Gorley-Smith, they did not believe it.
Where could one hide a gun that it would be retrievable, and in a condition in which it could be used again? Not the river. And not where anyone else would find it, either casually or because they were looking for it.
He stopped on the path and stood facing the college. As always, its beauty filled him with pleasure. From the Bridge of Sighs the fine brick was met by white stone sheer down into the water. Further on there was a short stretch of grass sloping to the river. The walls were smooth except for the windows, all the way up to the crenellated edge of the roof with its dormers and high chimneys.
But Perth’s men had been up there.
All except the master’s lodgings. In deference to the Allards, they had merely looked at it from the next roof over, from where they could see everything. The drainpipes down were wide at the neck, to catch the runoff from the roof behind. An idea stabbed his mind. Was it possible? It was the one place, so far as he knew, where no one had looked.
Could Beecher have put it there after killing Sebastian? And could he have retrieved it again in time to take his own life with it? But even if Joseph was right, there would be no way to prove it now.
Perhaps he could deduce it if he tried. Where should he begin? With everyone’s movements after the discovery of Sebastian’s body. Anyone climbing on the roof of the master’s lodgings would have risked being noticed, even at half past five in the morning. At this time of the year it was broad daylight.
He started to walk slowly.
Was it possible they had kept it somehow concealed temporarily and then put it in a safe place later? Had it been in the top of the downpipe, it would have taken only a few moments to place it: a quick visit to one of the attic rooms with a dormer window, open it wide, lean far out and drop the gun, perhaps wrapped in something. Even a scarf or a couple of handkerchiefs would disguise the outline, then a few leaves.
If that were the answer, then it could only have been done from the master’s lodgings. He could not imagine it was one of the servants. That reduced it to Aidan and Connie Thyer, Beecher if he had seen Connie there, and whoever else might have visited.
Whoever it was had to have concealed the gun very soon after Sebastian’s murder was committed, because the police had started the search within an hour of their arrival.
What would he have done were he in that situation? Hidden it in the undergrowth in the Fellows’ Garden until he was free to go back and get into the master’s lodgings unobserved.
And to retrieve it again? Perhaps much the same.
It came back to Connie and Aidan Thyer—and perhaps Beecher. He could not believe it was Connie, but the more he thought of it, the more likely did it become that it was Thyer. Perhaps it was he whom Sebastian had seen on the Hauxton Road. Perhaps it was even he who was behind the plot itself. He was a brilliant man with a position of far more power than most people realized. As master of a college in Cambridge, he had influence over many of the young men who would, in a generation’s time, be the leaders of the nation. He was sowing seeds the world would reap.
Now that the thought was in Joseph’s mind, he had to test it until it was proved one way or the other. And there was only one place to begin. He would hate doing it, but he could think of no alternative.
He walked slowly back to the Bridge of Sighs and into St. John’s, then across the inner quad to the master’s lodgings. Thyer himself would be in the library at this time in the early afternoon. He hoped Connie would be at home.
The parlor maid let him in, and he found Connie standing at the window staring out at the bright flowers in the Fellows’ Garden. She made an effort to smile at him. “Thank you for coming yesterday,” she said a little huskily. “It was kind of you.” She did not explain what she meant, and turned away again almost immediately. “I’m relieved the Allards have gone home and Elwyn has moved back to his own rooms. But the house is unnaturally quiet now. It seems like silence rather than peace. Is that absurd?”
“No,” he answered. He hated what he was about to do, the more so because if it proved anything at all, it might be something she would infinitely prefer not to know. “I need to ask you one or two questions. . . .” He hesitated, not sure how to address her. Her Christian name was too familiar; using it would be taking something of a liberty. And yet to address her as Mrs. Thyer was both cold and bitterly ironic.
She was only mildly curious. “About what?”
He must do it. He could feel his body stiff and he was standing awkwardly. “I found a photograph in Sebastian’s rooms.” He hated this. He saw her stiffen, and he knew instantly that she was aware of it and that it meant all that he had supposed. “You met Harry in Northumberland. I know the place it was taken. He and I walked there.”
The tears filled her eyes. “He told me,” she whispered, her voice choked. “I didn’t go there to meet him. It was almost by accident.” She gave an awkward, lopsided little shrug. “I should have stopped myself. I knew it was wrong, and I knew what it would lead to—but I wanted it so much! Just once to have . . .” She looked away from him. It was a moment before she was able to compose herself. “Some passer-by took the photograph. Harry kept it. It must have fallen out of his pocket when his coat was over the arm of the chair. He was frantic when he discovered it was gone. I didn’t know Sebastian had it.” Her face was touched with a rare, terrible anger. It frightened him.
“Connie . . .”
The expression vanished again, drowned in misery.
He had to go on; there were other things that he had to know. There was no more time to spend in patience. “About the morning Sebastian was murdered, and the day leading up to the time Harry died.”
“I don’t know anything useful.” Her voice was flat again, emotion buried far below in a sea of pain too deep to dare touch.
“And about Sunday, the day the archduke and duchess were shot in Sarajevo,” he went on.
She swung around. “Oh, God! You can’t think Harry had anything to do with that! That’s idiotic!”
“Of course I don’t!” He denied it vehemently, but his mind went to the yellow Lanchester mangled and broken, and his parents’ bodies covered with blood. Until the moment of saying it, the thought had not entered his mind that Beecher could be guilty of that, but now it was there, a tiny shard, like a dagger.
She was staring at him incredulously.
“No!” he said again, forcing a smile, this time in the face of the absurdity of Beecher being responsible for the assassination in Sarajevo. “I simply used that event to bring the day to your mind. If you remember, it was also the day my parents were killed.”
“Oh!” She was stunned and utterly contrite, her face crumpled in pity. “Joseph, I’m so sorry. I had completely forgotten! With—” She took a deep breath and held it a moment. “With murder”—she forced herself to use the word—“here in college, an accidental death, even two, seems so much . . . cleaner. What is it you need to know? If I can tell you, of course I will.”
Now was the moment to say what he had to. “I think someone may have seen what happened. Do you know where Harry was about noon that day?”
The color swept up her face. She must have felt its heat, because her eyes betrayed her as well. “Yes. It couldn’t have been he,” she said.
He could not let it go quite so delicately. “Are you certain, as a fact, not a belief?”
“Absolutely.” She looked down, away from him.
“And the morning Sebastian was killed?” He chose the slightly softer word, blunting it where he could.
She turned a little to look out of the window again. “I got up early and walked along the Backs. I was with Harry. I can’t prove it because we kept to the trees. We didn’t want to be seen, and there are quite often other people around, mostly students, even at five or six.”
“Then it is not possible that Harry could have killed Sebastian,” he said, watching for the slightest shadow in her eyes or alteration in the rigidity of her body that would betray that she was lying to protect him, even now that he was dead.
She turned to face him, her eyes wide, brilliant. “How can you be sure?” she said, not daring yet to grasp the hope. “We didn’t meet until nearly six. Sebastian could have been killed before that, couldn’t he?” She was pale now, perhaps wondering if Beecher had come to her straight from having murdered the one man who threatened them both.
“Where did you meet?” he asked.
