by Raven, Simon
“Quite a correspondent, this Mr Honeydew,” said Tyrrel wryly.
“He does run on rather a lot. But he was none the less right,” I said, “for all that.”
“About Clarence being…a banner of rebellion?”
“Yes. I went down there a few weeks later and met him for the first time. He was all Marc had said – witty, attractive, dissolute. There was only one thing Marc had left out: except in money matters, Piers Clarence was very, very honest. He saw things very straight and clear. And one of the things he saw was that Dr Walter Goodrich was a monumental sham. His books, his parties, his influence in high places – his whole set-up, for all its front of culture and graciousness, was just a frowsty doss-house for the shelter of half-baked ideas and the incubation of intellectual vermin.”
“And he said as much to Mr Fountain?”
“Frequently.”
“And Mr Fountain agreed?”
“Not directly. He smiled a lot – sometimes rather uneasily. It almost seemed, for all his competence, as if he couldn’t quite cope with Piers Clarence… Meanwhile there was no doubt that things were getting very awkward. Because although Richard’s affection for Clarence was sexually innocent, their association was being talked about, Penelope was bitterly distressed that Richard would hardly ever see her, and Walter, so to speak, had plainly lost both his compass and his map. It must have hurt him a lot – one of the most promising protégés he had ever had, and one that once seemed so co-operative and malleable, coming back to a position more or less created for him by Walter himself and then behaving so disloyally. But Walter never entirely lost his grip. Whatever else, it was quite clear that if Richard stayed in Cambridge the situation would just become more and more humiliating. So he made a virtue of necessity, and saw to it that Richard got all the permissions and grants he needed to go off and research in Greece…which Richard did – but not without one parting act of defiance.”
“Oh?” said Tyrrel.
“Walter had put Richard on to researching into the Roman conquest of Greece – how far the Romans became Hellenised culturally and institutionally and vice versa. But Richard now said that he was going back to his original subject – the one he’d written his fellowship dissertation about.”
“The survival of Minoan rites?” said Tyrrel with speed and interest.
“Yes,” I said, faintly surprised that he should have remembered.
“He told Walter he still had a lot to clear up. Walter said that all the arrangements had been made on the assumption that he was to investigate the Roman conquest of Greece. Richard said he didn’t care what arrangements had been made; when he got to Greece he was going to spend a lot of his time in Crete, and it was Minoan rites he was going to look into, and they could like it or lump it. So finally Walter, who was still crazy to get him out of the way, pretended to like it and got the various College and Faculty boards concerned to allow the change of plan. It cost Walter a lot of hard work. But he managed.”
“And Mr Fountain left in the August of last year?”
“Yes.”
“And you’ve heard nothing since Christmas?”
“Little enough before then.”
“And Miss Goodrich was sorry when he left?”
“Very, I believe. She was hoping…well, that things would straighten themselves out.”
“What about Piers Clarence?” said Tyrrel with a grin.
“Piers is a realist. No doubt he was sorry to lose an ally. But he knows that people come and go and it’s no good getting into a state about it.”
“Yes,” said Tyrrel, still grinning. “I imagined he thought that… I hope I shall meet this Mr Clarence… So when had you expected Mr Fountain back?”
“This September, probably. But there was also some sort of idea that he might be enabled to prolong his stay for another year…if he seemed to be on to anything good. I fancy this was Walter’s scheme; because Clarence still had two years to do at Lancaster when Richard left, and no doubt Walter felt he might as well keep Richard out of the way till Clarence had finally gone.”
“I can tell you one thing,” Tyrrel said grimly. “Mr Fountain will be back this September and even a good while sooner.”
“Ah,” I said, “I hoped you’d volunteer something sooner or later. It’s very much your turn. How do you come to be so certain, Inspector Tyrrel? Expand.”
“Because the Greek authorities, sir, will not allow him to stay.”
Not for the first time that evening, he wandered over to my bookcase and looked carefully along the shelves.
“Go on, man.”
“One of the pleasing things about this case,” mused Tyrrel, disregarding my remark, “is that it has so many…intellectual implications.”
He took from the shelves a book by Carl Kerényi called The Gods of the Greeks.
“When did you last read this, sir?”
“As an undergraduate. Before one of my exams.”
“Read it again, Mr Seymour. Particularly the early chapters. Or perhaps you remember them?”
“Not in any detail,” I said.
“Very well… Now, let me remind you of one or two things that have emerged very clearly from our discussion. One: Mr Fountain wrote an essay as a boy of eighteen – an essay which created some impression – called ‘The Dying Gods’; and in it he complained that the old gods were not dying fast enough and constituted a menace to society. Correct?”
“Yes,” I said, “but–”
“–Two,” said Tyrrel firmly: “his fellowship thesis was concerned with the survival of Minoan rites into classical times.”
“Granted.”
“And three: after he came back from the Army Dr Goodrich put him on to another line of research; but before leaving for Greece, Mr Fountain insisted on changing back to his Minoan interests. And what do you conclude from all this, Mr Seymour?”
“That he is interested in ancient religions, particularly the earlier varieties.”
“Good enough. And necessarily of course he would have to know, not only about Minoan or Cretan carryings-on, but also about the early imported Northern practices, which were brought down into Greece from Central Europe or Asia or wherever?”
“Presumably.”
“So. Now, Mr Seymour,” said Tyrrel, as if he had occupied a lecturer’s dais all his life, “if you will be so good as to reread Mr Kerényi – or any other of the great number of books on this subject – you will not be slow to recollect that the ideas and rituals associated with Minoan religion were a trifle unsavoury. Mind you, the Cretans were an attractive people, and there is no doubt that their whole conception was being gradually softened, that a strongly pleasurable element was creeping into their observances. Still, even the Cretans are not exactly a model guide for contemporary procedure. Agreed?”
“Most heartily.”
“And if this can be said of the Cretans, what are we to think of the primitive Northern and Asiatic deities, who also occupied an important place in the original Greek theogony? They were not at all pleasant, Mr Seymour. There are little tales of rapes, castrations, wholesale devourings of offspring: their qualities, as befitted the harsh and uncharitable regions whence they came, were in every way destructive, vengeance primed and lustful. There is no need to go into detail. You take my point?”
“Very clearly,” I said with some admiration.
“Well, sir. Some say that the Female Principle – Mother Earth or the Mother Goddess – is on the whole a Cretan or Southern speciality; and that the Male Principle – Uranus the fertilising sky-god, perhaps – came from the North. What concerns us here is that both principles were celebrated, in early times, with sacrifice, violence and assorted indelicacy. And that is all I am going to say about that.”
He tossed Kerényi on to the table in front of me.
“Well?” I said.
“I do not permit myself, sir, to make connections without strong factual evidence. But you may care to bear in mind what I have just been s
aying; and then to hear, in return for the facts you have told me, the very limited set of facts which I can tell you.
“My facts are just these. Firstly, the Greek authorities are concerned because there have lately been two or three very nasty discoveries – discoveries associated with the unexpected disappearance of certain people and which suggest peculiar, not to say abnormal, conduct on the part of some other – unknown – people. Secondly, the Greek authorities have made it plain that Mr Fountain must be out of the country at the end of one year’s residence – which is to say by this September. Thirdly, they have given him no reason for this. Fourthly, they have informed Scotland Yard both that they are requiring Mr Fountain to leave, and also of their concern about…the incidents I have just mentioned. And those are all my facts.”
“I can see no connection anywhere,” I said petulantly.
“Of course,” said Tyrrel, “the Greeks know nothing of what you have been telling me. But with regard to what they do know, they did just hint that considerations of time and place were…indicative. There is a link or two, though admittedly no chain.”
“For Christ’s sake be more precise.”
“And the Greeks did observe that some of Mr Fountain’s scholarly investigations, on sites and in libraries, had been of a curious nature.”
“Of course they had,” I nearly shouted at him: “his subject is of a curious nature. Tell me what you mean, man. What anybody means.”
“I’m afraid we must leave it at that,” said Tyrrel abruptly. “You’ve been most helpful, sir. And believe me, I’ve told you all I can.”
He walked smartly towards my bookcase, carrying the Cavafis he had been reading when I first found him. Then he hesitated and turned round.
“Might I borrow this?” he said.
“If you wish,” I said, with as much annoyance as I could get into my voice. “Only remember to send it back – at some reasonable hour of the day. It is a rare book.”
“That,” said Tyrrel, “is why I asked to borrow it. And don’t worry about its being returned. You will be seeing something of me.”
“Oh?”
“We shall be needing your help, you see.”
“What more do you want of me?”
Tyrrel had picked up his hat (a brown trilby of the cut favoured by the more offensive type of young officer), but he now came back into the middle of the room.
“To keep your ears open. To let us know what you hear of Richard Fountain’s activities in Greece from his friends or from himself. Indeed, sir,” he said more humbly, “we should be grateful if you would make a point of going to Cambridge in a week or two to see if any of your friends – Mr Clarence, perhaps – have picked up anything of interest. They might have had news…or dreams,” he added oddly. “Though I must ask you not to tell them what I’ve told you.”
“You’ve told me very little, Inspector… But I’ll go to Cambridge – if you’ll trust me with one more thing to keep quiet about when I get there.”
“And what would that be, Mr Seymour?”
“These incidents…these discoveries the Greeks claim to have made. You must know more about them than you’ve said?”
By now Tyrrel was working his way slowly toward the door.
“Oh, those,” he said almost gaily. “Well, sir, you’re a man of education – and imagination. You don’t really need me to tell you what a place looks like after a butcher’s been in it. No,” he said, slipping lightly through the door, “I shan’t presume to instruct you further. Good night… Anthony Seymour.”
“Goodnight, John Tyrrel,” I said, acknowledging, half in pique and half with pleasure, the bond formed by the night’s discussion.
When I went over to my window, I could see Tyrrel disappearing out of the square and into Chester Row. He had both hands in his pockets; he was walking slowly with a kind of scuffle; his gaiety and jauntiness had gone. It was now impossible (just as it had been impossible earlier in the evening, when he looked at me like a tired child) to feel anything but sympathy for him. But you might have told me more, John Tyrrel, I thought – after all I told you. Particularly as you want more help. You might have stayed my questions. But then again, what questions? What useful question remained, at this juncture, to be asked? The facts, as far as they went, were really plain enough. There was a disagreeable mystery abroad in Greece, and the authorities, thinking but being unable to prove that Richard had part in it, were keen to get him out of the country. For the rest – it simply remained to be seen. So, “Keep your ears open”…“Let us know what you hear”…“Go to Cambridge if you will”… Well, I thought, I can do all that and gladly, John Tyrrel; but whether I keep mouth shut, as you request – that is another matter. Because the people involved are my friends, John Tyrrel: even Dr Walter Goodrich, if only because of the length of time I have known him, must count in some sort as a friend.
But now the birds were chattering in the square, and the light blue dawn was at hand, and it was time to sleep.
IV
In the end, I went to Cambridge early in June. Not the best time to go there, because the place is filled with outsiders who flock in for the alien gaieties of May Week, sweating mothers and proud but watchful fathers, hopeful and happy girls who cackle like geese along the river and far into the night. But in a way this was just the kind of thing I wanted. For there are a lot of people and a lot of drink about in May Week; and the sort of information Tyrrel had asked me to look for was far more likely to come leaping off a pleasure-loosened tongue over champagne after luncheon than to be soberly delivered during the long walks more typical of normal Cambridge afternoons.
I had arranged for a guest room in Lancaster, and also to give dinner to Walter and Penelope on my first evening there. I had warned Marc Honeydew I was coming, and in any case the bachelor flexibility of existence which both he and Piers Clarence enjoyed would make them easy of discovery and access at any hour of the day or night. There was only one thing which really bothered me. In order to find out what I wanted, I should have to proceed in a rather questionable fashion. It would be no good just saying “Heard from Richard lately?”: for I was after anything, however trivial, which might point to anything (however slightly) odd; and in order to come at that degree of detail I should have to nag and probe and cross-question in a manner which would at once strike my informants as being eccentric. They would realise there was “something up”, enquire what it was, and in part at least I should have to tell them. Well, I thought at first, and why not? These are my friends and Richard’s and they have a palpable right to know if something is amiss with him. And yet… You see, there had been something about the hours I had spent with Tyrrel which had not only made me like the man but had also enjoined on me, or so I felt, a definite loyalty towards him. Tyrrel had asked me not to reveal what he had told me, and, friends or no friends, I was ill disposed to breach the trust.
Still, as Tyrrel himself would have been the first to admit, it was very difficult. And so, as I lay resting on the outrageously uncomfortable bed with which Lancaster College saw fit to provide its guests, listening, as the evening deepened, to the gentle admonition of the clock across the Court, I pondered the matter without pleasure or certainty: loyalty to my friends, loyalty to Tyrrel, loyalty to Richard; not to mention my wish to achieve efficiently any available information; what did these conflicting interests require of me? (And for that matter, were they really conflicting? Did not all of us, at bottom, want Richard’s good?) In the end, glimpsing Tyrrel’s face pressing close to mine in my half-sleep, – “Now, you’re a man of education and resource, Mr Seymour” – , I came to the only possible decision. I should just have to use my wits and play the ball as it bounced. But whatever happened, I thought, I must try to keep as much as possible from Walter and Marc (the former an intriguer, the latter a common gossip); whereas it would be possible to let Penelope, with her courage and resignation, and Piers Clarence, with his fierce, improbable integrity, have any information they migh
t chance to ask of me.
Having decided which, I walked two hundred yards round the Court to the nearest bathroom; and then I set out to meet Walter and Penelope where I had bidden them – a Restaurant which was my favourite, not so much for its food as its position: for it was opposite that college which, in its serenity, grandeur and magic, is and will remain above all colleges whatever – the Royal College of the Blessed King Henry VI: King’s.
Walter looked pleased to see me in his usual rather squelchy way; while Penelope was also pleased, but at the same time wearing a general aspect of strain and dissatisfaction. For a long time (as the shadows over King’s lawn lengthened and the pigeons swirled for the last time, settled and ceased their murmuring) we gossiped on, vaguely and amiably, of affairs in Lancaster, of this Fellow and that award, the renewal of the panelling in the college hall, the resilience and devotion of the ageing Provost. I suppose it was on Penelope’s account that Walter was so unwilling to talk of Richard, and I was determined not to raise the subject for my own part. But sooner or later, as we all knew, the talk must turn on him; and finally, steering us with careful nonchalance into what he evidently considered a perilous region, Walter made use of a discussion we were having about the magazine I helped to edit, and asked: “Let’s see. You did review Richard’s second book of poems?”