Loretta Lawson 01 - A Masculine Ending

by Joan Smith

  ‘How about this?’ Loretta said at last. ‘Suppose I say I sent Puddephat something - an outline for a book, or some notes for it - and now I’m worried about getting them back. Yes, that’s it. I’m going to write a book on, um, the influence of structuralism on feminist literary criticism, and I’d asked his advice.’ It was brilliant, she congratulated herself. On hearing of the don’s disappearance, she’d naturally rushed up to Oxford in the hope of tracking down her precious notes.

  ‘Why didn’t you keep copies?’ Bridget objected.

  Loretta considered. ‘It’s the long vacation, and the photocopier had broken down,’ she said. ‘All right, I know it’s weak. Perhaps no one will ask. After all, we’re trying to pick holes in it. Other people may accept it at face value. People often do silly things.’

  ‘You may be right,’ Bridget conceded. ‘Just be prepared for the odd lecture on what a foolish girl you’ve been. Can you spend some time in Oxford tomorrow? I’ll ring Geoffrey first thing to see if he’s free for a chat.’

  The next day was Tuesday, Loretta thought, and the autumn term didn’t start until Friday. She could just about manage a day away from London. ‘That’s marvellous,’ she said sincerely. ‘And thanks.’

  ‘It’s nothing,’ said Bridget airily. ‘I saw you through your first marriage, so the least I can do is see you through your first murder investigation.’

  Loretta winced. Once they had got over the first shock, neither Bridget nor Tracey seemed able to take her story entirely seriously. But then they hadn’t seen the blood, she reminded herself.

  ‘You’d better eat your salad,’ Bridget pointed out. ‘you haven’t touched it yet.’

  An hour later, having paid the bill, the two women got up to go. At that very moment, a waiter turned abruptly from clearing the next table and crashed into Loretta. As the red wine from a half-empty glass dribbled down her yellow dress, Loretta reflected that bad luck is supposed to come in threes. Eating out should now be safe for some time to come.

  Chapter 4

  The following day’s papers contained surprisingly little about Puddephat’s disappearance. Studying The Times in Bridget’s kitchen, Loretta found only two paragraphs about the affair. The master of the college, Professor Morris, had issued a tetchy statement to the effect that, while it had been considered advisable to seek police assistance, there was at present no cause for alarm. A police spokesman had been equally unforthcoming: inquiries were continuing, he said, and several leads were being followed up. The Guardian carried much the same information. ‘Nothing new here,’ sighed Loretta.

  Bridget, in the middle of making fresh coffee for herself and Earl Grey tea for Loretta, was unperturbed. ‘Give it time,’ she said, making space on the table for two large white breakfast cups and saucers.

  ‘I still feel we could do with another clue,’ Loretta persisted. ‘Even a small one.’

  Bridget laughed. ‘What have you got in mind?’ she asked. ‘An anonymous note revealing the whereabouts of the body, postmarked from a small town in Germany? A bloodstained dagger, buried to its hilt in the door of Puddephat’s rooms? I doubt if life is like that. Now, just give me five minutes to drink some coffee and I’ll ring Geoffrey.’

  Loretta was rinsing the cups when Bridget came back from the phone. ‘It’s all fixed,’ she said gleefully. ‘I told him your cover story and he swallowed it quite happily. He even asked if you’d like to stay for lunch. The place is buzzing with gossip, so it’s an ideal opportunity. He said to come to his rooms just after twelve.’

  ‘I hope I can carry it off,’ Loretta said anxiously. Turning up at Puddephat’s college to make her own inquiries was a much more daunting prospect than her leisurely visit to the Herald library. ‘My story really is a bit thin.’

  Bridget sighed impatiently. ‘As you said yourself last night, people often do silly things. And the only person who can disprove it is Puddephat himself. If you’re right about him being involved in nefarious activities in Paris, he’s not likely to turn up and expose you. Anyway, most of what I told Geoffrey is true - that you and I are old friends, and that you lecture in London. Don’t worry, I’m sure if 11 be all right.’ She opened her briefcase, and started looking through the papers in it. ‘Hang on a minute,’ she said suddenly. ‘We haven’t considered suicide. Perhaps the answer is that Puddephat killed himself at the flat?’

  ‘Why bother going all the way to Paris to do it?’ Loretta pointed out. ‘And you’re not suggesting he managed to remove his own body from the bedroom.’

  ‘Silly me,’ said Bridget sheepishly. ‘I’m getting carried away.’

  Loretta was very nearly convinced by Bridget’s confidence in her. All the same, she could feel butterflies in her stomach when she arrived at the imposing entrance to Puddephat’s college at twelve. She soothed herself with the thought that the small deception she was about to practise was not the only reason for her attack of nerves: her own college in London, housed in a nondescript modern block, had nothing at all in common with the medieval gateway in front of her. Although the college had been admitting female students in recent years, its outward appearance still succeeded in impressing the visitor with its austere and indefinably masculine grandeur. The college coat of arms, consisting of two unlikely beasts locked in grim combat for possession of a narrow scroll, reposed at the centre of a stone arch surmounting heavy wooden doors. It was intended, she supposed, to represent the struggle between good and evil over knowledge; she was heartened to observe that the effect was, in fact, faintly comic. The college doors were firmly closed, affording entry only through a smaller aperture, barely the size of a human being, cut into one of them. Lowering her head, Loretta stepped through the narrow gap, and found herself looking from the shadow of the gateway across a carefully tended lawn to the far side of the college. Tall windows stared bleakly down at her from what she guessed to be the great hall.

  Before she could take in any more of the scene, a short, red-faced man bustled out from an office to her left and planted himself squarely in front of her. ‘Yes, miss?’ he demanded pugnaciously, reminding her of a sentry at a besieged garrison. ‘What were you wanting?’ His grey moustache bristled; he was so close that Loretta could make out the individual hairs. A bell rang in her mind, and she almost laughed aloud.

  ‘Mr Koogan?’ she began, remembering the ‘former army boxing champion’ who had shooed away the Sun reporter during one of Puddephat’s previous sallies into the public print. ‘I have an appointment with Dr Simmons. Could you direct me to his rooms?’ she asked. Firmness, she thought, was the only way to deal with the officious little man.

  Koogan was not impressed. ‘I’ll just check with Dr Simmons,’ he said. ‘Master’s orders. You might be from the newspapers, for all I know. What name is it?’

  Loretta hoped Mr Koogan’s experience of journalists was not limited to representatives of the Sun. She was not too pleased at the thought of being mistaken for a reporter from the tabloid press. ‘If s Ms Lawson,’ she said, with careful emphasis on the Ms. Loretta was perfectly entitled to call herself Dr Lawson and usually did so. But she wanted to impress upon the porter the existence of an appropriate form of address that did not reveal a woman’s marital status. She was wasting her time.

  ‘Miss Lawson,’ the man repeated. ‘Just wait there a moment.’ He disappeared into his cabin and, with the air of someone with all the time in the world, set about checking Loretta’s bona fides.

  It was just as well she had arrived early, she thought. The college had been one of the last to open its doors to women students, and she could see why.

  It was a good three minutes before Koogan reappeared. ‘Dr Simmons has confirmed your appointment, miss.’ His voice was tinged with regret. ‘Second floor, Erasmus wing.’ He turned his back on her and retired to his cabin. Loretta was about to knock on the window and ask for further directions, when she shrugged and gave up. Geoffrey’s rooms couldn’t be that difficult to find.

  Turning
to the right as though she knew where she was going, she approached the wing of the building which made up the right-hand side of the square. A door was set in the wall half-way down and, as she got closer to it, she spotted a brass plate bearing the single word ‘Erasmus’. Pushing open the heavy door, she began to climb the stairs to the second floor, admiring the way in which the stained-glass windows on each half-landing cast triangles of coloured light on to the worn stone steps.

  Simmons’s rooms were next to the staircase, not, as she had hoped, overlooking the quadrangle, but facing away from the main college building. Her knock was answered by a loud ‘Come in!’ and the door flew open. Geoffrey Simmons stood in the doorway. Small, dark, dressed in baggy corduroy trousers and check shirt, cigarette in hand, he was not at all what Loretta had expected. Apart from anything else, he looked to be only just in his twenties. ‘Loretta!’ he exclaimed, greeting her as if she were a friend of many years’ standing. ‘Come in! Take a seat! Well, you must be feeling sick!’ Loretta sank into an armchair with one of its arms missing, and tried to make sense of this reception. Sick? Why should she feel sick? ‘God, I bet you wish you’d kept copies of your notes,’ he rushed on. ‘You must be feeling a right berk.’

  Light dawned on Loretta, and she launched herself into her part. ‘Absolutely,’ she said with feeling, dispelling a pang of guilt with the observation that she was certainly not presenting herself in a flattering light. ‘I feel a complete idiot. But, then, you live and learn.’ She hesitated. Perhaps her last remark was a bit sententious?

  Simmons hadn’t noticed. ‘Sherry?’ he asked abruptly. He was already taking glasses and a bottle from a cupboard. ‘Awful stuff, this, I hardly ever drink it.’ Without waiting for a reply, he handed a generous glassful to Loretta. Tasting it, she discovered it was actually quite pleasant. ‘Why on earth did you want old Puddephat’s opinion in the first place?’ he asked. ‘Quite frankly, I wouldn’t even ask his advice on how to build a hamster cage. Since he got obsessed with this American nonsense - what d’you call it, demolition? - he’s gone right off his head. Never uses a word of less than five syllables. He only survives here because old Humphrey’s keen on him. That’s the master, by the way, Humphrey Morris. He’s an engineer, doesn’t know the first thing about literature, but Puddephat makes it all sound scientific by using these very long words. A lot of the arts fellows think Humphrey’s a bit of a twit and tend to talk down to him. But Puddephat goes on about hermeneutics and ontology, and the master pretends he understands. Nauseating sight. Mind you, if Puddephat has sunk beneath the waves after a heavy lunch in some little trattoria, we won’t have to put up with it any more. Look on the bright side, that’s what I say.’

  ‘What d’you think has happened to him?’ Loretta asked, keen to keep Geoffrey’s mind off his original question of why she had sought Puddephat’s advice. ‘God knows,’ Simmons replied cheerfully. ‘Something pretty serious. Term starts next week. You can get away with a lot of things at Oxford, but disappearing off the face of the earth just before term starts is not one of them. ‘Course, if it’s foul play we’re talking about, Theo Sykes would be my chief suspect. He thought he’d got a job for life when he got his old mate Humphrey in as master - they were at school together, you know - but all that’s backfired pretty badly. I don’t know what they fell out over, but it must have been serious. There’s been a distinct froideur between them for months. And Hugh saw his chance. He’s very well connected, Hugh - brother-in-law’s a Tory MP and all that. He got Humphrey on to some Royal Commission on the training of engineers, or something of the sort. Anyway, Theo’s fellowship is up for renewal any day now, and he ain’t going to get it. If I was the chief rozzer on this case, I’d have some questions to put to Theo, I can tell you!’ Simmons paused, and Loretta took her chance.

  ‘Is Theo … Dr Sykes … here at the moment?’ she asked. It was still possible, as far as she knew, that Sykes was Puddephat’s victim and not the other way round.

  ‘Saw him at breakfast,’ Simmons said helpfully. ‘But the main question is, how can I help you get back your notes?’

  ‘I thought he might have left them with somebody else at the college,’ Loretta suggested weakly. ‘To get another opinion on them, I mean.’ Her heart sank as she realized what she had laid herself open to. Would Geoffrey insist on taking her on a tour of every English don in the college? But she was in luck.

  ‘Not a chance,’ Simmons said. ‘He wouldn’t think anybody else’s opinion worth having.’

  ‘Oh, dear,’ said Loretta, trying to sound contrite in spite of her secret relief. ‘It looks as if I’ve wasted your time.’

  ‘Not at all,’ protested Geoffrey. ‘I always enjoy having guests at lunch. The food’s pretty dismal, by the way. I only eat here ‘cause it’s free. One of the perks of being a fellow. How long have you known Bridget?’

  Loretta was beginning to get used to Simmons’s abrupt changes of subject. ‘A long time,’ she replied. ‘About six years, I should say. Maybe seven. She was doing her PhD in London when I met her. In fact it was a rather odd coincidence,’ she said, warming to her theme, ‘I was introduced to her at a party, and we got on quite well. Then I saw an advert for a new consciousness-raising group in Spare Rib, and went along to the first meeting. Bridget was already there when I arrived. So we were in the same group together for a couple of years.’

  Simmons looked aghast. ‘Bloody hell,’ he said, ‘Women’s groups scare me stiff. Not that I’m against them. Not in principle. But if any girlfriend of mine joined one, I’d have a fit. I suppose you talk about men’s willies and all that sort of thing? No, don’t tell me. Gives me the shivers. Let’s go to lunch.’

  Loretta couldn’t help smiling. At least Simmons was frank. Tracey had at first pretended not to mind her joining the group; it was only later that his real bitterness about it emerged.

  Simmons was struggling into a black gown. ‘Sorry about this,’ he said. ‘Rules. They insist on us wearing them to every meal except breakfast. Bloody nuisance.’ He leaned across his desk and switched on an answering-machine. Catching Loretta’s eye, he looked abashed. ‘It’s just for social things, really,’ he said. She laughed, dispelling a fantasy in which other historians were leaving urgent messages on the machine about the foreign policy of Pitt the Younger, and, still smiling, followed Geoffrey out of the room.

  Lunch was served in the great hall whose exterior Loretta had observed from the gate. Her impression of a bleak, high-ceilinged room was confirmed when she entered: the hall took up the top two storeys of the three-storey building. At the far end of the room, marooned on a dais in splendid isolation, sat those fellows of the college who were in for lunch that day. Their black gowns flowed to the floor where they were frequently trampled underfoot by passing waiters. Loretta noticed that, today at least, there were no women at table. As they approached the dais, she became aware that an animated discussion was taking place among a group of half a dozen dons at one end of the long table. Her heart quickened - perhaps they were discussing Puddephat’s mysterious disappearance? Simmons signalled her to an empty chair on the fringe of the disputatious group, and walked round the back of the table to take a chair opposite. Leaning across to the fellows closest to him, he attracted their attention long enough to introduce Loretta. Several heads nodded in her direction, then returned to the matter in hand. A man with unfashionably long hair - it had probably been that way since his own undergraduate days, Loretta guessed - was stabbing the air with his fork. ‘No, no, no, Griffith,’ he insisted. ‘I can’t let you get away with that. Statistics, man, you’re ignoring the statistics!’ Loretta began to wonder if she had been mistaken. It didn’t sound as if they were discussing Hugh Puddephat. But, then, why was the conversation so heated?

  ‘Come along, Daly,’ replied a languid, fair-haired don further down the table. ‘Griffith’s right. It’s only because you’re a Yorkshireman yourself that you’re taking that position. Boycott probably wouldn’t get into the tea
m, never mind open the batting. The choice is between Grace, Fry and Jack Hobbs. Boycott simply isn’t England material, old man.’

  ‘Aren’t you forgetting Ranji?’ piped up an elderly voice from the very end of the table. ‘Sixty-two - and 154 not out in his first test against Australia in 1896.’

  Loretta was disgusted. They were arguing about cricket. One of their colleagues had vanished in mysterious circumstances and all they could do was make up imaginary England cricket teams. She leaned forward to address Simmons, intending to remind him of the reason for her visit to the college, but he began to speak.

  ‘Ranji wasn’t an opener,’ he said scornfully. ‘And I have to say I’m with Griffith on this Boycott business. Now, what about Botham?’

  Appearances were deceptive, Loretta concluded sadly: in spite of his youth and casual dress, Geoffrey Simmons was still very much one of the fellows. She turned her attention to the bowl of soup which had just been placed in front of her. It was tomato, and definitely out of a packet. She could tell from the small lumps of matter floating on its vermilion surface. She stirred it with her spoon without much enthusiasm.

  Simmons suddenly recollected his duties as host, and broke off in the middle of a discussion about whether Botham’s personality was right for the England team. ‘What’s the latest on old Puddephat?’ he asked the man sitting to his left, away from the sporting dons.

  The master’s furious,’ the man replied with obvious pleasure. ‘Local paper sent a man round this morning even though Humphrey said he wouldn’t see him. Got into the secretary’s office, and refused to leave. Humphrey threatened him with the police. He’s in a right old stew. Says there’ll be television cameras next.’ The thought did not seem to disturb him unduly.

  Another don joined in. ‘I hear the English faculty has been on to Humphrey already,’ he volunteered. They’re in a flap over who’s going to take Hugh’s lectures if he doesn’t show up. Prof. Wylie told Humphrey he’d have to renew Theo’s fellowship - can’t lose two senior lecturers at once, you know - and Humphrey just about blew a gasket. That’s why Humphrey’s not at lunch. He’s sulking in his rooms.’