No Graves As Yet (37 page)

“Where did you meet?” he asked.

She was confused. “Where? I went over the Bridge of Sighs, because it’s enclosed and no one would have seen me, then walked to the beginning of the trees. He was there.”

“He didn’t come to the lodgings?”

Her dark eyes widened. “Good heavens, of course not! We’re not completely mad!”

“When was the next time he was there?”

“I don’t know. Why? About two days, I think. I had the Allards by then, and everything was a nightmare.”

A warmth began to ease inside him. Beecher had definitely not killed Sebastian, because he had had no time to hide the gun! Not if it had been on the master’s roof—and the more he thought of it, the more certain he became that that was where it had been. “And before he shot himself?” he asked.

She stiffened again, her face white. “I saw him in the Fellows’ Garden the evening before, just for a little while, almost fifteen minutes. Aidan was due home.”

“Did he go inside?”

“No. Why?”

Should he tell her? Caution said not . . . but she had loved Beecher, and the thought that he had committed murder and then suicide was a bleeding wound inside her.

Yet if he explained, then she would work out for herself the only terrible alternative: that it was someone who had access to the roof of her house, her husband. She would be a danger to him then, and would he kill her, too?

Would she work it out, even if he did not tell her? No. It all depended upon the gun having been hidden on the roof. He dared not let her deduce it.

“I’m not sure,” he lied. “When I’m certain, I’ll tell you.”

“Did Harry kill Sebastian?” Her voice was trembling, her face ashen.

Would she guess anyway? “No, he couldn’t have,” he answered. “But say nothing to anyone!” He made the warning sharp, a message of danger. “If he didn’t, Connie, then someone else did! Someone who may kill you. Please, say nothing at all, to absolutely anyone . . . including the master! I may be wrong.”

That, too, was a lie; Joseph had no doubt he was right. Aidan Thyer might kill, but he was certain in his heart that Harry Beecher had not. And if Connie had been out on the Backs early in the morning, then Aidan Thyer could have been anywhere; certainly he could have been in Sebastian’s rooms. And Thyer could have killed Sebastian for the same reason—because he was blackmailing any or all of them over exposing Connie’s affair.

Or it could have been Thyer Sebastian had seen on the Hauxton Road.

“Say nothing,” he repeated even more urgently, touching her arm. Her wrist was slender under his fingers. His mouth was dry, his hands sweating. “Please—remember it is murder we are dealing with.”

“Two murders?” she whispered.

“Perhaps,” he replied. He did not say it could be four—or, if Reisenburg had been murdered also, then five.

She nodded.

He stayed only to give her a few words of assurance, then walked slowly back in the bright sun, cold in his flesh and his bones.

CHAPTER
FOURTEEN

Joseph walked slowly across the quad. The sun was hot in the early afternoon, but it felt airless. His clothes stuck to his skin. There were no clouds that he could see in the blue distance bounded by the crenellated tops of the walls, but it felt like thunder to come. The electricity of it was already inside him, an excitement and a fear that he was on the brink of the truth.

Where had Aidan Thyer been on the afternoon of Sunday, June 28? Whom could he ask that Thyer would not hear about it? Connie had been in the garden with Beecher. If Thyer had been on the Hauxton Road, where would he have told people he was? And who would remember now, over five weeks later?

He could not ask Connie; she would know why he was asking, and then no matter how hard she tried, it would surely be beyond her to conceal that knowledge from Thyer himself.

He was walking more and more slowly as he tried to make up his mind. Thyer had come late to the cricket match. Would Rattray, who had captained the St. John’s side, know where he had been before that? It was worth asking him. He turned and went rapidly back in through the door at the farther side and up to Rattray’s rooms. He was not there.

Ten minutes later Joseph found him in a corner of the library between the stacks, scanning the bottom shelf.

“Dr. Reavley! Are you looking for me, sir?” he asked, closing his place in the book in his hands.

“Yes, actually I was.” Joseph bent to the floor, looking along the row curiously. They were on warfare and European history. He regarded Rattray’s thin, anxious face.

Rattray bit his lip. “It looks pretty bad, sir,” he said quietly. “The kaiser warned the czar yesterday that if Russia didn’t stop within twenty-four hours, Germany would mobilize, too. Professor Moulton reckons they’ll probably close the world stock exchanges pretty soon. Maybe even by Monday.”

“It’s a bank holiday,” Joseph replied. “They’ll have all weekend to think about it.”

Rattray sat back on the floor, legs out in front of him. “Do you think so?” He rubbed the heel of his hand along his jaw. “God, it would be awful, wouldn’t it? Who could imagine five weeks ago that some lunatic in a town in Serbia, of all places, taking a potshot at an archduke—and Austria’s got loads of them—could blow up into this? Just a short time, barely more than a month, and the whole world’s changed.”

“Six weeks ago, nearly.” Joseph found the thought strange, too. Then his parents had been alive. Six weeks ago tomorrow would be the Saturday John Reavley had driven the yellow Lanchester to Little Wilbraham and talked to Reisenburg—and found the document. That night he had telephoned Matthew in London. The next day he had been killed.

“We played cricket at Fenner’s Field,” he said aloud. “You captained the side. I remember being there, and Beecher, and the Master.”

Rattray nodded.

“Sebastian wasn’t,” Joseph continued. “He was late coming back home. I expect the master wasn’t pleased. He was one of our best bats.”

“Rotten bowler, though.” Rattray smiled. He looked close to tears, his voice a little thick. “No, the master was pretty cross when he did come, actually. Sort of caught him by surprise that Sebastian wasn’t playing.”

Joseph felt cold. “When he did come?”

“He was late, too!” Rattray pulled a slight face. “Don’t know where he’d been, but he arrived in a hell of a temper. He said he’d been stuck on the side of Jesus Lane with a puncture, but I know he wasn’t, because Dr. Beecher came that way and he’d have seen him.” He sighed and looked away, blinking hard. “Unless, of course, you can’t believe Dr. Beecher anymore. I just can’t—I can’t understand that!” He chewed painfully on his lower lip to stop it trembling. “Everything’s sort of . . . slipping apart, isn’t it? You know, I used to think Sebastian was pretty decent.” He looked at Joseph. “He had some odd ideas—used to waffle on about peace, and that war was a sin against mankind, and that there wasn’t anything in the world worth fighting for if it meant killing whole nations and filling the earth with hate.”

He rubbed his jaw again, leaving a smudge of dust on it. “A bit too much, but still sane, still all right! I never thought he would do something really squalid, like blackmail. That’s filthy! Beecher might have been doing something out of line, but he was a decent chap—I’d have staked anything you like on that.” He pushed his hair back off his forehead in a gesture of infinite weariness. “I’m beginning to wonder if I really know very much at all.”

Joseph understood his confusion profoundly. He was fighting his own way through the same desperation, trying to make sense of it and regain his own balance. But there was no time for the long, gentle conversations of comfort now. “Where do you think the master was?” he asked.

Rattray shrugged. “I’ve no idea. Or why he should say something that wasn’t true.”

“But he was in his car?” Joseph persisted.

“Yes, I saw him drive up in it. I was waiting for him.”

“Thank you.”

Rattray looked curious. “Why? What does it matter now? It’s over. We were all wrong—you and me, everyone. Beecher’s dead, and our quarrels don’t amount to much if there’s going to be war and we’re all drawn into the biggest conflict in Europe. Do you suppose they’ll ask for volunteers, sir?”

“I can’t see that we’ll be involved,” Joseph replied. “It will be Austria, Russia, and perhaps Germany. It’s still possible they’re all just threatening, seeing who’ll be the first to back down.”

“Maybe,” Rattray said without conviction.

Joseph thanked him again and went out of the library and back to the first quad to see Gorley-Smith. There was a vital question to ask now, and he dreaded the answer. He was surprised how deeply it cut into his emotions to believe that Aidan Thyer was guilty of killing John and Alys Reavley. And for what? That was something he still did not know.

He knocked on Gorley-Smith’s door and stood impatiently until it was opened. Gorley-Smith looked tired and irritable. His hair was untidy, he had his jacket off, and his shirt was sticking to his body. It very obviously cost him some effort to be civil.

“If you came to apologize for dinner, it really doesn’t matter,” he said abruptly, and started to push the door shut again.

“I didn’t,” Joseph answered him. It was clear that there was going to be no opportunity for subtlety. “Beecher doesn’t seem to have left any note, or wishes of any kind. . . .”

Gorley-Smith suppressed his momentary annoyance. “No, I don’t suppose he did. Look, Reavley, I know he was a friend of yours, but he was obviously driven beyond his sanity by whatever it was that young Allard was pressuring him over, and I’d really rather not know the details. I don’t think we should speculate.” His face was filled with distaste and with the anxious desire to avoid embarrassment.

Joseph knew what was on his mind. “I was going to ask you,” he said coldly, “if Beecher had any opportunity to speak to the master around about that time. He might have some ideas what we should do. As far as I know, Beecher had no close family, but there must be someone who ought to be informed as discreetly as possible, in the circumstances.”

“Oh.” Gorley-Smith was taken aback. “Actually, I don’t think so. Whatever sent him over the edge must have been rather sudden, and as it so happens, I know the master was in a meeting for at least two hours before we heard about it, because I was there myself. I’m sorry, Reavley, but you’ll have to look elsewhere.”

“You’re quite sure?” Joseph pressed. He wanted it to be true, and yet it made nonsense of the only answer he could think of.

“Yes, of course I’m sure,” Gorley-Smith replied wearily. “Basildon went on interminably about some damned building fund, and I thought we were going to be there all day. It was mostly the master he was arguing with.”

“I see.” Joseph nodded. “Thank you.”

Gorley-Smith shook his head in incomprehension and closed the door.

Once again Joseph made his way over the bridge to the Backs. The air was cooling at last, and the light shone through the flowers in rich colors like stained glass. The trees across the grass barely shimmered in the faint sunset wind, and there was no sound but the call of birds.

If Aidan Thyer had not killed Beecher, and Beecher had not killed Sebastian, then what was the answer?

He walked slowly, his feet silent on the dry grass. He passed into the shade of the trees. Here it smelled cooler, as if the greenness itself had a fragrance.

Who else could have put the gun on the roof of the master’s lodgings? Or was he wrong about that after all? He went back to the beginning of all that he knew for certain. Elwyn had come to his rooms, almost hysterical with shock and grief, because he had gone to fetch Sebastian for an early morning walk by the river and found him shot to death. There was no gun there. Anyway, no one had ever suggested Sebastian had any reason on earth to take his own life. No one who knew him had ever imagined such a thing.

The police had been called and had searched everywhere for the gun, but had not found it. Everywhere except the funnel openings to the drainpipes on the master’s roof.

Of course, it was always possible there was another answer he simply had not thought of. Maybe someone had quite casually walked out with the gun and put it in another college—or had given it to somebody else.

Except that unknown person had retrieved it with no difficulty in order to shoot Beecher.

Joseph concentrated on who could have shot Beecher and who might have wanted to. Everyone seemed to assume after Beecher’s death that he had killed Sebastian. But had anyone assumed it before?

Mary Allard? She would have had the fury and the bitterness to kill. But how would she have known where the gun was, or got herself to the roof for it?

Gerald Allard? No, he had not the passion, and he also would not have known where it was.

Joseph was opposite Trinity now. The wind was rising a little, whispering in the leaves above him, and here in their shade the light was fading rapidly.

Elwyn? He could not have killed Sebastian. He was accounted for in his own room at the time. Besides, he and Sebastian had been close, even for brothers, and so unalike as to have been rivals in very little. They admired each other’s skills without especially wanting to possess them.

Nor could Elwyn have had anything to do with crashing the Lanchester. He had been in Cambridge all day.

But he had been in and out of the master’s lodgings seeing his mother, trying to comfort her and offer her the support his father seemed incapable of giving. He could have retrieved the gun if he had known it was there.

But how could he have known? Had he seen it somewhere? Could Beecher have hidden it there? For whom? Connie? The thought was ugly, and the pain of it sat so tight in his chest he could hardly breathe. Had Beecher been protecting her?

And had Elwyn assumed it was Beecher who had shot Sebastian? That would have been motive enough to have killed him and deliberately left the gun there to make it seem like suicide, an admission of guilt.

Except that he was wrong.

In the shadows Joseph could hardly see the path at his feet, although there were echoes of light across the sky. He walked onto the grass again. Outside the avenue of trees there was still that tender, airy dusk that seems neither silver nor gray. He looked at the horizon to the east, where the depth of the coming night was a veil of indigo.

In the morning he would have to face Connie again and put it to the final test.

He slept badly and woke with a nagging headache. He had a hot cup of tea and two aspirins, and then as soon as he knew Aidan Thyer would have begun his college duties, he went across to the master’s lodgings.

Connie was surprised to see him, but there was no shadow in her eyes. If anything, she seemed pleased.

“How are you, Joseph? You look tired. Have you had any breakfast? I’m sure Cook could make you something if you wish.” They were in the sitting room with the light slanting in through the French windows.

His stomach was knotted far too tightly to eat, and the aspirins had not yet had much effect. “I have been thinking a great deal about what must have happened, and I’ve asked a few questions.”

She looked puzzled, but there was neither hope nor fear in her face.

“The police never found the gun after Sebastian was killed,” he said. “Although they believed they searched everywhere.”

“They did,” she confirmed. “Why do you say
believed
? Do you know of somewhere they didn’t look? They were here. They searched the entire house.”

“When?”

She thought for a moment. “I . . . I think we were about the last. I suppose they came here only as a matter of form. And at first Elwyn was here, because he was desperately shocked and grieved, and then of course his parents.”

“Did they search the roof?”

Would she lie to protect herself, even if it was only to leave the matter closed? Was it she who had originally started the subtle suggestion that the love affair over which Beecher was blackmailed was not with her but with Sebastian himself? That was a repulsive thought. He pushed it away.

“They were up on the next roof,” she replied thoughtfully, remembering it as she spoke. “They can see all of this one from there. It’s not so big. Anyway, I really don’t think anybody could have been up there. We would have heard. How can you hide a gun on a rooftop? It would be obvious.”

“Not if it were poked barrel first into one of the funnels at the top of a downpipe,” he said.

Her eyes widened. “You could reach those from the dormer windows. It could be anyone who was in this house!”

“Yes,” he agreed.

“Aidan? Harry?”

“No.” He shook his head. “Neither of them had the opportunity. Harry could not have killed Sebastian—you told me that yourself. Weren’t you telling the truth?”

“Yes! Yes, I was!” she assured him. “You don’t think Aidan? But why? Not over . . .” Again the blood flushed up her cheeks. “He doesn’t know,” she said huskily.

“What about Elwyn?” he asked her. “Could he have found the gun there and taken it to kill Beecher, believing Beecher had killed Sebastian?”