unattractive and certainly a very vivacious girl, with a puckish sense of humour and a piquant wit.' The Dean smiled slowly. What a sentence! Over the years he had compiled his own little book of synonyms:
'not unattractive' = 'hideous to behold'
'vivacious' = 'usually drunk'
'puckish' = 'batty'
'piquant' = 'plain rude'
Ah well. Perhaps she wasn't such a bad prospect after all! But he wouldn't be interviewing her himself. Blast the Syndicate! It would have been interesting to test his little theory once more. So often people tried to create the impression of being completely different from their true selves, and it wasn't all that difficult. A smiling face, and a heart as hard as a flintstone! The opposite, too: a face set as hard as a flint and. . A vague memory stirred in the Dean's mind. Chief Inspector Morse had mentioned something similar, hadn't he? But the Dean couldn't quite get hold of it. Never mind. It couldn't be very important
Bartlett had received the call from Mrs. Martin at eight o'clock. Did he know where Donald was? Had he got a meeting? She knew he had to work late some nights, but he had never been away as long as this. Bartlett tried to make the right noises; said not to worry; said he would ring her back; said there must be some easy explanation.
'Oh Christ!' he said, after putting the receiver down.
'What's the matter, Tom?' Mrs. Bartlett had come through into the hall and was looking at him anxiously.
He put his hand gently on hers, and smiled wearily. 'How many times have I told you? You mustn't listen in to my telephone calls. You've got enough—'
'I never do. You know that, Tom. But—'
'It's all right. It's not your problem; it's mine. That's what they pay me for, isn't it? I can't expect a fat salary for nothing, can I?'
Mrs. Bartlett put her arm lovingly on his shoulder. 'I don't know what they pay you, and I don't want to know. If they paid you a million it wouldn't be too much! But—' She was worried, and the little Secretary knew it.
'I know. The world suddenly seems to have gone crazy, doesn't it? That was Martin's wife. He's not home yet.'
'Oh no!'
'Now, now. Don't start jumping to silly conclusions.'
'You don't think—?'
'You go and sit down and pour yourself a gin. And pour one for me. I shan't be a minute.' He found Monica's number and dialled. And like someone else the day before, he found himself mechanically counting the dialling tones. Ten, twenty, twenty-five. Sally must be out, too. He let it ring a few more times, and then slowly replaced the receiver. The Syndicate seemed to be on the verge of total collapse.
He thought back on the years during which he had worked so hard to build it all up. And somehow, at some point, the foundation had begun to shift and cracks to appear in the edifice above. He could almost put the exact time to it: the time when Roope had been elected on to the Board of the Syndics. Yes. That was when things had started crumbling. Roope, For a few minutes the little Secretary stood indecisively by the phone, and knew that he could willingly murder the man. Instead he rang Morse's number at the Thames Valley HQ, but Morse was out, too. Not that it mattered much. He'd mention it to him in the morning.
CHAPTER THIRTY
MRS. SETH ARRIVED at a quarter to ten and made her way upstairs to the Board Room. She was the first of the Syndics to arrive, and as she sat down her thoughts drifted back. . back to the last time she had sat there, when she had recalled her father. . when Roope had spoken. . when Quinn had been appointed. . The room was gradually filling up, and she acknowledged a few muted 'good mornings'; but the atmosphere was one of gloom, and the other Syndics sat down silently and let their own thoughts drift back, as she had done. Sometimes one or two of the graduate staff attended Syndics' meetings, but only by invitation; and none was there this morning except Bartlett, whose tired, drawn face did little more than reflect the communal mood. A man was sitting next to Bartlett, but she didn't know him. Must be from the police. Pleasant-looking man: about her own age — mid-, late- forties; going a bit thin on top; nice eyes, though they seemed to look at you and through you at the same time. There was another man, too — probably another policeman; but he was standing diffidently outside the magic circle, with a notebook in his hands.
At two minutes past ten, when all except one of the chairs were occupied, Bartlett stood up and in a sad and disillusioned little speech informed the assembly of the police suspicions — his own, too — that the integrity of their own foreign examinations had been irreparably impaired by the criminal behaviour of one or two people, people in whom the Syndicate had placed complete trust; that it was the view of Chief Inspector Morse ('on my right') that the deaths of Quinn and Ogleby were directly connected with this matter; that, after the clearing-up of the comparatively small Autumn examination, the activities of the Syndicate would necessarily be in abeyance until a complete investigation had been made; that the implications of a possible shut-down were far-reaching, and that the full cooperation of each and every member of the Syndicate would be absolutely essential. But such matters would have to wait; the purpose of their meeting this morning was quite different, as they would see.
The Dean thanked the Secretary and proceeded to add his own lugubrious thoughts on the future of the Syndicate; and as he tediously ummed and ahed his way along, it became clear that the Syndics were getting rather restless. Words were whispered along the tables: 'One or
The Dean finished at last, and the whispering finished, too. It was a strange reversal of the natural order, and Mrs. Seth thought it had everything to do with the man seated on Bartlett's right, who thus far had sat impassively in his chair, occasionally running the index finger of his left hand along the side of his nose. She saw Bartlett turn towards Morse and look at him quizzically; and in turn she saw Morse nod slightly, before slowly rising to his feet.
'Ladies and gendemen. I asked the Secretary to call this meeting because I thought it only proper that you should all know something of what we've discovered about the leakage of question papers from this office. Well, you've heard something about that and I think' (he looked vaguely at the Dean and then at Bartlett) 'I think that we
