No Graves as Yet_ A Novel - Anne Perry [147]
He started to walk slowly.
Was it possible they had kept it somehow concealed temporarily and then put it in a safe place later? Had it been in the top of the downpipe, it would have taken only a few moments to place it: a quick visit to one of the attic rooms with a dormer window, open it wide, lean far out and drop the gun, perhaps wrapped in something. Even a scarf or a couple of handkerchiefs would disguise the outline, then a few leaves.
If that were the answer, then it could only have been done from the master’s lodgings. He could not imagine it was one of the servants. That reduced it to Aidan and Connie Thyer, Beecher if he had seen Connie there, and whoever else might have visited.
Whoever it was had to have concealed the gun very soon after Sebastian’s murder was committed, because the police had started the search within an hour of their arrival.
What would he have done were he in that situation? Hidden it in the undergrowth in the Fellows’ Garden until he was free to go back and get into the master’s lodgings unobserved.
And to retrieve it again? Perhaps much the same.
It came back to Connie and Aidan Thyer—and perhaps Beecher. He could not believe it was Connie, but the more he thought of it, the more likely did it become that it was Thyer. Perhaps it was he whom Sebastian had seen on the Hauxton Road. Perhaps it was even he who was behind the plot itself. He was a brilliant man with a position of far more power than most people realized. As master of a college in Cambridge, he had influence over many of the young men who would, in a generation’s time, be the leaders of the nation. He was sowing seeds the world would reap.
Now that the thought was in Joseph’s mind, he had to test it until it was proved one way or the other. And there was only one place to begin. He would hate doing it, but he could think of no alternative.
He walked slowly back to the Bridge of Sighs and into St. John’s, then across the inner quad to the master’s lodgings. Thyer himself would be in the library at this time in the early afternoon. He hoped Connie would be at home.
The parlor maid let him in, and he found Connie standing at the window staring out at the bright flowers in the Fellows’ Garden. She made an effort to smile at him. “Thank you for coming yesterday,” she said a little huskily. “It was kind of you.” She did not explain what she meant, and turned away again almost immediately. “I’m relieved the Allards have gone home and Elwyn has moved back to his own rooms. But the house is unnaturally quiet now. It seems like silence rather than peace. Is that absurd?”
“No,” he answered. He hated what he was about to do, the more so because if it proved anything at all, it might be something she would infinitely prefer not to know. “I need to ask you one or two questions. . . .” He hesitated, not sure how to address her. Her Christian name was too familiar; using it would be taking something of a liberty. And yet to address her as Mrs. Thyer was both cold and bitterly ironic.
She was only mildly curious. “About what?”
He must do it. He could feel his body stiff and he was standing awkwardly. “I found a photograph in Sebastian’s rooms.” He hated this. He saw her stiffen, and he knew instantly that she was aware of it and that it meant all that he had supposed. “You met Harry in Northumberland. I know the place it was taken. He and I walked there.”
The tears filled her eyes. “He told me,” she whispered, her voice choked. “I didn’t go there to meet him. It was almost by accident.” She gave an awkward, lopsided little shrug. “I should have stopped myself. I knew it was wrong, and I knew what it would lead to—but I wanted it so much! Just once to have . . .” She looked away from him. It was a moment before she was able to compose herself. “Some passer-by took the photograph. Harry kept it. It must have fallen out of his pocket when his coat was over the arm of the chair. He was frantic when he discovered it was gone. I didn’t know Sebastian