Death Row - Mark Pearson [36]
‘Is this him?’
The Dean took the photo and studied it, dipping her head and blowing out a sigh. ‘Jamil Azeez. Yes, it is.’ She handed the photo back. ‘Do we know what happened?’
Kate shook her head. ‘He hasn’t regained consciousness yet.’
‘And it was you who found him?’
‘Yes.’
‘Last night?’
‘Yes. In Camden.’
The Dean frowned. ‘And what time was this?’
‘Just before midnight.’
‘What was he doing in Camden?’
‘We don’t know,’ said Bennett.
‘Especially that late at night.’ The Dean shook her head, puzzled.
‘It was a Friday. A lot of people socialise on a Friday night,’ said Kate. ‘Camden is a very popular place for people of his age, particularly at the weekends.’
‘But Jamil never drank.’
Bennett cleared his throat. ‘Forgive me, but as a Dean of the halls of residence how would you know that?’
‘Because of his religion. He was very devout. We know because students with special dietary requirements inform us of it, for obvious reasons.’
‘He was a Muslim?’ DI Bennett pulled out his notebook.
‘Yes.’
‘He wouldn’t be the first Muslim to drink and it may well be that he wasn’t drinking anyway. They do serve soft drinks in the pubs and nightclubs.’
‘I get the sense he was pretty devout.’ She caught herself. ‘Sorry, that he is pretty devout. How is he, by the way?’
The Dean seemed a little embarrassed to be asking that question only now. Kate put a reassuring hand on her arm. ‘He is in a very serious condition. The next few hours are going to be critical.’
‘Who could have wanted to hurt him?’
DI Bennett tapped the notebook in his hand. ‘We don’t know. Is it possible to look in his room, as we asked?’
‘If it will help. I’ve sent Arthur to fetch a key.’
At that moment a stooped white-haired man in a brown overall came towards them. For some reason he reminded Kate of an ancient zookeeper. Thinking of some of the students under her tutelage she wasn’t altogether surprised at the thought. He handed the Dean the key with a jerky deferential nod.
‘Thanks, Arthur,’ she said.
Arthur grunted almost inaudibly and turned, walking away slowly.
‘He’s long past retirement age but we couldn’t bear to see him go,’ the Dean explained although no one had made a comment. She held the key aloft and pointed to the buildings on her right. ‘Jamil’s on the first floor.’
The turfed area in the centre of the building was circular rather than the traditional quadrangle of older colleges and in the centre of it there was a tall sycamore tree, some leaves still just about clinging to its branches.
A youth of eighteen or nineteen, dressed in a workman’s overall with a black baseball cap on his head and a scarf wrapped around his neck, was raking the fallen multicoloured leaves into a large pile. Or was trying to. The wind was gusting, sending swirls of the leaves dancing around the grass like animated creatures of myth. She didn’t envy him his job, a Sisyphean task if ever there was one – not that he would probably get the reference, she thought.
A young woman’s laugh echoed across the grounds and Kate looked over to the main hall where the laughing woman was emerging, duffel-coated and wearing a bright red scarf, flanked on each side by two young men who were hanging onto her every word. All of them clutching textbooks like badges of honour, their eyes bright with the possibilities of their future. She looked back at the man raking the leaves, wondering if he wished he had studied harder at school, or whether he relished the fact that he never had to study again and could work outdoors in the open, fresh and healing air.
Kate snapped out of her thoughts as she realised that the Dean had said something. She smiled apologetically back at her as the woman briskly led the way, skirting around the grass and continuing along to one of the blocks of student accommodation through a pair of wire-meshed glass doors that opened onto a concrete stairwell. She walked briskly up the stairs to the first floor. The stairs opened out into a corridor with