The Cambridge Theorem Read Online Free PDF

down. He wanted to leave Cambridge and go away to college, like any other teenager with half a chance.
    He resisted the suggestion of police service as a career with the violent mixture of indignation and remorse that always characterized his dealings with his father. It was absurd for someone with his prospects, however modest, to toss them away on a career that did not require even A levels. And besides, he would never try to follow his father’s act at Cambridge police station. It would be an impossible task.
    At the same time, he realized that a career in the police appealed to him acutely. He was unsure whether the attraction was the tug of a genetic imperative, or that compliance was simply the only way he could ever amount to anything in his father’s eyes. He dismissed the idea as ridiculous and told no one of it. He could never fit in over there. For Christ’s sake, he liked books. And besides, he would never subject any future offspring of his to the grief and isolation he had suffered as a policeman’s child. For some reason he could not explain, Derek Smailes found himself preoccupied with thoughts of his past as he stared at the back of Nigel Hawken’s head, the steel-gray hair and the crisp white collar above the blue pinstripes.
    Hawken was standing at a modern glass cabinet with his back to the detective. “Sherry?” he asked over his shoulder, the syllables rhyming.
    It was only eleven thirty and Smailes was on duty, but he didn’t hesitate. You never really got used to it. You just switched something off in your mind, pretending that the deceased was not someone who had shared your humanity, like air.
    â€œYes, thank you,” he said, resisting the temptation to rock back on his heels and say, “Don’t mind if I do.”
    Hawken looked more like a banker than an academic. He had led the detective to a large suite of rooms overlooking the main court of St. Margaret’s. They were in a spacious sitting room with oak panelled walls and college crests around the picture rail. Former luminaries of St. Margaret’s gazed bleakly in oils from the long wall which faced the door. Smailes could see through a partially open door into a cluttered study where Hawken obviously did his paperwork. At the far end was another door, which probably led to a bedroom.
    The sitting room was furnished in a combination of sombre traditional mahogany and Danish modern. Two large butcher block sofas faced each other across a low coffee table, on which were stacked copies of National Geographic and Foreign Affairs. The room reminded him vaguely of the headmaster’s study at The Crowe School.
    Hawken handed him a small crystal glass and indicated the sofa with a gesture of his hand. Smailes declined, reaching into his raincoat pocket for his first cigarette. He took the coat off and laid it carefully over the back of the couch.
    He had been right about Hawken’s smoking habits, since he had begun stuffing a pipe skilfully with his single good hand and was regarding him steadily.
    â€œOfficer, before we proceed, may I ask you whether we can keep this matter out of the newspaper? I see nothing to be gained from a lot of garish publicity, and these things do tend to bring the college a bad name,” he began.
    Christ, it was always the same story. Forget the culprit or the victim, what about the reputations of the rest of us? This time he had no inclination to comply.
    â€œI’m afraid not, sir,” he said. “We update the press twice daily from the incident book, and there’s no way we could keep a suicide from them. Besides, there will have to be an inquest. The coroner’s office has already taken over.”
    Hawken shook his head in resignation. The news seemed to worsen his mood of glacial displeasure. Smailes had seen detachment before, but Hawken’s response to this tragic death seemed extreme.
    â€œVery well then. How can I help you?” he