The Secret of Annexe 3

by Colin Dexter

  (ROBERT FROST)

  GLADYS TAYLOR WOULD be very sorry to leave ‘The University of Oxford Delegacy of Local Examinations’. It was all a bit of a mouthful when people asked her where she worked; but the Examination Board’s premises, a large, beige-bricked, flat-roofed building in Summertown, had been her happy second home for nineteen and a half years now – and some neat streak within her wished it could have been the full twenty. But the ‘Locals’, as the Board was affectionately known, insisted that those women like herself – ‘supernumeraries’, they were called – had their contracts terminated in the session following their sixtieth birthday. These ‘sessions’, four or five of them every academic year, varied in duration from three or four weeks to nine or ten weeks; and the work involved in each session was almost as varied as its duration. For example, the current short session (and Gladys’s last – for she had been sixty the previous November) involved three weeks of concentrated arithmetical checking of scripts – additions, scalings, transfers of marks – from the autumn GCE retake examinations. The entry was very much smaller than the massive summer one, comprising those candidates who had failed adequately to impress the examiners on the earlier occasion. But such young men and women (the ‘returned empties’, as some called them) were rather nearer Gladys Taylor’s heart than many of the precious summer thoroughbreds (she knew a few of them!) who seemed to romp around the academic racecourses with almost arrogant facility. For, in her own eyes, Gladys had been a bit of a failure herself, leaving her secondary-modern school at the beginning of the war, at the age of fifteen, with nothing to show any prospective employer except a lukewarm testimonial to her perseverance and punctuality. Then, at the age of forty-one, following the premature death of a lorry-driver husband who, besides faltering in fidelity, had failed to father any offspring, she had applied to work at the Locals – and she had been accepted. During those first few months she had brought to her duties a care over detail that was almost pathological in its intensity, and she had often found herself waking up in the early hours and wondering if she had perpetrated some unforgivable error. But she had settled down; and thoroughly enjoyed the work. Her conscientiousness had been recognized by her supervisors and acknowledged by her fellow ‘Supers’; and finally, over the last few years, she had been rewarded by a belated promotion to a post of some small responsibility, part of which involved working with inexperienced women who came to join the various teams; and for the past six months Gladys had been training a very much younger woman in the mysteries of the whole complex apparatus. This younger woman’s name was Margaret Bowman.

  For the past three sessions, the two of them had worked together, becoming firm friends in the process, and learning (as women sometimes do) a good many things about each other. At the start, Margaret had seemed almost as diffident and insecure as she herself, Gladys, had been; and it was – what was the word? – yes, such vulnerability that had endeared the younger woman to Gladys, and very soon made the older woman come to look upon Margaret more as a daughter than a colleague. Not that Margaret was ever too forthcoming about the more intimate details of her life with Tom, her husband; or (during the autumn) about the clandestine affair she was so obviously having with someone else (Gladys had never learned his name). How could anyone not have guessed? For the affair was engendering the sort of bloom on the cheek which (unbeknown to Gladys) Aristotle himself had once used in seeking to define his notion of pure happiness. Then, in the weeks of late autumn, there had occurred a change in Margaret: there were now moments of (hitherto) unsuspected irritability, of (hitherto) uncharacteristic carelessness, and (perhaps most disturbing of all) a sort of coarseness and selfishness. Yet the strangely close relationship between them had survived, and on two occasions Gladys had tried to ask, tried to help, tried to offer more than just a natural friendliness; but nothing had resulted from these overtures. And when on a Friday in mid-December the last session of the calendar year had finally come to its close, that was the last Gladys had seen of her colleague until the new-year resumption – on January 2nd, a day on which it hardly required the talents of a clairvoyant to see that there was something quite desperately wrong.

  Smoking was banned from the room in which the Supers worked; but several of the women were moderately addicted to the weed, and each day they greatly looked forward to the morning coffee-breaks and afternoon tea-breaks, both taken in the Delegacy canteen, in which smoking was allowed. Hitherto – and invariably – during the time Gladys had known her, Margaret would sit patiently puffing her way through a single cigarette a.m.; a single cigarette p.m. But on that January 2nd, and again on the 3rd, Margaret had been getting through three cigarettes in each of the twenty-minute breaks, inhaling deeply and dramatically on each one.

  Margaret’s work, too, during the whole of her first day back, had been quite unprecedentedly slack: ten marks missed at one point in a simple addition; a wrong scaling, and a very obvious one at that, not spotted; and then (an error which would have made Gladys herself blanch with shame and mortification) an addition of 104 and 111 entered as 115 – a total which, but for Gladys’s own rechecking, would probably have given some luckless candidate an ‘E’ grade instead of an ‘A’ grade.

  At lunchtime on Friday, January 3rd, Gladys had invited Margaret for a meal at the Chinese restaurant just across the Banbury Road from the Delegacy; and over the sweet-and-sour pork and the Lotus House Special chop suey, Margaret had confided to Gladys that her husband was away on a course over the New Year and that she herself had been feeling a bit low. And how enormously it had pleased Gladys when Margaret had accepted the invitation to spend the weekend with her – in Gladys’s home on the Cutteslowe housing estate in North Oxford.

  Mrs Mary Webster, the senior administrative assistant who kept a very firm (if not unfriendly) eye upon the forty or so women who sat each day in the large first-storey room overlooking the playing fields of Summerfields Preparatory School, had not returned to her accustomed chair after the coffee-break on the morning of January 6th. Most unusual! But it was the intelligence gleaned by Mrs Bannister (a woman somewhat handicapped in life by a bladder of minimal capacity, but whose regular trips to the downstairs toilet afforded, by way of compensation, a fascinating window on the world) that set the whole room a-buzzing.

  ‘A police car!’ she whispered (audibly) to half the assembled ladies.

  ‘Two men! They’re in the Secretary’s room!’

  ‘You mean the police are down there talking to Mrs Webster?’ asked one of Mrs Bannister’s incredulous colleagues.

  But further commentary and interpretation was immediately forestalled by Mrs Webster herself, who now suddenly entered the door at the top of the long room, and who began to walk down the central gangway between the desks and tables. The whole room was immediately still, and silent as a Trappist’s cell. It was not until she reached Gladys’s table, almost at the very bottom of the room, that she stopped.

  ‘Mrs Bowman, can you come with me for a few minutes, please?’

  Margaret Bowman said nothing as she walked down the wooden stairs, one step behind Mrs Webster, and then into the main corridor downstairs and directly to the room whose door of Swedish oak bore the formidable nameplate of ‘The Secretary’.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  Monday, January 6th: a.m.

  The cruellest lies are often told in silence.

  (ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON)

  ‘THE SECRETARY’ WAS one of those endearingly archaic titles in which the University of Oxford abounded. On the face of it, such a title seemed to point to a personage with Supreme (upper-case, as it were) Stenographic Skills. In fact, however, the Secretary of the Locals, Miss Gibson, was a poor typist, her distinction arising from her outstanding academic and administrative abilities which had led, ten years previously, to her appointment as the boss of the whole outfit. Grey-haired, tight-lipped, pale-faced, Miss Gibson sat behind her desk, in an upright red leather chair, awaiting the arrival of Mrs Margaret Bow
man. Arranged in front of her desk were three further red leather chairs, of the same design: in the one to the Secretary’s left sat a man of somewhat melancholy mien, the well-manicured fingers of his left hand occasionally stroking his thinning hair and who was at that moment (although Miss Gibson would never have guessed the fact) thinking what a very attractive woman the Secretary must have been in her earlier years; in the middle sat a slightly younger man – another policeman, and one also in plain clothes – but a man both thicker set, and kindlier faced. Miss Gibson introduced the two police officers after Margaret Bowman had knocked and entered and been bidden to the empty chair.

  ‘You live in Chipping Norton?’ asked Lewis.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘At 6 Charlbury Drive, I think?’

  ‘Yes.’ Even with the two monosyllabic answers, Margaret knew that her tremulous upper lip was betraying signs of her nervousness, and she felt uncomfortably aware of the fierce blue-grey eyes of the other man upon her.

  ‘And you work here?’ continued Lewis.

  ‘I’ve been here seven months.’

  ‘You had quite a bit of time off over Christmas, I understand?’

  ‘We had from Christmas Eve to last Thursday.’

  ‘Last Thursday, let’s see – that was January the second?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘The day after New Year’s Day.’

  Margaret Bowman said nothing, although clearly the man had expected – hoped? – that she would make some comment.

  ‘You had plenty of things to occupy you, I suppose,’ continued Lewis. ‘Christmas shopping, cooking the mince pies, all that sort of thing?’

  ‘Plenty of shopping, yes.’

  ‘Summertown’s getting a very good shopping centre, I hear.’

  ‘Very good, yes.’

  ‘And the Westgate down in the centre – they say that’s very good, too.’

  ‘Yes, it is.’

  ‘Did you shop in Summertown here – or down in Oxford?’

  ‘I did all my shopping at home.’

  ‘You didn’t come into Oxford at all, then?’

  Why was she hesitating? Was she lying? Or was she just thinking back over things to make sure?

  ‘No – I didn’t.’

  ‘You didn’t go to the hairdressers’?’

  Margaret Bowman’s right hand went up to the top of her head, gently lifting a few strands of her not-so-recently-dyed-blonde hair, and she permitted herself a vague and tired-looking smile: ‘Does it look like it?’

  No, it doesn’t, thought Lewis. ‘Do you go to any beauty salons, beauty clinics, you know the sort of thing I mean?’

  ‘No. Do you think I ought to?’ Miraculously almost, she was feeling very much more at ease now, and she took a paper handkerchief from her black leather handbag and held it under her nose as she snuffled away some of the residual phlegm from a recent cold.

  For his own part, Lewis was conscious that his questioning was not yet making much progress. ‘Does your husband work in Oxford?’

  ‘Look! Can you please give me some idea of why you’re asking me all these things? Am I supposed to have done something wrong?’

  ‘We’ll explain later, Mrs Bowman. We’re trying to make all sorts of important inquiries all over the place, and we’re very glad of your co-operation. So, please, if you don’t mind, just answer the questions for the minute, will you?’

  ‘He works in Chipping Norton.’

  ‘What work does he do?’

  ‘He’s a postman.’

  ‘Did he have the same time off as you over Christmas?’

  ‘No. He was back at work on Boxing Day.’

  ‘You spent Christmas Day together?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And you celebrated the New Year together?’

  The question had been put, and there was silence in the Secretary’s office. Even Morse who had been watching a spider up in the far corner of the ceiling stopped tapping his lower teeth with a yellow pencil he had picked up, its point needle-sharp. How long was the well-nigh unbearable silence going to last?

  It was the Secretary herself who suddenly spoke, in a quiet but firm voice: ‘You must tell the police the truth, Margaret – it’s far better that way. You didn’t tell the truth just now – about being in Oxford, did you? We saw each other in the Westgate Car Park on New Year’s Eve, you’ll remember. We wished each other a Happy New Year.’

  Margaret Bowman nodded. ‘Oh yes! Yes, I do remember now.’ She turned to Lewis. ‘I’m sorry, I’d forgotten. I did come in that Tuesday – I went to Sainsbury’s.’

  ‘And then you went back and you spent the New Year at home with your husband?’

  ‘No!’

  Morse, whose eyes had still been following the little spider as it seemed to practise its eight-finger exercises, suddenly shifted in his chair and turned round fully to face the woman.

  ‘Where is your husband, Mrs Bowman?’ They were the first six words he had spoken to her, and (as events were to work themselves out) they were to be the last six. But Margaret Bowman made no direct answer. Instead, she unfastened her bag, drew out a folded sheet of paper and handed it over to Lewis. It read as follows:

  31st December

  Dear Maggie

  You’ve gone into Oxford and I’m here sitting at home. You will be upset and disappointed I know but please try and understand. I met another woman two months ago and I knew straightaway that I liked her a lot. I’ve just got to work things out that’s all. Please give me that chance and don’t think badly of me. I’ve decided that if we can go away for a few days or so we can sort things out. You are going to want to know if I love this woman and I don’t know yet and she doesn’t know either. She is not married and she is thirty one. We are going in her car up to Scotland if the roads are all right. Nobody else need know anything. I got a week off work quite officially though I didn’t tell you. I know what you will feel like but it will be better for me to sort things out.

  Tom

  Lewis read through the letter quickly – and then looked at Mrs Bowman. Was there – did he notice – just a brief flash of triumph in her eyes? Or could it have been a glint of fear? He couldn’t be sure, but the interview had obviously taken a totally unexpected turn, and he would have welcomed at that point a guiding hand from Morse. But the latter still appeared to be perusing the letter with inordinate interest.

  ‘You found this note when you got back home?’ asked Lewis.

  She nodded. ‘On the kitchen table.’

  ‘Do you know this woman he mentions?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘You’ve not heard from your husband?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘He’s taking a long time to, er “sort things out”.’

  ‘Has – has my husband had an accident – a car accident? Is that why—’

  ‘Not so far as we know, Mrs Bowman.’

  ‘Is that – is that all you want me for?’

  ‘For the minute, perhaps. We shall have to keep the letter – I’m sure you’ll understand why.’

  ‘No, I don’t understand why!’

  ‘Well, it might not be from your husband at all – have you thought of that?’ asked Lewis slowly.

  ‘Course it’s from him!’ As she spoke these few words, she sounded suddenly sharp and almost crude after her earlier quietly civilized manner, and Lewis found himself wondering several things about her.

  ‘Can you be sure about that, Mrs Bowman?’

  ‘I’d know his writing anywhere.’

  ‘Have you got any more of his writing with you?’

  ‘I’ve got the very first letter he wrote me – years ago.’

  ‘Can you show it to us, please?’

  From her handbag she brought out an envelope, much soiled, drew from it a letter, much creased, and handed it to Lewis, who cursorily compared the two samples of handwriting, and pushed them along the desk to Morse – the latter nodding slowly after a few moments: it seemed to him that by amateur and profe
ssional experts alike, the writing would pretty certainly be adjudged identical.

  ‘Can I please go now?’

  Lewis wasn’t at all sure whether or not this oddly unsatisfactory interview should be temporarily terminated, and he turned to Morse – receiving only a non-committal shrug.

  So it was that Margaret Bowman left the office, exhorted in a kindly way by the Secretary to get herself another cup of coffee from the canteen, and to be ready to come down again if the police needed her for further questioning.

  ‘We’re sorry to have taken so much of your time, Miss Gibson,’ said Morse after Mrs Bowman had left. ‘And if we could have a room for an hour or so we’d be most grateful.’

  ‘You can stay here if you like, Inspector. There are a good many things I’ve got to see to round the office.’

  ‘What do you make of all that, sir?’ asked Lewis when they were alone.

  ‘We haven’t got a thing to charge her with, have we? We can’t take her in just for forgetting she bought a pound of sausages from Sainsbury’s.’

  ‘We’re not getting far, are we, sir? It’s all a bit disappointing.’

  ‘What? Disappointing? Far from it! We’ve just been looking at things from the wrong end, Lewis, that’s all.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Oh yes. And we owe a lot to Mrs Bowman – it was about time somebody put me on the right track!’

  ‘You think she was telling the truth?’

  ‘Truth?’ Morse shook his head. ‘I didn’t believe a word of her story, did you?’

  ‘I don’t know, sir. I feel very confused.’

  ‘Confused? Surely not!’ He turned to Lewis and put the yellow pencil down on the Secretary’s desk. ‘Do you want to know what happened in Annexe 3 on New Year’s Eve?’

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  Monday, January 6th: a.m.

  It is a bad plan that admits of no modification.