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The man holds the door open for her without being asked. Liz supposes she looks respectable, or as if she knows where she’s going, or both. She pauses in the hall, enjoying the coolness that rises from the red and black Victorian tiles.
She feels less favourably disposed towards the stairs, particularly after having climbed a stationary escalator at the Tube station and then having to be polite to a woman giving out free perfume samples at the exit, but she’s hardly going to turn back now. She hauls herself and her briefcase up to the third floor.
She knocks. No answer.
‘Isobel?’
She turns the knob, and the door opens. Either Isobel’s in, or she’s forgotten to lock the door.
The room’s empty. But there’s a strong smell of ammonia, and the gurgling noise of running water, which together suggest that Isobel’s printing photographs.
Liz wrinkles her nose. She calls, ‘Isobel? It’s me!’
A voice comes from the far end. ‘I’ll be out in ten minutes! Make yourself some coffee!’
It’s a long, thin, slice of a room, running the depth of the house from the front to the back. Goodness knows how much extra Isobel pays to have a private bathroom – not so much on her own account, though Liz is sure she appreciates it, but because it means she has running water on hand, and can black out the windows and make it into a darkroom. At the front, there’s a jumble of lights and tripods and drapes.
The part that serves as the kitchen is midway between the two. Liz lifts the kettle to see how full it is. There’s enough water for two, which will save disturbing either Isobel or Isobel’s landlady. She lights the spirit lamp and puts a pan of water on to boil, then looks for the coffee.
It’s in an old cocoa tin, which is just like Isobel. Liz sprinkles a couple of spoonfuls into the water, watching to see that it never quite gets to boiling point. She knows where to find the milk: in a cardboard box lined with silver paper, in the coolest corner of the room. She brings it out and sniffs it.
The coffee’s nearly there. Isobel always buys nice coffee. It seems rather a waste to use it to mask the smell of fix. Not that Liz isn’t glad of it. It’s been a long day – interesting, but long – and the tea served at the conference had alternated between ‘stewed’ and ‘dishwater’. She strains the coffee into a pudding basin.
The bathroom door opens and Isobel emerges, blinking in the light. ‘Darling!’ She comes over to kiss Liz. ‘What’s the time?’
‘About half past five.’ Liz pulls her close and kisses her again. ‘This place smells worse than the laboratory.’
Isobel grins. ‘I’m used to it. Besides, it’ll wear off soon enough.’ All the same, she goes back and shuts the bathroom door. ‘How was the conference?’
‘Generally quite interesting, though rather longer than it needed to be.’ Liz pours the coffee and hands one mug to Isobel. ‘Your uncle told me to give you his love, by the way.’
‘Sweet of him.’
‘I was wondering if you wanted to go out for dinner.’
Isobel nods. ‘I sort of told Paul that I’d go and see his pictures. But we could do dinner afterwards, or I could do a different night.’
‘I don’t mind going to look at pictures,’ Liz says. ‘Do I know Paul?’
‘I think you met him at Trudi’s party in March. Dark hair. Idiosyncratic taste in trousers. I’d better change.’ She glances at the front window, seems to decide that nobody’s going to see in, and unbuttons her shirt. Liz watches, smiling. She doesn’t have anything to change into herself, but she’d dressed reasonably smartly for the conference; she takes out a pocket comb and mirror and tidies up her hair; then returns to her coffee. Meanwhile, Isobel replaces her shirt and slacks with a short, bright, dress and takes mascara to her lashes.
‘Ready?’
‘Nearly.’ Isobel kneels to rummage in a chest of drawers.
‘What are you looking for?’
‘Perfume.’
Liz remembers the woman at the Tube station, and fumbles in her bag. ‘Do you want to try this one?’
‘What is it?’
‘I don’t know. They were giving out free samples.’
Isobel takes the tiny bottle, sniffs at it, and wrinkles her nose. ‘I don’t think I like this.’ She sprays a little on a handkerchief and smells again. ‘No. I don’t like it.’
‘Maybe it smells better on.’ But Liz has to agree that there’s a strange, metallic note to it in among the rose and vanilla. Perhaps it’s the photographic chemicals or the coffee interfering.
‘I don’t want to risk it. It’s good old Arpège for me.’ She resumes her search and after half a minute gives a triumphant cry. ‘Here we are! Now, all I need is my camera.’
‘Won’t Paul mind?’
‘Mind my taking my camera? No, he knows I do people. He doesn’t, or not really. All his photos are from the point of view of bees, or butterflies, and very experimental. I won’t upset him by getting some pictures of the arty set at his opening. Besides, I’m hoping to sell some to the Flâneur and if I do he’ll be dreadfully pleased.’
When they arrive at the gallery, Liz sees Isobel’s point. The only photographs of human beings are whimsical shots of noses or the tops of people’s heads. Others show gutters or the open mouths of birds. One, all bright squares and black bars, she eventually deciphers as a glowing lantern. They’re all rather fascinating. She examines them all while Isobel embarks on a tour with her lenses and flashbulbs.
The gallery is a long room with stark white walls. There’s quite a crowd – nobody Liz recognises, though Isobel seems to be greeting a few acquaintances on her circuit. Some of the audience are obviously fellow artists, but there are more conventional suits and handbags too.
A man and a woman – a couple, she thinks, from the way he has the palm of his hand on his companion’s back – move in front of her, blocking her view of the photograph she was looking at. The man is smoking Gauloises, and a cloud of pungent smoke follows him around the room. She steps backwards and waits for them to clear out of the way. But the gap is immediately filled by a group of five young women, chattering about “the Ministry” and “Mr Peters”.
That’s familiar… she thinks. That perfume… That’s…
That’s…
That’s…
Liz steps backwards, back into the cloud of smoke. Her head becomes immediately, startlingly, clearer. Suddenly, she understands.
It’s the same perfume. Rose and vanilla – and something metallic that doesn’t make itself apparent until there’s something equally strong and equally unpleasant to act as a foil. Without that, and with the warmth of human skin, it becomes sweet. Drowsy. Hypnotic.
There’s something nasty going on here, and she isn’t going to be happy until she’s got a sample of it onto a microscope slide. She extricates herself from the crowd, catches Isobel’s eye, and moves towards the door.
‘Leaving so soon?’ someone asks her. She supposes he might be Paul.
She smiles at him. ‘I hope not, but I need to find a telephone.’
There’s a phone box just outside in the street. She feeds in a couple of tuppences and dials the HQ switchboard.
‘Is the Brigadier there, or the Doctor? It’s Liz Shaw.’
‘Not at the moment, Miss Shaw.’ She recognises the voice at the other end of the line: it’s young Private Drewe. ‘What’s the matter?’
‘If you could just let them know that I’ve stumbled across something rather worrying and I’m heading to the lab as fast as I can… Either or both of them, it doesn’t matter.’
‘What’s that?’ The man seems to be talking to someone else. ‘Hang on half a tick, Miss Shaw, apparently the Brigadier’s still here…’
Isobel comes to find her, listens to her half of the conversation with eyebrows raised.
The Brigadier sounds tired, but he’s as quick and crisp as ever. ‘Miss Shaw. I hear you’ve found something.’
‘Hello, Brigadier. Yes, someone’s been handing out some chemical up here, free perfume samples, and I don’t like it at all. It seems to have a hypnotic effect. I can’t be sure that it’s extraterrestrial, but it reminds me very much of those samples the Doctor was working on the other day.’
Isobel nudges her and says loudly, ‘Tell her we’ll be along just as soon as we’ve said goodbye to Paul – oh, but I need to get something on the way. Does she like dark chocolates or milk ones?’
‘Did you get that?’ Liz pretends not to see the man who’s walking past just a little too slowly.
‘You’re being overheard?’
‘Dark. Yes, that’s right. Thank you. Well, we’ll be half an hour or so.’
‘Very well. I’ll get the Doctor out of… wherever he goes in the evenings. Come as fast as you can.’
‘No, we’re not far away. We’ll take a cab.’
Isobel nods and scurries off.
The wonderful thing about Isobel is the way she accepts the most incredible situations without batting an eyelid. She’s not gullible or credulous, but she doesn’t waste time arguing that something can’t possibly happen when it obviously has. As soon as the cab moves off, she says, ‘You think that stuff’s dodgy, then?’
‘I think so.’ She hesitates. ‘I can’t quite describe what it was doing to my head, but it wasn’t natural at all. And when there was a stronger, unpleasant smell, the effect vanished immediately. You wouldn’t expect that to happen with drugs, for example. So I think it must be something neurological, or psychological. I want to have a look at it.’
‘But of course.’ Isobel falls silent, no doubt wondering how she might photograph any part of the analysis.
‘I’m afraid it isn’t much of a date.’
‘No, don’t say that! I'm sure I'd enjoy a trip to UNIT HQ! It’s only a pity you’re not based on that giant freighter aircraft.’
‘There wouldn’t be room for all the equipment I want,’ Liz retorts. She reaches for Isobel’s hand and squeezes it.
‘The perfume. You said they gave you the sample at the Tube station.’
‘That’s right.’
‘Why there? Why not Oxford Street, or Knightsbridge? There isn’t anywhere that sells perfume anywhere near me.’
‘I suppose they’re targetting the working woman, in the hopes that she has some disposable income.’
‘I suppose so,’ Isobel says, but she doesn’t sound convinced.
‘So either they were handing the stuff out at every Tube station, or else there’s something special about yours.’
‘It isn’t far from the Ministry of Trade,’ Isobel says thoughtfully. ‘But –’
‘What?’
‘You were coming out of the Underground. Unless they’d been there all day – and I didn’t see them when I went out for milk – that would suggest that they were going for people who live in the area, not those who work there.’
‘Oh, they were handing the stuff out to women going in as well.’ Liz glances out of the window. ‘Look, we’re nearly there.’
Both the Brigadier and the Doctor are waiting for them. Isobel is fascinated by the Doctor’s changed appearance and makes him promise that she can take his picture once again.
In the meantime, the Brigadier gives Isobel the run of the UNIT darkroom, sets a sergeant to phoning London Transport to see whether anybody knows about the perfume distributors, and sends for maps of the area.
And Liz analyses the perfume.
The Doctor is very interested. He listens carefully to Liz’s account of her experience. It’s his idea to look at the stuff through the polarised crystal filter, and that reveals something surprising.
Liz gazes at it in fascination. ‘I’ve never seen a structure like that before.’
‘No? I have.’ His expression is rather grim.
‘Where?’
‘Oh, a little planet somewhere beyond Cygnus. It was a long time ago, but I suppose that’s given them time to get here and…’
The Brigadier looks up from his maps. ‘And what?’
‘Well, their usual modus operandi was to get into the trade networks and get control of certain influential figures within them. Nothing moves as fast, you see.’
Liz asks, ‘And how did they do that, Doctor?’
‘Oh, they used to prepare the subjects with a sort of psychological barrier-dissolving formula, and then implant the suggestion sub-consciously. It was really very effective, because the emissaries remained perfectly in character, and the results didn’t show until some time later. And of course by that time it was too late; they were embedded in the system, and, when the invasion came, there was no resistance.’
Isobel appears, looking tired but triumphant. She brandishes a sheaf of damp photographs. ‘Here you are.’
‘I think some of the women at the viewing worked at the Ministry of Trade,’ Liz says. ‘I wonder what’s going on there.’
The Brigadier is already dialling a number. ‘We can find out.’
Isobel selects one particular print. ‘Liz, aren’t these the women you meant?’
She looks. ‘Yes. They’re the ones.’
‘I think,’ says the Brigadier, ‘we might contrive to keep those ladies at home tomorrow. In fact, it might be worth shutting the whole building until we’ve confiscated all those little spray bottles.’
‘You can’t do that!’
‘I can’t,’ he agrees, ‘but we could arrange for a health hazard in the basement, meaning the lifts are contaminated and unusable, or some such.’ He purses his lips, thinking, then lifts the telephone receiver once again. ‘Bungo? Is that you? Lethbridge-Stewart. Now, listen…’
Liz knows she ought to be horrified, but she’s been in UNIT long enough to know the way things work. And she can’t think of another way to deal with this. She turns her attention back to the molecular diagram she’s been drawing. Meanwhile, Isobel takes a lot of photographs of the Doctor, who enjoys the attention shamelessly.
‘There,’ says the Brigadier at last, ‘that’s sorted.’
‘Well,’ Liz says rather tartly, ‘if that’s all…?’
‘What? Oh, er, yes. Thank you for your help; I hope I haven’t spoilt your evening.’
Isobel smiles. ‘It’s been very interesting,’ she says.
The Brigadier finds a UNIT driver to take them back.
‘Would you like me to drop you at your lodgings, Miss Shaw?’
‘No,’ says Liz. ‘I’m not back on duty until tomorrow morning, and I’m not giving up my night out.’
Isobel grins at her. The driver laughs. ‘Very good.’
Instead, they get him to drop them at Roberto’s.
At this hour they have the place almost to themselves. There’s one other couple seated at the window, but they’ve nearly finished their meal. Liz sighs, tired but content. Isobel’s eyes sparkle and her face glows in the candlelight.
‘I didn’t realise how hungry I was,’ Liz says.
‘I know. Have you ever had the cannelloni here? It’s divine.’
The cannelloni is excellent. So is the wine, and the tiramisù, and the coffee.
‘Just as well,’ Isobel says. ‘We didn’t wash the cups up before I went out, and I have other ideas for things to do when we get home…’
Liz nudges her foot under the table. ‘Well, then, what are we waiting for?’
They pay the bill and walk arm in arm down Peter Street. It’s a pleasant night, clear, with the stuffiness of the day dissipating into coolness, and they have the road to themselves. The sky between the streetlamps is velvety black. A bus lumbers past, its windows bright.
‘So,’ says Liz, ‘do you think your place will smell slightly more civilised by now?’
Isobel grins at her. ‘I shut the bathroom door and opened the window. Besides, I’m used to it, and you ought to be.’
Liz presses a quick kiss to her lips. ‘That’s very true.’
‘Come on.’ Isobel quickens her stride. There's a very promising smile hovering around the corners of her mouth, and Liz speeds up to match her. ‘I’ve been thinking all evening about taking your hair down...’