‘Now?’ asked Miss Hayburn.
‘Well, I realise that he may be teaching, or about to.’
‘I’m afraid that Mr Wood went home sick.’
‘Nothing serious, I hope.’
‘Complaining of a migraine,’ said the headteacher, clearly torn between the poles of confidentiality and assisting the police as far as she could.
‘Is he prone to migraines, or is he under particular stress at the moment?’ asked Tyler.
Mills wondered if the DCI was about to make the subtext of his question explicit. But Miss Hayburn was no fool. The unspoken suggestion that Mr Wood had become aware of the police visit and subsequently fled into hiding, was allowed to hang in the air until refreshments were tactfully suggested.
While Mills contacted Maggie Calleer and Howard Wood, Tyler shared a pot of tea with the headteacher.
The conversation quickly turned to the old regime, and the legacy left by Fredrick Wise. But whether or not Maggie Calleer might turn out to be a woman with an axe to grind, which anyway seemed doubtful and nothing more than a temporary outbreak of naive and wishful thinking, Miss Hayburn was far too diplomatic to polish the blade in the presence of an inquisitive police officer.
‘They were different times,’ she said. ‘I think that headteachers were more remote then. You know, summoned to deal with major problems and otherwise leaving the teachers to sort out the day to day matters. But from my understanding, speaking to those who worked under Mr Wise’s leadership, I believe that had a major bullying issue been brought to his attention, he would have dealt with it directly.’
Tyler allowed an inward smile to manifest as the ghost of an outward, mild and polite one. He could see how Miss Hayburn had made it to headteacher. There was a politician lurking in there, and possibly even an honest one at that.
But still he didn’t feel inclined to let the point go so easily. ‘This enquiry is at an early stage. The picture is far from clear. But, hypothetically, if a child died as a result, directly or indirectly, of the actions of others at the school, then surely it would reflect, would it not, rather negatively on the man at the top?’
‘Hypothetically, yes, of course. Hypothetically, anything might happen as a result of something that might or might not have happened in the first place. Hypothetically, we might assume almost anything and then root around for facts to fit those hypothetical assumptions. Of course, I wouldn’t really expect that to happen in the context of a modern-day police enquiry. How’s your tea?’
‘One more hypothesis,’ said Tyler.
‘Just one?’
‘If a child went missing on your watch, how long would it take you to forget all about it?’
Miss Hayburn seemed about to say something when Mills appeared at the door. ‘A word, sir?’
Tyler excused himself.
Outside in the corridor Mills reported that he had made contact with Howard Wood. ‘Reckons he’s too unwell to receive visitors at the moment, sir.’
‘That bad, eh? What about Calleer?’
‘Only too pleased to speak to us, and at our convenience.’
‘She remembers Alan Dale, then?’
‘Remembers him very well.’
‘Local?’
‘She lives a few miles out. I took the liberty of telling her that we’re on our way.’
‘They all seem to retire outside the city,’ said Tyler. Mills didn’t respond.
‘I’ll tell Miss Hayburn that we’re leaving. See you in the car.’
Tyler went back to finish his tea, and to find out what wisdom Miss Hayburn had been about to impart on the subject of lost children.
‘People deal with tragedy in different ways,’ she told him. ‘It’s easy to condemn with hindsight, to make something out of nothing.’
He thanked her for her help.
As he strode out to the car he was cursing the timing of Mills’ interruption.
You give a politician time to think and the truth goes to hell.
12
Heading east towards Longton, Mills had turned into a tour guide, pointing out his old school, even the street where he had spent most of his early childhood, before passing the small police station and reflecting on the many happy years he had spent there. When they passed the Gladstone Pottery Museum, he threatened to take Tyler along when they had a spare hour.
‘You would make a local of me? Do you think I’m worthy?’
‘Not for me to say, sir. But in your spare time I could at least make a tourist of you.’
‘You’re very proud of where you live, aren’t you?’
‘Is there any crime in that?’
‘Maybe I’m envious.’
The city was receding already. Vistas of green were opening up all around as they passed through Weston Coyney and beyond, approaching Cellarhead crossroads.
‘I live close to here,’ said Mills.
‘Not exactly a city boy, are we?’
Mills felt a strong urge to defend his move out of the city, but resisted, letting a grunt suffice by way of explanation. It wasn’t exactly prudent, these days, to police the streets where you lived. To keep on doing the job you needed distance from it, a place to escape to, and even more so when you had a young family to think about.
His wife had told him that much and told it many times. It had been part of her argument for moving in the first place. He had to admit, there was some sense to it, though it still didn’t help when it came to finding a decent local, or paying the bills. Or finding a decent school where your kids—
He glanced at Tyler but kept the thoughts to himself. It was either obvious enough or else impossible to explain. Perhaps it didn’t really matter which.
A little short of Cheadle they took the turn-off and were soon approaching the village of Kingsley Holt. On the far side of the village, a tidy terraced cottage, neighbour-less on one side, opened its door as the unmarked car parked up outside the neat front garden.
‘You found me,’ sounded a cheerful voice as the detectives entered through the front gate. ‘Maggie Calleer,’ said the equally cheerful-looking woman, holding out a hand to the two officers in turn, before ushering them inside.
‘Drinks?’ she asked, before leaving them to make themselves comfortable in the small sitting room while she disappeared into the kitchen to boil the kettle.
Tyler cast an eye over his surroundings. ‘I don’t know about Kipling’s parents,’ he said, catching Mills’ eye, ‘but my guess is the great man himself would have preferred it.’
‘What’s that, sir – Kingsley over Rudyard?’
‘Understatement over ostentation. I bet the tea will be better, too. China cups are for looking at, not drinking out of.’
‘Prefer beer mugs myself,’ said Mills, as Maggie Calleer brought the drinks through.
Miss Calleer had been retired two years, holding out to the tender age of sixty. She had entered the profession straight from college, serving for five years at her first school, the rest of her career spent at River Trent High. She had never married and had no children – and liked bangles and bracelets, by the look of it, thought Tyler. A charity-shop chic that didn’t go at all badly with the carefree ’60s elegance. More than anything, he noticed, was an abundant aura of kindness.
‘So, how are you finding retirement?’ asked Tyler.
‘I recommend it,’ she said. ‘I loved my job, but I love my freedom too. I can spend all day reading, or walking, with no one to answer to other than my own conscience.’
‘Which is always clear?’ asked Tyler.
‘I believe that you would like to ask me about Alan Dale.’
‘You remember Alan, then?’
‘I remember him,’ she said. ‘He was in my form the year before, well, you know.’
She described a shy, introverted boy with a ‘lovely smile that could have charmed ducks off the water’ but acknowledged that Alan probably wasn’t the cleverest child in the year, certainly not in academic terms. She underlined
that he had ‘something about him, something marking him out. In his own way, he was a very bright spark. That was part of the problem.’
Tyler asked her to elaborate.
‘What I mean is, unless you can handle yourself … well, in my experience a child generally has an easier time of it if they blend in. Surviving school requires the average child to be something of a chameleon. Alan didn’t blend in anywhere. He was different, and the difference was unmistakable. I don’t think the poor lad could have done a thing about it.’
Tyler asked her to explain what exactly was different about Alan Dale, but the retired teacher was having difficulty nailing it.
Then her face lit up.
‘Let me give you an example,’ she said. ‘I remember one day giving the class a poetry exercise. I asked them to write a poem about what they did at the weekend, or on holiday, something like that. Most would have written something silly, no doubt, because they felt awkward about doing the exercise at all. Others might have rehashed an idea that they’d heard in a song, or an advert. Something that would be instantly familiar.’
‘What did Alan write?’ asked Tyler. ‘It’s a tall order, I realise. Recalling what a pupil wrote thirty years ago.’
‘Well, that’s just the point,’ she said. ‘I can remember. I can remember like it was yesterday. Alan was simply never bland. While he did his best to blend in, if something caught his imagination, he couldn’t help but shine.
‘He wrote a poem about a tree standing alone in a park. The tree had no friends until one summer all the birds came and built nests in the tree. It was a beautiful poem.’
‘But not appreciated by everybody else in class?’ said Mills. ‘Who read the poems out?’
‘I did. The class laughed along with the dafter stuff, and the derivative nonsense. I didn’t identify the authors, but most of the class gave themselves away through sniggers or gestures, showing how proud they were, or ashamed. I read Alan’s poem and, I tell you, I was almost in tears.
‘When I’d finished reading it out, there was a kind of stunned silence. Most hadn’t a clue what to make of it. I read it out a second time, and they probably still didn’t get it, the majority of them.
‘But they were getting who had written it. It wasn’t the sort of thing that you would expect a – what was he then? – a fourteen-year-old boy to write.’
‘You think,’ said Tyler, ‘that he would have suffered for that poem?’
‘I’m sure of it. A girl might have got away with it. Things were very different back then.’
‘They certainly were,’ said Tyler, remembering only too well. ‘Boys didn’t do things like poetry, at least not without a direct order from above. Sorry, go on, Miss Calleer.’
‘What you say is right. That macho thing – quite ridiculous, when you stop to think about it. And you see, a cleverer boy than Alan would have, how can I put it? He would have found the wavelength operating in that classroom. He would have joined in the spirit of things and written rubbish.
‘But Alan was naïve; he had an idea and he ran with it. I don’t think it would have occurred to him that it might have consequences.’
Tyler moved on to the subject of the old headmaster. He asked what Frederick Wise was like to work for.
‘Old school,’ she said. ‘Very old school. You saw him in assembly and the kids saw him if they were in trouble. And usually that meant big trouble. Otherwise, ivory tower ‘don’t call me, I’ll summon you’, was his style.’
‘Would he have taken bullying seriously?’ asked Tyler.
She thought for a moment. ‘That depends.’
‘On what?’
‘I think he had, like I say, an old-fashioned mind-set. An attitude that people ought to be able to stand up for themselves. Sort out their own problems.’
‘Might he have turned a blind eye – if it wasn’t causing an obvious disruption?’
Calleer looked uncomfortable with the question.
‘And if it was?’ asked Tyler.
‘Then he would have shown them who was boss. Not exactly a pacifist, Mr Wise. He didn’t take prisoners. The kids feared him, that was clear enough. If somebody threatens to beat the living daylights out of you, I think that you have a tendency to fear them. But that’s not what I, personally, would call respect. More a matter of survival. That isn’t how you sort out the bullies, not really.’
‘Were there any bullies in your class?’ asked Tyler.
‘I think I know where this is heading.’
‘Then perhaps you can tell me, because I haven’t the faintest idea.’
‘You think Alan Dale was the victim of bullying, and that one of his tormentors may have been responsible for his death.’
‘And what do you think?’
Again, she looked uncomfortable, and the silence stretched out until Tyler at last intervened. ‘I mean,’ he said, ‘it is, at least, an interesting hypothesis.’
‘You mean that you haven’t considered it yourself?’ she asked.
‘Well,’ said Tyler, ‘clearly you have.’
She thought for a few moments. ‘Yes,’ she said, ‘I suppose I have. I’ve considered a lot of things. But I’m not sure about what I think happened.’
Tyler watched her carefully and then he said, ‘At least you have given it some thought. I’m not sure that your old boss did.’
When she didn’t respond, Tyler said, ‘You didn’t like him much, did you?’
‘I didn’t see a great deal of him, to be honest.’ She hesitated again, and then seemed to come to a decision. ‘I think that children deserve the very best. Children are vulnerable, all of them, no matter how tough they act.’
‘Though some are more vulnerable than others?’ said Tyler. ‘Like Alan Dale?’
‘Yes.’
‘You think Wise let him down? You think that he let Alan Dale down?’
While Calleer made a second round of drinks, the two detectives sat ruminating over what the retired teacher had said, and what she hadn’t said. When she returned Mills took the cue to freshen up the room with further talk of retirement and the consolations of the stunning countryside that surrounded them. In the course of the conversation he told her that he had two children of his own, both of school age, while Tyler remained outside the conversation, drinking a mug of tea and brooding silently.
At the same time he listened.
He listened intently as the conversation meandered around the education system, local school options, discipline in the classroom and in society generally. Topics debated by politicians and a multitude of experts on countless TV and radio shows, arguments going around in circles as people tried to solve conundrums and contradictions a sight older than most of them realised.
‘Bullying,’ said Calleer, ‘is not something that happens only in the classroom, or in the playground. It is not confined to children.’
‘I hope you’re not referring to the police force,’ said Tyler.
‘It all comes down to power, in the end,’ she said. ‘One person exerting it over another. Forming a gang, or an organisation, to gain the whip hand.’
Tyler nodded.
‘You know,’ said the retired teacher, ‘I sometimes think that the history of bullying is the history of human relations.’
‘Bit strong, don’t you think?’ said Mills.
But Tyler didn’t think so, not at all. He liked Maggie Calleer. She spoke a language that he understood. And he wanted to hear more of it, to gain the full extent of what her time with the likes of Frederick Wise had taught her.
‘I think that bullying is endemic in society,’ she went on, encouraged by the senior detective. ‘A lot of it is probably unintended, to some extent, and the perpetrators would be absolutely horrified, in a lot of cases, to realise that they were in fact acting as bullies. But that doesn’t stop it being harmful. On the other hand, you have the sadists. You have those who know absolutely what they are doing. And they’re a different breed altogether.’
> ‘And did you come across many of those during your time at River Trent High?’
She laughed. ‘You don’t miss an opportunity, do you?’
‘I don’t tend to,’ said Tyler. ‘And poor Sergeant Mills here will be taking his children out of school altogether by the time we’ve finished.’
The room fell silent.
And Tyler knew that the door had been loosened.
Calleer took off her glasses and massaged her eyes, as though to coax the faces from the darker recesses of memory. ‘There were one or two, yes.’
‘Can you remember their names?’
Her mind was evidently whirring, and not merely through the act of trying to remember.
At last Tyler said, ‘The school have been putting together lists of personnel and pupils at the school during the early 1970s. If you can’t remember the names off the top of your head, you may recognise some of them when you see the lists.’ He paused for a moment. ‘You have to understand that this is a very serious matter that we are investigating, Miss Calleer.’
‘I don’t need reminding of the seriousness. A dead fifteen-year-old boy – I don’t need lists to remind me. I’m not senile quite yet, thank you all the same.’
‘It was a long time ago,’ said Mills, trying to defuse some of the tension in the room.
‘Thank you,’ she said. ‘But when you teach a class for three terms, you tend to remember them. At least, human nature being what it is, you tend to remember certain ones. The difficult ones always prove to be the hardest to forget, for some reason.’
‘And who were the difficult ones that year?’ asked Tyler. ‘Who stands out from the class of ’72?’
It turned out that there were two persistent troublemakers, both of them in trouble regularly and for behaviour that included bullying. ‘They thrived on trouble, those two. It went against the grain to send pupils to see Mr Wise, but I happily made exceptions where that pair were concerned. I don’t know that it made the slightest bit of difference, mind you. You beat a savage dog and it doesn’t stop the thing from biting people. If anything, perhaps it makes it worse. But it got them out of the classroom for a while, and some days it was a matter of survival.’
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