Well-Schooled in Murder (51 page)

Yet there were other considerations here. Lynley accepted the inevitability of that fact. There was the memory of Eton. There was his drunken stupor and Corntel’s decision not to hand him over for expulsion from the school. There was the memory of his schoolmate speaking eloquently in the chapel, writing prize-winning essays, making himself available to help boys less gifted and less articulate than he. There was seeing him clearly in his striped trousers and cutaway, dashing under the arched gateway, late for a lesson but still having time to help the porter wrestle a large package from a lorry onto the ground. There was seeing that quick smile, hearing the shouted greeting from across the schoolyard. There was a shared expanse of history. There was a common experience. There was—and always would be—the old school tie.

Lynley felt the package of photographs under his arm. They cried out for a decision. He could not make one.

“Inspector.” Alan Lockwood was standing at the foot of the stairs. “Might I expect an arrest this afternoon?”

“Once the crime scene men—”

“Bugger the crime scene men! I want Clive Pritchard out of this school. The Board of Governors are gathering for a meeting here tonight, and I want this cleared up before they arrive. God knows when Pritchard’s family will claim him. Until they do, I won’t have him here. Is that clear?”

“Perfectly,” Lynley replied. “Unfortunately, all we have at the moment is a tape with his voice on it. We have no evidence that he did anything to Matthew Whateley, and even Harry Morant won’t name him as his tormentor. I can’t arrest him on the strength of Chas Quilter’s identifying his voice, Mr. Lockwood. All I can do is suggest that you keep an eye on him.”

“Keep an
eye—
” Lockwood spat. “You
know
he killed that boy!”

“I know nothing of the sort. I make an arrest on evidence, not intuition.”

“You’re putting six hundred pupils at risk! Do you realise that? If you don’t remove that little bastard from the school, anything could happen. To anyone. I won’t be responsible—”

“You
are
responsible,” Lynley said. “That’s the truth of the matter. But Clive knows he’s under suspicion. He’s hardly going to step out of line now. Especially since he apparently believes that nothing we have so far can tie him to Matthew Whateley.”

“What do you suggest I do with him until you’ve decided you have something substantial upon which you can base your arrest?”

“I suggest you confine him to his room with someone posted outside to see that he doesn’t leave it.”

“And
that
will be sufficient?” Lockwood demanded. “He’s a killer, blast you. You
know
it.” The Headmaster pointed to the envelope under Lynley’s arm. “And those? What has your investigation managed to uncover about the pictures, Inspector?”

It was, after all, an easy decision. Now, in this moment. For better or worse.

“Miss Bond found them in her classroom,” he said. “Apparently a student had left them behind. She didn’t know who it was. She thought it best to burn them.”

Lockwood snorted. “At least someone has shown a bit of common sense.”

It was beginning to rain again when Sergeant Havers pulled Lynley’s Bentley to a halt alongside the chapel. She stepped on the brakes so hard that the car lurched forward and swerved to one side, grazing against the bare branches of a row of pruned hydrangeas. Lynley winced and went to join her.

She was just finishing a bag of vinegar crisps. Crumbs and salt sequined the front of her pullover.

“Lunch,” she explained to him, brushing the remnants off her chest as she got out. “Two bags of crisps and a glass of bitter lemon. I should get combat pay.” She shoved the door closed. “This thing’s a monster, Inspector. It takes up half the road. I nearly bashed into a call box in Cissbury and I swear I hit an old milestone just beyond the school. At least, I think that’s what it was. Something inanimate and solid.”

“That’s a comforting thought,” Lynley responded, removing his umbrella from the rear seat. Without one herself, Havers joined him under his. “What did you uncover in Cissbury?”

They began walking in the direction of Calchus House. A bell sounded the summons for afternoon lessons. For a few moments they were caught up in the tide of blue and yellow uniforms as schoolchildren hurried past them in the rain. Havers didn’t speak until they were alone on the path. “As far as I can tell, Clive’s story checks out, sir. The barman at the Sword and Garter saw him by the rubbish bin late Saturday night. He couldn’t exactly tell what Clive was doing, but in his words, ‘Whatever it was, he was doing it to a bird who seemed to like it well enough.’”

“Are there lights by the rubbish bin?”

Havers shook her head. “And the barman couldn’t describe the boy he saw other than in general terms about his size. He didn’t know the girl at all, or at least he didn’t get a clear look at her. So we
can
say the boy wasn’t necessarily Clive.”

“It could have been another boy from the school,” Lynley agreed.

She took up the idea with an enthusiasm that suggested she had been thinking it over since leaving the village. “Someone Clive knew would be sneaking off to meet a girl in the village on Saturday night. Someone who might have bragged to Clive about his conquest afterwards, including details of the encounter by the rubbish bin.”

Lynley saw how her hypothesis didn’t quite fit together. “It sounds good enough, but when it comes down to it, Havers, my guess is that Clive’s going to hand over the name of that girl. She’ll verify his identity. We’ll be back to square one. What time did the barman see them?”

“Just after midnight.” Havers dragged her feet on the path. After a moment of reflection she said, “Well, there
does
seem to be something in that, sir. Clive’s clever. We saw that in the way he chose to use those pictures at just the right moment. I can see him going into Cissbury to arrange an alibi and then coming back to deal with Matthew Whateley’s body later. He claims that he saw Emilia Bond when he was coming over the wall from his trip to the village. But he could just as easily have come back earlier, taken the minibus to Stoke Poges, dumped the body, and seen Emilia Bond upon his return. She didn’t see him, after all. We’ve only his word that he saw her when he was climbing over the wall. And if Frank Orten saw the fire round three in the morning, surely Clive had time to do everything.”

“Stretching it, Havers.”

“A bit. But he could have. He
could
have. And you can’t tell me that bloke wouldn’t know how to orchestrate a crime. His first words from the cradle were probably ‘synchronise your watches.’ If you ask me, all we need is some evidence from that room in Calchus House, something more from the minibus, and Clive Pritchard as we know and love him is going to be history.”

Lynley frowned, going over Havers’ words in his mind. Getting no response from him, she continued.

“I saw Jean Bonnamy in the village as well. Posting some letters. She was a bit done up, Inspector, like she was going to meet someone for lunch.”

“Hardly a suspicious activity, Sergeant.”

“I know that. But when she’s seen to herself, she’s not half-bad. Nice hair, nice skin. I had a good look at her. And I couldn’t help wondering what she might have looked like fourteen years ago, what she might have looked like to an eighteen-year-old boy.”

“Edward Hsu.”

“It’s possible, isn’t it? She’s lived in Hong Kong. She has her father’s love for things Chinese. She might be Matthew Whateley’s real mother. She might have kept track of him all these years. She might even have seen to it that he was sent to their house as a Bredgar Volunteer. We have only Giles Byrne’s description of what Matthew’s natural mother was like, scheming and money-grubbing. Perhaps she wasn’t like that at all.”

“Your argument suggests Giles Byrne is more involved in Matthew Whateley’s birth than he would like us to think.”

“Jean Bonnamy could have known about Giles Byrne through Edward Hsu. She could have gone to him for help. And now, to protect her, Giles Byrne might be lying like the devil.”

“We’ve thought that from the first about Byrne,” Lynley agreed. “Perhaps Constable Nkata will find something in Exeter.”

“Or nothing,” Havers added.

“Then we’ll be closer to the truth.” Lynley guided Sergeant Havers across the lane to Calchus House. “Let’s see what the crime scene team have come up with.”

The team were still at work up above the drying room, and the crime scene photographer was just climbing down the metal ladder, followed by one of the other officers.

“Anything?” Lynley asked the second man who was carrying a work case. Above them a vacuum began to howl.

The officer placed his case on the floor, squatted over it, and said over his shoulder, “Just finished dusting for prints. They’re hundreds of them. Hairs. Fibres. It’s like a rubbish heap.”

“How long before you—”

“We don’t have the manpower of the Met, Inspector. We’ll be sorting through everything for weeks. That’s the best we can manage.”

Lynley knew how reluctantly Horsham CID had sent their crime scene team to the school in the first place. He chose his words carefully. “We’ve one of the upper sixth boys under suspicion. If there’s anything we can use to tie him to this room, to tie Matthew Whateley to this room…”

The man scratched his head, rearranging a haystack of untidy grey hair. “Whateley was…how old?”

“Thirteen.”

“Hmmm. Does seem unlikely that Whateley…” The man removed the top tray from his case and brought out three plastic bags. “These might have belonged to your upper sixth lad,” he said. “I’m not certain a thirteen-year-old would have been using them, and I hope to hell an adult would have the finesse to arrange his sexual liaisons in a more attractive environment. Apologies to you, Sergeant. Not a sight for a lady.” He dangled the bags in front of their faces. Each contained a used condom. As he continued to speak, he swung the bags back and forth, keeping time to his words. “An old blanket’s been used up there as well. We’ve packaged that already. I’ve money on its showing plenty of stains.
You
know the sort I’m speaking of, no doubt. Appears the room was used for a bit more than…Well”—he grinned lasciviously—“no doubt you take my meaning.”

“The drawings on the wall suggest that well enough,” Lynley said drily. Havers, he noted, was standing with her arms folded across her chest, her face a stubborn refusal to give in to the Horsham officer’s attempt to embarrass her. She was used to it. Women had been in CID for years, but not everyone welcomed them. Lynley drew her into the corridor.

She was quick to speak. “Those fit in with Clive’s personality, don’t they?”

He nodded. “Anyone who’d have at a girl standing up next to a rubbish bin would hardly draw the line at having her lie down in a bit of dust and filth. And yet, I wonder about Clive’s willingness to take precautions against pregnancy, Havers. That seems out of character, doesn’t it?”

Havers’ face registered the extent of her distaste. “Unless the girl insisted. Although I can’t imagine
any
girl in her right mind wanting to…up there…alone with him…Frankly, our Clive made my skin crawl, Inspector. So whoever the girl is, I should guess she goes in for whips and chains. That seems to be Clive’s style.”

“If we can find her, Havers, we’ll have someone who can place Clive Pritchard in that room.”

“Affirmation that he knew of the room’s existence,” Havers concluded. Her eyes widened as she completed the thought. “Daphne!”

“Daphne?”

“The girl he went after in Cowfrey Pitt’s German class. If I’m not mistaken about her, she’s just the person we’re looking for to put the thumbscrews to Clive.”

They returned to the administrative offices in the east quadrangle, seeking the current location of the girl whom Clive Pritchard had harassed on the previous day. The Headmaster’s secretary had all the pupils’ schedules in a file on her desk, but instead of looking through it to seek the information Lynley wanted, she handed him a telephone message and spoke curtly enough to transmit her displeasure at having to come into unsavoury contact with the police.

“Scotland Yard,” she said. “You’re to phone them.” As Lynley’s eyes dropped to the telephone on her desk, she added icily, “From the porter’s office, if you please.”

Frank Orten was not at his desk when they entered his office. The room was unoccupied, a fact that was not lost on Lynley. Hanging against the wall on the other side of the counter that separated Orten’s work space from a waiting area designated by the presence of three wooden chairs, keys dangled from a pegboard. Lynley went behind the counter and examined them. Havers remained by the door.

“Minibus keys are there, aren’t they?” she asked.

Lynley found them on a hook above which was a label printed with the single word
vehicles
. Other hooks had labels as well, printed with the names of the various buildings:
maths, technical centre, theatre
, etc. The houses were also represented by labels, the two girls’ houses—Galatea and Eirene—segregated from the boys’ houses on the other side of the board. Havers had indeed been accurate in her assessment of the school’s security. It was nonexistent.