An Oxford Scandal Read online

  As he ran, his agile brain was already leaping ahead, seeking direction. He remembered coming back from dinner and the dean saying something about the alarm being faulty.

  And if he’d heard it, so had the others with him. Martha, Dr Ngabe, Dr Ollenbach, Sir Laurence. His thoughts stopped abruptly as he passed through Becket Arch and he yelped, his running feet suddenly and painfully hitting gravel. He hopped to an agonised stop, cursing himself, but all the time wondering why he was taking it for granted that the chalice had really been stolen.

  It was so fantastic. Things like that didn’t happen in Oxford. And certainly not in a college as old and as respectable as St Bede’s.

  The Van Gilder woman was obviously nearly hysterical.

  But not stupid.

  It was as if Gideon had been expecting something bad to happen all night long. Which was absurd.

  As he tiptoed in and carefully approached the college clock, it began chiming the half hour.

  He stepped into the hall outside the Senior Common Room and saw the scene at once, just as she’d described it.

  Incredible.

  But it had happened. He himself had seen the chalice in there on their return from dinner. When he’d left, hadn’t something big and dark been covering the cabinet? He looked down and saw a big black coat he vaguely recognised as belonging to the college butler, lying on the floor. He didn’t know then that it was Laurel who’d dropped it there.

  He glanced inside just long enough to make sure that the chalice was indeed gone. But, unlike Laurel, however, he didn’t forget the proximity of the Senior Common Room and knew his first priority was to alert the principal.

  Although it was half past midnight, he didn’t doubt that there were still a few stragglers around finishing off the Napoleon brandy.

  He moved to the green baize doors, pushed them open a little, and peered inside. Mindful of his state of undress and instinctively going into ‘damage limitation’ mode, he only half looked in, careful to hide the bulk of his body behind the doors.

  Several dons were grouped around the fireplace, pleasantly dopey and tipsy. The college butler, sure enough, was still circulating with drinks.

  Sin-Jun himself was just in the process of dismissing the butler, a sure hint to the others that it was time to call it a night.

  He caught the slight movement of the door, turned, and raised an eyebrow in shocked disbelief at the sight of the Experimental Psychology fellow stood there in his pyjamas. Then he noticed the man’s paleness and narrowed his eyes at the beckoning finger Gideon crooked his way.

  Sin-Jun took a quick look around, satisfied himself that nobody else had caught sight of Professor Welles, and moved to the door, stepping through in one fluid movement. He closed the door quickly behind him.

  ‘My dear chap,’ he began. Even if the man had been celebrating his well-deserved victory, it didn’t give him the right to make a scene.

  ‘The Augentine chalice has been stolen,’ Gideon said flatly.

  For one second, Sin-Jun said, did and thought nothing. Then his training took over. As an ex-soldier, Sin-Jun had had his fair share of dealing with crises.

  He strode to the cabinet, stared at it, noted the coat on the floor, frowned, and then glanced at Gideon.

  ‘Tell me what happened,’ Sin-Jun said, his voice grim.

  Briefly, Gideon related Laurel Van Gilder’s abrupt intrusion into Wolsey and her tale of the missing chalice, followed by his own part in checking out her claim.

  By the time he’d finished, Sin-Jun was already thinking ahead. He said simply, ‘I’ve got to call old Fishers.’

  Old Fishers was Chief Constable Stanley Fisher, an old St Mark’s man, and one of Sin-Jun’s many cronies. In confirmation of this, the principal muttered grimly, ‘He’ll be able to keep a lid on all this.’

  It was typical of the man that, in any crisis, his duty came first. Whether it be to queen, country, or St Bede’s.

  Gideon hoped that the chief constable would indeed be able to keep it quiet, but surely that depended on getting the chalice back quickly.

  And on Laurel agreeing to be reasonable.

  His lips twisted wryly as he pondered the chances of that.

  Sin-Jun stooped to pick up the coat and draped it across the cabinet. He wondered how many others had innocently left the party, passing the cabinet, unaware of the theft within.

  Gideon was thinking the same thing. Once again, he felt himself shudder. It was incredible that a thief should have boldly come in and stolen it when they had all been only a few yards away. He paused. But how would the thief have known the alarm wasn’t working?

  It had to be one of them!

  No. Gideon shook his head. It was a stupid, idiotic thought. Who at the party tonight would possibly want to steal the chalice? They were, one and all, men and women of reputation. Standards.

  Suddenly, Sin-Jun stiffened. ‘Are the main gates still open?’ he asked briskly.

  ‘I think so. They usually are whenever we have a late night.’

  ‘And the posterns?’

  Gideon nodded at the postern gates leading into the car park. ‘Those are — they have to be.’

  The principal nodded. ‘So anyone could have got in off the streets and done this.’

  ‘Not through the main gates,’ Gideon demurred. ‘Jenkins would have seen them.’

  The principal didn’t doubt it. St Bede’s had a redoubtable head porter in Jenkins. Many a time a male student had tried to sneak past Jenkins, in the pursuit of amour, and felt his collar pinched instead. Mind you, a bottle of Scotch might persuade him to pretend it had never happened.

  Jenkins hadn’t had to buy his own booze in years.

  Gideon grimaced but understood what the principal was thinking. Oxford, like any big city, had its fair share of drug addicts. Wretched individuals who mugged and robbed in order to feed their habit.

  But still, they would have to know there was a valuable chalice here, and would surely expect such a thing to be well secured and guarded — it was by no means easy pickings. Which led him back to those who knew the alarm was faulty . . .

  Gideon stirred restlessly. ‘If it was someone from outside,’ he said quietly.

  Sin-Jun turned and looked at the younger man openly.

  ‘I think you should keep that thought to yourself for the moment, hm, Gideon, old boy?’ he said. ‘After all, it would be to everyone’s advantage if we, er, instigated some discreet enquiries ourselves and got the chalice back before any real harm is done. Yes? Come to that, I could always hold off calling Fishers for a day or two.’

  Gideon looked at the old man with respect. So that’s what he was thinking, was it?

  ‘But what if we don’t get the chalice back quickly?’ he asked.

  Sin-Jun ran a hand thoughtfully across his chin. ‘We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it,’ he said grimly. No doubt the police would not be at all impressed if they were forced to call them a few days after the actual theft.

  Still, a man had to take chances.

  ‘In the meantime,’ he mused, straightening his shoulders, ‘we’ve got to come up with a good cover story to explain the absence of the chalice. Being cleaned? Something along those lines?’ he suggested.

  Gideon sighed. He still wasn’t convinced but he was more than willing to let his principal have the final say. ‘All right.’

  ‘You’ll need to speak to Miss Van Gilder. See if you can’t persuade her to give us some time before calling in the police herself,’ the principal said, missing the appalled look Gideon gave him.

  Then Sin-Jun, taking in the Experimental Psychology don’s bare feet and thin clothing, sighed wearily. ‘Go back to your rooms and have a glass of brandy, old boy. You need it.’

  ‘But . . .’

  ‘Didn’t you say that Miss Van Gilder is waiting for you back there? I dare say it’s been a bit of a shock to her. And you’re by far the best man to see to her.’

  Gideon couldn’t help
but grin wryly at that statement.

  He was the last person to offer Laurel Van Gilder psychological advice, but he could hardly say so. Come to that, he was also probably the last man in the world she would agree to help out, but that, again, was something he could hardly explain here and now.

  Besides, he wondered if having the police called in right away might not be the best course, after all.

  ‘I’ll do my best,’ he said wearily, but he fully expected to be talking to the police before the night was out. He doubted Laurel Van Gilder had ever had anything but her own way her whole life through.

  And why should she agree to help St Bede’s out of their current crisis?

  Gideon left, wincing at his now raw feet.

  Sin-Jun watched him go, his eyes thoughtful and not unsympathetic. Gideon didn’t know it yet, but the principal fully expected him to be the one to track down their thief. His psychological training alone would surely help him ferret out the lies, neurosis or outright greed of the culprit responsible. Plus Laurel Van Gilder was clearly interested in the man, so he was sure to get her on his side too.

  And, of course, he realised smugly, it wouldn’t take Gideon long to realise that he himself was also very much on the suspect list and would need, if nothing else, to clear his own name and reputation.

  Sin-Jun, like most old soldiers, could be quite ruthless when he wanted to be.

  * * *

  Dr Julie Ngabe paced about in her little flat just off Canterbury Road, overlooking the Nissan Institute of Japanese Studies.

  She was still fully dressed and her robes swung angrily around her feet as she paced up and down, up and down, staring at the telephone.

  She had promised to call her mother, all those thousands of miles away, as soon as she’d heard the results of the prize-giving. But now she didn’t have the heart. Didn’t want to hear the disappointment in her mother’s voice. Didn’t want to have to admit failure.

  Her parents had worked hard — day and night — to educate their daughter to the degree that had allowed her to gain a two-year research fellowship at an Oxford college.

  Other parents would have insisted their sons have the education, but they had been wise and strong-minded enough to realise that Julie’s brothers didn’t have one-tenth of her brains.

  She had needed to be awarded the Van Gilder chair in order to stay on and get her DPhil. Now her money had run out, her college would not renew the fellowship, and she’d have no choice but to return to Kenya . . . and her disappointed family.

  Of course, Gideon Welles had always been the main opposition. And he was a very fine scholar. Even so, he didn’t actually need the chair. He had tenure for life at St Bede’s. A secure future. An academically recognised persona.

  It was not fair!

  Julie carried on pacing. Agitated. Angry. And afraid. Deathly afraid.

  * * *

  Dr Felicity Ollenbach was in the shower. She was not so much standing as lolling under the hot, needle-sharp spray, one hand steadying herself against the slippery tiled wall.

  She was crying, although the spray hid the fact, which was just as well because, suddenly, the curtain was thrust open and a youngish, sleek, good-looking man stood there, glowering at her.

  ‘But I thought you said you had it in the bag?’

  The voice was petulant, as was the set of the handsome man’s lips. ‘That there would be no problem?’

  Clive Westlake was an Englishman, several years younger than Felicity, and her husband of some eight years.

  Like a lot of Oxford dons, Felicity had kept her maiden name for working purposes and out of a natural desire to retain her identity.

  Now she sighed wearily and straightened up, pushing her long length of wet hair from her face and reaching for the soap.

  ‘I didn’t think there would be,’ she lied. ‘Sir Laurence was too old, Dr Ngabe is too young to have made much of a dent, and Martha Doyle hasn’t done anything good in years.’

  ‘But this Gideon Welles guy,’ Clive sneered. ‘You never mentioned him, did you?’

  ‘Clive, please,’ she said wearily.

  ‘You know that money could have dug us out of the hole, don’t you?’ Clive snarled, whirling away from the shower cubicle and moodily slamming down the toilet seat lid so that he could sit on it and sulk.

  Felicity laughed grimly. Did she know? Of course she knew.

  If only those investments she’d made two years ago had panned out.

  She’d had no illusions about her husband when she’d married him. An out-of-work actor, he was younger than herself, more beautiful, and sexually capricious.

  Felicity was middle-aged and besotted. To keep him, she knew that she’d need money (plenty of it) and prospects. As an Oxford don, she’d had the latter. And, in desperation, she’d tried to acquire the former.

  Now on the verge of bankruptcy, only the huge amount of cash that came with winning the Van Gilder chair would have kept their heads above water.

  She scrubbed herself down vigorously, obsessively, gouging out the tender skin under her fingernails, lathering and washing and lathering again every inch of her body.

  ‘We’re going to lose the house, aren’t we?’ Clive’s angry voice cut through the soothing hiss of the water.

  They had bought their house in Woodstock Road during the first fall in property prices after the eighties bubble had burst. Now it was worth a lot more than they’d paid for it. It had been a wonderful status symbol, the ultimate in elegant living.

  Now . . .

  Felicity Ollenbach continued to weep, bitterly and in private, beneath the disguising spray of the shower.

  ‘No, Clive,’ she muttered, ‘we’re not going to lose the house.’

  No way were they going to lose the house.

  * * *

  Dr Martha Doyle watched her lover packing. She’d suspected he was about to leave her, of course, but tonight was lousy timing even for him!

  ‘Don’t slam the door on the way out, you louse,’ she said with a viciousness that was more for show than out of any real hurt.

  She felt curiously flat and tired.

  ‘I won’t. And so sorry you didn’t get that chair, sweetie,’ the mocking voice was muffled as his head rummaged around in the wardrobe.

  Martha grunted. ‘Old Gideon deserved it, I suppose.’

  The man finished his packing and snapped his suitcase shut. He regarded her with a jeering smile and no regrets.

  ‘You suppose,’ he sneered. ‘Admit it. You’re mad enough to spit tin tacks. You’ve lived your life for a career, and that career, after a golden sunburst of promise, has fizzled out like a wet weekend.’

  Martha laughed sourly. ‘And you have to go now? Abandon me in my hour of need?’

  ‘You know I do. Things to do and people to see.’

  ‘Creep.’

  ‘Bitch.’

  Martha watched him go, and then sighed deeply. The apartment suddenly seemed empty.

  Her life seemed empty.

  It was not, funnily enough, how she had expected to feel. She picked up a shoe and threw it at the door. Down below, in the stairwell, she could hear her lover laugh.

  Her ex-lover now, she supposed.

  She needed a drink!

  But still, there were always compensations.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Laurel looked up as Gideon walked in. She was sitting in a large armchair, her legs tucked up under her, sipping brandy dispiritedly.

  ‘It’s gone, right?’

  Gideon nodded. ‘I told the principal. He wants to keep the police out of it. At least for the time being.’

  Laurel frowned. ‘I don’t think I can agree to that,’ she said cautiously. Her first instinct was to cover all her bases. And fast.

  ‘He’s anxious to avoid bad publicity,’ Gideon explained carefully, slumping down in the chair opposite her and putting one foot across his knee. He ran his fingers across his lacerated instep and winced.

  Laure
l snorted. ‘Huh! He doesn’t want bad publicity!’ she said disgustedly. ‘He thinks I do? The last thing I need is to have the Van Gilder name dragged through the mud.’

  Gideon looked at her curiously. She sounded her usual fierce and arrogant self all right, but he was sure he’d caught a hint of something else.

  Worry.

  Yes, she was definitely worried. Instantly, the psychologist in him took over. Slowly, he lowered his foot to the floor and leaned forward in his chair.

  ‘You sound as if you have the weight of the whole world on your shoulders,’ he said softly, in his encouraging, questioning voice.

  Many times, his students or friends had unburdened themselves after being subjected to just this tone of voice.

  But Laurel, it seemed, was made of different stuff altogether for she merely sighed, then laughed. Wearily she rubbed a hand across her face. ‘Poor little rich girl, huh?’ she said self-mockingly. Then her eyes sharpened. ‘You’re bleeding!’

  Gideon glanced down at the carpet where she was staring and quickly lifted his feet off the floor. ‘Damn!’

  ‘You didn’t go out in bare feet!’ Laurel squeaked, slipping to her knees in front of his chair and grabbing one ankle.

  Gideon just had time to squawk a protest before she hoisted his leg up and stared at his foot.

  ‘You idiot,’ she said. ‘Where’s the antiseptic cream?’

  His ankle felt hot where her fingers were closed around it and he had to swallow — hard — before he told her where the first aid kit was. He supposed, albeit reluctantly, that it made more sense for her to go and get it than for him to bleed all over the carpet on the way there and back.

  When she returned with a bowl of warm water, a bag of cotton wool and some antiseptic, he firmly took over, refusing to let her minister to him but sinking his feet in the water with a sigh of bliss.

  ‘Are you sure you don’t want me to help,’ Laurel said, stooping down in front of him, her hand reaching out for his calf.

  ‘No!’ Gideon yelped. ‘Thanks,’ he added as she stood up, her eyes mocking him.