The Silent World of Nicholas Quinn

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

IN THE SYNDICATE building on Wednesday morning, Morse told Bartlett frankly about the virtual certainty of some criminal malpractice in the administration of the examinations. He mentioned specifically his suspicions about the leakage of question papers to Al-jamara, and passed exhibit № 1 across the table.

3rd March

Dear George,

Greetings to all at Oxford. Many thanks for your

letter and for the Summer examination package.

All Entry Forms and Fees Forms should be ready

for final despatch to the Syndicate by Friday

20th or at the very latest, I'm told, by the 21st.

Admin has improved here, though there's room

for improvement still; just give us all two or three

more years and we'll really show you! Please

don't let these wretched 16+ proposals destroy

your basic O- and A-pattern. Certainly this

sort of change, if implemented immediately,

would bring chaos.

Sincerely yours,

Bartlett frowned deeply as he read the letter, then opened his desk diary and consulted a few entries. 'This is, er, a load of nonsense — you realize that, don't you? All entry forms had to be in by the first of March this year. We've installed a minicomputer and anything arriving after—'

Morse interrupted him. 'You mean the entry forms from Al-jamara were already in when that letter was written?'

'Oh yes. Otherwise we couldn't have examined their candidates.'

'And you did examine them?'

'Certainly. Then there's this business of the Summer examination package. They couldn't possibly have received that before early April. Half the question papers weren't printed until then. And there's something else wrong, isn't there, Inspector? The 20th March isn't a Friday. Not in my diary, anyway. No, no. I don't think I'd build too much on this letter. I'm sure it can't be from one of our—'

'You don't recognize the signature?'

'Would anybody? It looks more like a coil of barbed wire—'

'Just read down the right-hand side of the letter, sir. The last word on each line, if you see what I mean.'

In a flat voice the Secretary read the words aloud: 'your — package — ready — Friday—21st — room — three — Please — destroy — this — immediately.' He nodded slowly to himself. 'I see what you mean, Inspector, though I must say I'd never have spotted it myself. You mean you think that George Bland was—'

'—was on the fiddle, yes. I'm convinced that this letter told him exactly where and when he could collect the latest instalment of his money.'

Bartlett took a deep breath and consulted his diary once more. 'You may just be onto something, I suppose. He wasn't in the office on Friday 21st.'

'Do you know where he was?'

Bartlett shook his head and passed over the diary, where among the dozen or so brief, neatly-written entries under 21st March Morse read the laconic reminder: 'GB not in office.'

'Can you get in touch with him, sir?'

'Of course. I sent him a telegram only last Wednesday — about Quinn. They'd met when—'

'Did he reply?'

'Hasn't done yet.'

Morse took the plunge. 'Naturally I can't tell you everything, sir, but I think you ought to know that in my view the deaths of both Quinn and Ogleby are directly linked with Bland. I think that Bland was corrupt enough to compromise the integrity of this Syndicate at every point — if there was money in it for him. But I think there's someone here, too, not necessarily on the staff, but someone very closely associated with the work of the Syndicate, who's in collaboration with Bland. And I've little doubt that Quinn found out who it was, and got himself murdered for his trouble.'

Bartlett had been listening intently to Morse's words, but he evinced little surprise. 'I thought you might be going to say something like that, Inspector, and I suppose you think that Ogleby found out as well, and was murdered for the same reason.'

'Could be, sir. Though you may be making a false assumption. You see, it may be that the murderer of Nicholas Quinn has already been punished for his crime.'

The little Secretary was genuinely shocked now. His eyebrows shot up an inch, and his frameless lenses settled even lower on his nose, as Morse slowly continued.

'I'm afraid you must face the real possibility, sir, that Quinn's murderer worked here under your very nose; the possibility that he was in fact your own deputy-secretary—Philip Ogleby'

Lewis came in ten minutes later as Morse and Bartlett were arranging the meeting. Bartlett was to phone or write to all the Syndicate members and ask them to attend an extraordinary general meeting on Friday morning at 10 a.m.; he was to insist that it was of the utmost importance that they should cancel all other commitments and attend; after all, two members of the Syndicate had been murdered, hadn't they?

In the corridor outside Lewis whispered briefly to Morse. 'You were right, sir. It rang for two minutes. Noakes confirms it.'

'Excellent. I think it's time to make a move then, Lewis. Car outside?'

'Yes, sir. Do you want me with you?'

'No. You get to the car; we'll be along in a minute.' He walked along the corridor, knocked quietly on the door, and entered. She was sitting at her desk signing letters, but promptly took off her reading glasses, stood up, and smiled sweetly. 'Bit early to take me for a drink, isn't it?'

'No chance, I'm afraid. The car's outside — I think you'd better get your coat.'

The man inside does not go out this same Wednesday morning. The paper boy lingers for a few seconds as he puts The Times through the letter box, but no lucrative errand is commissioned this morning; the milkman delivers one pint of milk; the postman brings no letters; there are no visitors. The phone has gone several times earlier, and at twelve o'clock it goes again. Four rings; then, almost immediately it resumes, and mechanically the man counts the number of rings again — twenty-eight, twenty-nine, thirty. The phone stops, and the man smiles to himself. It is a clever system. They have used it several times before.

The man outside is still waiting; but expectantly now, for he thinks that the time of reckoning may be drawing near. At 4.20 pm. he is conscious of some activity at the back of the house, and a minute later the man inside emerges with a bicycle, rides quickly away up a side turning, and in less than five seconds has completely disappeared. It has been too quick, too unexpected. Constable Dickson swears softly to himself and calls up HQ, where Sergeant Lewis is distinctly unamused.

The car park is again very full today, and Morse is standing by the window in the buffet bar. He wonders what would happen if a heavy snowshower were to smother each of the cars in a thick white blanket; then each of the baffled motorists would need to remember exactly where he had left his car, and go straight to that spot — and find it. Just as Morse finds the spot again through his binoculars. But he can see nothing, and half an hour later, at 5.15 pm., he can still see nothing. He gives it up, talks to the ticket collector, and learns beyond all reasonable doubt that Roope was not lying when he said he'd passed through the ticket barrier, as if from the 3.05 train from Paddington, on Friday, 21st November.

As he steps out of his front door at 9.30 a.m. the next day, Thursday, 4th December, the man who has been inside is arrested by Sergeant Lewis and Constable Dickson of the Thames Valley Constabulary, CID Branch. He is charged with complicity in the murders of Nicholas Quinn and Philip Ogleby.