Dead Scared

‘YOUNG PEOPLE COMMITTING suicide is hardly uncommon, though,’ I said, thinking as I spoke. ‘The suicide rate is higher among the student body than the rest of the population, isn’t it? Wasn’t there a case in Wales a few years ago?’

‘You’re thinking about Bridgend,’ said Joesbury. ‘Although technically, that didn’t involve a university. Cluster suicides do happen. But they’re rare. And Dana’s mate isn’t the only one who’s worried. The media attention is getting the governing body very edgy too. Outlandish public suicides don’t look good for one of the world’s leading academic institutions.’

‘But no suggestion of foul play?’ I asked.

‘On the contrary. Both Bryony and Jackie had a psychiatric history,’ said Joesbury. ‘Jackie in the past, Bryony more recently.’

‘Bryony was receiving counselling?’

‘She was,’ said Joesbury. ‘Not by Dana’s friend herself, what’s her name …’ He pulled a stack of paper from the file and flicked through it. ‘Oliver,’ he said, after a moment, ‘Dr Evi Oliver … not with her but with one of her colleagues. There’s a team of counsellors dedicated to the university and Dr Oliver heads it up.’

‘What about the other girl?’ I said.

Joesbury nodded. ‘Jackie had her problems too, according to her friends,’ he said. ‘So did the young lad who hanged himself in his third week.’ Joesbury glanced down at his notes. ‘Jake Hammond. Nineteen-year-old English student.’

‘How many cases are we talking about?’

‘Nineteen in five years, including Bryony Carter,’ said Joesbury.

‘Well, I can see why the authorities are worried,’ I said. ‘But I don’t get why SO10 are involved.’

Joesbury leaned back in his chair and put his hands behind his head. He looked thinner than I remembered. He’d lost muscle definition from his chest and shoulders. ‘Old girls’ network,’ he said. ‘Dr Oliver contacts her old Cambridge buddy Dana, who in turn gets in touch with her old mentor on the force, another Cambridge alumna.’

‘Who is?’

‘Sonia Hammond.’

Joesbury waited for the name to register. It didn’t.

‘Commander Sonia Hammond,’ he prompted. ‘Currently head of the covert operations directorate at Scotland Yard.’

I’d got it. ‘Your boss,’ I said. ‘I didn’t know you reported to a woman.’

Joesbury raised one eyebrow. I’d forgotten he could do that. ‘Story of my life,’ he said. ‘Commander Hammond has a daughter at Cambridge, so she has an added interest.’

‘Even so,’ I said. ‘What on earth do they think an undercover operation in the city of dreaming spires will achieve?’

‘I think the city of dreaming spires is Oxford,’ said Joesbury. ‘Dr Oliver has this theory that the suicides aren’t coincidence. She thinks there is something decidedly sinister going on.’