“After that he again went on his usual rounds and presented himself at the back door of Ma Bellefoy’s cottage. At lunch time on the afternoon of Rapson’s death, this was. It was just starting to snow, so he put his grinder in the shelter of the old cow sheds. He did her knives twice a year. She has six. Odd ones. None of them a set. Two of them are six-inch meat knives. Both very worn. Getting like tissue paper. Only one more season left in them, Rory says. They’re old friends-he knew her when she was up at the school, and he likes to deliver news and gossip as he works. He usually gives her a wooden toy he’s made himself-for her little boy. It wasn’t the only thing he delivered. He gave her-or sold her-a rabbit. One he’d poached? He claims it was a wild one from up on the heath. That’s what made him unwilling to talk to you. A nasty magistrate could send him to Australia for poaching, to join his Uncle Tom, who suffered that fate twenty years ago.”
Martin shook his head in irritation. “He’s living in the past, miss. No one’s bothering him for a bit of poaching. There’s families around here couldn’t keep their ribs apart if they didn’t break a few daft rules.”
“Then, with the snow threatening, he went off with his donkey into town, where he could shelter and pick up the hotel business the next day. That’s where you caught up with him. He hopes you’ve taken care of his donkey.”
“He’s all right. Well, that gets us nowhere,” Martin grumbled. “Everything agrees with Ma Bellefoy’s account. She has a full complement of knives-they’re all present and correct. But there’s only three six-inch knives in the school kitchens. One missing. And then my constable picks one up out of the snow melt. Two questions: Who took the knife out of the kitchen? And why wasn’t it in Rapson’s ribs? Well, the weapon’s in the labs by now, and we’ll have to wait and see what the lads in white coats can come up with. Meanwhile, there’s a bit of honest-to-goodness police work the local plod can do.”
Martin detained Joe as he was about to start off back for the school. “A moment, sir. Your colleague, Miss Joliffe.… I was wondering if she’s as good at getting words out of small boys. Ma Bellefoy’s little lad is who I have in mind. I’m sure there’s things he knows that he’s too scared to tell to a big policeman.”
“Martin, you must ask her yourself. I’m not her boss.”
“I’ll do that. It could give us just the leg-up we need.”
He smiled at Joe and smoothed his mustache in a comic-opera gesture. “Watch it, Commissioner! We’ll be up that staircase while the Yard’s still feeling for the light switch.”
There were two eager faces waiting for him when Joe reached Rapson’s study: Gosling and Godwit.
Godwit spoke at once. “Commissioner, you must attend to my young colleague first. My news can wait. He is due to give a hockey lesson directly. It’s a Saturday. I’ll return in a moment.”
“Five minutes, sir?” Gosling suggested.
“Right, Gosling.” Joe settled at the desk. “Spielman. What have you to report?”
“Bugger all, sir. Phone engaged-or off the hook more like-for hours, but I kept trying. Finally I got the butler. Shifty, I thought. Or perhaps just in the dark like yours truly. Didn’t want to speak to me. What possible business could it be of mine? ‘Put your headmaster on if you deem it absolutely essential,’ and all that going on. You know what butlers are like. I kept at it and managed to get out of him that he really hadn’t a clue either. The master was still out in deepest Sussex and, after a brief phone call just after five o’clock, the mistress had packed and gone off in the Dodge to join him.”
“Five o’clock. Remind me where we were at five o’clock, Gosling.”
“Just turning out of the driveway of the asylum, sir. Sir? I hope you don’t mind-I thought all this sounded a bit off key. I rang my boss and asked him if there was anything of interest in Spielman Senior’s situation. Regarding his professional attachment to the German Embassy or his domestic life. Masterson’s going to ring back. I, er, didn’t mention your involvement, sir.”
“Very wise. We would always want to avoid a lecture on the dangers of fraternization. I hope you got further with the research clinic.”
“A little. Again, I can find no trace of young Spielman. The duty matron I spoke to refused to discuss patients or admissions. I threw everything I had at her, including manly charm, but she resisted me. Quoted hospital policy. I might be a scurrilous journalist, after all. Any rogue with tuppence in his pocket can ring them up from a phone box these days, she explained. Their patients value their anonymity. But she did offer to make an appointment for you. Three P.M. This afternoon. Professor Bentink will grant you fifteen minutes. That’s if you are who you say you are. You must be sure to have your authorisation with you. Sorry, sir. It’s the best I could do. They’re well within their rights, of course.”
“That will do well, Gosling. Anything more of any urgency?”
“No sir. I’ve really got to dash-fourteen small boys waiting down in the gym for seven-a-side hockey. They’re armed with sticks. Lord knows what they’re up to! The rest of my report can wait until you’ve seen old Godwit. Sir-he’s always worth hearing.”
“Thank you, Gosling. Wheel him in will you?”
Mr. Godwit entered, twitching with excitement. “Ten minutes to go before my class,” he said. “I have something to confide.”
He declined to take a seat, and they stood together on the rug. “You remember asking me what the three headmasters had in common? I told you nothing. And I still believe nothing. But-”
“The slightest thing, sir, will interest me.” Joe was determined to encourage him. “They wore the same stone in their cufflinks. Each had a nanny called Edith. Each was a member of the Society of Druids?”
“No, no, nothing like that at all. But there’s one thing they have all done. A rather strange habit. Being so old-bridging the three tenures-I’m the only one who would have noticed and remembered. The first Wednesday of each month, Streetly-Standish used to go off into town-Brighton, I mean. By himself. No one thought anything of it. He never spoke of it. In the school carriage. Horse-drawn, of course, in those days. Oddly, he used to dispense with the services of the groom and drive himself.”
“Returning?”
“Always before midnight. Then Dr. Sutton took over, and he did exactly the same thing. Straight after tea on the first Wednesday of every month, a taxi would come to pick him up. Mrs. Sutton used to wave him off. Clearly no clandestine object to these excursions. Then our present head, Mr. Farman, took over seamlessly and-blow me if he didn’t keep up the tradition. The Wednesday taxi comes for him. At exactly the same time. Oh, sorry. It’s not much is it?”
“On the contrary, it’s very interesting,” Joe said, trying not to sound disappointed. A monthly trip to Brighton was all too easily explained, even for a married head. Hadn’t Godwit put two and two together? Obviously too unworldly for such suspicions. “Well, well! Are we perhaps thinking … cinema visit?” he suggested innocently, having no wish to shock the old classicist.
“The visits of Streetly-Standish predate the arrival of a picture palace, Sandilands. And he couldn’t bear the notion of moving pictures. A bad influence on the young, he thought. None of the men were involved with masonry or druidry or any such mumbo jumbo. Perfectly normal, all three.”
“Think back, Mr. Godwit. Their behaviour when they returned-did they show any signs of, um, weariness, elation, resolve, mood or behaviour change of any kind?”