The Cambridge Theorem (37 page)

“Aw, come on, Plod. You're a cop through to your bones, what the hell else are you gonna do? Eat shit, tell them you really regret what you did, all that crap. Don't lose your job over something as stupid as this. I sort of felt the same when my Dad died, that my motivation had dried up, because he wasn't around to pat me on the head any more. That's bullshit. You do what you have to, inside.”

Smailes wanted to tell her the real reason he had put his job in jeopardy, but couldn't. Instead he asked her if she had any photographs of Simon Bowles.

“Simon? No, I don't think so. Why on earth do you want a picture of Simon?”

“Well, it seems that I'm going to have some time on my hands, and I've often thought it would be interesting to try and find out what he did in London, the day before he died. You know, take his picture around Somerset House, see if anyone remembers him.”

“So you are still looking into the whole thing, huh? You never told me. What else haven't you told me? What else have you found out?”

“Nothing, Lauren, I swear,” he said, and he knew then that when she found out about Alan Fenwick she was going to be very, very angry. He would deal with that when it came, because he had a strong intuition that if he was going to save his job, he needed to present some kind of new evidence in the Bowles case to justify his actions. And if he was to find new evidence he needed secrecy, which meant he had to keep Lauren out of the picture. But he felt awkward at the baldness of his deception, and thought she sensed it.

“Giles might,” she said. “You know, have a picture of Simon. I don't even have a camera. And I still don't understand why you're doing what you're doing. You're not levelling with me,” she accused.

Smailes met her gaze and then said quietly, “Let's just say it's something I have to do, inside.”

There was a palpable coldness between them, and he could sense Lauren's anger with him.

“Look, Lauren, I've had quite a day, and I've got a lot on my mind. Maybe tonight we shouldn't…”

“Yes, let's forget it,” she interrupted. “I was going to suggest the same myself.” She drained her glass and began to gather her coat. Smailes looked down at his glass and felt uncomfortable. But as she was leaving she stopped and held him by the arm.

“Derek, it's okay. I'm real sorry about what you found out, and I'm real sorry that you're in trouble at work.” She leant towards him and kissed him firmly on the mouth. “Call me soon, okay? I want to know what develops.”

“You bet,” said Smailes.

“Okay, cowboy,” she said, and was gone.

It was before ten when Smailes got home and he had one more call to make that night. He realized that unless he discovered what the college council had decided in the Fenwick matter, he could not take his suspicions any further. He looked up a number in the Cambridge directory and called Sir Martin Gorham-Leach.

G-L was his normal, affable self and did not even seem surprised that Smailes wanted to speak with him again, or curious about why. He said he would be at his lab all the next day but was planning to take dinner in college and would be in his rooms around six thirty.

“You know where they are, Axton Court, B staircase?” he asked mildly.

“I can find it.

“Fine, I'll expect you,” said Gorham-Leach. “We can have a glass of sherry.”

Smailes hung up and reflected that he was stepping further into uncharted, unauthorized territory. But if his commitment to his career felt shaky, his commitment to following through with the Bowles investigation was not. He thought of calling Iain Mack, telling him about his extraordinary day, but decided against it. This was his last hand, and there would be plenty of time to recount his story after he had played his cards.

T
HE AFTERNOON POST
the next day brought a registered letter from George Dearnley, informing Smailes officially of his paid suspension, and the reasons for it. Smailes was reminded of the procedures and his right to representation at a disciplinary hearing. The letter was copied to the Commander at headquarters who was in charge of internal affairs. The tone was cold and precise and Smailes felt sharply crestfallen when he read it. He knew how wounded and angry George must feel, and could not really blame him. Any defense sounded conceited and contemptuous, just as George had accused him of being. He dialled the union representative at the station, but hung up when then the line was answered. He could not decide whether to just call it quits, or to accept Lauren's strategy and throw himself on the mercy of his senior officers. It was the first time he had been in trouble, after all. Officially, anyway.

He spent the afternoon puttering about the flat in an agitated and uncharacteristic way. He cleaned his oven for the first time ever, and it made him shudder at the prospect of unemployment. He could just hear Yvonne, her outrage if he told her he was going to miss any child support payments. His mother would be crushed too, when she found out. He was glad when the light began to fail and it was time to meet with Gorham-Leach.

He walked briskly past St. Margaret's lodge with only a quick glance inside, and saw neither Beecroft nor Fenwick. Christ, if he met Lauren, he thought, what would he tell her? That he was going to see Allerton, to track down a photograph of Bowles, he decided quickly. He lived in Axton Court like G-L, after all. He stopped at the foot of B staircase in the small dark courtyard and examined the elegant copperplate nameboard, the names white against the black background. He saw that in fact Allerton and Gorham-Leach shared the same staircase, and that G. Allerton was in B1, whereas M.P. Gorham-Leach was in B8, presumably the top floor. He found the lack of distinction in their listings quaint, an academic pretense of equality. He remembered again the story of Davies and the disputed nameboard, the origin of the bad blood between Hawken and the Welsh archaeologist. What had been the original name again, Forse-Davies? The name rang a bell with him, but the memory darted away like a minnow behind a rock, and stayed hidden. He mounted two flights of stairs, made a right turn and knocked on the door of B8. Gorham-Leach opened it to him, beaming, and ushered him in.

The room was in considerably better array than G-L's study at his home, with merely a large number of books which seemed to fit adequately into the shelf space provided. There was a small red leather sofa facing the customary gas fire, and a matching wing chair that stood in a pool of light from a standing lamp. At the far end of the room was a desk cluttered with papers in another pool of light from a desk lamp, opposite an open doorway that doubtless led to the bedroom. The atmosphere of the room was cordial and inviting, like Gorham-Leach himself. He solicitously helped Smailes remove his raincoat and poured two glasses of sherry from a bottle that he removed from a mahogany sideboard that stood to the left of the hearth. He waved at Smailes to sit down on the sofa and handed him the small fluted glass. Then he took up his position perched on the edge of the wing chair. He was wearing a neat, light green tweed suit and a fawn cardigan. He held his head to one side in his odd, birdlike way and asked, “Now, Detective Sergeant, to what do I owe the pleasure of your company?” It was somehow typical that Gorham-Leach would be punctilious with Smailes' rank. He found himself smiling at G-L's exaggerated courtesy.

Smailes realized as he began his account that despite himself he did in fact believe Paul Beecroft's conjectures, both about the possible relationship between Hawken and Fenwick, and the fact that Simon Bowles had somehow discovered it. He was aware also that this disappointed him, for it meant that Bowles' motive for taking his life was probably nothing more than jealous anguish. Notions of conspiracy, the theft of a file, were probably irrelevant. And while Nigel Hawken was still no doubt deeply compromised by these events, it was unlikely that anything further was involved in Bowles' death that could provide him with a trump card to play against the hand Dearnley was holding against him. But he could still take Hawken with him, he thought with some consolation, as he gravely rehearsed for Gorham-Leach the circumstances of Alan Fenwick's interrogation, suspension and reinstatement. G-L listened with a rapt intentness, and then suddenly placed his sherry glass on the gray tile of the hearth.

“My word, you're suggesting that this man Fenwick has been reinstated in his position because of an improper relationship with the senior tutor of this college.”

“No, I'm not. I'm just pointing out that it seems unusual. I would not even have known about it if I had not seen him when I visited the porters' lodge last night on a completely different matter. I managed to ask one of the other men on duty, confidentially, what had happened, and he told me that the college council ordered him reinstated at their meeting last Thursday. You don't happen to know if that's true, do you sir?”

“Well, no, I haven't sat on the council for years. It's a committee of six fellows, you see, who do most of the administrative work. But we can jolly well find out. Ivor Davies will know.”

Gorham-Leach got up and walked over to his desk and looked up a number in a small directory with the St. Margaret's crest on the front. “You probably know Dr. Davies, don't you?” he asked as he dialled. Smailes nodded. “He's on the council, you see, and well, we are old friends. He'll tell me what's going on.”

Gorham-Leach paused and then Smailes heard the faint sound of a reply from the telephone receiver. “Ivor? Hello, it's G-L. Oh, very well, thank you. Very busy, unfortunately. No, not really. I want to ask you about something that might have come up at the last council meeting. About one of the junior porters.”

Smailes listened as G-L discreetly outlined the case as he had understood it. He raised his eyebrows at the policeman as he repeated, “Oh, so that's the first you've heard of it, is it? Well, I'm sure there's some logical explanation. I say, Ivor, please don't say anything about this little chat for the time being, all right? Yes, yes, I'll see you in hall.” He hung up, and came slowly back to his chair, frowning.

“Well, you're right. The matter was never discussed, according to Ivor. It certainly does seem highly improper, doesn't it?”

“Yes, I suppose it does,” said Smailes. “But you can understand that I did not want to go further with this matter until I had confirmed the information.”

“Yes, quite,” said G-L thoughtfully.

“And I guess now I need to ask your advice. What should I do about all this?”

“I thought you were going to ask that,” said Gorham-Leach, in the same tone.

“I should tell you also, sir, that I did speak with Dr. Hawken after our last meeting and inquired about any interviews he might have had with young Bowles before his death. I was quite careful not to reveal how I knew about the subject. And, well, he did confirm to me his intelligence role here and that he had had some kind of meeting with Bowles where Bowles had asked him about it. So I am informed about this matter, if you're concerned, sir.”

“Yes, yes, I thought that might happen. Oh dear, this really is most troublesome.”

“I believe that you've known Dr. Hawken for many years, haven't you sir? Since before the war probably.”

“Yes, indeed I have. Indeed I have.” Gorham-Leach seemed on the point of confiding in him, and Smailes wanted to reinforce the impression of existing knowledge.

“And then I think you saw some wartime service together,” he said.

Gorham-Leach seemed distracted and did not reply, then exhaled quite loudly. “Candidly, Detective Sergeant, this does not surprise me. Only that it has taken so long for something like it to happen.” He paused. “You see, I've been aware of Nigel Hawken's, indiscretions, shall we say, for many years. Usually he has managed to confine his activities outside the college, where he assumed no one knew of them. He was the same during the war. Always preferred fellows from the, well, lower classes, shall we say.”

“You were both at Bletchley Park, I believe sir,”

“Yes, we were indeed,” said Gorham-Leach, without surprise. “That's what made his conduct when he first arrived here so infuriating, though I for one never protested, which I have sometimes regretted. Not that I didn't agree that some kind of thorough investigation was needed here, absolutely. But the manner was quite reprehensible, and Hawken as an inquisitor was thoroughly discredited, I felt. I could have put a stop to it with a few discreet phone calls, I'm sure, but I was timid, concerned about my work. I assume you know why he was brought in here?”

“Yes, I do sir. A security service appointment following the espionage scandals.”

“Quite. Well, firstly his academic credentials for the position were thin, and I think that has hurt the college's reputation over the years. Then the way he went about his work was quite unnecessary.”

“How do you mean, sir?”

“Officer, you cannot imagine the witch hunt that was conducted within the walls of this University. I grant that there may have been some genuine security risks still in place, but their numbers were paltry compared with the dozens of entirely blameless men who were hounded from their positions into retirement or second rate jobs because of someone they had once taken tea with, or because of malicious gossip. And to see Hawken strutting through the whole procedure when he was an obvious security risk himself, well, I found the spectacle quite disgusting. But it was so typical of our security service in a way. Unable to present a proper response even at this late hour, because it was so stricken with the disease itself. And may well still be, for all I know. Please don't misunderstand me. I am quite in favor of positive vetting and undergo it regularly myself. Most important. But I have seen colleagues, worthy men, have their careers destroyed by our esteemed senior tutor on the flimsiest of grounds. And now it seems he has finally enmeshed himself in a scandal here at the college. Well, indeed…”