Young, Gifted and Dead

by Lucy Carver

‘Seriously.’ In fact, it was Jack who did the grabbing and kissing, right there in full view of the lunch queue. ‘You know I couldn’t stand it if anything bad happened to you.’

  ‘OK. How about we both go tomorrow morning?’

  He agreed that this would have to do and I made Jack a promise that I would stay in the school grounds, even though I had a free afternoon. ‘What if the journos manage to grab me – what do I say?’

  He made a zipping gesture across his mouth. Say nothing.

  OK again. ‘And if the police want to talk to me and Paige before we see Tom? Do I tell them about the bag?’

  ‘Yeah, definitely mention it,’ Jack decided. ‘Let them put some pressure on him as well as us – it can’t do any harm.’

  We kissed again, lips brushing – a reassuring, we’re-a-couple kiss – then parted.

  But the journalists were penned inside a taped-off area outside the gate and Inspector Cole, the man in charge of the investigation, didn’t come anywhere near St Jude’s. Instead, he spent the afternoon in front of TV cameras, making an appeal for anyone with information about Lily’s movements on the day she’d drowned to come forward. I watched him on my iPad.

  ‘Alyssa – the bag!’ Paige insisted. We were in our room and she was getting ready for a session in the indoor arena with Mistral, but she broke off to watch the broadcast. ‘That’s definitely information.’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘So go forward.’

  ‘I will. Tomorrow, after Jack and I have talked to Tom.’ Maybe this doesn’t sound like my best decision and it probably wasn’t, but, remember, I trusted Tom and wanted to give him a chance to explain. That’s the only clear reason I can give for not going to the police straight away.

  Paige said, ‘Please yourself,’ and went to do dressage while I spent an hour preoccupied with OCD things like rearranging the objects on top of my bedside cabinet three times and checking my phone for new messages every five minutes. I tried not to remember Lily sitting cross-legged on her now-empty bed, but failed. I saw her face, her dark hair piled on top of her head, heard her voice teasing me. God, I missed her.

  ‘Jack?’ she said. ‘Jack Cavendish asked you to Tom’s party?’

  ‘He did.’

  ‘You’re sure it wasn’t Jack Hooper?’

  I remembered the debris of paint tubes squeezed out of shape, chocolate wrappers, her broken Kindle. I remembered it in so much detail that I had to get out of the room before Lily’s ghost drove me crazy.

  ‘I found out it was Sir Edward Bond’s own daughter who died in 1938,’ Hooper told me when I ran into him on my way to the sports centre to watch my Jack play tennis. He always slouched around the place looking disengaged – a fly on the wall, constantly observing with his bug eyes – so to have him volunteer this information without being asked was unusual. ‘She was a student here, part of the first year’s intake.’

  I changed course and walked with him into the quad. ‘How do you know this?’

  ‘Easy – anyone can do it. I went online and checked the newspaper archives.’

  ‘This stuff about the history of St Jude’s – you think it could be relevant?’

  ‘Maybe, maybe not. I’m just following my nose, doing a spot of research. That’s what I do.’

  ‘OK, so what else?’

  ‘The daughter’s name was Eleanor. Do you want to know how she died?’

  ‘She drowned in the lake.’ Call it a flash of inspiration or sixth sense. Anyway, I was right.

  Hooper nodded. ‘After that, Sir Edward was a broken man. He resigned as St Jude’s chairman of the board, retired from all his business interests and turned into a recluse.’

  ‘What about Eleanor’s mother?’

  ‘She’s not mentioned.’

  We’d reached the doorway up to the boys’ dormitory and stood in the archway to finish our conversation. ‘Do they explain how Eleanor ended up in the lake?’

  ‘Misadventure – that was the verdict. In other words, it was a tragic accident. One other thing – St Jude’s was damaged by German bombs during the war. Three more kids and a teacher were killed.’

  ‘But we’re miles from anywhere,’ I pointed out. ‘The nearest big city is Bristol, so how come German pilots were dropping bombs on poor little us?’

  Hooper shrugged. ‘Another case of misadventure probably. Anyway, St Jude was the patron saint of lost causes – which doesn’t exactly inspire confidence.’

  ‘He could have been the patron saint of martyrs – that would probably be worse.’

  ‘Yeah, but not much,’ was his parting comment as he climbed the stone stairs to his room.

  When I retraced my steps and reached the sports centre, I found I’d got my timings wrong. Jack’s extra maths came before his tennis coaching, not after, so I found Luke and Zara shooting basketballs into a hoop in an otherwise deserted space. Up on the mezzanine level, D’Arblay was deep in conversation with Guy Simons. When I say ‘deep in conversation’, I mean that D’Arblay was doing the talking and Guy was scowling – until I appeared and then they quickly broke apart.

  What’s that about? I wondered briefly.

  With another hour to kill, I grabbed a coffee to go and went for a wander in the grounds, drawn towards the woods at the far side of the lake where I could stay out of sight. It was one of those cold, grey December days when you need Christmas lights and town glitter and sparkle to lift your spirits – not bare, black trees and freezing fog creeping down from the hills.

  I walked for ten minutes while I finished my coffee, slid the crushed, empty cup into my pocket then turned for home.

  The next bit reminds me of a scene from Jane Eyre – the part where lonely, plain governess Jane is walking along a path towards Thornfield and a big grey dog dashes by, like a wolf in a fairytale forest. The dog scares her half to death. Then we get her first sight of Mr Rochester on horseback. He gallops up and rescues her, sets her back on her feet. Major frisson moment – love at first sight for our heroine. ‘Reader – I married him’ eventually.

  Love wasn’t in the air where I was, but the atmosphere was exactly the same – cold and bleak – when I heard a horse coming up fast along the bridleway and I was almost too late to step out of Harry Embsay’s way.

  I swore at him in an un-Jane-like way. He laughed and galloped on towards the main house.

  First a guy on a motorbike tries to run me down, now Harry on horseback. This was not funny.

  ‘Where is he?’ I asked Paige as I strode into the stable yard after an angry dash past the lake, hard on Harry’s heels. I was out of breath, hot and sweaty under my padded jacket and big scarf.

  ‘Where’s who?’ She was heaving Mistral’s saddle off his back and carrying it into the tack room while her horse stood patiently tethered outside his stable.

  ‘Harry Embsay. He almost knocked me down, for Christ’s sake!’

  ‘He went out on Guy’s horse.’

  ‘I already know that!’

  ‘He’s not back yet.’ Paige disappeared into the tack room while I checked the empty stable where Guy kept Franklin.

  ‘See!’ she said as she re-emerged.

  ‘It was stupid,’ I complained. ‘Harry’s a total idiot.’

  ‘Tell me about it.’ Paige got busy with brushes and combs, speaking more softly to her horse than she ever did to mere humans. ‘You did pretty well with your transitions today, didn’t you, boy?’

  ‘Did you hear what I said, Paige? Harry practically mowed me down. He could’ve killed me!’

  ‘Yeah, but it wasn’t on purpose.’

  ‘I don’t know – maybe it was.’ Harry must have seen me up ahead with my red hair and bright green scarf in all that greyness, yet he hadn’t made any effort to avoid me – the exact opposite, in fact.

  Paige stopped brushing. ‘You don’t think you’re being a teeny bit par-a-noid?’ she mouthed quietly. She winked and suddenly my tension melted away.

  I grinned. Mistral stamped his hoof.<
br />
  ‘Chill, my friend,’ Paige said as she got back to her grooming.

  Then without warning the tack-room door flew open. A figure in a grey hoodie, the bottom half of his face hidden by a black scarf burst out, a blade in his left hand. With his empty right hand he took hold of a tall green wheelie bin containing feed and thrust it straight at Mistral.

  The bin smashed into the side of the horse. Mistral squealed and reared. The hoodie guy raised the knife to strike the horse, but the rope tethering Mistral to the wall strained, frayed and then snapped. He broke free and reared on to his hind legs.

  The attacker slashed again at the horse’s neck. He missed and, as Mistral crashed down to earth, hoodie-guy covered his head with his arms and cowered under the flailing hoofs. Then he scrambled out of reach.

  Mistral reared again and before we knew it the hooded figure was scaling the wall, scrambling over the top, disappearing across the fields.

  I remember the noise – the horse squealing, the thud of the bin smacking against him, Paige yelling, hoofs crashing down on to the cobbles. I’d moved out of the way, but not Paige. Fearless, she ignored the hoodie attacker and tried to grab the end of the rope, got in much too close to all that terrified bone, hoof and muscle.

  She reached up as Mistral reared yet again, caught the rope and had her arms almost pulled from their sockets. I yelled at her to let go. She stumbled sideways, fell between her horse and the stable wall, was down on the ground as he landed on top of her.

  Then there was silence. Mistral stood over a motionless Paige, legs braced as if scared to move another muscle and hurt her more than he already had. She lay on her back. There was no blood.

  The horse looked down. He quivered, flared his nostrils then let out a loud, broken sigh.

  Paige didn’t move. Her eyes were closed.

  Guy Simons appeared. He’d heard the horse squeal and Paige cry out. He ran into the yard.

  ‘Call an ambulance!’ he yelled, dropping to his knees and putting his cheek close to Paige’s mouth to see if she was breathing. ‘Alyssa, call 999!’

  chapter ten

  ‘Why didn’t I do something?’

  Jack had heard me say this over and over. ‘What? What could you have done?’ was the question he put to me each time.

  I would shake my head. ‘I don’t know – just something.’

  He held my hand, didn’t push me for a more logical answer as we waited in the old library.

  The ambulance hadn’t reached the stable yard until twenty endless minutes after I’d made the call. There’d been rush hour traffic, a thickening fog – the roads were chaotic.

  ‘Don’t move her!’ I’d said to Guy, who was first-aid trained and had checked that Paige’s airway was clear. He nodded then stepped back. There was no blood, like I said. She was unconscious, but maybe she would be OK.

  I’d brought a horse rug from the tack room and gently laid it over her. Guy had cornered Mistral and led him into his stable.

  Then other people had arrived – Zara and Hooper, Luke in sweatshirt and shorts. He’d knelt beside Paige and spoken her name, given me a quick, scared glance when she didn’t answer.

  ‘Don’t move her,’ I’d whispered automatically to anyone who went near. Then I told Zara and Hooper to chase after the person who’d caused this. ‘A skinny kid in a grey hoodie. He climbed over the wall and ran away. But watch out – he has a knife!’

  Zara was the first to react. Before I knew it she was hauling herself up and over the wall, yelling at Hooper to follow her.

  Luke, Guy and I were the only ones left, waiting those endless minutes for help to arrive.

  In the middle of our vigil Harry Embsay had ridden Franklin into the yard and immediately started yelling at people – blaming them. ‘Somebody, do something,’ he’d demanded as he vaulted from the saddle and seen how bad things were – Paige lying spread-eagled and white as a corpse, eyes closed, the minutes ticking by. ‘Don’t just stand there!’

  I’d listened for every breath, watched for even the slightest movement and seen nothing.

  Fifteen minutes passed then we’d heard a siren muffled by the fog, had another delay as the ambulance driver navigated through the press pack then discovered exactly where to come, blue lights still flashing.

  Two paramedics – a man and a woman – had jumped out as Harry, Guy, Luke, and I stepped back to give them room.

  After that I had the temporary memory collapse that comes over me when I’m in shock and everything becomes a blur. The paramedics had followed their procedures, testing vital signs and hooking Paige up to tubes and monitors before they immobilized her with back and neck braces then carried her on a stretcher into the ambulance. No one had spoken – I do remember that – not until the ambulance door was closed and the vehicle had backed out of the stable yard. We’d heard the fading siren, felt empty and numb in the silence that followed.

  Then it had been D’Arblay who’d taken control. He’d issued the orders for Zara and Hooper to call off their search and return to school while the rest of us went back to the main building and waited in the old library for news. He said that no one should tweet or text about Paige’s accident until her parents had been informed.

  I did as I was told, was waiting with the others in the periodical section of the library, when my Jack finally caught up with events.

  ‘Why didn’t I do something?’ was the first thing I whispered to him from a million miles away, from the vastness of a huge, hostile universe.

  Something truly big and bad was happening – I already knew that – but it wasn’t until the attack on Paige that I got really scared. Fear got into my bones and clutched at my heart, sent chills up and down my spine.

  ‘Someone wants to get rid of us,’ I admitted to Jack as Zara and Hooper reported back to D’Arblay and Saint Sam in the principal’s office. Apparently they hadn’t found any sign of the guy in the hoodie, and even the news hounds camped out at the gates had missed most of the latest drama, noting the arrival and exit of the ambulance, but then caught off guard when, half an hour later, two police cars had nee-nahed past them, sweeping through the gates and up the school drive.

  ‘This kid – did he actually try to kill Paige?’ Jack put into words what I was trying not to think.

  ‘Whoa!’ Harry muttered. ‘That’s crazy.’

  But Harry hadn’t been there, either when the guy on the motorbike rode straight at me or when the kid burst out of the tack room with the knife.

  I re-ran the event in my mind and recalled some of the details – the hoodie kid gripping the Stanley knife in his left hand, the bottom half of his face covered by a black scarf. The wheelie bin slamming against Mistral’s side as the kid raised the knife to slash at the horse’s neck. ‘No,’ I told Jack. ‘It was Mistral he was after. Paige just got in the way.’

  Jack’s logical brain took over. ‘So these two – the biker and the hoodie kid – they’re more likely to be scaring the shit out of you and Paige than trying to kill you.’

  ‘You can’t know that for sure,’ Luke said, finding it hard to believe that his on-off girlfriend was in hospital. He’d dropped the uber-cool act and talked as if he was in a state of total shock.

  I followed Jack’s thinking and stepped in with an opinion. ‘I’ll say one thing – if they are trying to kill us, they’re not very good at it.’

  ‘We need to find out who “they” are.’ This was Jack again, gripping my hand across the oak table, thinking furiously.

  When D’Arblay had finished with Zara and Hooper, he came to the library and chose me and Jack to go to the hospital to wait outside the door to the ICU. ‘Paige’s parents are out of the country and it will take them some time to fly back,’ he explained. ‘If she regains consciousness, she may want Alyssa there to hold her hand.’

  We found at the hospital that Paige hadn’t regained consciousness – not yet – and it was almost midnight.

  ‘She sustained the injuries approximately
eight hours ago,’ I heard one medic report to another as their soft shoes squeaked towards us down the polished corridor and they pushed through the wide doors into the unit. I saw four beds, all occupied by patients hooked up to tubes and monitors. It was impossible to tell which one was Paige.

  ‘Three broken ribs, one punctured lung, broken collarbone . . . X-rays and brain scan . . . possible aneurysm . . . skull fractures, small splinters of bone lodged in the frontal cortex . . .’ The words slipped out between the doors before they swung closed.

  I gripped Jack’s hand tighter. ‘I should’ve pulled her clear,’ I moaned. ‘All I did was yell at her to get out of the way. She didn’t listen.’

  ‘She’ll be OK,’ he insisted. ‘They know what they’re doing.’

  ‘Paige was trying to calm Mistral down. He reared up when the guy with the knife ran out of the tack room. She was in a corner, backed up against the wall. She didn’t even put her hands up to protect herself.’

  I paused to let my total recall kick in once again, as I knew it eventually would.

  The tack room door flew open. A figure in a grey hoodie burst out, holding a Stanley knife. Grey hoodie and black scarf. A man, tall. Grey eyes with heavy lashes. A hoodie with an Adidas logo and three white stripes down the arms.

  He took hold of the handle on a tall green wheelie bin and rammed it straight into Mistral’s flank. He raised the knife. Mistral squealed and reared. The rope came loose.

  ‘What was the guy doing in there in the first place?’ Jack asked.

  One of the medics came back out of the ICU and avoided eye contact as she hurried away.

  ‘Hiding.’ He must have been – otherwise Paige would have seen him when she carried Mistral’s saddle in.

  ‘And where did he go afterwards?’

  ‘Up over the wall, across the fields.’

  ‘You didn’t recognize him?’

  I shook my head. ‘He had grey eyes with long, dark lashes. He was wearing an Adidas top.’

  We waited until two in the morning, when Paige’s mum and dad showed up and the hospital sent us home.

  ‘Go and get some sleep,’ a nurse advised. ‘We’ll keep in touch via the school.’