Chapter 25
While they were walking to the car, Wesley took a call from Rachel, who told him that she’d heard from Morbay University and that a Professor Hughes was expecting them.
On their arrival, they were provided with directions to the history department, where they managed to locate Professor Hughes’s office.
The professor stood up as they entered and shook hands, completely unworried by a visit from the police.
He was a tall, thin man who walked with a stoop and reminded Wesley of a heron.
His face was unlined, and Wesley guessed that he was younger than he first appeared.
‘I was told you wanted to ask about someone who once worked in my department. A Dr Aleric Donnal, am I right?’ he asked after he’d invited them to take a seat.
‘I’ve been away for the weekend and I’ve only just heard that his body’s been found.
I was shocked. Who on earth would want to do such a thing? ’
Gerry gave Wesley a small nod. He’d leave the talking to him.
‘I believe he was here between 2010 and 2011,’ Wesley began.
‘That’s a long time ago, and he was only with us a year.
But I worked with him when I was a young lecturer.
’ Hughes smiled at the memory. ‘He took his doctorate at York, I believe, and then he taught and researched at various universities up north before going to France. Immediately before coming here, he spent a few years carrying out research at a university in Brittany. I remember him saying he’d returned to Devon to pursue .
. . now what did he call it? A passion project, that’s it. ’
‘Do you know what that project was?’
The professor thought for a few moments.
‘I think it was something to do with mythical beasts in medieval religious art. Bit esoteric, I’m afraid, but that seemed to be his specialist interest. And there was something else connected with a discovery he’d come across in Brittany; I think it concerned a local family. ’
‘Could that be the Fontescues? He did some research in the muniment room at Fontescue Hall.’
Hughes gave an apologetic smile. ‘I’m sorry. He kept his research very close to his chest.’ He smiled knowingly. ‘You know what we academics are like. Always terrified of someone stealing our findings before we can publish. Plagiarism is a sin against the Holy Ghost, but it does go on.’
‘What happened when he left?’
Hughes took a deep breath. ‘As far as I know, he returned to France. He was certainly intending to go back there after the students’ end-of-term exams, but I didn’t have a chance to speak to him before he left.
He went without any fuss, but I don’t think anyone was particularly surprised about that.
He was the sort of man who kept himself very much to himself.
Lived for his studies. The eccentric academic type, if you know what I mean.
There are a lot of us about – though maybe not as many as there used to be. ’
Wesley wanted to get the order of events clear in his head. ‘Did he leave in May 2011?’
The professor thought for a few moments.
‘It would have been around then, but I can’t tell you the exact date.
The exams were almost over, his contract was about to run out and I recall him saying that there was exciting material in the Rennes Cathedral archives he couldn’t wait to investigate further, so I assumed that was where he’d gone.
And he wasn’t really the type who’d keep in touch with old colleagues.
’ He paused. ‘To think that all the time he was . . .’ For the first time the man looked genuinely upset.
‘You never think that sort of thing is going to happen to someone you’ve met, do you. Not that I knew him very well.’
‘Can you remember anything else that might help us? An argument with someone, perhaps? A professional disagreement? Something in his personal life?’
‘As far as I remember, Dr Donnal didn’t have a personal life.
Married to his job, isn’t that what they say?
His body might have been in the twenty-first century, but his mind was in the Middle Ages.
We’re all a bit like that in this department, I suppose, but with him it was taken to the extreme.
Having said that, he was hardly the sort to make enemies – even of the professional kind. ’
There was a long silence. Then Hughes raised his hand. ‘Hang on, it’s probably not important, but I do remember him mentioning once that he was a little concerned about one of the students in his tutorial group.’
‘Do you know who that was?’
‘I’m sorry. It was just something he said in passing and I wasn’t taking much notice. I think it was a boy whose sister had died and he was about to drop out of the course before the exams. That sort of thing happens from time to time.’
‘Did you ever hear him mention the name Timothy Fontescue-Burns? He ran some kind of commune near Neston. Casa Mirabilis.’
‘Doesn’t ring a bell. Sorry, I’ve not been much help, have I? But as I said before, it was a long time ago. Plenty of water has flowed under the proverbial bridge since then.’
‘He didn’t really tell us much we don’t already know,’ said Gerry gloomily as they walked back to the car.
But Wesley didn’t share his pessimism. ‘I don’t know.
He said that everyone assumed Donnal had gone off to France at the time he disappeared.
That’s probably why he was never reported missing.
He lived alone and his colleagues thought he was back in Brittany living his best life rifling through the cathedral archives in Rennes. ’
‘When all the time he was dead, walled up in Sycamore House.’ Gerry paused. ‘As far as Sue Potter’s murder is concerned, my money’s still on Jim Baker. He argued with the dead woman, and if we can find a link with Aleric Donnal . . .’
‘Perhaps Baker was the troubled student Professor Hughes mentioned, the one Donnal was concerned about.’ Wesley fell silent as he turned the possibilities over in his head. ‘What if Jim Baker lived in Sycamore House as a student and Donnal went there to speak to him?’
‘It’s a good theory, Wes. But was Donnal the type to go in for pastoral visits?’
‘Probably not.’
‘We need to speak to Baker again. The alibi Gadson gave him was vague to say the least. And I have the feeling that Baker was lying when he said he didn’t know Timothy Fontescue-Burns.’
‘The team have been trying to trace the former residents of Casa Mirabilis, but finding them on any official records is like trying to trap smoke in a bottle. And they’re still trying to track down the house’s previous owners.’
‘Someone’s bound to know more about the people who lived there. What about that builder, Pete Wolsey?’
‘As far as he was concerned, they were just a bunch of hippy weirdos, and they probably weren’t on surname terms, so it’s a long shot.’
Gerry thought for a moment. ‘A woman called Fiorenza gave evidence at Tim Fontescue-Burns’s inquest. According to Miles Fontescue, she laid out Timothy’s body. Fiorenza’s not a common name.’
‘It might be a name she just fancied using, in which case it might not be the name she’s known by now. We’ve had no luck tracing her so far.’
‘Well, someone put that body inside the wall and sealed up the alcove. If it wasn’t Pete the builder – and I’m pretty sure it wasn’t – it must have been someone who lived in the property or had unlimited access to it either just before or shortly after Timothy Fontescue-Burns moved in.
I think we should make finding out who was there that month a priority. ’
‘What about Sue Potter?’ asked Wesley.
‘I suspect that once we solve one case, we’ll solve the other.’