A Lesson in Secrets (18 page)

Chapter Fourteen

I
t took a while for Maisie to locate the administration office at King’s College in the Strand. The grand Byzantine Gothic buildings overlooked the Thames on one side, and proved to be something of a maze for the new visitor. Following a wait of over half an hour in the records office, she made her way to the room of Dr. Trevor Petit, lecturer in politics and history. Petit was tall and thin, with silver hair; he wore a gray jacket and trousers, though they did not match and could not be referred to as a suit. A collar stud had come loose, and he kept touching his neck to stop the starched collar from riding up towards his ear while she introduced herself and informed him that she wanted to find out more about a young man called Robson Headley. Maisie explained that he was representing the College of St. Francis in a debate, and she was endeavoring to assess the potential for success. Petit did not seem to doubt her story, though she suspected he might think twice about the reason for her questions after she had left his office.

“I’d like to know what he was like as a student—I understand he left the university only three years ago, so you’d probably remember him.”

“That’s right; I remember him quite clearly.” Petit pressed his collar down and straightened his tie. He looked at Maisie. “May I be candid, though I would not care for these thoughts to be attributed back to me?”

“Of course. My visit is informal; anything you tell me is in absolute confidence.”

Petit nodded, and folded his arms. “I couldn’t stand the chap. Opinionated, unable to engage in constructive debate—bear that in mind, Miss Dobbs—and something of a troublemaker, despite those baby-faced looks.”

“How did he cause trouble?”

“He seemed quite unable to stand back and demonstrate intellectual curiosity without extreme involvement. If he joined a team of any sort—he was a runner, for a while—he would go at it tooth and nail. There was no middle ground, and that extended to his politics. He could not simply argue a point in tutorial, for example. With most students, there might be argument or dissent in the classroom, then when the class is over, it’s off to the common room and they’re still talking about it, but not necessarily with a venomous ferocity. Well, Headley wasn’t like that—he would harangue people. I had heard that on one occasion, he was so intent upon continuing an argument that he woke up a fellow student by throwing stones at his window at night, trying to get him to come down and finish the row outside. The police were called.”

“Oh dear, he does seem rather passionate.”

“I call it being spoiled. His family have indulged him, and I cannot see him changing overnight, though I would hope he has mellowed.”

“Did he become involved in any particular political groups?”

“I can’t think of anything off hand, though he did try to start something himself. It was a group that countered the stance of pacifists—there’s quite a pacifist movement among students, you know—he was maintaining that an inability and unwillingness to take up arms, along with peaceful overtures towards our enemies, would lead to a disease of weakness. He would hold meetings outside, try to get other students to join him in challenging the man on the street to be part of the cause—and at a time when the man on the street is probably more interested in making a day’s living. Passionate? Yes. And misguided. And he isn’t quite as bright as he thinks he is; quite a mediocre student, actually.”

“You have been most forthcoming, Dr. Petit. I wonder if your fellow lecturers would share your opinion.”

“Granted, I didn’t like Headley, but I think he offended other members of staff, too—it was talked about, especially when he started holding meetings, trying to be a leader, talking about entering politics, and so on. He was giving off a lot of hot air—though I have to admit, when I learned his older brother was killed in the war, I wondered if that might account for his behavior. I daresay he was pandered to as a child, and is used to getting his own way. And of course he is quick to show temper.”

“You said he was mediocre, but did he try, did he work hard?”

“He
thought
he worked hard and was surprised when his marks did not meet his expectations. I think he was easily distracted by his ambitions and things that would suddenly take his attention—starting a political interest group, for example, or campaigning for a member of Parliament he suddenly supported—so he found settling down to complete a piece of academic work quite difficult.”

“Did he have friends here?”

“People were drawn to him, then turned away. He wasn’t above getting into a fistfight in support of his beliefs, or at least challenging another student physically.”

“Really?” Maisie was trying to reconcile this picture of Robson Headley with the young man she had met, and whom she had seen being solicitous towards Delphine Lang.

“In fact, I saw him once, having a go at another chap after classes. I don’t know what he did exactly, but that lad was on the ground in a second—and he was a young man of some heft, not easily caught off guard. But Headley just whipped him up off his feet and was standing over him, calling him all sorts of names—and all due to some argument about the way in which the British defeated the Boers.”

“Well, this is very interesting, Dr. Petit, I—”

“Personally, I put it down to the fact that he’s spent a few years overseas—apparently his father had business in the Orient—something of that order, anyway—but he came back here to attend university. In my position, you don’t always remember your students—too many of them—but some stand out, and as you’ve probably gathered, Headley was one of them. I recall thinking that it was as if he didn’t really know how to communicate with people his own age and kind anymore. Of course, he looks very friendly, almost debonair, but he is a young man who has a fair bit of nasty bottled up inside him. Mind you, he’ll be an energetic debater, if he can hold his temper—and perhaps he’s grown up since I last saw him. What’s the subject of the debate?”

“The title might have been changed again in my absence, but it’s to do with whether the emerging politics in Germany—national socialism—could be accepted here in Britain.”

“Then just watch him. I could imagine him being quite a vehement supporter of the motion to accept something along the lines of Herr Hitler’s Nazi Party. They’ve garnered considerable support in Germany and they’re very well organized in groups in other countries, to ensure that German citizens abroad are brought into the fold. Wouldn’t surprise me if Headley isn’t a Fascist—mind you, the corridors of power are littered with Fascist leanings; anything to save the upper classes through disenfranchisement of the common man while allowing the common man to think you’re on his side.”

Maisie thanked Dr. Petit for his time. After leaving his office she referred to a rough map of the building scribbled by the administrative clerk, then made her way to the Strand. She would have liked to speak to another of Headley’s tutors, as Petit had been so vociferous in his dislike of Headley—perhaps as passionate as Headley himself; thus she cautioned herself not to take his summing-up as the last word regarding the young man’s performance as a student. However, it gave her food for thought. Robson Headley and Delphine Lang might have more in common than time spent in the Orient and membership in the Ortsgruppe. She remembered the way in which Lang had deflected the cricket ball as if it were no more than an errant feather in her hand, and she paid attention to Dr. Petit’s description of Headley taking down another student during an argument. She did not want to jump to conclusions, but it seemed they both possessed a certain level of control and strength; a physical self-possession that Clarence Chen would recognize.

U
pon reaching the railway station in Cambridge, Maisie went straight to a telephone kiosk and placed a call to The Old Fenland Mill, the inn where she knew MacFarlane and Stratton had taken rooms. She left a message for MacFarlane, and said that she would meet them at seven o’clock in the private bar.

Now she was on her way to see Professor Arthur Henderson. Although he was retired, she had managed to find out his address from a porter at Trinity College—again, lies came easily when she was in search of more color to add to her picture of Greville Liddicote.

Professor Henderson answered the door of the Edwardian villa himself. He wore olive-green corduroy trousers, a pale-green shirt, a green polka-dot bow tie, and a dark-green knitted pullover. Although the professor’s clothing seemed more suited to early autumn, Maisie felt over-warm and had taken off her jacket, which she now carried across one arm. She could feel perspiration on her forehead and she welcomed the cool interior of Henderson’s study when he invited her in. She explained that she was looking into Greville Liddicote’s work with a view to possibly writing an article about his children’s books, and she thought he might be able to assist her in her research, seeing as he and Liddicote were colleagues as well as friends.

“Well, I don’t know about
friends
, Miss Dobbs.” A knock on the door distracted Henderson, who smiled as his housekeeper entered. “Ah, Mrs. Mills, would you be so kind as to bring two glasses of your delicious lemonade—thank you.”

Maisie was relieved. A cold drink was just what she needed, with the Indian summer weather leaving her parched.

“Now, where was I?”

“You were saying that you didn’t know whether Greville Liddicote was really a friend.”

“Yes, yes, of course. But no, he wasn’t what you would call a friend, though I was brutally honest with him, I must say.”

“About his work?”

“Well, yes. You see, he would insist on publishing that damn book, the one about the children going off to find their fathers in the war. I’m not saying it wasn’t a good book—as children’s books go, it was excellent, which rather surprised everyone, actually—but it caused so much trouble.”

Maisie nodded, and was about to ask another question when there was another knock on the door and the housekeeper came in. She placed two tumblers of lemonade on the table in front of Henderson and Maisie. At the sight of the pale-yellow liquid, with a slice of lemon and a sprig of mint on top, Maisie felt her mouth water with anticipation. She reached for a glass and took a sip

“Oh, that really is lovely—definitely wakes you up,” said Maisie, setting down her glass again.

“It’s certainly a pick-me-up, and she won’t divulge her recipe, either, much to the chagrin of many a caller on a hot day.”

“Professor Henderson, regarding the book, why did it surprise you? I know you had read Dr. Liddicote’s children’s books in the past, so you must have been familiar with his storytelling.”

“I was, very much so; I was always his first reader, followed by my grandchildren. But this one was different, in style, tone and—frankly—his ability. It was far more nuanced than anything he had written before; it had layers of meaning not demonstrated in previous books. It was the work of a true storyteller rather than a jobbing writer, which was what Greville was, really, before this one. He wrote to bring in a bit of extra money, and—again, to be frank—saw himself as another Grimm.”

“There was some talk, I understand, regarding the origin of the book; it’s suggested he might not have been the original writer.”

Henderson sighed, fiddling with his bow tie before taking another sip of lemonade, setting the glass down once again and then clearing his throat to speak. “I would hate to comment on the provenance of the book, and of one or two others that followed. But they were not like those he’d published before—or since. There were two more after the banned book, with similar ground covered though the stories were tempered. Then he published another book, must have been in about 1920, and it was just like his prewar books—very light, silly little stories. Those three that were written during the war—and which, overall, he did very well with financially, despite the first one being effectively banned—were gems in a rather run-of-the-mill body of work.”

Maisie nodded again, and waited a moment before putting forward her next question. “And were the books—the three written during the war—so controversial that they would have led to his dismissal?”

“He tendered his resignation to follow other pursuits, one of which was to found a college to promote peace, as you know.”

Maisie reached for her lemonade again, taking one or two sips before she pressed Henderson. “But do you think it might have come to it that Dr. Liddicote felt he had to leave, given that feelings were running high regarding his work?”

As Henderson looked down at his hands, the folds of skin on his face seemed to concertina into a soft place for his chin to rest. He sighed and looked up at Maisie. “If you’re asking whether he was pushed or whether he fell, let us simply say that he fell, but there was a heavy hand at his back.”

“Ah, I see.”

“Indeed.”

“And if—in confidence, I assure you—you had to make a considered guess regarding the three books at the heart of this controversy, would you say that they could have been written by someone else?”

Henderson sighed again. “How I hate the feeling of being cornered. Makes me feel a bit like I’ve been ambushed.”

“I’m sorry, Professor Henderson. I beg your pardon, it was just that I wondered, in your opinion, whether—”

“The answer is
yes
, Miss Dobbs. Greville Liddicote had a very pedestrian writing style, whether we are talking about the task of composing an academic paper or the art of storytelling. Those books, especially the first, were not written by an author with a pedestrian style.”

“I see. So Greville Liddicote did not leave his teaching position simply because of what he wrote, but because you did not believe he had written it.”

“I think I’ve said more than enough, Miss Dobbs.” Henderson reached for a bell on his desk. “More lemonade before you depart?”

Maisie declined, and Henderson accompanied her to the door, at which point she decided to press her luck. “You’ve been so generous with your time, Professor Henderson, I wonder if I might put just one more question to you?”