The Age of Treachery by Gavin Scott

Finally, he got dressed, put on his overcoat and walked out into the night.
    Snow lay thick on the ground and it was oddly soothing to walk through the cloisters and across the quadrangles of the college while everyone slept. There was an innocence about a community asleep that made Forrester feel oddly protective towards both the students and his fellow dons. And even, somehow, to the generations of scholars who had lain and dreamt there since the Middle Ages. When he came to the Lady Tower he stopped and looked up, hoping to see the stars; but there were no stars tonight, just the silhouette of the scaffolding Norton had put up for the repair work. The cloud cover was thick over the Oxford Valley that night, and Forrester knew it was going to snow again.
    What he did not know was that Haraldson was standing directly behind him, in the shadow of the tower, and the scalpel he had taken from the Churchill Hospital was just inches from Forrester’s jugular vein.
    Haraldson was significantly taller than Forrester, and the scalpel was raised in his right hand so that it would sweep down diagonally, connecting with Forrester’s neck just below his right ear. Behind the bandages, the dark eyes glittered in the reflected light of the snow as Forrester stared up at the boarded up window of Gordon Clark’s room, asking himself what had really happened there.
    Had he turned back towards the Lady Tower, the sight of Haraldson’s bandaged face would probably have been the last thing he saw; but as it was, not knowing the significance of what he was doing, he stepped out onto the lawn and walked across the snow to the place where David Lyall’s body had lain. He then stood there, contemplating the spot, for a long moment. Behind him, Haraldson watched intently and then padded silently along the cloisters and up the stairs to David Lyall’s rooms, where he pushed the bandages away from his eyes and resumed the search he had begun the night before.
    * * *
    Detective Inspector Barber appeared in Forrester’s rooms early that morning and stood at the window with his back to him, his drooping eye studying the quadrangle as Forrester struggled into his clothes. “History,” said Barber, almost to himself. “History oozing out of every pore.”
    Dons and undergraduates went back and forth across the snow, their gowns flapping behind them. Forrester knew Barber had positioned himself so that he was silhouetted against the window and the light would fall on Forrester when he began to question him. So before Barber could begin Forrester came and stood beside him, looking out at the same view.
    “I find the view very soothing,” he said. “Puts things into perspective, looking out there. Do sit down.” And he pulled a hard chair behind the desk out for himself and gestured for Barber to take the comfortable one in front of it.
    Which put him in the precise spot Barber had intended to take.
    Forrester had been interrogated by professionals and knew the advantages of keeping the light out of your eyes as they probed. So did Barber, clearly, who accepted this small defeat gracefully and sank into the chair. “So, this assault on Professor Haraldson,” he said. “What was all that about?”
    “I have no idea,” said Forrester without rancour. “As I told you at the time I had nothing to do with it.”
    “And yet I found you struggling with him. Violently struggling.”
    “You saw yourself he was concussed and confused. He struck out blindly and I was trying to calm him. I imagine if you’ve talked to him since he’ll have clarified what happened.”
    “I visited him yesterday. He intimated that he had seen a light on in Dr. Lyall’s room, and went to investigate. He was struck from behind.”
    “And you believe him?”
    Barber ignored the question. “You and Dr. Clark were close,” he stated, paused briefly to allow Forrester to demur if he so wished, and then went on, “Did he tell you why he killed David