They waited beside the car, eager as pups for the praise they were confident that this time they must have, won. It was one of their most endearing traits, the pathetic certainty with which they waited every time for their boss's loud and fervent gratitude, only to find that, once again, their hopes were dashed to pieces on cold, Scottish rocks.

It had been a hazardous business and they had both conic close to death, Cowley knew that, considered It of little moment. There were thugs all over London to replace these two when they met their inevitable end. There was that blonde girl he'd had his eye on... Lumpey, Joanna Lumpey. She would do nicely as a replacement for these two. Twice the brains and nearly as much brawn when you considered what a skinny little, runt one half of this pair was. Cowley always had problems recalling their names - which was why he usually stuck to numbers. Much simpler all round, and they'd happily answer to anything numerical since neither of them could cope with any mathematical concept other than one, two or many.

They were starting to Irritate him too, the way they looked at each other, a sort of glowing, soppy look that spoke of things: Cowley did not understand, things like love and happiness and trust that made a decent Scotsman draw aside the skirts of his kilt In horror and think longing things about claymores and dirks

Look at 6 and 7/8ths now, staring at the other one's back view as though he'd seen the sun begin to rise.., and here it was midafternoon, and in any case, everyone knew the sun rose somewhere South of Miss Walsh!

Luckily for Bodie he was no mind reader or he might have been tempted to draw Cowley's attention to that exquisite patch that gleamed like a beacon on the rear of the faded jeans. It had called to something deep within him all day, progressing ahead of him, enticing as Lorelei herself...

Bodie gave a long, happy sigh, sure that today all his dreams were going to come true at last. That light, furtive brush across his crotch had told him all he wanted to know.

He came Out of his abstraction to find a bright, chartreuse eye watching him -yes, It would be tonight, Bodie decided. He returned the look -- in spades!

Perhaps George Cowley saw it, perhaps he merely tripped, no one will ever know for sure, but the next moment the innaculate Controller of CIS had measured his length ( such as it was ) on the muddy, oil-covered ground, sliding with a squeak of anguish and a muffled Scots' oath down the heap of rubbish they had been traversing.

Bodle and Doyle hurried to the rescue, not daring to look at each other, and hauled him swiftly to his feet.

Too swiftly.

Neither of them had seen the rusty piece of old iron until it was too late and by the time they had Cowley on his feet the damage had been done and the front. of Cowley's pin striped trousere was irreparably torn.

Bodie surveyed it solemnly. I hope you have a second pair of trousers to this suit, sir."

Cowley looked down at himself. He had, but that was small consolation at present with his talk to the Minister arranged for a quarter of an hour's time.

Never one to shilly shally, Cowley came to a decision.

"4.2, get 'em off!"

"?" Doyle squeaked, his eye rolling Bodie's way. Their chief had finally flipped.., he hoped

"I said I will need to borrow your trousers, Cowley said, starting to remove his. "1.7's would be too big for me.

"But... er... won't mine be a little... er... tight? hazarded Doyle. Surely Cowley must be larger than a 22' waist!

"Possibly," Cowley snapped. "But you can hardly expect me to walk around in his."

"Why not?" Doyle demanded rebelliously. "You could roll the bottoms up."

"Do as you're told, man, I haven't time to argue," Cowley thundered.

Aware of Bodie's gleaming pavonine stare Doyle slithered to the lea of a friendly car door and sullenly removed his jeans, accepting Cowley's nether garments in a less than fair exchange.

Bodie tactfully kept his back turned to the entire proceedings, feeling it was not his place to lick lascivious lips over Doyle's temporarily bared legs in Cowley's presence.

From the strangled Scottish grunts that peppered the air he guessed their boss was having trouble with fastening the zip and waist band... well, he wasn't going to offer help!

Finally, his voice hitting a rather higher note than usual, Cowley said, "I'll see you two back in my office tomorrow morning."

Bodie turned, face carefully neutral as his eye ran down the odd looking vision that was revealed in all its glory. An old bean bag in a towel would have looked more elegant, he thought; striving to maintain a disciplined decorum as a beady, zaffre Scot's eye dared him to utter one single sound or twitch one solitary muscle.

He watched their incongruous looking figure striding busily towards its car, and to his internal and unspeakable relief found that the patch just did not look the same somehow.

He turned to Doyle, certain that even Cowley's pin-striped strides would not detract from that delectable, magnetic little bum.

A' rather harrowed looking Doyle was still cowering behind the car door, a haunted expression lighting the verde-antique eyes.

"What's the matter, petal?" Bodie enquired, ever solicitous.

"Take me home," Doyle hissed.

Clever, Bodie thought admiringly. It took Art (not to mention Craftsmanship) to hiss a sentence with no esses in it.

"Anything you say," he agreed, always ready to oblige a friend. "We'll just call in at HQ and..."

"No," the look of anguish on Doyle's face was growing visibly stronger.

Always alert, Bodie divined the cause instantly. "You've been hit!" he cried, clutching his heart dramatically. "Oh, gosh!?

"No, you great fool," Doyle said warmly, expressive eyes turning Lincoln green at the realisation of what his pain would do to Bodie - it took real love to suffer like that and he had been so afraid Bodie only lusted after his fit and cleansed little body - "I'm OK. It's just... just..." He faltered into a shy silence.

"Just what?" Bodie prompted gently.

"Just that these trousers don't... er... haven't... um..."

Bodie came round his side of the car and looked over the door.

"No, they don't, do they?" he agreed, awed and delighted. I can see your..."

Doyle blushed, hollyberry red turning his celadon eyes into a sort of Christmas negative and quickly adjusted the torn flap of cloth demurely across his revealed anatomy.

Ever observant and quick, Bodie said, "You're not wearing any underwear."

Doyle's flush deepened to carmine.

"I thought you'd never notice," he said, hanging his head. "I wanted you to notice."

Bodie took his hand and held. It tightly. "Let me take you home," he suggested huskily, "and I'll show you what I think about it now I have."

-- THE END --