Grantchester Grind (27 page)

‘Cathcart my boy,’ said the Praelector, ‘have you ever had any allergic reaction to
duck? By that I mean, has the ingestion of concentrated fat ever affected the way you
perceive things?’

Sir Cathcart D’Eath’s eyes bulged in his purple face. ‘Have I what?’ he bellowed. ‘An
allergic reaction to duck? Are you quite insane? Here we are with dead bodies littering
the damned College and you want to know if the ingestion of digitalized duck affects the
way I perceive things. Well, as a matter of fact…’

‘Hush, my dear chap, do keep your voice down,’ the Dean intervened.

Sir Cathcart did. As a matter of fact the way I perceive things has changed,’ he said
hoarsely. ‘I perceive that the College has gone collectively off its trolley. Not only
have we an ex-Head Porter as Master and one who admits to killing his predecessor but we
also have a Senior Tutor who has beaten, anyway mangled, another Fellow to death and
put his body in the Crypt and to top it all…’

‘What on earth are you talking about? What makes you think the Senior Tutor has beaten
anyone to death? Bodies in the Crypt? Of course there are bodies in the Crypt. The Masters
are buried there. No one else.’

Sir Cathcart eyed them with a doubtful and extremely cautious suspicion. ‘Then why
did you tell me before that damned dinner that the Senior Tutor had butchered this new
Fellow, Osbert?’ he demanded of the Praelector.

‘Me? I never said a word about the Senior Tutor murdering Dr Osbert,’ said the
Praelector indignantly. ‘I’ve never heard such a farrago of nonsense in my life.’

‘You bloody well did. You said you blamed the Senior Tutor…’ Sir Cathcart hesitated. In
his befuddled mind a fresh doubt had arisen.

The Praelector took advantage of the pause. ‘I said I blamed the Senior Tutor for
allowing Dr Osbert to be appointed without properly investigating who was putting
him up for the Fellowship. I said nothing about him murdering anybody.’

‘And to the best of my knowledge Dr Osbert is still alive,’ said the Dean.

Sir Cathcart stirred unhappily in his seat. ‘There has evidently been some sort of
ghastly cock-up,’ he said. ‘All the same some stupid bastard told me…’ His voice trailed
away as enlightenment slowly dawned.

‘The Chaplain, perhaps?’ hazarded the Dean.

Sir Cathcart nodded.

‘Ah,’ said the Praelector significantly and reached for the brandy. ‘That explains
everything. Which still leaves us with the vexed question of a Master to succeed
Skullion. I take it that we are all agreed that he has not nominated Lord Pimpole.’

For a moment it seemed as though Sir Cathcart was going to object on the grounds that he
had given his word as a gentleman etcetera, but he backed away. Sheep and dogs were too much
even for his sexual eclecticism. ‘Good,’ continued the Praelector. ‘In that case I shall
convene an emergency meeting of the College Council to have the Master declared _non
compos mentis._ This will negate any future nominations he might attempt. It is the only
method open to us and it will have the additional advantage of rendering any ridiculous
assertions that he murdered Sir Godber Evans nugatory. And now, if you’ll excuse me, it
is long past my normal bedtime.’

‘And mine,’ said Sir Cathcart.

As he made his way out past the Porter’s Lodge a figure hurried by into Porterhouse It
was the man the General had come to identify.

It was a very different Purefoy Osbert who came into Porterhouse that night. He no
longer felt strongly that crime was a product of the law or that human misbehaviour
existed only as a side-effect of police brutality and social repression. He had
moved beyond these generalizations into a more personal world in which his own anger
dominated everything. He had been deliberately humiliated and made to look an
idiot. All the way back from Kloone he had faced the fact, the evident fact that Mrs
Ndhlovo, far from loving him or even feeling fond of him, had made a mockery of his
feelings for her. Just as evidently she had always regarded him as a fool. And Purefoy
was prepared to agree with her. He had been a damned fool to have been taken in by her
stories of a black husband in Uganda who had ended up as various portions of President
Idi Amin’s late-night snacks. A woman who could hoodwink the University authorities
into believing such an unlikely story by speaking pidgin English had to be an
experienced charlatan. It wouldn’t have surprised him to have learnt that she had never
been anywhere near Africa and that her encyclopaedic knowledge of sexual practices had
been obtained entirely from treatises on the subject or from hearsay. Whatever the case
she was definitely a liar and a fraud as well as a heartless bitch and Purefoy wanted no
part of her. She belonged to a past that he intended to forget. He had even given up the
idea of writing her a letter in which he told her what he thought of her. She wasn’t worth
the trouble, might even find some satisfaction in knowing how much she had hurt him, and
besides he had more constructive things to do.

For one thing he was going to make his presence felt in Porterhouse. The place was worse
than an anachronism, more than an archaism, it was decadent, possessed a diseased
arrogance to disguise its abysmal banality and lack of any academic distinction and to
hide from the outside world the fact that it was morally as well as financially bankrupt.
What other colleges in Cambridge hid from the world Purefoy had no idea but, whatever
that might be, they did produce educated graduates and distinguished scholars. It was
even claimed, though Purefoy found the statistic incredible, that one college, Trinity,
had produced more Nobel Prize winners than the whole of France. In short, other Cambridge
colleges could afford to parade a sense of superiority without appearing wholly
ridiculous. Porterhouse had no such right. It was ridiculous. Worse still, it had as a
Master an ignorant brute who could admit to having murdered the previous Master
without a vestige of remorse or regret. Well, all that was going to change. Maddened by
Mrs Ndhlovo’s laughter and the recognition it had brought with it of his own
ineffectuality, Purefoy Osbert had lost all fear of the place and of the elderly
buffoons who were the Senior Fellows. He intended to fulfil his contract as the Sir
Godber Evans Memorial Fellow and make his presence felt. With this dominating thought he
strode past Sir Cathcart D’Eath without noticing him and went to his rooms. It was too late
to do anything now but in the morning he would tackle the Dean and tell him what he knew and
what he intended to do. He had in mind to announce that he was going to the police with
his knowledge and he would see how the Dean reacted. It was this reaction that would
actually be his purpose. Purefoy Osbert had discovered gifts of provocation. He would
force the Dean to admit the truth of Skullion’s confession. Or to deny it. It hardly
mattered which. His own position didn’t matter to him either. All his life he had
pretended to accept only certainties. But now in the space of half an hour in Mrs
Ndhlovo’s flat he had learnt that nothing was so unsettling as some prior knowledge mixed
with absurdly inconsequential accusations. He would apply the technique to the Dean
in the morning. Exhausted by the day’s events Purefoy Osbert slept soundly.

The Praelector slept too, though in short bursts. He always went to sleep quickly only
to wake an hour or two later to be awake dwelling on the previous day’s events or simply
lying quite happily in the darkness letting thoughts roam. He rather enjoyed his broken
nights. They gave him an opportunity to ponder things uninterruptedly and without
the feeling that he ought to be doing something useful. But this night his thoughts were
focused narrowly on the question of the new Master. Unlike the Dean and Senior Tutor he
had no illusions about Porterhouse. He had, as he had told the Dean on their walk, been
shocked at the state of the College finances. And then on top of that had come the shock of
Skullion’s crime and his imminent removal to Porterhouse Park and the need to decide on a
successor. Finally, and in its own way most disturbingly, the multiple
misunderstandings at Duck Dinner and in the Dean’s room had proved once and for all the
incompetence of those who were supposedly in charge of the College. The Senior Tutor
had become childishly emotional, the Dean was demoralized and Sir Cathcart D’Eath’s
changes of mood and identity suggested he was beginning to suffer from senile decay.
The time for radical change had obviously come. As the sky began to lighten at dawn the
Praelector went to the nub of the problem and with a sudden grasp of essentials found a
startling solution.

In fact it was so startling that he hoisted himself up the bed and sat upright against
the pillows to consider it more carefully. But though he looked at it from as many angles
as he could think of he could not fault the solution. On the other hand it was so
extraordinarily wild and daring that he could hardly bring himself to believe in it.
Besides, the risks were tremendous. For an hour he lay there propped up against the pillows
searching for a more moderate alternative and failed to find it. Then with the clearest
picture in his mind of what he must do and with the certain knowledge that he had found a
way to save Porterhouse, he slid down the bed and went back to sleep.

At half past seven he was awake again. He got up, had his bath and shaved, and then, as he
did every day, he stood naked in front of the wardrobe mirror and studied his long, lean
body with a dispassionate acceptance that was the tribute he paid to reality. What he
saw was what he had become, an old man with spindly legs, a slight stoop but with clear blue
eyes above a long nose and a firm, if shrunken, mouth. Having done that he dressed more
carefully than usual and chose a suit that was so old that it seemed to have no
perceptible style at all. It was his favourite suit and one he wore so seldom that Dege
might have cut it for him only a week before. Having dressed and checked that his tie was as
imperceptibly smart as the suit he went down to breakfast by way of the Porter’s
Lodge.

‘Kindly inform the Senior Fellows that there will be an Extraordinary Meeting of the
College Council at 11.30,’ he told Walter. ‘It is vital that as many as possible
attend.’ And leaving the Head Porter to wonder what was in the offing he walked across the
Old Court to the Hall.

‘Something serious is up,’ Walter told the under-porter. ‘When they use
Extraordinary they don’t mean Maybe. And when the Praelector calls the tune, you jump to
it.’

For the rest of the morning the Praelector went about various errands. He visited the
offices of Waxthorne, Libbott and Chaine, Solicitors, and spent half an hour with Mr
Retter and left that gentleman in a state of consternation and alarm, and in no doubt
that it was make-or-break day at Porterhouse. After that the Praelector took a taxi to
the Bursar’s house and, after a short and bitter exchange in which the Praelector spoke
with lethal clarity of the alternative futures facing him, the Bursar took three pills
and went back to Porterhouse with him.

‘I have some telephone calls to make but you can come to my rooms and sit there while I
make them,’ the Praelector said. And so long as you do as I say you will be quite safe.’ The
Bursar said he felt quite safe, but he spoke without conviction.

On the other hand, as they passed beneath the Dean’s windows the sound of raised voices
clearly indicated that a very different form of conviction was being discussed. The
Praelector stopped to listen. He disapproved of eavesdropping as much as he did the
reading of other people’s letters but he had shed all moral and social conventions
during the night.

‘You…you…dare to come in here and…and threaten me…you…have the effrontery to…to suggest
that I instigated the mur…murder of the late Master?’ the Dean stammered.

‘You tell me,’ a quiet, calm voice replied. ‘You tell me and I’ll tell you what you
did.’

There was a silence in the room. Even the Praelector felt the menace of that cold and
calculated statement. The Bursar whimpered.

For a moment the Praelector hesitated before ordering the Bursar to go to his room
and stay there. Then he hurried through the doorway and mounted the stairs. As he reached
the top he heard the strangulated voice of the Dean. ‘You…you infernal little
whip…whippersnapper,’ he tried to shout. ‘I’ll have…the…the law on you. I’ll…’

‘By all means,’ Purefoy Osbert interrupted in a tone of voice that was as icy as it was
confident. ‘By all means call the police. The telephone is there beside you. Do you know
the number?’

The Praelector had heard enough. Opening the door he stepped into the room. Ah, Dr
Osbert,’ he said with a geniality he did not feel, ‘how very convenient. I hope I am not
interrupting anything important?’

Purefoy Osbert was standing in the middle of the room with his back to the window. He
said nothing and against the sunshine outside the Praelector could not see the
expression on his face. He could see the Dean’s face well enough though. It was purple with
ashen patches.

‘He’s accusing me of…of…of having organized Sir Godber’s murder,’ the Dean managed
to say. ‘He’s saying–’

‘Oh surely not,’ the Praelector began, still maintaining an air of unconcern. ‘I’m
sure Dr Osbert knows better than to make unwarranted accusations of that sort. He is
merely fulfilling the terms of his contract as the Memorial Fellow, and we all know
Lady Mary’s views on the matter. They are understandable in a widow and the fact that we
have a Master in the last stages of senile dementia brought on by alcoholism makes such
assumptions unfortunately all too plausible.’ He turned to Purefoy. ‘I suppose you
have been talking to poor Skullion?’ He paused for a moment and smiled. ‘Alas, the poor man
has developed a sense of guilt, an obsession caused no doubt by his stroke and the
terrible misfortune of his position as the so-called Master. He was an excellent Head
Porter in his time. We can hardly blame him for taking to drink.’

Purefoy Osbert looked into the blue eyes which might have been smiling at him and he
knew he had met his match. ‘I have made no accusation,’ he said. ‘I merely wanted to know
what the Dean thought. I think I have found out.’ And without another word he left the room.
As his footsteps retreated down the staircase the Praelector helped the Dean out of his
chair.

‘Come,’ he said, ‘we must hurry. The Council is due to meet in five minutes and I have
still a telephone call to make.’

‘That bloody man–’ the Dean began but the Praelector raised a finger to his lips and
listened. The sound of an ambulance siren was growing louder.

‘They have come for the Master,’ he said and led the way down into the Court.

The Extraordinary Meeting of the College Council was a solemn occasion. Even the
Senior Tutor and Dr Buscott, evidently sensing that something unprecedented was in
the air, were in a subdued mood, while the Dean, still shaken by Purefoy Osbert’s calm
assumption that he had conspired with Skullion to murder Sir Godber, was incapable of
doing more than agreeing with everything the Praelector proposed even though he did not
follow the argument or understand the consequences any more than the Bursar did.

‘In the first place we are here today to mark the passing of the Master,’ the
Praelector announced. ‘During the night his state deteriorated to the point where he
was no longer capable of fulfilling those few statutory duties he has been limited to.
This, together with his state of mind, obliged him to relinquish the position of Master
on the grounds that he is _non compos mentis._ We are therefore in a state of interregnum
until the new Master has been appointed. Yes, Dr Buscott?’

‘I was just wondering if Skul…if the late Master exercised his right to nominate his
successor,’ Dr Buscott said. And, if he did, being as you say _non compos mentis,
_whether his nomination had any validity.’

‘It is a perfectly proper point to make and one on which I have this morning consulted
the College solicitors. They have given it as their opinion that in the circumstances of
the Master being unable to make a rational decision the choice of a new Master
devolves upon the College Council and in the event of the Council failing to agree, the
matter automatically reverts to the Crown. Or, to put it more precisely, the choice of
a new Master will be decided by the Government of the day.’ He paused and looked round the
table. ‘I, for one, am wholly opposed to such a course of action. We have had previous
and catastrophic experience of a Prime Minister’s choice.’

There was a murmur of agreement from the Fellows, all of whom remembered the late Sir
Godber Evans.

‘It is therefore essential that we show a degree of unanimity in the interest of the
College and at the same time accept the indisputable fact that a wholly unprecedented
and catastrophic financial crisis faces Porterhouse. I won’t go into the history of
it. Rather than look back, I would ask you to look to the future. We are now in a position
to ensure that, from being the poorest college in Cambridge and one that is in fact on the
point of total bankruptcy, Porterhouse can be among the very richest.’

A gasp of amazement ran round the table. The Praelector waited until he had their full
attention again. ‘You will, I am afraid, have to take my word for it. I have been a Fellow
of Porterhouse for more years than I care to remember and I think I can claim to have the
interests of the College at heart.’