Dry-mouthed with anticipation, Snell cast a desultory eye over the corridor. Nothing stirred. Yawning, he shambled towards the main foyer and his office beyond.
But Jim Snell was not alone. Cat’s eyes gleamed in the darkness. A shadowy form glided stealthily from a pool of darkness and moved towards the stairs like a phantom come to take possession of its kingdom. Sighing deeply, as though sucking the essence of the building deep into its lungs, the figure disappeared into the upper regions and was gone.
The nightmare was about to begin.
1. First Impressions
OLIVIA MULLEN SAT DISCONSOLATELY on one of the hideous olive-green ‘easy chairs’ arranged in rows in Hope Academy’s common room on a dreary late October Thursday evening.
Clutching a polystyrene cup of rapidly cooling coffee, Olivia watched her colleagues arrive for yet another interminable staff meeting. As the newest member of the English faculty, she had not yet been whole-heartedly welcomed into any of the departmental cliques which colonized the place on such occasions. The onlooker sees most of the game, she reassured herself, as noise levels rose and a buzz of expectation ran around the room.
Here was dear old Doctor Abernathy, Hope’s moth-eaten head of English, bowing gravely to her with old world courtesy. Close on his heels came ginger-haired, cadaverous Mike Synott, the second in department whose whippet-like intensity offered an amusing contrast to his boss’s absentmindedness. Then followed Val Thorpe and Brenda Wray, two sensible middle-aged women, quietly competent with a Mary Poppins air about them. A trio of grungy looking newly qualified teachers, marked by angst and acne, slunk in behind them. Olivia brightened as her old friend Matthew Sullivan, lanky and beanpole-like as ever, sat down beside her wearing his usual expression of ironic detachment.
‘What will the dear leader have in store for us tonight, I wonder,’ murmured Sullivan mischievously.
‘Raising attainment in boys, isn’t it?’ Harry Mountfield, the rumpled head of religious studies, who had squeezed in next to them, mimed cutting his throat.
‘Bit of an oxymoron that,’ drawled Sullivan irreverently, eliciting reproachful frowns from Val and Brenda.
Olivia smothered a grin, watching with amusement as Harry proceeded to make himself comfortable. With hayseed hair sticking up in all directions and footballer’s thighs akimbo in uninhibited ‘manspreader’ mode, he was the perfect foil to Sullivan’s saturnine elegance. The two men were good friends, generating an air of complicity for which the only word was ‘cahoots’. Harry winked at her, and Olivia felt a rush of pleasure at the intimacy, the more so as it elicited a flurry of harrumphing and eyebrow raising from Val and Brenda.
A sudden commotion at the door heralded the arrival of Hope’s headmaster, James Palmer – ‘call me JP’. Short, balding and perma-tanned, with Eric Morecambe specs, he struck Olivia as curiously charisma-free, an impression reinforced by his squeaky voice and spermatozoon-like physique. ‘But don’t be fooled,’ Sullivan had warned her. ‘The man could give Machiavelli a run for his money. He’d stab you in the back as soon as look at you.’
Bobbing obsequiously in JP’s wake came the human resources manager and headmaster’s PA: Tracey Roach, or ‘Cockroach’ as she was more commonly known, and Audrey Burke (to rhyme with Berk). Strange, mused Olivia, how a wispy little woman like the Cockroach could wield so much influence. Drearily clad in hues of oatmeal and beige, with an unthreatening grey bob, breathless voice and ingenuous limpid gaze, she was more like a down-at-heel librarian than the power behind JP’s throne. Behind the apparently harmless exterior, however, there lurked an arch snoop and world-class sycophant. Certainly, to hear her greasing up to JP was enough to curdle the milk! As for Audrey Burke, her honest, short-sighted eyes shone adoringly at the headmaster from behind bifocals as big as gig-lamps. It was beyond Olivia’s comprehension that the woman could not discern what an awful phoney Palmer was. Love was blind and deaf in her case!
JP took his place behind a lectern, the Cockroach and Audrey taking their seats in the front row after having conducted a beady-eyed inventory of the room which was now almost full. Any absentees were sure to be slated for a reprimand before the day was very much older.
‘Our focus this term is on kinaesthetic learning and peer feedback, with a view to helping boys take ownership of their own learning. The Change team will also be developing appropriate intervention strategies for our more vulnerable learners …’
Same old, same old, Olivia thought glumly, tuning out and contemplating her fellow sufferers. Judging from what sounded like the occasional stifled groan, some of the audience shared her feeling about JP’s rhetoric. The poor swots on the front row had it worst of all – recoiling before the heady blast of Paco Rabane, Fisherman’s Friend and Capstan Full Strength!
By ironic contrast with the apathy of its captive staff cohort, the common room sported an array of vibrant Day-Glo banners exhorting staff in quasi-religious inspirational terms, Our Best Always, Everywhere! being the most egregious example of the prevailing educational Esperanto. Survival of the fittest more like!
God, it’s an ugly building! Olivia’s eyes wandered to the academy’s rear courtyard, visible through the floor to ceiling window at the far end of the common room. The modular cinder blocks which enclosed the courtyard on three sides looked even grimmer than usual in the failing light. Matthew and Harry called Hope ‘The Bunker’, an entirely apt designation for the three-storey cement building situated a little way outside Bromgrove’s town centre, next to one of the two municipal cemeteries. Abandon hope all ye who enter here.
For the thousandth time, she asked herself what she was doing back teaching English at Hope Academy. Gilbert (‘Gil’) Markham, her detective inspector boyfriend, had tried to dissuade her from returning to teaching after last year’s ordeal at St Mary’s Choir School, when she had become involved in a triple murder case. She wasn’t sure she fully understood her own motivation. One thing she knew for certain, though. The longer she postponed getting back in the saddle, the harder it would be to rebuild her teaching career. And she still got a buzz from communicating her passion for literature, so it felt too early to pack it all in.
A sharp dig in the ribs from Matthew roused Olivia from her reverie. Uncomfortably, she became aware that Val was fixing her with a hard stare. She did her best to adopt an air of suitably alert interest. Judging from Val’s po-faced attitude, her attempt fell woefully short of the mark. It was so unfair, she reflected. Only ten minutes or so gone and Harry appeared to be falling into a gentle doze without attracting any similar opprobrium. He’d be snoring his head off in a minute!
At that moment, there was a minor kerfuffle as JP’s two deputy heads arrived.
‘A thousand apologies, JP. A deputy’s work is never done!’ brayed Helen ‘Killer’ Kavanagh (Deputy Head, Curriculum) wearing the expression of abject hero-worship she always adopted on such occasions. Slab-faced and wall-eyed, sporting an unflattering pudding bowl haircut and boxy suit, she resembled nothing so much as a female Khrushchev. The only incongruous touch was her footwear – kittenish ankle-strap stilettos. Of course, it wasn’t her taste in shoes which had earned her the nickname ‘Killer’, though the blood-red stilettos were an apt metaphor for her ruthless ambition.
She wants power so badly you can smell it, thought Olivia as she watched Kavanagh plonk herself down on the front row with all the grace of a hippo on safari.
Dave Uttley (Deputy Head, Pastoral), embarrassed to be the focus of so many eyes, sat down next to Kavanagh with a mumbled apology and bashful duck of the head. How on earth had Uttley ever made it onto the Senior Leadership team, Olivia wondered. He might as well have had Kick Me tattooed across his forehead. The assertive Vinny Jones ‘high ’n’ tight’ haircut was fatally undermined by a timid goatee and his lips moved continuously, as though he was praying – a not unreasonable assumption given his total eclipse by Kavanagh. And OMG, could that possibly be scrambled egg on his tie? Emphatically not a loo
k which proclaimed him to be a Master of the Pedagogic Universe!
The common room felt stiflingly hot and stuffy. A wave of exhaustion washed over Olivia. At times like this, she felt that the entire education system, and Hope Academy in particular, was a sodding prophylactic against catching any genuine enthusiasm for literature, culture, or anything else for that matter. The NQTs were yawning and surreptitiously checking the hands of the large wall clock, trying to calculate when their ordeal would end.
‘Splendid to hear how colleagues in all faculties are building a climate of mutual respect, trust and co-operation.’
Kavanagh was now on her feet, oozing unctuously. No cliché left unturned. Time to zone out once again.
Olivia let her mind drift. Having only recently returned to the chalk face, it was unlikely that she would be put on the spot …
Ah, here was another late arrival. But this one sauntered in unapologetically without a care in the world, lounging with languid grace against the wall next to the door.
Ashley ‘Dreamboat’ Dean. Assistant Head.
The sobriquet was fully justified, Olivia thought as she scrutinized Dean from beneath demurely lowered eyelids. He looked more like David Beckham than ever, bespoke pinstripe suit erotically enhancing rather than concealing a gloriously taut physique – broad shoulders, snake hips, muscular legs. Taken in conjunction with piercing blue eyes, chiselled cheekbones, pouty mouth and wavy blond mane (plus tasteful five o’clock shadow), it was little wonder that he had left a trail of broken hearts in his wake.
The staff grapevine buzzed with speculation that Palmer ‘had a thing for him’. How else to account for Dean’s meteoric rise from groundsman to the dizzy heights of senior leadership? It was unprecedented and had given rise to much muttering in the ranks. Not so much as a GCSE to his name and yet responsible for everything from facilities management to staff appraisal! He had to have slept his way to the top!
Little wonder that Jim Snell was glowering sullenly in the corner. Olivia couldn’t imagine that he had ever lit an erotic fuse. Contemplating the caretaker’s wizened figure, she felt as though all the light had been sucked out of him and transferred to his glowing former subordinate. If looks could kill, then she wouldn’t give much for the Dreamboat’s chances!
Dean invariably appeared oblivious of the Year 10 and 11 Lolitas who lurked in the corridor outside his office in the hope of catching his eye, much to the scowling resentment of their pimply boyfriends. When conversing with the headmaster, he never yielded place to Dave Uttley, despite the weedy deputy head’s desperate hemming and hawing as he waited in line. No, Ashley Dean appeared to have eyes only for Palmer, whose physiognomy seemed lit from within, his features irradiated by a glow of pure delight. As though the two of them existed in a magic circle of intimacy from which interlopers were excluded. When Olivia observed them engrossed in their tête-à-tête, the sight made her scalp prickle with an odd sensation of danger. Averting her eyes, she left them to it.
Just when she thought she couldn’t keep the rictus smile nailed to her face for a single moment longer, Olivia heard the magic words ‘And finally’. Providing some moron didn’t ruin things by responding to JP’s ‘Any questions?’ they were home and dry!
For once she was in luck! Even the toadies appeared bludgeoned into silence.
There was a desperate stampede for the door.
‘You joining us down the pub, Liv?’ This was Harry Mountfield, back in the land of the living and happily anticipating his aesthetic first pint.
‘Not tonight, I’m bushed,’ she answered truthfully.
As she reached the exit, some impulse made Olivia turn around.
JP and Ashley Dean stood side by side, their heads close together. The look of naked adoration on Palmer’s face made her uneasy.
Trouble, she said to herself and slipped away.
2. Olivia
HOME, SIGHED OLIVIA AS she staggered across the threshold of number 56, ‘The Sweepstakes’, a complex of upmarket apartments at the far end of Bromgrove Park, off Bromgrove Avenue.
Architecturally, the block with its stark cubist lines was something of an anomaly in that part of town, otherwise dominated by down-at-heel Victorian terraces, but Olivia loved the corner flat she shared with Gilbert Markham on the third floor. However toxic her working day, she never failed to be soothed by its tranquil ambience. In an instant, she sloughed off all the small-mindedness, backbiting and petty treacheries of life at Hope Academy. Like a snake shedding its skin, she thought ruefully.
‘In here, Liv!’
Dumping her bulging briefcase and nimbly side-stepping the islands of books which dotted the carpet and almost every visible surface, Olivia headed for her boyfriend’s study.
Markham’s sanctum was almost monastic in its lack of clutter. She guessed that the clinical austerity was an antidote to the gruesome effluvia which were his constant companions. No case files, no crime scene photographs were visible, only a police-issue laptop. But Olivia knew that this room, with its view of Bromgrove North Municipal Cemetery, was where her gentle, sensitive lover communed with those whom he had been unable to save, keeping their memory evergreen long after the world had forgotten them and moved on. A striking mixture of hard-bitten worldliness and romantic idealism, it was only with Olivia that Markham ever fully let down his guard.
He turned his white, tired face to her – all its vitality concentrated in quick grey eyes – and pushed the thick, dark hair away from his forehead in a characteristic gesture of impatience.
‘Perfect timing, my love. I’ve had more than enough of crime figures for one day!’ He laughed at the expression on Olivia’s face. ‘Ah, I see it was very bad. Your headmaster not at his Ciceronian best!’
She shuddered theatrically. ‘I’d rather have a prefrontal lobotomy than go through that again. It was even worse than usual. We were all sandbagged, but he just chuntered on, spouting the same old mumbo jumbo. Harry Mountfield calls it JP’s Esperanto cos it makes bugger all sense to the rest of us.’
Markham’s eyes rested lovingly on his girlfriend, the coppery chignon spiralling in wavy tendrils around the flushed face, her slender frame quivering with indignation. She had the uncanny look of another world. La Belle Dame Sans Merci. Yet he knew she possessed a heart as large as that of the Virgin Mary and – for all the philippics against JP and his ilk – an unwavering belief in the essential goodness of humanity.
He always enjoyed her vividly drawn vignettes of Hope’s staff and sparkling accounts of the innumerable daily skirmishes with JP and his apparatchiks. But, observing the shadowed eyes and tautly compressed mouth, he felt a sudden sharp pang of concern. Perhaps it had been a mistake for her to return to work so soon, given the trauma of her involvement in the St Mary’s murder case. Perhaps he should have tried to dissuade her from returning to Hope Academy where she had previously worked as a supply teacher. Or at least insisted that she go back part-time rather than accepting a full-time permanent position with all its stresses and strains. On the other hand, Olivia was difficult to resist once she had decided upon a course of action. ‘I’d only brood and mope if I was at home,’ she had told him. ‘Work’s the best medicine for me.’
Something was bothering her, he shrewdly concluded. Something more than the usual tedious politicking and battles with bureaucracy. Hopefully, she would open up over supper.
Markham’s calculation was correct. As they sat over their whisky, having laughingly ranged far and wide over the topics of the day, Olivia returned to the subject of Hope.
‘There was a strange vibe in the air tonight,’ she said tentatively.
‘How so?’
A faint line appeared between Olivia’s brows.
‘Oh, I couldn’t quite put my finger on it, but something felt “off”.’ She hesitated before adding, ‘It’s been like that ever since I came back to school. Like when a thunderstorm’s brewing and the air’s so muggy that you get a headache …’
‘So, yo
u think some sort of scandal might be about to break?’ enquired Markham with a chuckle. ‘How delectably improper!’
Olivia grimaced. ‘Well as to that, I don’t know… At first I thought people might be wary of me because of … everything that happened last year, but then I realized it wasn’t that.’
Markham waited expectantly.
‘D’you remember my telling you about the new assistant head?’
‘The one you call the Dreamboat? Meteoric rise from pool attendant or some such…?’
‘Groundsman,’ Olivia amended with a smile. ‘Yes, that’s the one.’
‘What about him?’ Markham was gratifyingly curious.
‘His name’s Ashley Dean. Word has it he leapfrogged his way to the top of the promotion ladder all because JP has a pash.’
Markham was thoughtful. ‘Isn’t the head married? A family man?’
‘Was. He and Cheryl separated last year.’
‘Because of this infatuation?’
‘It’s beginning to look like it …’ Olivia groped for words. ‘Oh, I feel prurient saying this … but there’s definitely something weird going on. You should have seen the way JP was looking at him. Totally smitten.’
‘Hmmm. And does young Mr Dean return his affection?’ asked Markham with mock-primness.
Olivia pulled a face. ‘He’s what you’d call an operator. Cut quite a swathe through the staff – male and female – leaving emotional havoc in his wake.’ Seeing that Markham was watching her closely, she added softly, ‘Not me, Gil. I saw through him from the start. There’s something vulpine about him,’ she shuddered, ‘a sort of animal instinct for scenting vulnerability. He was downright cruel to Audrey Burke. I told you about her, didn’t I? She’s the head’s PA and number one fan. Well, Ashley christened her ‘the galloping gormless’ and mimicked her all the time.’
Detective Markham Mysteries Box Set Page 23