Murder Is Academic (20 page)

‘Anyway,' Alison went on, ‘I don't suppose for a moment that you'll be the only ones who'll find it difficult to account for their whereabouts.'

Aiden and Merfyn needling each other, just as they always did, and Alison mildly irritated by them, just as she always was. There had been dozens of mornings like this. Except that Margaret wasn't there and a student was dead; two students, in fact, I reminded myself.

‘Two students and the head of department in – what? – six months, nine months?' Aiden said. It was as though he had read my mind. ‘You can't blame the police for wanting to poke about a bit.'

There was silence around the table.

He looked at his watch. ‘Must go. I want to get over to the library.'

He stood up.

As we followed him to the door, Cathy fell into step beside me.

‘By the way,' she said, ‘I checked the list of college undergraduates for an Annabelle, but we haven't got a student of that name. Why did you want to know?'

‘Oh, it was just a rather strange wrong number,' I said.

Aiden must have paused momentarily because Cathy trod on his heel and bumped into him. He turned and darted a sharp glance at me.

It was that glance that reminded me. Annabelle was the name on the piece of paper that Aiden had snatched from my hand. Annabelle Fairchild. But I didn't have time to think what that might mean because Merfyn was touching me on the arm.

‘Can I come and see you, Cass? This afternoon?'

*   *   *

‘It's very awkward,' Merfyn said.

I was sitting behind my desk and he was sitting beside it on the upright chair that I usually reserve for students.

‘Last Wednesday,' he went on. ‘You see, I was with Ingrid. At least for the first part of the afternoon. It's embarrassing, having to tell the police that I was at a séance.'

Don't worry,
I nearly said,
they already know,
but I stopped myself in time.

Instead I said, ‘All the same, I really think you should.'

‘I thought I'd better have a word with you first. You did say that you didn't want it to get around.'

‘Just as a matter of interest, what were you doing the rest of the afternoon?'

‘Oh,' Merfyn raised his eyebrows and shrugged, ‘just wandering around, thinking things through.'

He stood up to leave.

‘Wait a moment,' I said firmly. ‘Sit down, Merfyn.'

He seated himself reluctantly.

‘How is it going now, the book?'

‘Oh, much better, in many ways. I'm plugging on with it and I'm getting encouraging responses from Conan Doyle.'

I sighed. It went against the grain to act as though I accepted this, but if Merfyn really was making progress.…

‘In what ways
isn't
it going well?'

‘What?'

‘You said, in
most
ways it's going well. That suggests that there are ways in which it isn't.'

‘Ah.'

Our eyes met and Merfyn looked away quickly. I picked up a pencil and began to tap it softly on my desk. I realized that I was behaving exactly like Lawrence and put it down again immediately.

The silence stretched out between us.

Merfyn pulled the red silk handkerchief out of his top pocket and blew his nose with a loud trumpeting sound. This seemed to give him confidence. He stuffed the handkerchief away in his trouser pocket with an air of decision.

‘There are problems with the publishers,' he said.

‘Don't they like it?'

‘No, no, they think what they've seen is first-rate.'

‘Well, then?' I sat back and spread out my hands. ‘Where's the problem?'

‘Well, about a week ago, a message came through from Conan Doyle. He wants the book to be translated.' He hesitated.

‘Translated? You mean German? French? What?' I found that I was fiddling with my pencil again.

‘He says he wants the message of spiritualism to reach the widest possible audience. He wants my book to be published in Esperanto.'

I dropped my pencil. It rolled off the desk onto the wooden floor.

‘The thing is,' Merfyn went on, ‘Esperanto was all the rage when he died in 1930. He's sure it must have become a universal language by now. He won't take any notice when I try to explain that no one uses it. He says that St Etheldreda's was founded to further internationalism and that we ought to lead the way. I don't know what I'm going to do.'

He looked as if he was on the verge of tears.

My mouth was hanging open. I closed it. For a while I didn't feel anything, nothing at all. Then I did feel something, but I didn't know what it was. It hit me like a shot of neat vodka. It was anger: pure, white-hot, liberating anger.

Merfyn seemed to sense what was coming. His eyes opened wide. He pressed himself against the back of his chair.

‘You don't know what to do?' I said. ‘I'll tell you what you are going to do, Merfyn. Are you listening?'

He nodded.

‘Really listening?'

‘Yes,' he said hoarsely.

‘Good.' I found I was enjoying this. ‘First let me make my own position quite clear. I do not believe that Conan Doyle has contacted you from beyond the grave. I do not believe that he is dictating your book to you or that he wants it published in Esperanto.'

Merfyn opened his mouth to speak. I lifted up my hand. He closed it.

‘I can't prove it. I don't know for certain what happens to us when we die. But this I do know.' My voice was rising. ‘I know that the problem of finishing this book is
your
problem, not Conan Doyle's. And you
are
going to finish it, make no mistake about it. It is all that stands between you and redundancy. In fact, it's all that stands between all of us and redundancy. So I don't want to hear a single word more about séances or writer's block. I've had enough, Merfyn. I've reached the end of my rope.'

I leaned as far forward as I could; given the fact that I was almost six months pregnant, it wasn't all that far.

‘You'll get off your backside,' I said. ‘You will go away and you will write this book. You will finish it and get it published.
In English!
'

I thumped my fist on the table. Merfyn flinched.

‘IS THAT CLEAR?' I roared.

He nodded. We regarded each other, our eyes locked, for a few seconds. Merfyn was the first to look away. He got up and left the room, closing the door very softly behind him.

I felt intoxicated. Would losing my temper with Merfyn have done any good? Who knew? who cared? A sense of wellbeing and relaxation was permeating my entire body. It was like the relief that comes from a storm breaking. It didn't last long. Intoxication never does. It soon ebbed away, leaving me wondering if I had been too histrionic. Reasoning with Merfyn hadn't worked, so perhaps this would.

My eye fell on a pile of student essays on the corner of my desk. I had tutorials with these students the next day. I sighed, and glanced at my watch. Five o'clock. It was time to collect Stephen from his first day back at work. I'd have to take the essays home with me.

Already there was a touch of frost in the air and the glow from the porter's lodge struck sparks of light from the pavement. I paused on the threshold to pull my hat down over my ears, and fumbled in my coat pockets for my gloves.

The car park is tucked round the side of the college and is reached by a narrow path that runs along one of the residential wings. I'd been late that morning, so the car, Stephen's Audi, was parked near the far end. This was a favourite spot in the summer because it was sheltered by a group of mature trees, but today, with my bulging briefcase pulling my shoulder down, the extra distance was irksome. The car park was pock-marked with shallow potholes in which delicate feathery films of ice were forming.

I opened the car door and put my briefcase on the passenger seat. As I fastened my seat belt, my thoughts ran ahead to the Old Granary, a warm welcome from Bill Bailey, a pot of lapsang souchong tea. There were some crumpets left, too. If I got a move on, I could get through the essays in an hour and a half, a couple of hours at the most. Then dinner with Stephen, and an early night with an undemanding book, perhaps
not
a crime novel. There was a copy of the latest Anne Tylor novel that I hadn't started yet.

It took me a moment to realize that, although I had turned the key in the ignition, nothing had happened. I tried again. Still nothing.

The battery was completely dead.

The perfect end to a perfect day.

I folded my arms on the steering wheel and laid my head down.

Soon I'd go back to the porter's lodge, sort the situation out, be my normal competent self. But just for a second I needed to surrender to the awfulness of everything and the cussedness of inanimate objects.

I buried my head deeper into the cradle of my arms.

That was why I didn't hear the footsteps approaching the car and why I jumped as if I'd been electrocuted when I heard the tap on the window.

Chapter Sixteen

Alison's anxious face was looking in at me. I put my finger on the button for the electric window, forgetting that it wouldn't work. With a sigh I opened the door.

‘You OK there?' she asked.

‘Yes, yes. I was just allowing myself to feel miserable for a bit. The car won't start. I think it's the battery.'

I dragged my briefcase over the passenger seat, cursing as I caught it on the hand-brake, and struggled out of the car.

‘What are you going to do?'

‘I'll go back into college and ring Stephen, ask him to get a taxi and come over to pick me up as well. No point in ringing the garage until first thing in the morning. They'll have gone home by now.'

‘I was wanting to have a word with you anyway, Cass, I'll walk back with you. Here, let me take that.'

She reached for my briefcase. I surrendered it to her.

‘What on earth have you got in there? Bricks? Gold bullion?'

‘If only. Let me see.' I counted them off on my fingers. ‘Laptop, batch of student essays, proofs of an article – overdue – two books that should have been back at the university library last week, and a kind of compost of unanswered correspondence. My briefcase is a mobile pending tray.'

‘You won't have had a chance to look at my article yet, then?'

‘I'm afraid that's in there too, Ali. But I have skimmed through it, and read the beginning. I thought it looked terrific.'

‘I've got some good news. I sent a copy to the editor of
Literary Women
and he rang me this afternoon to say that he's got an unexpected gap in the Spring edition. He wants to use it.'

I was impressed. It was quite a prestigious journal. ‘It'll be a great boost to our research profile. And wonderful ammunition against Lawrence. He's been on my back about the RAE submission.'

‘Well, you've had other things on your mind, haven't you?'

We walked in silence, thinking about those other things.

Alison said, ‘Any news yet about Rebecca's funeral?'

‘No. I suppose the family will have to wait for the police to release the body. I don't know when that's likely to be.'

‘Poor Rebecca,' Alison said. ‘And even if she had survived, what kind of life would she have had? Perhaps she would have been dependent on other people for everything.'

Her voice was troubled. I looked at her. We were just passing under a light. It caught the single lock of white in her hair and emphasized the pallor of her face.

‘Death isn't always the worst thing that can happen, is it?'

She's not really talking about Rebecca, I thought.

‘Paul's worse, isn't he?' I said.

She nodded.

We reached the porter's lodge. I said, ‘When I've rung Stephen, let's go and have a cup of tea and you can tell me all about it.'

Tea was being cleared away from the Senior Common Room, but we were just in time to grab a cup. The large room was deserted except for a solitary lecturer from the Spanish department reading the
Daily Telegraph
in the far corner.

When we had settled ourselves, Alison said, ‘It's his eyes at the moment. He's having trouble focusing. He can still cook, just about, but he can't read without getting a terrible headache.'

I felt a pang of sympathy. I couldn't imagine anything worse than not being able to read. What was it that Logan Pearsall Smith wrote? ‘People say life is the thing, but I prefer reading.' I often think that should be my motto.

‘He's been like this before, hasn't he?' I said.

‘Yes. It may well improve, so I mustn't make too much of it. I'm probably just tired. We've had a few bad nights lately, and I've been working hard, too.'

I nodded. She was about to say something more. Her lips parted, her eyes met mine. Then she seemed to think better of it.

‘What is it?' I said.

She pushed back her hair.

‘Well, I was wondering – the thing is, it's a bit ghoulish – about the RAE – will we be able to count Margaret's work? If there was stuff that was just about finished, but hadn't been published, well, could we get it published and use it for the RAE? Or is that too macabre?'

I turned it over in my mind.

‘Do you know?' I replied slowly. ‘I think you've got something there. Malcolm did ask me if I would see about getting her unpublished work into print, but that's another thing I haven't had time to do. There
is
a lot of stuff, mostly on disk fortunately. He let me have it months ago and I haven't looked at it since. I'll have to ask Lawrence about the policy for posthumous publication. There might be things that are almost ready. Or joint publication could be a possibility.'

The lecturer from the Spanish department folded up his newspaper. He switched off the standard lamp by his chair and left the room, nodding to us as he passed. We listened to his footsteps retreating down the corridor. The college was very quiet now and it was warm in the Senior Common Room. The only light came from the table lamp next to us. I stifled a yawn and slumped deeper into the sofa.