Poor fish, Houston thought wryly.
There was no noise, no excitement. Five minutes after Sir Lewis had entered the front door, it opened again. A man whom Houston had never seen before stepped out and gestured with one hand. At the same time, Houston's speaker said: "They've got him. Hit him with a stun gun when he tried to get out through the fire exit."
An ambulance which had been waiting at the entrance of the Mews pulled up in front of Number 37, and a minute or so later a little clot of men came out bearing a stretcher, which was loaded into the ambulance. Immediately after them came another man who had a firm, but polite grip on the arm of Sir Lewis Huntley.
Houston sighed and leaned back in his seat. That was that. It was all over. Simple. Nothing to it.
Another Controller had been apprehended by the Psychodeviant Police. Another deviant, already tried and found guilty, was ready to be exiled from Earth and imprisoned on one of the Penal Asteroids. All in the day's work.
There's just one thing I'd like to know, Houston thought blackly. What in the hell's going on?
In his hotel room near Piccadilly Circus, several hours later, David Houston sat alone, drink in hand, and put that same question to himself again.
"What's going on?"
On the face of it, it was simple. On the face of it, the answer was right in front of him, printed in black and white on the front page of the evening Times.