Dying Fall Read Free Page A

Can’t let the students down. Or your friends, who get lumbered with extra work. Esprit de corps, or something.’
    â€˜Sounds familiar,’ said Groom, as if awarding Brownie points.
    When she returned, Shahida accepted a mint. She explained our record-keeping system: one on computers, which might one day be networked, if ever the funds ran to it, and a paper-based one for computer-illiterates like me. She fished a manila folder from the cabinet next to the computer. ‘This is easier,’ she said.
    The folder held a copy of Wajid’s timetable – he should have been in Computer Science this morning. Someone would have to break it to the class. I pointed and looked at Groom. He nodded. His job, or one of his colleagues’. I reached for one of Dale’s mints.
    There was a list of Wajid’s qualifications: seven good GCSEs. A set of comments on his Christmas exams – A grades in all of them. And his punctuality and attendance were exemplary. Then there was a note in ill-formed handwriting asking if he might have leave of absence because his father had died. A college reference – he’d applied for a local-authority grant and his tutor, Shahida, had written a glowing report supporting him very strongly.
    â€˜That’s odd,’ I said.
    â€˜Odd?’ repeated Groom.
    â€˜Yes. Applying for a grant on the grounds of extreme financial hardship.’
    â€˜He was absolutely broke,’ said Shahida.
    â€˜Broke students don’t wear designer jeans or a Rolex.’
    â€˜They’d be cheap copies, Sophie,’ said Dale.
    They hadn’t looked like that to me, but he’d no doubt taken a closer look than I had. There wasn’t time to argue, anyway. I had a class to go to, and the phones had started to ring. I took the nearest. It was a parent. He wasn’t letting his daughter come to college till they’d caught the murderer. Just to make sure, he was sending her back to Pakistan for a holiday.
    I reported back to Shahida.
    â€˜Shit! The bastard!’ she said, slamming her hand on a desk.
    â€˜Seems reasonable enough to me,’ said Dale. ‘Can’t help worrying when you’re a parent. Wouldn’t want my girls taking any risks.’
    â€˜But you wouldn’t marry her off just to make sure. A holiday in Pakistan is all too often a euphemism for an arranged marriage, officer. These poor girls end up with country cousins, real hicks some of them.’
    Groom’s eyes flickered to her wedding ring.
    â€˜I was lucky. We fell in love: our parents got on and arranged it,’ she said.
    I gathered up my folder and the register and headed for the corridor. Groom followed. I stopped.
    â€˜Can I ask you something, Chief Inspector?’
    â€˜Chris. Of course.’
    Dale coughed gently. To urge discretion, perhaps.
    â€˜Fire away,’ said Chris.
    â€˜Why didn’t you suspect me?’
    A couple of my colleagues, late and anxious, pushed by. We exchanged terse greetings.
    â€˜Would you rather we had? We wouldn’t have had the coffee and cakes in my room, for sure.’
    â€˜Sandwiches. But why should you and all your colleagues assume I was telling the truth?’
    Dale fidgeted his feet. I looked at Groom, wishing I was taller so I could stare him in the eye. As it was, I must have looked like a supplicant.
    He looked down at me, crow’s feet of amusement spreading from his eyes.
    â€˜Let’s see: you must be about five foot tall?’
    â€˜Five foot one,’ I bridled.
    â€˜And weigh not much above eight stone? And though you’re fit – very fit!’ He glanced across at Dale –‘you don’t break any records weight-training. Nor are you an ex-medical student.’
    â€˜You saw my file before you saw Wajid’s,’ I said evenly.
    He nodded, almost apologetically, and then regained the initiative. ‘So it was most unlikely that you killed that lad.