The Teacher's Secret

by Suzanne Leal

  He shakes his head. ‘Not for me.’

  Nina feels Bridie start to tremble. ‘I’m sorry,’ she says. ‘For running away. I’m really sorry.’

  Nina keeps the girl close. ‘It’s okay,’ she says. ‘It’s okay.’

  Bridie pulls back so she can see Nina’s face. ‘Are you still going to call the police?’

  ‘You won’t be in trouble,’ Nina tells her. ‘I promise.’

  Terry Pritchard leans forward in his seat. ‘What’s say we go and find Leonie?’ he suggests to Bridie. ‘Maybe you could help her on the register while I sort things out here.’

  This makes Nina bridle. How dare he try to take over? How dare he have the nerve to suggest anything at all?

  Instead of falling silent, he keeps talking. ‘They get on well,’ he says. ‘Leonie’s always happy to give her a go on the register. And, quite frankly, she’d be better doing that than staying here listening to us.’

  I’m her teacher, Nina wants to tell him, and I’ll decide what she’d be better doing. Instead she gives him a stiff nod.

  Standing up, he walks over to the girl. ‘Let’s go, sweetie,’ he says. Bridie gives him a tentative smile and, to Nina’s horror, slips her hand in his as they head towards the door.

  Get your filthy hands off her, she wants to cry out. Only the thought of scaring the child stops her. But as she watches them disappear down the aisle, another fear seizes her. What if he were to simply take her out of the shop? What then?

  Her mind racing, she follows them towards the exit doors. And when she fears he will do just that—he will walk out with her—he stops at the cash register.

  ‘Leonie,’ he calls out, lifting the hand still clutching Bridie, ‘thought you might need a bit of back-up help.’

  Leonie is a plain woman, her lank hair tied back in a loose ponytail, but when she sees Bridie, her face lights up. ‘That’s good news for me. You going to be my offsider for a bit?’

  Bridie nods as Leonie lets her into the register area.

  Terry Pritchard gives them both a wink. ‘Let the boss know I’ll be in the tearoom. There’s just something I need to sort out.’ He says all this with an easy smile; a smile he drops as soon as he turns back to Nina.

  In the tearoom, he offers her a seat then sits down across from her. Leaning back in his chair, he lays his hands on the table, palms out. ‘Okay,’ he says, ‘so shoot.’

  Nerves make her own hands shake as she takes a breath. ‘What have you been doing to her?’ she asks.

  His answer comes quickly, without hesitation. ‘Today,’ he says, ‘I was comforting her. Today she turned up on the verge of hysterics so I brought her in here to calm her down.’

  Unlikely, she thinks. ‘So that’s why you had her on your lap, is it, to calm her down?’

  He looks at her with distaste. ‘Yes,’ he says, ‘that’s why I had her on my lap.’ The way he says this—with such disdain, with such scorn—fills her with rage.

  How dare he? she thinks. How dare he treat her like that, given everything he’s done?

  ‘I know all about you,’ she tells him, her voice hard.

  To her astonishment, this makes him laugh.

  ‘I doubt that,’ he says.

  She feels the colour rising up her neck. ‘Laurie Mathews has told me everything.’

  Again he laughs: a sarcastic, angry sort of laugh. ‘And, of course, Laurie Mathews would be well placed to do this, wouldn’t she? Given that she worked with me for, what, less than half a year?’

  She doesn’t have to listen to this. ‘She told me why you had to leave,’ she says.

  His voice turns sharp. ‘And what exactly did she tell you?’

  ‘That you’re not allowed to work with children. Under the—’ she grapples for the right term ‘—child-protection laws.’

  He gives her a dry smile. ‘Which means I must be a paedophile, is that what you’re trying to say?’

  When she doesn’t answer, he runs a finger over his lip. ‘Let me help you out. I think you’ll find that what I am is a “prohibited person” under the Prohibited Persons Act. I think that’s the term you’re looking for. Is that what Laurie told you?’

  She’s not sure. ‘Something like that.’

  He nods. ‘All right, then. And since you know everything about me already, I’d imagine you know why it is that I’m a prohibited person.’

  ‘Carnal knowledge,’ she whispers, her voice tightening.

  ‘Carnal knowledge,’ he repeats, ‘that’s right. I have a conviction for carnal knowledge. And since Laurie told you everything, I assume she told you the circumstances. The agreed facts, that’s what the police call them.’

  Nina shakes her head. ‘No, I don’t think so.’

  He seems unsurprised to hear this. ‘Well, maybe I can help you out there. Make sure you’re right: that you actually do know everything about me.’ He cocks an eyebrow at her. ‘So why don’t we start with the facts, then, the agreed facts. Yes, there was a girl—Clare, that’s her name—and yes, she was only fifteen and yes, because she was so young, I should have known better. I accept that. I’ll wear that. But I’m not sure that makes me a paedophile.’

  She doesn’t want to hear his excuses. ‘Well, what does it make you, then? She was a child, you’ve said it yourself. She was fifteen years old.’

  ‘That’s right,’ he says, ‘at fifteen she was a child, and I was an adult. So what I did was a crime. I accept that. But out of interest, did Laurie tell you how old I was when it all happened?’

  She stays silent.

  ‘Funny that,’ he murmurs. ‘Well, let me tell you, then. I was eighteen years old, and the victim—if that’s what we’re going to call her—was my girlfriend.’

  Nina stares at him. ‘You were eighteen?’

  He nods. ‘That’s right. Eighteen. I was eighteen when she fell pregnant. And Clare, she was fifteen. Call me naive, but I thought we’d go ahead and have the baby. She’d have been sixteen by the time she gave birth; I’d have been nineteen. I wasn’t earning a lot—I was a baby carpenter in those days—but I figured we’d get by.’

  He pushes his thumb up against the edge of the table. ‘Her parents, they were the only snag. They screamed blue murder. As far as they were concerned, there was no way she’d be keeping the baby. So she had an abortion instead. At least, that’s what I heard. Because once they found out about the pregnancy, she wasn’t allowed to have any contact with me. None. And the next thing I know, I’m being charged with carnal knowledge. Because she was a child and I was an adult. Simple as that.’

  That can’t be right, Nina thinks. It can’t work like that.

  ‘Of course, I could have denied it—denied being the father and all. That would have been a way out. But I was the father, wasn’t I? Or at least I would have been. And that was the truth of it. So I pleaded guilty, copped a good-behaviour bond, and everyone told me how well I’d done to get it: they’d expected me to go to jail.’

  When he looks across at her, he gives a soft chuckle. ‘To be honest, I’d expected it too. And when I didn’t, I just wanted to get away instead. So I moved down south, where no one knew me. And later, much later, my record was finally wiped—that’s what they told me, anyway—and I didn’t have to disclose the conviction anymore. So I didn’t. By then, I’d started to get sick of the building caper—not that I didn’t like carpentry, I just didn’t like the industry—and I was looking for something else to do. We’d just got married, Michelle and me, and she suggested teaching. Said she thought I’d be suited to it, because I was good with kids.’

  He lets out a laugh that isn’t really a laugh at all. ‘And how about this for a twist to the story? After the mess with Clare, it turned out Michelle and I couldn’t have kids. Funny, isn’t it, how these things pan out? So, long story short, I went to teachers’ college, got the degree, then started teaching. And what a fabulous thing that turned out to be. What a marvellous thing that was.’

  For moment, he is quiet.
‘But it all came back again. Forty years later and it all came out. Because that’s how it works, doesn’t it? Doesn’t matter how much time’s gone by, doesn’t matter what the situation was, once you’ve been done for something like that, you’re cooked. And as it happened, Laurie Mathews was the one to get the ball rolling. She got the department to check up on me. And bingo, they struck gold. Carnal knowledge.’

  Nina is confused. ‘But couldn’t you have explained the situation? Couldn’t you have told them how old you were?’

  He shakes his head. ‘I’ve asked the lawyers, love—believe me, I’ve asked them—but it seems that there’s no way around it. Once they find out you’ve been done for carnal knowledge, that’s it, you’re out. No appeal, nothing.’

  For a moment, she feels herself wavering. What if it’s true, she asks herself, what if everything he’s told her is true? What if that’s all there is to know?

  But she’s getting ahead of herself. Because even if it’s all true—everything he’s told her—it still doesn’t explain what he was doing with a child on his lap and the door closed behind them.

  So that’s what she asks him.

  Closing his eyes, he tilts back his head and takes a deep breath. ‘Do you know how humiliating it is to be asked a question like that? Do you have any idea what it’s like?’

  When he opens his eyes again, he takes a good look at her. ‘You want to know why Bridie came here? She came to me because she needed my help. She was that upset the first time she turned up—just out of the blue—and I didn’t know what to do. I couldn’t just send her packing, could I?’

  Nina doesn’t know what he’s talking about.

  ‘It was the bloody play,’ he explains. ‘She didn’t think she could do it. Didn’t think she’d be able to get up onstage; didn’t think her voice would be loud enough; didn’t think she’d be able to remember her lines. Didn’t think she could do anything. And when she came here that first time, when she came to find me, she’d got herself into such a state, it took me half an hour to calm her down.’

  There’s a half-smile on his face now. ‘You know what she wanted me to do? Join some bloody play committee so I could come to school to help with the rehearsals. How the hell could I tell her I wouldn’t be able to do it because I wasn’t even allowed to set foot in the school? That if Laurie Mathews so much as saw me on the school premises, she’d be setting the dogs on to me? So I told her I couldn’t help out with the rehearsals because I had to work at the shop. That’s the excuse I gave her. And you know what she said? She said she could come to me instead; she could come after school and just wait until I was free. How could I refuse her? You tell me. So I said we could give it a try and she started coming on a Thursday after school. I’d take my break, we’d come in here to get a bit of peace and quiet, then we’d go through her part.’

  ‘But why you?’ Nina asks him. ‘Why didn’t she just ask her grandmother to help?’

  The question makes him laugh. ‘Good old Vonnie. Why can’t Vonnie stretch herself just a bit further? Vonnie’s got a heart of gold, anyone will tell you that, but she’s struggling. She’s over seventy, for God’s sake, and she’s trying to raise a young girl. She can’t do everything—it’s a wonder she manages as well as she does. I’ve always tried to help out where I could.’

  ‘Like buying her glasses?’ She asks this deliberately, so he’ll know that she knows all about it.

  Again he laughs. ‘Laurie’s told you about it, has she? That I broke the kid’s glasses so I could lure her into my car? Is that what she said?’

  He’s wearing her down now and she doesn’t want to be worn down. And she doesn’t have to answer any of his questions. Not when he’s the one who’s supposed to be answering her. ‘I’m going to have to tell her,’ she says.

  He looks baffled. ‘Tell who?’

  ‘Laurie.’

  ‘About what?’

  ‘That I found Bridie here, with you. I’m going to have to tell her.’

  His face falls. ‘Do you have to?’

  She hesitates before she answers. ‘Yes,’ she says, ‘I do.’

  He lets out a long sigh. ‘Well, that’s something for you to decide,’ he says eventually. ‘But let me say this: if you tell Laurie, I can guarantee you she’ll contact the police—because it’s me, and because of the whole palaver—and if she contacts the police, she’ll also be contacting Family Services. And once she does that, it’ll all be on.’ He’s becoming agitated now. ‘Just so you know, this is how it goes: some Family Services officer will be brought on board, and they’ll be overworked and under-experienced, but with any luck well meaning, and they’ll have a close look into Bridie’s situation to see what they can find. And if they look hard enough, you know what they’ll find?’

  When Nina shakes her head, he makes a clicking sound. ‘Well, Nina,’ he says, ‘I know. I know exactly what they might find. The problem is I’ve been told a lot of it in confidence. And I’m not the sort of person who blabs about things. It’s something I’ve always prided myself on. But you might appreciate that I’m in a bit of a tight spot here now: if I keep it all to myself, you’ll be straight off to Laurie Mathews and the police and Family Services and what have you. And if I do tell you what I know—in the hope you might have a bit of a rethink—then I’ll be breaking a confidence. So you can see how I’m caught: either I spill the beans or I sit by and watch the catastrophe unfold. The thing is,’ he says, his voice thick now, ‘that means we have to come to an arrangement: anything I tell you, you’re going to have to promise to keep it to yourself.’

  While he waits for her answer, a voice fills her head. It’s Marina’s voice, low and droll. Sounds a bit freaky, love. Got himself banned from the school and now he wants you to keep his secrets for him? Sounds a bit problematic, Nina Ballerina.

  But she needs to find out. So she promises.

  ‘How much do you know about Bridie, family-wise?’ he begins.

  Almost nothing, she admits. That her mother died, and that she lives with her grandmother. That’s all she knows.

  He takes a moment to consider this. ‘And her father, what do you know about him?’

  ‘Only that he’s been working up north,’ she says.

  This makes him chuckle. ‘Up north now, is he? It used to be out west. She’s getting inventive, I’ll give her that much. As it happens, he’s not working up north, or out west, for that matter. He’s not actually working at all, unless you count the roster they give them.’

  She doesn’t know what he’s talking about.

  ‘Trent’s been inside pretty much since the day Bridie was born,’ he tells her, ‘and he’ll be there until she’s well and truly out of school. Twenty-two years he got, all up.’

  ‘I had no idea,’ she says quietly.

  He seems pleased to hear it. ‘Diane always took care to keep it under wraps. Strictly on a need-to-know basis. Bridie doesn’t know that much herself. If you were to ask her, she’d say robbery. And there’s probably some truth in that. But it still leaves a bit out. The bit the kid did to get himself such a long sentence. The bit about what happened to her mother.’

  Nina can feel her eyes widen.

  ‘Yes,’ he says, ‘comes as a bit of a shock, doesn’t it?’

  ‘How?’ she whispers.

  He shrugs. ‘Nothing very original. Donna was at home with Bridie when Trent came home, tanked again. And maybe Donna said something to him, something that got him going, so he gave her what for. Only this time he went too far. This time, he killed her. Lucky he didn’t kill Bridie while he was at it, I suppose. Stupid boy. Stupid, stupid boy. You couldn’t have seen it coming. Leastways, I didn’t.’

  Nina can only whisper, ‘You knew him?’

  ‘Oh yes,’ he says softly, ‘I knew Trent Juckes. I had him in Year 6, you know, and by the end of the year, I thought I knew him like the back of my hand, little blighter that he was. A lot like Kurt Ward, really—always up to mischief, but bright, too, and funny wi
th it. A bit rough, but all right. Never out of control. I can still see his cheeky little face looking up at me. Gave me the shock of my life to read about it afterwards. Thank God for Vonnie. Thank God she took over. I knew she would, mind you, I knew she’d step up. But when I saw her in the schoolyard with that little girl beside her, well, you could have knocked me for six. Dead ringer, she was, an absolute dead ringer for her father.’

  He pulls at his hands until the knuckles crack. ‘Trent and Donna, they were never married—they were still so young, weren’t they—so officially Bridie was Simon, like her mother. Donna’s name had been plastered all over the papers, and soon enough everyone would have put two and two together. They’d have worked out that Bridie was Donna’s daughter. But here’s the thing: Vonnie was Taylor, from her second marriage, so when Bridie turned up at the school, I suggested Vonnie change her name to Taylor, too. That way there wouldn’t be a connection to either of them: to Donna or to Trent. Of course, Brindle’s a small place and Vinnie’s cohort, they’d have known—nothing to be done about that—but at least we could try to keep it a bit quiet where we could. So that’s what happened. And up until now, it seems to have worked. The way I see it, the longer it stays like that the better. Because once the police or Family Services get a whiff of it, it’ll all be on again and suddenly she won’t be Bridie Taylor anymore, she’ll be that kid. And I don’t think she could cope with it. I don’t think any of us could.’

  Terry

  Once they’re in the car—she drives a small, zippy little thing—he stands by the entrance to the shop and waves them off. He’s not sure what else to do, how else to behave. So he waves. And as he waves, he whacks a smile on his face in case Bridie is still watching. Only when the car is out of sight does he let it fade. Then he just stands there. When he feels his shoulders slump, quickly he pulls them back again. This is not the time to crack. This is the time to get back to work.

  So he gets back to work. And for the rest of the afternoon and into the evening, he’s as attentive to the customers as always: he listens to their questions, he gives them some suggestions, he even manages a joke or two. The only thing that makes it difficult is his throat: it’s so dry it just about kills him to swallow.