A RECENT sad event in Okehampton has demonstrated what a huge appetite there is among so called normal and sensible people for gossip and rumour. Why was the worst possible and most melodramatic interpretation put on it before anyone knew anything for certain? Why did so many conversations begin, ?Have you heard . . . ? and continue ?I heard that . . . ?. becoming more sensational by the hour? Later that week when I delivered Meals on Wheels, I found one of my frail, elderly, housebound clients very nervous because her neighbour had frightened her by describing the event in grisly detail, which hadn?t a shred of truth in it. I wonder how many other people in a similar position were deeply disturbed by ?friends? with no other thought in their empty heads than a burning desire to be the first with the worst? When there is so much real evil about it is insulting to innocent victims to indulge in this despicable loose talk. Zoë Bradshaw East Street Okehampton