CRYPTIC CROSSWORD

FOR your chance to win, solve the crossword to reveal the word reading down the shaded boxes. HOW TO ENTER: Call 0901 293 6233 and leave today’s answer and your details, or TEXT 65700 with the word CRYPTIC, your answer and your name. Texts and calls cost £1 plus standard network charges. Or enter by post by sending completed crossword to Daily Mail Prize Crossword 16270, PO Box 28, Colchester, Essex CO2 8GF. Please include your name and address. One weekly winner chosen from all correct daily entries received between 00.01 Monday and 23.59 Friday. Postal entries must be date-stamped no later than the following day to qualify. Calls/texts must be received by 23.59; answers change at 00.01. UK residents aged 18+, exc NI. Terms apply, see Page 74.

ACROSS

1 After church, Mildred arranged to hire trendy nanny (11) 9 Head of Tate, say, is demoted, producing bad reaction (7) 10 Quirky comedian wastes energy travelling around (7) 11 Arab king’s original zoo? (3) 12 Expert upsets poor

worker (3,4) 13 Record poem about one’s

part in serial (7) 14 Low satellite with no

name (3) 15 Secure reversal of

roles (5) 17 Film about European

geese in flight (5) 18 Object with more

expensive finish (3,2) 20 Savage Roundhead

protected by metals (5) 22 Bird’s leg bone missing

both ends (3) 24 Irish accepting new party

sanction (7) 25 Bound to delete abrupt transition between scenes (4,3) 26 Main southeastern

area (3) 27 Bad-tempered sheep worried — six must be brought in (7) 28 It’s used when operating

laptop in various places (7) 29 Unprompted, comic puts on a nose (11)

DOWN

1 Callous indifference is a feature of reptiles (4-11) 2 Latest routes making progress (7) 3 Wood nymph boring a cedar’s heart (5) 4 Publican offers board and lodging in private (9) 5 Five hundred swim with it at sea, the fools! (7) 6 Big dishes of oilseed rape Scot cultivated (5,10) 7 Organised function with Mike that’s unplanned (6) 8 Sieve loose stones at bottom of mountain (6) 16 Report furore

involving meat (5,4) 18 Release former English politician on time (6) 19 Left in charge of old covered entrance (7) 21 Posh doctor in Lagos curtailed backache (7) 23 Endless, like some

stories (6) 25 Mythical sailor, at the outset just a lad (5) NEED A CLUE? Text TIP to 65700 to receive FOUR answers to today’s crossword, or call 0901 293 6236. Texts and calls cost £1 plus standard network charges. Today’s clues available between 00.01 today and 23.30 only.