Dying on Principle Read online

  I decided my knee was well enough to go for a walk to the post the long way, and set off along Court Oak Road away from the city. But I was mistaken. Eventually I compromised; I’d post the letters since that was what I was supposed to be doing, then cut back through the rear of the college grounds. It would save only a couple of hundred yards, but even that was worth it.

  I followed the path round the back of the building, where the computer technicians’ lab and Dr Trevelyan’s room lay. Even there, where hardly anyone ventured, the grass was neatly clipped, and someone had dug over the flowerbeds under each window, raking them into a fine tilth. If only they put as much effort into making the staff happy as into maintaining the grounds, the college would indeed be a fine place. Only one bed was disturbed, with a couple of little craters a foot or so apart. Paradoxically the general neatness made me depressed again – when could I attend to my own little patch? Not this evening, certainly, I reflected as I crossed Balden Road, dodging the sad little corpse of a grey squirrel newly squashed and awaiting the attention of the Harborne Fox Posse. Frozen peas and the sofa for me again. Thank goodness for thick Sunday papers!

  I’d been reduced to the business section when the phone rang.

  I hobbled briskly over. For a moment there was silence. Then a man’s voice, not one I recognised: ‘Hello, Sophie. When you going to give it me, then? This nice long suck?’

  I said nothing. To be honest I could think of nothing to say. I always told people on those self-protection courses at William Murdock to make the caller suffer – blow a whistle down the phone or, failing something as efficient as that, make as loud a noise as possible. Hurt the bugger’s ears, that was it.

  Then I said, so foolishly I hang my head to think of it; ‘Why me?’

  All those ears listening to me making a cake of myself!

  ‘Come on, Soph – all those ads –’

  ‘Shut it!’ At least I think that was what another man’s voice said. But I couldn’t be sure, because the line went dead.

  I tried to make sense of it. Did heavy breathers hunt in pairs? And why should one stop the other?

  The phone rang again. This time, when I snatched the receiver, I was ready. I sang, very loudly, as if I were raising the roof in the ‘Hallelujah Chorus’.

  ‘Goodness me,’ said a quiet voice at the other end. ‘What on earth did I do to deserve that?’

  ‘I’ve had an obscene phone call, Chris,’ I said dully. ‘Didn’t you—?’ But I remembered in time about the other bug, and swallowed the rest of the question.

  He waited a moment, as if thinking. ‘I’ll be round in ten minutes,’ he said.

  I’d abandoned the peas and resorted to the tubi-grip by the time his car arrived. He didn’t even get as far as the front door before I was out there, locking up and hurtling towards him. ‘I want them out!’ I yelled. ‘Now! His too! I can’t live my life with those bloody bugs! I can’t even cry in peace!’

  ‘OK, OK. Tomorrow, I promise. Moving his may provoke something interesting, of course,’ he said more reflectively.

  ‘How interesting?’ I asked, opening his passenger door and fastening my belt. ‘And where are we going, anyway?’

  ‘I did think of the Court Oak – no? Somewhere further away?’

  I nodded emphatically.

  ‘What’s happened, Sophie?’ he asked quietly, as he started the engine. ‘Something’s really rattled you.’

  ‘It’s so stupid: just a nasty phone call, that’s all. You know, the lewd-suggestion sort. But there were two of them on the other end – I’m sure there were. What’s up? What’s so funny?’ My voice was sharper than I intended.

  ‘Just that we’ll be able to check from the listening device. These things have their uses, after all.’

  He’d found a canal-side pub out on the far side of Bromsgrove before he told me why he’d phoned earlier. At first I didn’t take it in properly: somehow the weekend had managed to cloud what had once seemed a major issue – who was supplying George Muntz’s computers. Yes, Dave Clarke and his contacts had come up with something. PRT Computers did indeed have an address. One in Birmingham. And a lot closer to home than I’d imagined.

  ‘I’m surprised we didn’t twig earlier,’ he said, swirling the bitter in the bottom of his glass. ‘But the initials PRT – you said Dr Trevelyan was called Ena.’

  ‘She is.’

  ‘Wrong. Rowena. Paulina Rowena Trevelyan.’

  ‘What a mouthful! No wonder she abbreviated it! So where is this little firm of hers?’

  He looked embarrassed.

  ‘Don’t worry, Chris, it was just a matter of interest. I’m not burgling anyone till my leg gets better.’

  ‘You don’t need to burgle,’ he said, the crows’ feet round his eyes in hyperactive mode. ‘It can all be done by warrant. The trouble is making charges.’

  ‘Particularly when your perpetrator is a few lines short of a program and being dosed to the eyeballs?’

  ‘What a fine mixture of metaphors,’ he said. ‘Time you went back to teaching Eng. Lit. at William Murdock to resharpen your critical faculties. Anyway, she’s still missing. No sign of her anywhere.’

  I ignored him. ‘And what corroborative evidence do you have? I’d hate it to be a one-woman job,’ I added, suddenly urgent. ‘I want you to nail a couple of people at Muntz – at least two.’

  He looked at me over his glass.

  ‘Oh, just because I don’t like them,’ I conceded. ‘And I don’t want it to be Phil, because I like him. There’s logic for you. Tell you what, next time I want some exercise, why don’t we come out here? What could be nicer than a level walk along the cut and a good meal to come back to?’

  ‘Next weekend, if your knee’s up to it,’ he said. ‘It’s a date. I may need to cheer you up – did you hear the news?’

  ‘The news?’

  ‘Poor old Albion lost 2–1. Looks as if you’re stuck with Second Division football for next season. Thought that would make your weekend.’

  SOPHIE FUCKS GOOD. And there was my home number, accurate to the last digit.

  My first reaction was rational, I suppose. I locked the lavatory from the outside, scrawled a CLOSED notice on a sheet of computer paper and Blu-Tacked it to the door, and called the caretaker.

  ‘Yes, Miss Rivers. I’ll see as it comes off as soon as I’ve got a man free.’

  ‘Now, please. And I’m timing you.’

  Now I had time to think about it, I wasn’t simply angry. Where had a student got my number? At William Murdock, when I’d known a student for some time I might tell them to call me if they were beset by problems that weren’t controlled by college hours. But I’d not cared enough to give it to any Muntz student. Since I was ex-directory, I was worried.

  I was staring out at the rain wondering what to do next when the phone rang. A man.

  ‘Sophie Rivers? You got ten minutes? ’Cause I need a bit of hand-relief—’

  I slammed down the phone.

  I don’t know how long I stared at it. Then I reached for it again and dialled the switchboard.

  ‘I’ve just had a nuisance call,’ I said.

  ‘A what?’

  ‘An obscene call. Here, in college. I want you to intercept any incoming calls for me – ask who the caller is. I know it’s a pain, but—’

  ‘We can’t do that without permission. Ever so busy we are, not that you lot give a damn. I’d need Mr Curtis’s authority to do that.’

  I wanted to yell at her, but forced my voice down to a more normal register. ‘Could you get it, then? It’s important. You can see that.’

  ‘Our instructions are not to put calls through to Mr Curtis today. He’s got important meetings.’ And she cut the line.

  By the time I’d visited every women’s loo I wanted to scream. Each had my name and number, but the type of sex I offered varied. I ran back to Polly’s office: I had to tell someone.

  Polly was sitting at her desk, staring unmoving at her compu
ter screen. She was so still, so pale, I thought she was ill. But at last she raised her hand and pointed at the screen. An e-mail message. Anonymous. Tom Hendry died yesterday.

  ‘When I taught basic communication skills,’ she said, her voice so quiet I could hardly hear what she said, ‘I used to get the kids to do an exercise about giving information. I used to crack that old joke about announcing a death. The sergeant major says, “All those with mothers step forward. What the ’ell are you doing stepping forward, Private Jones?”’

  I pulled her head to my chest and held her. She started to cry. I waited.

  ‘We’d had this row,’ she said at last, her face and voice blurred with tears. ‘About the union. It was too bloody supine, he said. And I said we had to stick within the law. And then – and I couldn’t even – not when he was lying there – couldn’t—’

  ‘Apologise? He wouldn’t have heard, Polly. But when he was in hospital, didn’t you make up then?’

  She laughed, a savage, painful laugh. ‘Hospital! I couldn’t see him there. And I can’t even go to his funeral. Can’t say goodbye.’ She pushed away, but let me take her hand.

  ‘Let’s get you home,’ I said.

  ‘Home? Home! So my husband can see me like this? I’ve not kept this secret for eleven years for it to come out now, Sophie.’

  I was back in my office when there was a tap at the door. Hector came in, closing the door carefully. He looked hard at me. ‘You heard about it then, Sophie? That shit about you.’

  ‘Seen it, Hector. Every single women’s loo. Haven’t checked out the gents’ yet.’

  ‘Don’t even think about it. It’s real bad, man. And permanent. They won’t get that off in a hurry. Jesus, Sophie – it’s as bad as I’ve seen, man.’

  I nodded. Now I came to think of it, it oughtn’t to be cleaned off until it had been photographed. Evidence.

  ‘You better see the boss, man. This is harassment, you know. Someone got it in for you. Say, is it really your number?’

  If he had to ask, he didn’t know. Did he?

  ‘Jesus, man, it is? You better get on to Telecom, man. Change that number now.’

  I nodded.

  ‘And tell that inspector friend of yours. Some of them things, they’re sick, man. Real sick.’

  This was important enough for me to demand a meeting with the principal, Curtis and any others in the hierarchy who might be interested. ‘Might’, come to think of it, was the wrong word: ‘ought’ was better. Too bad if they thought they had something else to worry about. And that included Mrs Cavendish too.

  I penetrated the security systems and strode up to her desk. I suppose I was too busy presenting an assertive front – and, to be honest, trying not to cry – to think about anyone else, including her. But in mid-sentence I noticed her face. If I’d made her inexplicably pale in previous encounters, today, without any provocation from me, she was grey. That didn’t arrest my flow, however.

  ‘And I propose to see him now. Not next Friday at ten. Now.’ I swept past her and threw open the principal’s door.

  His room was empty.

  Curtis’s next. That too was empty, but the bin by his shredder was extremely full. Unfortunately he’d finished the job.

  Out to la Cavendish again. She was busy screwing tissues into unattractive balls.

  ‘Well? Where will I find someone with a modicum of authority?’

  She reacted as if I were six feet tall: ‘Truly, I don’t know. I’m so sorry, Miss Rivers. This is a terrible thing, and someone should do something. But I don’t know where they are, I really don’t.’

  I sat on the edge of her desk and leaned forward with as much menace as I could muster. ‘Write this down, Mrs Cavendish. Ms – no, not Miss, Ms – Ms Rivers’s name, telephone number and vicious sexual allegations are on the wall of every lavatory in this building. She demands an immediate investigation into the serious and reprehensible lapse of college security which has enabled someone to misuse confidential personal information.’ I paused for breath. Now I came to think about it I wasn’t so keen on the style, but perhaps officialese might work better for Blake and Curtis. I continued, ‘She also requires immediate action to remove the offending graffiti from every site, no matter what the expense, as soon as paint samples and photographs for analysis have been taken. Failure to remove it immediately will result in legal action for the most serious sexual harassment.’ I looked down. Her hand was shaking so much her shorthand might be indecipherable. ‘OK. Now get it on to computer. Four copies, please, when you’re ready.’

  ‘Four?’

  ‘One for Mr Blake, one for Mr Curtis, one for the chair of governors and one for me.’

  The memo crept quietly from the laser printer. I signed each copy as it appeared.

  ‘Thanks.’ I managed a smile. Then I remembered my manners: ‘Are you all right, Mrs Cavendish?’

  She shook her head. ‘Like I said, Miss Rivers, I really don’t know where he is. Mr Blake. There’s no sign of him. His car’s in the car park, but he’s not in college. And his wife said he came in last night to do some work and that was the last she saw of him.’

  ‘Does he often do that – sleep here?’ I tried not to sound too incredulous, but I always associated such long hours with us lower orders.

  ‘He has a room. From when this used to be a residential teachers’ college. It’s locked. I’ve tried the private number in there. No reply.’ More tissues disintegrated in her hand; she stared at me when I passed her a bin, and then dropped them in it.

  ‘Have you thought of calling the police?’ I asked.

  She looked at me aghast.

  ‘If there’s no sign—’ I began.

  ‘What’s she doing here?’

  I turned: it was Curtis, as red as Mrs Cavendish was pale.

  ‘Poor Miss Rivers has been the victim of a most unpleasant prank—’

  ‘Prank? Harassment!’

  ‘Hm?’ He picked up a couple of files and affected to read them, flicking back a lock of blond hair as if he were a matinee idol. It irritated me that such good looks should accompany a personality I’d so far found nothing in to like.

  Mrs Cavendish pushed one of my memos at him. He took it idly and read it.

  ‘Well?’ I prompted him at last.

  ‘The best thing that you can do is clear your room and return to your old college – Cadbury.’

  ‘William Murdock,’ I said automatically.

  ‘Wherever. The caretaker’ll give you a couple of boxes for your stuff. Sooner the better, Iris.’

  I think even Mrs Cavendish was shocked. She watched his departing back, and turned to me, shaking her head.

  ‘He can be quite ruthless at times. He was quite unkind when Dr Trevelyan was taken ill. He told dear Mr Blake they were to make sure she kept her mouth …’

  ‘Go on.’

  ‘No, perhaps I’ve got it wrong. I heard someone saying that to him.’ She flushed. ‘Mr Blake’ll do something, I’m sure he will. I’ll tell him the instant we find him. But – I hope you don’t mind me saying this, Miss Rivers – maybe he’s right. Maybe it would be better to take a day off.’

  I left before I laughed out loud.

  I did leave the building, but didn’t go home. Soon I’d have to phone Chris, but I needed a few moments on my own. I’d take a breather in the park – the rain was steady enough to put off most people. I followed the path, dodging dog shit, and made my way to the scented garden. Something smelled sickly sweet in the rain and I turned away, almost nauseated. Finding a phone that hadn’t been vandalised, I read the graffiti about other women who didn’t have even my limited powers to get rid of it, and phoned Chris.

  ‘It’s too much of a coincidence,’ I said, drying my feet in the warmth of his car heater. He’d picked me up and driven into a side road. ‘This guy Hendry dies, so they vandalise the college to give everyone something else to talk about. Could that be it?’

  ‘Could be. If Hendry’s sufficiently impo
rtant as a catalyst to rock the college. But it seems a mighty big sledgehammer to crack a nut. No, if you asked me, I’d say that you were the target. Sorry. And I don’t think it’s personal. I still think that Chummie thinks you know something. Do you?’

  I watched the windscreen wipers – backwards, forwards, backwards, forwards. ‘No. I’ve seen bits and pieces of things that worry me. Someone dropped an odd hint – about paper … but they’re more Dave Clarke’s area than yours.’

  ‘Have you told him?’

  ‘Haven’t got my chastity belt locked yet!’

  Chris laughed dutifully. ‘Shall I get him over to my office? Or take you over to his?’

  I shrugged. ‘Whichever. Why not just phone him?’

  ‘What’s on your mind, Sophie?’

  I shook my head ‘You know, I think you ought to search Muntz.’

  ‘You can’t just go busting in on a place uninvited. There has to be some very good reason.’

  ‘Like a crime.’

  ‘A crime?’

  ‘How about the principal’s disappeared?’

  ‘Has he? Is he a missing person?’

  ‘I’ve only met him twice so I suppose I don’t miss him. But he has gone AWOL. Tell you what, why don’t you come and have a look at my graffiti and see what else you find? Just as a friend, you understand.’

  ‘OK, Sophie. Just as a friend.’

  22

  My long-awaited meeting with Mr Blake was undoubtedly memorable. It took place in Dr Trevelyan’s office. Mr Blake was sitting in front of a state-of-the-art computer, wearing a viritual-reality headset and overalls from which emerged clusters of wires, apparently connected to the rear of the headset via a tube an inch and a half or so in diameter. The tube looked like a narrower version of the stuff they line central-heating flues or extractor-fan ducts with.

  Mr Blake was dead.

  On automatic pilot, perhaps, Chris felt for a pulse. He shook his head and fished his phone from his pocket. He should, I suppose, have told me to leave, and I suppose I should have left without being told. But I wasn’t in the mood for passivity. I didn’t touch anything, of course, and I even restrained myself from wandering around the room lest I damage any footprints Chris’s team might be able to lift from the carpet. But I didn’t switch off my eyes or ears. I didn’t even hold my nose.