Well-Schooled in Murder (31 page)

“You did nothing to check on it, though?”

“That’s right. I didn’t check.”

“Why not, Mr. Pitt?”

“I didn’t have the time. I was running late and had to get out to the game myself. I hardly thought about it. Matthew Whateley had bunked off games before. Some three weeks ago, in fact. If I thought anything at all when I saw the new chit, it was that he was up to that trick again and I’d see to him later. But I forgot to do so. If there’s a crime in that, arrest me.”

“What happened three weeks ago?”

“He’d an off-games chit—this one signed by Laughland—that he brought to me himself. If you ask me, he was faking that one, trying to look sick and working on a cough to make it authentic. But if Laughland bought into it, who am I to complain? So off he went.”

“Where?”

“To bed, I presume. To his room. Or to the day room. I’ve no idea. I didn’t follow him.”

“I’d think seeing a second off-games chit on Friday, so soon after the other, would have made you immediately suspicious, Mr. Pitt. Especially if this one wasn’t signed and the earlier one was.”

“Well, it didn’t. There it is. I just gave it a quick look and put it in the rubbish.” Pitt took a piece of chalk from his desk. He rolled it in his palm, using his thumb to guide it. Outside, a bell rang, the five-minute warning before the next lesson.

“You were running late, you said. But this was after lunch, wasn’t it? Had you been off the grounds?”

“I’d been to Galatea. I was…” He sighed, but looked tense and sounded more defensive than defeated. “All right. If you must know, there was a row with the wife. I lost track of time. The only reason I stopped by my pigeonhole and saw the chit at all was that I was carrying a stack of papers to my room. I saw the time on the bell tower and realised I wouldn’t be able to make it to the classroom and then back to the playing field before the boys started tearing up the lawn.”

“But to be just a few minutes late? What sort of crime is that, Mr. Pitt, that you would drop everything and run out to the field?”

“Crime enough for Lockwood. Especially in my circumstances. With a wife who likes the bottle just a bit too much. Do you want me to be any clearer, Inspector? I’d more on my mind than Matthew Whateley.”

Pupils called to one another outside in the hall. Sergeant Havers maintained her position by the door. Pitt looked in her direction, dropped his chalk onto the desk.

“I’ve a lesson,” he said with terse insistence.

Lynley responded placidly. “I take it that you and Mr. Lockwood don’t get on.” He could see Pitt’s reaction in the muscles round his eyes.

“Lockwood’s looking to sack me because I don’t fit the picture of what he has in mind for Bredgar Chambers. He’s been trying to build a case for dismissal since first we met.”

“Unsuccessfully, it seems.”

“The problem he faces is that in spite of my wife and in spite of my appearance, I’m good in the classroom, and the number of my pupils who do well in their A-levels proves it. So he’s stuck with me. And stuck with the fact that I know a bit more about him than the average master does.” Pitt offered the last sentence in a manner to encourage further enquiry along those lines. Lynley was willing to play along.

“Such as?”

“I know his background, Inspector. I’ve made it my business to know it. He wants to sack me and I’ve no intention of giving up without a fight. So I’ve one or two items I can pull out of my hat if the Board of Governors decide to sit in judgement on my competence.”

Pitt possessed fine expertise in playing out his information for maximum effect. Lynley had no doubt that he used this same method when dealing with superiors and colleagues. It couldn’t make him a likable man, or a man pleasant to deal with.

“Mr. Pitt,” Lynley remarked, “as you’ve said yourself, you have a lesson this hour. We’d get through this interview a bit more quickly if you got to the point.”

“There is no
point
, Inspector. Just that I know all about Lockwood’s second-class performance at the University of Sussex, about his interesting live-in arrangement with three young ladies before he married Kate, about his job in the last state school that would have him where his colleagues finally sent him to Coventry because he snitched on them to aggrandise himself every time they stepped out of line. The Headmaster would love to sack me, Inspector, if he could only be sure I’d hold my tongue and not tell the Board of Governors everything I know about him.”

“You’ve apparently managed to uncover quite a bit.”

“I go to conferences. I meet other teachers. They talk. I listen. I
always
listen.”

“Yet this is a relatively prestigious school. How did Lockwood manage to become headmaster if his background is as black as you paint it?”

“By carefully adjusting the facts here and there. By climbing over the wounded. By sucking up to people who could help his career. For a price, of course.”

“Giles Byrne?”

A look of approval passed across Pitt’s face. “You’re a quick study. Bravo. Why do you think Matthew Whateley was given the governors’ scholarship in the first place? Not because he was the best or the brightest. He wasn’t. He was very average. A nice boy, but average. That’s all. There were half a dozen other candidates more deserving than he. The decision rested with the Headmaster. But Giles Byrne wanted Matthew. So Matthew was selected.
Quid pro quo
. And Byrne was able to illustrate for the other members of the Board of Governors exactly how much power he really does wield. He’s like that, you know. But then, aren’t we all? Power’s an intoxicant. Get a bit, want a bit more.”

Certainly the aphorism could be true in Pitt’s life. Knowledge was power, and he’d wielded enough in the last few minutes to derogate the Headmaster in every way he could, as if blackening the man’s reputation somehow did something to improve his own, as if placing the focus of their conversation on Lockwood would eliminate the chance of its coming to rest upon another, closer, more tender area.

“You traded duty weekends with John Corntel,” Lynley pointed out. “Why?”

“My wife had expressed an interest in seeing a play in Crawley. I wanted to humour her, so I asked John to trade.”

To keep her away from the bottle, no doubt, Lynley thought. He asked, “What play did you see?”

“
Otherwise Engaged
.” Pitt smiled thinly at the irony of the title. “An older play, I know. But we’d not seen it before.”

“Friday night? Saturday?”

“Friday,” he replied.

“And on Saturday?”

“On Saturday, nothing. We stayed in for the evening. Watched television. Read. Even tried to have a conversation with one another.”

“Did you see Emilia Bond during this time? Friday or Saturday?”

The question piqued Pitt’s interest. He cocked his head. “Not at night. I saw her during the day, of course. She lives in Galatea House. It’s hard to avoid her. But I didn’t see her either evening. And as I recall, her door was closed when I walked through the building.” Seeing the alteration in Lynley’s expression, Pitt went on. “I
do
check on my girls, Inspector. I’m housemaster, after all. And frankly, they bear a great deal of watching.”

“Ah.”

Pitt coloured. “That’s not what I meant.”

“Perhaps you might explain what you meant.”

Outside the classroom door, a raucous burst of laughter told them Pitt’s upper sixth group were getting restless. Neither Lynley nor Havers made a move to admit them into the room.

“They’re unnecessary trouble on the campus, Inspector. Provocation. Temptation. I’ve seen two of them expelled in the last year for licentious conduct—one with a
groundsman
if you can believe that—and another slither off in the sort of disgrace that her parents euphemistically labelled ‘transferring to another school.’” He gave a snort of laughter. “That’s just at Galatea House. God knows what they’re up to over in Eirene.”

“Perhaps that’s due to having a housemaster and not a housemistress,” Lynley noted. “It must be difficult keeping watch over girls when there are certain conventions of privacy required of you.”

“It wouldn’t be difficult if Emilia Bond did her job with a bit more care, would it? But I can’t depend upon her, so I do it myself.”

“In what manner?”

Pitt bristled openly. “I’ve no interest in sixteen-and seventeen-year-old girls. What does this have to do with Matthew Whateley’s death? I only knew him in games. So why don’t you toddle off and find someone to talk to who can tell you something of value, Inspector? I’m not that person. This is a waste of time for all of us. I know little enough about policework, but it seems to me that you ought to be looking for someone who likes to dandle young boys. Frankly, I’m not your man. And I don’t know who is. I’m only glad to say…” His brows knotted suddenly.

“Mr. Pitt?” Lynley asked.

“Bonnamy,” he said.

“I’ve heard the name. Matthew visited him as part of his job with Bredgar Volunteers. Why do you mention him?”

“I’m in charge of the Volunteers. I know the man. Before Matthew, we’d never been able to place a pupil with Bonnamy and have either of them survive more than a single visit. But he liked Matthew from the first.”

“Are you suggesting Colonel Bonnamy’s the man who liked to dandle little boys?”

Pitt shook his head with a jerk. “No. But if someone at the school was after Matthew that way, the boy might have confided in Colonel Bonnamy.”

This was, Lynley admitted, a distinct possibility. Yet what could not be overlooked was the fact that Pitt had manufactured several potential smokescreens during their conversation. They took the form of his allusions to Alan Lockwood, his references to Giles Byrne, his dissatisfaction with Emilia Bond, and now Colonel Bonnamy’s friendship with the murdered boy. Once again at Bredgar Chambers, there was too much information being given out in an interview, as if the appearance of ostensible assistance would gloss over the ineradicable stain of guilt.

Lynley looked towards Havers who still guarded the doorway. “Let them in, Sergeant,” he told her.

She swung the door open. Four pupils entered at once, three boys and a girl. They looked at neither their teacher nor the police detectives, but instead directed furtive glimpses back into the corridor with mischievous grins. A second girl began to enter the room but she was suddenly snatched backwards, lifted off her feet, and carried into the doorway by a misshapen, hunched figure wearing a black cape and hideous make-up.

“Sanctuary!” he roared, twirling around with the struggling girl in his arms. “Esmeralda! Sanctuary!” He staggered forward three steps and dropped to his knees. His grasp on the girl did not loosen.

The other pupils laughed as the boy bent his head and nuzzled his face into the girl’s neck, smacking his lips, smearing both her jersey and her skin with his make-up.

“Let me go!” she shrieked.

Cowfrey Pitt interceded. “That’s quite enough, Mr. Pritchard. We’ve benefitted enormously. You’ve at least made us thankful that the film was silent.”

Clive Pritchard released his grip on the girl, and she rolled onto the floor. She was small and unattractive, with sharp, bony features and a spotty face. Lynley recognised her from his visit to Emilia Bond’s upper sixth chemistry lesson the day before.

“You little—” She grasped her yellow jersey. “Look at what you’ve done! I’ll have to have this cleaned!”

“You loved it,” Clive responded. “Close as you’ve ever been to a man, wasn’t it?”

She leapt to her feet. “I ought to—”

“Enough.” Pitt didn’t need to raise his voice. His black tone was sufficient. “Pritchard, get rid of that ridiculous make-up. You’ve ten minutes to do so. And eight pages of translation by tomorrow for this fascinating display you’ve regaled us with. Daphne, you’re excused to see to your appearance as well.”

“That’s
it
?” Daphne shrilled, fists balled at her sides, her face screwed up so that her eyes disappeared. “Eight pages of translation? That’s to be his punishment? You think he’ll do it?” She didn’t wait for an answer. “Keep
away
from me, you bastard!” she hissed at Clive and pushed past him to get out of the room.

Lynley looked towards Sergeant Havers but saw that he had not needed to take the trouble of giving her so much as surreptitious direction. She had seen the opening herself and followed the girl.

Barbara Havers did not usually feel any compunction about using a moment of emotional upheaval to press forward to an advantage when she was working on a case. But as she followed Daphne down the corridor, up a short stairway, and into a lavatory, she found herself reluctant to do so. She knew the reason. Whether she wanted to face it or not, like called out to like from the person of this undersized teenager with her dishwater hair, her crooked posture, and her concave chest. Even though there were no actual physical similarities between them, they were both misfits. They might well hail from different social strata—even in her anger, the girl’s accent told Barbara that—but their isolation within those strata was identical, nonetheless.

From the door, Barbara watched the girl run water into one of the basins. The room smelled of disinfectant. It was very cold. A small green bar of crusty soap lay on the basin’s edge. Daphne lathered her hands with it, grimaced, and rubbed at the greasepaint on her neck.