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you something nice.’ He indicated the Fortnum and Mason package. ‘Chocolates?’
    ‘I imagine so.’ She looked slightly surprised at his abrupt change of topic.
    ‘Your birthday?’
    ‘No, they just came addressed to me. When I produced Tiny Toddlers I used to get lots of little presents. Aubrey, we’ve a meeting with the union this afternoon at three. They’re demanding full compensation for Matt Parker.’
    ‘But the Company’s hardly responsible for—’
    She cut him short. ‘And they want Andy Page’s head. For handling the camera.’
    ‘Oh my God!’ He took off his horn-rimmed glasses and began to polish them vigorously on his handkerchief. ‘Trouble. I was going to use him on—’
    ‘Don’t touch him!’ she snapped. ‘Leave him where he is, at least till we see which way things are pointing. Compensation for Parker could amount to thousands, perhaps hundreds of thousands, we just don’t know yet.’
    ‘He was insured.’
    ‘The insurance company will dispute it. They’ll want to know what he was doing there by himself when the rest of the crew had gone off. But whatever they say, we need to work out a strategy for this afternoon’s meeting. If necessary, we’ll haveto let the union have their blood sacrifice.’
    ‘Andy Page? Well, he asked for it.’
    She reached out for the Fortnum and Mason package and started to undo the ribbon. ‘I’ve invited Al Wilson, Jimmy Case, Veronica and Max—’ Her scream shocked through him.
    ‘Mary, what—?’ For a moment he sat paralyzed, then he jumped up from his armchair and dashed around to her side of the desk.
    She screamed again. A long, sobbing, terrified scream.
    Several small worms, about four or five inches in length, were spilling out of the Fortnum and Mason package which lay on its side on the pink blotter. They wriggled over the desk towards her. One of them was already attached, leech-like, to the heavy white flesh of her forearm. She stared at it, screaming, making no attempt to pull it off, but just screaming.
    Aubrey caught hold of her high leather chair and tried to tug it clear of the desk. Before he could shift it a second worm launched itself at her from the blotter. If only she hadn’t been wearing that short-sleeved dress … The worm dropped on to the heaving bodice and started to squirm purposefully towards the low V-neck.
    Again she screamed, shuddering with horror, but not defending herself at all.
    Her secretary ran into the room, a thin wispy woman in her late thirties, prematurely grey. She stood there goggling at Mary, at the worms, and whispering, ‘No! Oh, no… no…’
    ‘Come and help, for Chrissake!’ Aubrey bawled at her, but she stayed rooted to the spot.
    By now he’d managed to pull the chair back from the desk but gradually Mary slipped down from her seat till she was collapsing to her knees on the thick carpet, paralyzed with hysteria. He caught her under one arm, trying to hold her up, but she was too heavy for him.
    ‘For Chrissake, help me!’ he yelled again at the secretary.
    ‘No… no…’ She was backing towards the door. ‘No…’
    He shoved the heavy chair to one side and dragged Mary across the room as far away from the desk as possible. At least half-a-dozen worms writhed over it, making for the edge.
    Over towards the window he lowered her gently to thecarpet where she lay with her dress riding high above her knees and her bare arms spread out defencelessly. The thick flesh of her forearm was puckered and red where the worm was still feeding on it. A thin stream of blood moved rapidly down her skin.
    He caught the worm just below the head, holding it between his fingers and thumb and squeezing hard. Something snapped, and it went limp. He was surprised at how easily it’d died. For a few seconds he stared at its lifeless body lying in the palm of his hand; then, feeling sick, he flung it away from him and turned back to Mary. Blood from her arm was staining the carpet, but she was