my bottom with it,’ he said.
Inspector Flint gazed at him demonically. ‘You did what?’
‘Well, there was no toilet paper in the lavatory so I…’ he stopped. The Inspector was lighting yet another cigarette. His hands were shaking and he had a distant look in his eyes that suggested he had just peered over some appalling abyss. ‘Mr Wilt,’ he said when he had managed to compose himself, ‘I trust that I am a reasonably tolerant man, a patient man and a humane man, but if you seriously expect me to believe one word of your utterly preposterous story you must be insane. First you tell me you put a doll down that hole. Then you admit that it was dressed in your wife’s clothes. Now you say that she went away without telling you where she was going and finally to cap it all you have the temerity to sit there and tell me that you wiped your arse with the one piece of solid evidence that could substantiate your statement.’
‘But I did,’ said Wilt.
‘Balls,’ shouted the Inspector. ‘You and I both know where Mrs Wilt has gone and there’s no use pretending we don’t. She’s down at the bottom of that fucking hole and you put her there.’
‘Are you arresting me?’ Wilt asked as they walked in a tight group across the road to the police car.
‘No,’ said Inspector Flint, ‘you’re just helping the police with their enquiries. It will be on the news tonight.’
‘My dear Braintree, of course we’ll do all we can,’ said the Vice-Principal. ‘Wilt has always been a loyal member of staff and there has obviously been some dreadful mistake. I’m sure you needn’t worry. The whole thing will right itself before long.’
‘I hope you’re right,’ said Braintree, ‘but there are complicating factors. For one thing there’s Eva…’
‘Eva? Mrs Wilt? You’re not suggesting…’
‘I’m not suggesting anything. All I’m saying is…well, she’s missing from home. She walked out on Henry last Friday.
‘Mrs Wilt walked…well I hardly knew her, except by reputation of course. Wasn’t she the woman who broke Mr Lockyer’s collar-bone during a part-time Evening Class in judo some years back?’
‘That was Eva,’ said Braintree.
‘She hardly sounds the sort of woman who would allow Wilt to put her down…’
‘She isn’t,’ said Braintree hastily. ‘If anyone was liable to be murdered in the Wilt household it was Henry. I think the police should be informed of that.’
They were interrupted by the Principal who came in with a copy of the evening paper. ‘You’ve seen this I suppose,’ he said, waving it distraughtly. ‘It’s absolutely appalling.’ He put the paper down on the desk and indicated the headlines. MURDERED WOMAN BURIED IN CONCRETE AT TECH. LECTURER HELPING POLICE.
‘Oh dear,’ said the Vice-Principal. ‘Oh dear. How very unfortunate. It couldn’t have come at a worse moment’
‘It shouldn’t have come at all,’ snapped the Principal. ‘And that’s not all. I’ve already had half a dozen phone calls from parents wanting to know if we make a habit of employing murderers on the full-time staff. Who is this fellow Wilt anyway?’
‘He’s in Liberal Studies,’ said the Vice-Principal. ‘He’s been with us ten years.’
‘Liberal Studies. I might have guessed it. If they’re not poets mangoes they’re Maoists or…I don’t know where the hell Morris gets them from. And now we’ve got a blasted murderer. God knows what I’m going to tell the Education Committee tonight. They’ve called an emergency meeting for eight.’
