Sidney Chambers and the Perils of the Night (18 page)

‘Did they know that you thought like this, Mr Crawford?’

‘I told them all the time.’

‘And what did they say?’

‘That if I didn’t like it I could go and work somewhere else.’

‘And why didn’t you?’

‘Because they owe me so much back pay. If I left I’d never get it unless I went to court. And then God knows what would happen. My old man spent enough time with the law to last the rest of us a lifetime.’

‘There’s no need to go into that now,’ his sister counselled.

‘They pretend to be fair but there’s only one thing they’re concerned about and that’s themselves,’ Charlie replied.

The following morning the Master telephoned to ask if Sidney could pop over and discuss Dr Cade’s funeral arrangements. He was sure that Easter would make a difference, but he hoped the event could be kept as low-key as possible. ‘I don’t want the college acquiring a bad reputation. We’ve had enough trouble as it is.’

‘I am not sure I can hide a funeral, if that is what you are asking,’ Sidney replied, ‘although I was wondering how much of a family Dr Cade might have. I do not think he was married?’

‘No, Sidney. Although he must have relations somewhere.’

They were interrupted by the irascible figure of Edward Todd who had asked how soon they might be able to seek out a replacement for Dr Cade. He didn’t want to take on the extra burden of teaching before the summer tripos exams. ‘I can farm some of the undergraduates out to other colleges but I need to be sure that they’re not going to any duffers. The Professor of Mathematics at Fitzwilliam leaves a lot to be desired, I must say, and Catz isn’t much better.’

‘Was Dr Cade a good tutor?’ Sidney asked.

‘One of the best, I’d say,’ Todd acknowledged, ‘although he was almost certainly bound for America. He was not without ambition.’

‘That must be a good thing in a mathematician, surely?’

‘Better than in a priest,’ the Master observed.

‘Of course,’ Sidney replied. ‘I try not to think about aspirations.’

‘Nonsense. We all know that you will be a bishop one day.’

‘That is unlikely.’

‘Provided, of course, that you detach yourself from the world of crime.’

‘Surely a wife will help?’ Dr Todd asked.

Sidney tried to contain the conversation to matters in hand. ‘I don’t have any marriage plans.’

‘That’s not what it looks like, if you don’t mind my saying so.’

Sidney did, indeed, mind him saying so. ‘How things look and how things are can often be very different matters,’ he replied, hoping that he could escape this subject as quickly as possible.

‘Your friend is staying with Crawford’s sister, I believe?’ Professor Todd continued before turning to the Master. ‘I am afraid I’ve had to sack him.’

‘Oh dear,’ the Master replied, ‘and in the middle of the rewiring. Are you sure that’s wise?’

‘On what grounds?’ Sidney asked.

‘Dr Cade was already on to him. He had started to charge whatever overtime he felt like and his attitude was surly. We can’t allow trade-union mentality to take over the college when there’s a perfectly good electrical company in town.’

‘But Crawford is a member of the staff. Shouldn’t we give him a warning? Isn’t it rather brutal to dismiss him out of hand?’

‘We need to get on with things, Master. The college needs to steady itself and concentrate on its academic duties. Everything else is a distraction. Wouldn’t you agree, Sidney?’

‘Of course,’ his clerical companion replied, without thinking fully about his answer.

He was already wondering why Professor Todd should be keen to dismiss Charlie Crawford so soon and whether Dr Cade’s heart attack was all that it seemed.

Later that day, Hildegard confirmed the news of Charlie Crawford’s dismissal and asked Sidney to intercede. ‘An injustice has been done. He is very upset.’

Any involvement in the disciplinary proceedings of the college would have to be handled with caution. ‘Being distressed does not necessarily qualify a man for sympathy,’ Sidney replied. ‘Perhaps he is showing remorse.’

‘He isn’t showing any at all. In fact he is making terrible accusations.’

‘I suppose that is understandable.’

Leonard Graham entered the room to refill his cup of tea. ‘You think that Charlie Crawford has been wrongfully dismissed?’

‘I do. He has even suggested that Dr Cade has been, I think his words were, “bumped off”.’

Leonard Graham raised a clerical eyebrow. Sidney tried to pin down what Hildegard was saying. ‘Why on earth would he suggest that?’

‘He speaks very wildly. I think you should talk to him, Sidney.’

‘We can’t have him going all over town making accusations. Sooner or later we’ll have Keating in the college again and who knows where that will lead?’

‘Dr Cade was young.’

‘And with a weak heart. We have no evidence that there has been any malpractice.’

‘Charlie Crawford has been got out of the way.’

Sidney could not believe that Hildegard was thinking along these lines. She was jumping to a conclusion that he had already begun to fear himself. ‘You are not suggesting that these two incidents are related? Surely they are coincidental?’

‘We witnessed an argument.’

‘Which would lead anyone to conclude that if Dr Cade was murdered then Charlie Crawford is the most likely culprit. So why would he suggest such a thing?’

‘I do not know, Sidney. But I do think that he is a man of principle.’

‘I tend to agree with you, but this line of enquiry will do us no good. The last thing we need is to raise the question of one man’s murder and why he died.’

‘Oh really?’ Leonard Graham began to wash up his teacup and saucer. ‘I thought that was the point of Easter.’

Hildegard decided that she would eat with the Crawfords that evening. She knew that Sidney was expected at High Table and that he still had work to do on his sermon. Time spent at her lodgings would also give her the opportunity to ask her landlady a few questions.

Sidney was grateful for her interest, and recognised that she had a logical mind and a clear, direct way of thinking, but he was concerned that Hildegard took Charlie Crawford’s suggestions so seriously. Any uncertainty would necessitate further probing and yet more distraction from his duties.

He spoke the college grace at High Table, hoping the familiar repetition would restore his religious sensibility: ‘
Benedic, Domine, nobis et donis tuis, quae de tua largitate sumus sumpturi, et concede ut illis salubriter nutriti, tibi debitum obsequium praestare valeamus, per Christum Dominum nostrum
.
Amen
.’

As he sat down to partake of his beef consommé, he was troubled by Hildegard’s vehemence and by the disregard of the fellows for the working men of the college. They were, it had to be admitted, an odd group of people with which to spend his time, and although they had their eccentricities, he could not believe that any of them was capable of murder.

He observed them eating their soup in ruminative silence.

There was Clifford Watts, Professor of History and constitutional historian. He was now an elderly don, but even in his prime he had been so flummoxed by the reduction of staff during wartime that he had needed to ask how to draw the curtains to his room at night, never having done so on his own before. Neil Gardiner, the admissions tutor and Reader in Jurisprudence, kept a private aeroplane for trips to the country. This was a man who, it was rumoured, liked to dress up as an old lady and get himself helped across the road when the volume of bicyclists was at its height.

Then there was Marcus Mortimer, the English don, a charming but alcoholic womaniser who took most of his tutorials while lying on the floor. So hopeless was he that Sidney had often been called in to help out his students when they were studying the metaphysical poets, after Mr Mortimer had declared the work of Donne and Herbert to be ‘too Christian’ for his taste.

Apart from Orlando Richards, there were few dons with whom it was possible to sustain conversation. Edward Todd, the Professor of Mathematics, was particularly bad-tempered and was continually making comments about the college catering. He had recently complained that redcurrant tart without raspberries ought not to be offered, that stewed rhubarb was a weed unfit for human consumption, and that sherry should always accompany turtle soup and that it was a trivial and exasperating economy to withdraw it.

Sidney was seated next to him at dinner that night and asked what Adam Cade had been working on at the time of his death.

‘I am not sure that’s relevant now.’

‘Perhaps not, Professor Todd, but if Dr Cade had a work that was close to publication perhaps it could be produced in his memory.’

‘I doubt that anyone would understand it.’

‘From what you said earlier, I gather that he had a growing reputation. Such a work could add lustre to the mathematical reputation of the college.’

‘I am not sure about that. I have a forthcoming publication myself.’

‘Would you care to explain what it is about?’

‘Percolation theory. Do you know what that is, Canon Chambers?’

Sidney smiled ruefully. ‘I’d have to hazard a guess. Is it a study of the way in which water passes through or around rock?’

‘Not quite. It is a mathematical examination of the behaviour of connected clusters in a random graph. It is an attempt to model the flow of liquid through a porous body.’

‘You look for pattern or repeated incidence so that you can predict the flow or spread of the percolation, I imagine?’

‘Well, that is how I might describe it in simple terms. One predicts across two- and three-dimensional lattice structures. Two dimensions are clearly more straightforward than three but the aim is to develop a coherent theory of random spatial processes; an attempt to marry geometry with probability.’

‘Was Dr Cade aware of your work?’

‘We worked in the same department.’

‘I mean to say, had he read anything of it?’

‘Dr Cade was interested in the practical application; how you could use percolation theory to model the spread of a forest fire, the course of a disease or the increase of populations. I was more interested in the core mathematical material.’

‘And had you read any of Dr Cade’s practical applications of the theory yourself?’

‘You are taking an unusual interest in this, Canon Chambers.’

‘I believe there is always room to improve one’s knowledge. And there have been suggestions that mathematics and theology are not as far removed from each other as people might think.’

‘I hope you are not going to start talking to me about numerology,’ Todd warned.

‘The number twelve in the Bible is significant, I think.’

‘Not mathematically. It is thematic. Twelve tribes of Israel, twelve disciples, twelve foundations in the heavenly Jerusalem, twelve gates, twelve pearls and twelve angels. This is mere repetition.’

‘I am aware that it can be taken to extremes, but the number three, for the Trinity, is also important.’

‘Or six. Man was created on the sixth day, six words are used for Man and the mark of the Beast is 666, a mockery of the Trinity. You can do anything you like with the Bible. Dr Cade was more interested in musical numerology. He used to talk to Professor Richards about it all the time although, as far as I am concerned, most of the theories were too far-fetched to be given credence.’

‘Did you work closely with Dr Cade?’

‘Mathematics requires intense solitary concentration and that is precisely why Crawford’s rewiring was such a distraction. He kept coming in and out all the time. Neither of us could get any work done.’

Professor Todd had finished his soup. Sidney had abandoned his. ‘Why did you suggest that it might have been a cause of Dr Cade’s death?’ he asked.

‘I said no such thing.’

‘Crawford has stated that you did.’

‘I can assure you that I did not. I hope that you are not going to take his word against mine?’

The soup was removed from the table and spring chicken was served.

Sidney recognised that Edward Todd was irritated and that he would have to be careful not to press matters further. There was, however, something about the tone of this conversation that was fiercer than mere donnish superiority. Todd had been quick to dismiss the college electrician, and he appeared to Sidney both defensive and aggressive. Sidney wondered if there might be a reason why he had wanted Adam Cade dead and Charlie Crawford so conveniently removed from the scene.

He would have to make some discreet enquiries and then, if his fears were confirmed, he would have to tell Inspector Keating. It was not a prospect to which he looked forward. He could not quite believe, having often involved Amanda in his previous escapades, that Hildegard could already be embroiled in another. He worried how it might affect the future of their relationship, but if he were still to be, in Bunyan’s words, ‘valiant for truth’, then everything else in his life would have to be secondary to the process of investigation.