by Maxine Barry
Gideon’s eye sharpened on her for a moment, then he very carefully turned his attention back to the road. He knew that keeping his head turned away from her would make her feel less threatened. ‘Oh? From the sound of your voice, I take it that it wasn’t exactly a raging success?’ he said carefully.
‘Nope. Boy meets girl. Girl gets bowled over. Boy promises her the world — so long as she’s the one paying for it. Girl’s father pays off boy. Boy leaves girl. Girl learns a big fat lesson. Think they could make a Hollywood movie out of it?’ she asked, grinning determinedly across at him.
‘Oh, bound to,’ he said cheerfully. He was well aware that her joking manner was nothing but a front — a really good front, but one that didn’t fool him for a minute. ‘Who do you think would play you?’ he mused. ‘Julia Roberts?’
‘Oh, at least Julia Roberts.’
‘It must have hurt,’ Gideon said, and she shot him a quick look.
‘Oh, I got over it,’ she said airily.
‘After getting your self-confidence brutally battered,’ he predicted softly. ‘And after redefining what you wanted from life. And a few nights spent crying into your pillow. Not to mention an unwanted hardening of your shell, which has left you with a mistrust of men that you’re scared will taint any of your future relationships. How am I doing?’
‘Gee, Professor Welles, anyone would think you were a psychologist!’
‘Cute.’
‘Aren’t I though?’
Gideon indicated left, knowing that they were not far from their destination and wishing he’d had more time to talk to her about all this. He’d never really thought about Laurel Van Gilder as a vulnerable teenager before. As someone who’d taken hard knocks and come through. As someone, well, human, just like the rest of mankind.
One thing was for sure — her run-in with a fortune hunter would have left a very nasty scar indeed, whether she was aware of it or not. And from now on, he was going to keep it firmly in mind. For some reason that he wasn’t yet ready to acknowledge, even to himself, he had the idea that one day — and perhaps soon — he was going to have to do something about that scar of hers.
Like heal it.
Forever.
He sighed heavily, then pulled the car over to the side of the road and parked. As he switched off the engine, Laurel looked up at the small block of flats. ‘So, where are we?’ she asked, shamelessly heading for safer ground and pushing the true confessions of the past few minutes firmly to the back of her mind.
Time enough to deal with them later.
‘Dr Julie Ngabe’s. She’s got a house just around the corner.’
‘You have been a busy little bee,’ she mused, getting out of the car, this time with a long-limbed easy grace.
Gideon watched her with hungry eyes, then got out himself. ‘Oh, I’ve been even busier than that,’ he said smugly.
‘Oh?’ she raised one black eyebrow in interrogation.
He locked the car and, as he moved to join her on the pavement, he held out his hand. He did it without really thinking about it. And, in the same manner, she took it. Suddenly, they found themselves on a cold and damp November afternoon, walking down a leaf-strewn pavement hand in hand.
‘Er, yes,’ Gideon said. Her hand felt so right in his. Not small, not delicate, not cold. It was a hand that he felt he could hold on to forever.
Laurel wondered if she should pull her hand free. But she didn’t want to. Simple as that.
‘What else have you found out then?’ she asked, keeping her voice light and a little challenging.
‘I’ve learned that Dr Ngabe’s college, St John’s, has been reviewing her research fellowship.’
‘Is that good or bad?’
Gideon launched into an explanation. ‘A research fellowship is not a full fellowship. They can be anything from one year to three or five. And they’re renewable. Say a college wants to “check out” an academic. This academic has a good reputation and is doing some good work, but is still young and a relatively unknown factor. They offer him or her a research fellowship. That makes them an active member of the college — they get to teach and use the facilities, become an active force in the place.’
‘But, at the end of the fellowship, the college can get rid of them if they want,’ Laurel followed.
‘Right. But it’s not all as bad as it sounds. Take one of your countrymen, for instance. He or she comes over here on a Rhodes Scholarship. Gets a good degree. Now, he’s really got his eyes set on a full professorship at Yale, say. But the competition’s tough. A three-year stint as an Oxford fellow will give him a good CV and a massive boost up the ladder. Oxford gets a very able teacher with good credentials, who’ll pull in other Rhodes Scholars and be a good contact afterwards. After three years, he goes off to Yale to commence battle and Oxford gets to snaffle up another Rhodes Scholar. Everyone wins.’
‘Unless?’ Laurel asked. For she was sure there was an ‘unless’ in that scenario somewhere.
‘Unless what the research fellow really wants is to stay in Oxford full time and hold a permanent post. Then the life of a research fellow gets to look pretty rocky.’
‘But not if the college is happy with her,’ Laurel pointed out.
‘But what if it’s not?’
Laurel glanced up at him. Being so tall, it was not often that she got the chance to look up at men. She found she rather liked it.
She also liked the way the grey day around her couldn’t diminish the silver brightness of his hair. The way the mist had to give way to the power of his icy bright blue eyes. She liked walking beside him. She liked the looks passers-by were giving them.
Laurel forced herself to concentrate. ‘Are you saying St John’s doesn’t want to renew Julie Ngabe’s fellowship?’
‘That’s the word I heard. I have a friend at St John’s.’
I’ll bet you do, Laurel thought, with just a little pang of jealousy. For some reason, she was sure it was a female friend.
‘I see. But I thought being shortlisted for the Van Gilder chair would have given her chances of renewal a boost?’
Gideon smiled. ‘You don’t know Oxford. What your Van Gilder panel might have thought impressive doesn’t apply here. There are enough toffee-nosed dons who, secure in their own places, spend their time making life difficult for up-and-comers.’
‘Especially women from Africa?’ Laurel said sourly.
‘Yes and no. They’re nasty to everyone. It’s the old lion defending his territory against the young lion.’
‘But surely St John’s must have some good dons? They’d be cutting off their noses to spite their faces, if not.’
‘I agree. And if Dr Ngabe had won the chair, then her tenure would have been assured, of that I have no doubt. But she didn’t win. And I’m wondering just how bitter that might have made her, and what she might have done in the heat of the moment.’
‘You mean steal the chalice?’
Gideon sighed. ‘It seems so far-fetched. But she might have seen taking the chalice as no more than her due. A sort of consolation prize.’
‘Hmm. A nice psychological point of view,’ Laurel mused. ‘How about going for the more straightforward filthy money option. I don’t suppose the good doctor has a big income?’
By now they’d reached Dr Ngabe’s house. It was a modest semi, well-maintained, with a small, well-kept garden.
‘Do you think she knows all this? About the college pulling the plug on her, I mean?’ Laurel asked curiously.
Gideon shrugged. ‘Why don’t we ask her?’
‘Yes.’ Laurel sighed. ‘Well, let’s get on with it.’
Julie Ngabe opened the door herself. She was dressed in a flowing orange and emerald-green robe with a matching turban. She looked as beautiful, noble and aloof as ever. Beside her, Laurel felt under-dressed and about as feminine as oxtail soup.
‘Professor Welles. How nice to see you again,’ Dr Ngabe said graciously. ‘And Miss Van Gilder. Please, do come in
. I wasn’t expecting visitors. Please excuse the state of the house.’
The house looked immaculate. Dusted, recently vacuumed, with not a dent in the cushions.
‘Tea?’
‘Please,’ Gideon said, and allowed himself to be ushered into a living room and seated on a large, well-stuffed sofa. As their hostess went into the kitchen, Laurel and Gideon looked at each other helplessly.
‘This is not going to be easy, is it?’ Laurel said with massive understatement. And she was soon proved correct. Julie Ngabe returned with perfectly made Indian tea and expensive wafer biscuits.
‘I expect you’re wondering what we’re doing here,’ Laurel blurted, a little unnerved by the other woman’s quiet serenity.
Julie Ngabe smiled briefly and inclined her head.
‘It’s about the Augentine chalice,’ Gideon took up the baton softly. ‘We were wondering if you knew it had been stolen.’
For just a moment, the long, well-shaped hands hesitated as they raised the china teapot. Then Dr Ngabe calmly poured the first cup. ‘No, this is the first I’ve heard of it. I haven’t read the papers today.’
‘I see. But it’s not in the papers, Dr Ngabe. St Bede’s is trying to . . . er . . . keep the situation under control. We were hoping to regain the chalice without any adverse publicity.’
Dr Ngabe looked at him steadily. ‘That sounds very appropriate,’ she said. There was nothing in her voice that sounded like censure, but Gideon felt himself flushing.
Laurel sympathised with him. Dr Ngabe had a way of making you feel stupid, gauche, ugly and ridiculous, without even trying. In fact, she was so cool, so in control, that it was not hard to imagine her as a competent thief.
One thing was for sure — if this woman had the chalice, there was no way she was going to give it back.
Laurel bit her lip, then bit into a biscuit and looked away.
‘Did you notice anything odd at the party that night?’ Gideon pressed on.
‘Is that when the chalice was stolen?’ Dr Ngabe allowed herself to sound surprised. ‘Surely not. Not with so many people present. It was only out in the hall, wasn’t it?’
Gideon nodded. ‘Yes.’
‘Then whoever took it took a great chance,’ Dr Ngabe pointed out the obvious. ‘Anyone could have left the party and caught the thief out.’
Gideon nodded. ‘Yes. It was an act of desperation, all right. Or perhaps anger?’
Dr Ngabe’s eyes flickered. Then she inclined her head graciously.
‘Were you surprised that I won the chair, Dr Ngabe?’ Gideon asked. He felt awkward questioning this proud, aloof woman. Like it was he who had done something wrong.
Dr Ngabe stiffened visibly. But was that just embarrassment? Gideon wondered.
‘No. Of all of us, you were the strongest candidate. Of course, in a few years’ time . . .’ she shrugged delicately, but the message was clear.
Dr Ngabe didn’t see herself as anybody’s also-ran.
Gideon nodded. ‘Yes. I agree. So, to get back to the theft. Did you notice anybody leave the party for any length of time?’
‘You did,’ Dr Ngabe said — and was there just a hint of a smile on her inscrutable face?
Gideon inclined his head. ‘Yes. Anyone else?’
‘We are concentrating on those of us who overheard your dean announce some sort of problem with the alarm, I take it?’ she said calmly, and sipped her tea.
Laurel felt herself watching her in open admiration. Was this some class act or what?
‘Yes, we are,’ Gideon admitted. ‘For obvious reasons.’
Dr Ngabe seemed to think. She was quiet, and utterly still, for about the space of five seconds. ‘Dr Ollenbach did — she was gone a fair while, I recall. Dr Doyle, I’m not sure. Possibly. Sir Laurence didn’t leave the room at all, as far as I’m aware.’
‘And yourself?’ It was Laurel who put the question in. She managed, somehow, not to make it sound too impertinent.
‘No. Like Sir Laurence, I never left the room — except to go home, of course,’ she added.
Laurel glanced at Gideon. Now there was a thought. Had the thief simply nicked the chalice on the way out?
But no. Surely not. That would just be suicidal. The later the hour the more likely it would be that someone else would also be leaving the party and catch the thief red-handed.
So was she just blowing smoke? Laurel wouldn’t put it past her. Anyone who could be quite so sphinx-like bore careful consideration.
Gideon, however, was less inclined to read anything sinister in the doctor’s flat tone. He knew that to a woman of Dr Ngabe’s refinement, maintaining a polite and deferential veneer at all times was a top priority.
‘You did your first PhD in Nairobi, I believe?’ he changed tack abruptly. If she seemed surprised, it didn’t show.
‘Yes.’
‘And you’re now working on a DPhil,’ Gideon said conversationally. ‘I look forward to reading your thesis once it’s published.’
‘Thank you.’
‘I mean it,’ Gideon said softly. ‘I think it will be well worth reading.’
Her calm brown eyes met his. He couldn’t tell if she was angry at him — suspecting that he was just being patronising — or whether she found praise from a man of his standing genuinely satisfying.
He sighed. No doubt about it. If this woman was responsible for the theft, she was not about to give herself away. Still. He couldn’t just give up.
‘Your research fellowship runs until the end of next Trinity Term doesn’t it, Dr Ngabe?’ he asked casually.
‘It does.’
‘I hope, at the end of it, you might apply to St Bede’s for another post. I’m sure Lord St John James wouldn’t be averse to adding another psychologist to the college prospectus.’
It was a clever ploy, Laurel realised at once. If Dr Ngabe jumped at it, it might indicate that she knew St John’s was going to kick her out.
Dr Ngabe smiled politely. ‘That’s very flattering, Professor Welles.’
And that, thought Laurel wryly, was an even cleverer ploy. It gave absolutely nothing away.
Gideon, too, knew when he was hitting his head against a brick wall. He finished his tea, made professional small talk for a while, and then rose to excuse himself.
Laurel took his hint and the good doctor showed them to the door. On the way back to the car, Laurel felt a depressing sense of déjà vu.
‘We’ve gone this route before,’ she mused glumly.
‘I know. And how much further forward are we?’ he agreed. They approached the car and he fished out his keys. ‘Where to now?’
‘Why not go back to your place?’ she asked. ‘Put our heads together and see what we come up with? Then we can track down the don who was taking photographs that night. Although what good pictures will do us, I can’t say. Unless you can use some secret psychic powers and point out the guilty one just by looking at his or her picture?’
‘I’m not John Edward,’ Gideon said wryly.
As they got into the car, Gideon, for the first time ever, felt reluctant to head for St Bede’s. He fought the sensation off and drove swiftly back to the Woodstock Road.
Walking through the quads, past the War Memorial and through Becket Arch, they both noticed that the college had a curiously breathless air about it. As if the very buildings were waiting for something to happen.
The last time she’d been in this room, Laurel thought as Gideon ushered her into his spacious quarters and closed the door behind them, she’d just discovered that the chalice was missing. She’d been in shock and seeking refuge.
Now it was nearly four o’clock and already getting dark.
She watched Gideon walk to the windows and draw across the long velvet curtains. He moved confidently around in the dark, turning on lamps, and then walked to the drinks cabinet. ‘Brandy?’
‘Please.’
Laurel sank down on the sofa. Gideon handed her a drink, then walked over to the gr
ate. A scout had laid out a log fire all ready to light. Although the radiators had kept the chill off the room, she was glad to see a cheery flame flicker among the coal and paper. Soon there was a blaze going. That and the brandy warmed her through. Funny, she hadn’t realised how cold she’d been until then.
Wearily, Gideon stretched out on the white sheepskin rug in front of the fire. He often lay there, but to Laurel, who’d been expecting him to draw up a chair, or better yet, sit next to her on the sofa, the manoeuvre came as a complete surprise.
She watched him lie out like a long, lean polar bear, and noticed how the firelight played such wonderful, loving tricks with the colour of his hair and eyes, and on the planes of his cheeks.
Looking into the flames, Gideon sighed. ‘Well, let’s recap. The Ollenbachs are definitely in financial straits. And there’s certainly tension between husband and wife.’
‘Agreed,’ Laurel said. Her eyes were still on his profile.
Sitting so close to the fire made Gideon take off his sweater. The wool teased his fine fair hair, leaving it as wispy as cobwebs where the static electricity had made it dance.
He leaned back on his elbows, his long legs stretched out towards the door.
‘Dr Ngabe, on the other hand, is another definite contender. She needed to win the chair in order to keep her Oxford place, and when she knew she wasn’t going to get it — who knows? Also, if she was desperate enough to stay on here, she might have been inclined to secure herself a fair whack of money, if only in the hopes of going independent and financing her own research.’
‘And she’s got the temperament for it,’ Laurel put in. ‘She’d be good at whatever she tried to do. Level-headed. Calm. In control.’
Gideon sighed. ‘But has she got the right psychological make-up to take that kind of chance? I just can’t see Dr Ngabe taking such a risk. If caught, she’d have gone to jail. She’d certainly have lost all chance of a life in Oxford. I just can’t see her risking it. Her personality is all wrong for that.’
‘And let’s not forget your precious Dr Doyle,’ Laurel said waspishly. ‘Keeping your face and figure at her age costs a lot of money.’
