Detective Inspector Skelgill Boxset 1, page 28
part #1 of Detective Inspector Skelgill Series
‘Ah – excellent, lad. Glad to hear that. Whereabouts?’
‘Just below Little Crossthwaite, where the Derwent flows into Bass Lake.’
‘I know it. Beautiful spot.’
‘Come with me some time.’
‘That would be an honour – though the hours you keep send a shiver down my spine.’
Skelgill grins. ‘A policeman’s lot.’
‘On which note – there must be something I can do: for you to have run me to ground in my lair here.’
‘I did want to pick your brains. It’s about Oakthwaite School.’
‘Be my guest.’
The Professor indicates a chair opposite, but as he does so the shadow of the librarian darkens the doorway beyond, her posture communicating a hint of disapproval.
‘We’re making too much racket, Daniel. Shall we retreat for a cappuccino? Let me just tidy this lot up. I’m giving a talk to the Borrowdale History Society next month: The Flight of Mary, Queen of Scots. She came this way, you know, when she was driven from Scotland?’
‘She got around a bit, I know that.’
‘She was an extraordinary girl – she would have been a media sensation if she’d lived four hundred years later. Not least because she was six foot two in her party shoes.’
Skelgill watches as he neatly stacks and files his meticulous notes and coloured pens: no sign of any new technology. Jim Hartley, now retired, was for many years Professor of Medieval History over at Durham University, some eighty miles due east across the Pennines. A native of Keswick, and an ardent angler, he’d kept on a house in the small Lakeland town, and had come to know the spotty teenage Daniel Skelgill when the latter had attended one of his ‘summer schools’ on fly-casting. He’d identified Skelgill’s natural talent at once, and ‘young Daniel’ became something of a protégé in the absence of children of his own.
They make their way through to the little cafeteria attached to the library. As the Professor takes his seat he says, ‘Oakthwaite – now there’s a curious coincidence, Daniel.’
‘Oh?’
‘Yes. I came across a reference to the place only this morning. Not the school, you understand? There has been a stronghold on the site since the Dark Ages – probably earlier.’
‘What – like a castle?’
‘Yes. Perhaps some kind of broch originally, but certainly a substantial fortress in late medieval times.’
‘What became of it?’
‘It may be that Mary proved its undoing. In 1568, aged just twenty-five, she’d escaped from confinement in Loch Leven Castle, and rallied an army that was on its way to take up position at Dumbarton Castle. Their defences would have been impregnable. But they were intercepted and routed at the Battle of Langside, south of Glasgow, by forces under the Earl of Moray – her half-brother, no less.’
‘Sounds like my family.’
The Professor grins. ‘Then she fled south, misguidedly hoping Elizabeth would help her. From Dundrennan Abbey she was smuggled across the Solway disguised as a fisherwoman, and rumour has it she was given refuge at Oakthwaite. She was a staunch Roman Catholic, naturally, and this part of Cumberland was a clandestine stronghold. It may be that in time the local lords suffered for providing assistance to the pretender.’
‘So the castle at Oakthwaite was destroyed?’
‘If it wasn’t one catastrophic event, certainly the barony was strangled into decline over the course of a couple of generations, the estate with it. I expect half the farms in the vicinity have pieces of the castle stone in their walls. The foundations will still be intact, though, somewhere beneath the school. There would have been extensive vaults, wells, dungeons, and a crypt under the chapel. I’ve read of a tunnel that led away to safety in case the priest ever needed to evade capture. But of course it’s never been excavated: the school was built before they thought of Time Team.’
‘Quite a history, buried away.’
‘But it’s the present you’re interested in, Daniel. I should cut to the chase rather than try out my lecture on you.’
Skelgill grins ruefully. ‘That depends where history ends and the present begins.’
‘Ever the philosopher, Daniel.’
‘I doubt that’s the term my Sergeant would use for me, Jim.’
‘I’m sure you’re secretly admired.’
Skelgill’s cheeks colour a little. He retreats to the invitation to discuss the present. ‘Do you know much about the school today?’
The Professor shakes his head apologetically. ‘I’m afraid not Daniel. It wasn’t ever my remit – admissions – so I didn’t have any direct association. Of course, we had a few Oakthwaite freshers coming up each year into our faculty. Always well presented, diligent, solid performers. The ones that just missed out on Oxbridge, I imagine.’
‘Did you ever visit the place?’
‘Sadly, no. What I’ve assimilated down the years is from local hearsay – folk who’ve worked there. I’ve always had the impression that they operate in a rather cult-like manner. Most of the masters live on site, I believe, and they like to keep their own company. I suppose when you have several hundred charges to occupy round-the-clock during term times, you must run a pretty tight ship. Being a closed community facilitates that.’
‘Ever heard of a family named Querrell? The last one spent his life there, man and boy.’
The Professor stirs the residue of milky froth and chocolate flakes into the last dregs of his coffee. ‘It rings a very faint bell, Daniel. Of course, it’s an unusual name. Was there one at Bosworth, now? I’d have to look that up. Querrell’s your man?’
‘Was. Drowned last week in what appears to be a suicide.’
‘Appears?’
Skelgill nods slowly.
‘I’ll put my thinking cap on. You know how these things can come back to you when you’re least expecting it.’
‘That’s my system, too. At least, it’s my excuse to go fishing.’
‘Quite reasonable, Daniel. Complex problems can’t be solved by rational thought.’
‘Just as well, in my case. However, if it’s any help he was born in nineteen forty-six. Christian names Edmund Donald.’
‘So the parents had a classical education. And a sense of humour.’
‘Come again?’
‘Querrell, Edmund Donald: initials QED. Quod erat demonstrandum. That which is proven.’
Skelgill grins sheepishly. ‘Over my head, Jim. My Latin starts and finishes at Esox lucius.’
‘And no better place to begin and end.’
Skelgill smiles. ‘I’d better let you get back to finding out something about Mary.’
As they rise the Professor asks, ‘How’s your mother keeping these days?’
‘Ah – slowing down at bit. But still cycles over Honister every morning.’
‘I wish I could decline to such heights, Daniel. And I read about your latest fell-running exploits in The Westmorland Gazette. Like mother, like son.’
‘What – mad as hatters?’
8. THE GROUNDSMAN
‘Can you believe it, Guv – they’ve even got a shooting academy!’
‘That would have been popular where you went to school, eh Leyton?’
‘Too right, Guv. It ran in a few families round about our gaff.’ He scratches his head absently. ‘They’re all bang to rights now, of course.’
‘What is it, air rifles?’
‘No – clays, Guv. Twelve-bore, and four-tens for the juniors.’
‘They obviously blood them young, the gentry.’
‘You’re spot on there, Guv. Apparently some of the sixth-formers are expert shots, national competition standard. Half a dozen of them stand to inherit shooting estates, mainly up in Scotland – though there’s one beyond Brough. They do gundog training as well. The groundsman’s got a couple of labs in a kennels round the back of the school – says he used to be a keeper over Cockermouth way. Seemed a bit wide to me, though. Couldn’t be certain, but I think he might have smelled of drink.’
‘Name of?’
‘Royston Hodgson, Guv. Ring any bells?’
Skelgill looks pensive. ‘Maybe. Does he run the shooting club?’
‘He says he just helps out, setting up the clay traps. Apparently it’s all above board. Our licensing boys inspected back in March and renewed their certificate. They’ve got a gun room in the cellars of the main school building.’
Skelgill nods. ‘Be interesting to know who keeps the keys.’
‘A master called Snyder is in charge.’
‘He’s first on our list.’
‘Bit of a red herring though – shotguns – eh, Guv?’
Skelgill shrugs. ‘I guess I just like to know the lie of the land if I’m within a quarter of a mile of a twelve-bore. I developed a dislike of them early in my career.’
‘So you’ve mentioned, Guv.’
Skelgill flashes DS Leyton a disapproving glance. ‘What’s Hodgson’s story, then?’
DS Leyton consults a small black notebook. He flips it open where the elastic band marks a page. Considering his somewhat shambolic deportment, his printing is surprisingly small and neat, if a little elementary.
‘He said the Head called him to ask if he’d seen Querrell – and he replied not since the previous afternoon when he was taking a cricket practice. So Goodman asked him to have a look round and check Querrell’s cottage in case he was ill.’
‘What time was that?’
‘He reckons about eleven. He drove to the gatehouse – he’s got a quad bike that he uses for the mowers and whatnot. It was unlocked and empty – the key was on the inside of the door.’
‘Was that unusual?’
‘He’s not sure. He said he wouldn’t be surprised if Querrell didn’t lock up, the generation he was, though the lodge is near the road and an easy target. He says they’ve lost quite a bit of sports equipment in the past couple of years.’
‘Probably the PE staff from my old comp.’
‘Ha-ha, Guv.’
‘Go on.’
‘Querrell owned a motorbike. That was still in its shed, so Hodgson figured he must be somewhere on the property. They’ve got a jogging track that more or less follows the perimeter of the grounds. He didn’t see anything until he passed the boathouse and noticed the boat anchored out on the lake.’
‘What made him stop there, do you think? The water’s shielded by all the vegetation?’
DS Leyton looks quizzically at his superior, as if wondering how he knows this. ‘Dunno, Guv – he didn’t say. Just that he went down onto the landing stage – climbed onto the railing in case Querrell was asleep in the boat. But he couldn’t see anything, and since Querrell apparently wasn’t much of a swimmer that was enough for him to raise the alarm. Obviously it was our search team that found the body.’
Skelgill nods pensively. After a minute’s silence he says, ‘What did they use the boat for?’
‘He said Querrell kept the only key – at least that he knows of. And the boat’s not generally used any more. They don’t let the pupils out on the water – there was some accident years ago. And now there’s all this Health and Safety palaver.’
‘And Querrell didn’t fish.’ Skelgill says this as a statement – it’s something he would know.
‘That’s right, Guv. I asked about that. It’s not proper angling here, apparently.’
‘What’s that supposed to mean?’ Skelgill’s hackles rise.
‘It’s all coarse fishing on Bassenthwaite Lake – you’d know this, Guv? For the young gentleman fly-casting’s the thing.’ DS Leyton must notice Skelgill’s black expression, for he quickly adds, ‘According to Hodgson, anyway.’
‘I’ve caught plenty of big pike out there on a fly.’ Skelgill tuts. ‘I’d like to see them try that.’
‘Definitely, Guv. You’re the expert.’
Skelgill nods, apparently feeling vindicated. ‘And what did he say about Querrell?’
‘Nothing untoward, Guv. No indication he was about to top himself. He’d asked Hodgson to use the heavy roller on the juniors’ wicket for the match at the weekend – which he never made, of course.’
‘Who did they play?’
‘School from Edinburgh, Guv.’ DS Leyton checks his notebook. ‘Merchiston Castle.’
Skelgill shows no indication that the name has any significance to him. ‘How did Hodgson get on with Querrell?’
‘Alright, he reckons. He says Querrell was a bit of a loner, but didn’t look down his nose on the ancillary staff like some of the masters do.’
Now Skelgill’s features involuntarily flicker with the recollection of DS Jones’s remark.
DS Leyton continues, ‘Called him cantankerous, though. And that’s me missing out the two expletives, Guv. Says he took the hump whenever the school brought in new equipment or started chopping down trees to make room for car parking spaces.’
‘What about Hodgson himself, think he was hiding anything?’
‘Not especially, Guv.’ DS Leyton pauses, and jolts mildly, as though he’s just received a small electric shock. ‘One thing he did say, though – just as I was leaving.’
‘Go on.’
‘Well – you know how I was supposed to ask about Querrell having any relatives – to fit in with our excuse for investigating?’
‘Aha.’
‘Well – I nearly forgot. But I think I pulled it off – like as a casual afterthought, Guv.’
Skelgill raises his eyebrows reproachfully.
‘He said as far as he knows Querrell had no living relatives – but only because that’s the story that does the rounds.’
‘So – what’s the big deal?’
‘Well – he said a few weeks ago he got a surprise – could have sworn Querrell had an identical twin.’
‘What made him say that?’
‘One evening he’d seen Querrell going into the school, then a few minutes later he went down to mark out some lines on the athletics track, and there was Querrell walking up the field from the direction of the lake. He couldn’t figure out how he could have been in the two places almost at once.’
‘But both sightings were Querrell?
‘So he says, Guv.’
‘Maybe he mistook the person going into the school for Querrell. You know how bad eyewitness testimony can be. More likely Hodgson had his lunch in the Blacksmith’s Arms.’
DS Leyton nods ruefully.
‘Thing is, Guv – I put in a call to the station to get him checked out. The reason he stopped being a gamekeeper was because he had his shotgun licence revoked. He put the wind up a couple of walkers who’d strayed off a public footpath. Claimed he thought they were poachers.’
‘No excuse.’
‘He only got a caution but it was enough for the Chief at the time. What do you reckon, Guv?’
Skelgill screws up his face and shakes his head. ‘I don’t reckon the Chief is going to be reaching for the cigars just yet.’
DS Leyton looks slightly crestfallen. Skelgill reaches across and pats him on the shoulder. ‘Come on, Leyton – cheer up. Let’s go see what else we can turn up. And, remember – we act like we’re daft local coppers.’
‘I’ll give it my best shot, Guv.’
9. DR SNYDER
‘So, I’m sure you’ll understand, Inspector, we don’t indulge in what you might call parochial advertising. In this era of the global village, Oakthwaite positions itself firmly on the international stage. And indeed we attract applicants from all four corners of the earth.’
Skelgill nods politely, despite the somewhat oblique reply to his observation that the school keeps the surrounding community at arm’s length. Dr Snyder, a tall stooping long-headed man in his mid-forties, is reminiscent of a character from a gothic horror movie, with jet-black swept-back hair, contrasting pale skin, dark sunken eyes wide set astride an aquiline nose, prominent jaw and brows – overall a caricature underscored by the fact of him wearing his academic gown, an elaborate hooded affair of charcoal and deep purple. He sits watchfully still, and when he speaks, which he does slowly, he embellishes his words with paddling gestures of large hands that articulate at the wrist.
‘Certainly, sir – and there’s no law against that. On this occasion, the school and Mr Querrell being something of unknown quantities – it means we have no real alternative but to begin here in order to establish whether there are any surviving relatives.’
Dr Snyder blinks slowly, perhaps in lieu of a nod of acceptance. He says, ‘Well I’m sure you are aware that as far as we know Mr Querrell was the last of his line.’
‘So I gather, sir. And do you have any reason to doubt that?’
Dr Snyder flaps his flipper-like palms. ‘I have seen no evidence to the contrary. The school’s historical personnel records were destroyed in a fire in the early nineties, so there is no file on him, either as a master, or earlier as a pupil.’
‘How long had you known Mr Querrell?’
‘This is just my second year at Oakthwaite.’
Dr Snyder rubs his nose between his two forefingers. He shows no sign that he will elaborate, so Skelgill asks, ‘Where were you before that, sir?’
‘At an international school... in Singapore.’
‘Is that why you came – because of your experience abroad?’
‘It probably did no harm to my curriculum vitae, Inspector.
‘And is that your remit here, sir – the foreign students?’
Dr Snyder sits back and folds his arms, as though he’s bored with the direction the questions are taking. ‘My role is largely administrative. Admissions, examinations, timetables, university entrance, IT policy, discipline. I take the occasional class in the event of illness. The usual stuff of the Deputy Head.’
‘It sounds like Mr Goodman gets off lightly.’
‘Oh, I think you’ll find he’s kept adequately busy, Inspector. What with corporate strategy and our gamut of outward facing matters.’
‘So, like the Head’s, your acquaintance with Mr Querrell has been relatively short-lived.’
