Death Drop Page 5

  He missed the paragraph at the bottom of page three.

  Mr. John Fleming, the father of the child who died tragically at the Maritime Museum, armed at Marristone Port on Sunday. He informed our reporter that he would speak to him at a later stage when he was conversant with all the facts of the case. The autopsy is being carried out today and the inquest will take place on Friday. Mr. Fleming is staying at The Lantern after having spent one night only at Marristone Grange School.

  Brannigan read the report aloud across the table to Alison while she poured him his second cup of coffee. The report was innocuous enough apart from the 'one night only' which was stiff with implication.

  Her plump cheeks coloured with annoyance. "You brought him here and we did our best to make him welcome. He could have stayed here and had our support. He didn't have to go to The Lantern. He's impossibly belligerent. I think he's halfway out of his mind."

  Brannigan said quietly, "Wouldn't you be, if it were your child?"

  She conceded the point. "Possibly – yes – if we'd had a child. But I'd contain my feelings. I wouldn't go looking for the worst all the time. I wouldn't line up all the staff of the school and call in a firing squad because one boy played carelessly and fell."

  "Or jumped – or was pushed."

  "Utter rubbish! You can't believe that."

  He was trying his best not to. If he hadn't seen the sketch he would have persuaded himself by now that it was an accident. He wished that Hammond could have seen the sketch. The description of it had far less impact than actually seeing it. Hammond had listened" apparently without emotion. He seemed to have got himself pretty well in hand – or perhaps he was learning the knack of not letting his feelings show. He had agreed to see Fleming at the Maritime Museum with a curt, "All right – if that's what he wants!" but he had taken considerable persuasion to agree to see Lessing. His "You don't get counsel's advice unless you're accused – who the hell is accusing me?" Brannigan had countered with, "Nobody – yet. He's representing the school. I've already explained to you that the school must be represented. I've asked him to come up and have a chat with you here – informally."

  Brannigan had contacted Lessing after leaving Fleming at The Lantern the previous evening. Lessing had agreed to come up to the school house at eleven.

  There was one matter that Brannigan wanted to see to before Lessing arrived. It was quite likely that the request would be abortive,' but he had to try. He waited until Alison had taken the breakfast things through to the kitchen and then he closed the door so that she wouldn't hear. He dialled Sam Preston's surgery.

  Preston was facing the boy's father across the desk when the phone rang. It couldn't have been more inopportune, but at least Fleming couldn't have guessed the identity of the caller. He said brusquely that he would call back.

  The sketch was on the desk between them.

  The doctor repeated what he had begun to say when the phone rang. "I understand your anxiety. The pathologist will discover if there was sexual assault. He would discover that anyway, without any prompting from me, but I'll get in touch with him this morning if that's what you want."

  "That's what I want. When will I know?"

  "The report goes straight to the coroner, but in this instance as you're the child's father and next of kin you're entitled to be informed. You'll know later today."

  He picked up the sketch again and examined it. If the boy had been assaulted then this sketch was dynamite. A prosecuting counsel using a psychiatrist's professional back-up could blow the school to hell.

  He handed the sketch back. "You had professional advice from a psychiatrist at the time?"

  "No. What's your medical opinion on it now?"

  Preston thought: Lax of you, but lucky for Brannigan. "I'm a general practitioner – not a, shrink. All I can do is to advise you to be open-minded about it until you know one way or another. Don't jump to conclusions. The boy might not have been touched."

  "My God – if he has been!"

  "Quite. But don't start thinking the worst."

  He took out his prescription pad and wrote on it. "Take this to a chemist. They'll make the waiting period more bearable. And they'll help you to sleep."

  Fleming returned the sketch to his wallet. He stood up slowly and took the prescription. He wouldn't use it, but it would be churlish to say so. Preston understood. Bloody pills, he thought. Bloody situation. But it was the best he could do. He saw Fleming to the door and then he put the call through to Brannigan.

  "If you're about to ask me what I think you're about to ask me – then don't. The findings at the autopsy will be sub judice." Brannigan guessed the situation. "Fleming was with you just now?"

  "Yes."

  "Obviously he showed you the sketch?"

  Preston was silent.

  "No comment?"

  "I'm sorry."

  "So am I – but I had to try."

  "Strictly off the record," Preston said, "do you think the pathologist will find anything?"

  Brannigan said heavily, "Strictly off the record – I don't know. If it happened then whoever it is isn't likely to go up on the roof-top and shout mea culpa. The sketch worries me as much as it worries Fleming – are we both exaggerating its importance?"

  Sam, struggling between kindness and truth, did a bit of adroit side-stepping. "If the autopsy doesn't show anything then the verdict at the inquest should be favourable. There's no point in worrying in advance."

  Tom Lessing, later that morning, said much the same thing. He was an old boy of the school and time had mellowed his memories of it. He had gleaned some carnal knowledge there and emerged heterosexual. He had been bullied to a point considerably short of dementia and done some bullying back. Muscles grown defensively – and offensively – large in adolescence had now shrunk back into flab. The school had given him the right qualifications to get into university and if he had had any sons of his own he would have unhesitatingly sent them there. That to him was recommendation enough. On the whole he thought that Brannigan was taking far too serious a view of the affair. It made sense to be legally represented – it made even better sense to keep everything in proportion. Hammond was sick to his gut already without Brannigan piling on the agony.

  Lessing tried to keep the conversation light. "What it all boils down to is your contractual duty of care. If you failed in that duty – which I don't believe you did – action can be taken against you for breach of contract and for the tort of negligence. 'For t. I tort I saw a pussy cat. Joke." He grinned and Hammond and Brannigan looked stonily back at him. He raised his thickly fleshed hand. "Okay – okay – I'll be serious – but if you'd waded the murky waters of the law courts as I have you wouldn't let this regrettable little affair worry you so much. 'For t. Let me explain it. A tort is a civil wrong, not a criminal wrong. Let's say you took a bunch of boys on that ship and then left them to get on with whatever they were getting on with while you nipped off to the nearest pub for a drink. The child Fleming falls. Okay – you were negligent. You'd have cause to sit there sweating."

  Hammond, unaware until then that he was sweating, surreptitiously wiped his hands on the plush arms of his chair.

  "Did you nip off anywhere?"

  "No."

  "Right. Fine. I didn't for a moment think you did. How many boys did you take on the ship – eight – eighteen – twenty-eight -• fifty?"

  "Eight. I told you."

  "So you did. A reasonable number. You kept the three youngest near you and told the rest to get the hell out of your hair – right?"

  "I told them not to go to any other deck level without my permission."

  "Young Fleming came and asked you for permission?"

  "No. He went without telling me he was going."

  Lessing leaned back in his chair and beamed. "But you, having second sight and the ability to look around corners, knew quite well he was going, so you told your three youngest to fall off the gangplank while you went and hauled him back?"


  Hammond was silent.

  "It doesn't stand up," Lessing said. "It just doesn't stand up. Would you call yourself a reasonable man, Hammond?"

  "Yes – I suppose so."

  "Do you think you'd pass the test of reasonable foresight?"

  "What do you mean?"

  "I mean the law might be an ass, but it isn't an unmitigated ass. It protects you when all the circumstances are in your favour, and it slams you to the devil when they're not. In this case, I believe you did everything humanly possible to look after the boys in your care."

  Brannigan asked, "What about the blindfold?"

  "Well – hell – if one small boy wants to play Captain Hook and breaks his neck in the process – what's Hammond to do? Go and shoot himself? The boy crept off and played a game. He died. Tragic. I'm sorry. But you're asking me about Hammond and I'm telling you I think Hammond is all right. He discharged his duties to the best of his ability. If the boy had obeyed his orders he would be alive now."

  Brannigan, who had explained about the sketch, mentioned it.again, but Lessing refused to speculate.

  "That's outside my sphere. It looks to me like an ordinary, simple accident. If the coroner doesn't return a verdict of accidental death I shall be greatly surprised. Even if it were suicide, I don't see that anyone can get at Hammond with that. As I said before, he's not a mind-reader. If the child's jump were premeditated, how was Hammond to know? What you need, Brannigan, is a holiday. This accident has shattered your judgment. You need to get away for a bit and rest. The Grange isn't perfect – what school is? But it's a great deal better than most and when the British government starts putting back a little of the money where it rightfully belongs your numbers here will start to rise again. Marristone Grange had a damned good past and it will have an even better future once this little ripple in the pool is over and done with."

  Brannigan glanced over at Hammond. If Lessing had relaxed his tension then it was all to the good. He told Lessing about the meeting at the Maritime Museum with Fleming. "He requested it. I agreed on Roy 's behalf. If you think Roy shouldn't go…?"

  " Roy? Oh, Hammond." Lessing smiled weakly, but his eyes narrowed in thought. "Do you want to go… Roy?"

  Hammond, intensely disliking the use of his Christian name, said no, but he believed it would look bad if he didn't. "I have nothing to hide." It was like a cracked gramophone record, he thought, he kept on saying it.

  "No, of course you haven't. But if you meet Fleming do you think you can make that clear? If you can't – then stay away."

  "I think I can make that clear."

  Lessing shrugged. "Go then. You don't have to. If I were you, I wouldn't. But I don't think you can damage your position by going. It all depends on how you handle it." He raised an interrogative eyebrow at Brannigan. "Are you going along, too?"

  "I thought it might be advisable."

  "Well, if you do, don't look so worried. No general ever won a battle by expecting to lose it."

  " Battle?"

  "Well – no – false analogy. No battle. No case. That's what I think. Animosity can breed its own sort of trouble, though. The ship is a particularly evocative rendezvous – a bit knife-twisting, I'd say, for all of you. Have a care."

  Before leaving the school Lessing took a nostalgic walk on his own around the school grounds. Alex Peterson, Alison's father, had been headmaster in his time and Brannigan one of the housemasters. Peterson had run the place like a general who balanced strategy with force of arms. He had none of Brannigan's sensitivity. If this particular situation had been thrust upon him he would have refused point blank to contemplate placing the blame anywhere other than on the child himself. All that psychological mumbo-jumbo about a caterpillar on a bed he would have dismissed as balderdash. He would have been politely sympathetic with the boy's father, but he would have made it absolutely clear that the school had discharged its duty to his son. He would have been emphatic – unwavering – and as tough as the occasion demanded. Brannigan had a soft core. The ability to see the other person's point of view was useful in some situations, but not in this one. Brannigan needed to cultivate an inward eye. Alison knew all about self-interest. She took after her father.

  The morning was becoming less chill and the clouds were lifting. He could hear the smack of a cricket ball at the nets and took the gravelled path through the yew trees down to the pitch. He hadn't been too bad a hand at cricket, though he couldn't remember liking it very much. Even the smell of the earth around here was evocative of his youth. The games master in his day had been a whippet-thin, small, fast-moving, ex-football pro called Patell – nicknamed Knees. The present sports master couldn't be more different. He was as hirsute as all the younger generation these days, thick, heavy, slightly pot-bellied, and with a lazy swing to his arm when he bowled. The ball got there though. The kid with the. bat lunged out at it, missed, and the middle stump thwacked back into the grass. Innis, aware he was being observed, nodded over at Lessing and Lessing raised his hand in greeting and moved on.

  Sports days in his time – in the fifties – had been well attended affairs at which boy met girl – other boys' sisters. Very decorous. Apart from one little broad he'd laid in a hollow in the long meadow. Even the long meadow in those days had been neatly mowed – apart from the rough grass beyond the wind-break of poplars. Now the grass was several inches high and even grew nettles. He ventured a little way into the wilderness in the general direction of the hollow.

  He couldn't remember her face, or her name. He couldn't even remember the act, except that it had been his first with a girl – but not, he suspected, her first with a boy. She had smelt like wet grass with sun on it.

  This was a good place, even now. Marristone Grange, like its meadow, had gone to seed a bit, but it was still a good place. If the grass weren't soaking his socks he would go to the hollow and linger there a little. It was a pity the day was so damp.

  He stood for some while looking towards the wind-break and building up again a picture of what had happened beyond it before turning and retracing his steps up to the path. Durrant, his hand over Corley's mouth, raised his head cautiously and watched him go. The child's teeth under his hand snapped suddenly at his fingers and drew blood. "You sodding little bastard!" Durrant's left hand took over from his right and pressed harder. The child, choking, tried to twist away. His stomach began heaving and green bile shot through Durrant's fingers. Sickened himself, Durrant drew back, and Corley, still vomiting, threw himself sideways and began running.

  Lessing, startled, saw a child of about ten blundering out of the long grass and running blindly in his direction. The child's eyes were half closed and his skin was pallid. The sickness was around his mouth and on the front of his grey shirt. The school tie flapped around his right wrist and then fell off. Lessing called, "Hey there – what's the matter?"

  The boy swerved as if Lessing had delivered a hook to his jaw. Gasping he changed his direction and made for the cricket pitch.

  Lessing picked up the tie and examined the slip knot. A noose. Intended for two wrists, apparently. The boy had pulled one hand clear. This time Lessing braved the wet grass, but when he reached the hollow no-one was there.

  He stood and looked down at the flattened grass. There was vomit on a dock leaf and near it a tiny globule of blood. His mouth was suddenly sour with disillusionment. This had been his place – his place of youth. Now he would always see it this way. With disgust. With unease. What the hell had happened to the child – and how the hell had the other one got away so fast? He had no doubt at all that there had been another one. He made a quick search of the area and found nothing.

  He fingered the tie, his mind on young Fleming. A child playing?

  But this child now hadn't been playing.

  Sick with fright. Just an expression before – but now it took on meaning.

  Fleming senior had a case – or might have a case.

  On balance it would be better if he didn't have a case
. One rotten apple took some time to turn the rest bad. After the inquest Brannigan could be warned to start searching for that rotten apple – and damned fast.

  In the meantime… He unknotted the tie and dropped it deep into the heart of a convenient bush.

  Five

  THE REVEREND SIMON SHULTER wore his dog collar on Sundays only, but on this morning made an exception. It looked incongruous with his blue sports jacket and jeans, but it stated his identity and cut out a lot of unnecessary explanations. He waylaid Fleming on his return to The Lantern after his visit to the doctor and suggested they should have a drink together. "I read the piece about your staying here in the paper this morning and I came straight over. The Marristone Grange boys attend my church. I knew David. We'd had a chat or two about confirmation."

  Fleming's first reaction was a curt refusal, but he bit it back. Here was another stranger who had known his son. Confirmation? David? Religion hadn't played any role in his life at all. Ruth had arranged with her local pastor to have him christened, and he had a vague recollection of the ceremony in Ruth's non-conformist chapel. After that – nothing.

  He agreed to the drink, one pint of bitter. Shulter ordered the same. They took their drinks over to the window recess where the watery sun gleamed intermittently and dazzled on Shutter's gold-framed spectacles so that he was forced to move his chair sideways to the table.

  He was used to bereavements, but not to one of this nature and he made the usual speech of condolence hesitantly.

  Fleming politely heard him out. Irreparable loss. It was odd how even a young cleric, just a few years out of theological college, fastened on to the well-worn cliches. This one had difficulty with his r's… not an impediment exactly, but one r too many which didn't quite come out as a burr. 'Deepest sympathy' would come next followed by 'God's will'.