by L. A. Nisula
I was passing the entrance to the college and considering my next step when a student more intent on some internal dilemma than where he was going bumped into me, almost knocking me into the street. I glared at him, ready to lecture, when I recognized Mr. Mayer.
He recognized me as well. “Sorry Miss Pengear. I just have to figure out how to get out of playing waiter next week.”
“Playing waiter?” He hardly seemed the sort to need a job as a waiter despite his shoplifting issues.
“Old Professor Armstrong. He's always after us boys to do our bit for the school and volunteer at his dinner parties or to clear up some bit of the grounds or to get people to buy subscriptions to things. It's usually easiest to volunteer to hand out drinks at one of his little parties and be done with it.”
“Little parties?”
“Dinner parties to raise money for the school. It's not so bad if you can get five or six friends to all do it at once. It's just the washing up that's no fun, but sometimes he hires someone to do that.”
Something about that seemed odd, but I couldn’t quite place it. “So you don’t get paid?”
“That’s what volunteering is, isn’t it?”
“I’m afraid so. Well, good luck with it.”
Mr. Mayer shrugged as if he didn’t think luck would help him and continued on his way.
Perhaps Mr. McAvery would know what was wrong with that. The poor man was going to dread seeing me with all my questions.
Mr. McAvery looked up as soon as he heard the door open. “Miss Pengear, is it too much to hope that you are here to tell me our Mr. Langley has been released?”
“I'm afraid he's still incarcerated. I'm going to see if Inspector Burrows will let me see him tomorrow.”
“If there is any way for me to be of assistance... I see by your expression that there is. Whatever I can do, please don’t hesitate.”
I started with what seemed to be the most likely avenue to explore. “What can you tell me about Professor Armstrong?”
Mr. McAvery didn’t question why I needed the information, merely tapped his pen thoughtfully against the blotter. “He's been here over ten years, uninspired but never seems to be a problem. His mother was quite ill, but he sent her to the South of France, and she seems to be doing much better. Married Miss Patrice Sinclair about seven years ago. No accounting for taste, I suppose. Very enthusiastic about raising money for the school.”
I scribbled all of that down. “And the parties he holds to raise money?”
“I’ve never been to one. The tickets are quite expensive, and I’m afraid the food and service leave something to be desired.”
“And where does the food and service come from? Volunteers? A particular pub in the area?”
“I’m afraid I don’t know. As I said, I’ve never attended one. I will ask Mrs. McAvery in case she has heard some gossip.”
“And the students don’t talk about volunteering?”
“Not in my hearing. Of course they don’t speak here as they do among themselves.”
“And when was the last one held?”
“It’s been a while. I would say three, maybe four months. Is any of that helpful?”
“I don’t know, but I hope so.”
“As do I. I’ll see if Mrs. McAvery has heard anything else.”
I thanked him and returned to the guest house. I went directly to my room and locked the door just in case someone came looking for me, then pulled out the notes I’d made on the blackmail materials. I scanned the list until found the one I was looking for. There had been a list of arrangements for a dinner party. I hadn’t had time to make many notes on the specifics, but at the time it had seemed to be an accounting page listing the expenses. The party itself had been held last September. That was all I’d written. I copied the small amount I had onto a fresh page to separate from the other notes then put the rest of it away and went down to the tea shop to head off any suggestion of dinner with Mrs. Eggleston.
In the tea shop, I ordered a pot of tea then spread the notes out in front of me. The ledger page had been in the drawer of blackmail papers: why? There must have been something there that would have been useful to Professor Headly or dangerous for someone who I was assuming was Professor Armstrong, although if there was proof of that, I hadn’t realized the significance at the time or noted it down. Since it seemed to have been an accounting page, then money was the obvious answer. Missing money, obviously. I scribbled that down. That was what had sounded wrong to me. Mr. Mayer had said they were always being asked to volunteer, but I was fairly certain I had seen entries for wait staff with money listed. That was why I had thought it was a dinner of some sort. I’d have to check with Inspector Burrows and see if he’d let me have another look at the page. Maybe something would make sense if I saw it again.
Of course, Professor Armstrong could have hired a mix of paid staff and volunteers. That would be reasonable. Charity banquets were not common in the circles I ran in, so I had no idea how much staff would be required or what they would be paid.
“Miss Pengear, you didn’t order a sweet, so I brought you some Eton mess.”
I glanced up. “Thank you, Maisie. It sounds...interesting?”
“It’s just some berries and cream with meringue and bit of gooseberry jam left over from yesterday’s fool on the bottom. It depends what Mrs. Gilbert has around. The boys all like it before exams. We like it too since it’s nice and quick to make and we can use up odds and ends.”
“Thank you.”
“You looked like you needed it. Can I get you anything else?”
I stared at the page in front of me. “Do you know anything about Professor Armstrong’s charity dinners?”
“The ones he’s always trying to get people to buy tickets for? A bit. Why?”
“How many waiters would you say one of those parties needs?”
Maisie put down her tray. “He usually has around 150 paying guests, so six or seven to pass food around, another one or two to clear away, someone to see the drinks are poured correctly and not stolen by the students, and someone to run everything.”
“Does he pay well?”
“You're not looking for work, are you?”
“Oh no, I'm just gathering facts. Somewhere there is some little bit of information that is going to lead me to the murderer.”
“As long as it doesn't lead you towards Mr. Langley. Or towards me.”
“Mr. Langley seems quite popular in town.”
“He’s a kind man. He always has a nice word or a compliment. So yes, I suppose he is. And Professor Brookwald as well. Not as concerned with the divide between the school and the town as some.”
“I suppose, since they live in town.”
“Perhaps. But you wanted to hear about Professor Armstrong’s dinners. Let me see. I'm usually hired to be in charge of either the drinks or the wait staff, seeing as I have experience. Two shillings for the night, which is more than fair. The students would get less, of course.”
“Of course.” Quite a bit less if they were volunteers. “And I would assume the other supervisor gets the same. Who else would be there?”
“Someone to take the coats—usually a pair of students, a cook—usually he gets someone from the college for that, and someone to clear up afterward. Sometimes that's the students, sometimes he hires Mrs. Grantly who does for most of the dorms. I happen to know he pays her the same as us, two shillings, because she’s said she doesn't mind the extra money.”
I scribbled down all of the numbers she gave me. “Thank you.”
“Does that help anything?”
“I don’t know. It depends on what Inspector Burrows has in his file, but it might.”
“As long as I’m not a suspect, I’ll be happy to talk to him about the parties, but I’m not quite certain how that will help. Professor Armstrong hasn’t had one in months, but when he does, he raises quite a bit of money. The last one was to buy some translations for the library, and they were a
ble to purchase everything they wanted.”
“I’m sure Inspector Burrows will be happy to get any kind of witness. None of the students want to be involved.” I made a mental note that Maisie was unlikely to be a blackmail victim if she was so willing to talk. Maisie went back to her tables, and I started on my Eton mess, which proved to be quite nice, and did some figuring on the page.
~*~*~
After my meal, I returned to the police station. When I entered, Constable Winters was receiving a telegram on the machine. I let myself through the partition and waved as I passed. He made a motion of acknowledgment with his pencil and continued to listen to the clicks of the machine. I hoped it was some nice crime for Inspector Crawley. Maybe jewel thieves. Or an international gang of spies.
Inspector Burrows was alone in the office, hunched over his desk with papers spread out over everything. I thought he was examining them until I caught a glimpse of the edge of the page he was looking at.
“So you think the answers can be found in The Adventures of Mike and Spike? And you find my methods unorthodox.”
He shoved the penny dreadful under some other papers. “You could have warned me you were coming. I thought you had Inspector Crawley with you.”
“If I had, do you think I’d have commented on your choice of reading material? Although I do think he’d warm to you a bit if he saw something outside of the case he thinks you stole from him. Where is he, anyway?”
“A fast-breaking lead in the missing cat case. Were you here to pay a call on him, or was there something I could help you with. Or did you bring the letter?” I couldn’t tell if he was hoping I had or hadn’t found it yet.
“Something I can help you with. Perhaps. I hope it is anyway. Could I take a look at something in the drawer? I think there was a page from an accounts ledger used for the parties Professor Armstrong has been holding.” I didn’t have to tell him which drawer, although after the words were out of my mouth I remembered we were pretending I didn’t know about it. Inspector Burrows ignored that, though, so I did as well.
“You mean the charity events for the school? I suppose so. Is there a reason?”
“One of the students mentioned that he volunteers to serve drinks.”
Inspector Burrows dragged the box over to his desk and rooted around until he pulled out the paper I was talking about. “Here it is. I’m not sure it’s from a ledger, more of a budget really.”
“I thought I remembered seeing totals on it.”
“I think it’s the sort of thing he would turn in to get reimbursed for funds, or to show what he’d taken out of them if he’s also doing the accounts. Let’s see. It starts, ‘Wait staff £1-2s.’ Does that tell you something?”
“That’s 22 shillings, right? Maisie said they usually have six or seven to serve, someone to clean, and two supervisors, and she usually gets paid 2s for the night. So that suggests he paid at least eleven people to work that night serving food.”
“And you said the students volunteer?” He looked at the rest of the entries. “He spent 16s on welcome staff. I would assume they would take coats and get cabs for people leaving. Then there’s money for food, wine, musicians, all sorts of things.”
“I wonder how many were volunteers and donations.”
Inspector Burrows looked down at the page. “If there were six students serving unpaid, that’s 12s. Another 14s for the welcome staff, assuming they needed to be supervised as well. Food and drink accounts can always be padded, although I don’t know how we’d be sure of that without access to the receipts. Musicians could be volunteers as well, I suppose, if they were students and not professionals. It’s not a princely sum by any means, but he’d clear a nice bit of money, and the school would still make a good bit. You said the students volunteer regularly?”
“According to Mr. Mayer.”
“I’ll try to get a staff list and the full accounting for this party. The question is, could Professor Headly have done the same?”
I handed back the page. “Why not? They told me he was always looking for volunteers. If Professor Headly volunteered to help arrange one of the parties, he could have seen the accounting.”
“And could he have found out about it?”
“Probably the same way I did. One of the students may have said something about volunteering to him, and he knew that they were paying for those jobs. Once he knew that it probably wasn’t too hard for him to figure out who had arranged it.”
Inspector Burrows put the paper back in the box. “At least if it’s right, it’s a good motive for murder. I’ll look into it.”
“And Mr. Langley?”
“Is still my best suspect. But this is promising, at least.”
I decided that was the best I was going to get.
Chapter 12
I left the police station and turned my steps towards the college. I had found one additional viable motive for murder in the box of papers; perhaps I could find some others if I poked around Professor Headly’s office again.
When I got to the Classics Department, Miss Fenchurch was at her desk. I waved as I went by. She pretended she was busy with something, and I pretended I believed it.
Professor Headly’s office was just as I had last seen it. I closed the door so I wouldn’t be disturbed and debated where to start. I had already searched the desk, and I was certain Inspector Burrows had searched all of the other obvious places. So what was left?
I was still wondering where to begin when there was a soft tapping at the door. It wasn’t the sharp rap of a policeman or someone who knew they were allowed to enter, but I wasn’t sure who else it could be. I was still considering how best to answer when the door swung open a bit and a student peered around the edge. I smiled, trying to encourage him to enter. “Were you looking for someone?”
“No, yes, I mean I was looking for some missing tinkering notes, and I thought they might be here.”
I grinned. “Lost them at cricket practice?”
He laughed and came into the office. “You’ve heard that too, then? No, I’m not on the team, but my friend Donne is. He’s the one who lost the notes. He’s tried all the normal places where they usually turn up, but he couldn’t find them. He’d had a meeting with Professor Headly, so he thought he might have left them here. I thought if there was someone here, I could take a look.”
“When was here?”
“Friday morning. The meeting was at nine.”
So too early to see anything useful to Mr. Langley. “And you didn’t ask the police if they had found them?”
“I did. I didn’t like to bother the London man, so I asked Constable Winters, but he said he hadn’t heard of any being found.”
“When was this?”
“Monday.”
So the day before I’d received them from Mrs. Albright. “Why did Mr. Donne have your notes?”
“He was checking my calculations.”
That struck me as odd, but I could see he was becoming wary, so I shifted the focus back to the notes. “What did they look like?”
He pulled a notebook out of his bag. “Here’s some more of them. They were for my end of year project, so they’re really important to me.”
I leaned over and studied the notes. The handwriting seemed the same, and the drawings appeared to be the same style as the ones I’d been sent. “I think Inspector Burrows has them.”
“Really? But Constable Winters said he didn’t...”
I wasn’t sure how much I should tell him. “I happen to know he came into possession of them after Monday, so Constable Winters wouldn’t have known then.”
“But how... oh, police evidence, you can’t tell me.”
I shrugged. “I don’t want to get in trouble with him. I’m sure you can get them back once you identify them for him.”
He seemed to understand. “Then I guess I’ll go see him. Is he at the same station as Constable Winters or the main one?”
“With Constable Winters. You said Mr. Donn
e was checking your calculations. Does that mean he was a tinkering student too?”
“That’s right.”
“Then why was he meeting with a Classics professor?”
“I guess that is odd. I have no idea. Maybe the cricket team was volunteering for something again. No, that’s Professor Armstrong. Anyway, thanks for the help. If I can get the notes back today, I won’t be too far behind, and I can probably make up the time.”
“It seems a bit early to be worried about making up the time for an end of year project.”
“Oh, this is just the beginning. Once it’s approved, I still have to build it.”
“Build it?”
“That’s right. Or at least enough of it to show it could work. Some of us make things that are too big to build, like Robert and his steam-driven drilling machine. For mining, you see. Mine too, I suppose. It’s a safety mechanism for spinning factories. It further automates the process to filter the air and catch the lint, then felt it so it can be sold. That’s what will encourage them to implement it, you see.”
Something about that triggered a memory. “With all of these diagrams you submit, could someone else put together your tinkering project?”
“Of course. That’s why we have to submit them to our adviser. They have to look them over and be sure that the design is feasible, and we have the right materials for it, and we’re not going to blow up the whole school when we try it. They don’t mention the last one, but I do think it’s a priority.”