Doctor Who_ The Banquo Legacy - Andy Lane [40]
‘How so?’
I frowned. ‘The best way I can put it is that there is a marked lack of compassion in her manner.’
‘That’s been worrying me as well,’ he said quietly. ‘Compassion seems to be conspicuous by her absence.’
‘So, what you appear to be telling me is that I can’t rule out anyone except for the servants.’
‘Didn’t I mention the servants?’ he asked. ‘They too have been around Richard Harries’s experiments for some time, and Simpson at least strikes me as being a lot more intelligent than he lets on. Oh, and don’t forget the absent Mr Seavers –’
A wave of coldness ran through my body. ‘Gordon Seavers? But he’s –’
‘Sir George mentioned his name when Fitz and I arrived. I gather he’s expected at any moment.’
Gordon Seavers was dead. That was why I was here. But the news had apparently not percolated through to Banquo Manor yet. Why hadn’t John Hopkinson told anyone that Seavers had killed himself? Everything seemed to link back to him, and I remembered the sudden flash of recognition between us. Where had we met before? Suddenly I wanted very much to talk to John Hopkinson.
‘Is something the matter, Inspector?’ asked the Doctor.
I was torn between telling him about Seavers and letting the matter ride until I could confront Hopkinson. Professional feelings won over humanity. ‘Just feeling tired,’ I said. ‘I’ve had rather a busy day.’
‘I would suggest you ask Simpson to find you a room here – I’m sure Sir George won’t mind. It will save you making the journey to the village and back again. Especially in this weather.’
‘Thank you,’ I said, but my words were lost on the Doctor’s retreating back. Like a searchlight, his attention had been directed elsewhere.
He turned back to me as he reached the doorway to Harries’s room. ‘Footprints,’ he said succinctly, his eyes wide with sudden enthusiasm.
‘Footprints?’
‘In the snow. They might show if someone had entered the conservatory from outside in order to tamper with the equipment. I’ll go and check.’
‘There’s no need, Doctor,’ I called as he sprinted away down the corridor, ‘Baker and I can check later on.’
‘There’s no present like the time,’ he called back. I thought I just caught him muttering the phrase ‘Artron energy’ as his footsteps faded away into the distance. Well, good luck to him.
I took a last look around the room before leaving. It was remarkably bare, and I gained the impression that it was less of a bedroom and more of a functional utility for Harries. If he could have fitted a bed into the conservatory, I think he would have done. My attention was attracted by a book holding down a sheaf of papers on a desk in the corner. Out of curiosity I crossed to pick it up. The papers seemed to consist of a journal entitled Archives de Neurologie for July of the year. It was opened to the first page of a paper with a long French title, of which the only words I could recognise were ‘hysterical’ and ‘paralysis’. The author had the unarguably Germanic name of Freud, and a few sheets of manuscript paper beside the journal bore witness to Harries’s attempts to translate the paper.
A man who understood technical French of a highly specialised nature well enough to translate? My respect for Harries increased slightly. The book that had been holding the papers down appeared to be a collection of poetry and I noticed a slip of paper emerging from between the pages. On the basis of the two books I had examined, Richard Harries had been an incessant memory-jogger. I opened the book to the page marked. The piece of paper was blank but there was only one poem on the page revealed. It was by Samuel Coleridge and a few lines in the middle had been underlined in a thick, wavering red penstroke:
Two lovely children run an endless race,
A sister and a brother!
This far outstripped the other
Yet ever runs she with reverted face,
And looks and listens for the boy behind,
For he, alas! is blind!
O’er rough and smooth with even step he passed,
And knows not whether he be