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‘It’s not very convenient, coming at this time of the morning,’ the administrator replied acidly, her poise recovered.
‘To be quite frank with you, I don’t actually care how convenient it is for him or indeed for you,’ Fox retorted. He had no intention of being pushed around, especially in a place like this. ‘I need to speak to him, and I need to speak to him now. And I need a room to do it in.’
‘I see,’ she replied. ‘In that case, I suppose you’d better use my office.’
She turned briskly on her heel, and without any further word led him back down the corridor from where he had seen her come, and ushered him through a door to the left. ‘If you wait here, I’ll go and see if I can find Tull.’
The task of tracking down Joseph Tull cannot, in the event, have been too difficult for Sarah Russell, because he appeared in the doorway little more than a minute later.
‘What is it?’ He spoke with an accent and arrogance that immediately pressed several of Fox’s buttons.
‘Well, I’m not here to enrol as a student, that’s for sure.’
‘I’m not sure they’d let you in. They are rather fussy.’
‘So am I.’
‘And it costs a packet.’
Fox said nothing back. He didn’t like Joseph, but he knew from experience that he had to avoid getting sucked in if he was going to keep control of the interview. And besides, it was as plain as a pikestaff that Joseph was a clever little shit who’d always have a smart-arse answer up his sleeve. He went and sat down at the desk, gestured Joseph towards another chair, and waited for him to subside into it. Only then did he speak.
‘The night your mother was killed, you were at a party. In Southfield Road as I recall. I need a list of people who can verify that you were there.’
Joseph put his hand to his head and pushed back the hair that had flopped across his face. ‘That could be a problem,’ he said.
‘Why?’
Again the hand pushed at his hair, which had already fallen back across his face. ‘Because I didn’t go to it.’
‘So you lied.’
‘I had to. Because I had told my father that that was where I was going.’
‘So where were you, and what were you doing?’
‘I just went out. To the pub.’
‘Which pub?’
‘In town. Does it matter which one?’
‘Of course it bloody matters. Which pub?’
‘The Three Goats Heads, in St Michael’s Street. But only for a while.’
‘And is there anyone who can verify any of this? Because from where I sit, you’ve got an alibi that’s worth bugger all.’
‘My mate Hugo. Hugo Horsefield.’
‘Just him?’
‘Yeah.’
‘And is Hugo Horsefield a pupil of Cornforth College, too?’
Joseph Tull said nothing at first. He chewed his lower lip, and looked apprehensively across at Fox, as if weighing up his options. Eventually he replied.
‘He used to be.’
