by M. J. Trow
‘Gentlemen, I believe that Inspector Lestrade has something to say to you,’ bellowed Nails, thereby reducing the room to silence. ‘In view of the seriousness of the situation I have allowed him to address you. Inspector.’
Lestrade took a pace forward. ‘Gentlemen. It will come as no surprise to you, I feel sure, that my men and I are investigating what began as one murder – that of Margaret Hollis the laundress, found drowned in the school laundry at the end of September. That inquiry developed into a second – the death of your colleague Anthony Denton . . .’
Saunders-Foote began sobbing quietly.
‘I’ll take him out, Headmaster,’ said the Bursar, helping the little old classics master to the door.
‘Cherak Singh Major was then found in a boat on the lake, followed by his brother, whose corpse Dr Nails and I discovered in what was left of the library. Only this morning, Mr Gainsborough came across the body of Major Bracegirdle.’
The room was stunned into a silence at once academic and electric.
‘That makes five deaths in as many weeks, gentlemen.’
‘Bravo!’ shouted a voice from a corner.
‘Sir?’ Lestrade turned to face it.
‘Honeycombe, mathematics master,’ the florid little man announced. ‘Your addition is admirable, Inspector, but what of your detection?’
‘We are making some headway, sir,’ Lestrade bluffed.
‘What?’ Clearly Honeycombe was not a man to mince his words.
Lestrade tried a long shot. He crossed pensively to Gainsborough. ‘You found Major Bracegirdle?’ he asked.
‘You know I did,’ said the Second Master, wondering to what depths of idiocy Lestrade was descending now. ‘You just told everybody.’
‘While out for a morning walk?’
‘Yes.’
Lestrade turned to the colleagues. ‘Gentlemen, please raise your hands if you were aware of the fact that Mr Gainsborough habitually takes morning walks.’
Colleague looked at colleague. One or two tentative hands rose.
‘Look here. . .’ began Nails, but Lestrade raised a hand to silence him.
‘How many, George?’ he asked.
The sergeant stood up to get a good vantage point. ‘Are you voting, sir?’ he asked, and instantly regretted it as Lestrade’s hand fell and his eyes raked him, ripping the metaphorical stripes off George’s sleeve. ‘Six, sir.’
‘Six.’ Lestrade spun round to Gainsborough again. ‘Six, out of . . . ’
There was a pause while George counted again, during which there were murmurings and shufflings and cries of ‘Oh, really!’
‘Twenty-nine, sir,’ said the sergeant, refusing to be hurried.
‘. . . twenty-nine,’ Lestrade repeated. ‘Odd, Mr Gainsborough, that so few of your colleagues know of this habit of yours.’
‘What are you trying to say?’ Gainsborough demanded, steam beginning to hiss from his ears.
‘That you are not an habitual walker. That the very least likely time the Second Master of a school would walk out for fresh air and relaxation is after a night of horror in which his library burned down and a boy died.’
‘I explained that.’ Gainsborough was shouting.
‘Yes, and not very convincingly,’ Lestrade shouted back. ‘What you did not explain was that you saw Bracegirdle leave the buildings last night in search of the Fire Brigade. You saw your chance. Alone in the darkness, you followed him, but not before you took the opportunity of implicating someone else – Ruffage, the Head Boy – by stealing his sword. You overtook Bracegirdle in the darkness and ran him through.’
‘Overtook Bracegirdle?’ Gainsborough laughed. ‘He may have been the wrong side of fifty, Lestrade, but he was a fitter man than I. And what was my motive?’
‘Stop it, Gainsborough,’ Nails interrupted. ‘Lestrade, you go too far.’
‘Oh no, Headmaster,’ Lestrade turned on him. ‘Not nearly far enough.’
Sergeant George recognised the signs. Lestrade with his dander up, going for the throat.
‘This is eighteen eighty-eight, Dr Nails,’ the Inspector said.
‘Indeed it is,’ the Headmaster replied. ‘So what?’
‘So I am surprised that Rhadegund Hall does not have a telephone machine.’
‘I must take the blame there, Inspector.’ Mercer the Bursar had returned from comforting Saunders-Foote. ‘The infernal cost of the thing, you see. Astronomical.’
‘So must I,’ another voice sounded. ‘Rutherford, science master. They are not good for one. The resonance in the earpiece can cause deafness. That’s been scientifically proven. The speaking tube has a tendency to harbour bacteria thereby rendering the speaker open to infection.’
‘And what is your reason, Headmaster?’ Lestrade asked.
‘New-fangled nonsense, that’s what. Lestrade, where is all this getting us?’
‘It got Bracegirdle murdered,’ Lestrade said flatly. ‘If you’d had a telephone installed you could have rung the Brigade last night. And Bracegirdle and Cherak Singh Minor would both have been alive.’
‘Stuff and nonsense,’ argued Nails. ‘You’re clutching at straws, Lestrade.’
The Inspector circled the carpet a few times. ‘Then, of course, there was Denton, strangled by Saunders-Foote . . .’
‘What?’ The whole room was on its feet.
‘How dare you, Lestrade?’ Nails thundered. ‘The old fellow might be slightly . . . how shall I put it? . . . not as other men . . .’
‘Avuncular, Headmaster,’ Mercer suggested.
‘Quite so. Avuncular. And it is true I may not have strictly approved of his avuncularism, but to suggest that Saunders-Foote is a murderer is preposterous. What would be is motive? You’ve seen how devastated he is.’
‘Oh yes, thereby making the motive all the more obvious. Why did he not report the matter to anyone? Denton died at lunchtime. The first person Saunders-Foote told was me – in the evening,’ said Lestrade. ‘Sit down, gentlemen, I beg you, and let me ask you to picture the scene. Mr Denton arrives from Oxford, fresh-faced, bright-eyed. He falls into the . . . avuncular? . . . clutches of Mr Saunders-Foote whose advances the young man rejects. Saunders-Foote is hurt, devastated even, to be rebuffed. In a fit of jealous rage, he strangles Denton and throws his body into the river.’
‘Jealous rage? Advances?’ Nails was purple. ‘I won’t have it said . . .’
‘Come now, Headmaster, we are all men of the world.’ Lestrade glanced at Spooner. ‘Or at least I am. Words cannot frighten us.’
‘How could Denton have been overpowered by Saunders-Foote?’ Gainsborough asked. ‘Any more than I could have outrun Bracegirdle?’
’What’s your point?’ Lestrade asked.
Gainsborough closed to him, then took his place, centre carpet. ‘Headmaster, gentlemen, I don’t say this lightly. God knows, it goes against all I’ve ever stood for, but, Lestrade, look to the boys.’
‘Any boys in particular?’
Gainsborough looked at Nails, who slowly raised his head. ‘Ovett could outrun Bracegirdle,’ he said.
‘And Eaden had a grudge against him,’ Gainsborough said. ‘I shouldn’t say it of a departed colleague, but Bracegirdle was a beast.’
‘Unlike Temple of Rugby,’ nodded Nails, half to himself, ‘just a beast.’
‘And he didn’t like Indians,’ Lestrade said, in the same contemplative tone. ‘But then, Reverend Spooner, neither do you.’
‘Eh?’ The Chaplain shot up off his chair.
‘When we first met, you told me you disapproved of Dr Nails introducing our brethren of the Empire to Rhadegund.’
‘Spooner? Is this true?’ Nails lowered.
‘Only in the broadest sense, Headmaster. I am, as you know, coyal to the lause of education. And the honour of the school.’
‘I see,’ said Nails, which mystified Lestrade still further.
‘And, of course,’ the Inspector said, ‘two of the victims were black. Then aga
in,’ he patted the Chaplain’s ample shoulder and admired the bull neck above the dog-collar, ‘it would have taken a powerful man to deliver that sword thrust through Bracegirdle’s body and to strangle young Denton. I suspect Maggie Hollis and the boys were rather easier. Muscular Christianity I think you called it when you pole-axed Mrs Shuttlecomb the laundress. How is she, by the way, George?’
The sergeant consulted his book. ‘A vegetable, sir,’ he said.
‘Thank God she’s recovered,’ sighed Spooner. ‘Headmaster, I must protest. Faunders-Soote is innocent. He kept the death of Denton to himself because he feared your wrath. He panicked. Knew not which way to turn.’
Nails held up both hands. ‘I will do the protesting, Chaplain. Lestrade, had I known that the purpose of this little charade was to harangue and hound my staff, I would never have allowed it. You have falsely accused several of my colleagues tonight, not to mention sullied the honour of my school.’ He controlled himself with the experience that came of years of dealing with children infinitely more stupid than he was. ‘You have my word for it that your head will roll. I do not need a telephone to get you off this case. I will merely point my head in the direction of London and shout.’
Lestrade could believe it. With Nails and Gainsborough at their head, one by one and two by two the Rhadegund Senior Common Room filed out, all except Mercer.
‘How is Saunders-Foot?’ Lestrade asked him.
‘Inconsolable,’ the Bursar said. ‘You know, Lestrade, I’m not like the others. I’m not a master, you see, so I view things perhaps in a different light.’
‘If your light is any brighter than mine, Mr Mercer, I’d be grateful to share it,’ Lestrade sighed.
The Bursar got up. ‘I was in the library last night,’ he said.
‘Indeed?’ Lestrade’s ears pricked up.
‘In fact I entered by the west door as you gentlemen left by the east.’
‘May I ask what you were doing there at that hour?’
‘I couldn’t sleep, what with all this business. I think we’re all a little on edge recently. I came to get a book.’
‘And?’
Mercer produced a slim volume from his pocket. ‘While browsing, I came across this. It sounded familiar.’
He handed it to Lestrade, who read the embossed letters: ‘“The P . . . Proc . . .”’
‘Proximae Accessit, for the best all-rounder in the Upper Fifths. Won, I seem to remember by Timothy Porpoise in that year,’ Mercer said. ‘Not the prize, the title. On the spine.’
Lestrade flipped the book over. ‘Thuggee. Its Practices and Incidence’, he read.
‘Page five,’ Mercer told him.
Lestrade stiffened, causing his neck to lock again.
‘What is it, sir?’ George asked.
‘Mr Mercer has told us how Margaret Hollis, Anthony Denton and Cherak Singh Major died,’ he said. ‘They were killed by a thuggee knot. “The thuggees”,’ he read, ‘“were a fraternity of murderers and robbers who strangled unsuspecting travellers with a noose, turban or handkerchief. Their secret jargon was called Ramasi and their patroness was Kali, the Hindu Goddess of Destruction”.’
‘Does that help you, Mr Lestrade?’ Mercer asked.
‘Er . . . I feel sure it does, Mr Mercer, yes. But just now I’m not quite clear how.’
‘Yours, I think.’ Lestrade threw the Rhadegund Sword of Honour onto the floor where it clattered and then lay still.
‘The Devil, copper,’ snarled a young man by the fire.
‘It’s all right, Partridge. I’ve been waiting for the Inspector to call.’
‘You’re Ruffage?’ asked Lestrade.
‘I am.’
‘I’d like to talk to you. Alone.’ He lashed Partridge with a look that was guaranteed to freeze blood. Even so, the boy did not move until he got the nod from Ruffage.
Lestrade sat down uninvited. ‘So you’re the Bearer of the Sword?’ he asked.
‘For this year, yes,’ said Ruffage. ‘I go up to Cambridge next October.’
‘Or down from the Drop,’ said Lestrade.
Ruffage raised an elegant eyebrow. ‘I know the Sword ended up through old Bracegirdle,’ he said. ‘The whole school does, but what I don’t know is how it got there.’
Lestrade looked hard at the handsome young man before him. Arrogant, clever, athletic, loaded with honours.
‘I know you’re arrogant, clever, athletic, loaded with honours,’ he said. ‘What I don’t know is if I can trust you.’
‘It’s true I was Victor Ludorum,’ smiled Ruffage, ‘but I don’t know about the clever bit. As for arrogance, you’re probably right, it’s in the blood of the Ruffages. My great-grandfather was first into the breaches of Badajoz, you know.’
Lestrade was unprepared for the change of name. He’d get George to check on this Ludorum back at the Yard. But he really wasn’t interested whose trousers Ruffage’s great-grandfather had worn. He leaned forward and offered the Captain of the School a cigar.
‘Havana?’ Ruffage asked.
‘Of course.’
‘Then I will.’ He popped it into his blazer pocket. ‘Better smoke it later, when the oiks are in bed.’
‘I’ll be frank, Mr Ruffage,’ said Lestrade. ‘Five people are dead at this school. I need an ally before there are six.’
‘And you’ve chosen me.’
‘Among the boys, yes.’
‘And among the staff?’
‘That’s my business,’ smiled Lestrade, lighting up.
Ruffage nodded. ‘I hope you’ve chosen well,’ he said.
Lestrade leaned forward again. ‘So do I,’ he said.
Ruffage looked at the papers spread on his desk. ‘What do you know about Tacitus?’ he asked.
‘Would that be Tacitus of the Remove?’ Lestrade couldn’t really remember the name from George’s depositions.
Ruffage smiled. ‘All right, Mr Lestrade, you need help. What can I do?’
‘First,’ Lestrade pointed to the sword, still lying where he had thrown it, ‘I want to clear up that little matter. When did you last see it?’
‘Thursday,’ Ruffage told him. ‘Corps Parade is every Thursday morning, from reveille until luncheon.’
‘You wear the sword every Thursday?’
‘Yes.’
‘And where is it kept?’
‘In the Corps Hut. Hardman brings it to me.’
‘Hardman?’ Bells began to tinkle in Lestrade’s ears. ‘I was told only Major Bracegirdle, the Headmaster and you had access to it.’
‘Perfectly true, Inspector, but I give my keys to Hardman at reveille who fetches it from the Corps Hut.’
‘Why?’
Ruffage chuckled. ‘One of our rather silly traditions. Rhadegund must seem a little quaint to outsiders . . . oh, meaning no disrespect, of course. You see, next year’s Bearer of the Sword within the Corps is always chosen a year in advance. When I’m gone, it will be Hardman’s turn. He will be senior cadet under . . . whoever they appoint. As such, it is his duty to bear the sword to the Bearer. Silly, isn’t it?’
‘And is it also his duty to return it?’
‘At luncheon, yes. I give him the key again.’
‘And this happened as usual this Thursday?’
‘Yes, of course.’
‘So you have no way of knowing whether Hardman actually returned the Sword?’
Ruffage frowned. ‘Well, no, I suppose not . . . Look here, you don’t suspect Hardman, surely?’
Lestrade leaned back in his chair. ‘Why not?’
Ruffage thought for a moment. ‘The sword is circumstantial, surely? It’s not hard evidence, as you chappies say.’
‘I thought you were my ally.’ Lestrade blew blue rings to the panelled ceiling.
‘So I am,’ said Ruffage, ‘but not to the extent of ratting on a friend.’
‘Hardman is your friend?’ Lestrade had been at Rhadegund long enough to form some idea of the tangled web of relationships t
hat characterised the English public school.
‘Not exactly,’ Ruffage admitted. ‘Call it the honour of the school if you like.’
‘Ah, you’ve been talking to the Chaplain,’ said Lestrade. ‘On second thoughts, perhaps you haven’t. You pronounced it properly.’
‘You can’t expect a chap to peach on his fellows, Lestrade. This is a public school. More than that, it is St Rhadegund’s. Anyway, if I had the slightest shred of evidence of any involvement by Hardman or anyone else – I’d tell you, believe me. But I cannot and will not deal in tittle-tattle.’
‘Spoken like a true Rhadegundian,’ Lestrade applauded. ‘Careless talk may cost lives, Mr Ruffage; it can also save them. If you reconsider, you know where to find me.’
There was a knock at the door and a little boy stood there.
‘Well?’ said Ruffage.
‘Sorry, Ruffage,’ the little boy said meekly, ‘I’ve a message for Mr Lestrade.’ He handed the Inspector an envelope, and left.
‘Well, well,’ mused Lestrade, ‘so Dollery was right. A letter.’
‘What?’ Ruffage asked.
‘Nothing.’ Lestrade opened the envelope. It was the sort of invitation he couldn’t resist. ‘It appears Hardman wants to see me. In the gymnasium at midnight.’
Ruffage stood up and crossed to Lestrade. ‘If you’ll take my advice you won’t go,’ he said.
‘Why?’ said Lestrade ingenuously.
‘Because Hardman won’t be alone,’ Ruffage told him.
Lestrade smiled. ‘Neither will I,’ he said.
‘Oh, yes,’ said Ruffage. ’I’d forgotten your men.’
‘No,’ Lestrade chuckled. ‘Six great plates of meat tramping all over the late Major’s floors. That would be unfair to the fabric – and no doubt the honour – of the school. Even so,’ he patted his pocket in a gesture Ruffage didn’t understand, ‘I shan’t be alone.’
Lestrade turned left at the top of the stairs. Prefectorial eyes followed him from the photographs on the walls. The 1st XI and the 1st XV were silent witnesses to his approach, clandestine, in the dark. He knocked on the door, below which shone the glow of lamplight. And the lady of the lamp opened it to him.
‘Matron,’ he said and felt himself being hauled inside.
