Paul Christopher - Michelangelo_s Notebook

Greyfriars Academy was located on the Sark River in the hilly, wooded countryside a dozen miles north of Greenwich, Connecticut. The closest civilization was the small crossroads village of Friardale on the way to Riverview and Toll Gate Pond. Passing through the village, Michael Valentine followed the signs to Oaklane and drove along beside a low fieldstone wall capped with wrought iron spikes to the main gates of the school. Directly ahead, down a slightly curving gravel drive lined with mature oaks, was the main building. It looked like a cross between a medieval church and a weathered, ivy-covered English country house. It was huge and looked very old.

“Like something out of a Harry Potter story,” Finn commented, staring through the windshield of Valentine’s rental as they went down the sun-dappled drive toward the school.

“More like Frank Richards,” murmured the older man.

“Who?”

“Never mind.”

They continued up the tree-lined drive. To the left there were half a dozen outbuildings, including a porter’s lodge, something big enough to be a swimming pool or a gymnasium and a small chapel complete with miniature bell tower. To the right was a baseball diamond, tennis courts and something that could have been a stable. Behind the main building and running back to the wall was an orchard, the stunted trees laid out in neat rows. In between everything there were winding paths, neatly trimmed lawns and a number of artfully placed flower beds. It was clearly a school for rich kids.

They parked in a small lot outside the main quadrangle. The lot was empty except for a burgundy-colored mid-nineties Taurus station wagon with one of its windshield wipers missing and an old, humpbacked Jaguar Mark II saloon in British racing green. The Taurus had a toddler-sized car seat in the back.

They left their rental car and stepped into the hot morning air. The sun was almost directly overhead and everything had a flat, baked, deserted look about it. A school in midsummer was like an abandoned husk until September. They entered the main quadrangle. Directly in front of them was a stone fountain topped by a large, classically draped figure of a woman with a tilted amphora on her shoulder, spilling water down into the granite pool below. It looked as though the figure had stood there spilling water for a hundred years, the pool never filling, the container on her shoulder never emptying. The burbling water was the only sound and movement in the place. They turned to the left and went up a set of wide stone stairs. Valentine pulled open one of the dark oak doors and they stepped into the cool interior of the school.

They found themselves in a large reception hall paneled in the same oak as the front doors. The floor was marble, laid out in alternating squares of light and dark. The ceiling was more coffered oak set in the center with a massive wrought iron chandelier. Finn expected to see suits of armor and crossed halberds ranged around the room but instead she saw dimly lit display cases filled with dusty trophies and old framed photographs. Just inside the doors there was a massive granite slab bolted to the wall, etched like a tombstone, which is what it was, in a sense. Picked out in gold, the inscription running along the top of the memorial said simply: 1916-1918-1941-1945. Below the dates were a dozen columns of names. Apparently for Greyfriars, history had stopped at the end of the second world war and paid no heed to the conflicts that had followed. Either that or they’d simply run out of space and the Greyfriars dead from Korea, Vietnam and Iraq were left to fend for themselves.

Finn and Valentine crossed the entry hall, following the seesaw sound of an old dot-matrix printer and the blurred clatter of fingers on a keyboard. Through the main hall they found a narrow corridor disappearing left and right, half paneled in oak, with ancient ochre-colored plaster above. A number of small rooms led off the corridor; only one had an open door. Valentine peeked in, tapping lightly on the doorframe. A small, plain woman was working away in front of a keyboard, her feet neatly tucked under her desk, her head erect and posture perfect. She wore glasses and had her hair drawn up into a loose untidy bun. She looked up at Valentine’s knock, eyes going wide behind the glasses. Valentine smiled.

“I’m Dr. Michael Valentine from New York. This is my assistant, Miss Ryan.”

“Dr. Valentine?” The woman looked even more startled now, a rabbit frozen in high beams. “No one here is sick that I know of. There’s really nobody here. A few of the masters, the head.”

“You are?” Valentine asked.

“Miss Mimble. Jessie Mimble. I’m the receptionist.”

“We’d like to see Dr. Wharton, if you don’t mind.”

“Do you have an appointment?”

“No. It’s about the stolen knife.”

“Oh dear.”

“Right. We’re here about that.” The young, rabbit-eyed Miss Mimble stared up at them as though expecting further orders. She seemed transfixed by Valentine.

“Dr. Wharton?” Finn reminded.

“Oh, right,” said the woman. She got up from behind her desk and scuttled off to an adjoining door, knocking mouselike before entering. Watching her go, Finn noticed that she had an enormous rear end and jutting hips, as though the body of a much slimmer woman had been grafted onto the waist of a Bradley tank camouflaged in a flowered skirt. She was back a few moments later, pulling open the door and standing aside.

“Dr. Wharton will see you now.” She gestured them into the room and closed the door behind them.

Dr. Harry Wharton was in his mid-fifties, bald, clean-shaven and wearing bright red reading glasses which he took off and dropped on the pile of papers in front of him on the desk as Valentine and Finn Ryan entered the room. The room itself was pleasant and bright. The curtains on the tall window behind Wharton were bright red and drawn back to let in the sun. The desk was dark oak, large and modern. The carpet matched the curtains and the tack-upholstered red leather chairs that sat in front of the desk. On the wall behind the headmaster was a framed aerial photograph of the school. The rest of the walls were taken up with floor-to-ceiling bookcases. Very professorial, like the Architectural Digest version of a private school headmaster’s office. Finn smiled; just the kind of thing to set rich parents at ease. The room smelled faintly of apple-flavored pipe tobacco. There was no ashtray.

Wharton stood up, most of his attention on Finn. She noticed the tie he was wearing was bright red with small blue heraldic shields on it. His suit was a dark pinstripe and the toe caps of his brogues shone like the top of his head. He reached out a hand across the desk and smiled. The smile seemed perfectly pleasant and genuine. Finn took his hand first. The grip was dry and firm and he wasn’t one of those people who kept pressing the flesh for too long. He sat down again.

“Dr. Valentine, Miss Ryan, what can I do for you?”

“We’re here about the koummya.”

“The knife.” Wharton nodded. “It was stolen several weeks ago.”

“Yes,” said Valentine.

“I’d like to know why you’re interested?” Wharton asked. His voice was still pleasant enough but there was a faint edge to the question.

“I’m generally interested in antiquities but I’m more interested in how this one was put to use.”

“The murder.”

“Yes.”

“You’re with the police then?”

“I sometimes do consulting work for them.”

A nice bit of evasion, thought Finn. Not the truth but not necessarily a lie either. Said without a twitch or hesitation-an expected question, the answer ready. As her mother might say, Michael Valentine certainly was a caution.