by M. J. Trow
He dug a piece of crumpled paper out of his jacket pocket; his timetable for the week. ‘French. Lower Fifths. Pure joy.’
‘No,’ she said, hands on hips. ‘What are you really doing?’
‘Talking to the new bloke, Robinson of PE, about the death of Bill Pardoe. Where are you staying?’
‘Same hotel as the DCI. Barcourt Lodge, out on the A-Something.’
‘Ring me tonight,’ he whispered. ‘I’ll watch for thee by moonlight, though Hell should bar way.’ And she watched as he lost himself in surging sway making for the Languages Block.
‘What’s going on, George?’ Sir Arthur Wilkins had just fought his way through an army paparazzi at his own front gates. And even with a crystal of the Headmaster’s best claret in his fist he was not a happy bunny. Wilkins was the epitome of the country squire, eternally pissed off that Oxbridge had let the oiks in, his own family had been crippled by death duties and everything was New Labour and television presenters were called Ali G.
‘Arthur,’ Sheffield was at a loss. ‘You know much as I.’
‘If you’ll permit me, George, bollocks. You’re the bloody Head, for Christ’s sake. It’s your job to know.’ He closed to the shorter man, his silver moustache bristling. ‘It’s what we pay you for.’
Sheffield ran an exasperated hand through his sandy hair. His large, comfortable study was suddenly appallingly small. ‘The bottom line is, Arthur, there were … rumours … about Bill Pardoe.’
‘Rumours?’ Wilkins had been a navy man all h life. He knew about rumours. It could seep into men’s souls, sap the will, sink a ship. ‘Bout what?’
‘That he was …’
‘Queer as a coot?’
Sheffield blinked, sighing. It was better now that it was out in the open. Someone had said at last. Now he could make a stand. ‘There is absolutely no evidence,’ he said defiantly.
‘No evidence?’ Wilkins growled. ‘Good God, man. We’re trying to run a school here. Can you imagine what those bastards camped at the gates will do with a thing like this? They’re the Press, for Christ’s sake; they don’t need evidence. The last newspaperman with any integrity was William Russell in the Crimea. Who’s taking over as Housemaster?’
‘Tony Graham. He’s young, but he’s the obvious choice as Pardoe’s junior.’
‘Oh, yes,’ Wilkins remembered. ‘Pushy little tick, but he’ll do. Well, get him onto it.’
‘What?’
‘The evidence,’ Wilkins snarled, quaffing half the glass. ‘Get him talking to the boys. I want to know if Pardoe had touched any of them up.’
‘Now, Arthur …’
‘For fuck’s sake, George, face reality, will you? The private sector, like the Catholic church, is crawling with perverts. Too many schools are so desperate to recruit, staff and boys, that they don’t ask any questions. It’s a pederasts’ paradise out there. Well, it’s not going to happen at Grimond’s. Is that understood?’
‘Of course, Arthur, but Bill …’
‘There are no buts here, George,’ Wilkins shouted his man down. ‘None at all. If there’s been any dinky finger in the dorm, I want to know about it. And get on to Howard.’
‘Howard?’
‘Gritchley, George, Gritchley. You know, Treasurer to the Governors. Balances the books and pays your wages.’ He turned to the window, glowering at the grounds below and the smoking, skulking mob at the gates. ‘If any boys are involved, we may need to get our chequebooks out.’
‘Arthur …’ Sheffield couldn’t believe his ears.
‘Realism, George,’ Wilkins turned to him, barking sharply. ‘“Every man has his price” after all. It’s quite astonishing how reasonable parents can be when the offer of waived fees is on the table.’ He turned back to the window. ‘Who that?’
Sheffield joined him at the leaded panes. A man in a Cambridge scarf and a shapeless tweed hat was sauntering across the front lawn, glancing at the mellow brick of the building every now and again, and at the little crowd at the gates. ‘Er … Peter Maxwell. He’s here for a couple of week from a state school in Sussex.’
‘State school?’ Wilkins turned purple and almost swallowed his dentures.
‘Someone I met on a course in London,’ Sheffield reminded him. ‘It seemed a good idea. I sent you a memo.’
‘I hope you know what you’re doing, George,’ and he followed Peter Maxwell with his eyes along the drive that led to the gym. ‘Now, where’s the flatfoot in charge of the case?’
‘I’ve put him in the planning office.’
Wilkins slammed down the glass. ‘What are we going for here, George? Suicide or murder?’
The Headmaster blinked again, feeling himself railroaded as ever by his Chair of Governor ‘We’re going for the truth, aren’t we?’ he asked.
Wilkins guffawed. ‘It’s obvious you weren’t my appointment,’ he growled. At the study door, he stopped. ‘Suicide,’ he said. ‘That’s what we’re going for. “Balance of mind disturbed”, that sort of thing. Nobody goes off a roof by accident, so we can’t sell anybody that one. Suicide implies derangement of course, and therefore a certain lack of judgement on our part. But it’s infinitely preferable to murder, don’t you think? I don’t even want to go there … Coming, George?’
They faced each other along the dull pink of the piste, the Captain of Tennyson and the Captain of Austen. Maxwell had clashed some steel in his time and he was enjoying this. The spring sunshine was streaming in through the reinforced windows high above the wall bars. Grimond’s gym smelt like gyms the world over – rubber mats, feet, groin liniment. And it boomed with the thud of action.
‘Who’s your money on?’ he whispered to Tim Robinson, sitting next to him on the excruciating gym bench.
‘Selwyn’s got the strength,’ Robinson said, ‘but he’s not as fast as Cassandra.’
‘Cassandra?’
‘Yes. Have you met?’
‘After a fashion,’ Maxwell nodded, watching the girl’s lithe body in front of him. ‘I didn’t recognize her under the mask. Bit of a cold fish.’
‘Watch,’ Robinson told him. ‘Fence!’
The foils slid together as the bout began, Selwyn waiting, public schoolboy that he was, for Cassandra to make the first move. One step, two, she drove him gently back.
‘You’re the new kid on the block, then?’ Maxwell asked Robinson.
‘That’s right. Keep your guard up, John.’
‘How are you finding Grimond’s?’
Tim Robinson was thirtyish, with a Zapata moustache that gave him a vague ’seventies look. His eyes were dark and flashing. Small wonder there was a coterie of white-suited Austen girls hanging near him, hoping he’d notice their parries-en-sixte. ‘It’s a learning curve,’ Robinson smiled. A shout and a clash. ‘First blood to Austen.’ A whoop from the girls. ‘Keep that guard up, John. I warned you.’
Cassandra bounced back to the starting position.
‘You’re not electric?’ Maxwell asked, noting the lack of wires and circuit boxes.
‘Not for practice bouts. This is a warm up. The inter-house is next week.’
‘You’re Head of Games?’
‘God, no. Richard Ames has that distinction.’
‘Where were you before?’
‘Fence!’ the blades scraped together again.
‘Army originally,’ Robinson said.
‘Ah, so this is your first post?’
‘No, I was at Haileybury.’ Robinson looked away from the action for the first time. ‘You ask lot of questions, Mr Maxwell.’
‘Just nosy, I guess,’ the Head of Sixth Form shrugged. ‘I just feel a little like a fish out of water here, to be honest. Comprehensive oik in a private school. I thought you might relate to that.’
‘Did you? Nice one, Cassandra.’ The thud and grunt told Maxwell that Cassandra had scored second palpable hit. The Austen girls whooped and bounced again.
‘Dr Sheffield’s had a word?’
Robinson
half-turned. ‘Mr Maxwell, I really fail to see …’
There was a squeal and Selwyn retreated, blade by his side, point down. Cassandra was nursing a bruised rib. The Austen girls booed and hissed. ‘Yes, all right,’ Robinson signalled, his turn to be taken off guard. ‘Two-one to Austen. Everybody all right? Fence!’ He closed to Maxwell. ‘Yes,’ he said quietly. ‘Dr Sheffield has spoken to me. The need to keep the lid on things, not to talk to the Press and so on. He really didn’t have to.’
Steel rang as Selwyn tried the fleche, but he over-reached himself and came off the piste, steadying himself against the wall. There was a distinct ‘Naa-naa-de-naanaa’ from the Austen girls. ‘Assume your positions!’ Robinson told them and the bout recommenced. This time, Cassandra was ready for Selwyn. She crouched like a greyhound in the slips, her right arm locked forward, probing the boy’s defences, the red button on her foil tip a blur in the shaft of light. Her feet were firmly grounded, her legs balanced as she came at him, sliding her blade along his, looking for a third opening.
‘Tell me,’ Maxwell whispered, ‘As a relative outsider, do you notice anything odd at Grimond’s?’
‘Odd? Watch him, Cassandra. Watch your balance. In what way, odd?’
Maxwell shrugged. ‘Undercurrents, shall we say? Moods? Every school has them.’
‘I’m not all that used to schools, Mr Maxwell. I was only at Haileybury …’
‘Hit!’ the girls behind the bench roared, giving each other high fives. Selwyn turned away clenching his fist is fury as the girl had given him a pummelling again. Cassandra bounced back o her agile feet, foil blade wobbling in the morning air.
‘Three-one to Austen,’ Robinson called out ‘Fence!’
Selwyn’s parrying was faster, Cassandra’ ripostes more desperate. Each hit was taking it out of her as the stronger fencer banged her blade aside. She winced behind the mask.
‘All the more observant, then,’ Maxwell persisted. ‘You’ve got an outsider’s slant. Bill Pardoe for instance. What did you have to do with him?’
‘Almost nothing. The PE staff aren’t attached to Houses. Pardoe was a Housemaster. We’d nod in the corridor, that sort of thing. Easy, Selwyn. This is only a practice.’
The boy ignored him, driving his opponent back. Suddenly, his blade came up, too high and slashed the girl across the mask so that the steel rang out. Cassandra crashed sideways, off the piste. There was a scream from the spectators gallery overhead and uproar from the girl fencers on the ground. Tim Robinson dashed across the floor to the fallen girl. He helped her to her knees. Cassandra had taken off the mask and knelt there, shaken but unhurt, her long dark hair across her face. Robinson turned to Selwyn who took off his mask and stood there, gnawing his lip in frustrated silence.
‘The bout’s over,’ the gym master said. ‘Selwyn you will apologise to Miss James.’
‘Sorry, Cassandra.’ The boy saluted her with his sword, an over-the-top flourish if ever Maxwell had seen one, but Robinson hadn’t finished. He closed to the lad. ‘You’re out of the competition next week,’ he hissed.
‘What?’ Selwyn shouted.
‘You heard me. Now, do you want to make even more of an exhibition of yourself than you’ve done already?’
Selwyn drew himself up to his full height, looming over Robinson. ‘I shall have a word with Mr Graham,’ he said, in that sarcastic way of his.
‘You do that. And he’ll tell you the same as I would. This sort of behaviour is not on. Epee strokes are not permitted in a foil bout.’ Robinson helped Cassandra to her feet. ‘Right. Showers. You’ve got ten minutes to the next lesson. All this gear to be put away. You girls, you’re not doing anything.’ He pointed to the gaggle who had been giggling near him by the bench. ‘Put this lot away.’ The Austen girls moaned and began to haul at the piste mat. ‘He crossed to the visiting Head of Sixth Form. ‘Mr Maxwell, I’d be grateful if you didn’t distract me again. You must, as a teacher, know how easily accidents happen.’
‘Accidents?’ Maxwell echoed. ‘The Captain of Tennyson broke every rule in the book with that cut. Even for a sabre stroke, it was questionable, but for foil unforgivable.’
Robinson scowled at him. ‘Thank you for your observation.’ And he spun on his heels. As Cassandra slid past Maxwell, she bent her head a little and smiled, letting her hair fall free of the mask.
It was in the corridor outside that Maxwell waited. He’d hoped that Tim Robinson might be more amenable than the rest, a chink in the defensive wall that was the Grimond staff. As it was, he turned out to be more close-lipped than any of them. A dark-haired girl was coming down the stairs from the gallery, her face scarlet an her cheeks running with tears, dripping onto the starched white of her blouse.
‘Are you all right?’ Maxwell asked, a Head Sixth Form in spite of himself.
She looked at him through tear-filled eyes ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘I’m all right.’
‘I’m sure she’ll be fine,’ he said.
‘Who?’ the girl sniffed.
‘Cassandra. It was you who screamed, wasn’t it?’
‘Oh, yes,’ the girl swallowed, looking through into the gym where the clash of arms had happened. ‘I’m sure she’ll be fine,’ and she spun on her heel and clattered off down the darkness of the outer corridor.
They lay in bed that night in her room at Barcourt Lodge. The green electronic figures read two-sixteen.
‘I wonder what’s going on at Grimond’s tonight?’ he asked.
Jacquie propped herself up on one arm ‘Thanks,’ she snorted. ‘Your mind elsewhere, always!’
He tried to shove the duvet over her mouth and they giggled in the darkness.
‘Are you sure you won’t stay?’ she asked, suddenly still, suddenly serious.
‘What?’ he chuckled, ‘and face Henry Hall over the breakfast kipper? “I understand you’ve been sleeping with one of my officers, Mr Maxwell.’” It was a damned good DCI Hall. ‘“I have to caution you …”’
She cuffed him playfully round the head. ‘I don’t think I joined the SS,’ she said. ‘I am allowed to choose my sexual partners, you know.’
‘Sexual partners!’ he guffawed. ‘Sounds like a rather bizarre square dance. Back to back and a dosy-doh!’
‘Seriously, though, Max …’ she smoothed the hair away from his temple.
‘Seriously though, Jacquie,’ he took her fingers and kissed them, one by one. ‘I must get back. It’s been …’ and he clambered out of bed.
‘Yes?’ she said archly.
He turned to her in the darkness, then reached cross the bed again, taking her face in both hands before kissing her deeply and slowly. ‘More than I deserve and more than I could ask,’ he told her and turned away as her eyes filled with the tears he knew were there. ‘Now, why would you have hidden a pair of less-than-reputable boxers? And you such a normal- looking girl.’ And he counted only to two until her pillow hit him on the back of the head.
She took him back through the moonlight-dappled lanes of Hampshire, the headlights flashing back on the cats’ eyes as they drove. A hundred yards or so from Grimond’s, she pulled to the side of the road and cut the engine.
‘I can’t believe they’re still there.’ He peered into the darkness ahead where the road was silver under the moon in the absence of Jacquie’s headlights. A dark-headed hydra coiled and recoil by the gate posts, its breath smoking on the night air. ‘They must be frozen. Are the Fourth Estate so desperate these days?’
‘Drugs, sex, rock ‘n’ roll and private school,’ Jacquie said. ‘It sells newspapers. Can you find your way from here?’
‘There’s a little postern to the south-west,’ Maxwell told her, unhooking his seat-belt, ‘and a little marble cross below the town. I’ll do better there than the Barbican at the front. Catch you tomorrow. Where will you be?’
‘Same place,’ she told him. ‘The office off Sheffield’s study. We’re starting with Tim Robinson.’
‘Well, good luck to you,’ Max
well smile ‘You’re bound to do better than I did,’ and kissed her before slipping into the night.
It was chilly as he skirted the hedgerows and the grass felt wet and cold against his trouser bottoms. In an hour or two all would be frost and magic in those hallowed grounds. He’d left the tell-tale scarf and hat in his room under Grimond eaves and his dark clothes gave him a certain invisibility. Even so, he kept close to wall that ringed the school and waited until Jacquie’s Ka roared off into the night, taking the road to the south to avoid the night-watch of paparazzi.
Somewhere in the darkness ahead the white ghost of a barn owl flew on silent wings, signalling death for some luckless creature of the pre-dawn. Maxwell hurried along the grassy bank, careful not to let himself slip down onto the road and then he was out of sight of the main gates and looking for the chink in the wall.
The side-door he’d told Jacquie about was there all right, but it was locked. Luckily the stones jutted at crazy angles by the lintel and he was able to haul his way up. Gingerly negotiating the jagged glass on top, he lowered himself over the other side, steadying himself before getting his bearings. Grimond’s lay black and unlit below him, a sleeping monster in the first tentative rays of pink that tinged the East. To his right the lake lay chill and chiselled with its windy ridges and there was a sighing of the rushes that ringed the water. It was there he saw it, a movement half in, half out of the shadows. And he froze. Kneeling by the wall, his back against the stone, Maxwell listened. There were muffled voices, male and female, but they were fragmented, like snatches of prayer at vespers in some long-dead monastery. The teacher in him knew that whoever it was should not have been there, in that place, at that hour. The boatyards. That’s where t was coming from and he still couldn’t make it out. He moved nearer, crouching low and keeping his head down. Damn. There were no clouds overhead now, just the three-quarter brilliance of the moon. He stopped halfway, glancing back at the little, buried postern gate and the gothic blackness of old Jedediah Grimond’s little piece of ostentation.
Then he was there, his fingers spread on the old corrugated iron of the boating-shed wall. He could hear clearly now, a rhythmic grunting punctuated by a screeching sigh. The speed was erratic, but insistent.