Death is now my neighbour - Morse 12 Read online

  Thus it was that the legendary Stamper had stayed on in Lonsdale as an honorary Emeritus Fellow, with full dining rights, from the year of his retirement, 1945, to 1955; and then to 1965 ... and 1975; and almost indeed until 1985, when he had finally died at the age of 104 -and then not through any dysfunction of the bodily organs, but from a fall beside his rooms in the front quad after a heavy bout of drinking at a Gaudy, his last words (it is said) being a whispered request for the Madeira to be passed round once again.

  The agenda which lay before Sir Clixby Bream and his colleagues that morning was short and fairly straightforward:

  (i) To receive apologies for absence

  (ii) To approve the minutes of the previous meeting

  (already circulated)

  (iii) To consider the Auditors' statement on College

  expenditure, Michaelmas 1995

  (iv) To recommend appropriate procedures for the

  election of a new Master

  (v) AOB

  Items (i)-(iii) took only three minutes, and would have taken only one, had not the Tutor for Admissions sought an explanation of why the 'Stationery etc' bill for the College Office had risen by four times the current rate of inflation. For which increase the Domestic Bursar admitted full responsibility, since instead of ordering 250 Biros he had inadvertently ordered 250 boxes of Biros.

  This confession put the meeting into good humour, as it passed on to item (iv).

  The Master briefly restated the criteria to be met by potential applicants: first, that he be not in Holy Orders; second, that he be mentally competent, and particularly so in the 'Skills of the Arithmetick' (as the original Statute had it); third, that he be free from serious bodily infirmity. On the second criterion, the Master suggested that since it was now virtually impossible (a gentle glance here at the innumerate Professor of Arabic) to fail GCSE Mathematics, there could be little problem for anyone. As far as the third criterion was concerned however (the Master grew more solemn now) there was a sad announcement he had to make. One name previously put forward had been withdrawn - that of Dr Ridgeway, the brilliant micro-biologist from Balliol, who had developed serious heart trouble at the comparatively youthful age of forty-three.

  Amid murmurs of commiseration round the table, the Master continued:

  'Therefore, gentlemen, we are left with two nominations only ... unless we ... unless anyone ... ? No?'

  No.

  Well, that was pleasing, the Master declared: he had always wished his successor to be appointed from within the College. And so it would be. Voting would take place in the time-honoured way: a single sheet of paper bearing the handwritten name of the preferred candidate, with the signature of the Voting Fellow beneath it, must be delivered to the Master's Lodge before noon on the nineteenth of March, one month away.

  The Master proceeded to wish the two candidates well; and Julian Storrs and Denis Cornford, by chance seated next to each other, shook hands smilingly, like a couple of boxers before the weigh-in for a bruising fight.

  That was not quite all.

  Under AOB, the Tutor for Admissions was moved to make his second contribution of the morning.

  'Perhaps it may be possible, Master, in view of the current plethora of pens in the College Office, for the Domestic Bursar to send us each a free Biro with which we can write down our considered choices for Master?'

  It was a nice touch, typical of an Oxford SCR; and when at 10.20 a.m. they left the Stamper Room and moved outside into the front quad, most of the Fellows were grinning happily.

  But not the Domestic Bursar.

  Nor Julian Storrs.

  Nor Denis Cornford.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  The virtue of the camera is not the power it has to transform the photographer into an artist, but the impulse it gives him to keep on looking — and looking

  (Brooks Atkinson, Once Around the Sun)

  EARLIER THAT SAME morning Morse and Lewis had been sitting together drinking coffee in the canteen at Kidlington Police HQ.

  'Well, that's them!' said an unwontedly ungrammatical Morse as he pointed to the photograph which some darkroom boy had managed to enlarge and enhance. 'Our one big clue, that; one small clue, anyway.'

  As Lewis saw things, the enlargement appeared to have been reasonably effective as far as the clothing was concerned; yet, to be truthful, the promised 'enhancement' of the two faces, those of the murdered woman and of the man so close beside her, seemed to have blurred rather than focused any physiognomical detail.

  'Well?' asked Morse.

  'Worse than the original.'

  'Nonsense! Look at that.' Morse pointed to the tight triangular knot of the man's tie, which appeared - just -above a high-necked grey sweater.

  Yes. Lewis acknowledged that the colour and pattern of the tie were perhaps a little clearer.

  ‘I think I almost recognize that tie,' continued Morse slowly. 'That deepish maroon colour. And that' (he pointed again) 'that narrow white stripe ...'

  'We never had ties at school,' ventured Lewis.

  But Morse was too deeply engrossed to bother about his sergeant's former school uniform, or lack of it, as with a magnifying glass he sought further to enhance (?) the texture of the small relevant area of the photograph.

  'Bit o' taste there, Lewis. Little bit o' class. I wouldn't be surprised if it's the tie of the Old Wykehamists' Classical Association.'

  Lewis said nothing.

  And Morse looked at him almost accusingly. You don't seem very interested in what I'm telling you.' 'Not too much, perhaps.'

  'All right! Perhaps it's not a public-school tie. So what tie do you think it is?'

  Again Lewis said nothing.

  After a while, a semi-mollified Morse picked up the photograph, returned it to its buff-coloured Do-Not-Bend envelope, and sat back in his seat

  He looked tired.

  And, as Lewis knew, he was frustrated too, since necessarily the whole of the previous day had been spent on precisely those aspects of detective work that Morse disliked the most: admin, organization, procedures with as yet little opportunity for him to indulge in the things he told himself he did the best: hypotheses, imaginings, the occasional leap into the semi-darkness. It was now 9 a.m.

  You'd better get off to the station, Lewis. And good luck!'

  'What are you planning to do?'

  'Going down into Oxford for a haircut.'

  'We've got a couple of new barbers' shops opened here. No need to—'

  'I - am - going - down - into - Oxford, all right? A bit later, I'm going to meet a fellow who's an expert on ties, all right?'

  'I'll give you a lift, if you like.'

  'No. It only takes one of those shapely lasses in Shepherd and Woodward's about ten minutes to trim my locks - and I'm not meeting this fellow till eleven.'

  'King's Arms, is it?'

  'Ah! You're prepared to guess about that' 'Pardon?'

  'So why not have a guess about the tie? Come on!' 'I dunno.'

  'Nor do I bloody know. That's exactly why we've got to guess, man.'

  Lewis stood by the door now. It was high time he went.

  'I haven't got a clue about all those posh ties you see in the posh shops in the High. For all I know he probably got it off the tie-rack in Marks and Spencer's.'

  'No. I don't think so.'

  'Couldn't we just cut a few corners? Perhaps we ought to put the photo in the Oxford Mail We'd soon find out who he was then.'

  Morse considered the possibility anew.

  Ye-es ... and if we find he's got nothing to do with the murder

  'We can eliminate him from enquiries.'

  Ye-es. Eliminate his marriage, too - '

  ' - if he's married - '

  ' - and ruin his children -'

  ' - if he's got any.'

  You just get off to the railway station, Lewis.' Morse had had enough.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  It is the very temple of discomfort (John Ruskin, The Se
ven Lamps of Architecture — referring to the building of a railway station)

  AT 9.45 A.M. LEWIS was seated strategically at one of the small round tables in the refreshment area adjacent to Platform One. Intermittently an echoing loudspeaker announced arrivals or apologies for delays; and, at 9.58, recited a splendid litany of all the stops on the slow train to Reading: Radley, Culham, Appleford, Didcot Parkway, Cholsey, Goring and Streadey... Cholsey, yes.

  Mrs Lewis was a big fan of Agatha Christie, and he'd often promised to take her to Cholsey churchyard where the great crime novelist was buried. But one way or another he'd never got round to it.

  The complex was busy, with passengers constantly leaving the station through the two automatic doors to Lewis's right, to walk down the steps outside to the taxi-rank and buses for the city centre; passengers constantly entering through those same doors, making for the ticket-windows, the telephones, the Rail Information office; passengers turning left, past Lewis, in order to buy newspapers, sweets, paperbacks, from the Menzies shop - or sandwiches, cakes, coffee, from the Quick Snack counter alongside.

  From where he sat, Lewis could just read one of the display screens: the 10.15 train to Paddington, it appeared, would be leaving on time - no minutes late. But he had seen no one remotely resembling the man whose photograph he'd tucked inside his copy of the Daily Mirror.

  At 10.10 a.m. the train drew in to Platform One, and passengers were now getting on. But still there was no one to engage Lewis's attention; no one standing around impatiently as if waiting for a partner; no one sitting anxiously consulting a wristwatch every few seconds, or walking back and forth to the exit doors and scanning the occupants of incoming taxis.

  No one.

  Lewis got to his feet and went out on to the platform, walking quickly along the four coaches which comprised the Turbo Express for Paddington, memorizing as best he could the face he'd so earnestly been studying that morning. But, again, he could find no one resembling the man who had once sat beside the murdered woman in a photographic booth.

  No one.

  It was then, at the last minute (quite literally so), that the idea occurred to him.

  A young-looking ticket-collector was leaning out of one of the rear windows whilst a clinking refreshment-trolley was being lifted awkwardly aboard. Lewis showed him his ID; showed him the photograph.

  'Have you ever seen either of these two on the Paddington train? Or any other train?'

  The acne-faced youth examined the ID card as if suspecting, perchance, that it might be a faulty ticket; then, equally carefully, looked down at the photograph before looking up at Lewis.

  Someone blew a whistle.

  "Yes, I have. Seen him, anyway. Do you want to know his name, Sergeant? I remember it from his Railcard.'

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  A well-tied tie is the first serious step in life (Oscar Wilde)

  MORSE CAUGHT a No. 2A bus into the centre of Oxford, alighting at Carfax, thence walking down the High and entering Shepherd and Woodward's, where he descended the stairs to Gerrard's hairdressing saloon. 'The usual, sir?'

  Morse was glad that he was being attended to by Gerrard himself. It was not that the proprietor was gifted with trichological skills significantly superior to those of his attractive female assistants; it was just that Gerrard had always been an ardent admirer of Thomas Hardy, and during his life had acquired an encyclopaedic knowledge of the great man's works.

  ‘Yes, please,' answered Morse, looking morosely into the mirror at hair that had thinly drifted these last few years from ironish-grey to purish-white.

  As Morse stood up to wipe the snippets of hair from his face with a hand-towel, he took out the photograph and showed it to Gerrard.

  'Has he ever been in here?' 'Don't think so. Shall I ask the girls?' Morse considered. 'No. Leave it for the present.' 'Remember the Hardy poem, Mr Morse? "The Photograph"?'

  Morse did. Yet only vaguely. 'Remind me.'

  ‘I used to have it by heart but 'We all get older,' admitted Morse. Gerrard now scanned the pages of his extraordinary memory.

  ‘You remember Hardy'd just burnt a photo of one of his old flames - he didn't know if she was alive or not - she was someone from the back of beyond of his life -but he felt awfully moved - as if he was putting her to death somehow - when he burned the photo .. . Just a minute .. .just a minute, I think I've got it:

  Well — she knew nothing thereof did she survive,

  And suffered nothing if numbered among the dead;

  Yet —yet — if on earth alive

  Did she feel a smart, and with vague strange anguish strive?

  If in heaven, did she smile at me sadly and shake her head?'

  Morse felt saddened as he walked out into the High. Hardy always managed to make him feel sad. And particularly so now, since only a few days earlier he'd consigned a precious photograph to the flames: a photograph hitherto pressed between pages 88-89 of his Collected Poems of A. E. Housman - the photograph of a dark-haired young woman seated on a broken classical column somewhere in Crete. A woman named Ellie Smith; a woman whom he'd loved - and lost

  Morse pondered the probabilities. Had other photographs been burned or torn to little pieces since the murder of Rachel James - photographs hitherto kept in books or secret drawers?

  Perhaps Lewis was right. Why not publish the photo in the Oxford Mail} Assuredly, there'd be hundreds of incoming calls: so many of them wrong, of course - but some few of diem probably right...

  Morse turned left into Alfred Street, and walked down the narrow cobbled lane to the junction with Blue Boar Street, where he tried the saloon-bar door of the Bear Inn.

  Locked - with the opening hour displayed disappointingly as midday. It was now 11.20 a.m., and Morse felt thirsty. Perhaps he was always thirsty. That morning, though, he felt preternaturally thirsty. In fact he would gladly have swallowed a pint or two of ice-cold lager - a drink which at almost any other time would have been considered a betrayal by a real-ale addict like Morse.

  He tapped lightly on the glass of the door. Tapped again. The door was opened.

  A few minutes later, after offering identification, after a brief explanation of his purpose, Morse was seated with the landlord, Steven Lowbridge, at a table in the front bar.

  'Would you like a coffee or something?' asked Sonya, his wife.

  Morse turned round and looked towards the bar, where a row of beers paraded their pedigrees on the hand-pumps.

  'Is the Burton in good nick?'

  The landlord (Morse learned) had been at the Bear Inn for five years, gready enjoying his time there. A drinking-house had been on the site since 1242, and undergraduates and undergraduettes were still coming in to crowd the comparatively small pub: from Oriel and Christ Church mostly; from Lincoln and Univ, too.

  And the ties?

  The Bear Inn was nationally - internationally -renowned for its ties: about five thousand of them at the last count Showcases of ties covered the walls, covered the ceilings, in each of the bars: ties from Army regiments, sports clubs, schools and OB associations; ties from anywhere and everywhere. The collection started (Morse learned) in 1954, when the incumbent landlord had invited any customer with an interesting-looking tie to have the last three or four inches of its back-end cut off - in exchange for a couple of pints of beer. Thereafter, the snipped-off portions were put on display in cabinets, with a small square of white card affixed to each giving provenance and description.

  Morse nodded encouragingly as the landlord told his well-rehearsed tale, occasionally casting a glance at the cabinet on the wall immediately opposite: Yale University Fencing Club; Kenya Police; Welsh Schoolboys' Hockey Association; Women's Land Army...

  Ye gods!

  What a multitude of ties!

  Morse's glass was empty; and the landlady tentatively suggested that the Chief Inspector would perhaps enjoy a further pint?

  Morse had no objection; and made his way to the Gents where, as he washed his hands, he
wondered whither all the washbasin plugs in the world could have disappeared - plugs from every pub, from every hotel, from every public convenience in the land. Somewhere (Morse mused) there must surely be a prodigious pile of basin-plugs, as high as some Egyptian pyramid.

  Back in the bar, Morse produced his photograph and pointed to the little patch of tie.

  'Do you think there's anything like that here?'

  Lowbridge looked down at the slimly striped maroon tie, shaking his head dubiously.

  'Don't think so ... But make yourself at home - please have a look round - for as long as you like.'

  Morse experienced disappointment.

  If only Lewis were there! Lewis - so wonderfully competent with this sort of diing: checking, checking, checking, the contents of the cabinets.

  Help, Lewis!

  But Lewis was elsewhere. And for twenty-five minutes or so, Morse moved round the two bars, with increasing fecklessness and irritation.

  Nothing was matching .. .

  Nothing.

  'Find what you're after?' It was the darkly attractive Sonya, just returned from a shopping expedition to the Westgate Centre.

  'No, sadly no,' admitted Morse. 'It's a bit like a farmer looking for a lost contact lens in a ploughed field.' "That what you're looking for?'

  Sonya Lowbridge pointed to the tie in the photograph that still lay on the table there.

  Morse nodded. "That's it.'

  'But I can tell you where you can find that'

  'You can?' Morse's eyes were suddenly wide, his mouth suddenly dry.

  ‘Yep! I was looking for a tie for Steve's birthday. And you'll find one just like that on the tie-rack in Marks and Spencer's.'

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  A Slave has but one Master; yet ambitious folk have as many masters as there are people who may be useful in bettering their position

  (La Bruyere, Characters)

  'WELL?'