Doctor Who: The Banquo Legacy by Andy Lane; Justin Richards

Author:Andy Lane; Justin Richards
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Tags: Science-Fiction:Doctor Who
ISBN: 9780563538080
Publisher: BBC Worldwide
Published: 2000-07-01T10:00:00+00:00

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THE REPORT OF INSPECTOR IAN STRATFORD (8)

I spent the afternoon in a state of some confusion. No matter what I was doing, my thoughts kept flashing back to the scene in the bedroom, pulling down the sheet to find Harries’s body missing. My mind revolved around that point, going in ever-decreasing circles. I spent some time using Sir George Wallace’s telephone, trying to get through to Chief Inspector Driscoll and failing miserably. I was shoved up, down, sideways and backwards between a succession of secretaries, sergeants and pen-pushers – without any result. The man was in a meeting, but no one knew where, with whom, or for how long. I left a message and gave up.

After that, I finally managed to question Miss Seymour about her movements of the previous night. I tried to be as tactful as possible, bearing in mind the death of her fiancé, but my mind lagged far behind my tongue and I am sure I offended her more than once, judging by the lapses into silence that she displayed and the regal, almost arrogant gaze with which she occasionally deflected my clumsy questions. In my thoughts I was still staring blindly at a pile of bolsters and blankets piled into human shape. What loomed largest in my mind was embarrassment. I cringed to think that my first action had been to pull the sheet completely off, as if I expected Richard Harries to be hiding at the foot of the bed. It had been John Hopkinson who took the most practical action: checking the cupboards to see if the body had been hidden in there.

Miss Seymour could add little to my meagre store of knowledge, apart from the interesting supposition that Richard Harries’s body either was, or contained, a clue to the murderer. That, she suggested, was the only possible motive for the theft.

As soon as she left, Baker turned to me: ‘Do you think she’s right, sir?’

‘About the body, yes. Although it might just he a red herring. About Hopkinson being innocent? No, I don’t think so. At least, he may well be innocent, but it doesn’t naturally follow from anything she said.’

‘She may have taken it herself, sir.’

Good old Baker, investigate every possibility. ‘Not without help, I don’t think.’

‘Then maybe she had help, sir.’

But there was a difference between theory and wild speculation. ‘Yes, possibly,’ I said, unconvinced. Then I remembered something. ‘Baker, any sign of the Doctor yet?’

‘Ah, no, sir,’ said Baker.

‘I am getting sick and tired of talking to people who claim not to know anything,’ I snapped. ‘Let’s do something practical for a change – let’s search the house.’

Baker’s eyes brightened. ‘Yes, sir!’

We started at the top of the house. The quarters occupied by the scullery-maid and the kitchen maids were sparsely furnished and freezing cold, with threadbare bedding. Improving biblical tracts were fixed to the walls. A single change of uniform hung in each closet, along with a few personal items: Sunday bonnets, worn gloves, a once beautiful pair of dancing shoes.

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