The Company of Fellows (28 page)

He opened his
eyes and put in a disk. Time to think first, whilst his mind was
empty, let the thoughts percolate up slowly, see if they would
follow his bidding.

What were the
questions he had for today? Other than who killed Charles Shaw.
That was simple. What did Knightley do with Carol Shaw? Did Charles
know about it and is that why he was killed? Scrap the second bit;
that was a secondary question. What did it have to do with the
armature, and what exactly was the armature for – what and who?
Where did Shaw get his money and what did he do on his sabbatical,
and where did Spain come into it? Was that connected to Carol too?
And what did Hedley Sansom know about all of it that he wasn’t
letting on? Tommy was sure that the motive for Shaw’s murder was in
these questions. It wasn’t in his ideas about childhood. Not ideas
in the abstract at any rate, but in something that happened to two
particular children 18 years ago.

Money
, he thought. Money may not be
the answer but it was important. Tommy thought of Charteris’ money,
all £98,000, stored neatly in piles of £50 notes. What was it for?
That was still bothering him. Maybe for a trip? To the Sorbonne? To
Spain? Maybe, but surely it was for something else as well. Was
this the money he the Professor made all those years ago? Was that
it? If he found out how Shaw had made the money would he find the
reason for his death? Was this the money Henry Wilde was looking
for, that Charles had squirreled away somewhere far from his
traceable bank accounts? He made a note to go through Shaw’s CV
with a toothcomb, and to call the Sorbonne to check exactly where
Charles had been and at what times.

Tommy shut his
eyes and made himself put the money to the back of his mind. With a
few clicks of the mouse Tommy opened the first disk. He wasn’t
really expecting to find answers here any more, but he tried not to
let impatience make him careless. Shaw had given him everything in
the box. He would look at everything he could, just in case. He
reminded himself of the need to be painstaking. If Shaw hadn’t
found the answer then he had too look harder and closer – and
smarter – than the Professor.

The files on
the first disk seemed to be a list of chapters, drafts for the
book, all except one file, which piqued Tommy’s curiosity. It was a
Word file,
Things we can or should only do
once
. It was just the sort of thought
experiment Shaw loved thinking up. He imagined the Professor trying
to devise a mathematical formula to decide when he should do
things: when the anticipation and the memory were in perfect
equilibrium, when the disappointment of knowing that the thing is
done would be outweighed by the potential disappointment of knowing
that it would have been more pleasurable done yesterday.
Tipping points and symmetries, the shapes and
numbers that had covered the surface of Shaw’s
mind
.

“
So,
Professor, what did you actually do with your life?”

Tommy clicked
the document open:

• First kiss –
  Can
  

• Realisation
  that you are finally in love – C
  

• Make the
  fundamental choice in your life – C
  

• Have sex with
  someone you have loved as long as you can remember –
  Should
  

• Drink the
  oldest bottle of Tokaji in the world – C
  

• Have Sappho
  read to you by the Andalucian moon - S
  

• Raise a child
  – S
  

• Go to the
  Bayreuth Festival – S
  

• Eat puffa
  fish – S
  

• Skull-fuck a
  trepanned baby
  
  - S
  

Tommy stared
at the screen. Stay calm, he told himself. That was easier than he
thought.
Which suddenly made him realise
that he had known all along what the armature was
for
. It was the last thought he had for an
hour.

When he came
to he couldn’t remember opening his eyes. Looking at his watch it
was as though an hour of his life had gone, which wasn’t the first
time he had simply lost chunks of time. He knew what that had meant
the last time, and hoped desperately he could fight off total
breakdown long enough to find the truth.

The
screensaver was on, a bottle of Tokaji slowly pouring itself into a
crystal glass. Tommy flicked the mouse and the screen came back.
Tommy gagged instantly. There was something wrong, though.
Of course there’s something wrong!
he screamed at himself. No, not that. The
emoticon, the smiley.

What the hell
did it mean? That Charles knew what had happened to Carol and found
it funny? That he had done it to her himself? No, he couldn’t bring
himself to think that. Besides, why get Knightley involved and then
make such a point of being miles away when Carol was born if he was
going to sue her himself?

No, Shaw
hadn’t done this to her, but Tommy had a sickening feeling that’d
known who had; and that he’d been part of a set-up with Knightley
to make it happen. Tommy had a terrible feeling all of a sudden
that he knew where the Professor’s money had come from.

This wasn’t a
thought experiment; it was a real one. It was a real experiment for
someone’s actual pleasure. And, however obliquely, the Professor
was writing the whole thing up. Someone wouldn’t want it published.
Someone would want it kept secret very much. Surely that was a
motive for murder.

Then a thought
that made Tommy even sicker. Someone had already killed to stop
this becoming public. Now he had the only copy.

____

41

Tommy picked
up the phone and dialled Rosie’s mobile.

“
If you’re
with Em just say ‘that’s right’.”

“
That’s
right.”

“
If you want
to see me this afternoon say ‘I’ve considered that already’. If you
don’t, say you hadn’t thought of it.” He opened the door to his top
floor flat and went downstairs to collect the post.

“
Yes, I’ve
considered that already.”

“
Great. Five
o’clock at mine unless you tell me that you have to wait for
results the path lab.” He flicked through the post. There were a
couple of catalogues for some new Chinese silks.
Can’t they be bothered to send some real
cloth?
he thought. It would probably
weighs less and cost them less than thick glossy paper and bad
Photoshop.

“
I think I’ve
got those results already, sir.”

“
What can I
say to get you to blush in front of the boss then?” There was a
thick cream envelope, simply addressed to Tommy West. Something
felt wrong. Instinctively he took off his shirt and picked it up by
the corner through the cloth.

“
Goodbye,
Sir.” Rosie hung up.

Tommy put the
letter on a tray on the kitchen side. He went to the cupboard, got
out some corn flour and turmeric, and mixed them together in a
bowl. It was hardly Thames Valley’s finest fingerprint powder, but
what was he supposed to do? Ask Rosie to do it for him?
And why would you want me to do that?
she’d say.
Oh, I’m just
investigating a murder. I would have told you but I nicked a
hundred grand
. If he had a print, though,
who knows what he might be able to do from her laptop next time he
went round. He dusted the fine mix over the envelope with an egg
brush. Nothing. No surprise there. He slit the envelope with his
paring knife, and shook it onto the tray. A tiny piece of thin
paper with nail scissor trimmed edges floated out, thin crisp paper
like you’d find in a Bible. He dusted it but still there was
nothing. What did it say?

“
Since they
did not know the righteousness that comes from God and
sought”

Hmm. He turned
it over. It said exactly what he expected. “…the younger.’ Just as
it is written: ‘Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.”

He recognised
the translation as coming from the New International Version of the
Bible. It shouldn’t take too much work to find the edition by
comparing the layout of the type to his vast collection of
scriptures. He knew he should be scared but all he could do was
wonder if this was how Shaw’s letters had come. It made him smile.
All he had to do was ask who was bulk-buying Bibles if that was the
case. Then he remembered what he’d read in the Professor’s papers
and it snapped his mind right back into focus. This was no longer a
game. It wasn’t therapy for him; it wasn’t an adventure. People had
lost their lives, and now someone knew that he was looking around
for something they wanted left hidden.

____

42

“
Who was
that?” asked Emily.

“
Just someone
from the lab.” Rosie answered.

“
No it
wasn’t.” Emily looked at her intently. “Have you finally got
yourself a boyfriend?”

“
No,” she
said. Almost at once she gave up. She knew she’d never be able to
keep something like that a secret from Emily. “Well, it’s too early
to say, but who knows?”

“
That’s
fantastic!” Emily was already out of her chair and on her way to
the vending machine for a celebratory coffee.

Rosie decided
to walk with her before everyone else found out.

“
So who is
he?”

Rosie could
feel that her cheeks were going the same colour as her
lipstick.

“
Shit, Rosie,
do I know him?”

Could say
that, she thought. “Let me get these,” she said, turning her back
and making herself busy with change in her handbag.

“
Come on,
Rosie, you know I’m not going to give you any peace until you tell
me. I’ll keep shooting names at you and you can’t keep your back to
me all day.”

Rosie turned
round and handed her a dark brown liquid that purported to be
coffee. “OK.” She stirred her own black unsugared drink.

“
I’m waiting.
I assume OK means you’re going to tell me.”

“
Mm.”

“
Get on with
it then.”

Rosie started
walking back to the office, Emily at her shoulder. When she found a
piece of partition wall that looked like it didn’t have anyone
behind it she stopped. “You did say you thought we’d be suited.
Well, we are. On the evidence so far, anyway.” She didn’t look
up.

“
No!”

“
Unh-hunh.”

“
Well I didn’t
see that coming. No, actually I did but I thought I’d have to lock
the two of you in a room together before you’d do anything about
it.”

“
So you’re not
pissed off?”

“
Shit, no.
That’s wonderful, Rosie. You’ll have to come round for
dinner.”

“
And what
would David make of that?” said Rosie, imagining just how many
permutations of conflict a dinner like that could give rise
to.

“
David might
finally get off my back about both of you if he thought you were
going to be busy keeping each other amused.”

“
You’re worse
than my mum you know. You’ll be sitting me down with cake designs
and flower arrangements if I’m not careful.” She looked around and
then looked at Emily, unable to control the grin that had broken
out, “God, I’ve been bursting to tell you since yesterday
morning.”

Emily put her
arms around her in a bear hug, “Soft git. I couldn’t be
happier.”

Rosie walked
back to their big open plan office smiling and relaxed. She knew
that half the people who saw her were wondering why she looked
different, and that many of them would spend their tea breaks
guessing, but she didn’t care. For the moment things felt better
than they had done in a long while, and for now it really didn’t
matter how long that moment lasted.

____

43

It didn’t take
much googling to find the full CV of Professor Charles Shaw. The
University’s Theology Faculty posted full details of all staff on
its website. In some cases it even gave details of where people
went on holiday, and had snaps of their kids. Tommy wondered if
they’d heard of the Data Protection Act.

Tommy knew a
lot of the Professor’s CV already, from his first ever
article,
Conceptions of Co-existence: The
Moral Importance of Identical Twins
, and
the early books that had made Shaw’s name:
It is better for a man not to marry: History’s
Misrepresentation of St Paul on Marriage
,
Consent and Concubines: Marriage
and Medieval Misogyny
. Then, of course,
there was a hiatus before 1992’s masterpiece,
Aquinas: Sacrament and Sin in Marriage
. 1992, he thought. The timing would fit perfectly with Shaw
working on the book at the Sorbonne then publishing it when he got
back.

What Tommy was
really interested in was the list of papers he had published in the
years directly before the book. If the Professor really had been
working on his book, then Tommy would have expected him to have
published some preliminary papers in the area. Or he may have
published nothing at all if he’d locked himself away and dedicated
himself to researching his book. Tommy scrolled down to the papers
section. Here it was, 1990-1992. Shaw had published four papers in
two years. That was at least as high a strike rate as any other
time in his career. Clearly he hadn’t been holed up in his ivory
tower.