'Which I am.'
'How are we, Chief Inspector?'
'Less of the 'Chief.' Sheehy's going to demote me. I'll soon he just an insignificant Inspector.'
'The usual?'
Morse nodded.
'And you, Sergeant?'
'An orange juice,' said Morse for Lewis.
'Where've you parked?' asked Biff. It was a question which had become of paramount importance in Central Oxford over the past decade. 'I only ask because they're having a blitz this week, so Pam says.'
'Ah! How is that beautiful lady of yours?'
'I'll tell her you're here. She should be down soon any-way.'
Morse stood at the bar searching through his pockets in unconvincing manner. 'And a packet of--do you still sell cigarettes T'
Biff pointed to the machine. 'You'll need the right change.'
'Ah! Have you got any change on you by any chance, Levis...?'
When, at a table in the inner bar, Morse was finally settled behind his pint, his second pint, he took from his in-side jacket-pocket the used envelope on which Lewis had seen him scribbling certain headings on their return to Oxford.
'Did you know that Wolsey College is frequently re-ferred to, especially by those who are in it, as 'The House'?'
'Can't say I did, no.'
'Do you know why?'
'Let me concentrate on the orange juice, sir.'
'It's because of its Latin name, Aedes Archiepiscopi, the House of the Bishop.'
'Well, that explains it, doesn't it?'
'Another peculiarity is that in all the other colleges they call the dons and the readers and the tutors and so on--they call them 'Fellows.' You with me? But at Wolsey they call them 'Students.''
'What do they call the students then?'
'Doesn't matter what they call 'em, does it? Look! Let's just consider where we are. We've discovered a couple of possible links in this case so far: Mc Clure's fancy woman; and the Rodway woman, the mother of one of his former pupils. Now neither of 'em comes within a million miles of being a murderer, I know that; but they're both adding to what we know of Mc Clure himself, agreed7 He's a re spected scholar; a conscientious don--'
''Student,' sir.'
'A conscientious Student; a man who's got every sympa-thy with his stu--'
Lewis looked across.
'--with the young people he comes into contact with; a founder member of a society to help dedicated dmggies; a man who met Matthew's mum, and probably slipped in be-tween the sheets with her--'
Lewis shook his head vigorously. 'You can't just say that sort of thing.'
'And why not? How the hell do you think we're going to get to the bottom of this case unless we make the odd hypothesis here and there? You don't know? Well, let me tell you. We think of anything that's unlikely. That's how.
Any bloody idiot can tell you what's likely.'
'If you say so, sir.'
'I do say so,' snapped Morse. 'Except that what I say is not particularly unlikely, is it? They obviously got on pretty well, didn't they? Take that salutation and valediction, for instance.'
Lewis lifted his eyebrows.
'All Christian-name, palsy-walsy stuff, wasn't it? Then there's this business of her husband leaving her--you'll re-call I pressed her on that point? And for a very good rea-son.
It was November, a month or so after her precious Matthew had first gone up to Oxford. And it occurred to me, Lewis---and I'm surprised it didn't occur to you--that things may well have been the other way round, eh? She may have left him, and it was only then that he started playing around with his new PA.'
'We could always look at a copy of the divorce proceedings.'
'What makes you think they're divorced T'
Lewis surrendered, sipped his orange juice, and was silent.
'But it doesn't matter, does it? It's got bugger-all to d, with Mc Clure's murder. You can make a heap of all th money you've got and wager it on that. No risk there!'
Lewis fingered the only money he had left in hi pockets--three pound coins--and decided that he wa hardly going to become a rich man, however long the od6 that Morse was offering. But it was time to mention some thing. Had Morse, he wondered, seen that oblong patch o pristine magnolia...?
