The Cambridge Theorem (36 page)

“Did you know him?”

“Philby? No, but I knew Burgess all right. Everyone knew that bleedin' creature. He was one of the ones I couldn't stand.

“Well, then there's the rumor that Hawken is talking to people, dons you know, who'd been in the Party before the war, and I put two and two together. That's when I went to him and started workin' for him.”

“You work for Hawken?”

“Don't get me wrong. I've never liked the bloke. Never liked him at all. But I thought what he was doing was necessary. I told him about those I'd known back when I was a young man, those who came to Party meetings, who was still around. I don't feel bad about it, even now. I just wish I'd known more, could remember more. Of course, some was too high and mighty to come to meetings, and I just didn't know them. That old queen Blunt, for one. I was as surprised as anybody about him.”

“Then we, that is, me and Hawken, sort of had an informal agreement that I would keep an eye on the students, as much as I could. I'm in a good position to intercept the post, you know, and I get to hear a lot of gossip, about this college anyway. I'm not proud of it, but I'm not sorry, either. Plenty of young people make the same mistakes I made, and that's their privilege. I just felt we should know about 'em, make sure they did no harm.”

“What's all this got to do with Fenwick?”

“Well, that's the difficult part. You see, almost since he was hired on, I've had complaints about Fenwick, mostly from the other blokes on the late shift. Seems that he was always disappearing and gave as his excuse that he was doin' errands for Dr. Hawken, you know, odd jobs, buying things in the town. Well, it was irregular, but if he was busy for Hawken, well, there was not much I could do about it, was there? But I thought there might be something, well, unusual in that arrangement. See, he wasn't my first choice for that position, call it prejudice if you like, but like I told you Hawken has the last word on new hires, and he said we should take him on. Seemed peculiar at the time, not that I said nothing. But I wondered about his persuasion, if you like. That's why I knew it might be sticky if it turned out Fenwick was associating with young Bowles. I didn't want to believe it, when Givens told me about it. That's 'im out there in the lodge now. He was one always complaining to me about Fenwick, and I thought it might be, well, just malicious gossip. But when you told me that Fenwick had admitted to it, well, I had no choice but to report the whole thing to him, to Hawken, and he tells me to suspend him right away. Like you would expect. But then after the last meeting of the council, just this last Thursday, he tells me that Fenwick's been reinstated with just a reprimand, and I couldn't believe it. You see, the reports of the meetings aren't published, but I don't believe it ever came up. I don't think they ever discussed it, and then Hawken is able just to give him his job back, like that. And he was counting on me to say nothing. Not just because he has things on me, like, but because he knows I'm up for retirement this summer and I'm not likely to rock the boat by calling you or anything like that. And he was right, I didn't, although believe me I thought about it. Something's not right here. Not right at all.”

Smailes had sat on the corner of Beecroft's desk during this revelation. He was having trouble adding it all up.

“Mr. Beecroft, do you know something about Simon Bowles' death that you haven't told me?” he asked carefully.

“No, I swear. The first I knew about it was when Bunty Allen ran in here that day. Of course, I knew what young Mr. Bowles was lookin' into. Hawken had told me himself, after he'd tried to interview him. Asked me to keep my eyes and ears open about him. I did, as much as I could, but I didn't know anything about him, well, knowing Fenwick until one of the other porters told me about it, like I told you.”

“But you think Fenwick's kept his job because he can blackmail Hawken, right?”

“Well, you said that, officer, not me. But it's a very peculiar decision, that's all I can say. There's been some raised eyebrows in the lodge about it, and the men are all talking about it, I know. No one's come out and asked me about it plain, but if they do, I don't know what I'll say. I'm in a very sticky position, you see. I don't want people in this college to know I've been informing on students for nearly twenty years, and I don't want to do anything to upset my pension. I've earned that, you know. That's why I want you to go cautious with what I've told you. You understand?”

“Yes, I understand. But let me ask you straight. Do you think Hawken or Fenwick had some involvement with how Simon Bowles met his death?”

“That I can't say, Mr. Smailes. I don't know what he had found out, you see, about the two of them, so I'm just guessing. But I don't know if the inquest got the full story, you know. That I don't know.”

“Mr. Beecroft, who had a pass key to Simon Bowles' room?”

“Why?”

Derek Smailes recounted to him his suspicion that someone had removed a file from Bowles' cabinet in the twenty-four hours after his first examination of it, during the time the room was locked and Bowles' keys were at the police station. Beecroft's expression clouded.

“All members of the college council. One stays in the lodge, authorized sign-out only. The duty porter, which is unofficial-like. One on my ring. That's it.”

“How about the duty tutor?”

“No, he has to use the one in the lodge.”

“No one else?”

“No one else. Key can't be duplicated without college say-so, either. Stamped right on there.”

Beecroft turned again to look out into the lodge, pondering this new information. Fenwick was no longer around, and the other porter was talking to two students who were writing their names in a fat ledger. “So what are you going to do?” he asked nervously.

“I don't know,” said Smailes. “I'm going to think about what you've told me. But if I go anywhere with this, I'll do so in a way that protects you as the source of information, okay? Because I believe what you've told me. But whatever I do, I can't guarantee I'll tell you in advance, do you understand that? I can't operate that way.” The truth was, he was not sure Beecroft was telling him the whole truth. He was not sure at all.

“Please, officer. I've got more than thirty-five years' service with this place.”

“I know that, Mr. Beecroft. You've been able to trust me so far, haven't you?” Beecroft looked uneasy, but could see he was not going to get further guarantees from Smailes.

“I'm not asking you to understand what I've done. I don't know if anyone can understand, unless they had put their faith and their life on the line for the Party, like I did. It's got to do with betrayal. It makes you angry somewhere, very deep down, and you need some kind of revenge, even if it goes against your grain. I never enjoyed being an informer, but I've never taken a penny or gotten any considerations for it. I just feel that putting my trust in the Party was the biggest mistake of my life, and even if it's the likes of Hawken that is working to stop it doing any more damage, then that's no matter. The Communist Party is about consolidating its own power, pure and simple, and it has no respect for anything or anyone that gets in its way. I would do the same thing all over again, believe me.

“So in a way I wasn't put out of joint by what Bowles was up to, like Hawken was. More power to him, I thought, because he was a very bright bloke and maybe he would turn something over that'd been missed all these years. And if he'd found out about my past, well, I think I would have told him everything I knew, frankly, because he was a careful and trustworthy individual, I felt.”

“But he never did?” asked Smailes.

“Not to my knowledge, and I wasn't about to volunteer.”

“What do you mean when you say the inquest didn't get the full story? You mean about Fenwick finding the body?”

“No, I mean about why he did it, why he killed himself.”

“You have a theory?”

“Yes, I think maybe he found out that Fenwick was Hawken's lackey, and that had something to do with it. I'm only guessing, mind, but that's what I've been thinking. As for someone from here, going into his files after your fellas had been round, well, I'd be very surprised about that. Very surprised indeed.” He paused, then frowned at Smailes and said, “Well, I'm going to be off then, unless there's anything else.”

“No, what you've told me is plenty,” said Smailes. He reflected that Beecroft was an astute man, and considered talking to Fenwick yet again, probing his version of that night's events, and the circumstances of his reinstatement. Then he thought again of the precariousness of his own position, what would happen if Beecroft or Hawken were to call Dearnley. He decided to do nothing at present, and not tempt his fate.

Smailes called Lauren as soon as he got home and they agreed to meet for a drink. She sounded pleased to hear from him, but he felt uneasy about how much he should let her know of the day's developments. Either she did not know who Fenwick was, or she did not know that he had been reinstated, otherwise she would have let him know already, and would have been down on him like a ton of bricks. He guessed that since Fenwick worked the late shift and since Lauren lived out of college and checked her post in the morning, she had not yet run across him. When she did he knew it would be difficult to contain her. She would jump to the same conclusion he had, that Fenwick's reinstatement was somehow linked to Bowles' death, and she would want to make a stink. That could get him in further trouble at the station. Smailes started to feel that his situation there was looking hopeless.

He checked suspension procedures in his CID hand-book. In a paid disciplinary suspension, which was what he assumed he was on, he was entitled to a hearing within thirty days before a disciplinary panel. He was also entitled to free legal representation through the union, if he wanted it. He didn't know if he did. He could not invent much of a mitigating case for his deception in getting into the archive, and if George Dearnley was not going to stand up for him, he doubted anyone else would. If it came out that he was sexually involved with someone connected with the Bowles' case, and had divulged confidential information about it to her, then forget it. He was history. He was surprised he did not feel more anxious at the prospect of getting fired from the force. He made himself think of what he would do. His brother-in-law Neil had been at him for years to join his real estate agency, where he said there was good money to be made. Smailes couldn't quite see himself as a salesman, trying to sound enthusiastic about the new semi-detached estates in Histon. Then, of course, there was always the living death of the corporate security world, playing rent-a-cop. He didn't like the thought of that either. Maybe he should call the union, see about a solicitor.

What troubled him more was where to take the information that Beecroft had given him that afternoon. Assuming it was true, then there was definitely some kind of complicity between Hawken and Fenwick that was unethical, if not illegal. But what if Beecroft was simply aiming a knife at Hawken, and wanting Smailes to throw it? He could understand the level of resentment Beecroft might feel if it was true that he had been one of Hawken's informants for twenty years. What if the issue had been presented at the college council, and the dons had genuinely decided to let Fenwick off with a reprimand? Smailes would look a complete fool if he tried to cry foul over a decision that was completely legitimate, if peculiar. And who would he tell? George? Tell George that right after he had slapped him on suspension he had gone back to St. Margaret's to pursue the very same case for which he had been suspended? Or should he pick up the phone and dial MI5, and try and tell the Director-General that one of his senior men was being blackmailed by a homosexual college porter? What exactly was the relationship between Hawken and Alan Fenwick, and had Simon Bowles known anything about it? This was what troubled Smailes the most, his ever-growing suspicion that there was some kind of foul play involved in the death of Simon Bowles, and that somehow Hawken and Fenwick were tied into it.

He was still chewing over these issues when Lauren arrived at the pub and came over to join him. He got up and brought her a whisky, and she leaned over and kissed him behind the ear.

“You seem in a good mood tonight,” he told her.

“Why, aren't you?” she asked him.

“Surprisingly good, considering I just got suspended.”

Lauren expressed her horror in her predictably dramatic way and pressed him so hard for his story that Smailes had trouble getting out even his edited version. He told her he had followed up on a long-standing curiosity to inspect his father's personnel records in the government archive, but had had to forge the authorization to get in. He told her all about what the file had revealed, and how in his anger he had been unable to sit on the information, but had gone back to the station to confront the examining officer, who was now his direct boss. And that had earned him his suspension.

“So what's gonna happen, Derek? Are you gonna get thrown out?” she demanded to know. Smailes conceded it was a strong possibility if he could not think of a better defense than he had so far, and if George Dearnley stayed as angry with him as he was. This news seemed to make Lauren pensive, and they got into a discussion about Smailes' feelings in the light of the new information about his father. He said he could not decide whether to tell his mother or sister what he had learned, but that he would probably talk to his mother some day. He wanted to know if she had guessed, but had stayed silent to protect him, or to protect the reputation of his father. But if she had not guessed, then the information would be painful for her. He described his curious feelings of anger and elation, about how he now felt released from his lifelong need to meet his father's expectations, which were now revealed as a complete sham. He told her he felt the whole basis of his commitment to police service had been undermined.