Maxwell's Point (22 page)

‘Max!’

And he groaned in agony as Jacquie threw herself at him.

‘Thanks, guv,’ Jacquie Carpenter held out her right hand, her arm straight, her head high. ‘I owe you one.’

‘What’s this?’ Hall asked.

The pair of them were standing in Hall’s office the next morning as the sun filtered in through the slats of the blinds, the particles of dust swirling in the atmosphere.

‘It was either going to be a handshake or a smack in the mouth,’ she said. ‘I must confess I was ready to give you the latter last night. You sent me on that wild goose chase to Brighton to get me out of the way, didn’t you?’

‘Tsk, tsk,’ the DCI shook his head. ‘Know what you can get for striking a police officer? And yes, of course I did.’

She smiled at him. ‘For striking a police officer, I can get a lot of satisfaction, guv,’ she said.

He
almost
smiled back. But then, he was Henry Hall, so that wasn’t going to happen this side of Hell freezing over.

‘If it’s any consolation to you and Max,’ he said. ‘Jack Taylor’s been singing like a canary all night. He’s not the brightest apple in the barrel is our Jack, and for some reason he got fixated on the fact that Maxwell was involved in his dad’s murder. Got a little confused at the offices of the
Advertiser
apparently – well, which of us hasn’t? He
overheard a couple of journalists talking about the Taylor case and, as you’d expect, they happened to mention Peter Maxwell as somebody who might know something. Jack jumped to the wrong conclusions and so he fixed Maxwell’s bike – but not in a good way.’

‘Well, thanks for that,’ Jacquie said. ‘I think he had somebody else in the frame for that one. What’s going to happen to Juanita, guv?’

‘According to what we heard from Mendoza,’ Hall said, ‘she’s an accessory before the fact. We’ll have to inform the Spanish authorities and then it’s over to them.’

‘Rather ironic, really,’ Jacquie said. ‘Rodrigo Mendoza goes to all those lengths to hush the whole thing up, and it’s all going to hit the fan anyway.’

Hall nodded. ‘That’s Africa,’ he said. But he probably meant Spain.

Surrey was on the mend. He would forever be rather like the very axe that took off the head of Charles I, with a replacement blade and a replacement haft, in that his frame was new and his wheels had been resoldered and the tyres were hot off the press. At least Maxwell took some comfort from the fact that the agonising old saddle was still the same; that and the fact that it would be a while before he was in it again.

So it was on that Saturday morning, with Nolan ensconced with Pam and talking once more to little Zoë – zicker, zicker – and Jacquie getting back into harness after the scare of her life the night before, Peter Maxwell embarked on a journey he never thought he’d make.

‘Well, well, Dierdre,’ he could actually beam by this time,
‘what a lovely house. And to think, all these years we’ve been colleagues, I’ve never once been invited over the threshold.’

‘Max,’ the Medusa’s face appeared to have turned to stone. ‘What…’

‘…time is it?’ Maxwell finished the sentence for her. ‘Day is it? Are you doing here? The fuck? Which of those questions would you like me to answer first, Senior Mistress?’

Dierdre Lessing hadn’t been called that in a long time. It was no longer her role, but little things like educational exactitude never fazed Mad Max for long. ‘I was going to ask what happened to you?’ she said.

‘May I come in, Dierdre? I have a few things to say that I am prepared to bet your neighbours won’t want to hear. Or perhaps they will, depending on the precise nature of your relationship.’

‘Oh, please,’ she said, gushing more than a little. ‘Max, be my guest.’

‘Joy,’ growled Maxwell and entered her portals. He didn’t stumble over too many corpses in the hallway, though he was in the Lair of the White Worm.

‘I didn’t know you knew where I lived,’ she said. ‘What—?’

‘Questions, questions,’ Maxwell cut her short. ‘Let me ask you one, Dierdre. One I put to you, in fact, only days ago when I was still marginally employed by Leighford High School. How did the concerned member of the public who wrote that charming letter that maligned my character and libelled me know that Stephanie Courtney was in Year 11? I have added a few words there, because, as I’m sure you know by now, Dierdre, the little plan has been blown out of the water.’

She was staring at him open-mouthed.

‘Let me add a few more words for you, just for clarity – how did Oliver Lessing, who wrote that charming letter etcetera, etcetera…’ again, the immaculate Yul Brynner from
The King and I
; again, as so often in the past, wasted on Dierdre Lessing. ‘Now, talk me through this one, Senior Mistress mine, because, you see, it’s the similarity of the surname that has me fooled.’

She still hadn’t spoken.

‘Cough, Dierdre!’ he barked and immediately wished he hadn’t because he saw stars.

‘All right!’ she shrieked back. ‘Oliver Lessing is my uncle. I swear I didn’t know he was as…odd as he is. We were just talking the other day and he happened to mention that he’d seen you in the woods at The Dam with the girls.’

‘How did he know me?’ Maxwell wanted to be certain.

‘He’d seen you in the
Advertiser
, apparently.’

‘How did you know who the girls were?’

‘He described them,’ she muttered.

‘What?’ he asked.

‘He described them. In minute detail; what they were wearing, what they looked like. It couldn’t be anyone else.’

‘So you and he concocted the letter?’

‘No, no,’ she was adamant. ‘I merely said that I didn’t think it appropriate for a male member of staff to be alone with students like that.’

‘So the hands up the skirt and me exposing myself…?’

‘Max,’ she said, and there were tears in her eyes. ‘As God is my judge, I didn’t know he was going to write a letter at all. Obviously, it was to divert suspicion from himself…but, I had no idea. All that was just in his sordid imagination. I am so, so sorry.’

Maxwell looked at her. ‘Has Diamond been in touch?’

‘Yes,’ she said. ‘He’s delighted, genuinely delighted, Max, that it’s all been cleared up. You’ve misunderstood him all these years.’

‘Have I?’ Maxwell sneered, giving her his best Eddie Izzard. ‘Have I really?’

She turned into the kitchen and handed him a letter lying on the surface there. ‘You might like a copy of this,’ she said. ‘It’s my resignation from Leighford High. Uncle Oliver has done a bunk. I don’t exactly know why and I don’t want to know. Mother always tried to warn me about him, but…well, I didn’t listen. My part in this whole wretched business was stupid and irresponsible, but I swear, it was not intentional. I hope you’ll believe that, Max.’

He took the letter and read it. It was from the heart and the last line read ‘Peter Maxwell and I have rarely seen eye to eye on anything in the years we have worked together, but that has largely been my fault. He is, as you must know, one of the finest teachers and most caring men I have ever had the pleasure of knowing.’

Maxwell looked at the woman. The serpents seemed to have vanished from her head and her eyes, no longer hollows of horror, still had tears in them. He tore up the letter and let the pieces fall to the floor. He tipped his hat.

‘You have a good holiday, Dierdre Lessing,’ he said. ‘And I’ll see you in September.’

He was surprised to see Jacquie and Nolan waiting in the Ka outside Dierdre’s house.

‘Thought I’d pick you up,’ she smiled. ‘Bet no one’s done that in a long time.’

‘Bitch,’ he hissed, so that Nolan couldn’t hear.

She handed him a couple of tickets.

‘What’s this?’ he asked.

‘Danny Goodburn and the Denvers; they’re playing at the Town Hall tonight. I thought we’d go.’

‘“Whale on a beach”?’ mused Maxwell. ‘Yes, I think we shall.’

If you enjoyed this book, you may like to read the other books in the Peter ‘Mad Max’ Maxwell series.

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M.J. T
ROW
is a full-time teacher of history who has been doubling as a crime writer for twenty years. Originally from Rhondda in South Wales, he claims to be the only Welshman who cannot sing or play rugby. He currently lives on the Isle of Wight with his wife and son. His interests include collecting militaria, film, the supernatural and true crime. The author of the Inspector Sholto Lestrade series and nine non-fiction books,
Maxwell’s Point
is the twelfth novel featuring Peter ‘Mad Max’ Maxwell.

Maxwell's Point

Maxwell's Mask

Maxwell's Grave

Maxwell's Inspection

Maxwell's Match

Other titles in the series

Maxwell's Reunion

Maxwell's Curse

Maxwell's Ride

Maxwell's War

Maxwell's Movie

Maxwell's Flame

Maxwell's House

‘Trow has the reader chuckling while tussling over the intricacies of his dexterous plotting. Tragic and humorous by turns, the Maxwell novels are packed with dry wit and keep the readers guessing to the last page’
Good Book Guide

‘Trow’s skill at spinning mysteries a twist further than expected keeps him at the top of the form’
Sunday Telegraph

‘No one, no one at all, writes quite like Trow… It’s almost impossible to second guess Trow, so top marks for the scholarly sleuth’
Yorkshire Post

There comes a time in every teacher’s life when he must face his Nemesis – the four-yearly Ofsted Inspection. The investigation begins at Leighford High and Sally Meninger, the dangerously attractive chief inspector, is gunning for Peter Maxwell, Head of Sixth Form, from the start. But the tables are turned when Maxwell finds her in an intimate situation with her fellow inspector, Alan Whiting. Soon after, Whiting is found stabbed to death in the Inspection team’s office, and Maxwell can’t help but notice that Sally is not as upset as you might expect. In fact, her calm demeanour has more than a hint of the
femme fatale
about it. But it’s when Leighford High’s head teacher James Diamond becomes embroiled in the affair that things really start to turn nasty. It’s up to the embattled Head of Sixth Form to prove his friend’s innocence; the time has come to inspect the inspectors.

As part of a two-week staff exchange scheme, Peter ‘Mad Max’ Maxwell is swapping the delights of Leighford High for the altogether more sophisticated charms of local private school Grimmonds. This is a school where the teachers wear gowns, a school with inter-house rugby, debating societies and fencing lessons. It’s a far cry from his familiar comprehensive – Grimmonds is steeped in tradition and dripping with money. But within a day of stepping through the imposing school gates, Maxwell has yet again stumbled upon an unnatural death.

One of the Housemasters has fallen from the school roof – but did he jump or was he pushed? Two days later another teacher is found floating in the lake and this time it’s definitely murder. As the pack of journalists at the gates grows and parents start removing their children from the school, the headmaster has his work cut out to protect Grimmonds’ reputation. And when DS Jacquie Carpenter, Maxwell’s girlfriend, gets assigned to the case, Mad Max finds himself caught up in a complex police investigation and a tangled web of secrets.

When Peter ‘Mad Max’ Maxwell took his kids from Leighford High on an archaeological dig, all should have been about learning and fun. The professionals were very excited – was the grave they had found that of Alfred the Great? No, because the corpse was not Saxon and it wasn’t a king, but an altogether more recent murder.

No sooner has the first body been unearthed than another is discovered: a policeman on the case is found dead at the wheel of his car. What knowledge did he possess that led to his death? And does his colleague, Maxwell’s partner Jacquie Carpenter, unwittingly have the same information?

Maxwell locks horns with the great and not so good in a vicious world of skulduggery, academic back-biting and religious mania which can only end in murder.

Deena Harrison was one of Leighford High School’s ‘characters’ – and we all know what
that
means – but she had the voice of an angel and could act the skin off a rice pudding.

Now an Oxford graduate, Deena returns to her old school to help out the drama department – their production of the
Little Shop of Horrors
is in danger of closing down. So Deena’s back on the scene. And people start dying. Oh, just tragic accidents of course – loose cables, carelessly placed ladders. Just minor health and safety issues, really. But somebody is killing the company, and it isn’t Audrey II, the man-eating plant.

With murder treading the boards, DCI Henry Hall has his hands full. Especially when Peter Maxwell, Deena’s old Head of Sixth Form, stumbles into the spotlight. You see, Mr Maxwell has a habit of solving murders… Mad Max is once again on his bike.