Dead Unlucky (5 page)

‘Well, there’s always a chance that the lad’s computer will tell us something. And all that chocolate you found in his drawer makes me think a little idea that’s been rattling around in my head might not be completely daft, but I’ll tell you about that on the way back to the station,’ he added as he started the car.

*****

Hart settled himself down in his office and set his mind pondering about the little he knew regarding the case so far, and also whether he should get the kettle on for a cuppa before he went home. His musings were interrupted by a familiar clicking noise advancing along the corridor, which stopped as the pair of shoes reached his open office door.

‘Harry, I’m glad to have caught you,’ said Chief Superintendent Rodgers. ‘You missed out on a very fine dinner.’

‘Yes, sorry I had to leave like that, Sir. But I couldn’t really not turn up to lead a murder investigation just so I could get myself fed.’ Hart quickly decided the Chief deserved a more generous comment. ‘And it was very kind of you. I really do appreciate you inviting me along like that.’

‘Not at all, Harry. And you’re right that you had no choice about leaving, especially when a youngster has been murdered. But Patricia Luft was sad to see you go. You seemed to be getting on so well together.’

‘Sir?’

‘Harry?’

‘Her ex-husband is in the nick because I put him there.’

‘Exactly.
Ex
-husband. That water has well and truly flowed under the bridge. She divorced him as soon as she found out what he had been up to. And now she’s become a school governor, wants to be elected to her town council and is fast becoming a pillar of her local community.’ Rodgers gave the side of his nose a couple of conspiratorial taps. ‘And we took some time to have a little chat about you after you had gone.’

Hart didn’t fancy encouraging that line of conversation. ‘What’s caused you to nip into the station, Sir? I thought you would have gone straight home after your dinner.’

The Chief shuffled from foot to foot, looking sheepish. ‘Had to pick up some work. Well, best be off, my wife’s waiting in the car. Goodnight, Harry.’

‘Goodnight, Sir.’

As the clicking shoes moved away from his door, Hart smiled. Since the Chief’s hands were empty and he was walking towards the stairs which led to the station’s exit, perhaps he had forgotten that work he had come to pick up. After all, he surely couldn’t be so suspicious of Hart that he had popped by just to make sure that he hadn’t made up the story of the murder to get himself away from the dinner.

*****

Hart drove himself home, picked up a couple of brown envelopes from the hall doormat, chucked them unopened onto the kitchen table and went straight upstairs. Toilet, teeth, bed.

He was hungry after missing out on his fancy seafood dinner but, more than that, he was exhausted. Absolutely knackered. It wasn’t so much physically, but these things take a mental toll like nothing else on Earth. Murder. Bereavement. Supporting and encouraging the other police officers. Doing the same for anonymous families. Encountering every emotion known to humanity, and a few more besides. And you’re in charge of the whole blessed show. Everybody’s looking at you, expecting you to track down the killer of a young man, a boy really, just starting out on life. If you caught him, well then you were only doing your job so you couldn’t expect anyone to pat you on the back for that. And if you didn’t get this monster behind bars, then you had let them all down. You had failed family, friends, the force, the community; everybody who was looking to
you
to get justice done, to make the world a better, fairer and safer place. That was the burden of leading a murder investigation, and only a very few understood just what lonely work it was.

After hauling himself into bed and pulling up the covers to his chin, Hart leaned over and clutched the photo on his bedside cabinet. His eyes studied the smiling woman as she sat among the flowers in the garden, looking so beautiful to him in the happy summer sunshine of her life.

He whispered to her, as he did every night before he turned off the light. ‘Why did you have to leave me, Maggie old girl? Why did you have to go? You know I loved you so much. Still do. Always will.’

Hart kissed her, and then gently placed her back on her perch overlooking the bed. He pressed the switch on the bedside lamp, rolled over, and eventually drifted away into a heavy but troubled sleep.

The following morning Hart arrived at the police station car park bang on time to pick up Redpath for the journey to Highdean School. The price he paid for his punctuality was to miss out on the bumper breakfast, including a pile of mushrooms that were turning decidedly mangy, which he had promised to cook for himself that morning. He stayed behind the steering wheel since he would do the driving, as he always liked to do, with Redpath settling into the seat beside him.

‘I hear you took that new girl to the Emmers’ place last night,’ noted Redpath, starting them off on a subject which interested him. ‘It’s good to have an Asian working at the factory.’ He turned his head to the right and winked. ‘Especially when she’s drop-dead gorgeous.’

‘She’s not Asian, Darren, wherever her ancestors may have come from. She’s British. If she wasn’t she could hardly have joined up to a British police force now, could she? Think about it. Centuries ago, your forebears may have sailed over to this idyllic isle from Normandy or Germany. Just because they hauled themselves out of a Baltic bog you wouldn’t expect people to say,
It’s good to have a Saxon working at the factory
, would you?’

‘So what’s on the programme of events today then, Guv?’ enquired Redpath with a yawn after having his ignorance of ethnography put right.

‘Call me that again and you’ll be walking to school.’

‘Sorry, Sir.’

Hart prodded a button on the dashboard to silence the news on the radio; more journalists and minor politicians prattling on about horrors committed in faraway places.

‘First we have a word with the head, someone called Annalee Hargreaves, and then we interview as many teachers and pupils as we can get through today. There’ll be other coppers arriving later and they can take a fair bit of the workload, but I want you or me to see all the staff who taught him, and the boy’s best friends, those who were closest to him.’

‘Anything to look out for in particular?’ Another yawn.

‘Nope. A plain sheet of paper is what we’re writing on at the moment, but I reckon we’ll have something jotted down on it before the morning’s over, even if it’s only a bit of scrawl. And you’re not picking up a sergeant’s salary to spend your time taking a holiday in the land of Nod, Darren, so you can put that idea out of your head right now.’

As the sergeant lifted himself up out of his slouch he thought he was entitled to a bit of revenge. ‘Did you enjoy that seafood dinner last night, Sir? What there was of it, I mean.’

‘Stop taking the blooming mickey. You know full well that when I’m out with people like that I feel as comfortable as if I’m sitting in a sauna wearing a towel that’s been steeped in itching powder. I somehow can’t stop wriggling and sweating.’

‘I don’t know why, Sir. You’re a bright chap, very bright if popular opinion’s to be believed, and as good as any of them.’

They were travelling south towards London beneath a crisp starry heaven, with the large crescent Moon rising on their left telling them the sky wouldn’t be brightening for another hour or so.

‘Perhaps the brain’s still in fairly good nick, but bright isn’t posh. Not the same thing at all. God only knows what the Chief was doing trying to pair me up with Patricia Luft like that, and he’s not telling. It was me that got her husband banged up, for heaven’s sake.’

‘Perhaps the Chief thinks there’s a chance she may actually like you, perhaps he’s trying to do you a favour in his clumsy sort of way. Have you ever thought of that?’

‘What! No I blinking well haven’t.’ Hart darted a shocked expression to his left. ‘Patricia Luft is rich, divorced from that old money-bags of a lawyer who was put away for sticking his hand into the pocket of a multinational; she speaks English like it should be spoken, is more likely to drop her drawers than an aitch; and she understands the foreign bits on a menu.’

‘Never be surprised by women and what gets them hot. Think about all the females who drool over me, for instance.’

‘I’d rather not. It’s coming up on the left.’ Hart changed the subject with relief, and an abruptness which caught his passenger off guard.

‘What is?’ asked Redpath as he furrowed his brow.

‘The sign. We’ve just passed it. We have now crossed over the frontier which segregates us coarse bumpkins from the suave sophisticates of Greater London, and have therefore placed ourselves into the loving and tender arms of a police force which, despite compiling a catalogue of farcical and tragic catastrophes, still looks in the mirror and perceives the world’s most wondrous constabulary. Welcome to Metroland.’

A few minutes later, at just after a quarter past seven, they drove past another notice, this one declaring that they had arrived at Highdean School:
A prestigious school for day and boarding pupils between the ages of 11 to 18 years. Headteacher: Mrs Annalee Hargreaves, BA (Hons.), MA (Cantab.)
. The fees required to place your child under Mrs Hargreaves’ care and guidance were not displayed, but they were known to be pricey to say the least. Hart nestled the car into the parking space nearest the main door and they braved the freezing air.

Hart and Redpath followed the arrows to reception, guessing correctly that the Head’s office would be somewhere close by. There was nobody about at that time of the morning, prompting obvious exchanges about the security of the place, so they sat on a pair of comfy chairs and waited.

Their eyes panned around an administrative block which was the nerve centre of the school. No teaching was done here but it was where the queen bee lived and from where the orders and messages emanated which allowed the rest of the colony to function. Were it to flounder, then the whole nest would wither away from the inside. The walls were swathed with framed documents from eminent bodies proclaiming the excellence of the institution, and from grateful charities lauding its generosity.

The Headteacher arrived at half past seven exactly, and the two men stood to greet her. ‘Thank you for coming in so early, Mrs Hargreaves,’ said Hart as he shook her hand.

She was slim and as tall as Redpath, with a thin nose of length in proportion to her body. She used it like a rifle sight to look down at Hart in a manner which she clearly adopted instinctively – to make an immediate statement that her height conferred superiority and a consequent advantage in any future disagreement.

‘Not at all. It was the least I could do in circumstances like these, Chief Inspector Hart,’ she said, as she turned a key in the lock of her office door. ‘Won’t you please come in.’

Hart and Redpath assumed different vantage points in two of the four easy chairs which surrounded a glass-topped coffee table. They waited for Mrs Hargreaves to hang her maroon wool coat and to place her handbag in the bottom drawer of her desk before she sat down to join them. Like the walls outside, those in her office were plastered with an abundance of framed certificates: her degrees, diplomas, courses attended, and proof of the many and various educational achievements which merited praise. Only a visiting parent who was a complete simpleton could fail to be impressed.

‘We’re very sorry for the loss your school has suffered, Mrs Hargreaves,’ volunteered Hart.

‘Thank you, Chief Inspector. It is such a terrible shock, of course.’

After a respectful pause, Hart continued. ‘Our job is to catch the person responsible, with the least possible disruption to the routine of Highdean. However, we will of course need to interview all the staff and students who knew Sebastian. We’ll need a space in which to set up an office and, all being well, we’ll be out of here within a day or two, Friday at the latest. Of course, nobody here is a suspect and nobody will be treated like one.’ Hart managed to throw out a pair of great big lies in a short easy sentence.

‘You’ll have everything you need, I can assure you, Chief Inspector. This is a terrible tragedy and one we all want to put behind us as quickly as possible. The term finishes on Friday and I would rather we return in January with the matter closed.’

‘Can you give us an idea of what Sebastian was like, as a student and as a person?’

‘That’s simple. He was a delightful young man, a great credit to the school community. He excelled at sport and had many friends. He enjoyed an unfailing popularity with staff and students alike. Everybody knew him and, I think it’s fair to say, we all had considerable affection for him.’

‘And academically?’ quizzed Hart.

‘Always punctual with his assignments and always well-behaved in class.’

‘That’s handy to know but, not wishing to be too blatant, how bright was he?’

‘Well, if I were pushed, I would have to admit that he was not at the very top of his classes but, of course, our academic standards are so exceedingly high. Have you visited the school’s website?’

‘No, not yet,’ replied Hart, doing his best to maintain a neutral tone.

‘You really should. You would see that our examination results are most impressive, comparable with all the top private schools in the country, of which we are most definitely one, of course. There is also a list of alumni, detailing the universities they gained admission to and their subsequent employment and achievements. Our graduates have gone on to make highly significant –’

‘Mrs Hargreaves, I would prefer us to focus on Sebastian, if you don’t mind.’

She did mind. She minded a great deal, and her eyes shot a harsh glance all the way down her lengthy nose to tell him so.

‘Sebastian was a fine student, Mr Hart. There’s really very little else to say.’

‘Do you have any idea why he was in Lockingham yesterday evening? I mean, surely he boards at the school.’

‘Some of our students are day students, of course, although Sebastian himself was a boarder. Our older students do, however, have the option of signing out if they wish to spend the night elsewhere, as long as we know where they are going and that their destination is, how shall one say, appropriate. We prepare our students well for the freedoms of university and beyond, encourage them to make suitable lifestyle choices. I happen to know that Sebastian frequently went to stay with his parents as his journey home is relatively short and he does own a car.’

‘Thank you, Mrs Hargreaves. I’ll need to chat with you again but, for now, if you could let me know where Sergeant Redpath and myself will be working, I would be most grateful.’

‘I’ll make one of the deputy head’s offices available for any time you may wish to use the phone or computer, and you can have a couple of classrooms for your exclusive use for all of the time you are here.’

‘That’s very kind. And a list of all of the pupils with their contact details would be appreciated. And the teachers’ timetables and addresses, of course.’

‘We do have an excellent administrative system on the computer network, it’s the very best. We only had it installed over the summer and are rather proud of it. You’ll be able to gather all the information you need from there. It requires very little skill to use it.’

‘I’d prefer to have hard copies, if that’s all right.’

‘The secretaries are very busy, Mr Hart, I’m sure you’ll quickly get the hang of using the computer yourself.’

‘Mrs Hargreaves, we are all going to be very busy for the next few days. I would like those timetables because then I won’t need to take teachers out of lessons, with all the disruption that would cause, I can see them during their free periods instead. However, I’m not too fussed about that either way.’

‘If you’ll excuse me, Chief Inspector, I have to prepare for the arrival of the staff and for the assembly. The students are going to be devastated by the news.’

*****

However the income from the school fees at Highdean was distributed, not much of it made its way into the staffroom. Of course, the key employees would need to be well compensated to make sure they didn’t move to somewhere more attractive; Mrs Hargreaves and one or two of the senior educators, for example. The bursar and the extensive but vital non-teaching management team were also entitled to receive a just reward commensurate with their efforts and abilities. And the facilities for the students had to be top notch or there wouldn’t be a horde of prospective income jostling at the gate each September. So, by the time the owners had taken their share of what remained, there wasn’t much left to squander on regions of the school which were out of sight of the public.

A young woman wearing a burgundy PE skirt stood before the staff mail boxes, which were painted cream with brown specks where the paint had been chipped off, clutching a mug of coffee in her right hand. Her left was holding a neat A5 memo topped with the school logo and a few words of Latin she had never got around to finding out the meaning of.

‘A whole-school assembly,’ she announced to no one in particular. ‘I wonder what’s got up old Hag-greaves’ nose this time,’ she added before sipping her coffee.

About twenty teachers were sharing the staffroom with her, most of them having a chat on some decrepit chairs that looked like they had been cleared out when their Victorian owners had decided to spruce up their country home. A couple of men nattered by the metal sink as they rinsed out their mugs, while a woman recoiled and twitched up her nose before hurriedly closing the fridge door.