Free The Cutting Crew by Steve Mosby

surrounding the campus, there is a pedestrian precinct of charity shops, cafes, takeaways, chemists and bars; and then this deteriorates slowly as you reach the outskirts of the district - except to the west, where you find the markets and ethnic stores that segue slowly into the classier commerce of Elephant. At the other three edges of Horse, the shops give way to small estates: thin streets filled with back-to backs and terraces; occasional patches of more middle-class semis.
    That was where I lived: close to the district's eastern border with Wasp.
    There is a real cultural mix in these streets, which I liked, but because the student-to-local ratio is split roughly fifty-fifty there can often be trouble. The locals tend to be quite poor - and of course the students are too, but they're also generally young, loud and prone to partying like fuckers. The adult delights of Wasp are, after all, only a brief tram ride away. So people who have lived in the area all their lives have seen house prices driven up and their streets scattered with litter and vomit, and have been woken up in the early hours of the morning by people pissing against their hedges. Factor in a few posh accents and a general lack of self awareness, and you can understand why the uneasy truce between the two populations was sometimes broken.
    I took a deep breath and set off.
    Ten minutes later, I could see Parkinson Tower and I knew I was getting close to the main campus. I was already beginning to feel the frustration build. At other times of year, students moved very slowly, but at least you knew where you were: you could trundle along on the same treadmill of lethargy, or else you could plot a course and dodge and weave along at the approximate pace of a normal human being. But this was exam time and so all bets were off. Some clusters of people were walking quickly, determined to arrive at their departments on time, while others were meandering, staring at bits of paper in last-ditch attempts to learn things; and yet more sections of the stream had clotted into groups that were smiling and hugging each other and generally unaware of anyone they might be in the way of. A few people were sitting on the edges of pavements, crying. Bars were full, and I found that I wanted to be in one.
    Instead - as I reached the campus - I consulted a series of enormous but largely uninformative wall-mounted maps, relied a little on blind chance and eventually located the Fine Art department.
    It was based in one of the newest buildings on campus: a bright, shining block of glass and brick that was almost intimidating in its cleanliness. The automatic doors seemed to pause for a second before deciding to let me in; and while that might have been my imagination, the frostiness at reception certainly wasn't.
    'No,' she said.
    'No?'
    The three secretaries working behind a glass screen in the main office were bathed in poor light from a slatted window somewhere behind them. It was a strange atmosphere: everything looked slightly off-colour and the only real sound was that of fingers tapping on keyboards. Two of the secretaries were studiously ignoring me, working away. They were deferring to the third, who was young and pretty in an icy sort of way - or might have been, if her smile had gone anywhere near her eyes. When I'd rung the bell, her name had been Marie and how could she help? Presumably her name hadn't changed, but her attitude had certainly shifted a few miles.
    'We can't give out information about students,' she told me.
    I gave her my most charming smile. As my badge had already been produced and had failed to impress, the smile was all I had left, although I supposed there was still the gun.
    'Could you at least tell me who her personal tutor was?'
    'Not even that.'
    'Not even that,' I said, leaning away from the counter and tapping it gently. 'Thank you. You've been very helpful.'
    'And you're very welcome.'
    To be fair, I hadn't expected any different, what