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life, Detective Inspector Sloan took this last statement with a grain of salt, believing as he did that there was no such thing as a friendly trade. ‘What about the other greenhouse? What did you say was in there?’
    ‘Number one?’
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘Young orchids. And they’re all dead. Every blooming one of them …’
    ‘Except that they’re not going to bloom,’ murmured Crosby, sotto voce.
    ‘God knows what they were worth,’ said Haines, who hadn’t heard him.
    ‘This special order,’ said Sloan. ‘Was that for orchids too?’
    Jack Haines shook his head. ‘No, it’s for this landscape designer I told you about. Name of Anthony Berra. He’s got the contract for doing up a big old garden over the other side of Pelling on the way to Larking village and Berebury, like I said. It’s been neglected for years.’
    ‘Pelling Grange,’ supplied Mandy Lamb, studying the fingernails on her left hand. ‘Like I said, too.’
    ‘Has he got enemies?’ asked Crosby.
    ‘I couldn’t say, I’m sure,’ said Haines stiffly.
    ‘Have you got enemies?’ asked Sloan.
    ‘No,’ said Jack Haines flatly.
    ‘All God’s children got enemies,’ chanted Crosby almost under his breath, ‘like they’ve got rhythm.’
    ‘And Anthony Berra wasn’t best pleased, I can tell you, Inspector,’ went on Jack Haines, reverting to his own worries, ‘when I told him what’s happened to all his plants.’
    ‘Very upset, I should say,’ offered Mandy Lamb from the side-lines.
    ‘I’d better have some names,’ said Detective Inspector Sloan, tugging his notebook out of his pocket.
    ‘He’s called Anthony Berra,’ said Jack Haines. ‘His plants are … were … for one of those fashionable Mediterranean gardens that he’s creating for Oswald Lingard over at the Grange in Pelling.’
    ‘And Mrs Lingard,’ put in Mandy. ‘Mustn’t forget her.’
    ‘Why not?’ asked Crosby curiously.
    ‘She’s the one with the money,’ said the secretary simply.
    ‘And Marilyn?’ prompted Sloan.
    ‘Marilyn Potts,’ gritted Jack Haines between clenched teeth.
    ‘She’s an orchid specialist,’ put in Mandy Lamb helpfully.
    Jack Haines glared at her.
    ‘One half of Capstan Purlieu Plants,’ said Mandy, transferring her studies from the fingernails of her left hand to those on her right hand. ‘The other half is Anna Sutherland.’ She did not amplify this.
    ‘I think,’ said Detective Inspector Sloan, snapping his notebook shut, ‘that before we go any further we’d better take a look at these greenhouses of yours. And then I’d like to have a word with your foreman.’
    Jack Haines jerked his shoulder. ‘I’ve sent him into town on an errand.’
    ‘You have, have you?’ said Sloan, making a mental note.
    ‘In theory,’ began Jack Haines, ‘the last fingerprints on the door handles should be Russ’s …’
    ‘In practice,’ Sloan interrupted him, suppressing his irritation, ‘they may well belong to someone else.’ Policemen, like doctors, didn’t like being told what to do. All the same he would get Crosby to take any fingerprints off the door handles while they were at Pelling. It didn’t seem a serious enough case to get a Scenes of Crime Officer out all this way, not with the economic climate being what it was. He snapped his notebook shut. ‘My constable will soon be able to tell us that. Come along now, Crosby.’
    The two greenhouses presented a sorry sight. In one,serried pots of infant orchid cuttings had been burnt by frost and were clearly beyond aid. In the other, tender young plants had collapsed, their leaves now drooped over their potting compost like so many dying swans. Detective Inspector Sloan led the way inside, noting that the heating of the orchid house was not on. Above the pipes was a mist-maker from which little bursts of spray should have been emerging but weren’t.
    ‘No sign of forced entry, sir,’ remarked Crosby, peering round. He started to apply his fingerprint gear to