John Harding 2-Book Gothic Collection. John Harding

indeed had never been allowed before she came, even by Mrs Grouse. Giles and I hardly evered to town, for all our needs were met at Blithe, where we were fed and watered and measured for our clothes and doctored when we illed.

      This last made me think. We were doctored but we were not dentisted. Once, when I was smaller and had an aching baby tooth, they took me into town to see Mr Field, the dentist, an ornery old man who evidently hated his job and even more so when it involved children. Now it obvioused me that a dentist could not call upon me at Blithe, for he would need his equipment, the heavy leather and brass chair, which he could pump up with a pedal to bring you to his height, and the looming flamingo threat of his drill, which I had never seen in action but only heard from the waiting room, although that was enough to shiver me quite.

      I thought at first of complaining of toothache so I would have to be taken to Mr Field, but that would not do, for if Miss Taylor came too, as well she might, then it would not opportunity me to visit the police station to see the captain. Only one solution suggested itself to me. Giles would have to be the one who visited the dentist. I would accompany him and, when the moment opportunitied, slip away to the police station.

      It was a couple of days before I aloned with Giles, long enough to put my plan to him. His reaction was no more than I expected. ‘The dentist? Ask to see the dentist? No fear! I’m not being drilled and filled or having my teeth pulled out one by one. The Spanish Inquisition used that as a form of torture, you know.’

      ‘But, Giles, you wouldn’t have to have your teeth drilled or taken out. There’s nothing wrong with them.’

      Giles inserted a finger into his mouth and ran it over his teeth, checking. ‘How can you be so sure? What if I get there and old Field spots something and gets that drill of his going?’

      ‘But he won’t, Giles, because there’s nothing wrong with your teeth.’

      ‘Oh, yes, so you’re a dentist now, are you? And anyway, what if he says there’s something wrong with one of ’em even though there’s not, just so as he can pull it out and collect a fat fee?’

      ‘He wouldn’t do that. It’s not allowed. It’s…it’s…it’s against the Hippocratic oath.’ I uncertained the truth of this, but when I explained what the oath was to Giles he didn’t question it, which just goes to show that if pulling out good teeth isn’t against it then it should be.

      Giles suspicioned me one, weighing up his options. ‘You’re sure he won’t do anything to me?’

      ‘Cross my heart and hope to die.’

      ‘Well, OK then, I’ll do it. When do you want me to go down with the toothache?’