Murder in Shades of Blue and Green by Ripley Hayes

Author:Ripley Hayes [Hayes, Ripley]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2023-04-29T16:00:00+00:00

16

Fiery pit

Tuesday 4.30pm

David scurried off, as if pursued by the hounds of hell, expressing complete certainty that no such donations had been made, but promising to check anyway. Immediately. Charlie took the opportunity to eat the rest of the sandwiches, and to consider whether he could manage the cake, before Tom asked the obvious next question.

“Who did the Pepperdines say called them to ask for money?”

“Mr Pepperdine couldn’t remember. I don’t know if he genuinely couldn’t remember, or if it was the shock of learning that Rico was dead. He did say that he got an official Llanfair College of Art invoice, and bank details, and that’s how he paid. But Mrs Sully, Kaylan’s mother said that Kaylan was in touch with Vitruvious before he came here, more than once. So that’s where I wanted to start. With his file.”

Ravensbourne’s phone rang. Either she had a strange sense of humour, or a wicked grandchild, but the ringtone was the B52s singing Love Shack. She looked at the phone and excused herself. Tom and Charlie grinned at each other, then Charlie remembered the wife and children again, and asked to see Vitruvious’s file.

“Hang on,” Tom said. He got a sheet of A4 out of his desk drawer and waved it at Charlie. “I got Ann to make me this crib sheet on how to get into the personnel files. I haven’t looked at them before. Eat the cake, this’ll take me a couple of minutes.”

Charlie ate the cake. It was on the dry side but still very welcome.

“This is weird,” Tom said. “Let me start again.” He began following the steps on his crib sheet, ticking them off with a pencil as he went. “Right, Vitruvious, enter …” He turned the laptop to face Charlie. “No file of that name exists,” read the text in the little box. “Please check and try again.”

“That was the third time,” Tom said. “The system is working. I’ve found my own file.” He turned the laptop back to face himself and clicked a few times before turning it back. “It’s even up to date.”

The screen had multiple boxes with text. The first one read: “Pennant, Tomos Dylan, Principal (Acting).”

“Tomos Dylan?” Charlie asked. “Really?”

“Do not go there. My father’s idea of a joke. I simply wanted you to see that it works. I’ve tried a couple of others, and they’re fine too. Only Vitruvious is missing. Let me ask Ann.” Tom went next door to the secretary’s office.

Charlie walked round the room, looking out of the window onto the courtyard and over the rooftops to the hills beyond. Then he examined the bookcases. There were a lot of glossy exhibition catalogues, thick and heavy with shiny covers and the sheen of expensive colour printing on each page. Most had their spines facing towards the room, but a few showed the front cover, and one of these caught his eye. He picked it up and carried it to the table: Habitatons: Tomos Pennant.

The image on the front cover was of a block of flats too tall for the page.

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