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‘Can’t say I did, sir, I’m sorry. I’ll have another look when I put the sand down. Was you wanting to call the police?’
‘Uh…I don’t know.’
‘Probably not now,’ Nicky said. ‘It seems to be an extremely dangerous prank, or piece of malice, but it’s past ten and I should rather consult the Master before making it a police matter. More urgent is the question of where he can sleep.’
‘Yes, DrRook. Uh?—’
‘Your sofa’s fine,’ Jem said.
‘My sofa it is, then, and he’ll need a new room—which will be on the ground floor, I don’t care what staircase—in the morning. Thank you, Drayton. I shall inform the Master tomorrow, but I think the priority now is ensuring nobody else risks injury. If I can leave that to you…?’
‘Yes, DrRook.’
‘Thank you.’ Nicky escorted the man out and shut the door behind him, locking it. ‘Christ alive, you look a state. Is there anything else I need to know before I put you to bed?’
‘Did you see the room?’ Jem managed.
‘I did. You’ve got under someone’s skin, my Jeremy. I did warn you.’
‘So’ve you,’ Jem pointed out but couldn’t quite remember why he said it.
‘I always do. You need to get those oily rags off and get to bed, you’re half-dead. I’ll lend you a nightshirt.’
NINETEEN
Jem woke up in a bed that smelled of Nicky. He sat up sharply and felt a stab of pain across his chest. He peered down into the billowing oversized nightshirt he wore and saw the beginnings of a nasty line of bruising.
He was alone. He looked around the dim bedroom, casting about for a clock, and saw that it was past nine. He got up, moving with caution, and rapped on the door to Nicky’s sitting room, in case there was a tutorial taking place in icy silence; it seemed unlikely, but he wouldn’t put it past Nicky. No answer came, so he helped himself to Nicky’s quilted dressing gown, which was a rich mahogany shade and came down to his ankles, and poked his head round the door.
There was a fire, going very nicely, and breakfast things—tea, bread and butter, anchovy paste—laid out on the little table in front of it, plus a note. Jem picked it up.
Jeremy
Help yourself to breakfast and then go back to bed. I have sent your clothes for laundry. I will be back some time after eleven. Ignore any knocking; it will be students, thus unimportant.
Nicholas
He was trapped in a nightshirt. For heaven’s sake, he had other clothes in his room in Bascomb Stair; someone might have thought to bring them. It was typical of Nicky. The whole note was typical, in fact. Jem didn’t know anyone else who’d use semicolons in a brief scrawl, and he hadn’t realised how much he’d missed that sort of thing.
He made himself a pot of tea and several slices of toast, lavishly spread with butter and Gentleman’s Relish, which he hadn’t had in years. It felt decadent to be lolling around in Nicky’s nightshirt and gown. It felt like old times. It felt safe.
He felt safe in Nicky’s rooms, and that was one more impossible, contradictory thing to add to the pile.
By the time he’d consumed his breakfast, cleared up, and had a wash, it was close to ten. He wanted to be doing something useful, and decided to make some notes, which gave him a squirm of worry about what had happened to his notebook. He had not, thank God, written up yesterday’s conversation with Aaron, but there was enough in there about Prue’s personal situation to make him feel exceedingly worried at it being in malicious hands.
He needed a bit of paper and a pencil. Nicky’s desk was large and covered with stacks of paper, ordered if not precisely orderly. Essays, marked and yet to be marked; piles of books with bits of paper sticking out as bookmarks; what seemed to be a translation in progress, dark with crossings-out and scribbles. It was odd to see Nicky from this angle, ten years into his adult life and career.
There was a sheaf of what looked like blank paper with a large, battered diary on top. Jem lifted that off and saw the crumpled page from Nicky’s pamphlet that had been left on his desk. Nicky must have found it in the pocket of his oily jacket. Jem picked it up, along with pencil and paper, and retired to the chair by the fire.
He made brief notes on everything he could remember of yesterday in the most obscure and unreadable manner he could achieve, then took a second piece with the intention of summarising everything he’d learned over the past week or so. He scrawledConclusionsat the top, underlined it, and then spent several minutes looking at the blank page.
Aaron. From what he had told Jem, a lot of lives including his own had hung on Toby’s silence. Aaron had lied about his lack of contact with Ella, known where Jem was staying in college, and doubtless seen the notebook on his desk, full of incriminatory details.
Ella, so strong and determined. She’d had a powerful motive for Toby’s murder, and, if she was still with Aaron, an equally powerful one to stop Jem’s investigation in his tracks. She planned ahead. She was ruthless. He could imagine her pouring oil on a stair, in a way that seemed unlikely for Aaron.
Aaron and Ella collaborating. Would they risk it? Could they really give each other another alibi, after the last time? Then again, would they need to? If he’d broken his neck on the stairs, with no record of his investigations and findings, would the police have called it an accident? Would anyone—Nicky, or Hugo, or Prue—have agitated for a murder investigation? It was an uncomfortable thought, among many uncomfortable thoughts.
Jem screwed up theConclusionspaper and threw it into the fire. The pamphlet page fluttered off his knee with the movement; he slapped it against his leg to catch it.
