The Mind Readers (7 page)

‘Oh dear, how awfully thorough.' Amanda was laughing in spite of herself. ‘Yes, of course, the young man would have to clear himself. What does Sam say?'

‘He's so quiet. I don't understand it. He was the only witness. He was alone in the classroom where it happened, kept in, writing an exercise. Both sides went to talk to him and the Head thought it would be better if the lawyers saw him at home.'

‘Is there any other evidence?'

‘Rather a lot. The boy with the leg—he's a friend of Edward's—had lost six weeks' work and couldn't prepare all the set English books. English is his one bad subject. There were six of these books, all the usual ones:
A Midsummer Night's Dream, The Fortunes of Nigel, Treasure Island, The Lays of Ancient Rome
and a couple more I can't remember. The boy had only worked on the Shakespeare seriously. The examiner—his name is Pellett and they call him Tabloid—arrived at St Josephus on the evening before the exam and went in to see Mr Allenbury, who was making all the arrangements. Allenbury was alone, except for Sam sitting at the back of the room. The two men chatted normally until Allenbury said something about the injured boy's beastly bad luck and mentioned that he'd only had time to do the one book. Sam says Pellett went black in the face at once and said: “That was a singularly ill-advised remark, Allenbury!” and stamped out leaving the briefcase on the desk.'

‘He thought he was being got at.' Avril seemed inclined to sympathise. ‘Then what?'

‘Then Mr Pellett came back, snatched up his property with a scowl and rushed off again.'

‘Had Allenbury looked in the case?' Amanda demanded.

‘I don't know. The solicitor may be able to get it out of Sam, I couldn't.' Helena's grey eyes met hers briefly. ‘Unfortunately, later on that evening Allenbury went over to see the boy in hospital and, according to him, the child asked him suddenly for a copy of
The Lays
which he'd not even taken over there. Allenbury came back to the school and got one for him and the boy spent the night swotting it up. In the morning when Pellett produced the paper, all the English Lit. questions
were
on
The Lays
.'

‘Oh dear.'

‘I know. To make things worse, all the St Josephus masters were certain they wouldn't be chosen. Macaulay is out of fashion and Pellett was known to dislike them because the thumpity bump of the verse is so easy to learn.'

‘Unhappy man!' said Avril. ‘Oh hello, Mrs Talisman, what is it?'

‘A gentleman, sir.' She was a little excited. ‘A Mr Anderton to see Sam.'

Helena got up. ‘That's Mr Pellett's solicitor. He's early. Shall I take him into your study, Uncle Hubert?'

‘No, I don't think so. Ask him to step this way, Mrs Talisman.' Avril's authority was of the old-fashioned kind. ‘We don't want any interviews to be too private, do we? That was the Headmaster's feeling. I agree. We'll see if we can help him.'

The two women had no opportunity to object. Mr Anderton came lightly into the room, his expression changing as he saw the unexpected group. He was a slim, youngish person, not quite the glossy type of modern legal business man, but shrewd enough, with a smooth approach and an unexpected leaven of humour in his outlook. At the moment his chief concern appeared to be curiosity. It came into the room with him like an odour.

He recognised Avril's authority and made his explanation to him with only a sidelong deference to Helena.

‘I came a little early because I thought I might perhaps have a word with the boy's father,' he said, looking about him, his glance taking in the old furniture, the silver, the worn Persian rugs. ‘I didn't realise he didn't live here . . . ?'

He left the question in the air and Helena answered it obligingly.

‘My husband had to stay at the Research Station,' she said. ‘He's a scientist you see . . .'

‘Research station?' He was both so surprised and so enlightened that he repeated the words. ‘Really? Oh, I do beg your pardon. I didn't understand that at all! You must forgive me. I thought . . . I mean I assumed that he had some sort of Diplomatic . . .' He took himself firmly in hand. ‘You must forgive me,' he repeated, starting again. ‘I shouldn't have bothered you. I should have telephoned but the appointment was made and I was, as it were, on my way home and so I took the liberty of dropping in.'

‘So you don't want to see Sam after all? Splendid!' Old Avril appeared to have followed the newcomer without difficulty. ‘Excellent! It might have proved a very grown-up problem for a very young person. May I enquire why you have decided not to worry him?'

‘Mr Pellett has withdrawn the accusation and is apologising, and Mr Allenbury is withdrawing the action.' Mr Anderton was startled into simplicity. ‘I only heard half an hour before I came out.'

‘You seem to find that very surprising?' The Canon was interested as he always was in anybody's news. ‘Didn't you think Mr Pellett would give way?'

‘I could have sworn he wouldn't!' The reaction was explosive. ‘Mr Pellett is a very determined man indeed. Frankly, I'm amazed by this development. However, he told me himself or I shouldn't have believed it. I gathered that some pressure had been put on both sides and, rightly or wrongly, I understood that it had emanated from
here,
from the child's family? I'm probably quite wrong?'

‘I think you must be. I don't know of anything of the sort.'

‘I see. Then perhaps the pressure was put upon the two schools by something very authoritative? Your husband's . . . ah . . . place of work, for instance, Mrs Ferris?' His eyes were knowing but she met them blankly and the shadow in her face was noticeable.

‘If that were true, it really would be the last thing any of us here would know about,' she said coldly, and added, to soften the snub, ‘Can we offer you some tea?'

He refused politely and set about taking his leave with as much grace as possible. ‘What a view that is!' he remarked, nodding at the window. ‘From outside one hasn't a clue it exists.'

The change of the subject was successful and for a moment everybody paused to look out at one of those London scenes which make the city one of the best loved and most unexpected in the world.

On the far side of the little square there was a wall with a pierced decorative border in brickwork. Behind it, quite ten feet below the level of the pavement, a short wide road ran down to the brightly lit shopping centre of Portminster Row where the scarlet buses teetered among the traffic and the hurrying crowds streamed homeward. The architect who had designed the Rectory must have envisaged the picture, the silhouettes of the trees in the square and the lace-like insertion in the wall showing up against the lights in the road; while above them, like a drop-cloth, the deep blue of London's evening shadow blotted out the towers and chimney-pots of the remoter reaches of the town. It was a nightly vision at the Rectory but, even so, the worn red velvet curtains were never drawn until the sapphire had faded and the lights had turned from yellow to white.

This evening, as they looked, a car turned in from the square's only entrance and Amanda got up. ‘There they are!' she said with relief.

Mr Anderton fled, passing two boys and two men in the hallway. They did not speak to him, merely stepping aside briefly in their descent upon the open parlour doorway.

It was not until the front door had closed behind him and the others were all in the room that he was mentioned at all

By then Sam was swinging on his mother's arm, Edward was shaking hands gravely with Amanda, and Superintendent Charles Luke was being welcomed affectionately by the Canon, with whom he was a favourite. Albert Campion, who had been the last to come in, put the question as he closed the door behind him.

‘Who was that running away?' His light affable voice only just penetrated the din but the enquiry was authoritative and the reply came back spontaneously, without thought, from the youngest mouth in the room.

‘That was only the silly old lawyer,' said Sam from Helena's arms. ‘He doesn't want to see me now, thank goodness.'

FOR SOME MOMENTS
there was an astonished silence. Sam had become very red and was staring intently at his shoes, while keeping very close to his mother who was sitting at the table with her arm round him.

The two adult newcomers were startled. Mr Albert Campion, a thin man with pale hair and eyes and a misleadingly blank expression, shot a thoughtful glance at the youngster through his horn-rimmed spectacles and Superintendent Luke permitted himself a bewildered smile. He was about to speak when Helena forestalled him by turning not on Sam but on Edward with actual ferocity.

‘How did Sam know that?'

The boy did not reply at once. He had crossed the room and was standing with his shoulders hunched and his hands in the pockets of his raincoat. His long school muffler, blue with horizontal stripes, was wound twice round his neck and he appeared embarrassed, like some shy elderly person overtaken by an awkward social situation.

‘Oh, I think he guessed, you know,' he murmured at last. ‘It wasn't awfully difficult, was it?'

‘How could you know the case had been dropped?'

‘
I
didn't, Aunt Helena.' He revealed a charming deference towards her which transformed his peaky face. ‘But Sam might have worked it out. After all, the solicitor hadn't waited to see him, had he?'

She turned her back on him with unreasonable exasperation. ‘Oh Edward—please let Sam speak for himself!'

‘Don't worry so,' the younger boy whispered, putting his ear against her cheek. ‘Edward and I are pretty tired. We got rid of a fearful woman at the station. We both did it. We thought of it together. Since then we've been looking at photographs trying to spot her.'

‘They're making an identikit portrait.' Edward's natural interest made everybody feel much more comfortable. ‘It may go on television,' he added with a sidelong glance at Amanda.

‘We'll go downstairs and look,' she promised. ‘How about some food now?'

‘We had some.' Sam was relaxing. ‘We went to the Canteen. Sergeant Ferguson took us. He's wonderful. He's got thousands of pictures of peculiar sorts of villains. All different kinds. Jolly interesting. We had beans and listened to him until Superintendent Luke was ready for us. He was ready before Uncle Albert. That's why we're so late.'

‘I got a message from an old friend and drifted over the road to see him,' Mr Campion said, making it an apology. ‘He showed me his new office and we forgot the time. We were talking.'

‘About who the spies are and how to catch them.' Sam uttered the words gaily. He was laughing and very happy. The room grew quite quiet. Mr Campion's expression froze and Luke, whose natural reaction was of the opposite kind, took a brisk step forward.

‘That's done it, young 'un. What do you know?'

‘Perhaps not, don't you think?' The thin man intervened swiftly. ‘Tell us about the exam paper and Mr Pellett, Sam. Don't get upset, old man. Who's been talking to you? You're on to something exciting, aren't you?'

‘Oh don't, Albert! Don't you see? It's not Sam at all. It's the other one!' Helena's outburst was more disconcerting than her son's disclosure. ‘I know what it is; and it's frightful! They're like the Drummond Brothers, the twins who used to be on the Island until one of them was driven to death. I've only just heard the full story. I must get hold of Martin at once; he'll know what to do.' She was holding her son so tightly that he wriggled. ‘Martin loves Sam. He didn't mean anything like this to happen and he won't let it, even if Paggen tries to force it. Sam and Edward are cousins, that's the point, and Edward is older and more clever and . . .'

‘You're quite wrong, you know.' Edward had scarcely moved. He made a very dignified pygmy, wrapped up in his raincoat and muffler, and his aloof intelligence reproved her and kept her at a distance. ‘You are being a little thick, Auntie, but it's only because—forgive me—you're far too old. Sam is better at something than I am and it's because he is younger, or I think so.'

Amanda sat up and her most valuable characteristic, which was an inspired vein of common sense, flowed smoothly across the tingling room.

‘If you two are trying to make yourselves interesting you've done it as far as I'm concerned,' she said briskly. ‘This is when you produce the goods jolly quickly or get sent to bed.'

Edward sighed and he turned to Sam. ‘I think you ought to tell them about the exam paper,' he said. ‘Don't forget we thought you might have to explain to the solicitor.' He broke off abruptly and looked towards Helena as if she had spoken. ‘I'm not “dominating” him! If I were, would I let him keep dribbling it all out like this?'

Sam crowed. He had a delightful chuckle, mischievous and utterly normal. ‘It was
me
!' he declared proudly. ‘I told Edward what Mr Pellett had put in the exam paper. I mean I described the book, but he guessed which it was and that made it fair to tell old Woodie in the sicker.'

‘Most dishonest. How did you know?' Amanda appeared to have decided to conduct the inquisition. ‘Was it you who looked in the briefcase?'

‘Oh no, Auntie, I wouldn't do that. Honestly I wouldn't.' Sam had ceased to be interestingly ‘fey' and had become a very ordinary small boy defending himself. ‘I got it from Mr Pellett when he ticked off Allie.'

‘
Mister
Allenbury. Did Mr Pellett say it to him?'

‘No.' Once again he grew crimson.

‘Under his breath, then?'

He shook his head.

‘Oh come
on
, Sam. Don't be wet!' Edward was irritable. ‘If you're going to say it, say it.'