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Threats of Bombs.’
    â€˜Good,’ said Sloan warmly.
    He supposed that – figuratively speaking – bodies fell into the College Bursar’s lap on much the same principle that the police collected a lot of their less happy jobs. If it wasn’t anyone else’s duty, then it was theirs. Sloan had been told that in the Civil Service, by some quirk of official irony, dealing with bombs came under the Accommodations Officer.
    Since Samuel Pepys, perhaps.
    Or even Guy Fawkes.
    You never knew with traditions.
    â€˜And,’ continued the Bursar, oblivious of Sloan’s train of thought, ‘I’ve sent Miss Hellewell over to Matron’s room. I know you’ll want to see her as soon as possible but she was very distressed.’
    â€˜Naturally,’ said Sloan, wondering what was possibly left to come after this. Not a lot, he hoped. Crosby was getting visibly restive already.
    â€˜I have,’ said Hardiman predictably, ‘also informed the Master of Tarsus.’
    â€˜Quite,’ said Sloan, concealing his own impatience as best he could. Death took people in different ways. It had obviously taken the Bursar by surprise because he was still trying to treat it as an administrative failure. Unless this was the way Bursars saw everything.
    â€˜The Master,’ continued the Bursar solemnly, ‘was dining with the Vice-Chancellor.’
    Crosby could keep silent no longer. ‘That lets him out nicely, then, doesn’t it?’ he remarked.
    John Hardiman turned courteously to the detective constable. ‘I beg your pardon.…’
    â€˜If there’s been any funny business,’ amplified Crosby with a comprehensive sweep of his arm, ‘then that puts the Master in the clear, doesn’t it?’
    This, instead of clarifying matters, clearly confused the Bursar. His frown deepened. ‘I don’t quite follow.…’
    â€˜Of course,’ added the detective constable conscientiously, ‘that would only be if the Vice-Chancellor is reliable.…’
    The Bursar swallowed preparatory to speech of a more definite kind; while Sloan charitably decided that they went too far at the Police Training School. Natural suspicion – even a simple open-mindedness about suspects – was one thing, but you didn’t include Caesar’s wife: not to begin with, anyway.…
    â€˜If,’ said the Detective Inspector hastily into the silence, ‘we might see the deceased as soon as possible.…’
    He managed not to murmur under his breath as well, ‘Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more.…’ Bricks seemed to be dropped every time the insouciant constable was taken anywhere and the University was no exception. How Crosby got on when he was allowed out on his own nobody at the Police Station cared to think. They just tried not to let it happen too often, that was all.
    John Hardiman turned back to Sloan at once and said rather abruptly, ‘Certainly. Follow me.’
    The two policemen fell in behind him, Sloan reflecting that the fundamental and time-honoured differences between Town and Gown weren’t going to be anything compared with those between Gown and … Gown and … Gown and Cape … no, that wasn’t right.… Gown and … Gown and Truncheon.
    â€˜It’s not far,’ the Bursar was saying. ‘Through here and into the main quadrangle and down this side on the left and then right. He’s half-way down on that side.’
    So he was.
    Henry Moleyns was lying exactly where the girl Bridget Hellewell had left him – in an ungainly heap on the cold stone of the cloister floor, near the base of the pillar to which he had clung in his last moments. As they approached him a tall figure standing by in the shadows moved forward to greet them.
    â€˜This is Mr Pollock, the Chaplain,’ said John Hardiman in suitably muted tones. ‘We tried to get our doctor,