Morse's Greatest Mystery and Other Stories by Colin Dexter Read Free Book Online

grave itself, the faces of Morse’s audience seemed mesmerized—and remained so as Morse gave his instructions that the notes should be replaced in their original envelope and returned (he cared not by what means) to Sergeant Lewis’s office at Thames Valley Police HQ
within the next twenty-four hours
.
    As they drove back, Lewis could restrain his curiosity no longer. “You really
are
confident that—?”
    “Of course!”
    “I never seem to be able to put the clues together myself, sir.”
    “Clues? What clues, Lewis? I didn’t know we had any.”
    “Well, those shoes, for example. How do they fit in?”
    “Who said they fitted in anywhere? It’s just that I used to know an auburn-haired beauty who had six—
six
, Lewis!—pairs of bright green shoes. They suited her, she said.”
    “So … they’ve got nothing to do with the case at all?”
    “Not so far as I know,” muttered Morse.
    The next morning a white envelope was delivered to Lewis’s office, though no one at reception could recallwhen or whence it had arrived. Lewis immediately rang Morse to congratulate him on the happy outcome of the case.
    “There’s just one thing, sir. I’d kept that scrappy bit of paper with the serial numbers on it, and these are brand-new notes all right—but they’re not the same ones!”
    “Really?” Morse sounded supremely unconcerned.
    “You’re not worried about it?”
    “Good Lord, no! You just get that money back to ginger-knob at the George, and tell her to settle for a jumbo-cheque next time! Oh, and one other thing, Lewis. I’m on
leave
. So no interruptions from anybody—understand?”
    “Yes, sir. And, er … Happy Christmas, sir!”
    “And to you, old friend!” replied Morse quietly.
    The bank manager rang just before lunch that same day. “It’s about the four hundred pounds you withdrew yesterday, Inspector. I did promise to ring about any further bank charges—”
    “I explained to the girl,” protested Morse. “I needed the money quickly.”
    “Oh, it’s perfectly all right. But you did say you’d call in this morning to transfer—”
    “Tomorrow! I’m up a ladder with a paint brush at the moment.”
    Morse put down the receiver and again sank back in the armchair with the crossword. But his mind was far away, and some of the words he himself had spoken kept echoing around his brain: something about one’s better self …And he smiled, for he knew that this would be a Christmas he might enjoy almost as much asthe children up at Littlemore, perhaps. He had solved so many mysteries in his life. Was he now, he wondered, beginning to glimpse the solution to the greatest mystery of them all?

EVANS TRIES
AN O-LEVEL

    Dramatis Personae

The Secretary of the Examinations Board
The Governor of HM Prison, Oxford
James Evans, a prisoner
Mr. Jackson, a prison officer
Mr. Stephens, a prison officer
The Reverend S. McLeery, an invigilator
Detective Superintendent Carter
Detective Chief Inspector Bell
     

    The unexamined life is not worth living.
    (Plato)
    It was in early March when the Secretary of the Examinations Board received the call from Oxford Prison.
    “It’s a slightly unusual request, Governor, but I don’t see why we shouldn’t try to help. Just the one fellow, you say?”
    “That’s it. Chap called Evans. Started night classes in O-level German last September. Says he’s dead keen to get some sort of academic qualification.”
    “Is he any good?”
    “He was the only one in the class, so you can say he’s had individual tuition all the time, really. Would have cost him a packet if he’d been outside.”
    “We-ell, let’s give him a chance, shall we?”
    “That’s jolly kind of you. What exactly’s the procedure now?”
    “Oh, don’t worry about that. I’ll be sending you all the forms and stuff. What’s his name, you say? Evans?”
    “James Roderick Evans.” It sounded rather grand.
    “Just one thing, Governor. He’s not a violent: sort offellow, is