“I don’t suppose it would have been difficult for her to obtain one,” said Finch, snapping off his gloves and binning them. “She’d been there before.”
Bryant uncovered Saralla White’s face. Usually, he did not care to see features from which life had fled, but he was hoping to find some clue from any remaining shred of spirit. “In the notes on her artwork, Saralla White was pushing for abortion on request up to a minimum of fourteen weeks. Most take place before thirteen weeks. Suppose she fought over the termination with her boyfriend? That would give us a suspect.”
“There’s the difference between us,” said Finch. “You think about suspects. I think about the victim. There’s more to life than finding who to blame.”
“This isn’t about life, Oswald,” Bryant reminded him.
Finch did not take kindly to being challenged. “You might have a word with your man Banbury,” he said, changing the subject. “I do bodies, not clothes.”
“What do you mean?”
“He delivered her corpse fully dressed. I thought we’d agreed that it’s not my job to undress them.”
“Why did he do that?”
“Oh, something about her outfit. She was wearing a sort of bandsman’s tunic, silver buttons all the way down the front. Banbury thought if the killer had been forced to manhandle her over the wall of the tank, he might be able to lift partials from them.”
“I hope he took prints from everyone who was in the gallery.” Bryant covered White’s face once more, disappointed by what he saw. “There’s nothing here.”
“What did you expect to find? Strands of ectoplasm wending heavenward as the soul departs?” asked Finch sarcastically.
“We once believed the eyes caught the last image seen in life,” said Bryant sadly. “It’s natural to seek answers in the face.”
“Then it was a waste of time looking.” Finch started to cover the rest of the body.
“It’s never a waste of time,” said Bryant. “Even taking into account that her facial muscles have relaxed, I would have thought there’d be some indication of stress in the features. She looks calm. She was caught by surprise and died quickly, without undue pain. That’s all any of us can ask.”
“That’s unusually morbid of you,” Finch sniffed. “You were due to have your first intimation of mortality about forty years ago. Don’t tell me it’s finally caught up with you.”
He expected the elderly detective to come back with a stinging rejoinder, and was amazed when Bryant walked quietly and thoughtfully from the room.
∨ Ten Second Staircase ∧
12
The Barrier of Youth
John May stood on the worn steps of St Crispin’s Boys’ School, St John Street, Clerkenwell, and studied the building’s façade: a fuss of railings and crenellations, stone urns, wreaths, garlands, ‘improving’ mottoes, and blunted statuary depicting Christian martyrs. Above the door, letters cut into a single block of white Portland stone read ‘Founded In The Year Of Our Lord 1685’. Through one of the double-height central windows, May could see a dozen pupils hunched in the pale light of their computer terminals.
“Hard to believe it’s been here for so long,” said Elliot Mason, echoing his thoughts. The teacher was still wearing his knitted beanie, and looked out of place. “Not on this site, of course – this building’s late Victorian. The coping stone was moved from the original site somewhere further east. For three centuries St Crispin’s was open to all devout Christians who had the will to learn. Now it’s reserved for the paying elite. There’s a five-year waiting list to attend. So much for progress. Sorry, I saw you at the art gallery this morning. Your sergeant interviewed me.” Mason introduced himself with a faint handshake.
May had been educated at a good grammar school in Vauxhall, a step above his partner’s experience in Whitechapel. He had reached maturity in a world of crow-black gowns and mortarboards. Consequently, the young teacher’s relaxed clothes and attitude came as a surprise to him. “Why do you choose to teach here?” he asked, surveying the exterior.
“The pay’s better than working in a state school, and there’s slightly less chance of getting stabbed. Sorry, there’s a limit to my altruism. In my book you can have a vocation and still meet your mortgage payments. It looks like it’s going to rain. The kids will be off soon. Are you coming in?”
“I wanted to talk to the class that visited the gallery yesterday,” said May. “I know they gave statements, but I wondered if we’d missed something. We’ve had trouble getting hold of your head teacher, Dr Westingham.”
“He likes the school to keep a low profile. Apparently he had kittens when he saw the afternoon news report. He’s an utter slave to parental demands, lives in fear of losing his exclusive status.”
“He has no reason to worry. We’re just gathering information.”
They climbed the worn steps together.
“He fears guilt by association. God forbid the idea of the big bad world intruding into these sepulchral halls, staining the innocence of his children. They might have fee-paying parents, but they’re the same as every other hormonal delinquent in the neighbourhood.
They nick stuff from a better class of store, and lie more professionally, but apart from that it’s business as usuaclass="underline" skinning up doobies in the kiln room, playing hockey with frozen mice in the biology lab, hanging around the girls’ school in Roseberry Avenue, shoving each other into strip clubs – they can get into Soho during their lunch hour and still be back in time for the first module of the afternoon.
Come on, I’ll dig them out for you. They won’t take any orders from me, of course, a lapsed socialist with a persecution complex and artistic aspirations. They smell my fear and play on it mercilessly.”
“Why were you taking the class?”
“I already explained to your sergeant. Their teacher, Mr Kingsmere, had an upset stomach and stayed home yesterday, so I had to take his place.”
“You were inside the County Hall Gallery while it happened – you didn’t see or hear anything unusual?”
“I walked through the main chamber a few minutes before the alarm was raised, then went to the café.”
“Why didn’t you stay with your class?”
“I needed to change into trainers. I was breaking in new shoes and they were killing me. Here we are. The element of surprise is the only weapon I have against them.”
Mason led the way through corridors built in the time of James II that had now been relaid for computer wiring, and stopped before a wide mahogany door, flinging it wide.
The pupils within were all working at their terminals, and barely bothered to look up. May had expected them to react by becoming statues, freezing in a variety of violent postures, their internecine cruelties caught in mid-brutalisation. It was what teenagers would have done in his day, had the demographic category been invented, but back then lessons had been focussed on blackboards and rote-learning, and any diversion had been welcomed.
“Would all of those boys in Mr Kingsmere’s art class please make themselves known?” asked Mason. A number of hands were desultorily raised. “Come on – Gosling, Parfitt, I know you were both there. You too, Jezzard, Tarkington, Billings, and the rest of you.”
Further hands crept up like unfurling ferns. Nobody was pleased about being drawn away from their screens. Adults – especially ones involved in law enforcement – would only ask pedantic, irrelevant questions, and would take ages doing so. “Outside, please; the remainder get on with your work.”