by Colin Dexter
‘We-ll. Doesn't really matter then, does it?' ‘You sure?'
‘Wish everybody was as honest as you, sir.' 'OK then, if you say so.'
Roope took a taxi and after alighting at the Syndicate tipped the driver liberally. Rectangles of pale-yellow light shone in the upper storeys of nearby office blocks, and the giant shapes of the trees outside the Syndicate building loomed black against the darkening sky. The rain poured down.
Charles Noakes, present incumbent in the key post of caretaker to the Syndicate, was (for the breed) a comparatively young and helpful man, whose soul was yet to be soured by years of cumulative concern about the shutting of windows, the polishing of floors, the management of the boiler, and the setting of the burglar alarm. He was replacing a fluorescent tube in the downstairs corridor when Roope entered the building.
‘Hello, Noakes. The Secretary in?'
‘No, sir. He's been out all the afternoon.'
‘Oh.' Roope knocked on Harriett's door and looked in. The light was on; but then Roope knew that the lights would be on in every room. Bartlett always claimed that the mere switching-on of a fluorescent tube used as much electricity as leaving it on for about four hours, and consequently the lights were left on all day throughout the office - 'for reasons of economy’. For a brief second Roope thought he heard a.noise inside the room, but there was nothing. Only a note on the desk which read: ‘Friday pm. Off to Banbury. May be back about five.'
‘Not there, is he, sir?' Noakes had descended the small ladder and was standing outside. ‘No. But never mind. I'll have a word with one of the others.' ‘Not many of 'em here, I don't think, sir. Shall I see for you?' ‘No. Don't worry. I'll do it myself.'
He knocked and put his head round Ogleby's door. No Ogleby.
He tried Martin's room. No Martin.
He was knocking quietly on Monica Height's door, and leaning forward to catch any response from within, when the caretaker reappeared in the well-lit, well-polished corridor. ‘Looks as if Mr Quinn's the only graduate here, sir. His car's still out the back, anyway. I think the others must have gone.'
When the cat's away, thought Roope ... He opened Monica's door and looked inside. The room was tidiness itself, the desk clear, the leather chair neatly pushed beneath it.
It was the caretaker who tried Quinn's room, and Roope came up behind him as he looked in. A green anorak was draped over one of the chairs, and the top drawer of the nearest cabinet gaped open to reveal a row of buff-coloured file cases. On the desk, placed under a cheap paperweight, was a note from Quinn for his typist's attention. But Quinn himself was nowhere to be seen.
Roope had often heard tell of Bartlett's meticulous instructions to his staff not only about their paramount duty for ensuring the strictest security on all matters concerning question papers, but also about the importance of leaving some notification of their whereabouts. 'At least he's left a note for us, Noakes. More than some of the others have.'
'I don't think the Secretary would be very happy about this, though.' Noakes gravely closed the top drawer of the cabinet and pushed in the lock.
‘Is it of a stickler about that sort of thing, isn't he, old Bartlett?'
"Bit of a stickler about everything, sir.' Yet somehow Noakes managed to convey the impression that if he were on anyone's side, it would be Bartlett's.
'You don't think he's too much of a fusspot?'
‘No, sir. I mean, all sorts of people come into the office, don't they? You can't be too careful in a place like this.'
'No. You're absolutely right.'
Noakes felt pleasantly appeased, and having made his point he conceded a little to Roope's suspicions. 'Mind you, sir, I reckon he might have picked a warmer week for practising the fire drill.'
'Gives you those, does he?' Roope grinned. He hadn't been on a fire drill since he was at school.
‘We had one today, sir. Twelve o'clock. He had us all there, standing in the cold for something like a quarter of an hour.
Freezing, it was. I know it's a bit too hot in here but...' Noakes was about to embark on an account of his unequal struggle with the Syndicate's antiquated heating system, but Roope was far more interested in Bartlett, it seemed.
'Quarter of an hour? In this weather?'
Noakes nodded. 'Mind you, he'd warned us all about it earlier in the week, so we had our coats and everything, and it wasn't raining then, thank goodness, but—'
‘Why as long as that, though?'
"Well, there's quite a lot of permanent staff now and we had to tick our names off a list. Huh! Just like we was at school. And the Secretary gave us a little talk ...'
But Roope was no longer listening; he couldn't stand there talking to the caretaker all night, and he began walking slowly up the corridor. 'Bit odd, isn't it? Everybody here this morning and nobody here this afternoon!'
‘You're right, sir. Are you sure I can't help you?'
‘No, no. It doesn't matter. I only came to give this envelope to Bartlett. I'll leave it on his desk.'
'I'm going upstairs for a cup o' tea in a minute, sir, when I’ve fixed this light. Would you like one?'
‘No, I've got to be off. Thanks all the same, though.'
Roope took advantage of the Gentlemen's lavatory by the entrance and realized just how hot it was in the building: like walking into a Turkish bath.
Bartlett himself had been addressing a group of Banbury headmasters and headmistresses on the changing pattern of public examinations; and the last question had been authoritatively (and humorously) dispatched at almost exactly the same time that Roope had caught his taxi to the Syndicate. He was soon driving his pride and joy, a dark-brown Vanden Plas, at a steady sixty down the twenty-odd-mile stretch to Oxford. He lived out at Botley, on the western side of the city, and as he drove he debated whether to call in at the office or to go straight home. But at Kidlington he found himself beginning to get caught up in the regular evening paralysis, and as he negotiated the roundabouts on Oxford's northern perimeter he decided to turn off right along the ring-road instead of carrying straight over towards the city centre. He would call in the office a bit later, perhaps, when the evening rush-hour had abated.
When he arrived home, at just gone five his wife informed him that there had been several phone calls; and even as she was giving him the details the wretched thing rang again. How she wished they had a number ex-directory.
On Saturday, 22nd November (as on most Saturdays), the burglar alarm system was switched off at 8.30 a.m., one hour later than on weekdays. During the winter months there were only occasional Saturday workings, and on this particular morning the building was, from all appearances, utterly deserted. Ogleby was on foot, and let himself in quietly. The smell of floor polish, like the smell of cinema seats and old library books, took him back tantalizingly to his early schooldays, but his mind was on other things. Successively he looked into each room on the ground floor in order to satisfy himself that no one was around. But he was aware of this instinctively: there was an eerie, echoing emptiness about the building which the quiet clickings-to of the doors served merely to re-emphasize. He went into his own room and rang a number.
'Morning, Secretary. Hope I didn’t get you out of bed? No? Ah, good. Look. I know it sounds a bit silly, but can you remind me when the alarm's turned off on Saturday mornings? I've got to ... 8.30? Yes, I thought so, but I just wanted to make sure. I didn't want... No. Funny, really. I'd somehow got it into my head that there'd been some change ... No, I see. Well, sorry to trouble you. By the way, did the Banbury meeting go off all right? ... Good. Well, I'll be off.'
Ogleby walked into Bartlett's room. He looked around quickly and then took out his keys. Botley was at least twenty minutes' drive away: he could probably allow himself at least half an hour. But Ogleby was a cautious soul, and he allowed himself only twenty minutes.
Twenty-five minutes later, as he was sitting at his own desk, he heard someone enter the building, and almost immediately, it seemed, hi
s door was opened. ‘You got in all right then, Philip?'
'Yes thanks. No bells ringing in the police station this morning.'
'Good.' Bartlett blinked behind his spectacles. 'I've er got a few things I want to clear up myself.' He closed the door and walked into his own office. He knew what had been happening, of course. For a clever man, Ogleby's excuse; about the burglar alarm had been desperately thin. But what had he been looking for? Bartlett opened his cabinets and opened his drawers; but everything was in order. Nothing seemed to have been taken. What was there to take? He sat back and frowned deeply: the whole thing was strangely disturbing. He walked up the corridor to Ogleby's room, but Ogleby had gone.
five
Morse looked directly into the large mirror in front of him, and there surveyed the reflection of the smaller hand mirror held behind him, in which, in turn, he considered the occipital regions of what he liked to think of as a distinguished skull. He nodded impassively as the hand mirror was held behind the left side of his neck, nodded again as it was switched to the right, declined the suggested application of a white, greasy-looking hair oil which stood on the surface before him, arose, like a statue unveiled, from the chair, took the proffered tissue, rubbed his face and ears vigorously, and reached for his wallet. That felt much better! He was never happy when his hair began to grow in untidy, curly profusion just above his collar, and he wondered sadly why it now failed to sustain such luxuriance upon the top of his head. He tipped the barber generously and walked out into Summertown. Although not so cold as in recent days, it was drizzling slightly, and he decided to wait for a bus up to his bachelor flat at the top of North Oxford. It was 10.15 on Tuesday, 25th November.
It would be unlikely that anything of importance would require his immediate attention at HQ, and he had to call in home anyway. It was a ritual with Morse. As a young recruit in the army he had been driven almost mad by the service issue of prickly vests, prickly shirts, and prickly trousers. His mother had told him that he had an extremely sensitive skin; and he believed her. It was always the same after a haircut He would take off his shirt and vest, and dip his head into a basin full of hot water. Bliss! He would shampoo his hair twice, and then flannel his face and ears thoroughly. He would then rub his back with a towel, dry his hair, wash down the short, black hairs from the sides of the basin, select a clean vest and shin, and finally comb his hair with loving care in front of the bathroom mirror.
But this morning it wasn't quite the same. He was just about to rinse off the second application of medicated shampoo when the phone rang. He swore savagely. Who the hell?
'Hoped I might find you at home, sir. I couldn't find anyone who'd seen you at the office.'
'So what? I've had a haircut. Not a crime, is it?'
'Can you get here straightaway, sir?' Lewis's tone was suddenly grave.
'Give me five minutes. What's up?'
‘We've got a body, sir.'
‘Whereabouts are you?'
'I'm phoning from the station. Do you know Pinewood Close?' ‘No.'
'Well, I think you'd be best to call here first anyway, sir.' 'OK. Wait for me there.'
Chief Superintendent Strange was waiting for him, too. He stood impatiently on the steps outside the Thames Valley Police HQ in Kidlington, as Morse hurriedly parked the Lancia and jumped out.
'Where have you been, Morse?'
'Sorry, sir. I've had a haircut.'
‘You what!’
Morse said nothing, not the slightest flicker of guilt or annoyance betraying itself in the light-grey eyes. 'A fine advertisement, eh? Citizens under police care and protection getting themselves bumped off, and the only Chief Inspector I've got on duty is having his bloody hair cut!' Morse said nothing.
‘Look, Morse. You're in charge of this case - is that clear? You can have Lewis here if you want him.' Strange turned away, but suddenly remembered something else. 'And you won't get another haircut until you've sorted this little lot out - that's an order!'
‘Perhaps I shan't need one, sir.' Morse winked happily at Lewis and led the way into his office. 'What's it look like from behind?'
‘Very nice, sir. They've cut it very nicely.'
Morse sat back in his black-leather armchair and beamed at Lewis. 'Well? What have you got to tell me?'
'Chap called Quinn, sir. Lives on the ground floor of a semi-detached in Pinewood Close. He's been dead for a good while by the look of him. Poisoned, I shouldn't wonder. He works' (worked', muttered Morse) 'at the Foreign Examinations Syndicate down the Woodstock Road somewhere; and one of his colleagues got worried about him and came out and found him. I got the call about a quarter to ten, and I went along straightaway with Dickson and had a quick look round. I left him there, and came back to call you.'
'Well, here I am, Lewis. What do you want me to do?'
‘Knowing you, sir, I thought you might want me to arrest the chap who found him.'
Morse grinned. 'Is he here?'
‘In the Interview Room. I’ve got a rough statement from him, but it'll need a bit of brushing up before he signs it. You'll want to see him, I suppose?'
'Yes, but that can wait Got a car ready?'
'Waiting outside, sir.’
‘You've not called the path, boys in yet, I hope?'
‘No. I thought I ought to wait for you.'
‘Good. Go and get your statement tarted up and I’ll see you outside in ten minutes or so.'
Morse made two phone calls, combed his hair again, and felt inordinately happy.
Several faces peeped from behind ground-floor lace-curtained windows as the police car drove into Pinewood Close, a small, undistinguished crescent wherein eight semi-detached houses, erected some fifty years previously, stood gently fading into a semi-dignified senescence. Most of the wooden fences that bordered the properties managed to sustain only a precarious pretence to any upright posture, the slats uncreosoted and insecure, the crossrails mildewed, sodden with rain, and rotten. Only at each end of the crescent had the original builder left sufficient sideroom for the erection of any garage, and it was at the house at the extreme left that the bulky figure of Constable Dickson stood, stamping his feet on the damp concrete in front of a prefabricated unpainted garage, and talking to a woman in her early fifties, the owner of the property and rentier of some half a dozen other houses in the neighbourhood. But whatever other benefits her various incomes conferred upon her, her affluence appeared not to be reflected in her wardrobe: she wore no stockings and was pulling a shabby old coat more closely over a grubby white blouse as Morse and Lewis stepped out of the car.
' 'Ere come the brains, missus,' muttered Dickson, and stepped forward to greet the Chief Inspector. 'This is Mrs Jardine, sir. She owns the property and she's the one who let us in.'
Morse nodded a friendly greeting, took the Yale key from Dickson, and instructed him to take Mrs Jardine to the police car and get a statement from her. He himself stood for a while in silence with his back to the house, and looked around him. In a kerbed oval plot, a thick cluster of small trees and variagated bushes sheltered the houses from the main road and gave to the crescent the semblance of partial privacy. But the small curved stretch of road itself was poorly maintained and unevenly surfaced, with a long, irregular black scar, running parallel to the pavement, where the water mains had recently been dug up again. The gutter was full of sopping brown leaves, and the lamp-post immediately outside No I had been vandalized. The front door of the next house opened a few inches and a middle-aged woman directed inquisitive eyes towards the centre of activity.
'Good morning,' said Morse brightly.
The door was closed in a flash, and Morse turned round to survey the garage. Although the claw of the lock which secured the doors was not pushed home, he touched nothing, contenting himself with a quick glance through the glass panels at the top. Inside he saw a dark-blue Morris 1300 which allowed little more than a foot of space between the wall and the driver's door. He walked over to the front
porch and inserted the key. 'Good job he doesn't drive a Cadillac, Lewis.'
‘Didn't,' corrected Lewis quietly.
The front door of No 1 Pinewood Close opened on to a narrow hallway, with a row of clothes pegs at the foot of the staircase which climbed the wall to the left. Morse stood inside and pointed to the door immediately to his right. 'This the one?'
"Next one, sir.' '
The door was closed and Morse took out his pen and depressed the handle carefully. 'I hope you haven't left your prints all over the place, Lewis?'
'I opened it the same way as you, sir.'
Inside the room the electric light was still turned on; the dull-orange curtains were drawn; the gas fire was burning low; and lying in a foetal posture on the carpet was the body of a young man. The fire was flanked by two old, but comfortable-looking armchairs; and beside the one to the right, on a low french-polished coffee table, stood a bottle of dry sherry, almost full, and a cheap-looking sherry glass, almost empty. Morse bent forward and sniffed the pale, clear liquid. ‘Did you know, Lewis, that about eighteen per cent of men and about four per cent of women can't smell cyanide?'
'It is poison, then?'
'Smells like it Peach blossom, bitter almonds - take your pick.'
The dead man's face was turned towards them, away from the fire, and Morse knelt down and looked at it. A small quantity of dry froth crusted the twisted mouth, and the bearded jaw was tightly clenched in death; the pupils of the open eyes appeared widely dilated, and the skin of the face was a morbid, blotchy blue. 'All the classic symptoms, Lewis. We hardly need a postmortem on this one. Hydrocyanic acid. Anyway the path, boys should be here any minute.' He stood up and walked over to the curtains, which had obviously shrunk in a not particularly recent wash, and which gaped open slightly towards the top. Outside Morse could see the narrow garden, with its patchy, poor-quality grass, a small vegetable plot at the far end, and a section of fencing missing on the left. But the view appeared to convey little of significance to his mind, and he turned his attention back to the room itself. Along the wall opposite the fire were a dozen or so bundles of books, neatly tied with stout cord, and a dark mahogany sideboard, the left-hand door of which gaped open to reveal a small collection of assorted tumblers and glasses, and an unopened bottle of whisky. Everywhere seemed remarkably clean and tidy. A small wastepaper basket stood in the shallow alcove to the left of the fire; and inside the basket was a ball of paper, which Morse picked out and smoothed gently on the top of the sideboard: