Colin Dexter - Last Seen Wearing

Morning school was almost over, and Mrs. Webb was tidying up her desk as he walked through.

'I shan't be in this afternoon, Mrs. Webb.'

'No. I realize that, sir. You never are on Tuesdays.'

'Er, no. Tuesday afternoon, of course. I'd, er. . I'd forgotten for the minute.'

It was like hearing the phone in a television play: he knew there was no need to answer it himself. He still felt wretchedly tired and he buried his head again in the pillows. Having found no more peace at Marylebone than at Paddington, he had finally arrived back in Oxford at 8.05 a.m., and had taken a taxi home. One way or another it had been an expensive debacle.

An hour later the phone rang again. Shrill, peremptory, now, registering at a higher level of his consciousness; and shaking his head awake, he reached for the receiver on the bedside table. He yawned an almighty 'Yeah?' into the mouthpiece and levered himself up to a semi-vertical position. 'Lewis? What the hell do you want?'

'I've been trying to get you since two o'clock, sir. It's—'

'What? What time is it now?'

'Nearly three o'clock, sir. I'm sorry to disturb you but I've got a bit of a surprise for you.'

'Huh, I doubt it.'

'I think you ought to come, though. We're at the station.'

'Who do you mean by "we"?'

'If I told you that, sir, it wouldn't be a surprise, would it?'

'Give me half an hour,'said Morse.

He sat down at the table in Interview Room One. In front of him lay a document, neatly typed but as yet unsigned, and he picked it up and read it:

'I have come forward voluntarily to the police to make this statement, and I trust that to some extent this may weigh in my favour. I wish to plead guilty to the murder of Mr. Reginald Baines, late second master of the Roger Bacon Comprehensive School, Kidlington, Oxon. The reasons I had for killing him are not, in my view, strictly relevant to the criminal procedings, that will be brought against me, and there are certain things which everyone should have the right to hold sacrosanct. About the details of the crime, too, I wish for the present to say nothing. I am aware that the question of deliberate malice and premeditation may be of great importance, and for this reason I wish to notify my lawyer and to take the benefit of his advice.

I hereby certify that this statement was made by me in the presence of Sergeant Lewis, CID, Thames Valley Police, on the day and at the time subscribed. Your obedient servant,'

Morse looked up from the sheet of typing and turned his light-grey eyes across the table.

'You can't spell "proceedings",' he said.

'Your typist, Inspector. Not me.' Morse reached for his cigarettes and offered them across. 'No thank you, I don't smoke.'

Without dropping his eyes, Morse lit a cigarette and drew upon it deeply. His expression was a mixture of vague distaste and tacit scepticism. He pointed to the statement. 'You want this to go forward?'

'Yes.'

'As you wish.'

They sat silently, as if neither had anything further to say to the other. Morse looked across to the window, and outside on to the concrete yard. He'd made so many stupid blunders in the case; and no one was likely to thank him overmuch for making yet another. It was the only sensible solution, perhaps. Or almost the only sensible solution. Did it matter? Perhaps not. But still upon his face remained the look of dark displeasure.

'You don't like me much, do you, Inspector?'

'I wouldn't say that,' replied Morse defensively. 'It's just. . It's just that you've never got into the habit of telling me the truth, have you?'

'I've made up for it now, I hope.'

'Have you? Morse's eyes were hard and piercing, but to his question there was no reply.

'Shall I sign it now?'

Morse remained silent for a while. 'You think it's better this way?' he asked very quietly. But again there was no reply, and Morse passed across the statement and stood up. 'You've got a pen?'

Sheila Phillipson nodded, and opened her long, expensive leather hand-bag.

'Do you believe her, sir?'

'No,' said Morse simply.

'What do we do, then?'

'Ah, let her cool her heels in a cell for a night. I dare say she's got a good idea what happened, but I just don't think she killed Baines, that's all.'

'She's covering up for Phillipson, you think?'

'Could be. I don't know.' Morse stood up. 'And I'll tell you something else, Lewis: I don't bloody well care! I think whoever killed Baines deserves a life peerage — not a life sentence.'

'But it's still our job to find out who did, sir.'

'Not for much longer, it isn't. I've had a bellyful of this lot — and I've failed. I'm going to see Strange in the morning and ask him to take me off the case.'

'He won't be very happy about that.'

'He's never very happy about anything.'

'It doesn't sound like you, though, sir.'

Morse grinned almost boyishly. 'I've disappointed you, haven't I, Lewis?'

'Well, yes, in a way — if you're going to pack it all in now.'

'Well, I am.'

'I see.'

'Life's full of disappointments, Lewis. I should have thought you'd learned that by now.'

Alone Morse walked back to his office. If the truth could be told he felt more than a little hurt by what Lewis had just said. Lewis was right, of course, and had spoken with such quiet integrity: but it's still our job to find out who did it. Yes, he knew that; but he'd tried and tried and hadn't found out who did it. Come to think of it, he hadn't even found out if Valerie Taylor were alive or dead. . Just now he'd tried to believe Sheila Phillipson; but the plain fact was that he couldn't. Anyway, if what she said were true, it was much better for someone else to finish off the formalities. Much better. And if she were just shielding her husband. . He let it go. He had sent Lewis round to see Phillipson, but the headmaster was neither at home nor at school, and for the time being the neighbours were looking after the children.

Whatever happened, this Tuesday afternoon was now the end, and he thought back to that first Tuesday afternoon in Phillipson's study. . What, if anything, had he missed in the case? What small, apparently insignificant detail that might have set him on the proper tracks? He sat for half an hour and thought and thought, and thought himself nowhere. It was no good: his mind was stale and the wells of imagination and inspiration were dry as the Sahara sands. Yes, he would see Strange in the morning and hand it all over. He could still make a decision when he wanted to, whatever Lewis might think.

He walked over to the filing cabinet and for the last time took out the mass of documents on the case. They now filled two bulging box-files, and pulling back the spring clips Morse tipped the contents of each haphazardly on to his desk. At least he ought to put the stuff into some sort of order. It wouldn't take all that long, and his mind positively welcomed the prospect of an hour or two of fourth-grade clerical work. Neatly and methodically he began stapling odd notes and sheets to their respective documents, and ordering the documents themselves into a chronological sequence. He remembered the last time he had tipped the contents (not so bulky then) on to his desk, when Lewis had noticed that odd business about the lollipop man. A red herring, that, as it turned out. Yet it could have been a vitally important point, and he himself had missed it. Had he missed anything else, amidst this formidable bumf? Ah, forget it! It was too late now, and he continued with his task. Valerie's reports next. They'd better go into some sort of order, too, and he shuffled them into their sequence. Three reports a year: autumn term; spring term; summer term. No reports at all for the first year in the school, but all the others were there — except one: the report for the summer temi of the fourth year. Why was that? He hadn't noticed that before. . The brain was whirring into life once more — but no! Morse snapped off the current impatiently. It was nothing. The report was just lost; lots of things got lost. Nothing at all sinister about that. . Yet in spite of himself he stopped what he was doing and sat back again in the black leather chair, his fingertips together on his lower lip, his eyes resting casually on the school reports that lay before him. He'd read them all before, of course, and knew their contents well. Valerie had been one of those many could-do-better-if-she-tried pupils. Like all of us. . In fact, the staff at the Roger Bacon School could quite easily have dispensed with terminal reports in Valerie's case: they were all very much the same, and one would have done quite as well as another. Any one. The last one, for example — the report on her spring term's progress (or rather lack of it) in the year in which she'd disappeared. Idly Morse looked down at it again. Acum's signature was there beside the French: 'Could do so well if only she tried. Her accent is surprisingly good, but her vocabulary and grammar are still very weak.' Same old comment. In fact there was only one subject in which Valerie had apparently not hidden her light beneath the bushel of her casual indifference; and oddly enough that was Applied Science and Technology. Funny, really, girls tackling subjects like that. But the curriculum had undergone mysterious developments since his own school days. He picked up the earlier reports and read some of the comments of the science staff: 'Good with her hands'; 'A good term's work'; 'Has good mechanical sense'. He got up from his chair and went over to the shelf where earlier he'd stacked Valerie's old exercise books. It was there: Applied Science and Technology. Morse flicked through the pages. Yes, the work was good, he could see that — surprisingly good. . Hold it a minute! He looked through the book again, more carefully now, and read the headings of the syllabus: Work; Energy; Power; Velocity Ratio; Efficiency of Machines; Simple Machines; Levers; Pulleys; Simple Power-transmission Systems; Car Engines; Clutches. .