The faint hissing came from somewhere to his left. Corporal Phillip Aston resisted the temptation to turn and look. He
wasn't an ordinary sentry. He was a member of the King's Guard; a living, breathing bit of British pageantry, buttoned up in crimson tunic, black bearskin hat and stoic attention pose. The ultimate challenge to skylarks.

On the other hand, it was growing dark, the hour when loonies crawled out of their holes. And in this chill autumn in the third year of her Troubles, England needed policing more than pageantry. In August, London's Bobbies had been issued automatic weapons. They needed them with all the looters. And lanterns, too, as often as the power was down.

The hissing sound came again, and this time the corporal took a breath, stepped smartly out of his guardhouse, and performed a left face.

"Bloody hell!" he huffed out on a cloud of frosted breath.

The man was no more 30 meters away, standing a few feet from the stone facade of Buckingham Palace. He was a small fellow, hatless, and wearing a dark overcoat that belonged on a larger man. He had something in his right hand, pointing it toward the building.

"Aston?" a voice rasped behind the corporal, snapping him around. It was Whitbridge, the gangling lance corporal who had just been transferred to palace duty. Aston shook his head, gave him a Stay hand sign, and turned back to business.

"You there!" Aston shouted. "What are you doing?

The intruder glanced in Aston's direction, but kept pointing whatever he held in his hand at the wall, just below a second story window. Aston tried to picture the layout of the palace in his mind. Where was the King to be tonight? On the second floor? The north wing? He couldn't remember. "Stop!" he yelled again, moving forward, unslinging his rifle from his shoulder. "Stop, I say! Stop or…"

The gunshot stunned him! With the blast ringing in his ears he saw the man in the overcoat crumple in silent slow motion. For a moment he thought his rifle had misfired, but that couldn't be right. He hadn't felt any recoil.
"Oh, shit," Whitbridge whispered behind him, and Aston turned. The kid was standing a couple of meters away, off to his right. He was all tangled up with his rifle.

"Mary and Joseph!" Aston breathed. "Are you mad?"

"The strap got caught. Somehow I…the trigger…" Whitbridge stumbled. "I…I'm sorry."

The corporal wiped at a slick of sweat that had appeared on his upper lip, and his training kicked in. "Right. It's too late for it now. You go back to your guardhouse and alert Sergeant Alsworth. Stamp on that red jigger in the floor. That rings a buzzer in his office. I'll see what kind of a muck-up you've got us into."

"But…"

"Go!" Aston ordered, pointing the way.

"I think I killed him."

"I'd be bloody well surprised if you didn't at this range! Now get back to…"

"I've got to know."

"Get hold of yourself, guardsman! You've been given an order. Follow it!" Aston moved away, then stopped and turned back. Whitbridge was still there. The corporal sighed. "Well, come on then."

The body lay face down, dark blood still pooling at the head. Whitbridge was quite right. The man was dead, shot straight through the neck. The bullet had apparently shattered the spine.

"Oh, my God." Whitbridge trembled.

Aston knelt down and gingerly turned the man over so they could get a look at him. He was young, not much older than they were. Thin and sallow faced. Dark hair. Faded blue eyes, wide open in surprise.

"Who is he?" asked Whitbridge.

"How should I know?" Aston said. "A painter."

"What?"

The corporal lifted a can laying next to the body in his gloved hand and turned it around to the label. Simpson's Flat Black, it read. He pointed to a place on the wall directly below the second floor window. "Looks like he was finished."

Whitbridge read the words aloud: "Noting in England Woks."