impressed.’
‘I certainly shall be.’ Her voice was wholly discouraging. ‘At the moment you don’t even receive letters saying the position has been filled.’
Kelby was walking towards the garage, but then he glanced at the sky and decided to walk. He had meant to ask Scott Reed about a job for Ronnie; perhaps one of Scott’s competitors needed a charming young man to hasten their flight into bankruptcy. But Kelby hated asking favours. He felt relieved that the subject was postponed until Thursday. Ronnie deserved a chance, but Kelby wondered whether the chance shouldn’t have been given him ten years ago – when his mother had died. Kelby quickly pushed the past to the back of his mind.
There was plenty of time to walk to the village. Forty minutes. And anyway Kelby was only a co-opted member of the education subcommittee. He paused at the gate and spoke to Leo Ashwood. Leo was the gardener, handyman, butler, the whole team of male servants, who had been attached to Melford House ever since Kelby had bought the place. Ashwood and his wife had come with the house. Leo understood about nature.
‘It’s weather like this, Leo, that reconciles me to the rural remoteness of the country.’
‘Yes, sir.’
Leo was the stolid type. Thickset, forty, and not plagued with the need to express himself.
‘I like this time of year. Nobody ever declares a war in March.’
‘No, sir.’
Kelby went off down the lane. He wasn’t really a countryman. There were birds in the hedgerow, in the poplars, but Kelby couldn’t be sure what they were, and he didn’t like to ask. He hummed happily to himself. He was a man with no problems.
‘Excuse me, am I right for Greatrex Lane?’
A man who looked like a doctor was calling from the car window. ‘Yes,’ said Kelby. ‘It’s about half a mile down the hill. On the right, just before you reach the village.’
‘Melford Grammar School?’
‘That’s halfway down the lane. You can’t miss it.’
An ambulance came speeding towards them, klaxon sounding, and it skidded to a halt on the wrong side of the road. ‘Greatrex Lane?’ the driver shouted.
‘Follow me,’ said the doctor.
Kelby decided to exert his authority. ‘Has something happened at the school? I ought to know. I’m on the board of governors.’
‘A fire,’ the doctor said. ‘It sounds like a bad one.’ He drove grimly off down the hill.
‘I say! Wait a minute!’
‘Do you want to come with us?’ asked the ambulance driver. ‘I suppose it will be all right, you being on the board of governors.’
‘Thanks.’
Kelby clambered into the back of the ambulance. A nurse and a male attendant hung on to him as they sped away. It was a bumpy ride. Kelby settled in the corner by the stretchers clutching his briefcase.
‘Have you been called in from Oxford?’ he asked conversationally.
Through the darkened windows he could see the telegraph poles and the occasional cottages whizzing by. It was a gloomy view. The school in the distance looked positively gothic, a sombre monument to the Victorian spirit of self-improvement. But Kelby couldn’t see any fire. There were boys playing unconcernedly in the playing fields and as they flashed past the school a master was walking casually across the courtyard.
‘That was the school,’ said Kelby.
The male attendant sounded bored. ‘Just relax, Mr Kelby, and nobody will hurt you.’
‘Now look here—’
‘Shut up, or somebody will hurt you.’
Kelby remained in the corner by the stretchers clutching his briefcase while the ambulance continued its journey.
PAUL TEMPLE stepped off the VC 10 at Heathrow airport with a feeling of relief. He had liked America as usual, its pace and enthusiasm had been invigorating. But he welcomed London for its coolness and its casualness.
‘Have you anything to declare, Mr Temple?’ asked the customs officer.
Paul Temple nodded. ‘It’s nice to be back in England.’
He had been on a promotional tour, making personal appearances and giving interviews all the way down to California, to boost the sales of his latest novel. He had been on early morning chat shows in Pocatello, Idaho, had given radio interviews in Omaha, Nebraska, and had signed several thousand copies of the book along the east coast. But the interviewers never seemed to have read his books. They had only heard the gossip.
‘Tell me, Mr Temple, why do you get involved in real investigations?’
‘I try not to—’
‘Don’t the police in England resent your intrusion?’
Paul had laughed. ‘Indeed they do.’
A women’s writing circle in the middle west had demanded to know why English small town life was so much duller than Peyton Place. ‘Do you think that murder is a dying art?’ they had demanded.
After fifteen days Paul Temple had arrived back in New York and he still didn’t know what a nickie hokie or a scoopie doo were. He had become tired of hearing that the English are so God-damned polite, and eventually he decided to take offence when a gossip columnist described him as an Englishman in the Empire-building tradition. Paul retorted that the gossip columnist was an American in the Empire State Building tradition. The man had simply laughed. The Americans are so God-damned good humoured.
Glancing at his reflection in the terminal lounge window, Paul decided that the Empire-building eyes were tired and the tall, lithe figure was slightly crumpled. Another week in America and he would have begun to look his age.
Steve and Scott Reed were waiting for him outside the Overseas Building. The publisher was looking like a worried terrier, as usual, but Paul Temple waved happily. The sight of his wife always made him feel quite euphoric.
‘Darling,’ she cried. ‘Hello! How are you?’
‘Steve!’ He embraced her gratefully. ‘I hadn’t realised how I would miss you.’ He shook hands with Scott Reed and sat in the back of the Rover. He knew that this wasn’t simply a chauffeur service: Scott was in some kind of trouble. But that could wait. Paul Temple took his wife’s hand and listened peacefully to the news about London. There really wasn’t any news, which was its charm. Nothing had changed.
‘How did the personal appearances go?’ Steve asked, almost as an afterthought.
‘Pretty quickly.’
She
