Murder at Pentecost

 

“BUZZ OFF, FLATHERS,” SAID the young man in flannels. “We’re thrilled by

your news, but we don’t want your religious opinions. And, for the Lord’s

sake, stop talking about ‘undergrads,’ like a ruddy commercial traveller.

Hop it!”

The person addressed, a pimply youth in a commoner’s gown, bleated a

little, but withdrew from the table, intimidated.

“Appalling little tick,” commented the young man in flannels to his

companion. “He’s on my staircase, too. Thank Heaven, I move out next

term. I suppose it’s true about the Master? Poor old blighter—I’m quite

sorry I cut his lecture. Have some more coffee?”

“No, thanks, Radcott. I must be pushing off in a minute. It’s getting too

near lunch-time.”

Mr. Montague Egg, seated at the next small table, had pricked up his

ears. He now turned, with an apologetic cough, to the young man called

Radcott.

“Excuse me, sir,” he said, with some diffidence. “I didn’t intend to

overhear what you gentlemen were saying, but might I ask a question?”

Emboldened by Radcott’s expression, which, though surprised, was frank

and friendly, he went on: “I happen to be a commercial traveller—Egg is

my name, Montague Egg, representing Plummet & Rose, wines and spirits,

Piccadilly. Might I ask what is wrong with saying ‘undergrads’? Is the

expression offensive in any way?”

Mr. Radcott blushed a fiery red to the roots of his flaxen hair.

“I’m frightfully sorry,” he said ingenuously, and suddenly looking

extremely young. “Damn stupid thing of me to say. Beastly brick.”

“Don’t mention it, I’m sure,” said Monty.

“Didn’t mean anything personal. Only, that chap Flathers gets my goat.

He ought to know that nobody says ‘undergrads’ except townees and

journalists and people outside the university.”

“What ought we to say? ‘Undergraduates’?”

“‘Undergraduates’ is correct.”

“I’m very much obliged,” said Monty. “Always willing to learn. It’s

easy to make a mistake in a thing like that, and, of course, it prejudices the

customer against one. The Salesman’s Handbook doesn’t give any guidance

about it; I shall have to make a memo for myself. Let me see. How would

this do? ‘To call an Oxford gent an—’”

“I think I should say ‘Oxford man’—it’s the more technical form of

expression.”

“Oh, yes. ‘To call an Oxford man an undergrad proclaims you an

outsider and a cad.’ That’s very easy to remember.”

“You seem to have a turn for this kind of thing,” said Radcott, amused.

“Well, I think perhaps I have,” admitted Monty, with a touch of pride.

“Would the same thing apply at Cambridge?”

“Certainly,” replied Radcott’s companion. “And you might add that ‘To

call the university the ’varsity is out of date, if not precisely narsity.’ I

apologise for the rhyme. ’Varsity has somehow a flavour of the ’nineties.”

“So has the port I’m recommending,” said Mr. Egg brightly. “Still, one’s

sales-talk must be up to date, naturally; and smart, though not vulgar. In the

wine and spirit trade we make refinement our aim. I am really much obliged

to you, gentlemen, for your help. This is my first visit to Oxford. Could you

tell me where to find Pentecost College? I have a letter of introduction to a

gentleman there.”

“Pentecost?” said Radcott. “I don’t think I’d start there, if I were you.”

“No?” said Mr. Egg, suspecting some obscure point of university

etiquette. “Why not?”

“Because,” replied Radcott surprisingly, “I understand from the

regrettable Flathers that some public benefactor has just murdered the

Master, and in the circumstances I doubt whether the Bursar will be able to

give proper attention to the merits of rival vintages.”

“Murdered the Master?” echoed Mr. Egg.

“Socked him one—literally, I am told, with a brickbat enclosed in a

Woolworth sock—as he was returning to his house from delivering his too-

well-known lecture on Plato’s use of the Enclitics. The whole school of

Literœ Humaniores will naturally be under suspicion, but, personally, I

believe Flathers did it himself. You may have heard him informing us that

judgment overtakes the evil-doer, and inviting us to a meeting for prayer

and repentance in the South Lecture-Room. Such men are dangerous.”

“Was the Master of Pentecost an evil-doer?”

“He has written several learned works disproving the existence of

Providence, and I must say that I, in common with the whole Pentecostal

community, have always looked on him as one of Nature’s worst mistakes.

Still, to slay him more or less on his own doorstep seems to me to be in

poor taste. It will upset the examination candidates, who face their ordeal

next week. And it will mean cancelling the Commem. Ball. Besides, the

police have been called in, and are certain to annoy the Senior Common

Room by walking on the grass in the quad. However, what’s done can’t be

undone. Let us pass to a pleasanter subject. I understand that you have some

port to dispose of. I, on the other hand, have recently suffered bereavement

at the hands of a bunch of rowing hearties, who invaded my rooms the other

night and poured my last dozen of Cockburn ’04 down their leathery and

undiscriminating throttles. If you care to stroll round with me to Pentecost, Mr. Egg, bringing your literature with you, we might be able to do

business.”

Mr. Egg expressed himself as delighted to accept Radcott’s invitation,

and was soon trotting along the Cornmarket at his conductor’s athletic

heels. At the corner of Broad Street the second undergraduate left them,

while they turned on, past Balliol and Trinity, asleep in the June sunshine,

and presently reached the main entrance of Pentecost.

Just as they did so, a small, elderly man, wearing a light overcoat and

carrying an M.A. gown over his arm, came ambling short-sightedly across

the street from the direction of the Bodleian Library. A passing car just

missed whirling him into eternity, as Radcott stretched out a long arm and

raked him into safety on the pavement.

“Look out, Mr. Temple,” said Radcott. “We shall be having you

murdered next.”

“Murdered?” queried Mr. Temple, blinking. “Oh, you refer to the motor-

car. But I saw it coming. I saw it quite distinctly. Yes, yes. But why ‘next’?

Has anybody else been murdered?”

“Only the Master of Pentecost,” said Radcott, pinching Mr. Egg’s arm.

“The Master? Dr. Greeby? You don’t say so! Murdered? Dear me! Poor

Greeby! This will upset my whole day’s work.” His pale-blue eyes shifted,

and a curious, wavering look came into them. “Justice is slow but sure. Yes,

yes. The sword of the Lord and of Gideon. But the blood—that is always so

disconcerting, is it not? And yet, I washed my hands, you know.” He

stretched out both hands and looked at them in a puzzled way. “Ah, yes—

poor Greeby has paid the price of his sins. Excuse my running away from

you—I have urgent business at the police-station.”

“If,” said Mr. Radcott, again pinching Monty’s arm, “you want to give

yourself up for the murder, Mr. Temple, you had better come along with us. The police are bound to be about the place somewhere.”

“Oh, yes, of course, so they are. Yes. Very thoughtful of you. That will

save me a great deal of time, and I have an important chapter to finish. A

beautiful day, is it not, Mr.—I fear I do not know your name. Or do I? I am

growing sadly forgetful.”

Radcott mentioned his name, and the oddly assorted trio turned together

towards the main entrance to the college. The great gate was shut; at the

postern stood the porter, and at his side a massive figure in blue, who

demanded their names.

Radcott, having been duly identified by the porter, produced Monty and

his credentials.

“And this,” he went on, “is, of course, Mr. Temple. You know him. He

is looking for your Superintendent.”

“Right you are, sir,” replied the policeman. “You’ll find him in the

cloisters. … At his old game, I suppose?” he added, as the small figure of

Mr. Temple shuffled away across the sun-baked expanse of the quad.

“Oh, yes,” said Radcott. “He was on to it like a shot. Must be quite

exciting for the old bird to have a murder so near home. Where was his

last?”

“Lincoln, sir; last Tuesday. Young fellow shot his young woman in the

Cathedral. Mr. Temple was down at the station the next day, just before

lunch, explaining that he’d done it because the poor girl was the Scarlet

Woman.”

“Mr. Temple,” said Radcott, “has a mission in life. He is the sword of

the Lord and of Gideon. Every time a murder is committed in this country,

Mr. Temple lays claim to it. It is true that his body can always be shown to

have been quietly in bed or at the Bodleian while the dirty work was afoot, but to an idealistic philosopher that need present no difficulty. But what is

all this about the Master, actually?”

“Well, sir, you know that little entry between the cloisters and the

Master’s residence? At twenty minutes past ten this morning, Dr. Greeby

was found lying dead there, with his lecture-notes scattered all round him

and a brickbat in a woollen sock lying beside his head. He’d been lecturing

in a room in the Main Quadrangle at nine o’clock, and was, as far as we can

tell, the last to leave the lecture-room. A party of American ladies and

gentlemen passed through the cloisters a little after 10 o’clock, and they

have been found, and say there was nobody about there then, so far as they

could see—but, of course, sir, the murderer might have been hanging about

the entry, because, naturally, they wouldn’t go that way but through

Boniface Passage to the Inner Quad and the chapel. One of the young

gentlemen says he saw the Master cross the Main Quad on his way to the

cloisters at 10:50, so he’d reach the entry in about two minutes after that.

The Regius Professor of Morphology came along at 10:20, and found the

body, and when the doctor arrived, five minutes later, he said Dr. Greeby

must have been dead about a quarter of an hour. So that puts it somewhere

round about 10:10, you see, sir.”

“When did these Americans leave the chapel?”

“Ah, there you are, sir!” replied the constable. He seemed very ready to

talk, thought Mr. Egg, and deduced, rightly, that Mr. Radcott was well and

favourably known to the Oxford branch of the Force. “If that there party

had come back through the cloisters, they might have been able to tell us

something. But they didn’t. They went on through the Inner Quad into the

garden, and the verger didn’t leave the chapel, on account of a lady who had

just arrived and wanted to look at the carving on the reredos.”

“And did the lady also come through the cloisters?”

“She did, sir, and she’s the person we want to find, because it seems as

though she must have passed through the cloisters very close to the time of

the murder. She came into the chapel just on 10:15, because the verger

recollected of the clock chiming a few minutes after she came in and her

mentioning how sweet the notes was. You see the lady come in, didn’t you,

Mr. Dabbs?”

“I saw a lady,” replied the porter, “but then I see a lot of ladies one way

and another. This one came across from the Bodleian round about 10

o’clock. Elderly lady, she was, dressed kind of old-fashioned, with her

skirts round her heels and one of them hats like a rook’s nest and a bit of

elastic round the back. Looked like she might be a female don—leastways,

the way female dons used to look. And she had the twitches—you know—

jerked her head a bit. You get hundreds like ’em. They goes to sit in the

cloisters and listen to the fountain and the little birds. But as to noticing a

corpse or a murderer, it’s my belief they wouldn’t know such a thing if they

saw it. I didn’t see the lady again, so she must have gone out through the

garden.”

“Very likely,” said Radcott. “May Mr. Egg and I go in through the

cloisters, officer? Because it’s the only way to my rooms, unless we go

round by St. Scholastica’s Gate.”

“All the other gates are locked, sir. You go on and speak to the Super;

he’ll let you through. You’ll find him in the cloisters with Professor Staines

and Dr. Moyle.”

“Bodley’s Librarian? What’s he got to do with it?”

“They think he may know the lady, sir, if she’s a Bodley reader.”

“Oh, I see. Come along, Mr. Egg.”

Radcott led the way across the Main Quadrangle and through a dark

little passage at one corner, into the cool shade of the cloisters. Framed by the arcades of ancient stone, the green lawn drowsed tranquilly in the

noonday heat. There was no sound but the echo of their own footsteps, the

plash and tinkle of the little fountain and the subdued chirping of

chaffinches, as they paced the alternate sunshine and shadow of the

pavement. About midway along the north side of the cloisters they came

upon another dim little covered passageway, at the entrance to which a

police-sergeant was kneeling, examining the ground with the aid of an

electric torch.

“Hullo, sergeant!” said Radcott. “Doing the Sherlock Holmes stunt?

Show us the bloodstained footprints.”

“No blood, sir, unfortunately. Might make our job easier if there were.

And no footprints neither. The poor gentleman was sandbagged, and we

think the murderer must have climbed up here to do it, for the deceased was

a tall gentleman and he was hit right on the top of the head, sir.” The

sergeant indicated a little niche, like a blocked-up window, about four feet

from the ground. “Looks as if he’d waited up here, sir, for Dr. Greeby to go

by.”

“He must have been well acquainted with his victim’s habits,”

suggested Mr. Egg.

“Not a bit of it,” retorted Radcott. “He’d only to look at the lecture-list

to know the time and place. This passage leads to the Master’s House and

the Fellows’ Garden and nowhere else, and it’s the way Dr. Greeby would

naturally go after his lecture, unless he was lecturing elsewhere, which he

wasn’t. Fairly able-bodied, your murderer, sergeant, to get up here. At least

—I don’t know.”

Before the policeman could stop him, he had placed one hand on the

side of the niche and a foot on a projecting band of masonry below it, and

swung himself up.

“Hi, sir! Come down, please. The Super won’t like that.”

“Why? Oh, gosh! Fingerprints, I suppose. I forgot. Never mind; you can

take mine if you want them, for comparison. Give you practice. Anyhow, a

baby in arms could get up here. Come on, Mr. Egg; we’d better beat it

before I’m arrested for obstruction.”

But at this moment Radcott was hailed by a worried-looking don, who

came through the passage from the far side, accompanied by three or four

other people.

“Oh, Mr. Radcott! One moment, Superintendent, this gentleman will be

able to tell you what you want to know; he was at Dr. Greeby’s lecture. That

is so, is it not, Mr. Radcott?”

“Well, no, not exactly, sir,” replied Radcott, with some embarrassment.

“I should have been, but, by a regrettable accident, I cut—that is to say, I

was on the river, sir, and didn’t get back in time.”

“Very vexatious,” said Professor Staines, while the Superintendent

merely observed:

“Any witness to your being on the river, sir?”

“None,” replied Radcott. “I was alone in a canoe, up a backwater—

earnestly studying Aristotle. But I really didn’t murder the Master. His

lectures were—if I may say so—dull, but not to that point exasperating.”

“That is a very impudent observation, Mr. Radcott,” said the Professor

severely, “and in execrable taste.”

The Superintendent, murmuring something about routine, took down in

a note-book the alleged times of Mr. Radcott’s departure and return, and

then said:

“I don’t think I need detain any of you gentlemen further. If we want to

see you again, Mr. Temple, we will let you know.”

“Certainly, certainly. I shall just have a sandwich at the café and return

to the Bodleian. As for the lady, I can only repeat that she sat at my table

from about half-past nine till just before ten, and returned again at ten-

thirty. Very restless and disturbing. I do wish, Dr. Moyle, that some

arrangement could be made to give me that table to myself, or that I could

be given a place apart in the library. Ladies are always restless and

disturbing. She was still there when I left, but I very much hope she has

now gone for good. You are sure you don’t want to lock me up now? I am

quite at your service.”

“Not just yet, sir. You will hear from us presently.”

“Thank you, thank you. I should like to finish my chapter. For the

present, then, I will wish you good-day.”

The little bent figure wandered away, and the Superintendent touched

his head significantly.

“Poor gentleman! Quite harmless, of course. I needn’t ask you, Dr.

Moyle, where he was at the time?”

“Oh, he was in his usual corner of Duke Humphrey’s Library. He admits

it, you see, when he is asked. In any case, I know definitely that he was

there this morning, because he took out a Phi book, and of course had to

apply personally to me for it. He asked for it at 9:30 and returned it at

12:15. As regards the lady, I think I have seen her before. One of the older

school of learned ladies, I fancy. If she is an outside reader, I must have her

name and address somewhere, but she may, of course, be a member of the

University. I fear I could not undertake to know them all by sight. But I will

inquire. It is, in fact, quite possible that she is still in the library, and, if not,

Franklin may know when she went and who she is. I will look into the

matter immediately. I need not say, professor, how deeply I deplore this

lamentable affair. Poor dear Greeby! Such a loss to classical scholarship!”

At this point, Radcott gently drew Mr. Egg away. A few yards farther

down the cloisters, they turned into another and rather wider passage, which

brought them out into the Inner Quadrangle, one side of which was

occupied by the chapel. Mounting three dark flights of stone steps on the

opposite side, they reached Radcott’s rooms, where the undergraduate thrust

his new acquaintance into an armchair, and, producing some bottles of beer

from beneath the window-seat, besought him to make himself at home.

“Well,” he observed presently, “you’ve had a fairly lively introduction

to Oxford life—one murder and one madman. Poor old Temple. Quite one

of our prize exhibits. Used to be a Fellow here, donkey’s years ago. There

was some fuss, and he disappeared for a time. Then he turned up again, ten

years since, perfectly potty; took lodgings in Holywell, and has haunted the

Bodder and the police-station alternately ever since. Fine Greek scholar he

is, too. Quite reasonable, except on the one point. I hope old Moyle finds

his mysterious lady, though it’s nonsense to pretend that they keep tabs on

all the people who use the library. You’ve only got to walk in firmly, as if

the place belonged to you, and, if you’re challenged, say in a loud, injured

tone that you’ve been a reader for years. If you borrow a gown, they won’t

even challenge you.”

“Is that so, really?” said Mr. Egg.

“Prove it, if you like. Take my gown, toddle across to the Bodder, march

straight in past the showcases and through the little wicket marked ‘Readers

Only,’ into Duke Humphrey’s Library; do what you like, short of stealing

the books or setting fire to the place—and if anybody says anything to you,

I’ll order six dozen of anything you like. That’s fair, isn’t it?”

Mr. Egg accepted this offer with alacrity, and in a few moments, arrayed

in a scholar’s gown, was climbing the stair that leads to England’s most

famous library. With a slight tremor, he pushed open the swinging glass door and plunged into the hallowed atmosphere of mouldering leather that

distinguishes such temples of learning.

Just inside, he came upon Dr. Moyle in conversation with the door-

keeper. Mr. Egg, bending nonchalantly to examine an illegible manuscript

in a showcase, had little difficulty in hearing what they said, since, like all

official attendants upon reading-rooms, they took no trouble to lower their

voices.

“I know the lady, Dr. Moyle. That is to say, she has been here several

times lately. She usually wears an M.A. gown. I saw her here this morning,

but I didn’t notice when she left. I don’t think I ever heard her name, but

seeing that she was a senior member of the University—”

Mr. Egg waited to hear no more. An idea was burgeoning in his mind.

He walked away, courageously pushed open the Readers’ Wicket, and

stalked down the solemn mediæval length of Duke Humphrey’s Library. In

the remotest and darkest bay, he observed Mr. Temple, who, having

apparently had his sandwich and forgotten about the murder, sat alone,

writing busily, amid a pile of repellent volumes, with a large attaché-case

full of papers open before him.

Leaning over the table, Mr. Egg addressed him in an urgent whisper:

“Excuse me, sir. The police Superintendent asked me to say that they

think they have found the lady, and would be glad if you would kindly step

down at once and identify her.”

“The lady?” Mr. Temple looked up vaguely. “Oh, yes—the lady. To be

sure. Immediately? That is not very convenient. Is it so very urgent?”

“They said particularly to lose no time, sir,” said Mr. Egg.

Mr. Temple muttered something, rose, seemed to hesitate whether to

clear up his papers or not, and finally shovelled them all into the bulging

attaché-case, which he locked upon them.

“Let me carry this for you, sir,” said Monty, seizing it promptly and

shepherding Mr. Temple briskly out. “They’re still in the cloisters, I think,

but the Super said, would you kindly wait a few moments for him in the

porter’s lodge. Here we are.”

He handed Mr. Temple and his attaché-case over to the care of the

porter, who looked a little surprised at seeing Mr. Egg in academic dress,

but, on hearing the Superintendent’s name, said nothing. Mr. Egg hastened

through quad and cloisters and mounted Mr. Radcott’s staircase at a run.

“Excuse me, sir,” he demanded breathlessly of that young gentleman,

“but what is a Phi book?”

“A Phi book,” replied Radcott, in some surprise, “is a book deemed by

Bodley’s Librarian to be of an indelicate nature, and catalogued

accordingly, by some dead-and-gone humorist, under the Greek letter phi.

Why the question?”

“Well,” said Mr. Egg, “it just occurred to me how simple it would be for

anybody to walk into the Bodleian, disguise himself in a retired corner—

say in Duke Humphrey’s Library—walk out, commit a murder, return,

change back to his own clothes and walk out. Nobody would stop a person

from coming in again, if he—or she—had previously been seen to go out—

especially if the disguise had been used in the library before. Just a change

of clothes and an M.A. gown would be enough.”

“What in the world are you getting at?”

“This lady, who was in the cloisters at the time of the murder. Mr.

Temple says she was sitting at his table. But isn’t it funny that Mr. Temple

should have drawn special attention to himself by asking for a Phi book, to-

day of all days? If he was once a Fellow of this college, he’d know which

way Dr. Greeby would go after his lecture; and he may have had a grudge

against him on account of that old trouble, whatever it was. He’d know about the niche in the wall, too. And he’s got an attaché-case with him that

might easily hold a lady’s hat and a skirt long enough to hide his trousers.

And why is he wearing a topcoat on such a hot day, if not to conceal the

upper portion of his garments? Not that it’s any business of mine—but—

well, I just took the liberty of asking myself. And I’ve got him out there,

with his case, and the porter keeping an eye on him.”

Thus Mr. Egg, rather breathlessly. Radcott gaped at him.

“Temple? My dear man, you’re as potty as he is. Why, he’s always

confessing—he confessed to this—you can’t possibly suppose—”

“I daresay I’m wrong,” said Mr. Egg. “But isn’t there a fable about the

man who cried ‘Wolf!’ so often that nobody would believe him when the

wolf really came? There’s a motto in the Salesman’s Handbook that I

always admire very much. It says: ‘Discretion plays a major part in making

up the salesman’s art, for truths that no one can believe are calculated to

deceive.’ I think that’s rather subtle, don’t you?”

 

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