Well-Schooled in Murder (29 page)

Corntel pulled back the curtains which had been partially drawn to cover the windows. Lynley noticed that the study looked out upon Calchus House, and that a pathway between the two buildings passed not twenty feet from the window. There would be little privacy in this room, save with the curtains drawn.

“Coffee?” Corntel offered and motioned towards a cupboard recessed into the wall. “I’ve an espresso machine if you’d like to try some.”

“Thank you.”

Watching the other man go about the business of making the coffee, Lynley recalled Elaine Roly’s words.
Little witch wants to turn him inside out. And has done so, if you want the truth from me
. He applied Roly’s allegations to John Corntel’s present state, questioning whether a relationship existed between the matron’s words and the housemaster’s condition.

Never had he seen a man wear such a thin veneer of protection. Emotions roiled just beneath the surface. They evidenced themselves in his eyes which refused to hold contact with Lynley’s own, in his hands which snatched at objects clumsily as if receiving inaccurate data from his brain, in his shoulders which hunched shell-like round him, in his speech which failed at modulation. It was hard to believe that Corntel could be reduced to such ill-hidden anxiety merely out of love for a woman, unrequited or otherwise. And something in the manner in which Emilia Bond had looked at the man when Lynley had come upon them in the playing fields suggested that if love led the vanguard that assaulted the walls of Corntel’s peace, it was not unrequited at all. That being the case, the problem became one of identifying the crucial element that lay at the heart of John Corntel’s affliction. Lynley thought he recognised it well enough. One usually does recognise the symptoms of disease in a fellow sufferer.

“What was the name of that boy at Eton who was so good at escaping the duty master?” Lynley asked. “You know the one. No matter who it was on night or weekend duty, he always knew exactly what the routine would be—when rounds would be made, when doors would be checked, when a surprise visit was due to a house. Do you remember him?”

Corntel was sliding the small metal coffee holder into the espresso machine. He locked it into place. “Rowton. He claimed to have ESP.”

Lynley chuckled. “He must have. He was never wrong, was he?”

“All that talent wasted just to slip into Windsor to see some bit of fluff. Did you know that? He got her pregnant eventually.”

“I can only remember him being harassed by the other boys about examinations. If he had ESP, damn it all, why couldn’t he use it to see what old Jervy had put into the history trial for next Tuesday?”

Corntel smiled. “How did Rowton always put it? ‘It don’t work like that, mates. I only see what these blokes do, or what they’re going to do, not what they think.’ Someone would argue that if he could see what they were going to do, he could damn well see the examination, since writing an examination is
doing
something, after all.”

“And Rowton’s response was an intimate description of Jervy writing out his examination, as I recall. Complete with details of Mrs. Jervy coming in to interrupt him, wearing a Mary Quant miniskirt and white vinyl boots.”

“And nothing else.” Corntel laughed. “Mrs. Jervy always dressed five or six years behind the times, didn’t she? Lord, how Rowton could lead one a merry chase with his stories. I haven’t thought of him in years. What made you do so?”

“The idea of a duty master. I was wondering who was duty master here this past weekend, John. I was wondering if it was you.”

Corntel made an adjustment to the espresso machine. Steam hissed out. Coffee began to flow into a glass carafe. He didn’t reply to Lynley’s remarks until he had poured two demitasses, arranged them with milk and sugar on a tin tray, and placed this on the drop-leaf table. He pushed the ashtray to one side but did not empty it.

“You’re clever, Tommy. I didn’t even see that coming. Have you always had such an affinity for policework?”

Lynley picked up a cup of coffee and carried it to one of the armchairs. Corntel followed. He moved a guitar to one side—Lynley noticed that two of its strings were broken—and sat on the sofa. He’d left his own coffee on the table.

“Matthew Whateley was a boy from this house,” Lynley answered. “You were responsible for his welfare. He somehow got lost in the cracks last weekend. All that’s true, isn’t it? But something tells me that what you’re feeling over this goes beyond the responsibility inherent to your position as housemaster. So I wondered if you were also supposed to be duty master this weekend, responsible for the security of the entire school.”

Corntel’s hands dangled limply between his legs. He seemed without defence. “Yes. You know the worst now. Yes.”

“I take it that you didn’t patrol the grounds at all.”

“Will you believe me when I say I forgot?” He looked at Lynley directly. “I’d forgotten. It wasn’t actually my duty weekend. I’d traded with Cowfrey Pitt some weeks back and I simply forgot.”

“Cowfrey Pitt?”

“The German master. Housemaster of Galatea, one of the girls’ houses.”

“Why did he want to trade? Or was it your idea?”

“His. I don’t know why. I didn’t ask. It didn’t matter to me anyway. I’m always here unless it’s a holiday, and even then sometimes…You don’t want to hear this. You know it all now. I forgot to patrol. It didn’t seem so bad at the time. Most of the children were gone. They had exeats. There was the hockey trip. But if I had only been doing my duty, I might have caught Matthew Whateley trying to slip off. I know that. Still, I didn’t patrol. There it is.”

“How often are you supposed to patrol the school on a weekend?”

“Three times Friday night. Six times on Saturday. The same on Sunday.”

“On a regular schedule?”

“No, of course not. There’d hardly be a reason to patrol, would there, if the pupils knew exactly when I’d be coming by?”

“Do all the students know who the duty master is?”

“All the prefects know. They’re given a list each month. They report to the duty master if something’s not right, so naturally they have to know who the duty master is.”

“Would they have been told that you and Cowfrey Pitt had exchanged duty?”

“The Headmaster would have told them. The exchange was cleared through his office. These things always are.” Corntel leaned forward, cradling his forehead in one hand. “Lockwood doesn’t know I failed to patrol, Tommy. He’s looking for a scapegoat. He has to find one, you know, lest he be named it himself.”

Lynley avoided the issue of Alan Lockwood. “I have no choice but to ask the next question, John. You failed to patrol the school on Friday night. You failed again to do so on Saturday. What were you doing? Where were you?”

“Here. I swear it.”

“Can someone corroborate that?”

The espresso machine hissed out a spout of steam. Corntel went to unplug it. He remained in that corner of the room, head bent, hands curved round the glass carafe.

“Emilia Bond?” Lynley asked.

A sound escaped Corntel’s lips, distant cousin to a cry. “I’m pathetic. What you must think of me. I’m thirty-five years old. She’s twenty-five. There’s no sense in this. There’s even less hope. I’m not what she thinks. I’m not what she wants. She doesn’t understand. She
won’t
understand.”

“You were with her Friday night? Saturday as well?”

“That’s the devil of it. Part of Friday. Part of Saturday. But not the entire night. So she can’t help you. Don’t ask her. Don’t involve her in this. It’s bad enough between us as it is.”

Corntel spoke insistently. His tone was a plea. Hearing this, Lynley reflected upon the penalty a housemaster would pay if Alan Lockwood knew that a woman had spent part of the night in his rooms. Beyond that, he reflected upon Corntel’s desire to leave Emilia uninvolved in the situation. This wasn’t the nineteenth century, after all, with Emilia Bond a woman whose virtue needed protecting at the cost of a man’s professional future. Neither was likely to face permanent perdition for spending a few discreet hours in the other’s company. There was something else here, something beyond the woman’s presence in Corntel’s rooms. Lynley could sense that probability unmistakably, like a clear and present danger. He sought a way to bring it into the open. As far as he could see, the only hope of Corntel’s speaking to him with any real honesty lay in the fact that the two men were alone. No notes were being taken. The interview wore at least the appearance of a conversation between old friends.

“I take it you’ve had some sort of row,” Lynley said. “Miss Roly isn’t very happy with the impact Emilia’s had on your life.”

Corntel raised his head. “Elaine’s worried. She’s been queen of Erebus for years. The last housemaster was unmarried as well, and she can’t bear the thought that a housemaster’s wife might come along and usurp some of her authority. I ought to tell her she has nothing to worry about. There’s no possibility of a marriage here.” His shoulders heaved. In a moment he turned round and faced Lynley again. His eyes were red-rimmed. “None of what happened to Matthew Whateley had anything to do with Emilia. She didn’t know the boy.”

“But you do admit that she was here, in this house?”

“With me. That’s the extent of it.”

“Yet she does know other boys from Erebus. Brian Byrne, for example, is one of her upper sixth chemistry students. I saw him in her laboratory yesterday afternoon. And he’s your house prefect.”

“What has that to do with anything?”

“I’m not certain, John. Perhaps nothing. Perhaps everything. You told me that Brian was here in the house Friday evening. Brian himself told me that he was in the upper sixth social club most of the night.”

“I thought he was here. I didn’t check.”

“Not even later? Not after Emilia left?”

“I was upset. I wasn’t thinking. I didn’t check on anything once she left.”

“Do you know whether she actually left the building at all? Did you see her leave?”

Corntel’s face, already ashen, seemed to lose even more colour as he took in the meaning behind the question. “Good God, you can’t be suggesting that
Emilia…
”

“Only yesterday she tried to protect your house prefect from being questioned, John. What am I to think of that?”

“It’s her
way
. She doesn’t believe anyone’s capable of evil. She can’t even see it. She doesn’t even think—” Again he stopped himself short of admission.

“She doesn’t think…?” Lynley prompted.

Corntel came slowly back to the couch and stared down at it as if trying to decide whether to remain standing or to sit. He reached out and touched a worn spot on its arm.

“How could you possibly understand?” he asked dully. “Viscount Vacennes. Earl of Asherton. When has anything you ever tried met with less than success?”

The unfairness of the words—their utter inaccuracy—struck Lynley to the quick. The fact that he had not been expecting to hear them struck him to silence. For the first time since the interview had begun, he wished for Sergeant Havers’ presence, for her ability and willingness to cut past emotions and ruthlessly carve right into the heart.

“It’s the truth, isn’t it?” Corntel was asking bitterly.

Lynley found his voice. “Far from it, I’m afraid. But I can’t expect you to know that, John. Not at a distance of seventeen years.”

“I don’t believe that.”

“Your disbelief doesn’t alter the truth.”

Corntel’s eyes moved away from him. Then they returned. His body shook with a convulsive tremor.

“We started out last year merely as friends,” he said. “I’ve never been much good round women, but it was different with Emilia. She was easy to talk to. She listened. Always she had her eyes right on my face. Other women had never been like that, in my experience. They always seemed to be after something. Talking to me, yes, but with their minds on something else so that soon into the conversation I wasn’t able to think of a reasonable thing to say to hold their attention. But Emilia”—his expression grew soft, reflective—“if Emilia was after anything at all, I imagine she was after my soul. I think she wanted nothing more than to know me through and through. We even wrote to each other on holidays. It’s easier, I find, to say things in writing, easier to be more of what one really is. That’s how it is in my case, anyway. So I wrote to her and I talked to her. About my father, about the novel I long to write and probably never will, about music I love, about things that seem important in my life. But not about everything. Just the things that made me look good. Even now I think that had I told her everything—all those nasty little secrets about ourselves that we hide—she might not have wanted me.”

“Nasty little secrets usually count for nothing set aside love,” Lynley noted.

“No. That’s not true.” Corntel spoke with resignation, a statement oddly without self-pity, considering how he continued. “Not really, Tommy. Oh, perhaps in your case. You’ve far more to offer a woman than I. But in my case, when the mind and the spirit and the body are revealed in all their inadequacy, there’s not much there.”

Lynley remembered the boy who strode across the schoolyard at Eton, head and shoulders above the rest, a King’s Scholar assured of a brilliant future. “I find that hard to believe,” he said.