspectre Hovis the package. “Bloke dropped it off for you at the front desk.”

Hovis took the package and leaned back in his chair. “And did this bloke leave his name?” he asked.

“No, but he was a respectable-looking type. Wore the uniform of a library clerk. And if we can’t trust a library clerk, who can we trust? Eh, Inspectre, sir?”

“Bugger off,” said Hovis. “And get on to those glaziers again. I’m sick of the wind blowing in through that dirty great hole in the window.”

The constable glanced towards the gaping hole. “I wonder what happened to the body,” he wondered.

“That is a question I shall be putting to Mr Omally. Here, take this before you go.” He handed the constable a sheet of paper.

“What is this, sir?” the constable asked.

“It’s a requisition form for a bigger cattle prod. A couple of days without rations should soften the blighter up. And then we’ll see what he has to tell us.”

“Nice one, sir.” And the constable departed, whistling in the way they often do.

Hovis pushed photos to left and to right and opened the package on his desk. In it was indeed a videotape. A videotape of the now legendary Beatles’ Wembley concert of nineteen eighty. CONTAINS ACTUAL FOOTAGE OF THE QUEEN’S ASSASSINATION, ran a gaily coloured flyer on the front. Hovis pulled the tape from its sleeve and a note dropped onto his desk. Hovis examined the note and read.

I PLAYED THIS TAPE YESTERDAY AFTERNOON IN A BOOTH AT THE VIRGIN MEGASTORE AND NOTICED SOMETHING ON IT THAT I THINK MIGHT INTEREST YOU. CHECK OUT THE FOOTAGE OF THE CROWD BESIDE THE STAGE JUST BEFORE THE QUEEN GETS SHOT. YOU’RE IN FOR A BIG SURPRISE.

Hovis took the tape and slotted it beneath his little portable television type of jobbie. He fast-forwarded through half an hour of Virgin commercials and then through band after band after band until he reached the moment when the Beatles finished their final song and the Queen walked onto the stage.

Inspectre Hovis diddled at the remote control. Doing that jerky slow-mo thing that you do when you reach your favourite bit. The head exploding, or the woman inserting the—

“No!” said Hovis. “That just isn’t possible.”

Rewind-slow-mo-freeze-frame.

“No!” Inspectre Hovis stared. “It can’t be.”

But it was.

There was no doubt about it. There, by the side of the stage, waving and cheering, were a dozen young men. And although they were surrounded by many many other young men there was no doubt in the inspectre’s mind about where he’d seen this bunch before. He had police speed-trap-camera photos of them all over his desk.

“It’s them,” said the inspectre. “The same men. But this concert was twenty years ago and they look exactly the same. They’re even wearing the same T-shirts.”

A knock came at his office door.

“Come in!” called Hovis. “What is it?”

The constable stuck his head around the door. “There’s something I think you should see, sir,” he said.

“What is it?” said Hovis. “I’m busy.”

“It’s a tape of surveillance footage, sir. From one of the cameras on the ground floor. It’s of that bloke who jumped out of your window.”

“What, of him hitting the pavement?”

“Well,” said the constable, “he does hit the pavement eventually. I think you’d better see for yourself. But I don’t think you’re going to believe it.”

“I don’t believe it! I don’t believe it!” Bob the Bookie wriggled and jiggled and clutched at himself and went “Oooooooooooooooooooooooooooooh!”

He had his Virgin-Sony Walkman on. Pooley had taken out the Now That’s What I Call a Cash Register tape and slotted in the Gandhis’ bootleg.

Bob seemed to be enjoying himself.

“I don’t believe it!” he screamed.

“I don’t believe it,” said John Omally, though not in a scream but a whisper.

Pooley stood before him in the Gandhis’ sitting room. The hour was now ten of the morning clock, the atmosphere somewhat electric.

The Gandhis stood all around Jim. Staring not only at him, but also at the open briefcase he held in his hands.

The briefcase bulged with money notes of high denomination.

“How much?” Omally dared to ask.

“One hundred thousand pounds,” said Jim. “It was all Bob had in his safe. He even lent me his briefcase to carry it in.”

“Bob? As in Bob the Bookie?”

Pooley grinned and nodded too. “You should have seen me, John,” he said. “It was my finest hour. I was nearly pooing myself, I can tell you. I did this thing where I casually thumbed through my wad. I’d practised it in front of the mirror, you see and—”

“Jim,” said Ricky, “you are a fucking genius.”