‘In any case, why? As far as we know, he had no previous acquaintance with the woman. How do you work up a motive in a few hours, especially to kill a woman who’s just offered you a job? No, I think he’s a non-starter there, sir. It’s the mouldy-oldies who were here at the time who are our best bet.’
‘You’re not helping much, lad,’ said Dalziel sadly. ‘We’ll have to stick with it. The other one looks better though.’
‘Yes, sir. But it still puzzles me why he would publicly accept her allegations that he had seduced her when he patently hadn’t.’
‘But he obviously wasn’t going to agree he had fiddled her marks to get her out of the place.’
‘No,’ said Pascoe thoughtfully. ‘There might be a motive there. He didn’t give a damn about his reputation, but he wasn’t going to lose his career so easily.’
‘Still, why did she send him that note? And why above all did he never deny they had been lovers?’
‘And who wrecked his flat? And why?’
They were silent for a moment.
‘That’s the trouble with you bloody intellectuals,’ said Dalziel finally. ‘I want answers, and all you give is a lot of bloody questions.’
‘Henry Saltecombe took Anita’s note to Fallowfield,’ said Pascoe inconsequentially. ‘And he’s got a pork-pie hat.’
‘That’ll really make them sit up in court,’ said Dalziel. ‘Come in!’
It was breakfast, brought, to Pascoe’s surprise, by Elizabeth Andrews.
‘Hello, love,’ said Dalziel. ‘Kippers, eh? The fairest fruit of the sea.’
Obviously encouraged by his tone and studiously avoiding Pascoe’s eyes, the girl planted the tray on the desk and said in a low voice, ‘Please, what happened the other night, the dancing I mean, will anyone have to know about it? Like the bursar - or my parents. I wouldn’t like …’
‘I don’t see why, love,’ said Dalziel, slitting open a kipper. ‘Not as long as you keep on bringing me food like this. What made you decide to be a witch, love?’
The girl’s hand went to her mouth, a completely natural example of a classic gesture.
‘Oh, I didn’t want … I’m not a witch … not really, I don’t believe …’
‘It was just exciting, was it? And of course, Mr Roote’s very nice, isn’t he?’
She blushed deeply.
‘Yes, yes. I think so. I just went because of him. I’d only been once before and then he … went with me. And I thought it’d be the same. I’d rather there’d been just the two of us. But it was dark, and it didn’t seem to matter. But this time, last Thursday, it wasn’t me. He explained. It was a special one, midsummer or something …’
Pascoe and Dalziel exchanged glances and Pascoe began consulting his pocket diary.
‘… and he had to have someone who … hadn’t before. You see. It was the ceremony, that was all, he’d rather have been with me.’
‘My God!’ said Pascoe.
‘So it was Anita, instead,’ said Dalziel quietly.
‘Yes. It should have been. I didn’t want to stay, but I thought if I went … anyway, I was glad when someone came, before … anything really happened.’
‘You all ran?’
‘Oh yes. I grabbed my clothes and ran as fast as I could. It wasn’t until later I found I’d left my bra and I wasn’t going back for it then.’
She managed a bit of a smile which Dalziel returned.
‘I don’t blame you. We’ll let you have it back. You didn’t happen to see who it was who disturbed you all?’
‘No. I’m sorry. She was too far, just a shape
‘She?’
‘Oh yes. I could tell it was a woman, from the outline of the skirts, I mean. But I didn’t wait to look closer.’
‘Well, thank you very much, my dear. If there’s anything else you remember, just have a chat with me, eh? And remember, mum’s the word.’
He placed a stumpy finger across his lips and winked ludicrously. With a look of great relief on her face the girl left the room, still ignoring Pascoe.
‘So much for Henry,’ said Dalziel through a mouthful of kipper. ‘Unless he was wearing a kilt. Your breakfast’s getting cold.’
‘I’ll just have coffee and a bit of toast.’
‘Please yourself. In that case -‘ Dalziel transferred Pascoe’s kippers to his own plate.
‘Midsummer’s eve,’ said Pascoe.
‘Is that special?’ asked Dalziel.
‘Yes, in a way,’ said Pascoe slowly. ‘It’s not one of the great witches’ nights like Walpurgisnacht, April the thirtieth, or Hallowe’en. But it’s pretty important. The eve of St John the Baptist as well.’
‘Dancing girls and heads on platters,’ offered Dalziel starting on his third kipper. ‘Look, Sergeant, you’re not really taking this witchcraft bit seriously? It’s just an ingenious method of getting lots of gravy! Adds a bit of spice too. Like playing sardines at a party. No one says, let’s all lie on the floor together and grope each other. No, you have an acceptable structure, a game. And you all end up lying on the floor groping each other. Remember? This boy Roote’s just a bit more ingenious.’
‘Yes. Isn’t he? And the virgin?’
‘Variety is the spice. Imagine him telling that nice kid from the kitchen that he’d prefer her but the ceremony required he got stuck into someone else! What a nerve!’
‘But she was a virgin.’
Dalziel pushed his plate away and burped.
‘So were they all. Once. It’s not an uncommon state even in this bloody randy age.’
‘Yes, but still …’
‘Drink your coffee, lad.’
Pascoe supped the lukewarm liquid thoughtfully.
‘How about this,’ he said. ‘Roote gets back from the dunes with the others, who were they? Oh yes, Cockshut and the girl Firth. Then he gets to thinking about what he’s missed that night, to wit, Anita. He broods on it a while, and finally sets out to get what he considers his due, ceremony or none.’
‘A year’s a long time to wait,’ agreed Dalziel.
‘But she’s not there. Perhaps he sees her making off. He follows her to Fallowfield’s cottage. Waits till she comes out and is making her way back -‘
‘- then jumps on her and kills her. Why?’
‘If I knew that we’d have him in here with us,’ said Pascoe.
‘All right. Talk’s over,’ said Dalziel leaping up energetically. ‘They’re not going to let us stay here for ever, you know. Let’s do some work.’
The morning went by quickly. Checks on the files and papers locked up in the study revealed no signs of interference. (Why should they be interested in interfering anyway? Pascoe asked himself. Unless -) But the bottle of Glen Grant in the filing cabinet had a couple of prints which matched those on the plastic cup Dalziel had taken from Cockshut. The superintendent seemed uninterested now. ‘Who wants Cockshut?’ he asked. ‘It would just make him feel important.’ An examination of the room in which Fallowfield had been found was even less productive. The key to the locked lab door was found in his pocket. The heroin had almost certainly been self-administered. Only the absence of a note bothered Dalziel.
‘I’ve a feeling he was the kind of man who would like to have explained himself in the end,’ he said.
One of the college gardeners dimly recollected having seen Fallowfield enter the science block about lunch time. This fitted in quite well with the medical report. While the two policemen had been so eagerly enquiring after him, he had been sitting alone in a dingy little storeroom, dying. It was illogical, but somehow the thought made Pascoe feel guilty.
‘Perhaps he did do the damage in his cottage himself,’ he suggested again. ‘Like Prospero, burning his books.’
‘What did we do him for?’ asked Dalziel, interested.
The memory of those books recalled another chain of thought which his mind had set aside, incomplete, till they could get hold of Fallowfield. Now Fallowfield was beyond any contact the poli
ce could hope for, whatever he himself may have believed. But the links of information might still be obtained elsewhere. He thought a while, then went in search of Sandra Firth.
She was not in her room. As it was shortly after twelve, he started to make his way towards the bar where it seemed likely she might be found. But as he came out into the bright and by now very hot sunlight he saw her standing beneath the beech trees which grew in the patch of ground which lay within the broad sweeping U-bend of the drive. She was talking with considerable animation to someone - in fact, they both seemed to be talking at the same time - and Pascoe felt a tremor of excitement as he looked at the other person. It was Miss Disney, obviously returning from morning service. A prayer-book (he guessed) was clutched in one black-gloved hand while the other held a large crocodile-skin handbag. But the article of attire which had caught Pascoe’s eye was her hat. It was absurd. On another woman it might have been forgiven as frivolous. But on Disney -! It was light blue and dark orange with an artificial red geranium pinned rakishly on one side. And in outline it had the shape of a man’s pork-pie.
Pascoe approached.
‘Now that evil man is gone,’ Disney was saying, ‘I had hoped that some of you, that you above all, Sandra, might have been at the service this morning. The vicar cannot understand; it’s not my fault I have told him; nonetheless in a small village, such things are noticed.’
‘Please, Miss Disney,’ said Sandra desperately. ‘I just don’t want to talk about it. Not now.’
She turned away, but Miss Disney grabbed her arm at the expense of her handbag.
‘For your own good, Sandra …’
‘Oh, for God’s sake!’
‘You’ve dropped your handbag, Miss Disney,’ said Pascoe, picking it up. He flicked the catch with his thumb as he did so and the bag fell open revealing a surprisingly feminine complexity of articles. But one was less common there than the rest. A thick stick of yellow chalk.
‘The good teacher is never without,’ said Pascoe, removing it.
‘How dare you!’ said Disney, beginning to swell. She looked tremendously fearsome, but taking his courage in both hands Pascoe leaned close to her and gently said three words. Her face froze, like a hen with the gapes. Sandra gasped in amazement at hearing such words uttered in such company.
But Disney had said nothing; there was no out-burst, no protest, and Pascoe, much relieved, knew he had been right.
‘On Mr Fallowfield’s wall,’ he said. ‘That’s what you wrote, wasn’t it? After you tore up the books.’
She took a deep breath and steadied herself.
‘Not in front of the child,’ she said. ‘She wouldn’t understand.’
‘Wait,’ said Pascoe to ‘the child’ who while she may not have understood was obviously agog for instruction.
He led Disney gently some yards away.
‘Now,’ he said. ‘The truth.’
‘I am not in the habit of lying,’ she said scornfully. ‘What I tell you may not redound to my credit, not all of it; but it shall be the truth, be certain of that.’
He almost admired her then.
Almost.
There was a ramshackle seat round the bole of one of the trees and they seated themselves, not without some trepidation on Pascoe’s part.
‘It does not become a woman of my beliefs to hate a fellow being,’ she began, ‘but we are exhorted in the Bible to hate evil and the man Fallowfield was evil.’
She nodded emphatically as though defying contradiction.
‘How was he evil, Miss Disney?’
‘In the worst possible way. He corrupted the young. Since he came here, I have noticed a steady decline of interest in the Christian societies I run, a growing scepticism and cynicism in seminar discussions I have with students.’
‘But surely that’s symptomatic of the age?’ said Pascoe.
‘If it is, it is people like Fallowfield who are responsible for it. Girls who would have looked to me as a friend and counsellor have turned away; even among the staff, among my own colleagues, he has mocked me unreproved. And when he debauched that poor girl, Anita Sewell, and finally brought about her death..’
‘We have positive evidence that he never debauched her,’ said Pascoe mildly, ‘and there’s no evidence that he had anything to do with her death. Is there?’
‘She was there! She was there that night! I saw them! That was his doing. Isn’t that evidence?’
‘You mean last Wednesday night out in the dunes? You saw them dancing without their clothes?’
Disney covered up her eyes and groaned. Pascoe was not in the least tempted to admire her now and pressed on relentlessly.
‘What did you do when you saw them, Miss Disney? Did you shout, cry out? Or did you just stand and watch till you were seen?’
‘I feel faint,’ she said suddenly. ‘I want to go to my room.’
‘Soon. Tell me what happened.’
‘They all ran away. At least I did that. I stopped it before … I couldn’t sleep that night. I couldn’t get the sight out of my mind.’
‘You went there deliberately? You knew what was going on?’
‘Yes. I suspected. I had overheard some young men talking.’
‘And yesterday, did you go to Mr Fallowfield’s cottage deliberately?’
‘Yes. It had all been too much. Miss Girling, Anita, the dancing. All that man’s fault, all … so I went to confront him, to challenge him. He wasn’t there, but the door opened when I pushed it. I went in. The place was in a mess, things all over the floor. At first I went next door to call for help, but there was no one in. Everybody was on the beach. I went back inside and started gathering things up. Then I saw what kind of books he had. Evil ideas.Evil ideas.Worse than the flesh. I began to tear them. I tore and tore and tore. And then I wrote on the walls, just what was up there already. The words, the drawings, applied to him, didn’t seem wrong, you understand? It was as if some force had come out of me already and begun the damage. Just like when I heard he was dead last night, I knew that I had helped somehow. And I am glad. It is a good thing, a good thing. There may be some hope for all our salvations now.’
Pascoe did not speak but instinctively stood up, disliking their proximity. She looked up at him coldly.
‘I fear you too are one of the new generation, young man. If you wish me to make a written statement, I shall be in my room. I have done nothing I am not proud of.’
She strode energetically away between the trees, across the grass.
‘What was all that about?’ asked Sandra, fully recovered from her emotional scene, and very interested.
‘Mainly about Mr Fallowfield. Look, Sandra, he’s dead now. He can’t be harmed, except by people like Miss Disney who’ll be sniping at his memory for ever. What do you know about him? She, Disney, says he was an evil influence. Was he? Or any kind of influence?’
She shook her head thoughtfully.
‘I don’t know much. This is just my first year, you see. When I first came, I was all dewy-eyed, innocent. A habitual church-goer, you know, the social thing. That’s how I got in good with Disney to start with. Then I started getting involved a bit with Franny and his lot.’
She glanced at Pascoe under lowered eyelids.
‘This is confidential, is it? I wouldn’t like …’
‘Absolutely,’ said Pascoe. A policeman’s fingers are always crossed, he thought.
‘Well, they were - are - fun. Sometimes a bit weird. And sometimes … well, we did the usual thing, you know. Drank a bit, smoked a bit of pot; there was one night when we got hold of some acid. It seemed fantastic to me. And I had this thing about Franny. Still have, I suppose.’
She spoke so lowly, Pascoe had to strain to hear her. But he did not interrupt.
‘You asked about Mr Fallowfield. Well, I got the impression that he had once been pretty close to the group in some way, I don’t know. A kind of Socratic figure, I suppose, showing the light. But he wasn’t any longer. And all thi
s business about him and Anita was somehow mixed up with this, I don’t know how. That was one of the sacred mysteries of the group, reserved for members of the inner sanctum only.’
She laughed as she said this, but with a slight trace of bitterness.
‘You never made the inner sanctum?’
‘Me? No. Newly-come, that was me. Good for the preliminary lay, but not yet ready for the full initiation. And Franny’ll be gone next year…hell, this place will be dead without him!’
She looked around desperately. What’s the man’s secret? asked Pascoe enviously. Disney should think herself lucky he didn’t fancy her!
He began sorting out some words of kind reassurance to offer Sandra, but she prevented them by glancing at her watch.
‘Hell. Nearly lunch time. They’re dead traditional here. Roast and two veg. whatever the weather. Phew!’
She wiped her brow with the back of her hand.
‘Remember. Confidential, eh? See you.’
‘See you,’ said Pascoe. That’s how I lose all my witnesses, he thought. I start being kind and they just bugger off.
After a working lunch with Dalziel (Sandra had been right - roast beef, carrots and peas) during which he gave the superintendent an account of his talks with Disney and the girl, Pascoe finally managed to track down the senior administrative officer, a long, lugubrious individual called Spinx, whose office contained all the expense records for the college. Grumbling constantly about the interruption to his day of rest and assuring Pascoe that there wasn’t a hope of such a record being kept for such a time, he unlocked a large store cupboard and began to dig around among a mound of dusty files and folders. Pascoe left him to it.
Fifteen minutes later there was a knock at the study door and Spinx, now very dusty, stood there looking very disappointed.
‘Sorry,’ he said.
‘That’s all right,’ began Pascoe.
‘I was wrong. Here you are. Is that what you wanted?’
‘Yes. Why yes,’ said Pascoe taking the dog-eared, stained sheet of paper from his hand and looking at it. ‘Thank you very much.’
‘Pleasure.That all? Right.’
An Advancement of Learning Page 20
