The Finishing School

by Joanna Goodman

  She just went off to her volleyball tournament without saying a word, without offering a shred of comfort to her. Why hadn’t she hugged her at least? And then, when she got back to school and saw Cressida leaving campus to go meet Magnus, she was resentful, spiteful. She assumed the worst about why Cressida hadn’t shown her the ledger. She ransacked Cressida’s room looking for it and then lay in her bed all night contemplating life without Cressida; how that might be a good thing for her.

  If only she had called out to her from the balcony and begged her to come back. Why didn’t she? Cressida might have come back. For Kersti, she might have.

  Kersti pulls her knees tight into her chest. She feels hollow inside. Maybe this is partly her fault. All her wishing that Cressida would get what was coming to her—a consequence, some disciplinary action, a punishment of any kind—has finally come to fruition. Wasn’t she always secretly hoping Cressida would get in trouble just once, to balance things out? Wouldn’t that have meant the world was just a little bit fair?

  Kersti has always wanted life to be fair. She thought Cressida having to pay for even one of her transgressions would make it so; would appease her. How many times had she silently, secretly wished for her best friend to be taught a lesson?

  She never meant for something like this to happen. She never wanted her prayers to be answered in such an irrevocable, cataclysmic way. If Cressida dies, she’ll never forgive herself.

  Someone bangs on the door. “Kersti? Ouvre la porte!” It’s Hamidou.

  “Is she still alive?” Kersti wants to know.

  “They’re doing everything they can to save her.”

  Kersti knows it’s a lie. Cressida can’t be saved.

  Chapter 35

  LAUSANNE—June 2016

  The Café le Petit Pont Bessières used to be a loud, bustling place filled with convivial, chain-smoking students pounding back chopes of beer before heading out to the bars. Tonight it’s a different vibe altogether. Maybe it’s the new smoking laws or maybe it’s just Kersti’s mood, but the loud din and party atmosphere she remembers is far more subdued and there are only a handful of old men at the other tables.

  After a long discussion about Noa’s planned trip to Africa to adopt a Sudanese refugee, the looming threat of Ebola in Europe, and the alarming revelation that asteroids are going to crash into earth at some point, Kersti politely excuses herself to go to the washroom. She scrubs her hands and splashes water on her face and then stands there by herself, savoring the quiet. Noa has become a crusader, which is noble and exhausting at the same time. Rafaella called her a “cause” junkie.

  Raf is the opposite. She seems to care about very little, only opening her mouth to complain or make negative comments. Her spaetzle tasted like rubber, the wine was cheap, the speeches at the ceremony today were interminable, Paris has lost its magic, the Western world has stopped valuing women, which is why she “chooses” to be alone, and on and on.

  Kersti takes a breath and wills herself to go back out there.

  “We should do something radical,” Noa is saying, with a mouthful of gelato.

  “We’re talking about Hamidou,” Raf tells Kersti.

  “We should call a TV news station and expose the whole thing,” Noa says excitedly. “I’ve done that before.”

  “You can’t do that,” Alison says. “It’s not just Hamidou you’d be destroying. There were victims.”

  They all fall silent. Kersti and Alison told them everything about Hamidou earlier in the evening. Noa was appropriately shocked and outraged, but all Raf said was, “Why am I not surprised?”

  “Did she ever try anything with you?” Kersti asked her.

  “Are you kidding?” Raf responded. “I literally would have beaten the crap out of her and told everyone in school.”

  “No you wouldn’t have,” Alison said softly, and Raf turned red and shut up.

  Noa tops up Raf’s wineglass and then refills her own. Alison doesn’t drink so she’s keeping Kersti company in her pregnancy-imposed sobriety.

  “We should all go to Hamidou’s place together,” Noa continues. “The four of us. Right now. To confront her.”

  “I’m not going to her place,” Alison says wearily.

  “Don’t you want to look her in her beady eyes and tell her that you know?” Noa says, with an intensity that makes Kersti squirm. “Don’t you want to see her face when you tell her you’re going to talk to Bueche and the police?”

  Kersti almost shouts yes, realizing it’s exactly what she wants to do, but she stays quiet.

  “Hamidou knows who has the ledger,” Noa concludes. “I guarantee it.”

  “You think she’d tell me?” Alison says.

  “She’ll have nothing left to lose.”

  “What if she flees the country?” Raf says. “I would if I was a child molester about to get caught.”

  Alison and Kersti look at each other. What if they’ve both come all this way and Hamidou manages to slip away? Hamidou is sly. She may have seen Alison at the ceremony today and already figured out they know.

  “You can make a civil claim against the school, you know,” Raf mentions to Alison. “Bueche would love that.”

  “I don’t care about the money.”

  “There’s been a ton of civil suits against former boarding school teachers,” Noa says. “I read an article that said at least a dozen schools in the UK have had teachers convicted for child abuse.” She finishes her gelato and washes it down with red wine. “The system is broken,” she adds, in a grating, dramatic tone. “I just never imagined it was happening at the Lycée. And Hamidou! She loved us so much—”

  “People harm people they love all the time,” Raf mutters. “That’s what families do.”

  “The system needs to be fixed,” Noa rants. “And it must start with the class system. These allegations are being reported at the most elite schools.”

  Kersti tunes her out and prepares to make her exit. The pregnancy excuse is always universally accepted.

  “I just can’t believe Bueche ignored what those girls spray-painted on the statue,” Alison says. “He just scrubbed Helvetia clean and got rid of the girls instead—”

  In the middle of Alison talking, it hits Kersti like a bolt. “Holy shit,” she blurts.

  “What?”

  “The statue,” she says. “Helvetia.”

  “What about it?”

  When Kersti went to Boston, Cressida tried to say the word statue. It was totally random and out of the blue. Kersti assumed she was just remembering something from her time at the Lycée, but what if she’d been trying to convey something to Kersti about it? Maybe she didn’t even know what, just that there was something. Somewhere in her psyche. What if she remembered?

  “I think I know where the ledger is,” Kersti says. “I should have clued in when Alison told me Cressida buried it.”

  “She buried it?” Raf says. “Why the hell would she do that?”

  “Hamidou used to go through our things,” Alison tells her.

  “I bet you anything the ledger is buried by the statue,” Kersti says.

  They pile out of the cab with shovels, flashlights, and gardening gloves from the Brico+Loisirs, giggling in spite of themselves. It feels a lot like the old days as they sneak across the school grounds in the dark, heading round back.

  “Kersti, you just sit and let us do all the work,” Noa says.

  “I’m fine,” Kersti tells them, excited to start digging. “She wouldn’t have buried it too deep or too far from the statue. Remember, she was planning to come right back for it.”

  Kersti walks around the statue, trying to get inside Cressida’s head. She would have been in a rush, not a lot of time to make a plan or demarcate her spot. She knew she would need it again in a matter of days. She would have shoved it somewhere she could easily remember.

  “I wish we had vodka and smokes,” Raf says, kicking off her shoes. “I’m not quite drunk enough for this to be fun.”


  “It’s not supposed to be fun,” Alison mutters, already on her knees, digging ferociously behind Helvetia.

  “All right,” Raf concedes. “Then at least bearable.”

  Kersti thinks about where Brooke Middlewood and Tatiana Greenberg—the two girls who were expelled—were standing in the photograph Cressida discovered inside the ledger. They were on either side of Helvetia, two sentinels with long hair and broken spirits, valiantly trying to send a message. Kersti kneels down and starts digging to the left of the statue.

  “At least it’s a nice night,” Noa says.

  “Are we crazy?” Alison asks, looking up from her pile of dirt.

  “Batshit,” Kersti says. “If Jay knew I was doing this . . .”

  “What are we hoping to find in this ledger anyway?” Raf asks.

  “Cressida,” Kersti answers. “We’re trying to find part of Cressida.”

  Kersti knows on some level they already have all the evidence they need. She knows the ledger will contain more evidence of some kind and that it’s probably superfluous at this point, unnecessary to make or break an investigation. But it belonged to Cressida. It was the catalyst that propelled her to speak up—for herself and for all the other girls Hamidou abused. She went to each one of them that night and told them she had the ledger and that she was going to put an end to the abuse. Whatever secrets it held, it obviously gave Cressida the courage and the ammunition she’d been waiting for to finally break her silence. Maybe all she ever needed was the support of someone like Amoryn Lashwood, who gave her the reassurance that she wasn’t alone—that it was a horrific legacy that needed to stop. Ledger in hand, Cressida decided she would be the one to do it. She was that brave.

  The ledger has become, for Kersti, the symbol of that bravery; the reminder of what she loved so much about Cressida.

  “Oh!” A small cry from Alison on the other side of the statue. “There’s something here!”

  Kersti crawls over, not giving a shit about her modal sundress, and starts digging right beside Alison. She can feel something hard.

  “Move,” Alison says, and yanks it out of the earth like a weed. It’s wrapped in a plastic Migros bag.

  “I don’t fucking believe it,” Raf says.

  “O mijn God,” Noa breathes.

  Alison hands it to Kersti. Kersti removes it from the bag and holds it the same way Cressida held it all those years ago, with reverence, incredulity.

  The ledger. It’s exactly as Kersti remembered it, only now it has an even more pungent smell of mold and dampness and dirt. She starts to go through it page by page, as Cressida would have done. She imagines Cressida holding it, just like she’s holding it now, reading every line of every page, looking for that secret.

  She’s aware of Noa holding a flashlight over her shoulder, Raf’s wine breath behind her. The first thing she finds is the photograph of the statue with the two girls on either side of it. “Those are the girls who got expelled,” she says.

  “I can’t read what they spray-painted—”

  “Read the back.”

  Do with this ledger what you wish. I’ve got no objections whatever you decide, only personal regrets. Amoryn El-Bahz.

  The other girls are dead silent as Kersti continues turning the pages, scanning the entries for something noteworthy. September, October, November, December. It all seems fairly innocuous.

  December 3, 1973. 23:00. Frei House.

  Minutes:

  Present:

  Amoryn Lashwood, President

  Brooke Middlewood, Vice President

  Tatiana Greenberg, Secretary

  Caris Yaren

  Fernanda Manzanares

  Karen Kim

  Donna Murthy

  Agenda:

  Candlelight Descent. Dec 19.

  HS XMAS dinner. (Café Pont Bessières.) Dec 15?

  1974 Charitable Events:

  Winter Olympics—Funds to Orphanage Lousanna—5 votes. International Women’s Club of Lausanne—2 votes

  “There’s nothing interesting,” Raf says, with disappointment.

  But when Kersti turns the page, she discovers another Polaroid jammed into the spine of the book. “It’s Amoryn Lashwood,” she murmurs, her voice a whisper. She removes it and has a hard time looking at young Amoryn naked in Hamidou’s bed, her expression frightened and confused.

  On the next page, another Polaroid. “Cressida,” Alison says, turning away. The picture is similar to the one that was left for Kersti at the hotel; the pose might be slightly different, but it’s the same bed, the same angle of her body.

  There are at least half a dozen of them. Stuffed between the pages, photos of Cressida, compromised in every possible way. Naked, wearing underwear, touching herself.

  Alison sits down on the base of the statue, her face in her hands. Noa and Raf are standing on either side of Kersti, both of them now shining their flashlights on the journal. They’re sniffling. Kersti can’t bring herself to look at them. She turns another page.

  “Oh God!” Noa cries.

  Kersti slaps the ledger shut before the image can burn itself into her brain.

  “What?” Alison asks from where she’s sitting. “What is it?”

  “Nothing,” Kersti says. “Just more of the same.”

  She doesn’t have the heart to tell her it’s a photograph of Hamidou—explicit, grotesque. Something Kersti wishes she could unsee, the incontrovertible evidence that would have ended Hamidou’s career and destroyed her life if anyone had ever gotten hold of it.

  Alison, clearly traumatized, is the first to leave. Raf and Noa decide to go for a drink at a nearby brasserie, and Kersti begs off, telling them she’s exhausted.

  She walks a few blocks by herself, needing to clear her head. She’s not exhausted at all. That was a lie. She’s charged with adrenaline. At the corner of Rue Centrale, she flags a passing cab and impulsively tells him to take her to 14 Rue Béthusy.

  Hamidou’s apartment is in one of those early seventies buildings with a white stucco façade and frosted green balconies. It probably looked futuristic in 1972 and now looks like something out of The Jetsons. Kersti dials Hamidou’s apartment code, surprising her. She buzzes her in and Kersti rides up in the elevator feeling strangely calm, almost possessed.

  “Kersti,” Hamidou says, opening the door. “What a surprise.”

  She’s wearing a navy velour robe that exposes her thin white legs. There’s a package of Gauloises sticking out of the pocket. Kersti’s skin crawls imagining Hamidou dropping her robe for Cressida, revealing that scrawny, boyish body. She tries to get the image out of her head.

  Amoryn, Alison, Lille. How many others? How many were there over forty years?

  Kersti steps inside the apartment. It reeks of smoke. There are Persian rugs on the linoleum floor, some mismatched antique chairs, and two lamps made of silver samovars sitting on a carved mahogany sideboard, none of which suit the dated apartment, with its Formica kitchenette, low ceilings, and vertical blinds. A clunky old air conditioner rattles from a picture window overlooking the back courtyard.

  “What brings you here so late?” Hamidou asks her. “Is something wrong?”

  “Yes, something’s wrong,” Kersti says.

  “I was just about to my brush my teeth—”

  “I found the ledger.”

  Hamidou’s left eye twitches. “What ledger?” she asks, trying to sound offhand.

  “You know what ledger,” Kersti tells her. “How many girls were there?”

  “What are you talking about?” Hamidou says, tightening the sash of her robe around her narrow waist.

  “I’ve seen pictures,” Kersti tells her, not recognizing the cold, threatening tone of her own voice. “I know about Amoryn, Alison, Cressida, Lille. I’ve read your disgusting letters to Cressida. I know what those girls spray-painted on the statue and why you got them expelled.”

  “I don’t know what you are talking about,” Hamidou says softly, unfazed.
r />   “I’ve seen you,” Kersti tells her. “Naked. I’ve got the Polaroid.”

  Hamidou is quiet, probably trying to figure out her next play.

  “There’s no point denying anything,” Kersti says wearily. “Alison’s already come forward. There’s too much evidence.”

  Hamidou sits down on her couch. She crosses her legs, rests her hands on her lap. “What did Alison tell you?”

  “That you sexually abused her and many others. I told you, I’ve seen all the Polaroids.”

  “Did she tell you she loved me?” Hamidou says.

  “As a matter of fact, she did.”

  “So then. How do you come to call it abuse?”

  Kersti sits down on the armchair facing Hamidou. “They were kids,” she says, disgusted. “You were an adult. That’s the very definition of abuse.”

  “I disagree.”

  Kersti shakes her head. “You disagree?” she repeats, incredulous.

  “I’m not the one who instigated the affairs.”

  “The affairs?”

  “That’s what they were,” Hamidou says, her tone unrepentant. “I loved each and every one of them, and they loved me in return.”

  “Like a mother!” Kersti points out. “Not like a lover.”

  “That’s where you’re wrong,” Hamidou responds calmly. “We were lovers, Kersti. All my relationships were mutual and consensual. They wanted me as much as I them.”

  “Alison was eight!” Kersti cries. “You manipulated and brainwashed them. They grew up confusing maternal love with sex. They were lonely. We all were. We missed our families, we felt abandoned, we were vulnerable. And that’s when you preyed on them.”

  “I did no such thing,” she says, indignant. “If they felt attracted to me and they expressed it, I merely responded. Perhaps I shouldn’t have—”

  “Perhaps you shouldn’t have?” Kersti cries.

  “I suppose I could have turned them away,” she reflects. “But I didn’t want to hurt them any more than they were already hurting. They were all so sensitive and eager to please.”