Dying Fall, A (24 page)

27 May 2010

Horrible day. I heard two of my students talking about the Neo-Nazis. They were saying that there were going to be ‘reprisals’. I reported this to Clayton and he admitted that he’d had a letter saying that the department was going to be destroyed by fire and ice. I laughed out loud. What utter Wagnerian nonsense! Clayton was rather hurt and said
that I would be scared, in his shoes. Looking at them, I think it’s safe to say that I’ll never be in his shoes.

When I got home though something happened that made me feel a little different. I had a letter—the usual rubbish about Jewish upstarts ‘dishonouring the memory of the White King’—but at the end there were the names and addresses of Miriam and Mum and Dad. Just that. Ms M. Golding. Dr and Mrs I. Golding. But the threat was plain. They didn’t need to spell it out. I rang Clayton and once again said that we should call the police. He refused. He’s shielding someone. But whom?

That is the last entry.

Ruth sits in the dark room and thinks about her friend Dan. In some ways it feels wrong to read his diary, which was obviously only ever meant for himself, but in other ways it means that Dan is more real to her than he has ever been. Her remembered Dan has almost vanished, to be replaced with a real person—passionate, witty (she loves the comment about Clayton’s shoes) and just a little pompous. She now knows Dan as she never really knew him when he was a cool undergraduate and she was a shy working-class girl from Eltham. To think if she’d played her cards right she might even have slept with him . . .

Do the diaries shed any light on who killed Dan? The references to the White Hand are frustrating because, like Clayton and Sam, Dan seems to treat the group with casual contempt. He writes as if they are an unfortunate but inevitable part of university life, like drug-taking in the union bar or cheating in assignments. But these people knew where he lived—they wrote him letters and put dead birds on his doorstep. They knew where his parents lived. Why didn’t anyone do anything about it? Dan thought that Clayton was shielding someone but didn’t know who it was. Or whom. Ruth loves it that even in his private diary, Dan remembered to write ‘whom’.

The tangled love lives in the history department are interesting too. Elaine still loves Dan but doesn’t trust Guy. Dan, on the other hand, both trusts and admires Guy. Dan obviously has some sort of past with Elaine and probably Pippa Henry too. Sam thinks that Guy and Elaine aren’t lovers, but how would Sam know? Ruth remembers Elaine’s behaviour towards Sam at the barbeque, how she’d been first antagonistic, then almost loving, sobbing in his arms. What is the nature of
their
relationship?

Dan’s attitude to Clayton seems to be one of affectionate contempt, which, considering he is (or was) sleeping with his wife, seems a little rich. Clayton ‘panicked as usual’, Clayton fusses about getting the excavation done on time, he ‘admits’ that he’s heard from the White Hand but doesn’t do anything about it. Ruth thinks of her experiences of the head of department—the genial host with the beautiful wife, the historian, the enthusiast striding over the fields in his pointed shoes, the scared man in the paper overalls. Did he know all along that the bones had been switched? Who did move the bones and why? Realistically it must have been one of the main players—Clayton, Guy or Elaine. Or maybe even Dan himself. Tim told her that Dan had been to see the bones several times. Was his identification with the Raven King so strong that he wanted his remains close at hand? After all, didn’t he say that what he really wanted was to take the bones home with him?

There are voices outside and Thing gets up, hackles rising. He keeps doing this; it’s very disconcerting. Ruth remembers that Flint does the same trick, looking past her as if he can see someone who isn’t there. Or someone only he can see. Ruth remembers Pendragon saying that Thing could see the ghost of Dame Alice. Is he now seeing his dead master? Of course not, he’s just jumpy because he’s in a strange house. Ruth goes to the window but the street is deserted apart from the woman with her little dog. No sign of the patrol car that Nelson has promised. Ruth pats her temporary dog.

‘It’s OK. It’s just someone going past. We’re not used to houses with people nearby, are we?’

Thing looks up at her, his eyes liquid with trust. He’s really a very sweet dog. Is it too late to ring Bob and ask how Flint is doing? She misses her cat. Hard to believe that she’s only been away from him for a week. It seems much longer. She gets out her phone.

There are two text messages in her in-box. One says, simply:
We know where you live.
The other, also caller unknown, reads:
Hi Ruth. It’s Guy Delaware here. Got your number from Clayton. I was wondering if we could meet up tomorrow. There’s something I'd like to discuss.

Ruth doesn’t know which message worries her most.

Guy suggests meeting on the Central Pier in Blackpool. It seems an inappropriately cheery choice of venue, heightened by the fact that it is the first really sunny day since Ruth arrived in Lancashire. The beach is filling up and on the pier the big wheel is already going round. Ruth and Guy sit outside the ice-cream parlour with mugs of tea and watch the children playing on the sand below, which, this morning, stretches far beyond the end of the pier. In fact, if Ruth strains her eyes, she can just see Cathbad and Kate building what looks like a sand henge. Kate is in her pink sun-suit with Hello Kitty hat and Cathbad has his trousers rolled up like a proper holiday-maker. For some reason, looking at them makes her want to cry. You wouldn’t think that Kate is estranged from her father or Cathbad from his child. You wouldn’t think that, less than forty-eight hours ago, Cathbad found his friend’s body swinging from a beam. They just look like a father and daughter playing in the sun.

Guy asks if Ruth would like something to eat. He is polite, almost too polite, holding doors open and flattening himself against walls to let her past. In the sunlight, the Brideshead features look rather careworn but he’s still a good-looking man with thick blond hair and a square-jawed face like a character from a Fifties comic strip. The voice matches the face; surely vowel sounds like this have not been heard in this cafe since Tommy Trinder starred in the end-of-the-pier show. Yet Guy tells Ruth that he is Lancashire born and bred.

‘You don’t sound like it,’ says Ruth.

Guy smiles, showing lots of white teeth. ‘I went to a rather posh school, then I did my first degree at Oxford and stayed there for a number of years. The accent stuck, but I can still do broad Lancashire if you want.’

‘And now you’re back in Blackpool.’

He takes a sip of tea and grimaces, whether at the question or the beverage it’s hard to tell. ‘I never expected to come back but I met Elaine and . . .’

Ruth waits. Guy looks up at the cloudless sky for a moment. Are you meant to look to the left or right if you’re lying? Ruth can never remember. Then he says, ‘It’s hard to explain but I think I’m going to have to. You see, I have a really strong connection with Elaine but we’re not lovers, never have been. It’s more like we’re twin souls. As if we were brother and sister in another life. Does that make any sense?’

Ruth could just imagine Nelson’s response to this. She too feels rather sceptical but then she thinks of Cathbad, playing on the beach with her daughter. She and Cathbad live together quite happily yet there’s no hint of sexual attraction between them. Maybe they too were brother and sister in a former life.

‘Yes it does,’ she says.

‘Elaine was doing post-graduate research,’ says Guy. ‘She did her first degree at Preston. She’s had a very hard life. Deprived childhood, abusive parents. And she’s had her own problems . . .’

Ruth waits, sure that Guy will tell her what these problems were. Sure enough, after a while, ‘Mental health issues,’ he says. ‘She’s very sensitive. Fearsomely bright. But, sometimes, the slightest little thing . . .’

Like being dumped by her next-door neighbour, thinks Ruth. She wonders if she dares ask about the affair with Dan. Luckily Guy seems to assume that she already knows.

‘That business with Dan didn’t help, of course. I don’t blame him. I’m sure he never promised anything. Dan hadn’t really got over the break-up with his wife. Elaine, though, I think she was really in love with him.’

Ruth really wants to ask about Pippa Henry, but if Guy doesn’t know she doesn’t want to be the one to tell him. Instead she settles for saying, vaguely, ‘I suppose Dan had lots of girlfriends?’

To her surprise, Guy bristles slightly. ‘Well, not that many. There was that business with Susan Chow, of course, and I’d heard rumours about a married woman but, that’s all it was, rumours. Dan wasn’t a lothario, if that’s what you mean.’

Lothario, thinks Ruth. It’s an odd, old-fashioned choice of word. Guy’s vocabulary, like his face, seems to hark back to another era. But the idea that Dan had an affair with Susan Chow, the county archaeologist, is a completely new one. Ruth thinks of the neat little woman in her book-lined office. She doesn’t seem a very likely girlfriend for Dan but then neither do Elaine or Pippa. Come to think of it, though, didn’t Dan refer to Susan as ‘Sue’ in his diary? In Ruth’s experience, it’s always a sign of something when people start using diminutives, or full names for that matter. She remembers her shock when Shona first referred to Phil as ‘Philip’.

‘What did Elaine think about the other women?’ asks Ruth.

‘It was a bit awkward,’ admits Guy, ‘living next door and everything. Elaine became a bit obsessed with watching all Dan’s comings and goings. But I’ll tell you one thing, Ruth, my friendship with Dan never wavered. I really loved that man.’

Ruth looks up and is surprised to see tears in Guy’s eyes. Whatever the truth of Guy’s statement, he is certainly in the grip of some strong emotion.

‘I was fond of him too,’ she says. ‘We were at university together.’

‘I know,’ says Guy. ‘I bet he was a wild student.’

‘He was super cool,’ says Ruth. ‘Dan the Man, we called him.’

Guy laughs again, a more natural sound this time. ‘Dan the Man. I love it.’

Ruth takes a gulp of tea. It is so strong that it makes her eyes water. ‘You said you had something you wanted to discuss?’

‘Yes.’ Guy looks straight at her, his face serious. Sometimes he looks like a teenager, sometimes a much older man. She guesses he is in his thirties.

‘I’ve heard a rumour that Dan’s laptop has been found.’ Ruth stares at Guy, with his dependable Fifties face. Is it possible that Guy stole into the burning house, took Dan’s computer and infected it with a virus so he would be able to trace its whereabouts? It doesn’t seem possible—but how else would he know that it has been found? She tries to keep her face blank. ‘Who told you that?’ For the first time, Guy looks slightly shifty. ‘I’m sorry, Ruth. I can’t tell you.’

‘Well, you’d better,’ says Ruth. ‘If you want me to tell you anything.’

Guy looks out over the beach and the jolly, holiday-making crowds. When he turns back, his face looks older again.

‘I heard about Pendragon. His sister told me. Your wizard friend was in his house. I was sure he must have found the computer.’

This raises a whole lot of new questions. Guy knew Pendragon, well enough to be on telephoning terms with his sister. Pendragon had links with the White Hand. What other secrets could Guy be hiding behind that
Boy's Own
grin?

‘What makes you think the computer was at Pendragon’s house?’

‘Someone told me.’

‘Who?’

‘I’m sorry, Ruth.’ Guy looks away again. ‘I can’t tell you. The thing is, there are other people involved here. I can’t break their confidence. But if the laptop’s been found there must be all sorts of valuable archaeological information on it. I really need that information, Ruth. I want to carry on Dan’s work. As a tribute to him.’

And to help your career, thinks Ruth. She resents the implication that Guy—a mere graduate student—is the only person who could make sense of Dan’s findings. She is the one Dan asked for help and, right now, that information is going nowhere.

‘I’m sorry,’ says Ruth. ‘The laptop’s with the police.’ This is, of course, true, but she doesn’t add that Tim has given her a brand-new memory stick containing copies of Dan’s files.

Guy groans and slumps back in his chair. ‘That’s it, then. That DCI Macleod is an ignorant bastard. He’s got no interest in furthering human knowledge.’

Ruth thinks this is probably true but, on the other hand, she wouldn’t call Sandy Macleod ignorant. He seemed uncomfortably sharp to her.

‘Don’t you have any records of your own?’ she asks.

‘After all, you were at the excavation.’ Too late, she wonders if she should admit to knowing this.

‘I’ve got a few notes,’ says Guy. ‘Nothing substantial. Did Dan say anything to you about the discovery? About King Arthur?’

‘I’m sorry,’ says Ruth. ‘I hadn’t seen Dan in over twenty years.’

Tim is going through paperwork which, in effect, means checking computer records. He realised, after a few days working for Sandy, that this was the way to make himself indispensible. Sandy loathes paperwork but he knows it has to be done. Tim saw immediately that his best chance of ingratiating himself with the infamous ‘Beast of Blackpool’ McLeod was to become an expert on forms, procedure and the Freedom of Information Act. It’s not what he dreamt of when studying (physics at York) or when he signed up for the graduate fast-track programme, but Tim is a pragmatist, and if his future holds no obstacles greater than a dinosaur DCI who can’t work a computer, he will be doing pretty well.

Despite everything Tim doesn’t dislike Sandy. He’s rude, chauvinistic, and he thinks that Jim Davidson’s a fine comedian, but he’s also a good copper and, according to his lights, fair. That is to say, he’s rude to everyone. Sandy doesn’t hold back from a borderline racist joke because Tim’s in the room and, in a way, Tim’s quite grateful for this. At least this way he knows what’s going on. And since they have been trying to infiltrate the White Hand Sandy has appreciated Tim’s ironical take on the problems of a black man who wants to join a white supremacist group. ‘At least you’ve got a sense of humour about it, lad,’ is his considered opinion.