‘And what about the lectures? Were they happy to have someone from another subject?’
‘Oh, God, yes.’ I laughed. ‘In History they don’t get much of an audience. They’re delighted. More the merrier. It’s not like Medicine or something where you have to go to all the practicals and sign in. It’s not like school. In History, lectures are completely optional. Lots of people don’t go at all.’
‘I see.’ Peck sounded a bit surprised. ‘And it didn’t interfere with your own studies.’
‘Not at all. You can check with my supervisor, Dr Waynflete. He says I’m doing fine.’
‘Thank you. We will.’ That was said by Cannon. His first contribution.
Peck looked across at him. Cannon was sitting under the Procol Harum poster, with the photograph of Julie just behind his head. Their presence was quite intrusive really.
Cannon pulled a packet of Embassy out of his jacket pocket and lit one with a side-action Ronson Varaflame. I leaned over from the desk and pushed the ashtray across the low table towards him.
‘Mr Engleby,’ said Cannon, ‘I’d like you to tell us more about Jennifer. How did you first meet her?’
I told him about Jen Soc, the meetings, getting to know her there, helping out with the clearing up, the film in Ireland and—
‘Did she invite you to go on this trip to Ireland?’
‘I can’t remember.’
‘Were you a member of the Film Society at that time?’ said Peck.
‘It wasn’t a Film Soc project. It was a private thing. Nick had the camera. Nick, you know, her housemate as he became. Stewart Forres just borrowed some of the Film Soc facilities when he came back. For the edit and so on. The screening room.’
‘I see.’
‘Have you seen the film?’ I asked.
‘Yes. Several times.’
‘Was it helpful?’
‘Yes,’ said Peck, ‘it’s very unusual in a missing persons inquiry to have such a clear and recent picture of what they’re like.’
Cannon said, ‘And what did you do on this film?’
‘Some sound, some carpentry, some catering.’
‘There’s a rape scene, isn’t there?’ Cannon stubbed out his Embassy.
‘Yes.’ Something told me to keep the answers short at this point.
‘Were you involved?’
It occurred to me that since it was now over two weeks since Jennifer’s disappearance they must have talked to Stewart, Nick and Hannah – at least – of the Tipperary people.
‘Yes, I did the sound that day.’
‘How was Jennifer?’
‘Fine.’
‘Go on.’
I shrugged.
Cannon said, ‘It’s not every day a twenty-year-old girl pretends to be raped. In front of a camera crew.’
‘No.’
‘Come on, Michael,’ said Peck in an avuncular way. ‘Barry just wants to know if she seemed all right.’
I turned to face Peck again. ‘Yes. She was an actress. It was a challenge.’ I was thinking of her tears and wondering if anyone had mentioned them. ‘I expect it was difficult but she was determined to get it right – because there was a political point to be made.’
‘And what was that?’ said Cannon.
‘A feminist point about rape.’
Peck looked at Cannon as though asking him not to speak.
I also looked at Cannon and wondered what on earth he knew about feminism, rape or sex. I could tell what sort of family he came from. Slightly better than mine, but still working-class prudes. They don’t do sex, those guys – the upper-lowers – except as a bargaining counter for marriage. I wondered how many girlfriends he’d had. Did they send him on a course to learn about the promiscuous middle classes and their soft ideas? ‘Simone de Beauvoir for Plods’. ‘Free love among the Posh: an introductory series of five lectures’. Don’t get excited, Cannon. Keep your ginger hair on.
I found Peck was looking at me. ‘And what was your reaction, Michael?’
‘My reaction to what?’
‘The rape scene. Were you upset?’
I bit my lips a little and looked at the policewoman. She looked down at her rubber-soled shoes. I looked over at Cannon, who was leaning forward in his chair, then back to Peck.
‘Not at all,’ I said. ‘I was just doing a job. Trying to get a clean soundtrack without aeroplane noise.’
‘And it didn’t upset you at all to see this girl you were . . . very good friends with, as you say, it didn’t upset you to see her being raped?’
I laughed. ‘Not at all. It was fun. It was interesting. We were all acting. She didn’t really get raped.’
‘And when you saw the actor who played the rapist . . . Er . . .’
‘Alex Tanner,’ said Cannon.
‘Yes,’ said Peck, ‘when you saw Alex pretend to rape Jennifer . . . You were . . . That was all right, was it?’
‘I . . . Yes. That was all right. Stewart was very professional. Also, Hannah was there, the actress. You know, the girl who did the Walk. So she was like a chaperone.’
It was funny hearing them talk about all these people in that formal way – Alex Tanner, for instance – as though they were real grown-ups in a significant life. They were students, making things up as they went along. They didn’t know what they were doing, right, wrong or neither. They had nothing to compare it with because it was all still being done for the first time.
‘So you watched this young man,’ said Cannon, ‘who was naked, I think, and this girl, your close friend, also naked . . . And how close did he actually go in his acting to raping her?’
‘I don’t know. I didn’t look.’
I felt a tightening of interest from all three.
‘Why not?’ said Cannon.
‘I was looking at her face to make sure she was all right. I told you. She was my friend.’
No one said anything for quite a long time. I could feel a headache starting, but didn’t say so.
Eventually, Peck began again on the nature of my friendship with her. Had I been to her house? Yes. How many times? Not that often, we saw each other mostly at lectures. Did I know her parents? Certainly not! Most people don’t admit to having parents . . .
I became quite bored with this after a while and offered to make tea. To my disappointment, they all said no.
‘Now, Michael,’ said Peck. ‘I’m going to have to ask you a more difficult question. I want you to tell me what you were doing on the night of Jennifer’s disappearance.’
I inhaled and turned round to look down at my desk. I heard the clock strike half-past five. I located my Heffer’s ringbound desk diary.
‘Let me see . . . Yes. I remember very well, in fact. I went to the party that Jennifer was at. It was in a house in Malcolm Street.’
‘We know where it was,’ said Cannon.
‘And who did you talk to there?’ said Peck.
‘Jennifer, of course.’
‘How was she?’
‘Fine. Absolutely fine.’
‘You didn’t notice anything unusual. She didn’t seem agitated or upset?’
‘Not at all. She was always fine.’
‘Who else did you talk to?’
‘I can’t remember. No one much. I didn’t stay long. It wasn’t my kind of party.’
‘Can you remember the name of anyone at all that you spoke to?’
‘The music was very loud, it was hard to hear. A guy called Steve. In Corpus, I think. Or maybe Christ’s. Anne, maybe? Was she there?’
There was another silence. Then Peck said, ‘Is there anyone who could corroborate your whereabouts on that night?’
‘I called in at the Bradford hotel for a drink on the way.’
‘The Bradford? Are you a regular there?’
‘Fairly regular.’
‘What’s the barman’s name?’
‘I don’t know. He’s a transvestite.’
‘Have you ever spoken to him?’
; ‘Only to order a drink.’
‘You’re a regular but you’ve never spoken to the barman?’
‘No, I . . . No.’
‘Where were you between one and two a.m.?’
‘In bed.’
‘Can you prove that?’
‘There was no one with me, if that’s what you mean. I got back about twelve-fifteen. I rang the bell at the porters’ lodge. The porter might remember letting me in.’
‘So what time had you left the party then?’
‘About twelve, I suppose.’
‘So you did stay quite a long time at the party, then.’
‘No, I got there late. After the pub. I really didn’t hang around there.’
The pauses were now becoming more frequent and rather tense. There was a lot of body, a lot of clothes – a lot of cubic footage of police officer in my room.
Cannon fired his Ronson again. I noticed that although he was on his fourth cigarette, he still hadn’t offered me one. I would have said no anyway, in case it made me look nervous.
‘Do you have a girlfriend, Mr Engleby?’ It was Cannon.
‘Well, there was Jennifer.’
‘I thought Robin Wilson was her boyfriend.’
‘It depends what you mean by that word.’
Cannon began to speak, but Peck held up his hand. Another treacly silence.
Eventually, Peck said softly, ‘Michael, are you being quite honest with us? We’ve talked to a lot of other people, you know.’
I said nothing.
‘Do you have girlfriends at home?’ said Peck.
‘Some. No one special.’
‘You see, what people have been telling us is that you prefer boys.’
I laughed. It was such a relief of tension. I couldn’t stop laughing for about a minute, and I noticed them looking at one another and signalling.
‘All right,’ said Peck. ‘I just want you to remember, Michael, that we’re looking for a lovely girl, someone people were very fond of. If you remember anything – it doesn’t matter how small – anything that might help us, I want you to ring this number.’ He handed me a card.
‘If there’s anything you suddenly “remember”,’ said Cannon. ‘Anything you feel you’d like to share. Sometimes it’s hard to bottle things up . . .’
‘We’re all on the same side,’ said Peck. ‘We’re all trying to find Jennifer.’
‘Sure,’ I said.
I thought of saying ‘Now if you’ll excuse me’, which is what the person in my position says in every detective story ever written for page, stage or screen. It’s a law. They can’t not.
But when I looked round their faces, I had a feeling that they wouldn’t get the joke.
I just waited for them to gather up their stuff and thunder off downstairs.
Then I cleared up Cannon’s mucky ashtray and threw the dog-ends in the pantry bin, where, after, a moment’s thought, I threw the unopened Rich Tea as well.
I felt badly in need of a real smoke and thought of going to get my stuff back from Stellings. Then I thought I’d better leave it for a bit in case there was a sudden knock at the door and Peck stuck his head sound, saying, ‘sorry, just one more thing . . .’
But perhaps he hadn’t seen that film either, because after an hour or so it was still quiet. Then I went to the drinks cupboard and opened a bottle of Johnnie Walker Black Label I had duffel-bagged from the Arthur Cooper’s on Sidney Street while the manager popped out the back for a moment.
I did it properly in a clean glass with ice from the fridge on the half-landing and a couple of inches of cold Malvern water. I lit a Dunhill King Size, drew the curtains and put on the first side of Goodbye Yellow Brick Road by Elton John.
I sat back in the armchair and watched the smoke rise up to the paper lantern-shade round the central bulb that hung from the ceiling. The instrumental ‘Funeral for a Friend’ gave way to ‘Loves Lies Bleeding’.
I thought of Hannah/Jennifer walking off into the mist towards Maid’s Causeway.
At the end of side one, I refilled my glass, flipped the record over, turned out all the lights, lit another cigarette and crashed back into the chair.
That sway of the hips – modest, not exaggerated, just necessitated by her frame. Slim, straight back, clean, fair hair pushed back, just touching the shoulders of the coat. Her step: light, but unafraid.
That flair for living.
Then into the darkness, the singer’s voice: ‘When are you gonna come down? When are you going to land?’
Sensational tune.
Five
I was walking up Sidney Street yesterday and this beggar came towards me. He was only about twenty-five.
‘All right,’ he said, ‘I’m talking to you and let’s get that straight from the start. Don’t let’s do that thing where you pretend you haven’t seen me, OK? Don’t look the other way and hurry on as though you didn’t hear. Is that clear?’
Dear God, a facetious beggar. A postgrad wino. I didn’t feel like giving him money. I felt like taking his money – like elbowing him in the teeth, clearing out his pockets and selling off his dog for dog meat.
There’s an alley down the side of Christ’s Pieces. It’s called Milton’s Walk, after the poet, who presumably used it on his way to and from his college. ‘The Lady of Christ’s’ is what the other boys in college called him at the time, though I don’t know why; it’s not as though they were even considering co-res in 1628. At the other end is King Street, which may have been more than a pub run in Milton’s day. Cemented along the top of the wall on the right of the alley as you go down are bits of broken bottle to stop you climbing into Christ’s garden (Gethsemane?). Below are graffiti. But they don’t say ‘Rovers For Ever’, ‘THFC Skins’ or ‘I love Tracy’; they say things like ‘Life is not a Rehearsal’ or ‘All Things Must Pass’. Sometimes it’s wearing to live amid such banality.
I’m worried about my mother. She’s had a hysterectomy and hasn’t been able to go back to work at the Waverley hotel. Julie says she hasn’t got out of bed for a week. I’m not sure what I’d do if she didn’t have any income, as my father’s pension from the paper mill barely keeps her in tea bags. I’m going to have to stop this life and get out to work.
We’re nearly at the end of term, and that means I’ve got only one term left. Most people are anxious about their final exams, but I’m not. Waynflete has more or less told me I need only turn up to get a first and Woodrow has fixed me some sort of interview in the last week of April.
The situation with Jennifer Arkland has become clearer. Officially, the ‘missing person’ case remains open. The police files are still growing as, day by day, further interviews are made with people who knew her less well – with casual acquaintances, boys who met her once at tea, girls who twice played volleyball against her on a Tuesday afternoon. So the ripples spread further from the point of impact, until, presumably, they’ll vanish.
Robin Wilson is under psychiatric supervision at the hospital in Fulbourn, formerly the county pauper lunatic asylum. The fifth time that Peck and Cannon did him over was apparently too much for him to take, and now he spends more time in group therapy than in lectures.
Unofficially, Jennifer’s parents, friends and college have been told by police to assume that she’s dead.
The college held a service yesterday in its 1880s chapel.
I have the printed order of service on my desk in front of me as I write. ‘Jennifer Rose Arkland (b. 10 January, 1953): Service of Hope. 3 March, 1974.’
Although the organisers tried to keep the valedictory note out of it, there were two talks on Jennifer that inevitably sounded like eulogies. Anne talked about Jennifer the Student, and a girl from Lymington called Susan Something spoke about Jennifer the Schoolgirl.
This Susan person had what I took to be a New Forest accent. She was funny about Jen’s sporting expertise at school. She was apparently quite good at hockey and lacrosse but didn’t like the divided skirt, or the gymslip
s, or whatever. (Girls are always bitter about the frumpy games clothes they were made to wear at school, though it’s not as if any boys were watching.) She was good at swimming, but hated being cold. So she ended up playing tennis because when she was eleven she admired Maria Bueno and liked her clothes. I’d always understood Miss Bueno was a lesbian, but this didn’t seem to spoil people’s appreciation of the joke, and I suppose there was something funny about the idea of this girl turning her back on the games she was good at so she could zoom about the tennis court in a white dress. Susan was also funny about Jennifer’s attempts to sing in tune and her refusal to be excluded from the school choir. ‘singing was perhaps the only activity where her sense of humour failed her.’
Was. Though I think Susan would have defended her use of the word on the grounds that the school days were in the past.
Anne’s picture of Jennifer was more austere. No gym skirts, no tennis. ‘A clear-thinking and idealistic woman’ was Anne’s phrase. ‘No doubt, she is destined for a serious career. She will do something where she can make a difference.’
No ‘was’ for Anne. She squarely inhabited the present tense. Anne’s talk was also well delivered until she came towards the end and tried to address Jennifer personally. Then her voice wavered. Then it broke. She clung to the edge of the pulpit, sobbing, while the candles were reflected in the green Pugin tiles behind her.
The college chaplain, a birdlike man whose hands came out beneath his white surplice like claws, climbed up and half-guided, half-carried her back to earth.
I wondered how Anne had got to know Jen so well and care about her so much so quickly. I mean, they were just student pals, weren’t they?
As I went past the National Westminster in St Andrew’s Street this afternoon I remembered it was Friday. I looked at my watch: twenty past three. I’d forgotten to withdraw money and this meant I would be broke until the bank reopened on Monday at ten. This happens surprisingly often. Cashless weekends mean a blizzard of small debts (I owe Stellings 50p) unless you can persuade a barman to cash a cheque for you. I’m not on speaking, let alone money-lending, terms with the tranny in the Bradford. Since Stellings has anyway gone to London, I’ll have to go into the jungle atmosphere of the cellar bar in Caius and help myself from a wallet in the heap of coats. I used to find cash flow easier to manage in the communal living of Chatfield with its open doors and empty changing rooms. I suppose I could just duffel some gin from Arthur Cooper’s and use chits to eat in hall, but I still need cash for cigarettes. Also, Robin Trower’s playing at the Tech on Saturday and I’ll have to buy a ticket.
Engleby Page 12