DEAD END: A call-out to a murder saves D.I Bill Slider from having to finish his canteen lunch but presents him with the problem of a dead conductor. In life Sir Stefan Radek was seriously famous & terminally unpleasant but neither of these facts seem reason enough to gun him down in a neo-Byzantine church in Shepherds Bush. BLOOD LINES: A celebrated music critic seems to have committed suicide just before appearing on a live television show but Slider suspects it is murder when it is shown that the body had been interfered with & when he learns that the victim had quarreled violently with his fellow panelists. KILLING TIME: Only half-recovered from an assault from the last villain he encountered Slider is forced to investigate the murder of an erotic dancer finding himself having to question lap-dancers prostitutes pimps & cabinet ministers & discovering one of his fellow officers has dubious links with all of them.