An Oxford Tragedy

by J. C. Masterman

  ‘No, no,’ he went on, ‘I hated having to do it. It hurt me to ask those questions. But they were quite, quite necessary. You must believe that, and trust me a little if I am to help you. I can’t tell you now just why I had to ask them, but I will tell you this. I like and admire your Miss Vereker, almost as much as she disapproves of me, and I’m very glad that she answered just as she did. But what a snub I got! Well, I must get over that. And now do remember that I only started on this investigation because you begged me to – so please let us have the old confidence, or we shan’t make progress.’

  I could hardly have resisted his appeal even if I had wished to do so, and I decided at once to tell him the whole ugly history of Cotter’s visit that morning, and of the latter’s suspicions of Scarborough. I had settled in my mind before Brendel arrived that I should say nothing of all this to him, but now I felt strongly the need for his advice and support. So I poured out the whole wretched story of Cotter’s discovery of Scarborough’s connexion with the revolver, and of the suspicions which, in the Inspector’s mind and my own, were making the case grow blacker and blacker with regard to that unfortunate young man. Finally I told him how I had written to Scarborough’s father, so that he might be warned of the danger in which his son stood.

  To my intense astonishment he broke into a roar of laughter. ‘Forgive me,’ he said. ‘I ought not to laugh, but it is really very funny. The Inspector had not seen Scarborough when he talked to you?’

  ‘No, he had not. But by now he may have put the wretched boy on the rack and, for all I know, have dragged a confession out of him. It’s too awful, and I’m more or less responsible for him up here.’

  Brendel patted me again on the shoulder.

  ‘No, no, don’t worry,’ he said. ‘I assure you on my word of honour that your young protégé is as safe from suspicion as you are, or as I am. And by now the good Inspector certainly knows that too. He was just what you would call one lap behind. When you’ve heard what I have to tell you, you’ll know all about that. Settle yourself down comfortably in your chair, and get ready for a long story. I want to tell you all about my luncheon party and a lot of other things as well.’

  Chapter Eleven

  We sat down on each side of the fire; I lit a pipe and composed myself to listen.

  ‘To-day,’ he began, ‘I had my little luncheon party. Two days ago I invited them, and they all accepted. There came – let me see –’ He held up four rather chubby fingers and ticked off his guests on them. ‘First your Scarborough, then his friend Garnett, and the young man Martin and his friend Howe. From your quite excellent descriptions of them on Thursday night I knew already a great deal of each of them. And so everything is as natural, as natural as can be. Look!’ He held up his four fingers again. ‘Of Scarborough’s father I heard so much from you that I am a friend of his early days. Garnett has lived for two years in Mexico, and I have studied Mexico in your college library with all the encyclopaedias for nearly two days, and he will never guess that I have not really had those six months there that I described so picturesquely! Of course I must ask my fellow-Mexican to lunch! And then Howe and Martin; that is really most curious! My friend Martyn with whom years ago I used to shoot in Norfolk spells his name with a Y, and so I am quite wrong in thinking that the Martin here is a relation of his! And my old business correspondent How, in the City of London, has no E in his name, and my guest of to-day has! What an extraordinary coincidence, so extraordinary that it must be true! If you invent something sufficiently absurd in all its details people will always believe it. How we all five laughed at the thought of a luncheon party where two of the guests had been asked because the host thought that their names had been spelt differently! Four guests and two of them there under false pretences! And so there we were all as happy as possible; no stiffness, no discussion of your quite execrable Oxford climate, no polite inquiries about the state of the University at Vienna. No Zwang, as we say, at all. Of course they called me “Sir” a little too often at first, and were just a little too polite, but that soon passed, for I had taken my precautions.’

  He paused to relight his cigar, and to smile at me.

  ‘There were no cocktails, because they would have been unsuited to your great traditions, but the estimable Callendar had provided me with some very admirable sherry, an Amontillado of great merit. The young, as I have often observed, are fond of discussing wine, so I ask them at once for their opinion. I think it really good, but is it perhaps the slightest degree too dry? Scarborough rolls it round his tongue, and says that for his taste sherry should be dry, and that it is excellent. And Howe commends it, and Martin praises it, and Garnett, who is a little older – isn’t he – than the others, continues to say nothing, but he drinks two glasses whilst the others are criticizing one. So we are already all good friends when we start lunch, and over that lunch I have taken very great trouble. It is a good lunch, Winn; let me say your cook is a great ornament and credit to your college. With our lunch we drink a Clos de Vougeot of 1911, specially commended to me by Callendar. And again I invite the criticism of these connoisseurs. Though I speak as host it really does seem to me a worthy wine, but do they think it if anything just a little lacking in body? Scarborough, who has been very well brought up, thinks it an admirable wine, but agrees that if any criticism could be offered it would be just precisely that one which I have suggested. Howe is full of encomiums, and Martin hazards some praise of the bouquet. Garnett offers no special contribution to the discussion, but the greater part of the bottle finds its way into his glass. I suggest that perhaps the second bottle will by chance be better than the first, since bottles differ so much. And my little party begins to go very well.

  ‘Sooner or later, of course, we must talk of the murder, though it is not I who first mention it. What do I think of it, they ask? I shrug my shoulders, and explain that I am of course a stranger here, and I can know nothing of the people concerned, or how this dreadful thing can have happened. But what do they think of it? And who was really the murderer, and how did he get away unobserved? Then they all begin to talk at once – (except Garnett who is filling his glass) – and I – well – I listen. But for you, my dear Winn, I shall disentangle their most interesting stories.’

  Brendel fancies himself not a little as a raconteur, and he now made a dramatic pause, and smacked his hand on the arm of his chair. ‘Ah,’ he said, ‘I’ve forgotten the most important thing of all! Now listen!’

  ‘Nonsense,’ I said, ‘you haven’t forgotten anything. I’m not taken in so easily. You’re just working up the effects.’

  He laughed. ‘Well, perhaps. But you must forgive the tricks of the old lecturer. I’m just underlining the important things for you, so be patient, and don’t spoil my little story.’

  ‘Go on,’ I said. ‘I’m too old to be kept in suspense like this. You’re like an old lady at the card-table who won’t play out her trumps.’

  ‘Not at all. I am that rare creature, a lawyer with a true sense of the dramatic. Besides, it’s better than a trump, or even than the ace of trumps. It is the joker which I shall now play, and the joker will make all your poor Inspector Cotter’s little trumps look quite shabby. Are you ready?’

  ‘Yes, for heaven’s sake, let’s have it out,’ I replied, half amused and half exasperated.

  ‘Well, it’s only this. I quite forgot to say – now don’t contradict me – I quite forgot to say that your friend Scarborough came to my little party with the fingers of his right hand all bandaged up …’

  ‘But …’

  ‘There are no buts about it. Listen to me. The young man shows me his hand, and curses his ill-fortune. (How little, my dear Winn, we understand our own best interests!) He tells me how he spoke to Callendar (we knew that!) and how he and Garnett went on to join the party which was celebrating your rowing victories. And since he was just a little – oh, just a very little – intoxicated, and since fireworks are dangerous things, he contrived to blow off a nice
little bit of the first and second fingers of his right hand. What happens next? Of course his friend Garnett is there to help him, and by happy chance the Head Porter is there too; between them they bandage up the damaged hand; they go into Garnett’s rooms and smear a lot of grease over the wounds and tear up a handkerchief or two, and the thing’s done. Yes, I’ve seen Mr Pine and it’s all correct. Five or ten minutes after he spoke those very incriminating words to Callendar, Scarborough was being bandaged up by Pine and Garnett. I daresay they didn’t bandage him very skilfully, but they did it quite well enough. Have you ever tried, Winn, to shoot a man with a revolver when your right hand has just been roughly bandaged by the Head Porter? Of course you haven’t, and, if you ever do, you’ll miss. Scarborough’s got a grand alibi, and nothing can shake it. Providence, as you must have observed in the course of your career, has a wonderful way of watching over the young and the intoxicated. He might have blown out one of his eyes and have been blind for life, he might have remained unhurt at all, and then he would have been considered by suspicious persons like you and Cotter as a murderer. But, no! He damages his hand just enough to give himself a cast-iron alibi at the cost of three weeks’ inconvenience. Really Providence is wonderful! And he, poor young man, is so blind to his good fortune, that all he can say is that it was damnable to be knocked out just then, because otherwise he and Garnett would probably have been cruising (yes, that was the word) round the Quad, and would no doubt have spotted the murderer on his way towards the crime. Incidentally Scarborough’s alibi secures Garnett as well; the pair of them were together all the evening. I noticed that you didn’t observe that one was as much implicated as the other, or that of the two Garnett was much the more likely to have committed a deed of violence. I’m afraid, Winn, that you let your personal feelings sway you too much for successful detective work! But Scarborough was lucky, all the same. And why did he want to see Shirley that night? Just because he had what he called a tutorial the next day, and he wanted to postpone it. Shirley was always difficult, but sometimes a little more approachable after a good dinner. How very, very simple!’

  Brendel puffed a cloud of smoke triumphantly into the air and looked questioningly at me.

  ‘You don’t seem quite so pleased at my little joker card as I expected,’ he said.

  I had indeed been unable to conceal my embarrassment. ‘Of course I’m delighted,’ I said, ‘but I’m frightfully put out about that letter to Fred Scarborough. You see, I put it all very strongly. I told him that his son was suspected of murder, that the facts looked very awkward for him, that he was really in a grave predicament, and that Fred ought to come up at once. What the devil am I to do now? I shall look a perfect fool, and Fred Scarborough will never speak to me again.’

  The laugh with which Brendel greeted my plaint seemed to me rather unfeeling.

  ‘Dear, dear,’ he said, ‘and now you are in a “very grave predicament.” Well, you must wire as early as you can tomorrow morning and ask him to burn your letter unread. For me, I find the situation piquant. Your old friend will sit down to his hearty English breakfast. Naturally he will read first the telegram which lies on the top of his letters. Every human instinct will then impel him to open the fat envelope, addressed to him in your handwriting, which lies by his plate. The training which he has laboriously received at his expensive public school and at St Thomas’s will urge him with equal force to obey your request. The struggle will be terrible. Will he succumb to the temptation or will he not? Really a most dramatic situation! I think you must word that telegram very strongly, and perhaps it would be wise to prepay the reply. Ask him to let you know that he has destroyed the letter unread. We ought to weigh the scale a little in favour of St Thomas’s training if we can; human curiosity is dreadfully strong on the other side. Don’t worry, Winn,’ he went on more seriously, as he noted my real distress, ‘honestly I don’t think you need be nervous, and you must keep up a standard of relative values. After all, the solid fact is that the young man is as safe from suspicion as you or I. Furthermore, the laborious Cotter, my rival in detection, has by now discovered the fact, and is kicking himself for having wasted another half-day on a false scent. But don’t write unnecessary letters again if you want to be a successful detective. And isn’t it better sometimes’ (his eyes twinkled as he spoke) ‘to overcome your natural shyness and ask a few awkward or even discourteous questions even at the expense of a snub? If you could have brought yourself to have inquired of your young protégé if he was murdering anyone that night, he would just have waved his bandaged hand in your face, and you need never have written to his father. There’s something in the straightforward question and answer method, you know. But surely no harm has really been done.’

  With my confidence partly restored I composed myself to listen to the rest of Brendel’s story.

  ‘The tale of Howe and Martin was no less interesting,’ he said. ‘Let me see, how did you describe them to me on Thursday night? “A pair of good, normal, rather simple young men, not really academically-minded.” How true!’

  From anyone else I should have felt disposed to resent the mimicry of myself, which I thought I could detect, but I was beyond the stage of resenting any of Brendel’s little habits, so I made no comment, and he continued.

  ‘Listen then to the true tale of the two not academically-minded young men, as drawn from them by my Clos de Vougeot.’

  He chuckled, and settled himself deeper into his chair as he continued his story. If the mimicry of myself had been doubtful and in slightly bad taste, that of the undergraduates was obvious and wholly amusing. The speaker was Brendel, but it seemed to me at times as though I was really listening to the voices of his Sunday guests.

  ‘“You see,” Martin said, “we went up, Howe and I, to do our weekly tutorial with the Sheep – I beg your pardon, Sir, with Mr Shepardson. And it so happened that we hadn’t done the work he’d set us.” “By a curious coincidence,” Howe interjected, “the same thing had happened the week before, too.” “Precisely,” said Martin, “and the Sheep, though a mild creature by nature and upbringing, had then shown unsuspected tigerish qualities. A fresh display of temper, unworthy of our tutor, was therefore, we felt, if possible, to be averted.” “That,” chorused Howe, “was exactly our intention.” “We therefore considered whether an appeal to his higher nature, or a well-phrased request for a moratorium might not melt his stony heart, and decided that we knew a trick worth two of that.” [I have,’ interpolated Brendel, with obvious satisfaction, ‘added considerably to my stock of English idioms as a result of my luncheon party. The more obscure phrases I noted down directly in my note-book, so I think they are correct, though I did not always fully understand them.] “Yes, we knew a trick worth two of that, so we put out a little bait.” “And the Sheep swallowed it line and all,” chimed in the faithful Howe.’ [Brendel looked at me inquiringly. ‘A piscatorial metaphor not usually applied to Sheep,’ I explained.] ‘“Before he could ask for the proses which we had not done, I said, all innocent like, ‘Please, Sir, I’d like to ask you a question before we get to work. Howe and I went to a lecture at New College to-day on Juvenal, and the lecturer seemed to think that two of Mr Shirley’s suggested emendations in the text of the third Satire might possibly be mistaken. I’ve brought the text along to ask you.’ ‘Possibly be wrong,’ snorts the Sheep, ‘possibly be wrong … obviously, palpably, manifestly, ridiculously wrong! Give me the text for a moment and let me show you. And remember always, both of you, that wild speculative guesses are not scholarship.’ Right off the deep end he goes at once,”’ [Brendel looked at me with a puzzled air, as he recounted this passage. ‘Deep end of what? A sheep or something else?’ ‘A swimming bath, I think,’ I said, ‘but the phrase is obscure.’] ‘“Well, the Sheep didn’t want much egging on after that. He got blood to the head in a way that was pretty to watch. He took a hold of the text and showed us one mistake of Shirley’s after another. But the trouble was that once he’d smelt blo
od we couldn’t stop him; hot on the scent and head down and all that. He showed us about one hundred instances which proved beyond all reasonable doubt that Shirley was a reckless and ill-informed person. Good, bitter scholarly back-chat it was too. At last we couldn’t stand any more. We’d got up at a quarter to nine, ten o’clock had struck, and the Sheep was still hitting poor old Shirley for sixes all round the ground.”’ [Brendel shook his head helplessly as he disinterred this phrase from his notebook. ‘A cricketing phrase,’ I explained, ‘and incomprehensible to anyone born outside England. Go on.’] ‘“It was pretty clear that we had to make an effort, so I kicked Howe under the table” [“unnecessarily hard,” muttered the chorus] “and said, with the innocence of a new-born babe, that it seemed that Shirley was a pretty dangerous sort of chap for us to get into touch with. Didn’t the Sheep think that we ought to give up going to his lectures in case our minds might be corrupted? Well, the Sheep began to see that he’d gone a bit too far in crabbing a colleague, so he stopped in his mad career, and said that we mustn’t take everything he said au pied de la lettre, that perhaps he’d overstated things a trifle, that Shirley was, of course, a great scholar, though fundamentally wrong in all his views about Juvenal, and that we must certainly not abstain (my God, what a word!) from his lectures, and that, well, it was getting late, and that he was glad we were so keenly interested in textual criticism, and, that, in short, we might go, and might bring him a couple of proses each next week. We didn’t exactly take long in making our dignified exit, and as we came out we saw the Dean in the Quad, standing just under the windows of his own rooms. And that’s the damnable thing again! If we’d shut down the Sheep’s blitherings half an hour earlier we might easily have seen the chap who went and shot up poor old Shirley.”’