Killing You Softly

by Lucy Carver

  Hooper followed with his cello, then Luke with his double-bass and Will with his viola. The quartet took their place by the side of the singers.

  Tap-tap-tap. Bruno settled them down and appealed for full concentration. His manner was fussy and irascible, like Hercule Poirot. Come to think of it, that’s not a bad comparison. Bruno is short and stout, dapper and methodical. Every time he conducts, he follows the bars, quavers and semi-quavers like a detective picking up clues. The musicians followed him, playing the quiet, slow prelude to the most famous aria from Verdi’s Aida.

  Egyptian slave girl Aida is waiting for Ramades, her lover. Eugenie is Aida; Marco is Ramades.

  Eugenie opened her mouth and the beautiful words poured out.

  ‘Ah, si tu vieni a recarni, o crudel

  L’ultimo addio.’

  Ah! If you come to give me, so cruel,

  Your last goodbye.

  ‘No, no!’ Bruno rat-a-tat-tatted his baton against the lectern. ‘More feeling, more passion, Eugenie. L’ultimo addio – last goodbye! Aida knows she will lose him. She is sad beyond words.’

  Marco stayed in the background as Eugenie began again. The string quartet kept perfect pace and rhythm. Bruno conducted with theatrical intensity, head to one side, both arms raised.

  Jealousy, exile and betrayal – that’s the theme of Aida. Songbird Eugenie closed her eyes and sang as if she had an old soul in her seventeen-year-old body, a soul that had experienced all there was to know about love and loss.

  ‘O patria mia, non ti vedro mai piu!’

  Oh my homeland, I will never see you again!

  ‘Yes,’ Bruno said with quiet satisfaction at the end, after each of his students had sung their parts. He didn’t praise or critique, but simply put down his baton and turned to the page where Aida and Ramades die together in a darkened tomb.

  ‘I never knew Marco could sing like that,’ I confessed to Hooper when the lesson had finished.

  Six of us left the music room together, leaving Eugenie and Marco to take notes from Bruno. We were headed for dinner, me with Galina’s school tie and the two Post-it notes stuffed in my jacket pocket.

  ‘I expect there’s a lot about Marco that we don’t know,’ Hooper suggested.

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘Like where he went to school before he came to St Jude’s, how big is his allowance, plus why he hates his dad.’

  ‘Does he?’

  ‘That’s my theory. Why else would he make a big show of saying no to following in his father’s giant footballing footsteps then play anyway?’

  Hooper braved the sub-zero gusts of wind, surging ahead of me across the car park then turning left round the front of the main building, his cello case in hand. I stopped to consider then ran to catch up with him at the main entrance. ‘You think Marco’s rejecting the whole football-hero lifestyle?’

  He nodded. ‘I know zilch about the game but even I realize that he’s already good enough to play at professional level – you saw that for yourself.’

  ‘In the five-a-side match – yes, you’re right. I remember that he did say he hates the game. Is that the same thing as hating your dad, though?’

  ‘Please yourself.’ Hooper shrugged. ‘I just thought it would be worth looking at. I’ll do it for you if you like.’

  ‘Cool. Yeah, go ahead.’ Ever since the hearts text and the jealous-rival flare-up with Jack, I’d pretty much kept my distance from Italian lover boy so Hooper’s offer to do a little investigating on my behalf was welcome. ‘I don’t think there’s much there, though,’ I warned.

  Zara and the girls had my back and eager, introverted, brilliant Hooper had taken up the Marco trail. Both things felt good as I waited for Jack in the entrance to the dining room.

  ‘This’ll only take a couple of minutes,’ he’d promised when he spotted Shirley Welford talking to Justine by the self-service counter. ‘I need to change the time of our next tutorial.’

  And this was a chance for me to contact Ripley about the tie and the messages, I decided. I took out my phone and found my list of contacts, but before I could make the call Will came up from behind and snatched the phone from my hand.

  ‘Will, what are you playing at? Give me that!’ I protested.

  ‘ “Give me that!” ’ he mimicked, holding it out of reach. ‘Who were you planning to call – your friend, Inspector Ripley? Yeah, I’m right – it was her.’

  ‘What’s it to you, Will?’ Here was another person who was not my flavour of the month – ever since the scuffle had broken out in the boys’ dorm and Hooper had hared off to fetch Molly.

  ‘Alyssa Stephens thinks that Alex Driffield is innocent –’ Will sneers as he breaks off from his card game – ‘holy shit! Now she’s got her super-sleuth claws in me!’

  Jack takes a swing at Will, punches him in the stomach and Will bends over double. Luke and Marco are the ones who drag them apart.

  Hooper sprints off while Zara insists that we hear Will’s version of events. ‘Come on, Will, we’re listening.’

  ‘So, I knew Scarlett,’ Will admits. He’s furious with me for dragging his relationship with Scarlett into the open and still has one hand across his stomach to protect himself from another attack. ‘But what am I going to do – go around telling everyone I was her ex and she dumped me for some other kid she met on holiday?’

  And Will was suddenly suspect number one.

  Ripley came knocking and interviewed him for two hours. But I still needed to be sure in my own mind – was Will a crazy psychopath?

  ‘Will, give me back my phone,’ I insisted.

  ‘Like you and Hooper gave me my phone back? Or, excuse me, let me rephrase that: like you and Hooper did after you’d stolen it from me?’

  ‘We didn’t steal it!’ I reminded him in a tone of injured innocence. ‘You dropped it and Hooper handed it back to you.’

  28th December, Scarlett to Will:

  Really need to see you

  Answer my texts

  Where r u? We need to talk.

  Those were the incriminating messages, word for word.

  ‘The problem with you is that you keep missing what’s under your nose.’

  My stalker is in a constant state of disappointment with me. He keeps raising the stakes, taking major risks to return Galina’s tie and leave me more messages. And I’m still not getting it.

  Will is here right now, in my face, under my nose. He is challenging me. Is it him – is he my stalker?

  ‘You read my texts,’ he accused, waving my phone in front of my face then rapidly raising it above his head. ‘You dropped me in deep shit.’

  There was no point denying it. ‘No deeper than the shit you dropped yourself in. You shouldn’t have kept those pictures on your phone.’

  ‘I didn’t see why not.’

  ‘Because she asked you not to. You kept them because you thought you could twist the knife by using some old photos against her. That’s nasty, Will.’

  He laughed then flung my phone at me. I stuck out a hand to catch it.

  ‘You have no effing idea,’ he mocked. ‘The way you see it, Scarlett was Goody Two Shoes and I was – God knows – anyway, I’m worse than the dog muck you scrape off the sole of your shoe.’

  ‘Unless you can tell me a different story and I decide to believe you – yeah.’

  ‘I can, but you won’t.’

  ‘Try me.’

  ‘OK, Alyssa, listen to this. With Scarlett Hartley, what you saw was not what you got. Sure, she looked fantastic, every guy’s dream girl. But underneath she was a mess.’

  Here it comes, I thought, the classic move to blacken the name of a dead girl who obviously can’t answer back.

  ‘I mean it,’ Will insisted. ‘Anyone going out with Scarlett had to turn into a cross between a shrink and her father, who by the way left home when she was seven years old. It messed her up permanently, so much so that when I started going out with her she came across as the most needy person I eve
r met.’

  ‘That’s not what Ursula told me,’ I said stoutly. ‘She said Scarlett was really upbeat. She came top in everything. That doesn’t sound to me like a girl with serious issues.’

  ‘Bright but flaky. The two things can definitely go together in one stunning, sexy package.’ He said this with a meaningful stare.

  ‘OK, I know you want to stick the two of us in the same boat.’ Just like my insane stalker guy did, actually. My flesh crept and I raised my shoulders to try and stop myself shivering.

  ‘You want an example? Take the night of the party,’ he went on. ‘Scarlett’s made an effort and she’s looking amazing but on the inside she’s falling apart because Alex isn’t there. She tells Jayden that Alex should’ve told his dad to sod off and come with her instead. She’s had too much to drink so her guard’s down and she lets Jayden know that someone’s been stalking her, and now she’s paranoid. Alex knows she can’t stand to be alone. She says he’s let her down big time – loud enough for everyone in the room to hear.’

  ‘So what did you do? Did you try to calm her down?’

  Will came right back at me. ‘You’re kidding me. I’ve spent my whole time since last summer trying to stay out of Scarlett’s way. So was I honestly going to step in and mop up the messy pieces just because she’d had a fight with Alex?’

  ‘Jesus, Will, is there a heart locked away behind all this macho bullshit?’

  ‘What are you talking about?’

  ‘The girl you once went out with, who at some time you must have really liked, is dead. Now all you do is trample her name in the mud.’

  ‘No. I’m telling you the truth, setting the record straight like I did with Ripley. Sure, Scarlett was beautiful and mega bright, with that photographic memory thing.’

  ‘Eidetic,’ I corrected pedantically. At least get the correct terminology, please. ‘It means you can pass exams, no problem, but otherwise it’s not all it’s cracked up to be.’

  Will shrugged. ‘You’re right – Scarlett didn’t appreciate having it. When we were together, she said she wished she could flick a switch and turn it off.’

  This time I managed not to hitch my shoulders up around my ears and instead took a deep breath, trying to dispel the familiar fear that Scarlett and I had led parallel lives and that at this rate, unless I pieced the clues together and solved the mystery, I too could soon end up face down in the canal.

  ‘Are you OK, Alyssa?’ Jack said as he rejoined me and Will. I saw that he was tensed up, ready to strike out in my defence.

  ‘Yes, I’m cool,’ I said wearily. ‘Will was telling me about the real Scarlett – the one behind the smiley face we all saw in the paper.’

  ‘Truth time – Alyssa thinks I killed her,’ Will scoffed, refusing to move aside.

  I stared at him for a long time. No, he wasn’t devious enough, not unless this was a double bluff. But then Will was impatient and didn’t pay enough attention to detail to carry that off. He had a brilliant mind, though. I went round in circles until finally I nailed it in one short phrase – he was angry but not crazy.

  ‘No,’ I sighed. ‘You’re wrong, Will. I crossed you off my list days ago.’

  I ate dinner with Jack, or rather I pushed my food around my plate. Then we walked down a long, low corridor in the ancient part of the school building to the old library where no one went. It was a book-lined room with an Adams-style fireplace and leather chairs, low oak tables with magazines and periodicals, and leather-bound volumes on the shelves that gave off a fusty smell, which was somehow comforting.

  ‘So – not Will?’ Jack sighed, putting his feet up on one of the low tables.

  I sat opposite him, curling my feet under me and tapping the arms of my chair. ‘Not unless he’s putting in an Oscar-winning performance to fool us.’

  ‘OK.’ Leaning back in his chair, Jack looked at me through half-closed eyes. Neither of us said anything for a long time.

  Happy with the silence, I did my favourite thing of breathing him in. I thought how much I loved him without needing to say it, felt my heart loosen and lighten, my whole body relax.

  ‘Why are you smiling?’ he asked eventually.

  I love you. I can’t believe it – is it possible that I’ve been lucky enough to find the person I want to be with forever? Do you know that you make me feel light and airy, feathery and free? If I tell you, will you run a mile?

  I didn’t say any of this – just thought it as I gazed at him.

  ‘Tell me,’ he urged.

  If I tell you that your eyes are the colour of clear honey and I know and love every centimetre of your face – those straight, dark brows; high, smooth forehead; and strong, perfect jaw (not too square, not too jutting, not too anything) – will you think less of me or more?

  Jack sat in the glow from a table lamp, watching me watching him.

  ‘You’re not going to say it,’ he guessed at last.

  We were in the moment, smiling, loving. I shook my head.

  I love you, he mouthed. Aloud – ‘I love you.’

  ‘I love you too.’ And my heart was totally his.

  ‘Narcissistic Personality Disorder,’ Zara read.

  It was Monday morning and we both had a study period. I came across her in the technology centre, busy looking up information on a website. Luke and Connie were there as well, but too loved-up to notice Zara and me sitting in a side bay overlooking the stand of bare beech trees set against an iron-grey sky.

  ‘An individual who suffers from NPD is excessively preoccupied with issues of personal adequacy, power, prestige and vanity. He or she may need admiration and lack empathy. They have an unwarranted sense of self-importance.’

  ‘Why are you showing me this?’ I asked.

  ‘I’ve been thinking. This guy we’re after for Scarlett and Galina – he’s mentally ill, right?’

  ‘Most likely, yes. And he’s on a power trip with me, for sure.’

  ‘He lacks empathy, plus he needs you to say, “Wow, how clever you are to keep ahead of the game!” ’

  ‘Again, yes. It gives him a buzz – he enjoys it.’

  ‘I love you when you’re angry, Alyssa. Catch me if you can.’

  Zara seemed pleased with herself for honing in on something that might give us a way forward. ‘Historically, people with NPD have been megalomaniacs. Think Napoleon, Hitler, Catherine the Great.’

  I nodded and we read on together. Statistically NPD occurs on average in one per cent of the population, which doesn’t sound a lot, but be aware – one in every hundred people you’re about to meet is a potential power-hungry monster. Anyway, the sufferer takes advantage of others to achieve goals and fantasises about having great success and power. They’re often extremely intelligent.

  ‘Is this fitting the profile of anyone we know?’ Zara wondered.

  ‘Are you kidding? It fits everyone we know here at St Jude’s!’

  Let’s face it – the outside world sees us as a bunch of arrogant, up-our-own-arses know-it-alls. We live in a hothouse of academic success. Forget Bryony’s rhubarb metaphor – in fact, we’re Narcissus personified. He, by the way, is the kid in the Greek myth who knelt by a lake and for the first time saw his own reflection. And what does he do? He only goes and falls in love with himself. Then he wanders off across country and loses his reflection. The poor, deluded sap searches for the reflection but never finds it again. He eventually dies of a broken heart.

  ‘Now the really bad thing about NPDs,’ budding neuroscientist Zara pointed out with all the conviction of the recent convert, ‘is that the underlying psychology is pathological.’

  ‘Translation – this means it’s a neurological pattern inside the brain that’s outside the sufferer’s control?’

  ‘Exactly – it’s involuntary. If this person is criticized, they may display anger-management issues and often turn violent.’

  ‘But look – it says they can disguise the anger by feigning modesty as a disguise. That makes it real
ly tricky to spot.’

  ‘Yeah, but they also have hypo-manic moods that they can’t disguise and if you push the right buttons the fake modesty blows apart and the psycho comes roaring out.’

  ‘Useful tip for whenever I finally come face to face with the guy,’ I muttered, feeling a shiver of fear run down my neck and spine.

  ‘The condition may be partly genetic.’ Zara read ahead and gave me a summary. ‘Plus, the sufferer has over-indulgent parents, maybe, who hand out unrealistic praise on a daily basis. On the other hand, there could be severe emotional abuse as a child. Or a combination of both. Hey look – there was a guy called Blackwell, jailed in 2005 for killing his parents. Really bright kid, nicknamed “Brains”. Used his dad’s credit cards and beat his mum and dad to death with a claw hammer when they challenged him on the credit-card issue, then used the cards to take his girlfriend to New York for the weekend to stay at the Plaza Hotel. Spent thirty grand. Came back to collect his A-level results – straight A*s in all of them. Police eventually found the parents’ bodies; he denied everything. Charge was reduced to manslaughter through diminished responsibility. Classic case study for NPD, apparently.’

  Facing a gruesome death was not what I would have chosen to be focusing on in my free period, I told Zara. I had a translation to do for Justine, an essay to begin for Bryony.

  ‘But it could be really useful in getting inside your guy’s head,’ she insisted. ‘All the stuff about taking advantage of others and seeking power – that really fits with what’s going on here. And the fact that it’s not always obvious – it doesn’t have to be an in-your-face, show-off guy like some people I could name in this school. Marco, for instance.’

  ‘Actually, there’s probably more to Marco than his blingy car. But funny you should mention him – Hooper’s interested in finding out more.’

  ‘Well, let him go ahead. I’m just getting my own head round the fact it might not be someone that obvious.’ Zara frowned at the screen, ignoring Luke and Connie as they strolled across and peered over our shoulders.

  ‘NPD?’ Luke read. ‘Sounds like a title for a cop series. Oh sorry, no – that was NYPD!’