Colin Dexter - The Silent World Of Nicholas Quinn

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

ON MONDAY MORNING Lewis was waiting outside as the door of Superintendent Strange's office opened, and he caught the tail-end of the conversation.

'. . cock-eyed, but—'

'Have I ever let you down, sir?'

'Frequently.'

Morse winked at Lewis and closed the door behind him. It was 10.30 a.m. and the inquest was due to start at eleven. Dickson was waiting outside with the car, and together the three policemen drove down into Oxford.

The inquest was to be held in the courtroom behind the main Oxford City Police HQ in St. Aldates, and a small knot of people was standing outside, waiting for the preceding hearing to finish. Lewis looked at them. He had written (as Morse had carefully briefed him) to all those concerned in any way with Quinn's murder: some would have to take the stand anyway; others ('but your presence will be appreciated') would not. The Dean of the Syndicate stood there, his hands in his expensive dark overcoat, academically impatient; the Secretary, looking duly grave; Monica Height looking palely attractive; Martin prowling around the paved yard like a nervous hyaena; Roope, smoking a cigarette and staring thoughtfully at the ground; Mr. Quinn senior, lonely, apart, staring into the pit of despair; and Mrs. Evans and Mrs. Jardine, leagues apart in the social hierachy, yet managing to chat away quite merrily about the tragic events which had brought them together.

It was ten minutes past eleven before they all filed into the court, where the coroner's sergeant, acting as chief usher, quietly but firmly organized the seating to his liking, before disappearing through a door at the back of the court, and almost immediately reappearing with the coroner himself. All rose to their feet as the sergeant intoned the judicial ritual. The proceedings had begun.

First the identification of the deceased was established by Mr. Quinn senior; then Mrs. Jardine took the box; then Martin; then Bartlett; then Sergeant Lewis; then Constable Dickson. Nothing was added to, nothing subtracted from, the statements the coroner had before him. Next the thin humpbacked surgeon gave evidence of the autopsy, reading from a prepared script at such a breakneck speed and with such a wealth of physiological detail that he might just as well have been reciting the Russian creed to a class of the educationally subnormal. When he had reached the last fullstop, he handed the document perfunctorily to the coroner, stepped carefully down, and walked briskly out of the courtroom and out of the case. Lewis wondered idly what his fee would be. .

'Chief Inspector Morse, please.'

Morse walked to the witness-box and took the oath in a mumbled gabble.

'You are in charge of the investigation into the death of Mr. Nicholas Quinn.'

Morse nodded. 'Yes, sir.'

Before the coroner could proceed, however, there was a slight commotion at the entrance door; and a series of whispered exchanges, which resulted in a bearded young man being admitted and taking his place next to Constable Dickson on one of the low benches. Lewis was glad to see him: he had begun to wonder if his letter to Mr. Richard Bartlett had gone astray.

The coroner resumed: 'Are you prepared to indicate to the court the present state of your investigations into this matter?'

'Not yet, sir. And with your honour's permission, I wish to make formal application for the inquest to be adjourned for a fortnight.'

'Am I to understand, Chief Inspector, that your inquiries are likely to be completed within that time?'

'Yes, sir. Quite shortly, I hope.'

'I see. Am I right in saying that you have as yet made no arrest in this case?'

'An arrest is imminent.'

'Indeed?'

Morse took a warrant from his inside pocket and held it up before the court. 'It may be somewhat unusual to introduce such a note of melodrama into your court, your honour; but immediately after the adjournment of this inquest — should, of course, your honour allow the adjournment — it will be my duty to make an arrest.' Morse turned his head slightly and ran his eyes along the front bench: Dickson, Richard Bartlett, Mrs. Evans, Mrs. Jardine, Martin, Dr. Bartlett, Monica Height, Roope, and Lewis. Yes, they were all there, with the murderer seated right amongst them! Things were going according to plan.

The coroner formally adjourned the inquest for two weeks and the court stood as the august personage reluctantly departed. Now there was a hush over the assembly; no one seemed to breathe or to blink as Morse slowly stepped down from the witness-box, and stood momentarily before Richard Bartlett, and then walked on; past Mrs. Evans; past Mrs. Jardine; past Martin; past Bartlett; past Monica Height; and then stood in front of Roope. And stayed there.

'Christopher Algernon Roope, I have here a warrant for your arrest in connection with the murder of Nicholas Quinn.' The words echoed vaguely around the hushed court, and still nobody seemed to breath. 'It is my duty to tell you—'

Roope stared at Morse in disbelief. 'What the hell are you talking about?' His eyes darted first to the left and then to the right, as if calculating his chances of making a quick dash for it. But to his right stood the bulky figure of Constable Dickson; and immediately to his left Lewis laid a heavy hand upon his shoulder.

'I hope you'll be sensible and come quietly, sir.'

Roope spoke in a harsh whisper. 'I hope you realize what a dreadful mistake you're making. I just don't know—'

'Leave it for later,' snapped Morse.

All eyes were on Roope as he walked out, Dickson on his right and Lewis on his left; but still no one said a word. It was if they had all been struck dumb, or just witnessed a miracle, or stared into the face of the Gorgon.

Bartlett was the first to move. He looked utterly dumbfounded and walked like an automaton towards his son. Monica's eyes crossed the gap that Bartlett had left, and found Donald Martin's looking directly into her own. It was the merest imperceptibility, perhaps; but it was there. The slightest shaking of her head; the profound, dead stillness of her eyes: 'Shut up, you fool!' they seemed to say. 'Shut up, you stupid fool!'

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

'YOU HAD MIXED luck in this wicked business, Roope. You had a bit of good luck, I know; and you made the most of it. But you also had some bad luck: things happened that no one, not even you, could have foreseen. And although you tried to cope as best you could — in fact, you almost succeeded in turning it to your own advantage — you had to be just that little bit too clever. I realized that I was up against an exceptionally cunning and resourceful murderer, but in the end it was your very cleverness that gave you away.'

The three of them, Morse, Lewis, Roope, sat together in Interview Room № 1. Lewis (who had been firmly cautioned by Morse to keep his mouth shut, whatever the provocation) was seated by the door, whilst Morse and Roope sat opposite each other at the small table. Morse, the hunter, seemed supremely confident as he sat back on the wooden chair, his voice calm, almost pleasant. 'Shall I go on?'

'If you must. I've already told you what a fool you're making of yourself, but you seem determined to listen to no one.'

Morse nodded. 'All right. We'll start in the middle, I think. We'll start at the point where you walked into the Syndicate building at about 4.25 p.m. a week last Friday. The first person you saw was the caretaker, Noakes, mending a broken light-tube in the corridor. But it was soon clear to you that there was no one else in the downstairs offices at all. No one! You concocted some appropriate tale about having to leave some papers with Dr. Bartlett, and since he was out you had the best reason in the world for trying to find one of the others and for looking into their offices. You looked into Quinn's, of course, and everything was just as you'd known it would be — as you'd planned it would be. Everything was cleverly arranged to give the clear impression to anyone going into his room that Quinn was there —in the office; or, at least, would be there again very soon. It was raining heavily all day Friday — a piece of good luck! — and there, on the back of Quinn's chair, was his green anorak. Who would leave the office on a day like that without taking his coat? And the cabinets were left open . Now cabinets contain question papers, and the Secretary would have been down like a hawk on any of his colleagues who showed the slightest carelessness over security. But what are we asked to believe in Quinn's case? Quinn? Recently appointed; briefed, doubtless ad nauseam , about the need for the strictest security at every second of every day. And what does he do, Roope? He goes out and leaves his cabinets open! Yet, at the very same time, we find evidence of Quinn's punctilious adherence to the Secretary's instructions. Since he took up his job a few months previously, he has been told, very pointedly told, that it doesn't matter in the slightest if he takes time off during the day. But —if he does go out, he's to leave a note informing anyone who might want him exactly where he is or what he's doing. In other words, what Bartlett says is all the law and the commandments. Now, I find the combination of these two sets of circumstances extremely suggestive, Roope. Some of us are idle and careless, and some of us are fussy and conscientious. But very few of us manage to be both at the same time. Wouldn't you agree?'