Tiernan agreed and disappeared into his newspaper again. Claude looked uncharacteristically serious. “You know, it’s strange - one of the few things Deborah did mention on the drive concerned a jet artefact of some sort. She said that yesterday morning she treated an antique-shop owner who was nearly murdered in his store. The attacker was an old man, a frail-looking chap who somehow had the strength to pick up heavy objects and hurl them at the owner. There were plenty of witnesses. It took four men to drag him away.”
“What happened to him?”
“Don’t know. But here’s the queer thing: before he went mad and started trying to murder the owner he was yelling at the top of his lungs about a jet piece of some kind. He kept screaming, ‘You’ve got it, I know you do …’ ”
“Do you think it’s our jet wolf ?”
“Well, who knows? It’s an antique shop, it could be anything made of jet. Not the most uncommon sort of jewellery stone.”
“Sounds as though the old man very badly wanted whatever it was.”
“Yes, it does. Very badly.”
“Which antique shop was it?”
“Lyndon’s Antiques on Lyon Street.”
“Oh yes, I know that one. Deborah and I went there last year to see if they could fix an old chair of hers. Run by a rather large man from what I remember.”
“A large man - almost killed by a old waif. Doesn’t stack up if you ask me.”
“No. What happened to the owner?”
“Terrible bruising about his body, several deep cuts on his face, according to Deborah. The old man smashed a cello on him.”
“A cello?”
“An antique cello. Is there anything in today’s paper on that, Tiernan?”
Tiernan shuffled the newspaper sheets. “No. Nothing.” He looked at Claude’s clock on the mantle. “Let’s go. It’s getting on.”
8
“… he snaps his fierce jaws together, slams shut hell’s
doors after the slaughter.
For those who enter, there is neither return nor escape,
any more than fish swimming in the sea
can hope to escape the whale’s embrace.”
The Whale,a riddle from The Exeter Book, c. 970 AD
After breakfast, the three of us walked abreast along the paths to our offices from Hall; past the vast lawn, the stone statues and the vibrant, coloured rhododendron rows of Central Court. It was not yet eight o’clock, but it was a humid day, and the morning air clung to us, thick, buttery, and suffocating. A light rain had fallen and lay steaming on the stones and tiles of the college. At this time of year, without the term-time throng of commoner-gowned undergraduates around us, the place was almost deserted.
I have always felt slightly ill-at-ease when the college is at low ebb. The dons walk around like ghosts. Without the grounding effect of duties to the students, they lose themselves in their own minds, mulling over unwritten papers, ruminating theories, settling arguments with adversaries real and imagined. Many spend significant portions of the day oblivious to much of what is going on around them.
St Matthew’s was the largest of Allminster University’s thirty-one colleges, with about 550 students, and one of the oldest, founded in 1291. From above, St Matthew’s looked roughly like a rectangle, with the lawn of Central Court forming a green filling. This rectangle was outlined along its western aspect by stacked rows of students’ rooms. Along its southern side were the academics’ offices - our offices - and the old gate. To the north was Hall, the chapel, some lecture theatres, and more student rooms. And to the east stood the enormous Wright Library, a multi-storeyed Georgian structure big enough to serve several colleges.
There were more college buildings, of course: hostels, recently constructed lecture halls, ugly modern boxes of more student accommodation jutting out of the main rectangle; but, in the main, everything revolved around the buildings that comprised its heart.
We were at our point of separation - the arched turn-off to Archaeology - when I remembered my promise to Monsignor Hough.
“Oh, before I forget: is there a man by the name of Humphrey Miller in your department?”
Claude’s brow furrowed. “Not that I know of. Tiernan?”
Tiernan answered as though bored. “Haven’t heard of him. He might be new, but we’d have heard about him if that were the case.”
“Ask around, will you? I’ll come and get you before Hall.”
Claude set off, but Tiernan lingered, and I knew he wanted to say something.
“George, I’m sorry for having a go at her earlier. Deborah, I mean. All that Catholic stuff.”
“That’s all right. I know you’re on my side, anyway.”
Tiernan shuffled, staring at his feet. “I suppose I’m cross with her sometimes for the way she treated you towards the end.”
“She wasn’t that bad, Tiernan. Just a little moody.”
“Moody? For months you couldn’t do a thing without getting your head bitten off.”
“Look, it doesn’t matter any more. I haven’t seen her in ages and I don’t plan on it. Let’s forget about her.”
“I think she still wants to be with you.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. If I saw her on the street she’d cross it just to avoid me. What on earth makes you say that?”
“Just a suspicion of mine. If she’d really put you out of her mind there wouldn’t be all this fuss every time one of us bumps in to her.”
“That doesn’t matter to me. Frankly, I’d be quite happy if I never saw her again.”
“I could talk to her. Or get Claude to talk to Anne.”
“Thanks. But I’d rather she left me alone.”
“You were fabulous together for a while. I’ve never seen two people so happy.”
“We were - for a while. But that was a bloody long time ago.”
“I won’t push it, then. Just letting you know I’m here. Any time. All right?”
I thanked him and we shook hands before parting. I felt grateful for friends like Tiernan.
As I walked down the passage to my office, my thoughts soon wandered. Nielsen’s documents … they still captivated me. This was not simply because they’d been written in the Dark Ages, a period that I was so fascinated by. No, it was Nielsen’s strange attitude towards them that had really piqued my interest. What was it that made them so valuable to him?
The situation didn’t make much sense to me. The documents said nothing about anything universally interesting except the jet wolf, and not much about the jet wolf at that. But the detective seemed to have had some sort of idea about what was in the documents - and he definitely didn’t want them discussed - so there must be something of value to the police about them. The answer eluded me, and that greatly irritated me. I decided that to satisfy myself, I would have to look into it personally.
Fitting my private research into today’s schedule would be tough, I realised, as I reached my office. I had not completely finished my conference lecture notes. I had my heavy summer doctoral workload to consider. There was also a research article entitled “The Evolution of Kingship in Early