A Thousand Cuts

by Simon Lelic

  I spoke to him though. I was watching him. I noticed that the clothes he was wearing on the Monday were the ones he’d gone home in on the Friday. He had two suits, from what I could tell, one beige, one brown, and he never wore the same suit two days in a row. He changed his shirt every day too. And his tie. You wouldn’t notice unless, well, unless you’d noticed but he had a strict rotation. Mondays it was one combination, Tuesdays it was another. There was no great diversity of style. I suspect the shirts had come five in a pack. The ties likewise. Not that I’m snobbish about such things. The clothes maketh the man, that’s what they say, isn’t it? Well Al Capone wore spats and Jesus Christ dressed in rags, which pretty much settles that argument in my mind. But I know how important such things are to other people, to the younger generation in particular. Just look at TJ, for instance. If he’s not in a track-suit, he’s wearing an Italian-made sports jacket and a tie with a knot the size of my fist. Like the footballers do when they’re giving interviews after a game. So that’s why I noticed it with Samuel. He was particular about such things, it seemed to me, but not for aesthetic reasons. It was as though he had established a system in order that he would no longer have to think about that system. On Mondays he wore suit A with shirt B and tie C. He just did.

  So I realised immediately on the Monday. He was wearing Friday’s outfit and Friday’s wrinkles. Saturday’s and Sunday’s too, by the look of things. There were rings around his eyes, like a cartoonist would draw on a character who’s just been beaten in a fight, and a web of red lines stretching across the white. What with the state of his clothes, I’d say he’d slept – if he’d slept at all – slouched in a chair or on the sofa or in the seat of his car.

  It’s the end of first break and he’s drifting out of the staffroom when I put my hand on his shoulder. As he turns, he spins and steps backwards. He stumbles on a chair leg and almost falls. TJ sees it happen and gives a snort. He makes some comment, some crack about having a good trip, and then he’s gone and Samuel and I are the only ones left in the room.

  Is everything okay? I ask him. Samuel, I say. He’s watching the doorway, you see. Samuel, I say again. Is everything okay? You seem… well… I don’t finish the sentence.

  What? he says. Oh. Yes fine. Excuse me. And he tries to slip by but I take his arm. Again he flinches. Again he pulls away. What? he says. What is it?

  Nothing, I say. I’m startled by his tone. It’s aggressive. Defensive. Not like Samuel at all. I mean, usually when he spoke he was never anything but polite. To a fault really. He was courteous but courteous like a waiter in a fancy restaurant, one who doesn’t necessarily own the place but certainly wouldn’t offer you a table if he did.

  Nothing, I say again. I just wondered, that’s all. Whether everything was all right.

  He laughs. A snort, really, like TJ’s. Oh yes, he says. Everything’s fine. Everything’s wonderful. And he tries to get past me again.

  I don’t let him. I don’t know why but it seems incredibly important all of a sudden that I talk to him, that I find out what’s bothering him. So I reach and place an arm across the doorway.

  Samuel looks at me. He glares at me. He says excuse me again but in a way that means you better had.

  Samuel, please, I say. If there’s something the matter you should talk about it.

  And he laughs again, that same derisive grunt. He says, that’s reasonable. I mean, you’d think that talking would help, wouldn’t you?

  I say, sorry?

  But he doesn’t elaborate. He just says excuse me again and this time I let him go. There doesn’t seem to be any other choice.

  It was only afterwards that I remembered about the gun. I’m walking to my classroom and my innards give a sudden lurch, like it’s just occurred to me I’ve left something burning in the oven back home. I stop and I think and I tell myself there’s nothing to worry about. He was upset about something, that was all. Something personal that wasn’t any of my business. I had no right to pry and he had every right to be angry with me. And he’d explained about the gun. He’d demonstrated to me that it didn’t even work. But when I thought about that, I thought about the expression I’d caught on his face after he had pointed the gun at TJ, that little flash of jubilation, and I grew anxious in spite of myself.

  I asked around. Other teachers, even one or two of the pupils I trusted not to make a fuss. But no one had noticed anything strange. Like I said before, most of them barely noticed Samuel at all as a rule. No, nothing odd, they told me if they had seen him. No odder than usual. And they would laugh and I would smile and that would be the end of that.

  In the afternoon, Samuel and I shared a free period. I knew we did but I checked the timetable just to be sure. So I went looking for him again. I would talk to him properly this time, I told myself. I would find out what was troubling him. I would ask him again about the gun. I would insist, if it came to it, that he hand it over to me, museum piece or not. But I couldn’t find him. I looked in every classroom, in the staffroom, in the playground, in the girls’ changing rooms for heaven’s sake. I ended up in the secretary’s office – you know, the room next to the headmaster’s office, where Janet has her desk and where we keep all the registers and the staff rotas and that sort of thing – even though I knew he wouldn’t be there. It was the last place I looked and when I didn’t find him there I lingered. For no particular reason other than I didn’t know where else to go. I leant against one of the filing cabinets and started to click my tongue against the roof of my mouth. It’s a habit I have. Most annoying to those around me, I would imagine.

  Everything okay, George? You look as stressed as I feel. This from Janet. She’s seated at her desk.

  I don’t reply. I give a grunt maybe.

  George? she says again. I look at her and she’s smiling. She’s waiting.

  Yes, Janet. Thanks. Everything’s fine. I push myself away from the filing cabinet and I’m about to leave. Then I say, you haven’t seen Samuel have you, Janet?

  Samuel? she says.

  Samuel. Samuel Szajkowski.

  No, she says. Then, yes. That is, he’s gone home, she says. The headmaster sent him home. I… um… don’t think he was feeling very well.

  Oh, I say. Oh. And I’m pondering this as I make to leave.

  With one word, though, Janet stops me. She asks me why. And I don’t really notice at the time but it’s a suspicious why. A defensive why. Like you’d say to a friend who’s just asked you how much money you have in your wallet.

  No reason, I say. It’s not important. And this time I do leave. And do you know what, Inspector? I wish now that I hadn’t. Given what has happened. The benefit of hindsight and all that. Because there was something more to it. I know there was and I realise now that Janet knew there was. And it doesn’t take much to get Janet talking. That’s why I left, in fact. She can trap you, just with her eyes and her tongue, from the opposite corner of a room. She would have told me what she knew if only I had asked. I wouldn’t even have had to ask, come to that. All I would have needed to do was provide her with an opening.

  Instead I spent the rest of my free period trying to concentrate on marking papers. After that I had classes. The next day, the Tuesday, Samuel didn’t come to school at all. He was still ill, that was all I could find out. Then, on Wednesday morning, I saw him. I was in the staffroom and I must admit I had almost forgotten why I was so desperate to find him. Not forgotten exactly. My unease, rather, had become more like idle curiosity. Only when he walked through the door, just as everyone else was filing out, did that sense of urgency reassert itself.

  He’s still wearing the same suit, the same shirt, the same tie. This time there’s no doubting that his clothes are unwashed, stained, crumpled. Also, he smells. I can tell he smells even from the distance I am away from him because the teachers he passes wince, they wrinkle their noses, they pull back so as not to brush against him. It’s time for assembly – it’s time for the assembly – but I hang back anyway to
try and talk to him. Vicky Long, though – she grabs my arm. She starts walking and talking and dragging me towards the door. I try to extricate myself but before I know it I’m in the corridor and Samuel’s left alone in the staffroom. Vicky’s talking to me about the musical she’s directing. An end-of-term performance of Oklahoma! She’s short a cowboy and she’s hoping I’ll agree to step in. There are only a few lines, she tells me, and practically no singing. There’s a dance or two but nothing complicated. A jig. A two-step. I’d have them down in fifteen minutes. Thirty minutes maybe – fifteen minutes a dance. So what do I say? Will I do it? It will be such fun, she promises me. Will I do it then? What do I say?

  I don’t say anything. I’m in the assembly hall now, climbing the steps to the stage. I’m taking my seat and something or someone catches Vicky’s attention and she drifts towards the seats on the other side of the lectern. I look down at the rows in front of me. The children are already seated. Some are whispering, one or two are laughing, giggling really, but most are sombre. They’ve caught on to the mood that the headmaster’s summons sought to convey. They know that there has been trouble. They know that the headmaster is about to put on a show.

  I’m still looking for Samuel when Mr Travis walks in. He closes the rear set of doors behind him, with a click that is more ominous somehow than if he had slammed them shut. Silence. The children stare ahead, at their hands in their laps, at their feet. A few affect nonchalance, bravado. There are two empty seats on the stage: one behind the lectern, the other at the lectern end of Vicky’s row. None of the other teachers seem to notice, however. They are watching the headmaster as he strides the length of the hall. He’s wearing a grey suit and a black tie. His shoes are polished to a military sheen. His footsteps are not loud but they resonate. They are as relentless and as purposeful as a countdown.

  The rest, Inspector, I believe you know. I did not get a chance to talk to Samuel. I did not make that chance. Whether I would have been able to change anything anyway, I’ll never know. Possibly I would have. Probably what happened next would still have found a way to happen.

  It’s not much of a consolation, is it? It’s not much of a consolation at all.

  .

  At the gate, Lucia paused. David had already stepped through and was several paces closer to the door. He turned when he realised Lucia was no longer at his shoulder.

  ‘What is it?’ he said.

  Lucia looked up at the house. It seemed empty. Abandoned almost. There was no movement at any of the windows. All the upstairs curtains were drawn, in fact, including those in Elliot’s room. Through the bay window downstairs Lucia could see an empty sofa, a coffee table bearing a stack of coasters and nothing else, a carpet devoid of toys, magazines, rogue shoes or slippers: anything that would suggest the house was still inhabited. The television in the corner was switched off.

  She stepped through the gate and refastened the latch. She sensed David watching her as she passed him. ‘Second thoughts?’ he said but she ignored him.

  A freesheet protruded from the letterbox. From its pages, a clutch of flyers had fallen on to the doormat. Lucia looked for a doorbell but could not find one. She glanced at David, then turned back to the door and twice tapped her knuckles against one of the frosted-glass panels.

  ‘No one’s going to hear that,’ David said.

  But a moment later they registered footsteps. Someone was coming down the stairs, in a hurry it seemed. The steps ended with a thump and for a second or two there was silence. Then a chain rattled and a lock clicked and the door unstuck itself from its frame as whoever was inside tugged it inwards. A girl’s face appeared, level with Lucia’s midriff.

  She did not look like Elliot. Her hair was so blonde it might almost have been bleached. If she had freckles, they would have been the kind that only came out in the sun. And her eyes were blue, whereas Elliot’s had been a muddy grey. Her nose, slightly squashed, may have resembled her brother’s; the worry lines on her forehead too. It was the girl’s expression, though, that most reminded Lucia of Elliot. In the set of her features she seemed apprehensive, almost fearful.

  When she spoke, however, there was no trace of Elliot’s timidity. ‘Yes?’ she said.

  ‘Hi,’ Lucia replied. ‘You must be Sophie.’

  The girl frowned. She turned to look at David and her frown deepened. ‘Who are you?’

  ‘This is David. My name’s Lucia. Is your father home, honey? Your mother?’

  ‘Are you reporters?’

  Lucia shook her head. ‘No. We’re not reporters.’

  The girl’s eyes narrowed. ‘What’s the password?’

  Lucia looked at David. David looked at Lucia.

  ‘Password?’ Lucia said. ‘I don’t think we know the password. If you could just—’

  The door closed. Lucia was left staring at the flaking mustard paintwork.

  ‘So,’ David said. ‘What now?’

  Lucia hesitated, then knocked once more, louder than she had the first time. Even as she withdrew her hand, however, there was a rattle and the door was pulled wide. Elliot’s father stood just across the threshold. His daughter was seated at the bottom of the stairs in the hallway, her chin in her upturned palms, her eyes fixed on Lucia and David: intruders.

  ‘Detective Inspector May,’ Samson said. He seemed barely to notice David. Even as Lucia introduced her companion, Samson’s handshake was cursory, mechanical, uninterested. ‘Come in,’ he said. ‘Fetch your mother, Sophie. And clear away your things.’

  There was a book lying face down to the side of one of the stairs. Sophie snatched it up and stomped her way to the landing.

  ‘Sorry about that,’ Samson muttered and gestured them into the lounge. David thanked him. Lucia led the way.

  ‘Have a seat,’ said Samson and they sat, side by side on the pale-green sofa Lucia had seen through the window from the porch. She found herself sinking back into the upholstery but resisted, shifting herself forwards until she was perched on the edge of the seat, her feet drawn in beneath her and her hands clasped together in her lap. David mimicked her pose.

  ‘Excuse the mess,’ Samson said but there was no mess. He was referring, Lucia assumed, to the boxes piled in the dining area at the far end of the room. Lucia could not tell what was packed inside them but the lounge itself had been stripped of adornments. Only the furniture, a few pictures and, tucked between cushion and arm on Lucia’s end of the sofa, a copy of that day’s Times remained. Lucia recalled the dishevelment she had spied the last time she had been in the house: the piles of books, the coats and shoes in the hall, Sophie’s bike, the remnants of breakfast scattered like crumbs; all the trappings, in short, of a family home straining to accommodate its occupants.

  ‘You’re moving?’ Lucia said but Samson shook his head.

  ‘Just having a clear-out. Getting rid of a few things. Junk. Kids’ stuff mainly. I should offer you tea. Or coffee?’

  David looked to Lucia. Lucia shook her head. ‘We’re fine. Thank you.’

  The room fell silent. Samson lingered by the door, one hand gripping the handle. He glanced at the chair opposite the sofa and moved towards it, reaching as he did so like a toddler wary of a fall. He lowered himself on to the arm, his knees still pointing towards the door.

  They waited. David cleared his throat.

  When Elliot’s mother entered the lounge, Lucia and David stood. Like her husband, Frances Samson looked tired. She looked, too, like she had been crying. There was a handkerchief barely concealed in one of her fists. Her hair was combed but bunched back in an unglamorous knot. She wore jeans and a shirt, untucked, that might once have belonged to her husband.

  Lucia took a step forwards but Elliot’s mother merely nodded and slid away, until she was barricaded behind the armchair. Samson remained perched on the arm. To an observer, they would have seemed the reluctant callers, Lucia and David the uneasy hosts. Sophie remained out of sight but Lucia had the impression that she was lurking at the top
of the stairs.

  ‘Thank you for seeing us,’ Lucia said. ‘I realise you’re probably both very busy.’

  To Lucia’s surprise, Samson laughed. The sound was bitter, almost derisive. ‘Not that busy, Inspector. Not busy enough, if you want the truth.’

  Samson’s wife put a hand on his shoulder. ‘Paul,’ she said. Samson did not turn around and her hand dropped away.

  ‘What do you want, Inspector? Why are you here? Forgive me for being so blunt but your call – it was somewhat unexpected. ’

  Lucia nodded. ‘This is David Wells,’ she said, looking at Samson’s wife. ‘He’s a solicitor. A very good solicitor.’

  David mumbled something. He tugged at one of his trouser legs, fiddled with a cufflink.

  ‘David’s firm was involved in a case some time back. It was several years ago now but it’s relevant. To your situation. To what happened to your son.’

  Now Samson began to fidget. He said nothing.

  ‘There was a boy,’ Lucia continued, addressing Elliot’s father again. ‘He had problems at school, just like Elliot.’

  ‘Elliot didn’t have problems, Inspector. He was bullied. The problems weren’t his. They were forced upon him.’

  Again Lucia nodded. ‘What I mean to say is, this boy was bullied too. He was persecuted, just like your son. In different ways perhaps. Through different means. But he suffered.’