Error of Judgment

by Roy Lewis

  ERROR OF JUDGMENT

  A gripping crime mystery full of twists

  (Inspector John Crow Book 2)

  ROY LEWIS

  Revised edition 2018

  Joffe Books, London

  www.joffebooks.com

  FIRST PUBLISHED BY WILLIAM COLLINS IN 1971

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organisations, places and events are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental. The spelling used is British English except where fidelity to the author’s rendering of accent or dialect supersedes this. The right of Roy Lewis to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

  We hate typos too but sometimes they slip through. Please send any errors you find to corrections@joffebooks.com

  We’ll get them fixed ASAP. We’re very grateful to eagle-eyed readers who take the time to contact us.

  ©Roy Lewis

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  THERE IS A GLOSSARY OF ENGLISH SLANG IN THE BACK OF THIS BOOK FOR US READERS.

  CONTENTS

  NOTE TO THE READER

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  INSPECTOR JOHN CROW SERIES

  FREE KINDLE BOOKS AND OFFERS

  Glossary of English Slang for US readers

  To Yvette, Mark and Sarah Jane

  NOTE TO THE READER

  Please note this book is set in the late 1960s in England, a time before mobile phones and DNA testing, and when social attitudes were very different.

  Chapter 1

  It was one of those velvet, early summer mornings when a low white mist lay grass-high, curling long fingers to the lower branches of the trees in Robert Fanshaw’s orchard, spreading soft tenuous tendrils upwards to caress the lead-paned windows through which he peered, sniffing with delight. He knew it would be like this right across the Down, until the road dipped through Arnleigh village and into Sedleigh. He snorted. Village! It had been a village when he was a boy, but though he still thought of it in those terms Arnleigh was a village no longer; the tentacles of Sedleigh, administrative and residential, had seen to that. He had always hoped he would be able to get Sedleigh as a retirement post, for the pleasure of living again in the village, but when the post had come the village was no longer there and it had been the long, splendid roll of the Down for Robert Fanshaw.

  The village as a retirement situation had been just a sentimental dream, he told himself as he twitched his tie into place in front of the hall mirror. He was far more comfortable in this bungalow; the area was far more ‘desirable’ in estate agent terminology; the sky was Sedleigh-golden and deep blue on the fine summer evenings when he took his walks. And, he thought, patting his flat stomach, those walks were not only pleasurable but they helped keep his fifty-nine-year-old figure in trim.

  Fifty-nine. One year to go.

  He wondered whether they’d ask him to stay on. He wasn’t bothered really, though it was possible that when the time came the days would be long and the evenings longer, so that he’d wish for the travelling and the files and the eternal crises that resolved themselves if you only locked them in drawers and forgot about them for a few days. The department might ask him to stay; good men were difficult to get these days. And men with his presence, even more difficult. It was the one luxury he allowed himself: vanity. He knew his figure was imposing: five feet eleven in his stockinged feet, upright, slender and elegant. Rimless glasses hardened his bright blue eyes and the teeth that he had managed both to retain and keep in good condition could flash whitely in contrast to his summer tan. He looked tough, resilient, imposing and suave. He knew it and saw no reason why he should not acknowledge it to himself.

  He flicked a piece of fluff from the well-cut dark suit he wore almost as a uniform, smoothed again with one hand the long, flowing white hair that he always trimmed himself with a patent comb-cutter — hairdressers were so damned expensive, and there was no reason why he should spend any of his four-thousand-a-year on such fellers — and picked up his black regulation briefcase with the small gold embossing. He opened the front door and walked out into the swirling mist.

  Pale blue and gold, the sky about Sedleigh hurt his eyes as he drove in his unpretentious family saloon down through the village, but to pull down the sun visor would be an admission of weakness. He drew the car in at the kerb outside Charley Nixon’s cottage and the old man was already there, hobbling out through the gate, grinning his apple-cheeked grin, eighty-three-years proud and holding out his nurtured gift.

  ‘Carnation today, Mr Fanshaw.’

  ‘And a splendid one at that, Charley.’

  ‘Goin’ far today, sir?’

  ‘Not today. Just as far as Burton. There’ll be time for a quiet half this evening at the Blackbird. About eight, Charley?’

  ‘I look forward to it, sir!’

  Fanshaw smiled, inserted the carnation into his button-hole, engaged first gear and drove off. In the driving-mirror he could see old Charley watch him go until he turned the bend on to the Sedleigh road.

  As he guessed, the mist had gone. The sun now struck through and the trees were black against the sky in spite of the green of their spreading foliage. Fanshaw glanced at his watch and eased off the accelerator; he would be able to enjoy the summer morning for Burton was a forty-minute drive and it was just eight o’clock. He didn’t want to arrive too early. Peters would want a few minutes at least to deal with his mail before Fanshaw appeared. Though that admirable Rosemary girl, Peters’s secretary, would no doubt undertake her usual sifting of mail to ensure that Peters was bothered with nothing that was inessential. Fanshaw hummed to himself as he drove into the thickening traffic on the outskirts of Sedleigh. Across to the ring road, out on the North Bypass and then it was but fifteen minutes to his destination. A splendid morning, splendid.

  The first signs of trouble appeared on the bypass.

  Fanshaw didn’t recognize it as trouble at first. He paid little attention to the van ahead of him; it was moving at about forty miles an hour and Fanshaw picked up speed to pass it. No sooner was he safely past, and tucking himself in to the left again, than the grinning van driver shot past him with an emasculated toot of his horn.

  That was one of the irritating things about modern cars, they never seemed to possess a horn that a man could use with dignity. With that thought in mind Robert Fanshaw noticed that the lettering on the side of the van proclaimed in startling electric blue that it was the property of the television company based in Sedleigh.

  Even then, no warning bells ran in Fanshaw’s mind; he still had ten minutes’ driving ahead of him. The van had pulled across in front of him and they proceeded for some two miles in that fashion until Fanshaw noticed in his driving-mirror that he seemed to have become involved in a flurry of vans. There were three such vehicles strung out behind him; he was bowling along with four television vans like a funeral cortege late for the gravediggers.

  Robert Fanshaw had never admitted to being status-conscious but this situation was hardly conducive to the retention of his image. With deliberation he slowed down, and there were three derisive and similarly emasculated toots as the three vans roared past him to take up post behind their brother.

  And still Fanshaw saw no cause for concern. Not even when the vans swung right at the Sedleigh roundabout, and left into Grangeway Road, not even when they pa
ssed under the railway bridge and plunged towards the motorway roundabout, not even when they took without wavering the highway into Burton, did he experience any qualms. But when they turned into Simmington Lane he felt in his stomach the little quiver that had used to come when a Minister’s file landed on his desk. It had been years since he had experienced such a quiver — not because Ministers’ files were few and far between but because a surfeit of anything toughens the entrails — but he experienced one now.

  It was not a pleasant experience.

  When the vans proceeded into Carlton Drive his worst fears were confirmed. Their destination was his. They bumped across the road running beyond the trees that Alderman Platt had planted with aplomb at the ceremony last year and once past the main gate one of them struck out across the lawn, scarring its green beauty with slashing black tyre-marks. It shuddered to a halt and as Fanshaw drove past the technicians were already bundling out of the van, unloading tripods and other mysterious television equipment. Outside broadcasters.

  Within two minutes he understood.

  At first there was the straggle of hoydenish females and hirsute males that he had come to expect, lurching in to their lectures after over-indulged evenings, but as he drove nearer to the looming glass and concrete of Burton Polytechnic their number became alarmingly greater until they were thronging the pavement, arguing under the trees, lounging against the white steps leading to the huge glass swing doors, draping themselves over the statue of Truth, a stone monstrosity which Fanshaw had always regarded as aesthetically disastrous, and talking, cursing, shouting, rumbling and generally converging upon the Administration building.

  ‘Oh, my God,’ Fanshaw groaned without the slightest belief that there would be any succour from that direction. He drove with circumspection, avoiding his natural inclination to remove one particularly unwashed specimen of humanity from the Burton Polytechnic student hours statistics, and took up a vacant parking spot marked VISITORS in front of the administrative block.

  As he locked the car with care and turned to walk towards the steps he noticed that Peters’s red Jaguar was already installed. The rector, at least, had arrived.

  At the foot of the steps a small clotting of students was already engaged in eager conversation with three men who had debouched from the nearest television van. Backed by two technicians trailing wires, the clean-looking young man with the microphone was asking a grinning girl,

  ‘And would you tell me, just what do you expect to achieve by this demonstration?’

  ‘Well, we got you bastards out of bed at least, didn’t we?’

  Robert Fanshaw winced at the innocence in her eyes and hastened up the steps, through the tall glass doors and across the echoing hall, and without a backward glance made his way quickly towards the enquiries desk, his stride purposeful and long, his briefcase swinging. There was no one on duty, so he turned, walked up the flight of stairs to the first floor, pushed open the African cedar-panelled door facing him and proceeded in the direction of the office of the rector’s secretary. He tapped the door with elegant knuckles, opened it and looked in.

  The girl staring at him had a surprised, unfamiliar face, as lacking in character as processed cheese.

  ‘Good morning,’ Fanshaw murmured. ‘Dr Peters, please.’

  ‘Er . . . I’m not sure . . . er . . . who shall I say it is?’

  ‘HMI. Mr Fanshaw.’

  ‘HM . . . er . . . I’m sorry, what did you say?’ Fanshaw frowned slightly and the girl became extremely nervous.

  ‘Will you tell Dr Peters that Her Majesty’s Inspector, Mr Fanshaw, has arrived and would like to see him for a few minutes.’ She was gone with a whisk of a mini-skirt and a discreet tap on the adjoining door. Within fifteen seconds the door opened again and she was back.

  ‘Dr Peters would like you to go in,’ she said breathlessly. Fanshaw gave her a brief smile to show her that he quite appreciated what a trial it must be for her on her first morning to have an HMI descend upon the college, and walked into Peters’s office.

  The carpet was deep, lush and red, the walls a delicate shade of green, the furniture black imitation-leathered and executive suite-designed and the man rising from behind the broad curving sweep of the desk was worried. Dr Antony Peters came forward with one hand outstretched. There was a frown on his handsome, regular features and a pinched look about his nostrils. His wide, rather sensuous mouth was set in a grim line.

  ‘Hello, Mr Fanshaw, I’m glad to see you. But you haven’t picked the best of days, it would seem.’

  Peters’s grip was firm but that was symptomatic of the man. Fanshaw had seen the short-list for the Burton Polytechnic when it was first drawn up and he’d remembered Peters as soon as he saw the name, even though it had been at least five years since he’d met him for the first and only time. As soon as he’d seen that short-list Fanshaw had guessed Peters would get the six-thousand-a-year post, for Peters had a large number of assets. He had a good educational background, both as a teacher and as an administrator, he had industrial experience of some quality, he had presence, good looks, charm, a persuasive tongue and a handsome and influential wife. He was a man’s man and women adored him. He’d got the job and as far as Fanshaw could make out from his infrequent visits to Burton he was making a good fist of it.

  He had established close relations with industry and made this the keynote of his planning for the polytechnic; by using contacts he had made in his previous activity, he had obtained considerable financial support from large national as well as local firms. Fanshaw was personally of the opinion that such endowments could well lead to academic distortion within the college, and there was some evidence that this was happening; nevertheless, there was no doubt that Peters had been extremely successful in his fundraising.

  But now his grey, wide-spaced eyes were flecked with red, and there was an angry set to his shoulders. He waved Fanshaw to a seat and took one himself, immediately next to him. Good personnel technique; don’t face a man across a desk, put him at ease by sitting next to him. Peters knew how to handle HMI as he’d know how to handle most men.

  A rumbling noise from outside the grand windows of the office reminded Fanshaw that it remained to be seen whether Peters could handle students.

  ‘What are they up to this fine morning?’

  ‘Student demonstrations, as always, are rather slow in communicating their precise desires to the administration. They are still, at the moment, indulging in mindless chanting about a number of things. Student representation on the academic body is one—’

  ‘But this will already have been covered by your articles of government, adopted when you were established!’

  ‘That’s no reason why they should stop chanting. I told you it was all somewhat mindless. There’s the representation thing, and there’s an expulsion which became necessary as a disciplinary measure last week, and it would seem that they’re somewhat unhappy about the content of one of our courses in the Humanities—’

  ‘As opposed to your more vocational degrees, no doubt.’

  ‘As you say.’ Peters’s voice soured into petulance. ‘We don’t seem to get much trouble from the accountants, or the architects, or the lawyers, or economists among our students. On the other hand, the less vocationally oriented among the student population seem to have a voice somewhat louder than their numbers would justify. I doubt whether they really seek to persuade, at all. These student demonstrations are nothing more than a self-indulgence and a desire for recognition. Any cause will do.’

  ‘It usually seems to be a Communist or anarchic minority that starts the trouble.’

  ‘Yes, and there are enough gulls, fools and addlepates in the student body to make such movements stronger than they actually are. You know, Mr Fanshaw, the whole thing is beginning to smack of a television soap opera — student militancy, an infinite variation upon a telegenic theme!’

  ‘I saw some television cameras being unloaded as I came along,’ Fanshaw said mild
ly.

  ‘Hell! I was afraid that would happen! It’s always the same; the cameras arrive whenever there’s something entirely disreputable about to happen. Well, there’s one person at least who won’t be appearing before them today!’

  Fanshaw smiled. ‘The Establishment will not be taking part, then?’

  ‘It certainly will not. The rabble can get on with it, and do all the shouting they need. I’ll only get over-excited if they start to invade the administration building. That’s hardly likely, however — the examination system would break down then and that they won’t want. There would seem to be,’ he added grimly, ‘a sufficiently large number even of the rabble outside who would still like to discover whether they’re likely to get through their examinations before they go down this term.’

  Fanshaw stirred unhappily in his chair. He wondered whether Peters was adopting the right attitude towards student activity. There was a certain contemptuous dismissal in the rector’s tone that led Fanshaw to believe the trouble might yet erupt surprisingly right under the rector’s nose. Still, it was hardly Fanshaw’s place to tell him how to handle his own college.

  ‘Ah, well, we’ll have to see how things go. I really only stuck my head in here, Dr Peters, to pay my respects, you know. I’ve come in to see Mr West, really. I’m not sure that he’s properly appreciated the part that his department could play in the development of the polytechnic as a whole. I’ve just received from the Office a copy of his Diploma scheme and I’m somewhat disturbed that he’s included no reference to any systems analysis work for the students. I mean, with the computer installation you have here it seems to me inconceivable—’

  He paused. Peters was leaning forward with the kind of look on his face that presaged bad news. It lacked sincerity; it was an assumed expression but it passed the necessary message on, and it added emphasis to the words.