Head Start Page 15

  Try as I might, however, I could not imagine any woman, especially the homely looking woman in sensible shoes, finding pleasure in the sort of pornography now in Lloyd’s care. But then, I couldn’t have imagined a highly respected solicitor taking pleasure in torturing his wife, both mentally and physically, until I had the scars to prove it. I peered at myself in the heated bathroom mirror: did I have the words Bully me stamped on my forehead? Or had I, in my paranoia, imagined that Dawes and his colleagues, who had been so supportive yesterday, had once been deeply unpleasant?

  Of course I hadn’t. Had I?

  So what had transformed them? You might have expected them to dance up and down with glee when they saw me in such straits. Yet they couldn’t have rallied round more kindly and effectively if I’d been their favourite niece. One thing I did know, however, was that my brain was rapidly becoming mush, and was simply not up to solving the conundrum. But it could at least remember, when I’d finished my evening’s work, how to make use of the tin of Prestat chocolate flakes that had come in my welcome pack.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  The consensus over Wednesday’s mid morning tea and coffee in the staffroom was that evisceration was probably too good for our miscreants, with Tom and Liz sharing a belief that Prudence should be included in the public executions.

  ‘Someone’s pulling their strings,’ Tom insisted. Ostentatiously he flung open the staffroom door, peering from right to left, before closing it firmly. ‘And though we’ve got some very bright children in the school, they all strike me as being straightforward – not manipulative as I’ll swear Prudence is. OK, she and I have form, so I may be biased, but that girl is – please note my technical language – dead creepy.’

  ‘She’s Fred’s star pupil,’ I murmured.

  ‘She’s everyone’s star pupil. She’ll romp through grammar school and take a double-first at Oxford. But none of that will make her less creepy. And I’ll swear she set up the Rosie incident, and made sure she was as far from the action as possible – bringing up all that stuff about hair and scrunchies with Kate was just a way of getting an alibi. As for her contacting the press – what exactly do you propose to do, Jane?’

  ‘Good question. I’m almost glad her mother emailed me to say she was off sick this morning – a stress-induced migraine, would you believe? – because I want to consult all of you. You know her so much better than I do, and some of you know that I have a terrible problem I’m embarrassed to confess publicly – I don’t like her, and that’s very immature of me.’

  ‘We all ought to be in kindergarten, then,’ Tom declared. ‘Is there any hard proof that she called the press?’

  ‘Julie Freeman – she’s the editor – has promised me a recording of the phone call. I’d rather line up all my weapons before I fly into the attack. But apart from Sophia making that clever quip about dropping I have no internal evidence that Prudence has done anything wrong. So what do we do about her puppets? I’d say Robert was afraid of Sophia and maybe even of Emma.’

  ‘And probably terrified of Prudence,’ Tom added, sotto voce.

  ‘Robert’s mother – who seems a pearl amongst parents—!’

  ‘College lecturer before she got made redundant,’ Liz put in.

  ‘She’s going to stop his pocket money and ban him using the computer. And he’s going to clean a lot of classroom cupboards. I’m not sure we can rely on Ms Wells to do the same – and I can’t see her backing any punishment we decide to impose. Apparently – and bang go our attendance stats – she’s keeping her poor daughter at home today because she’s probably got a cold coming on. According to her all this is our fault – and to a degree it is, because we don’t have the right recording systems.’

  ‘And don’t go thinking, Jane, that you have to take responsibility for it all,’ Melanie said, knocking and entering in one movement. ‘I was very fond of Mrs Gough, and the kids loved her to bits, but she was losing her grip as she got older. Just thought you’d want to know that Emma’s in tears in the playground. It’s not Kate on duty today, remember, but Eileen Woolley. I could see her giving Emma a cuddle, but I thought, after Monday, you might be interested.’ She darted out again.

  ‘It’d be more low-key if you had a word, wouldn’t it, Helen? If she did help hurt Rosie, I want to nail her, but you might get more out of her. And there’s the bell …’

  I had to wait till our already all-too-brief lunchtime to catch up with Helen.

  She dug into a plastic box of what looked like a quinoa salad and came up with an aromatic forkful. ‘She said that people had called her names. But of course she wouldn’t say who. I did ask her who she liked to play with, and she tried to say she didn’t really like playing, in the sort of voice that Prudence or Sophia could manage, but not poor Emma.’

  ‘Poor Emma?’ I asked through my belated breakfast bar.

  ‘All through the school she’s been the sweetest kid. Like Robert only much more academic. Wouldn’t say boo. She’s always seemed to enjoy being kind and helpful. She’s mothered the littlies. But she’s trying to join the big girls now – and I really don’t think her heart’s in it.’

  ‘If she was part of the plot to trip Rosie, she’d still have to be punished, wouldn’t she?’

  ‘But guilt by association in a primary school, Jane? It doesn’t seem fair.’

  ‘When was life ever fair?’ I asked unkindly. ‘Has she ever made any attempt to get into the stockrooms, by the way?’

  ‘Not to my knowledge. Jane, why don’t we just hire a skip and get someone like Richard to dump everything into it? I know we all thought there might be important stuff in there, but if there was nothing in there there’d be no reason for them to go in.’

  ‘I can’t say I’m not tempted. But if you knew the furore I caused just by trying to throw away a few football shirts …’ For the time being I’d keep quiet about the porn. In fact I might just consult Lloyd about it – and also see if Jo might be persuaded at least to come and look at the school. I wish I didn’t keep taking my eye off the metaphorical ball. But then, I reflected, as the bell went, I’d need as many eyes as Argos – the mythical character, not the store – to keep tabs on everything.

  Jo and Lloyd happened to be free that evening, and said they’d be happy to join me at the Cricketers for a meal: the only food I had in my space-age kitchen was that from the welcome pack, and even if I had the full range of a supermarket at my disposal it might take till the end of my tenancy to master the controls on the oven and hob. Not even the microwave was straightforward.

  ‘Do all the holidaymakers have PhDs in astrophysics?’ I asked as we settled at what I had come to think of as my table. ‘No, they probably have even better models of the same equipment in their Notting Hill homes, don’t they? I can recommend the Malbec, by the way.’

  ‘So long as you don’t get Jo so drunk she’ll agree to start teaching tomorrow,’ Lloyd said, asking for a jug of tap water. ‘I’ve got a few days’ leave and we’re heading off to Cape Verde to get warm.’

  ‘One of the main advantages of not teaching,’ Jo observed, ‘is not having to queue at an airport behind all your pupils. And the prices, of course. Jane, you look quite peaky – are you all right?’

  ‘It’s forgetting to eat that’s the problem – and this time I’m not blaming my kitchen. We just need more staff to cover when there’s a problem – I actually had to draft in some governors when we had a crisis the other day.’ Suddenly, against all the laws of hospitality, I found myself telling them about Rosie’s accident. At last, raising my hands in apology, I said, ‘No, we’ve not even enough evidence to keep anyone in detention, let alone refer the miscreants to social workers or whatever. It’s just that, like the police, we’re cut to the bone.’

  ‘Don’t you even have classroom assistants?’

  ‘My predecessor didn’t believe in them, and I must say I’d rather have properly qualified teachers to hand. Let me bribe you with some more wine, Jo,’ I said wit
h a grin.

  ‘Go on, then. Thanks. Tell you what, I will just look at the place. When we’ve eaten. We’ve got time. Tell me what I’ll find.’

  ‘It’s generally clean and tidy, but very institutional. For instance, there’s not nearly as much artwork as I’d like. And,’ I added as our starters arrived, ‘we don’t have any photos of staff or governors, and since no one’s yet organised a school council, there are no photos of any kids either. If the school’s ever won any trophies, they’re all locked away so tidily I’ve not located the cupboard, let alone the key. And there don’t seem to be any little silver cups for sports day prizes and so on. It’s such a shame. We’ve got a huge playing field that’s somehow escaped disappearing under a hundred houses, but no sports teams. Jo, I dearly want to develop the kids’ potential, but it’s going to be a long haul.’

  Diane herself came to clear the table and top up our glasses. ‘Don’t let her put herself down: she’s doing very well. Did she tell you about what she’s doing for the church and the cricket club? Now, who was having the steak?’

  I allowed myself one more quick question about the school: would putting all the contents of the stockrooms in a skip be advisable? ‘At one level it would be grand just to get rid of the problem,’ I said, ‘but at another, doing so without warning all the parents might have disastrous results.’

  Jo narrowed her eyes. ‘What do you think might happen if you did warn them?’

  ‘I think it might provoke quite drastic action from whoever left stuff like the porn in there. And for the time being I’d just like a really quiet life.’

  It was Lloyd who noticed it first: the key labelled Stockroom B was on its hook on the little board that Melanie kept within reach, but it was rocking backwards and forwards.

  ‘That’s funny,’ he said. ‘The front door was locked when you let us in, wasn’t it?’

  ‘Yes. Just as I’d left it. But there’s something even funnier: the brand-new state-of-the-art security light didn’t come on as we approached.’

  ‘It would have had a hard job sensing any movement. Didn’t you notice? It was covered in snow,’ Jo said. ‘Someone with an aim as good as that ought to be in your cricket village team. So, Lloyd, you think someone’s just hung up that key and scarpered?’

  ‘That’s the best scenario,’ I said. ‘But there’s another. What if someone’s still lurking?’ I tried to sound cool and insouciant – and probably failed.

  ‘Is it possible to isolate different parts of the school? I’m calling this in as an attempted breaking and entering, by the way,’ he added, fishing out his mobile.

  ‘There are lockable doors to each section. The stockroom area is furthest from here – in the new section.’

  ‘OK. I’ll find it. I want you two locked in the car – now.’

  ‘Uh-uh. This is my problem, too, Lloyd. The key was hung up and the one next to it – to the other stockroom – was quite still. Let’s assume either they’ve finished with the stockroom and scarpered or they’ve hung up the key and are hiding somewhere near here. We can check each room and lock up behind us.’ I fished my keys from my bag and jiggled them. ‘But you’re right: Jo’s safest locked in your car. And if she suspects anything she can call your colleagues – right?’

  ‘Lock it – promise!’ he said, almost pushing her out.

  We watched her until we saw her thumb go up.

  ‘Let’s start with the staffroom, shall we? And then my office.’

  ‘OK. Hey, what are you doing?’

  ‘Taking my boots off. Quieter that way.’

  I would have loved to be able to say that I was confident, but if the kids were supposed to tell the truth, so was I.

  ‘What if you have to run?’

  I put them back on again.

  We searched every inch of the school. We even checked inside the stockrooms. But there was nothing. No one.

  ‘So it looks as though they were returning the key,’ Lloyd said. ‘But why should anyone want to get their hands on that old junk?’

  ‘Apart from the porn mags, of course,’ I reminded him.

  ‘Of course. Can you see if anything’s missing?’

  I was in mid shrug when I cried out, ‘What the hell’s that noise? Your car, Lloyd?’

  He sprinted off, but lost his footing on the hall floor.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ I yelled ‘I’m on to it!’

  Someone had pretty well written off their car. The whole of the driver’s side had been scooped as if by a giant fork. The electronics were rightly offended, sounding the alarm unremittingly, and Jo was trapped inside, screaming with a mixture of terror and rage. Amazingly, despite the proximity of houses and cottages, no one else was on the scene.

  Lloyd, his whole body an exclamation mark of disbelief, was frantically pressing his key – to no avail.

  ‘Try turning it manually?’ I suggested. ‘No – shit!’ Through the pulses of orange from the hazard lights, I picked out a hooded figure running up the road. I gave chase, but soon lost whoever it was: my boots weren’t made for running, especially on the glass that the road surface was rapidly becoming.

  At least they fixed the car alarm. The silence was almost palpable.

  ‘It just happened,’ Jo was saying. Her voice was inclined to quaver and I could hear the effort she was putting into making it jaunty. ‘There I was, sitting listening to Classic FM, and there was a loud rumble and from nowhere – no, no lights, nothing – this huge tractor appears and hits the side with some gigantic piece of equipment it’s towing. Doesn’t stop, of course. The driver might not even know. No street lights, of course.’

  ‘You may be right. But I almost think – I know I’m paranoid, but they’ve been out to get me so long I’ve had a lot of practice – I almost think it was a diversionary tactic to get us out of the building and allow Mr or Ms Hoodie to escape.’

  ‘Come on, we searched high and low!’

  ‘Low, yes – but not high. What if they got into the roof space? I’ve never checked but there must be hatches or people wouldn’t be able to get up there for maintenance.’

  ‘Call myself a cop … never thought, did I?’

  ‘Did we. And it’s my territory. Even the roof space. Tomorrow’s job. If only I have time.’

  ‘Or someone elses’s if you have any staff to delegate it to. Now, Jane, you’re sure you really didn’t get a proper look at Hoodie Person?’ Lloyd seemed far more concerned with the runner than with his wife, who, released from her dented prison, was dithering with cold, and, I guessed, shock.

  ‘Just enough to know that whoever it was wasn’t carrying anything large. Small – who knows? Pocket-size? Jo, we need to get you inside somewhere warm. My cottage is a bit of a step—’

  ‘Bit of a slide, more like,’ she said with a game grin.

  ‘Get inside the school – it should be as safe as houses now.’

  When I went to open the door, bizarrely I found it locked: neither of us had had time to do that. And when I put my key in, it jammed tight. Wouldn’t come out. ‘The bastard’s only done the superglue trick,’ I told Lloyd.

  ‘Can you call your locksmith? He may have a twenty-four-hour service. Where the hell are you off to now?’

  ‘The old bike shed. Country ways. I know it was a risk, but I’ve hidden a spare key.’

  I could hear him call after me, ‘Bloody stupid! And what’s the point?’

  ‘Go round the side – kitchen entrance,’ I yelled.

  But at that moment all hell was let loose. Someone’s burglar alarm wailed across the street. As if on cue, blues and twos announced the imminent arrival of a police car. And now, at last, curtains started to twitch.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  Unsurprisingly, the colleagues whom Lloyd had summoned were far more interested in dealing with what sounded like a live incident than in commiserating with a mate with a smashed-up car, and never mind our strange invisible intruder, either. Jo, no longer dithering, was keen to see what was go
ing on; Lloyd was too busy haring hazardously in search of the source of the noise to argue.

  ‘Whose house is it?’ Jo gasped, as we slithered along in pursuit.

  ‘It could be Alison Tibbs’s – it overlooks the school. Ideal for a governor. If only they had street lights in this benighted place! No, it’s further up – Brian Dawes’s, maybe.’

  Our progress was speeded by a little rash of security lights popping on, and anxious or simply nosey neighbours emerging on to their doorsteps. Would they help? My personal dream was to intercept and floor the irritating figure in the hoodie whom I was beginning to blame for everything that had befallen me since I arrived here. I blamed the Malbec and too much running around in the cold for my lack of logic.

  We weren’t allowed anywhere near what the police had not unnaturally declared a crime scene: Lloyd, who’d already acquired a bright-wear waistcoat, was holding back a little knot of villagers, some of whom I recognised as parents – some in carpet slippers – and others who were complete strangers. I suspected that between us we were generating more heat than light.

  Lloyd became gratifyingly authoritative. ‘Did any of you ladies and gentlemen actually witness anything? If you’d be kind enough to give me your names and contact details then you can head home – it’s no fun being out on a night when it’s minus six and dropping.’ He caught first Jo’s eye and then mine – we were to lead the reluctant exodus.

  Were we indeed? I thought of calling out that we’d wait for him at the school, but stopped abruptly. Jo could easily text him with information I suddenly didn’t want anyone else to share. I took her arm and we made our ungainly way back.