Sidney Chambers and the Perils of the Night (22 page)

She turned to the second movement of the sonata, the arietta, and struggled with the trill and the subsequent division of bars into eighty-one parts. She slowed her performance down, first to half tempo and then stopped completely in order to work methodically on each individual bar, going over it again and again, gradually increasing the speed as she became more aware of the technique required.

The third variation, with its dance-like character, felt like playing boogie-woogie and she smiled at the notion of telling Sidney how close she thought it was to ragtime. She even imagined the horror that would spread across the face of Orlando Richards if she expressed the idea that Beethoven was one of the founders of jazz.

As she did so, she wondered how possible it would be to return to England. She couldn’t imagine Sidney going to live in Germany and assumed that if they were to spend more time together then she would have to come back to Grantchester: unless, of course, her future husband had some form of promotion. She could tell that he had the intelligence and the talent to rise through the ranks of the Church of England but she worried that his detective work was impeding his career. He had already confessed to the archdeacon’s warning. But perhaps the fact that he was involved in all these investigations was an inevitable part of his character; testimony to his willingness to engage in the darker side of the human story? To take away this sphere of activity would make him a lesser man; less involved, less committed, and less like himself.

Her
task, she decided, as she took the music at a run once more, was to help him become a more complete priest; and
his
task was to realise what she had to offer and how much more they could achieve if they were together. In the meantime, however, there was a mystery to solve.

Hildegard sighed as she finished the piece and closed the keyboard. She could play so much better, she knew, and there was so much more work to be done.

It was not clear how soon Keating’s ‘watch’ on G staircase would begin and Sidney asked Hildegard whether they should warn Orlando Richards that a surveillance operation was about to commence. She reminded Sidney that, despite his undoubted charms, the Professor of Music had still not been ruled out as a suspect. What exactly were his motives in planting coded messages within his compositions? Could their implementation simply be explained as some kind of donnish exhibitionism and was there anything that had been overlooked? Why, for example, had the professor so willingly vacated his rooms to Hildegard, and was there anything significant in the choice of Peterhouse as his place of refuge? Had he either suspected that some foul play was in the air or even been the perpetrator?

Sidney walked across New Court and climbed to the first floor of G staircase. Cade’s rooms were closed but the Professor of Music was not only sporting his oak; the inner doorway was ajar. On pushing it open Sidney could see Edward Todd in the far corner of the room in a kneeling position behind Orlando’s two-bar fire. He was fiddling with the back and rummaging around by the socket. After Sidney had expressed surprise at finding the dean of the college in another man’s rooms he asked what was going on.

‘This is my fire. I am collecting it. Professor Richards has failed to return it to me.’

‘Then why do you not simply unplug it?’

‘That is what I was doing.’

‘I don’t think you need a screwdriver to do that.’ Sidney had noticed the thin metal object in his hands. ‘What are you doing in his rooms in any case?’

‘I might ask the same question of you.’

‘Professor Richards has invited me in for a drink. He will be along shortly,’ Sidney lied.

‘I wanted to get my fire back.’

‘How did you know Professor Richards had it?’

‘The porters asked me. It was meant as a temporary measure. It was an act of goodwill on my part, if you must know. Not that this is any of your business.’

‘And are you aware of Professor Richards’s routine?’

‘What do you mean?’

‘You know that he plunges his hands into warm water before playing?’

‘No.’

‘And you are aware of the dangerous combination between water and electricity?’

‘Of course.’

‘Then you will not mind if I examine the plug that is affixed to his fire.’

‘Why would you want to do that?’

‘Because I believe you have hard-wired the fire to the mains. A man touching it with damp hands would receive a severe, possibly fatal, electric shock.’

‘That is nonsense.’

‘There is a basin in the room behind you. Perhaps you would like to wash your hands and touch the fire yourself.’

‘Don’t be absurd.’

‘Touch it.’

‘I will not.’

‘Touch it.’

‘For God’s sake.’

Edward Todd made a quick, and potentially fatal, decision. He advanced with the screwdriver in his hands, the metal tip raised as a weapon. Sidney took a step back and realised that he was either going to have to dodge his assailant’s approach, enter into some kind of fight, or retreat through the door as quickly as he could.

Todd blocked off the exit. ‘None of this is any of your business.’

‘Everything is my business.’

‘You are only making matters worse, Canon Chambers.’

Sidney wanted to say that the reverse was the case but knew that such a remark would only place him in further danger. ‘Put the screwdriver down.’

‘I need it. It is about to come in very useful.’

Sidney played for time. ‘Why have you done all this, Todd?’

‘I haven’t done anything.’

‘You killed Cade.’

‘I did nothing of the kind. It was a heart attack.’

‘No,’ Sidney replied. ‘It was an electric shock.’

‘I don’t know how you’ve come to that conclusion. By what logic . . .’

‘You know far more about wiring and are more practical than you have been prepared to let on. I see that . . .’

‘Then I’m going to make sure you don’t see anything else.’

Todd lunged forward. Sidney picked up a chair and threw it in his way. He was going to have to get to the door as soon as he could. ‘This is not going to help, Todd.’

‘No one has ever helped me. I have to do everything myself.’

‘That’s not strictly true, though, is it?’

Todd stopped for a moment. He was still holding the screwdriver. ‘What do you mean?’

‘You used some of Cade’s work in your thesis. He certainly helped you, not that he was aware that he was doing so.’

‘I’m not admitting to that kind of nonsense.’

‘He was about to accuse you of plagiary, wasn’t he?’

‘That is a lie.’

‘No, Todd. It’s why you killed him.’

‘No one can prove that.’

‘When you explained your theory . . .’

‘I don’t expect a man like you to understand any of this. You are a troublesome priest and you are out of your depth.’

Sidney was still far from the door and wondering how on earth he was going to attempt an escape when it opened suddenly, a whistle sounded and Inspector Keating came into the room with two police officers.

‘How dare you?’ Todd shouted before he was brought to the ground. ‘You can’t interfere in college life like this.’

He was disarmed and handcuffed. ‘You have no authority here,’ he complained.

Inspector Keating was having none of it. ‘Professor E.D.F. Todd, I am arresting you for the murder of Dr Adam Cade and for the attempted murder of Professor Orlando Richards and Canon Sidney Chambers. You do not need to say anything now, but anything that you do say . . .’

Hildegard did not hear the news of the night’s events from Sidney but during a surprise visit to her lodgings by the Master of Corpus. He had come to explain the situation in person to Charlie Crawford, to apologise for all that had happened, and to offer him his job back.

‘That’s a relief, I must say,’ Charlie began. ‘I have a reputation, as well you know. That man was trying to ruin me.’

‘I think he was trying to protect himself, Charlie.’

‘With no thought for the working man.’

Rather than accept a swift return to full employment, Charlie now used the opportunity to negotiate a rise in salary and the full payment of all the overtime that he considered due.

‘I must say,’ the Master had replied, ‘I think perhaps they could do with some of your negotiating skills in the Foreign Office.’

‘I just want to be paid for the work that’s done.’

‘At least in your line of business it is easier to establish what is being done and what is not. Within academia it is so much harder to tell whether anyone is being productive or not.’

‘That’s why they pay you more.’

‘I’m not sure they do, Crawford,’ the Master added wistfully. ‘If you divided a fellow’s annual salary by the number of hours he works then he’s probably paid less than a plumber.’

‘I promise that I won’t charge you for this hour, Master.’

‘Then,’ Sir Giles observed tartly, ‘I won’t charge you for my time either.’

After he had left, an appalled Grace Wardell tackled her brother, as she laid the table for their Saturday tea. ‘That took some nerve,’ she said.

‘You have to let them know where you stand. The fellows like a bit of banter anyway. Wouldn’t you agree, Mrs Staunton?’

‘I am not sure what you mean by “banter”?’

‘Quick chat, having a laugh.’

Mrs Wardell poured out the tea. ‘It’s just being cheeky, if you ask me.’

Her brother offered Hildegard an explanation. ‘You have to be English to understand it. It’s not something you’d find on the Continent, I imagine.’

Grace Wardell was fussing. ‘I don’t know how you can be so sure about that. Do sit down, Mrs Staunton.’

Hildegard was thinking about Dr Cade’s murder and how differently her stay had been to anything that she had been expecting. Tomorrow would be Easter Day and lunch with Sidney and they had hardly had a moment alone together.

Her landlady put the food on the table. ‘Sausages in batter,’ she announced. ‘You know we have a special phrase for this dish, Hildegard?’

‘Yes, I think I know it. And in another house in Cambridge it would not be “toad in the hole” but “Todd” in the hole.’

‘Very good,’ said Charlie. ‘I see you have a sense of humour after all.’

‘Not really,’ Hildegard smiled. ‘After all that has happened, I am only just beginning to put my toe in the water.’

‘Now that,’ Charlie Crawford laughed, ‘is what I call banter.’

Earlier that afternoon, Sidney had looked in on Keating in the police station in St Andrew’s Street. He wanted to discover if Professor Todd had made a full confession and if his suspicion as to the motivation of the murderer had proved correct. Todd had at first refused to answer any questions, quoting the ancient charter of 1231 given by King Henry III that awarded the university the right to discipline its own members,
ius non trahi extra
, and expressing a haughty disdain for the workings of the police.

‘But of course the fellows always think they are immune from the real world. The only way to fight back is to get them on their own terms.’

‘And how do you do that?’

‘We referred to the statutes and ordinances of the university itself.’

‘I didn’t know you had a copy.’

‘You’d be surprised what we have here, Sidney.’ Keating opened a large volume on his desk and began to quote from it: ‘ “No member of the university shall intentionally or recklessly disrupt or impede or attempt to disrupt or impede the activities and functions of the university, or any part thereof, or of any college.” I think electrocution counts as disruption, don’t you? However, we still haven’t got to the real reason why he did it.’

‘Adam Cade was threatening to expose Edward Todd as a plagiarist.’

‘Some kind of blackmail, you mean? Is plagiarism so dangerous that a man would want to murder to prevent it being known?’

‘Creative theft, which is, I think, the more polite way of explaining it, happens all the time with the flow of ideas. Musicians and writers are always stealing from each other. Hildegard has been telling me how Beethoven’s last sonata contains a hidden theme from Bach; and how, in turn, Chopin’s revolutionary étude takes up the theme and Prokofiev’s second symphony follows its structure. Eliot’s
The Waste Land
is full of quotations and borrowed ideas. But only the truly creative person can get away with this. They have to have enough originality to acknowledge their sources. Those who do not are on shakier ground, and my friend Professor Meldrum assures me that there is no more precarious territory than mathematical and scientific research. Professor Todd’s forthcoming volume on percolation theory owed much to the work of his research fellow and yet this is not acknowledged, even in the publisher’s proofs. Cade had got hold of a copy and threatened to expose Todd and ruin his reputation.’

‘Who told you this?’