Reginald Hill - An Advancement of Learning

“The letter!’ said Dalziel. ‘ sweating on the letter and a lot of bloody use it turned out to be.”

“It wasn’t intended to be useful,’ said Simeon Landor gently. ”s just a record of a man’s uncertainty and unhappiness.”

“It would have made me a lot happier if it had mentioned a few names,” said Dalziel gloomily.

There was a photostat of the letter on the study desk in front of Pascoe. He looked down at it again and read it for the hundredth time, still with a sense of emptiness, of loss.

Dear Henry, This is a strange letter to have to write, and a stranger way you might think to repay friendship. I am truly sorry if it is painful for you to read this. But pain is a risk we take in becoming fond of people, isn’t it? As I have found out to my cost.

I have decided to take my life, not out of despair or anything so religious as that. But merely out of confusion. These past few years have been troubled ones for me, troubled not in the way I have always felt troubled by the problems of life and humanity, but troubled by problems of mere living. I have had secrets to hide which I did not wish to know in the first place; I found that quite unbeknown to me I had become a leader and, as a leader, had to be deposed from a position I would have been only too happy to resign. I found myself admitting to accusations that were false rather than make accusations that were true.

(I was never anything more to Anita Sewell than a dear friend. At least I thought so, and I know in the end she did too.) Finally I was driven to absurd delaying tactics on points of procedure and constitutional issues — the kind of thing which has always bored me to tears as you know! — because I did not know what else to do.

In other words I had to make decisions. I really believe the majority of people are lucky enough to get through life without ever having to make a single greatly significant decision. I had to make such a one five years ago. I made it on personal grounds, unselfish I thought at the time, though I’m no longer sure, grounds of love, and respect, and hope, for an individual. The only grounds, I felt, on which such a decision should be taken.

So I concealed my knowledge of the death of Miss. Girling and felt that I had done my lifetime’s duty. No man should have to do that twice. Now five years later, because I did it once, I’m faced with the same decision again. Someone else is dead — Anita — someone much more valuable than Girling.

So, I’m confused. I acted once as I felt I had to act. I felt it was the only way to act. Out of that action came distrust, misunderstanding, contumely, slander, and finally another death. But the reasons for my original action still seem valid. So how do I act now?

Well, I’m confused. But not despairing. Living poses too many problems.

Life — and death — are simpler and there is an easy way to get at their meaning, if any. That’s the way I’m taking now.

As for this letter and any information, or hints of information, it contains, do what you will with it. Burn it, or show it to that ill-assorted pair of policemen. What you will. Me, I’ve given up decisions. Except for this last one. Your friend, Sam Fallowfield.

“It’s a terrible letter for anyone to write,’ he said aloud. The others looked at him, Landor sympathetically, Dalziel in irritation.

“It’s a bloody useless letter,’ he reiterated. ‘ tells us nowt. If Roote hadn’t been so keen to get the first blow in before the girl had a chance, we’d have been nowhere. As it is, well I suppose it served some purpose.

He leaned forward, groaned and rubbed himself between the shoulders.

“If my lad hadn’t come when he did, those two would have had all the time in the world to get rid of it. Or they might even have let us find it, for all the use it was. But unread, that was different.”

“They were both so firmly convinced Fallowfield would have told everything he knew and suspected, that they credited us with this knowledge once Mr. Saltecombe told us to read the letter,’ explained Pascoe. ‘ just kept quiet and looked confident.”

Dalziel nodded complacently.

“I told Mr. Saltecombe to look accusing and say a couple of nasty things to Roote when he appeared. That did the trick. And once he thought that Fallowfield had put the finger on him but not the girl, he went wild. I think he even felt betrayed. Imagine!”

“It was odd,’ said Pascoe. ‘ was quite happy to warn Cargo that we still had the letter, that’s why he came into the sickbay and asked about Saltecombe. But the minute he thought the letter wasn’t dangerous to her… ” “Yes,’ said Dalziel. ‘ saw her face then. And I remembered she was right on top of us when I told you I was going up to the Common Room. Also I had a sense of two other people being over me when I got clobbered up there. So when I saw Halfdane’s car making off, I wondered if she might not be in it also. So I put out a call. Poor lad. I feel sorry for him.” You sound it, thought Pascoe, remembering Halfdane’s face ravaged with shock and disbelief. You bloody sound it.

Landor shook his head in perplexity.

“It’s hard to believe… it has hurt us all in more ways than we realize, I think. When will it all be over?’ he asked.

“When someone decides we’ve got to the truth,’ said Dalziel.

“But you just said you have their statements, their confessions?”

“Which are very contradictory. It looked as if Cargo was going to crack completely at first, but she pulled herself together in the end. She’s too clever to go back to absolute denial — we’ve dug up all kinds of circumstantial evidence to tie them in together. We can prove they spent that Christmas together, for instance, so it would be foolish of her to deny it. But she’s hurling all the mud back at Roote that he’s slinging at her.”

“And who do you believe?”

Dalziel shrugged.

“Roote, I think. Mainly because he seems to have been motivated by something less or more than mere self preservation all the way through.

I don’t know whether this makes him a more or a less horrifying character. This is the way I read the story, though God knows if we’ll ever get the real truth.

“Roote and Fallowfield arrive together on that Friday in December.

Fallowfield’s a bit of a weirdo, king of the kids, one of your modern nothing-istoosacredorwayoutto-try philosophers who go down big with some youngsters. There was probably more than a touch of the queer there too. Anyway, they’re spending part of the Christmas vac together and Fallowfield, who probably persuaded Roote to apply for admission here when he knew he himself was being interviewed, drives them both up.

Roote has his interview. Is accepted. Even at eighteen he seems to have had a way with women, of all ages. He runs into Marion Cargo, practically the only student left in the place. She’s hanging on because she’s going skiing with Girling, remember. She’s three years older than he is, though I doubt if she was anything like as experienced. Perhaps enough to make things easy for him, though he’s obviously a very smooth operator anyway. By Monday, after a weekend of considerable delight, she is thoroughly infatuated. He asks her to spend Christmas with him — he was joining a party of friends, we’ve got all the details and the prospect pleases. But Girling has to be told. Just how much she was being the mother-figure and just how much she fancied her chances with Cargo for a romp in the snow, we’ll never know.”

Landor pursed his lips in distaste. Dalziel scratched his belly-button voluptuously and went on.

“Cargo gave me some story about Disney intervening: Disney denies it absolutely, though there’s probably just a speck of truth in it, enough for Cargo to build on. Anyway she goes along and tells Girling the trip’s off. Girling is furious, flies into a rage, cancels the bookings instantly, a kind of see-if-I-care gesture. Later that afternoon, after the governors’ meeting and Fallowfield’s appointment, Girling sends for Cargo again. Perhaps to plead with her, perhaps she has got wind of what’s going on and wants to put the bubble in, perhaps Cargo herself let something slip. Anyway, Roote is summoned to the presence also. When he arrives there is a full-scale fight going on. I’ve no doubt he quite enjoyed it. Anyway, his version is that finally Girling slapped Marion’s face in her fury. The girl retaliated by pulling her hair. It was a wig and it came off. Roote says he fell about laughing. Quite beside herself with rage, Girling flew at Cargo’s throat and she pushed her away so that she fell into the fireplace and cracked her head open on the sharp corner there.”