“A list of heroes?”
“It’s something schools do these days, sir. In the aftermath. Memories to be kept bright and all that. Example to the new intake. He was tracking down old boys of the school who’ve won medals for gallantry: the Victoria Cross, Military Cross and all the rest of them. An astonishingly large number of these turned up. Hardly a day passed when he didn’t come smugly into the common room announcing: ‘Hogweed Minor. Mentioned in dispatches at Omdurman,’ or some such. He had all the military service records and was matching them up with the school lists. They’re over there in that cupboard.”
“Right. We can follow in Rapson’s footsteps, then.” Joe waved an arm at the filing room. “I’ve had a preliminary snoop around. I’d say it will take several people weeks to get through it.”
“There may be shortcuts we can take, sir. Using the book for a start. If you’ll just give me a minute to concentrate. I’m trying to match up Peterkin with his disappearance date. And I think I’ve got it. Here! Look! At least we can see from this that he hasn’t obscured the boys’ initials. We’ve got a J.D.P., plain as day, and a date in … hang on a minute … MCMXXI—that’s 1921. Then we’ve got pr. Id. Oct. How’s your Latin, sir? When were the Ides in October? Thirteenth?”
“In October? No. Try the fifteenth.”
“Pridie. That’s the day before the Ides which gives us the 14th of October. Spot on! Got him! So we can probably assume the initials are a good guide.”
“Yes. I don’t think this is a code at all—thankfully! They’re just notes to himself. But notes he wanted to keep quiet. No one coming on these unwittingly is going to be seized with an overpowering need to wrestle with them. In his ferreting about, Rapson could have stumbled on some loose threads. And collated them carefully and discreetly here in these pages.”
“He had that kind of brain, sir. Never let anything get by. Questioned everything. Tedious.”
“Did he give any indication to the other staff that he’d come across something stinky in the school cupboard?”
Gosling frowned and considered. “No. He didn’t confide. I was on the lookout for something not quite right with the establishment, following my interest in Peterkin. In fact, I rather directed Rapson towards the Peterkin question. Claimed a family interest. Lord! Perhaps I triggered the whole thing?”
“Isn’t that why you were sent here, Gosling? Just doing your job.”
“The head had begun to trust me, I think. Or at least to depend on me in a nauseating way.” Gosling pulled a face. “Farman may have an imposing physical presence, but underneath the senatorial robes there beats the heart of a pleb and gurgles the stomach of a glutton. The urge to give him a good kicking is overwhelming.”
“I’m wondering if we might be contemplating something that could be termed a conspiracy?”
“More than one person involved? Sounds likely. If the headmaster weren’t such a jelly, he’d be a likely candidate for the frame. Not Rapson—he was a loner. But, sir, the time scale’s all wrong for a conspiracy, isn’t it?”
“Time? How?”
“The disappearances. We’ve got this first photo from Edwardian days. Rapson has a date here of MCMIII. Eleven years before war broke out. And the most recent is a date last year. There have been three headmasters in that period. Farman was appointed six years ago. Before that there was a Dr. Sutton. Before him, an ancient old bean who retired at the age of eighty. Now what was his name? Oh, where’s Rapson when you need him? Streetly-Standish! That’s it!”
“Difficult to assign the notion of criminal conspiracy to three generations of headmaster, going back three decades.” Joe’s voice was full of doubt. “ ‘Welcome to St. Magnus, old boy. Here’s the keys to the cocktail cabinet and, while you’re at it, you’d better have an open-ended list of boys who won’t be coming back. You may wish to add to it.’ I can’t see it. I think we need to get old Godwit in here again.”
Gosling was already on his feet. “He’s snoozing in the arm chair in the staff room, sir. I’ll fetch him.”
Godwit seemed alert enough as he entered and took the seat Gosling held for him. He even seemed pleased to be called on again. “The last three headmasters? I knew them all,” he chirruped. “A breed in decline, sadly. Streetly-Standish? He was fading somewhat by the time I arrived, but I served for three years under him. Excellent scholar. Though he was not a humanist—the natural sciences were his forte. Strict. Fine leader. Dr. Sutton, his successor? No, I’m perfectly sure he was not known and not related to the previous head. This is not an Oxford college. The heads are chosen by a committee and the most suitable one selected. The position is not passed down. Dr. Sutton also was an excellent headmaster. Differing from the others in that he was, in fact, a family man. Charming wife and three daughters all of whom lived on the premises. Mrs. Sutton doubled as Matron. And the present holder of the post?” Godwit fell silent and marshaled his thoughts. When he was quite ready, out they trooped: “These are straitened times. Many talented men, scholars as well as others, were wasted in the war, of course. The school was lucky to have acquired the services of Mr. Farman. He has been kind to me.”
Joe smiled his encouragement and his understanding. “I’m going to repeat a request,” he began.
“Ah! You’re still looking for the common denominator, Sandilands! And I have, once again, to tell you—there isn’t an obvious one. Or even an obscure one. Three different men from three different backgrounds. Different subjects and universities. Different views of life. Different proclivities.”
“Their religious beliefs?” Joe asked.
“I use the word again: different. Streetly-Standish was a declared atheist. A very fashionable thing to be in those days, but he didn’t impose his views on the school. He was thought modern and innovative even though some of his ideas were a bit ahead of the morality of the time. His successor, Sutton, had been a clergyman. Farman? Who can tell? Overtly, he’s Church of England and preaches to us all in the accepted manner. I don’t believe these three men knew each other. All they have in common is a stint at the same school. There is nothing else that linked them.” Godwit thought hard for a moment. “Except perhaps—” He shook his head, an elusive memory fluttering past him and escaping.
Getting to his feet, he added: “I shall turn this, whatever it is—I’ll call it ‘your quest’—over in my mind. Or what remains of my mind. I shall not forget. If anything stirs in the depth of this turgid pond of memory, I shall hurry to confide in you or young Gosling here. I take it he carries your seal of approval?”
“You may speak freely to Gosling. We’re working together on this. Working to right an ancient wrong.” It sounded overly dramatic but expressed Joe’s increasing determination to restore the lost boys, if only to memory. The words were received with an approving nod.
A hand as brown and fragile as a dead leaf reached out and tenderly touched the plump little face of John Peterkin. Godwit murmured a few words in ancient Greek, made the sign of the cross over the photograph, and left the room.
Joe turned to Gosling. “When it comes to Greek, I can claim, as with Shakespeare, that I have little Latin and even less—”
Gosling cut short his embarrassment. “Euripides, sir. It’s from one of his tragedies. Alcestis. We put it on in my second year at Oxford. Outdoors in a meadow on the banks of the Isis. That wonderful summer!” Seeing Joe’s puzzled look, he went on with the quiet tact of a courtier. “You’ll remember, sir, that, in the play, our hero, Hercules, is trying to snatch back the recently dead Greek princess, Alcestis, from Death?”
Gosling paused to give Joe a chance to say: “Ah, yes, of course. Familiar with the situation, not the injured party. Go on.”
“The deceased is the lovely wife of his friend Admetus. He, Admetus, is a bounder and a cad, as all agree. He’s destined to die according to a whim of the gods unless some other poor so-and-so can be persuaded to die in his place. His selfish old parents, though tottering at death’s door, refuse. The only one to offer is his dutiful wife, Alcestis.”