Dying on Principle Page 4

  ‘“Manpower”, you mean? No point. Not when Muntz College talks about “manpower planning”, “manning the reception desk” and so on, with far less excuse. I’m surprised they didn’t have a man room, not a staff room. Not that we’ve got one of those either, now.’

  I couldn’t quite read his expression, but there was an alertness that suggested he was more than casually interested in something I’d said. Or maybe it was just the arrival of the first course.

  The Mondiale had done everything it could to make an evening there enjoyable. The table linen was good quality and the right shade of dusky pink to go with the steely blue of the carpet. The cutlery lay well in the hand. The china picked up the silver and gold of the walls and ceiling.

  Or maybe the whole lot was kitsch and I’d had too much champagne to notice. The hors d’oeuvres were carefully chosen and beautifully prepared, I’d go on oath about that. Then I did something that surprised me: I found myself telling the worldly Chris about my plans for George’s bassoon.

  To my surprise, he agreed, and thought it not quixotic but wise. With one proviso: the same one as Aberlene’s, that I spend the proceeds of the insurance claim on a car for myself.

  ‘Tell you what,’ he said, leaning back to allow the waiter to remove his plate, ‘I’m free on Saturday. You decide how much you want to pay and what insurance group you can afford, perhaps read the odd Which?, and then I’ll take you on a tour round the most promising dealerships. You could phone them first to book some test drives. I’ll be your chauffeur and poke my head under any second-hand bonnets you’re attracted to.’

  ‘Well …’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘I don’t need—’

  ‘What’s behind this self-denying ordinance of yours? No holidays abroad, a house that’s nice, sure, but less than you could afford. OK, it’s only recently you could afford to let yourself go, but sure as God made little apples, you haven’t.’

  ‘But it’s not like that.’

  ‘Tell me, where did you spend your last summer holidays? The Gambia? New York? That’s what George’s money should have let you do. And where did you go? Sandwell. Well, good for you. Holiday at home to help the British economy. Saint Sophie.’

  ‘Hang on! This is supposed to be a pleasant evening with a friend.’

  ‘OK. Sorry. I overshot. And I’ll tell you this, it was a bloody good job you were there. Now, I’ll shut up. Provided you think about what I’ve said and promise to drive something wild on Saturday. No,’ he said to the wine waiter hovering to pour a test glass. ‘Let my friend try it, she’s got a better palate than mine.’

  I knew better than to do a Jilly Goolden spoof; and it was fortunate I didn’t. The wine was far too cold – it might almost have been chilled to disguise its age and general nastiness. I shook my head. ‘I don’t think so, but you try it,’ I said, passing him my glass.

  I laughed at his face.

  Grovelling with apology, the sommelier scuttled away.

  To lighten the moment, I told him about the death of our staff room.

  ‘Can the management do that? I thought you lecturers were a stroppy lot.’

  ‘Thank you. I’ll take that as a compliment.’

  ‘Thought you would. But surely you’ve got conditions of service? And in any case, health and safety regulations must apply to colleges like everywhere else.’

  ‘We’ve got something called a Silver Book,’ I said. ‘That lays down virtually everything about our contracts. I’d better read it.’

  ‘You mean you haven’t!’

  ‘Birmingham’s always had conditions much better than the Silver Book ones. But of course, we don’t work for Birmingham any more. Since April we work for individual colleges, which call themselves, if George Muntz is anything to go by, corporations. Complete with chief executives and things. Tell you what, there’s talk of a new contract.’

  ‘Can I bully you just once more this evening, Sophie?’ He sat forward urgently and took my hands. ‘Promise me you’ll read it cover to cover before you sign it. And ask an expert if you’re in any doubt.’

  The arrival of the sommelier with a bottle of far more expensive wine – a vintage Rioja, no less – allowed me to move my hands without ostentation.

  The tasting ritual revealed a superb wine that we were to have for the price of the Valdepenas. It went very well indeed with the guinea fowl.

  Arguing about the bill always gives me indigestion, so I flipped the waiter my credit card while Chris was in the loo getting rid of some of the booze. Fortunately enough remained for him to forget completely until his taxi was driving him away down Balden Road. It put me in a sufficiently good mood to blow him a kiss. Maybe I’d live to regret it.

  5

  The next morning I felt bad, of course, about Melina. I should have explained about the cleaner’s, and then gone back to her. Or suggested I phone her – anything except that brusque dismissal. I wasn’t the most obvious confidante, I hardly knew her, but perhaps she had no one else. Certainly her manner had suggested it wasn’t my broken printer she wanted to discuss.

  I intended to do no more than collect my machine coffee from the canteen – and a union handbill inviting all staff to an eat-in in the former staff room at lunchtime – and log on to my e-mail before phoning her. As it was, I found another little gem in my pigeonhole.

  George Muntz College of Further Education

  FROM: Mr W. J. Curtis, Deputy Chief Executive

  TO: All staff

  RE: MISUSAGE OF STAFF FACILITIES

  It has come to my notice that some staff persist in making liquid refreshments in their individual rooms. Personnel are reminded that this is an unwarranted misuse of the Corporations electrical power supplies and must cease forthwith. Failure to comply will result in immediate action under the Corporations Disciplinary Code, copies of which are available from the Deputy’s Chief Executives Personnel Assistant, Miss S. Blake.

  Perhaps I should offer senior staff some English lessons. If it was management training, it should pay well. I screwed it up and slung it into the bin. It landed with a satisfying clunk, the result of hours of practice under my father’s gaze. He’d been a cricket pro, and his main regret was that I’d turned out to be a girl. Nonetheless, he’d seen no reason why a girl shouldn’t be able to throw, and targeting bins had long been one of my party tricks.

  On further reflection I retrieved it to stick it to the office wall with a blob of Blu-Tack. ‘Deputy Chief Executive’, eh? At William Murdock we had advertisements and interviews for such promotions. And was it simply a curious coincidence that the name Blake appeared twice in key college positions?

  It struck me that phoning Melina would give the wrong impression. I ought to seek her out. But what if she came up to see me, despite my snub? I left a Post-It note on my office door promising her and anyone else who might be interested I’d be back in ten minutes. Then I went off to the computer wing, to see if she was there.

  The technicians’ restroom was in a wonderful state of uproar, which barely subsided enough for me to ask if Melina was in yet.

  ‘Not yet,’ said Phil, the chief technician, drawing me to one side so we could hear each other speak. ‘But she doesn’t have to be. You know we all have to work an evening and have a morning or afternoon off instead?’

  I nodded: the teaching staff worked the same system.

  ‘Well, it’s her morning off. D’you want to leave a message on her e-mail?’

  I shook my head. ‘I’m better with paper ones.’

  He passed me a sheet and a pencil, and then, after giving the matter some thought, an envelope.

  ‘You’ve heard the news, have you?’ he asked, as I wrote. ‘About Trevelyan?’

  ‘News?’

  ‘It’s what’s set this lot off,’ he said, sitting astride a chair and gesturing me to another. ‘No point in standing if you can sit. My veins, you know,’ he added, confidentially, ‘going varicose. Got to watch them. Yours OK?’ He p
eered at my legs dispassionately.

  ‘Fine. What’s this about Dr Trevelyan?’

  ‘I was just telling you. Ill. Now, to look at her you’d think she was as fit as a flea. Eats all the right stuff. Mad on this exercise.’

  Yes, those expensive clothes had fitted, now I came to think of it, an expensive body.

  ‘Always reminds me of that woman, the tennis player. Navratiwotsit.’

  I nodded.

  ‘Tough as old boots, you’d have thought. But it only goes to show, doesn’t it? See how the mighty are fallen.’

  ‘What’s she got then?’

  ‘Give me a moment, love. A breakdown, they reckon. Seems she thought she saw something last night and called every last one of the emergency services – ambulance—’

  ‘What sort of something?’

  ‘I was coming to that.’ He drew a single strand of hair across an otherwise bald pate. ‘A body, they reckon. Falling. A young woman.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Keep your wool on: there wasn’t a body, see. They reckon she had a hallucination. Overwork. Stress. They’ve taken her off to the Queen Elizabeth for treatment. Sedation. EEC.’

  ‘ECT!’

  ‘Like I was telling you. Poor lass! Never could stand her, but I had this cousin. Only a young chap. Lost his marbles, like her. These electrodes to his brain. Right as ninepence, now. But it’s his memory, see. Can remember before he was ill, and he knows about now. But d’you know what? Can’t remember anything about when he was ill. He’s lost a whole year – memory loss. Nothing about the carving knife or the dog or anything. Nor being in the bin. All Saints, he was in.’

  I muttered appropriately.

  ‘So there’s no knowing when she’ll be back. If ever.’ He rearranged the strand by half an inch.

  ‘If ever?’ I must have sounded as stunned as I felt. ‘She’s as bad as that?’

  ‘I was telling you. She signed up for this new contract they want you teachers to be on. I told her, you want to keep off that. Buying a pig in a poke, I told her. And what happens?’ He paused but I dared not interrupt. ‘She signs. And things like sick leave, they’re not like in the old contract. Eight weeks is all she’ll get. Two more unpaid. Then out. I did warn her.’

  I hadn’t liked the woman but I’m not one to bear a grudge. ‘Will there be a collection – for flowers and things?’

  ‘I was saying to the lads, there’s no one here’ll want to put a penny in the hat for her. Made life miserable for us all, she did. Young Darren, now – she had her knife into him something shocking.’

  A stout young man looked up and nodded. ‘Bloody right.’

  I stood up casually, as if to leave. ‘Where shall I leave this note for Melina?’

  Darren pointed. ‘Best place is her bench in the workroom.’

  I smiled helplessly at Phil.

  ‘I’m on my way. Follow me.’

  He dismounted his chair, and held the door gravely. As we walked down the corridor, I wondered if I dared risk it. ‘Tell me …’

  ‘And young Melina – don’t ask me about Melina.’

  ‘I gathered she and Dr Trevelyan—’

  ‘I was saying, cat and mouse. Nice kid, Melina. Dressed smart. Timekeeping a model to them kids. And work – could she shift that work! But whatever she did, it wasn’t right for Her Majesty.’

  He unlocked the workroom door but stepped in first to tap in a code to a security system. Then he gestured me in. The room was immaculately clean, already humming with soldering irons and oscilloscopes. Melina’s bench area was in the far corner, covered with bits of computer.

  I tucked my note under her soldering iron and looked round.

  ‘Good bit of equipment you’ve got here,’ I said. And then the sort of impulse Aberlene and Chris would have applauded washed over me. ‘Tell me, if I wanted a little laptop, what sort would you recommend?’

  He settled down on Melina’s stool; I pulled up another. This could take some time.

  We talked memory and capacity and size and possible use for ten minutes. Then he made an offer I couldn’t refuse.

  ‘Tell you what, young Sophie, I’ll get the names of our suppliers. Might be able to get you a good price if you can decide what you want. Go and have a look at those Toshibas, and see if you can find that Zenith, and then we’ll phone up for you. Cash, probably, mind. Come on back to our room and you can jot them down off the screen.’

  ‘Access denied.’

  However many times Phil tapped in the password – and he took care not to let me see it – the same message came up on the screen.

  He swore under his breath and then turned to me. ‘Looks as if there’s something wrong with the system, love. Could take a while to sort it, too. Tell you what, I’ll give you a bell or leave a note on your e-mail. OK? And in the meantime, you go and test-drive a few – right?’

  Polly, the union rep, had had the foresight to book the staff room, now conference room, via the chief executive’s secretary, Mrs I. M. Cavendish. No doubt she had booked it in the name of some solemn meeting, and indeed we did pass, both as union members and as staff, a couple of solemn resolutions. The union officers were authorised to meet the management on our behalf, and the secretary of the Staff Association, in which I was quickly enrolled, was to book the room for a variety of evening functions. I had not been in a staff association before – social life at William Murdock was nonexistent, for reasons I never knew – but the thought of quiz evenings for the Acorns Children’s Hospice, the geography teacher’s anecdotes of his life as a professional footballer and a wine-tasting organised by a woman who lived with a wine importer was reasonably enticing.

  Yes, I was looking forward to the rest of my time at George Muntz.

  I was just dashing off to class when my phone rang. Expecting either Melina or Phil, I took a moment to place the voice as that of Simon, the bass player. There were some complimentary tickets available for that night’s concert – would I like one?

  ‘Lutaslawski and Bartok,’ he added.

  ‘Which particular bits of Lutaslawski and Bartok?’ I asked cautiously.

  ‘Concerto for Orchestra, twice.’

  The Bartók is one of my favourites, and the Lutaslawski is no more than a challenge, so I accepted gladly.

  ‘There is a catch, though,’ he added. ‘We’re holding a raffle to raise money for Tim, Howard’s son. The lad with the blood problem. Needs to go to the States. And the Friendly Society isn’t authorised to pay up, even if it could afford it. The draw will be at the charity concert on 11 June, but we’ll be trying to sell tickets at every gig we do until then. What we were wondering was whether some of the trustees might help us sell them, and since I’ve seen you in action with an Oxfam tin—’

  ‘Half an hour separating people from their money seems a small price to pay for two hours’ music. See you by the box office?’

  ‘Can you make it really early? Six thirty?’

  ‘What about my tea?’

  ‘Curry afterwards,’ he said.

  And so it was agreed.

  I was just in time for my class: somehow, under this new regime, I didn’t think lateness was a good idea.

  It was a two-and-a-half-hour session revising set books someone else had taught – another visiting teacher my arrival had thrown out of a job. The kids resented being deprived of someone they trusted so close to the exam, and didn’t want to work on Hamlet. It wasn’t until I asked them what they would do if someone they loved got bumped off by someone they knew that they came alive. One or two Muslims were inclined to think revenge was a duty, but the rest, to my relief, preferred to trust British justice.

  I prayed silently that their faith would never be put to the test.

  6

  I’ve always liked Simon’s greetings. I love being swirled off my feet and soundly bussed. When he was wearing uniform – the white tie and tails of the orchestral musician – the effect was dramatic, particularly when I wore, as I did tonight, a li
ghtweight pleated skirt which flared à la Monroe. And in the glossy setting of Birmingham’s Music Centre, it reached perfection. We celebrated with a quick Fred and Ginger routine, which drew a smattering of applause from people queuing for coffee.

  My excuse was that there is a performer manqué in every teacher. Perhaps Simon didn’t need an excuse, lurking, as he did, behind possibly the most sober instrument of the orchestra, the double bass. He was also justifiably proud of his physique, though to the best of my limited knowledge the only sport he participated in was crown green bowls.

  ‘Come on, Simon: to business. These ’ere raffle tickets. Point me to them.’

  He did better, throwing me across his shoulder and transporting me fireman’s lift to the stall the Friendly Society had set up just outside the auditorium. After that, people knew my face – and perhaps other parts of my anatomy – when I approached them with tickets and a predatory expression disguised by a friendly smile.

  Most people responded generously enough, despite the occasional comment, which I could scarcely dispute, that Tim’s treatment ought to be available on the NHS. The only person who really drew me up short was a man in late middle age. There was a general sleekness about his clothes and shoes that argued a bank balance above the average for even the Music Centre’s affluent clients. But I wouldn’t have wanted to carry the bags under his eyes.

  ‘Have you bought your raffle ticket to support Tim Stamford yet?’ I beamed; surely a tenner at least from a hand with such a ring, such a diamond.

  ‘When is the draw?’ he asked.

  ‘11 June,’ I said. ‘At the Friendly Society charity concert.’

  ‘June? And this is still May. I’ll keep the money till then. I’d rather it did some work than sat in some low-interest bank account.’