Colin Dexter - Last Seen Wearing

'That wasn't the postmark on the second letter she wrote.'

'Second letter? Oh yes. What was the postmark on that?'

Lewis frowned slightly, 'W1. Don't you remember?'

'W1, eh? But I wouldn't worry your head about that second letter, Lewis?'

'You wouldn't?'

'No, I wouldn't bother about it at all. You see, Lewis, I wrote that second letter myself.'

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

And all the woe that moved him so

That he gave that bitter cry,

And the wild regrets, and the bloody

sweats, None knew so well as I:

For he who lives more lives than one

More deaths than one must die.

(Oscar Wilde, The Ballad of Reading Gaol)

THERE WERE OVER one hundred and twenty of them, and it was too many. Why, if each of them were given leave to speak only for a minute, that would be two hours! But anyway, Acum didn't think he wanted to say anything. The great majority of the delegates were in their forties and fifties, senior men and women who, judging from their comments and their questions, sent forth an annual stream of gifted linguists to assume their natural Oxbridge birthrights.

He had felt tired after his five-and-a-half-hours' drive the previous day, and this morning's programme, conducted in a genteel atmosphere of rarefied intellectuality, had hardly succeeded in fostering any real esprit de corps. Speaking on 'Set Texts in the Sixth Form' the Senior Tutor had given voice softly and seriously to the delicate rhythms of Racine, and Acum began to wonder if the premier universities were not growing further and further out of touch with his own particular brand of comprehensive school. His main problem in the sixth was to recruit a handful of pupils who had just about reached the minimum requirement of a grade C in O-level French, and who, in the wake of their qualified triumphs, had promptly mislaid the substance of their erstwhile knowledge during two long months of carefree summer freedom. He wondered if other schools were different; if he himself, in some way, were to blame.

Fortunately the post-lunch discussion on the merits of the Nuffield French experiment was infinitely lighter and brighter, and Acum felt slightly more at home with his co-delegates. The Senior Tutor, the rhythms of Racine still rippling along through his mind, testified evangelically to the paramount need for a formal grammatical discipline in the teaching of all languages, including modern languages. And if Racine and Moliere were not worth reading, reading with accuracy, and reading without the remotest possibility of misunderstanding arising from mistranslation — then we all might just as well forget literature and life. It sounded magnificent. And then that burly, cheerful fellow from Bradford had brought the academic argument down to earth with a magnificent thud: give him a lad or a lass with t'gumption to order t'pound of carrots at t'French greengrocer's shop, any dair! The conference exploded in glorious uproar. Slyly, a dignified old greybeard suggested that no Englishman, even one who had the good fortune to learn his native tongue in Yorkshire, had ever been confronted with an insuperable language-barrier in finding his way to a pissoir in Paris.

It was all good stuff now. The conference should have passed a vote of thanks to the burly Bradfordian and his pound of carrots. Even Acum nearly said something; and almost every other member of the silent majority nearly said something, too. There were just far too many there. Ridiculous, really. No one would notice if you were there or not. He was going out tonight, anyway. No one was going to miss him if he slipped away from the conference hall. He would be back long before the porters' lodge was shut at 11.00 p.m.

The school bell rang at 4.00 p.m., and the last lesson of the day was over. Streams of children emerged from classrooms and, like a nest of ants uncovered, bewilderingly crossed and re-crossed to cloakrooms, to bicycle sheds, to societies, to games practices and to sundry other pursuits. More leisurely, the teachers threaded their way back through the milling throngs to the staff room; some to smoke, some to talk, some to mark. And very soon most of them, teachers and pupils alike, would be making their way home. Another day was done.

Baines returned from teaching a fourth-year mathematics set and dropped a pile of thirty exercise books on to his table. Twenty seconds each — no more; only ten minutes the lot. He might as well get them marked straight away. Thank the Lord it wasn't like marking English or History, with all that reading to do. His practised eye had learned to pounce upon the pages in a flash. Yes, he would dash them off now.

'Mr. Phillipson would like a word with you,' said Mrs. Webb.

'Oh. Now?'

'As soon as you came in, he said.'

Baines knocked perfunctorily and entered the study.

'Have a seat a minute, Baines.'

Warily the second master took a seat. There was a serious edge to Phillipson's voice — like a doctor's about to inform you that you've only a few months more to live.

'Inspector Morse will be in again tomorrow afternoon. You know that, don't you?' Baines nodded. 'He wants to talk to us both — together.'

'He didn't mention that to me.'

'Well, that's what he's going to do.' Baines said nothing. 'You know what this probably means, don't you?'

'He's a clever man.'

'No doubt. But he won't be getting any further, will he?' The tone of Phillipson's voice was hard, almost the tone of a master to his pupil. 'You realize what I'm saying, don't you, Baines? Keep your mouth shut!'

'Yes, you'd like me to do that, wouldn't you?'

'I'm warning you!' The latent hatred suddenly blazed in Phillipson's eyes. No pretence now; only an ugly, naked hatred between them.

Baines got up, savouring supremely the moment of his power. 'Don't push me too far, Phillipson! And just remember who you're talking to.'

'Get out!' hissed Phillipson. The blood was pounding in his ears, and although a non-smoker he longed to light a cigarette. He sat motionless at his desk for many minutes and wondered how much longer the nightmare could go on. What a relief it would be to end it all — one way or another. .

Gradually he grew calmer, and his mind wandered back again. How long ago was it now? Over three and a half years! And still the memory of that night came back to haunt him like a ghost unexorcized. That night. . He could picture it all so vividly still. .

He felt quite pleased with himself. Difficult to tell for certain, of course; but yes, quite pleased with himself really. As accurately as it could his mind retraced the stages of the day's events; the questions of the interviewing committee — wise and foolish; and his own answers — carefully considered. .

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

In philological works. . a dagger † signifies an obsolete word. The. . sign, placed before a person's name, signifies deceased.

(Rules for Compositors and Readers, OUP)

THIS SAME MONDAY night or, to be accurate, Tuesday morning, Morse was not in bed until 2.00 a.m., overtired and underbeered. The euphoria of the earlier part of the day had now completely passed, partly as a result of Lewis's sceptical disparagement, but more significantly because of his own inability ever to fool himself for very long. He still believed that some of the pieces had clicked into place, but knew that many didn't fit at all; and a few didn't even look like pieces of the same jigsaw. He recollected how in the army he had been given a test for colour-blindness. A sheet of paper on which a chaotically confused conglomeration of colour blocks were printed had been magically metamorphosed when looked at through differently-coloured filter slides; a red filter, and there appeared an elephant; a blue filter, and a lion leaped out at the eyes; a green filter, and behold the donkey! Donkey. . He'd been reading something about a donkey only a few days ago. Where had he read it? Morse was not a systematic reader, he was a dipper-in. He looked at the small pile of books on his bedside table underneath the alarm clock. The Road to Xanadu, A Selection of Kipling's Short Stones, The Life of Richard Wagner and Selected Prose of A. E. Housman. It was in Housman, surely, that bit about the donkey who couldn't make up its asinine mind which bundle of hay to start on first. Hadn't the stupid animal finally died of starvation? He soon found the passage: