Doctor Who_ The Banquo Legacy - Andy Lane [68]
…And suddenly we were in another place, another time, but following the same actions. He replacing his glasses, asking what I wanted, but somehow the situations were reversed and he was questioning me. Then, like snow melting in my hand, the moment – the recognition – was gone, and we were back in the Manor…
‘I should like to see everybody in the study in ten minutes,’ I said. ‘Don’t go anywhere in the meantime, Mr Hopkinson.’
‘Got it all solved?’ he asked, half sarcastically.
‘Yes, I believe I have,’ I said, and had the pleasure of watching his face change, retreating behind his lenses to hide all expression. I turned towards the door. ‘Perhaps Susan and yourself could wait here while I go and help the sergeant to round everybody up.’
Without waiting for an answer I turned my back on the disconcerted John Hopkinson and left the drawing room.
* * *
THE ACCOUNT OF JOHN HOPKINSON (12)
Stratford had left the door open. But before I could move to close it Susan clutched my arm.
‘He thinks that Catherine… ?’ She broke off, unable to complete the question. She hardly had to, for I could see as clearly as Stratford the way in which events had moved along. I sat down slowly on the chaise longue, and Susan (still holding my arm) had no choice but to sit beside me. Kreiner was pacing up and down in front of the fireplace.
‘Oh I think he’s pretty certain,’ I told her, hoping that she would not be too shocked.
‘How can he be?’ she asked quietly, staring across at the window.
I took her right hand between both of mine, grateful for its warmth.
But before I could speak, Kreiner answered her question: ‘We were all at dinner when Beryl was killed. Even Simpson was in the room.’
‘Everyone except Catherine, that is,’ I said.
Susan turned from Kreiner back towards me. ‘But she can’t have – I mean, she isn’t… She can’t be…’
‘Have you any other suggestions?’ She had not.
‘What did Stratford want to see you for anyway?’ Kreiner asked abruptly. Was he trying to deflect the topic of conversation, or was he merely trying to satisfy his own curiosity?
‘About Richard.’
‘Ah.’ We both let her continue in her own time, if she felt she wanted to.
‘Did you know he was blackmailing George and Gordon?’
‘Yes,’ I admitted.
‘No,’ Kreiner said at the same moment. He shrugged and waved a hand for me to continue.
‘At least,’ I said, ‘I was fairly sure he was. I knew he was blackmailing Gordon Seavers.’
‘But why?’
‘Some of Gordon’s early work – his first few papers – was not entirely his own, shall we say? It would have damaged his career had it become known. He got them from a colleague at Oxford and published them after the chap died.’
I imagined that George had been easily trapped. His misdemeanours (if that is the right word) were already apparent to me, unless George had been less captivated by his maid than he had seemed. I was considering whether to mention any or all of this to Susan and Herr Kreiner when I noticed the figure standing in the doorway. I had no way of knowing how much Stratford had overheard, but from his words as he stepped fully into the room it seemed that he had heard enough. This time he took care to close the door.
‘Perhaps now you will allow me to see the letter that you removed from Mr Seavers’s house, Mr Hopkinson.’
There was no point in continuing to lie. I remembered Gordon’s body, crumpled on its side on the floor of his study, the blood trickling along the handle of the paper knife and dripping stickily through his fingers.
I remembered his face smiling down at me as I lay similarly on the grass waiting for a physician. Why hadn’t he gone with the others, back to the pavilion? It was only a sprain, it would soon heal. God, it hurt. But he had known my ankle was shattered…
‘What, and have to listen to Joe telling us how he took four wickets with four balls again?’ he had said. ‘No thanks. Pity he’s not so accurate with his batting, isn’t it, John? I think I’ll stay in