Was It Murder? Read Free Page B

that there is more in it than meets the eye.”
    Revell nodded once again, but with his glance fixed rather shrewdly on the other.  “What is it,” he asked, “that you would like me to do?”
    “Nothing definite, I assure you—nothing definite at all.  Just consider, if I may so express it, that for a few days you hold a watching brief.  Here, as I have told them to you, are the facts— presenting a situation that is, shall we agree to say, abnormal enough to be worth a little extra attention if only for its own sake.  Just look over it yourself and tell me how you feel about it— that’s really all I have in mind.”
    “But surely, sir, you don’t suspect—“
    “My dear boy, I suspect nothing and nobody.  As a matter of fact”— the emotional inflection was in his voice again—“this terrible business was a great blow to me—far greater than I have allowed people to see.  Apart from personal regrets, the publicity that the whole affair received was a great setback to the School.  You may or may not know, Revell, the state in which I found things when I first came here.  For half a dozen years I have toiled hard to raise and improve, and then—comes THIS.  There is no one on my staff in whom I would care to confide.  I cannot probe into the matter myself—to do so would draw even greater attention to it.  And yet, of course, there may be nothing at all to probe. . . .  My nerves, I am aware, are not in the best condition—I need a long holiday which I shall not be able to take until the summer vacation next year.  I can see you are tremendously mystified by all this.  And no wonder.  It is all, I daresay, perfectly absurd.”
    “I must admit, sir, I don’t see a scrap of evidence to suggest anything really wrong.”
    “Of course not.  There isn’t any, I don’t suppose.  And yet— there’s that little demon of curiosity in my mind—why WAS the boy thinking of death on that Sunday evening?”
    “Who can say?  Coincidences like that DO happen.  And there’s nothing very remarkable in the note itself.  Just the fatuous sort of thing I might have written myself on a Sunday night after chapel when I’d nothing else to do.”
    “Probably—you comfort me even by saying so.  Nevertheless, you will not decline my vague and probably quite ridiculous commission?”
    “Oh, of course not, if you would really like me to look into it.”
    “Good.  You see, no doubt, how well suited you are for the task.  As a distinguished Old Boy of the School, you have the best of reasons for being here as my guest.  You can talk to both boys and masters without anyone questioning your bona-fides.  No one, of course, knows or need know why you are really here.  You understand?”
    “Oh yes.”
    “Then I leave things in your hands.  I have heard splendid accounts, my dear Revell, of your work in connexion with a certain regrettable affair at Oxford.  This, I hope, will be less serious. . . .  You were in School House, I believe, when you were here?”
    “Yes.”
    “Good—that will give you a convenient excuse for meeting Ellington.  I mentioned your visit to him, in fact—he suggested you might care to breakfast with him to-morrow morning.”
    “I should be delighted.”
    “Most likely he will drop in later on to-night to meet you. . . .  Another cigar?  Yes, do, please.  Are you interested, by the way, in etchings?  I have one or two here that are considered to be rather choice.”
    Revell perceived that the discussion, for the time being, was over, and he could not but notice and admire the ease with which the other resumed his earlier manner.  Nerves or not, he certainly had them well under control.  They talked on for over an hour on varied topics; Roseveare showed himself to be a man of remarkably wide interests, and obviously enjoyed an exchange of views with the younger generation.  Yet there was not a trace of patronage or of condescension in his attitude.  He