A (Very) Public School Murder

by Parke, Simon;

  ‘Quite,’ said Peter.

  ‘Still, you’ll be very good, Peter, I have no doubt. And the police won’t touch me after you’ve gone. They don’t have your eyes or your unfortunate feel for people. And Tamsin likes me too much, anyway, sees in me a kindred spirit. I sense grudging admiration . . . she hates everyone at the school just as I do.’

  ‘But why, Cressida?’ Peter had to keep her talking . . . and killers did like the ‘Why?’ of their deeds. The ego loves to explain, to rationalize and justify, to drool over its smart behaviour . . . the last laugh and all that . . . the ego just loves the last laugh. ‘Why all this – when you had everything?’

  Cressida smiled knowingly.

  ‘Oh, we can have that very interesting discussion once you’ve drunk the hemlock, Abbot. But I’d say this,’ and suddenly there was rebuke in her voice, ‘you should be careful about judging someone’s life from the outside, really you should – especially when claiming they “have everything”.’

  ‘But you do.’

  That riled Cressida.

  ‘How on earth would you know what I have?’ She almost spat the words. ‘It’s always quite different on the inside, believe me.’ She calmed again and Peter lay still. ‘I do want to reassure you, however – putting my doctor’s hat on for a moment – that it’s all quite painless. I’ve said it before in the surgery, haven’t I?’

  ‘You have.’

  ‘And I was always right?’

  ‘You were generally right, Doctor. No complaints so far.’

  ‘It’s all about trust when it comes to healing.’

  ‘And killing?’

  She didn’t answer, she was looking for a tissue. And it was such a schoolboy question anyway, rushing headlong towards the drama of the kill. She wanted an adult conversation.

  ‘So what’s going to be quite painless?’

  ‘Oh, the hemlock, Peter – well, the technical name is Conium maculatum, of course. But this isn’t some medical conference, thank God! So we’ll just call it hemlock and note that it’s distinguished as a poison by its action of killing from the outside in – from the extremities inwards. Quite unique!’ She was genuinely excited. ‘It moves inwards slowly . . . well, you’ll be able to describe it to me. You will do that, won’t you? As numbness of your extremities becomes paralysis of your lungs . . . which will be your peaceful end.’

  ‘My inability to breathe?’

  Peter listened as one in a dream, needing a plan – but without a plan in the silent wood.

  ‘It has no effect on the brain, though,’ said Cressida. ‘This is the wonder of hemlock . . . enabling us to enjoy a most interesting conversation for the next couple of hours, quite alone in Loner’s Wood. It’s not busy at this time of night, as you’ll have noticed. And then I’ll need to get back.’

  ‘You were always the runner.’

  Cressida laughed.

  ‘School champion – I would have beaten you whenever we met. I mean, before you got old.’

  ‘It’s how you got to Stormhaven Head on Sunday afternoon.’

  ‘That knowledge will die with you.’

  ‘Possibly – though possibly not. You left the school in disguise, dressed as a man. Mr Thomas, the gardener, saw you. So that was your first mistake – there were others to follow.’

  He hoped she might enquire about them.

  ‘This is just white noise to me,’ she said.

  ‘He said, “I thought it was a woman – but then realized it was a man.” I trusted his first instinct.’

  ‘And look at the good it’s done you, Peter, lying here facing death. The prize for your remarkable intuition is hemlock.’

  ‘Will you kill him as well?’

  ‘You imagine I fear a gardener?’

  ‘Lower down the food chain, I suppose.’

  ‘He doesn’t know what he knows. And that’s why Jennifer had to die – she did. I saw her realize what she knew, there in the common room. She remembered where she lost her phone.’ Peter listened to his breathing; it was important to stay sane. ‘Still, a good life, I hope, Abbot. What was it Auden said? Something about letting your last thinks be thanks? I’m sure he said it better – after all, he’s the poet, not me – but a rather wonderful idea . . . one of Jamie’s favourites as well, strangely. We must hope that’s what he felt as he fell – thanks.’

  ‘That may be optimistic.’

  ‘Will your last thinks all be thanks, Peter?’

  ‘And you stole Penny’s phone for twenty-four hours . . .’

  ‘. . . borrowed, please!’

  ‘. . . to lure Jennifer to Tide Mills, by text presumably. And all because you thought she knew?’

  ‘She was also a Grade A bitch. She was forever keeping me away from Jamie, putting a screen between us. “He’s not presently available, Mrs King.” She always called me Mrs King. “Can I get him to call you back?” She impersonated Jennifer savagely. ‘She never did get him to call me back.’

  ‘Perhaps he didn’t want to call you back.’

  And the thought of that merely made Cressida hate Jennifer more.

  ‘But more pressingly – and that was an unfortunate remark, Abbot – I’d used her phone to lure Jamie to the cliff edge. I texted him from the front room when he was in the study that afternoon. He thought it was her, of course – well, why wouldn’t he? People always believe texts, trust the hand that sends it. And it was all suitably dramatic: she was going to kill herself, throw herself from the cliff! And Jamie being Jamie – well, he had to go to the rescue!’ She paused a moment. ‘I don’t know if he was in love with her. But if I couldn’t have Jamie, no one else was having him – certainly not Jennifer.’

  She hesitated, a moment of sadness, deflation. ‘Only when he arrived there, of course, there was just me, standing distraught, a maiden in distress, one might say.’ And she remembered the conversation, went back there now to Stormhaven Head – their final conversation after fourteen years of relatively happy marriage.

  ‘Why are you here, Cressida?’ Jamie had been amazed to see her, standing on the cliff edge. He hadn’t recognized her at first in the odd running hat which changed her appearance quite dramatically. But he was disappointed as well as surprised. He’d wanted to save the day without anyone’s help. Jamie was quite binary in that regard. Either he saved Jennifer or someone else did, his work or another’s – it shouldn’t be shared. But Cressida had been convincing in the moment.

  ‘She called me shortly after you’d left, Jamie. Jennifer often confided in me.’

  ‘Really?’

  He walked towards her.

  ‘Such a dear, sweet woman,’ said Cressida.

  That had surprised him, to hear those words. Jennifer had not hidden the fact that she did not believe Cressida was a proper wife to him – couldn’t even share his surname, which surely spoke volumes. Jennifer had said it on more than one occasion, ‘She’s not a proper wife, Jamie – speaking as a friend, of course.’ But now here was Cressida trying to save her. So where was Jennifer?

  ‘Jamie, this is terrible, just awful!’ said Cressida, standing like Florence Nightingale on the cliff top, desperate in her running gear. She noted they were alone on the cliff for now . . . only distant figures on the golf course, no walkers with a view. ‘I ran here as fast as I could, but . . .’

  ‘You mean she . . . did she . . . did she do it?’

  Cressida remembered Jamie’s face, so full of concern. Perhaps he should have been more concerned for his wife, she thought.

  ‘I saw her jump, Jamie, it was just too awful. But I mean, why would she do that?’

  ‘You saw her jump?’

  ‘I saw her jump – now look at her! Tell me that’s not her!’

  She was hysterical, quite out of character. But he’d be strong. He’d stepped forward to look over the edge, to take
control. She said, ‘Be careful, dear,’ and then nudged him forward, hardly a push at all, hardly a murder at all. She hadn’t touched him so gently for years . . .

  ‘And Terence?’ asked Peter,

  gazing up into the swaying branches overhead.

  ‘Terence?’ Cressida spoke as if he was long forgotten and quite unimportant. ‘Terence took his own life, Abbot.’

  ‘Without encouragement from you, I suppose?’

  ‘And now it’s time for your drink.’

  ‘You didn’t help him towards the rope?’

  ‘And excuse the bottle. It’s a kiddy’s bottle which somehow seems inappropriate. But it’s just so we don’t spill any.’

  ‘You’re too clever, Cressida – I mean, for it to be a coincidence.’

  She smiled with pride in the moonlight, her face still glistening with sweat from the run.

  ‘I may have dropped him the odd note about his homosexuality being exposed. I may have. His awful God knew already, of course, and was choking in heavenly disgust! But no one at the school knew . . . no one at school knew their Bible-bashing gay-bashing bursar was, well, gay as May! That would have been a fine shaming . . . he couldn’t have coped at all. His meticulous love of order and detail hid a very anxious soul, rather ill-equipped for this difficult world.’

  ‘And so you simply made it more difficult.’ She shrugged, a half-smile. ‘Do you like yourself, Cressida?’

  ‘I’m not a monster, you know.’

  ‘No one is a monster.’

  ‘Though really, that was a rather excessive response from the poor boy. I mean the rope and the car business.’

  ‘But why pick on him?’

  ‘I didn’t know how much he knew, given his “special relationship” with Benedict. Now drink up, Abbot.’

  ‘Benedict? How did you know . . . ?’

  Cressida moved the bottle firmly towards Peter’s mouth, like mother to child, nurse to patient – but he refused it, turning his head away.

  ‘Doctor can make this much more painful,’ she said and pushed the bottle against his mouth. ‘I’m giving you this the nice way, Peter, a sweet goodbye to life. Most people would be grateful.’ With a heave of his bound body, at the last second, he rolled away, face down now in the earth with a mouthful of leaves. She pulled him back, with all her strength, slapped him across the face, held his head once again, her fingers pressing his jaw, and said ‘Drink!’ as she tried to force the nozzle into his mouth. He opened his mouth for a moment and spat out the leaf mould towards her. She pulled back.

  ‘OK,’ she said, ‘we’ll do it another way, we’ll make you scream – and then you’ll be glad to drink.’ And in the half-light, Peter saw her take out a syringe from her bag and then a needle. She withdrew also a small bottle, pricked it with the needle and drew its substance into the syringe. ‘Not quite as hygienic as the surgery, but we’ll survive. Well, you know what I mean.’ She paused for a moment, still and pale like some statue in an Italian garden. ‘Do you know the last sermon I heard in that godforsaken chapel, Abbot?’

  ‘Tell me,’ said Peter.

  ‘I mean, I’m sorry to talk shop, you must be sick of sermons – but it just struck me.’ The moon’s glare caught the needle, a thin glint of murder in the dark. ‘It was about Christ in the Garden of Gethsemane, cornered by those with a desire to execute him. Recognize the feeling?’

  ‘At least Judas wasn’t his doctor.’

  ‘Oh, don’t be so prim, Peter – please! There are no pills for self-pity. And really, what’s so great about a doctor? It’s just a label. It carries no promise of virtue with it. It has suited me to heal people – reputation, money . . . but that doesn’t mean I’m good! Healers can be flawed, remember.’

  ‘I think you’re good.’

  ‘Don’t be stupid.’

  ‘No, whenever I’ve caught a murderer . . .’

  ‘. . . only you haven’t caught me. I’ve caught you.’

  ‘. . . I’ve always liked them. I’ve always liked the murderer, admired their adventurous plunge into excess. And I like you, Cressida.’

  ‘Don’t be stupid . . . a stupid thing to say.’

  ‘But true. You seem flustered.’

  She’d lowered the needle for a moment, but then lifted it again as if ready to prick the skin. But first, some verbal needle.

  ‘And then the sermon moved on from Gethsemane,’ she said, ‘to the second betrayal of Jesus, by his close friend Peter. Remember that one, Abbot?’ The abbot saw only the needle, dripping a little. ‘Well, of course you do! “Before the cock crows, you shall deny me three times.” And again I’m thinking – that’s so you.’

  ‘You’ve lost me.’

  ‘DI Shah, I mean. She is a friend, isn’t she? I sense a closeness.’ Peter stayed silent. ‘Oh, you aren’t in love with her, are you? Peter, Peter! She’s way too young . . . that’s bordering on the abusive.’ And then in a quieter voice. ‘But whatever you have together, I’m afraid she’s betrayed you.’

  Now Peter’s mind was busy again. Where was this going?

  ‘Fiction is a very crowded market, Cressida. I’d guide you towards the self-help section.’

  ‘This isn’t fiction, Abbot. Fiction has never interested me. Why waste time with other people’s fantasies? No, I complained about your behaviour today to the police . . . spoke to Chief Inspector Wonder.’

  ‘An experience that should be on everyone’s bucket list.’

  ‘Well, it seems I was pushing at something of an open door! It transpires that you’ve been taken off the case, with DI Shah in full agreement – full agreement – as he made very clear! It was her suggestion! “Before the cock crows three times . . .” Now let’s find a nice big vein.’

  Her fingers moved easily over his bare arm, his soft receptive flesh – and then she lurched forward . . . full forward, as if hit or pushed, thrown across the abbot’s chest, the syringe sent flying. Peter felt the force, gasping for breath, before she was dragged back across him, arms waving, pulled by an unseen figure, head in a balaclava, grunting with the strain, another blow – and then the stunned Cressida dealt with, her hands tied behind her back, her shoes removed.

  ‘I’m sorry, dear,’ muttered the figure, ‘but you were always rather fast – and you can’t be now.’ It then came over to Peter, knelt down beside him and untied his cords. Thank God for Bart – so something woke him up!

  ‘Feel better?’ he asked.

  But it wasn’t Bart.

  ‘Much better,’ said Peter, only half-believing the voice.

  The figure now stood up and removed the balaclava.

  ‘Father!’ said Cressida in the moonlight. ‘What are you doing here?’

  Wonder was feeling good

  about today . . . very good indeed.

  ‘Call it territory reclaimed,’ he’d said to himself in the shaving mirror that morning.

  And above all else, this was a victory for Wonder over DI bloody Shah. It had been a difficult eighteen months since the unfortunate incident at Mick Norman’s leaving bash. And it had been nothing, really – it wasn’t as if he was serious, just the drink talking. And who in his position wouldn’t have tried it on a little? As his old mate Darryl used to say, ‘She only has to say no.’ Which she had done – like the fridge that she was.

  And somewhere in his body the remembrance of the encounter remained. Mick’s embarrassing leaving speech, then the music blaring, the alcohol flowing and Shah telling him that she was going home – and him not wanting her to leave. He’d wanted her to stay, wanted them to dance . . . or whatever.

  ‘You do know that you’re a good cop, Tamsin,’ he’d shouted.

  The music was too loud for talking but she heard clearly enough.

  ‘Yes, thank you.’

  ‘Bloody good cop.’

  And she was thinking:
why do men get like this when drunk?

  ‘And a bloody attractive cop to boot,’ he’d continued. ‘Shouldn’t say it but there we are!’

  Oh dear.

  ‘And it’s not just the wine talking, Tamsin,’ and now as he held her arm, she was acutely aware this was the first time he’d touched her body. ‘It’s the truth talking! You have no right to be so bloody good and so bloody attractive. And if I was a younger man . . .’

  ‘And not married—’

  ‘—we’re not close, my wife and I.’

  ‘Good night, Chief Inspector,’ she said, easing herself free. She needed to get out.

  ‘Er, yes, good night, Shah – or whatever you call yourself.’

  His hands and lips moved towards her in a vague lunge but one she avoided with an evasive spin . . . and then she left, walked out at speed.

  ‘Fridge,’ muttered Wonder as John Lennon’s ‘Jealous Guy’ played across the room and he thought, we could have been dancing to that.

  *

  But this morning, that was all left behind, ancient bloody history. Wonder was a man back in charge, his authority re-established. She wouldn’t be taking any liberties in the future: ‘Territory definitely reclaimed!’ was the mood music of the day. And so a clean white shirt from the drawer – swanky place, Stormhaven Towers, they’d see him at his best. Then a quick polish of his pips and perhaps an extra squirt of aftershave . . . smack it on strong, Cecil! Because Cecil Wonder was turning things around and he’d be taking his new team to Stormhaven Towers himself, this he’d decided. He’d oversee the handover of the case personally. He’d be a visible presence to make a statement to the watching world and the statement was this: ‘Wonder’s in charge, Wonder’s calling the shots now – and thank God Wonder’s on the case!’

  At twenty past eight, they all met at the Lewes police headquarters and drove from there to Stormhaven. In the driving seat was the chief inspector, a symbol of the new order of things. In the back of the car were Jones and Shaw, shaved and polished for such a grand assignment. And in the front of the car, feeling slightly sick, was Tamsin. Jones had tried to make it up to her before leaving, not wishing to be at odds with his DI – frightened of her, in a way. And he wanted to work with her again, that would be pretty decent.