Chapter 27

Frank and Stuart returned from the Cross Keys to continue their search of the house. They’d limited their alcoholic intake to half a pint each of Adnams’ Best Bitter, but hadn’t held back on the food. Cod and chips, twice, and a large piece of Black Forest gateaux for Stuart. They drank the coffee Mabel had made for them in the kitchen.

Frank wasn’t sure if it was the amount of carbohydrates he’d eaten, or the fruitlessness of the morning search, but he felt low. Why were they doing this? The police had gone through it with a fine toothcomb. All they’d discovered in Clara’s bedroom was a wardrobe full of expensive clothing, and a dressing table covered with perfumes, lotions and unguents by Nina Ricci, Dior and Worth. In contrast Sam’s bedroom was as Spartan as a monk’s cell. Frank wouldn’t have been surprised to find a hair shirt.

‘Which room shall we start in?’ Stuart asked.

‘I don’t think we’ll find anything in the kitchen and there isn’t much left in Sam’s study, so we may as well start with the sitting room.’

‘Where he listened to music?’

‘Yes. Gloves on.’ He passed Stuart a pair. ‘We’ll do this room while we’re reasonably fresh, but I must say I think we’re wasting our time.’

‘Come on, Frank. That’s not like you. There must be some link between Sam and the school. His signing the death certificates of those two boys can’t be a coincidence.’

Frank bit his lip. ‘Sam Harrop was riddled with guilt; he wanted to see Nancy, perhaps to confess. He knew his time was nearly up. I was hoping he might have hidden a written confession, one that would nail the people at the school, especially Baron and Gary Salmon.’

‘Not to mention that foul matron, I didn’t like her at all.’

They went into the sitting room. Already it had an air of desertion, of lives over. There was the settee, the resting place of Sam Harrop’s body. Bile rose in Frank’s throat at the memory of his rictus grin and swollen belly. A famous surgeon, a respected member of his profession, a man to whom the residents of Aldeburgh looked up, a lover of opera and classical music. A paedophile?

He went over to the music centre. ‘What did Laurel say about Sam when she first saw him through the French windows?’

Stuart frowned. ‘She said she didn’t see him at first as his dressing gown blended in with the wallpaper.’

‘That’s right. Where was he?’

Stuart shook his head. ‘Why are you asking me? You know perfectly well what she said. Also, she wrote it in her report.’

He smiled at him. ‘I know, Stuart, but I like you telling me.’

Stuart took out his pipe and tobacco pouch. ‘In that case, I’m having a few puffs. Helps me to concentrate.’

He tamped down the shag tobacco and lit a match. He drew in air through the pipe until a satisfactory glow was produced. ‘That’s better.’ He sat down in one of the armchairs. ‘She said he was by the music centre with his hand over the cassettes.’

He looked at the record player, and cassette machine. Expensive equipment. The cassette machine had an external microphone; probably Sam used it to tape music recitals from Radio 3. ‘The police looked inside all the LP covers, didn’t they?’

Stuart nodded, sending plumes of smoke towards the ceiling. ‘Worth going through them again?’

‘No. But what about the cassettes?’

‘They looked in all of those as well, didn’t find anything, though you couldn’t get much in them.’

Frank rubbed his chin. The bristles told him he needed another shave. He looked at his watch. Two o’clock. He’d shaved at seven that morning. He must have a high testosterone level, or more likely a rotten shaver. Perhaps he’d try a cut-throat razor. He shuddered. No, perhaps not. ‘Stuart, there’s equipment here for recording. This machine can record as well as play tape cassettes.’

‘So?’

‘Supposing Samuel Harrop recorded something onto a blank cassette?’

‘You mean from an LP?’

‘No, supposing he left a message. It’s a possibility. He could hide it in one of the cassette covers.’

Stuart chewed on the end of his pipe. ‘Possible. From the look of that equipment and all those LPs and tapes, he was keen on his music and well up with the technology. So how do we go about this?’

Frank raised his shoulders, then let them fall, emitting a long sigh. ‘There’s only one way. We have to methodically play every tape. It’s a long shot. What do you think?’

Stuart got up, went to the fireplace, now empty of burnt papers, and banged out his pipe. ‘Let’s get on with it.’

Frank switched on the machine at the wall.

Stuart handed him the first tape. ‘Mahler Symphony Number Four, the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra.’

He pressed the triangular start button and strains of a full orchestra filled the room. He pressed the square stop button. ‘Next.’

‘Puccini, La Bohème.’

A few seconds later. ‘Next.’

‘This could take some time,’ Stuart said.

‘Come on, next!’

‘Keep your hair on. Here you are, Sir Adrian Boult conducts Vaughan Williams.’

Frank groaned.

An hour-and-a-half later they’d ploughed through half the cassettes.

‘Handel arias by City of London Baroque Sinfonia,’ Stuart said, wearily passing it to Frank. They listened. ‘I always liked Handel, he was a good man. Did a lot of work with orphans in London.’

Frank didn’t reply but took the cassette out of the machine and added it to the other rejects. Depression was setting in.

Stuart started on the next seam. ‘Ah, English composers. Here you are, try this. Elgar, Symphony Number One.’ They listened and it was ejected.

‘OK, what about some Delius. Bit of a mixture this one.’ The same result.

Stuart passed another cassette to Frank. ‘Our local composer, Benjamin Britten. Billy Budd, London Symphony Orchestra.’

Frank held the cassette in his hand. Billy Budd, the opera. The fight between good and evil. In Laurel’s report she’d noted Nancy had said he was Harrop’s favourite composer. He looked at Stuart.

‘Got a feeling about this one?’

‘It’s about an old sea captain recalling his part in the hanging of a young sailor, Billy Budd, and Claggart, the evil Master-at-Arms who wants Billy dead. We’ll see.’ The cover under the clear plastic showed the title, the names of the main singers and orchestra. He opened the plastic case. Inside was a cassette. It had no distinguishing labels to match the cover. Time seemed to stop as they looked at it. Frank almost didn’t want to put it into the machine for fear of disappointment.

‘For God’s sake, put it in,’ Stuart said. ‘If it’s blank, we’ll just press on.’

Frank’s fingers turned to putty, but he managed to click it in and to press the triangular play button.

Nothing, just the whirring of the tape. The day seemed to darken. Stuart groaned.

Then a voice. A reedy, hesitant, man’s voice.

‘My name is Samuel Harrop. I was born on the twenty-first of May, 1906, in Aldeburgh, Suffolk. This is my confession.’