ACROSS
1. Engineer calls up about end of check (8)
7. Fellow with a foot on female’s troublesome bustle (4)
10. Before affected person (upper-class), answer is about drink (9)
11. Sewer’s stuff found here in perpetuity (4)
12. To do with one university backing a part of Classics course? (6)
13. Indian tailor dressed Diaz investing rupees (5)
14. Worm’s always reversing into a shower of abuse (7)
15. Pirate above Seychelles shipping King before money (7)
18. Promiscuous OAP’s romantic about clinches (12)
20. Assigned to the defence, one near job-seeking? (12, three words)
24. Tore round first bit of golf course wet through (7)
27. Indeed, new layer of humus must circle flower (7)
28. A routine job shifting old gold (5)
29. First sign of numbats in thorny copse (6)
30. Retreat when adult is round this dormouse (4)
31. European Union busy until identification of alloy (9)
32. Scots solicitor initially entertains you and me — he’s no hero! (4)
33. Virgate garden also behind lough (8)
DOWN
1. Female would start in shoe stores (5)
2. Type of writing exercises islander finally stopped (8)
3. Usually those that bound regally will cause interest (5)
4. A note beside idly translated ancient language (6)
5. A hoard reported by company with troublefree business? (7, two words)
6. Unnatural craving consuming one local fruit (6)
7. Like a warm woolly? One in bazaar’s 50% less (8)
8. “Sir” deducting marks for late bloomer (5)
9. The old lie? To die in battle, smart but positive (7)
16. Oriental number in ordinary bloke’s coin (8)
17. African bibliothecary blackballing Academician for eccentricity (8)
18. Once poetically follow stream almost to the setting sun, upstream (7)
19. Tangle with a cockchafer who does for bulls (7)
21. Need stand-in’s office? Head’s been axed (6)
22. Part of swarm one moves under cover (6)
23. A message service about sex infections for Sassenachs (5)
25. Seal this inside a fort near Hamilton, perhaps (5)
26. Tangle at Culloden presumably — either way injured (5)
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Post your solution to Mephisto 2690, The Sunday Times, 3 Thomas More Square, London E98 1RL, or email puzzle.entries@sunday-times.co.uk. The first correct solution picked at random after next Saturday wins a Whitaker’s Almanack worth £50. Four runners-up will each receive £20. The Chambers Dictionary 12th edition is the primary reference. Readers may email comments or queries to Paul McKenna at paul.auctor@gmail.com
SOLUTION TO MEPHISTO 2688
Across: 1 Arid, 4 Phialled, 10 Metalanguage, 11 Adamic, 13 Dulse, 14 Piarist, 15 Ochery, 17 Change, 18 Calcite, 20 Griffon, 23 Ratine, 24 Zeatin, 25 Abasing, 28 Gryde, 29 Laical, 30 Monstre sacré, 31 Abstains, 32 Nand
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Down: 1 Amadou, 2 Reducer, 3 Damselfish, 4 Pliers, 5 Indican, 6 Agra, 7 Latinist, 8 Egis, 9 Debtee, 12 Tractarian, 16 Huitains, 18 Coenuri, 19 Tridarn, 20 Gramma, 21 Megass, 22 Aneled, 26 Blob, 27 Iota