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- Herausgeber: Allison & Busby
- Kategorie: Krimi
- Serie: Jane Cowan
- Sprache: Englisch
- Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2017
A head teacher's work is never done, especially if, like Jane Cowan, you're a victim of your own success. Having done well with Wrayford Primary, she's now expected to bring other neighbouring schools up to scratch as well. And all these responsibilities are compounded by an influx of children, most of whom do not speak English, following their families supplying cheap labour to surrounding farms. Jane can't turn a blind eye to the conditions in which many of these families are living, even more so when some children simply disappear. When everything points to the shadowy dealings of people smugglers in the area, she has her work cut out for her seeing justice done. And that's before a threat far closer to home rears his head.
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Head Count
JUDITH CUTLER
For Chance to Shine With thanks for all they do to give young people the lifelong love of cricket my father gave me
CONTENTS
CHAPTER ONE
I’d seen kids like that a thousand times on TV. Thin – emaciated really. Heads crawling with lice. Dirty. Not just grubby because they’d been playing outdoors. Filthy. Some of them ill. Some dressed in the remains of a parent’s idea of best clothes. Some with little bundles. Some with nothing. Some even with something tattooed on their wrists. But here? In the Garden of England?
So there I was, head over heels, if you’ll forgive my occupational pun, in a very thorny hedge, with plenty of time to reflect on my summer holiday so far.
Everyone knows that schoolteachers are an overpaid, idle lot, enjoying all sorts of fringe benefits, including enormously long holidays during which they do nothing but doss around. Meanwhile, parents have to scurry round in search of expensive and elusive childcare unless they are lucky enough to take a holiday that is hugely overpriced simply because it’s not in term time.
On the other side of the school fence, you might hear different facts. One of which, sadly, is that when the longed-for breaks finally arrive, the first thing the average teacher does is succumb to an evil virus that takes at least a week to shake off – by which time you should probably be starting your preparation for the next academic year.
The bug is no respecter of persons either. It doesn’t knock on the head teacher’s door and slink away when it’s told she’s too busy.
Not in my case, anyway.
I lost my voice on the last day of term. Perhaps people thought it was because I was so choked up at the transfer of some of my lovely pupils to the wicked world of secondary education. It might well have been. They were moving from a tiny school with only a hundred or so pupils to the giant world of a full-sized secondary – whether it was co-ed or single sex, a grammar or an academy, they would cease to be big fish in a tiny pond and become the smallest of minnows. If I had wept, I’d have tried to swallow my tears, for the sake of the kids and, let’s face it, my dignity. But swallowing anything was a pretty painful option, and remained so long after the last child had waved goodbye.
All through the rest of the day. And the day after. Which was interesting, because I’d been roped in to act as Wrayford Cricket Club’s substitute umpire, the regular one having succumbed to an attack of gout, which trumped my laryngitis.
Wrayford were playing St Luke’s Bay, down in the south of the county. The ground was in a lovely setting with the sea one way and wooded hills another. The village itself was small, but its harbour bulged with vessels of all shapes and sizes. There were a few working boats, but most were chic yachts that looked as if they didn’t really want to get their keels wet, any more than their owners would want their hair windswept.
The Bay team had produced county players in the past, and were already contributing girls to the Kent under-19 women’s team. So the match promised to be a good contest, and we had all signed up for a fish supper at a proper old-fashioned chippie, which had so far resisted attempts to gentrify it. There was also a good pub next door, according to Ed van Boolen, the captain.
Tall, broad-shouldered and blonde, with the bluest eyes in the world, Ed ought to have been a Viking. He’d actually come from the Netherlands. He’d arrived in the UK in his teens with his sister, both intending to study fruit growing. She’d married and given up on the idea – I had a feeling they were no longer in touch – and he’d turned instead to landscape gardening and cricket, in whichever order. The Netherlands were a growing presence on the international cricket scene; Ed was the driving force of Wrayford CC. We’d had a lot to do with each other ever since I’d persuaded the governors to let the cricket club use the school playing field. I insisted it would benefit everyone: club, village and school. The club wouldn’t have to close down, the village would have the social fun of a few fund-raising events, and the kids would get year-round coaching instead of the short burst that the wonderful Chance to Shine cricket charity provided. Yes, the club members involved would get the relevant background checks. Win, win, win, as far as I could see. The children didn’t just have role models, but next year would get the chance to play in the under-twelve team Ed and the club were now planning. I had my eye on a girl I was sure would become a founder member.
And rumour had it that Ed had his eye on me, which was good for my ego, at least.
He’d hired three minibuses for the players and supporters to take us down to St Luke’s Bay. We’d be dropped off one by one outside our own front doors in case any of us were too relaxed, as it were, to manage the stroll from a central point.
As it happened, we never made it to the chippie or to the pub because the captain of the Bay team, Marcus Baker, had organised a barbecue for us all, all the more generous in light of their eight-wicket defeat. Marcus’s house was halfway up the steep hill to the north-east of the harbour; apart from a patio bigger than the whole of my garden, a lawn the size of a tennis court dropped towards a low wall overlooking the bay. Tonight the sunset was spectacular. The food smelt as good as only the open air can make it, and the drink was free-flowing. But by now I could hardly do more than sip iced water. My head throbbed in time with the loud music; my eyes found even the fairy lights dazzling; I could no longer attempt to join in any conversation. Then one of the Bay’s players, extremely drunk already, started jabbing me in the chest, complaining about a leg-before-wicket decision I’d made. He’d argued at the time, with a lot of obscene words to emphasise his point. And another short, equally unacceptable gesture had ended his tirade as his fellow batsman, mouthing his apologies to me, propelled him off the square towards the boundary.
I shook my head: ‘Come on, Dennis, what’s played on the pitch stays on the pitch,’ I whispered.
‘I could have bloody killed you!’
The Bay umpire and another Bay player appeared, telling him it was time he left. He did, but not quietly. A couple of people came to offer their apologies. All I could do was smile pacifically, all the time longing for nothing more than paracetamol and my bed, with no one but Nosey the Bear for company, thank you very much.
But I had to wait for the minibus home: if I tried to call a cab someone would insist on driving me, which would break up an otherwise friendly party. So I looked for somewhere nice and quiet. Soon I found myself down by the back wall. Chunks of a poem I thought I’d forgotten years ago came unbidden to my mind as I leant heavily on the stonework and looked out towards the harbour:
The sea is calm tonight.
The tide is full, the moon lies fair
Upon the straits; on the French coast the light
Gleams and is gone; the cliffs of England stand,
Glimmering and vast, out in the tranquil bay.
… sweet is the night-air!
It was certainly sweet for a couple entwined in the shadows to my right. I would have averted my gaze from any lovers’ private moment but was even swifter with this pair: not for anything would anyone learn from me that the giant of an opening bowler was snogging the wicketkeeper, whom I had rebuked only five hours ago for the foulest mouthed macho sledging I’d ever heard.
I turned my attention to the sea,
… the long line of spray
Where the sea meets the moon-blanched land …
The sea, or rather the inlet, was full of life in the descending dusk. All the boats were lit up, either from the cabin spaces or with what I dimly remembered were called riding lights. So I was surprised when one vessel slipped in in complete darkness, mooring out of my line of sight. As I peered round I was joined by our host, who asked abruptly why I was out on my own, and what was I staring at.
He stood rather closer than I expected to follow the line of my finger as I pointed. ‘Just someone driving without lights,’ I rasped.
He ignored my comment – might not even have heard it. Hardly moving away, he waved the bottles he held in his right hand. His own glass was in his left: it was very elegant, more at home on a candlelit dinner party than in the chaos of a big al fresco bash. Bravely he put it on the wall. It wobbled once but stayed put. ‘Another drink?’ I shook my head. ‘No thanks.’
He topped up his glass with red wine. ‘You’ve lost your voice completely? Really? We should have argued more with your decisions, shouldn’t we! Though, to be honest, I thought you were very fair. Even when you awarded five penalty runs against us when the ball hit the helmet our wicketkeeper should have stowed somewhere safe. Very good all round.’ He didn’t even add ‘For a woman’. He raised his glass in a silent toast. I responded with mine, mouthing painful thanks.
I couldn’t work out why he bothered to stay with me, but he did, sipping his wine. Each time he wiped the glass rim with a tissue before drinking again. He might have been sharing a communion chalice except that there was no one there except me. The silence deepened. I was supposed to do something, wasn’t I? Interact. Utter polite nothings. He was a pleasant enough young man, after all, but fairly nondescript in appearance – there was nothing to mark him out as a keen sportsman who’d once hoped to play at county level. I had an idea he was something in the family firm of lawyers, which would explain the size of his house and garden. Sadly his wife looked as if she’d been dipped in a bucketful of resentful unhappiness, and every time I’d heard her speak it was to complain about something – from the sugar-high children who refused to go to bed, to the smelly dog stealing burgers out of guests’ buns and the fact that one of the minibus drivers had gone AWOL. Marcus, on the other hand, seemed serene enough, even if he must have been spitting tacks at being run out by his partner Toby something-or-other when he’d been on the verge of his first fifty of the season.
‘I’m sorry about your half-century,’ I growled.
He put his ear close to my mouth. I repeated what I’d said.
‘Shit happens. But I’ll put the little bugger in to field at very short square leg next match. See how he likes that.’
Yes. The most dangerous place on the field. I hoped Toby would wear adequate protection but couldn’t say it. All I could manage was a wry smile of agreement. The burning pain in my throat was spreading through my sinuses and lungs.
The silence returned.
Another boat was moving about unlit – this one was leaving the harbour.
‘Where ignorant armies clash by night,’ I gasped meaninglessly – and fainted, someone told me later, straight into his arms.
By Monday morning I’d tried everything the Sainsbury’s pharmacist had to offer, though she warned me she was sure that I only had a virus, which no antibiotics would touch. Otherwise I would have been pleading, presumably via text messages, for an appointment with the local GP. As it was, I resigned myself to salt-water gargles, silent communion with Nosey, the teddy bear that had come into my life a few months ago, and an indolence quite foreign to me.
I should have enjoyed myself in my latest temporary home, normally a holiday cottage, which was equipped to the highest standards. I could bask in either the tiny walled garden or the chic living area, working my way through a year’s worth of unread books. Sadly and bizarrely, reading made my throat worse – even the silent reading I always encouraged when playtimes were too wet for the pupils to go outside. I felt too weak to start packing up for the move to my new home in the village, knowing that in any case it was in such a poor state that until essential work like repairs to the roof and drains, the installation of a new kitchen and a new bathroom and total redecoration had made it habitable, there was little point anyway. And now rumour had it that some do-gooder was applying to get it listed. Just what I needed when I’d run to earth the only house in the area I could afford – thanks to my long-awaited divorce settlement and to a major change in my employment conditions thought to merit a respectable pay rise.
Fortunately my new landlord, Brian Dawes, the chair of the school governors, promised to let me stay as long as necessary. Furthermore, he was charging me at the low-season rate, which he could easily have tripled in the summer. Possibly he sensed that being generous to me would enhance his reputation in the village. But he didn’t demur when I suggested that at the very least I should pay the weekly cleaner’s bills.
Even though I was living on the outskirts of the village, news of my illness soon spread: a couple of wild-flower posies appeared on my doorstep, soon followed by soups of various sorts, some more successful than others. The things that brought the biggest smile to my face were the get-well cards crafted, perhaps lovingly and certainly proudly, by some of my pupils. There was also a mauve teddy bear, which Nosey eyed with disdain, and, from the cricket club, a canvas carrier bag containing a litre of whisky, a jar of local honey and a net of organic unwaxed lemons. A bunch of late sweet peas from Ed himself arrived late one evening too.
After a week of inertia and too much television, I found myself feeling better – though still silent. My new psychotherapist thought it might be something to do with being too angry at or even too upset by recent events to be able to speak. My own theory was a bit homespun, of course, but one shared by the GP to whom I’d had at last to report: that my throat, battered by all the end-of-term activity, had succumbed more heavily than most to what was a decidedly nasty bug doing the rounds in the south of England. So rest, gentle exercise – and no antibiotics. There was no reason to lurk self-pityingly indoors, he said, now my fever had subsided. Canterbury cricket week was coming up any day now. I smiled my approval: Dr Mike Evans and his practice had been generous in sponsoring the school Kwik Cricket team. Meanwhile, he asked, why didn’t I take advantage of my silent state? Why not buy a bike and explore the countryside?
Mouth agape, I pointed to my chest. Me, cycle?
He nodded, playing his trump card: ‘Two legs good; two wheels better.’
I couldn’t argue, could I? Firstly, I was still in Trappist mode. Secondly, I had to applaud his literary allusion.
One place within cycling distance would be my new school. No, I wasn’t leaving the one in Wrayford, but gaining another, in Wray Episcopi. It was tinier than mine with fewer than eighty pupils on roll, and, as its head teacher had retired, was threatened with closure – unless some kind fellow head could be bribed to take it on in addition to their duties at their own school. Kind – or ambitious. Unwilling to identify my motives, I quickly established that this would involve appointing deputy heads and freeing the head from teaching duties. Sadly teaching was what I enjoyed most about the job – but getting on the property ladder was important, so I was prepared to trade it. And, perhaps simply on geographical grounds, I got the post.
There had been a lot of negotiations; we might have been discussing the merger of two multinationals. I’d wanted the unions involved from day one: the rights of the teachers, my colleagues, on whom I would have to depend totally, were as important as saving local authority money, despite the swingeing cuts. The only male teacher at Wray Episcopi opted for voluntary redundancy, on the grounds that teaching wasn’t what it used to be and he wanted to live long enough to enjoy his retirement. No one could argue with that, but I drew the line at recruiting a young, untried replacement. Being trained was one thing; knowing the job inside out was another. The latest statistics showed that new recruits to the profession generally stuck it out for only three years. So I wanted someone battle-hardened, even though that would make a bigger dent in my staffing budget. I was also quite keen to recruit a man, to give the boys a role model since all the other staff at Wray Episcopi were women. On the other hand, I would really have liked my deputy there to be a woman, to balance Tom, my deputy at Wrayford. But I wouldn’t get any deputy till Christmas at the earliest, given notice periods, unless I could snap up one who’d been made redundant and wouldn’t mind a bit of rural downsizing.
At last the job descriptions were drawn up, and advertisements placed. All I had to do now was watch and wait – and pray I could make myself heard, in every sense, at the interviews.
After the overwrought garrulity of the school, in one way I enjoyed the enforced quiet. In another I loathed it. I discovered I was more sociable than I’d realised: I wouldn’t have had much of a career as a contemplative nun. I missed my elbows-on-bar gossips with Diane, the landlady of the Jolly Cricketers, who had sent me some magical ice cream, assuring me when I texted my thanks that she was simply using me as a guinea pig to test her new machine. She might even have been serious.
With only the birds and loud agricultural machinery for company, then, I followed Mike Evans’ advice. I bought a bike. I bought a helmet. I bought a hi-vis waistcoat. I bought gloves. What I found I couldn’t do was go the whole Lycra-wearing hog. I saw the point, I really did, but I wasn’t into that sort of statement. Overstatement, in my case. Any athletic skills I had had always involved keeping my feet on the ground, or at least running and jumping around on it. So, with everyday trainers on my feet and clad in old jeans and tops, I got on the saddle, waving a dubious Nosey goodbye. At first I confined myself to nice, secluded, dedicated cycle paths, even if that meant hoisting the bike on to the car – yes, I’d bought a bike rack too – and driving there. Gradually I progressed to country lanes, but I soon learnt that these might not be as idyllic as you’d think – learnt the hard way, too.
Suddenly I was flying. Suddenly I was on top of a hedgerow, which seemed to consist entirely of brambles, wild roses, and nettles. Ah, there was some barbed wire in there too. Probably rusty.
‘Help!’ But no sound came out, of course. And, for the time being, I couldn’t reach my phone, tucked in my bumbag.
Before I knew it, I was being rescued. Painfully. Pulled through a hedge backwards, as the cliché goes, but this was literally happening.
‘We’ve dialled 999,’ a man’s voice said. Oldish. Kentish.
‘I’m fine,’ I protested, though it’s possible that over the grunting of their own exertions they couldn’t hear my guttural whisper. By now I was making my own efforts to free myself, but could find nothing to give any leverage.
It was hard not to squeak with pain when my rescuers resumed theirs.
‘Come on, Doreen: don’t just stand there!’ he gasped.
‘You’re just making it worse,’ the woman said. She too was oldish and Kentish. ‘And you know your heart’s not what it was, Harry.’
What if trying to help me killed him? ‘I’m safe enough here,’ I gasped. ‘Do you live nearby?’
‘Just across the lane – well, a few yards.’
‘Maybe you’ve got such a thing as a stepladder, Harry?’
He had. His footsteps retreated.
‘I’d best help him carry it, silly old bugger,’ the woman said doubtfully. ‘If it’s OK to leave you?’
Certainly I wasn’t going anywhere. I promised her I’d be all right.
And soon I was. Maybe I really had been hoping for the wail of an ambulance siren. Certainly I hadn’t expected the throaty pulse of a motorbike. Not just any leather-clad rider, either: the miracle of a mobile paramedic, who introduced himself as Ian.
I suppose he had a list of guidelines to follow, because he fired a series of questions at me. No doubt my rescuers’ helpful suggestions drowned some of my replies: it took time to persuade him that my lack of voice wasn’t as a result of today’s activities.
Eventually, though I didn’t wish to challenge his professionalism, I risked a suggestion: ‘Ian, you’re practically wearing a suit of armour. You could even put your helmet on again. Couldn’t you just push your way through and hold me up while I wriggle free? Look, all my toes and fingers work, and I promise you I’ve not lost any feeling anywhere. Anywhere at all,’ I whispered emphatically.
‘I ought to get backup, Jane.’ For some reason he dropped his voice too. ‘Ambulances carry equipment I can’t. Then we could slide a back-board under you and fix a neck brace.’
‘I’m sure you ought. But I’m sure a quick tug and Harry’s stepladder under me will free me.’ Please let it be quick: otherwise it would be like having a slow tooth extraction or a leisurely leg wax.
He did his best. In a matter of seconds I was standing in my tattered jeans and shredded top on the dried-out grass verge. One foot hurt more than the other: I’d managed to lose a trainer at some point. My helmet was still in place, however, and things could clearly have been a lot worse. Even the blood – though there was quite a lot. I might have been embraced by razor blades.
Doreen and Harry were both, as I’d suspected, in their seventies. For some reason they dressed as if they were in a fashion time warp, he in grey flannels and she wearing a wrap-around pinny. Both were more appalled by the sight of all my blood than was reassuring.
‘The trouble is,’ Ian said, ‘I can’t take you to A&E. We need an ambulance for that.’
‘But I don’t need A&E. GP surgery or Minor Injuries, maybe. The scratches are all pretty superficial. Aren’t they?’
He was checking them carefully, and was clearly inclined to agree. But there was no doubt he registered my pathetic shaking.
‘I’ve only just had a tetanus booster,’ I added, as if that would put an end to the discussion. ‘It’s surely just a matter of putting dressings on the worst.’
At this point, Doreen – it turned out she was Harry’s sister, not his wife – insisted that we all adjourn to their bungalow so that the paramedic could treat me there and then in what she called decent privacy. I was very grateful, even though she kept popping in and out of the lounge – a strange choice of room, perhaps – with towels and bowls of hot water, as if I was an injured hero in an old black and white Western. Ian pretended to be appreciative, although he had a seemingly endless supply of disposable wipes; my husky thanks for the pot of tea for both of us were absolutely sincere, however. The cup rattled less and less in the saucer.
‘I suppose you didn’t get the reg of the guy that ran you off the road?’ he asked, probably to distract me while he diligently extracted a thorn.
‘He came up from behind. I think. I can’t recall seeing anyone coming my way. Bloody hell, Ian!’
‘Soon be done. There’s no one who’s out to get you, I suppose?’
Now wasn’t the time to regale him with my life story.
At last he announced he was satisfied. I was to take a taxi home and call my GP or the NHS helpline if I had any problems. We waved him off.
Doreen, who clearly disapproved of wasting money on a taxi, declared that Harry and she would drive me back to my cottage, even though my bike would have to await its turn in their front garden – a charming picture-book place with old-fashioned flowers surrounding an immaculate lawn. It was so lovely that I asked, flourishing my phone, if I could take a photo with them in it, but she simply pointed to a loft window she’d left ajar and dashed in to close it. Then she had to double-check she’d locked the front door. And nip round the back to see that all was secure there. Shades of my paranoid mother.
Harry let himself into an elderly two-door Fiesta, which looked as if it had last been cleaned the year he bought it: it was completely out of place against the neatness of the house. It had left a patch of oil on the driveway at the side of the cottage. Doreen was checking that all was clear for him to reverse into the lane, reassuring him with decidedly ambiguous arm movements.
‘What I can’t work out,’ he said through the open driver’s window, as he pulled up with two wheels on the verge, ‘is why that man drove at you. He did, you know, didn’t he? That man?’ he prompted as Doreen held the front passenger door open and tipped forward the seat. Somehow I was to get into the back seat. At last I managed. I dared not speculate on how I’d get out.
‘What man?’ She took her place beside him.
‘The man that drove at Jane, here. In the big car.’
‘Oh, the blue one.’
‘No, it was black. With tinted windows.’
‘Blue with tinted windows. One of those that look like a van. Ugly great things.’
‘More like a young lorry. What do they call them on Neighbours? Utes? Only with the back section covered up. Yes, you ought to tell the police, Jane. Who would want to do that to an innocent woman?’
‘I’ve no idea.’ Nor had I. Not precisely. The trouble was that though Simon, my violent ex-husband, was still in prison, he had plenty of cronies on the outside. On the other hand, I’d have thought they’d have done a more efficient job of despatching me. Who else could it have been? – assuming, of course, that it wasn’t a simple accident. I’d had problems when I’d arrived in the village but now I seemed to be on reasonably good terms with everyone.
‘We’d be witnesses,’ she continued.
‘Thank you,’ I said, without irony. ‘I don’t suppose you managed to remember any of the registration number?’
‘They’ve got such complicated ones these days, haven’t they?’
I took that as a negative. ‘Or the make?’ I added, more in hope than expectation.
As if they were an old married couple, bound together for fifty years, they bickered all the way to Wrayford: make; model; colour? Somehow I didn’t think there was much for the police to work on, even if I’d been able to make any intelligent guesses.
The only time they were silent was when, ready to say goodbye, I asked them for their address and phone number. They flinched as if I’d asked them to give classified information.
‘So I can phone you before I come and collect my bicycle,’ I whispered gently.
‘Oh, there’s no need for that. All you need to do is open the gate.’
I shook my head, trying to be patient and to sound even more grateful than I was. ‘You know, I think I must have banged my head after all. I haven’t,’ I declared truthfully, ‘a clue where it all happened.’
Their contact details safe in my phone, I waved them goodbye, unable, however, to rid myself of the idea that they wanted nothing further to do with me. I wouldn’t have been surprised if the cycle had appeared unannounced in my own front garden. But it hadn’t when I ordered a large bunch of thank-you flowers online next morning, including the message that I’d arrive in my car the following day.
I did. To find the bike still in place. It was absolutely pristine: they must have cleaned it when they cleaned their car, which I presumed they must do occasionally – an annual treat, perhaps. Meanwhile, far from spruce, wilting on the sun-baked doorstep, sat a large bouquet.
It must have been a combination of the virus and the accident that meant I could only stare, nonplussed, for what seemed like several minutes. They were out. That was all. Or perhaps it wasn’t. I took a prowl round the bungalow. A peep through a window showed me that everything was almost unnaturally tidy: it reminded me of how my mother used to leave the family home before our summer exodus to the seaside; my family hadn’t discovered cheap package tours abroad. Even the dishcloth was hung carefully to dry over the mixer tap. Some fairly deep tyre tracks led me to a long shed, the roof of which was so concave I couldn’t imagine it holding up much longer. What it held would remain a mystery, because it dawned on me that what I was doing was snooping. Even so I registered another puzzle: why two people should need such an inordinately long washing line. But perhaps they had once offered B&B accommodation and needed to dry loads of bedlinen.
But none of this was anything to do with me. I gathered up the flowers so I could return them to the Canterbury florist. Next time they might not leave anything unsigned for lying casually for all to see. All? Well, the odd sheep.
In the cycle shop, as the mean and lean owner sucked his teeth over the damage to the bike and worked out an estimate for repairing it, I looked at helmet cameras. The next person running me off the road had better smile.
CHAPTER TWO
Having bravely run the risk of being bled on, Nosey was very relieved when my scratches began to heal. Then my voice improved, apparently in sync. I was almost as disappointed as he was. Even though I’d have had to exchange two wheels for four until my bike was better too, I’d planned silent visits to some of the most famous tourist destinations in Kent: Dover Castle, Dungeness, Sissinghurst. But now I could read without throat complications, could I turn to my enticing pile of books? With Nosey on my lap? No, I told him: I’d better apply myself to the files of my new outpost, none of which would interest him. I’d arrived in Wrayford itself with precious little opportunity to prepare, and a whole heap of problems no one could have envisaged. So naturally I resolved to prepare this time for every single foreseeable eventuality.
I read the file of every child and every adult associated with the school. I knew the first name of the plumber who responded to what seemed an unnaturally high number of call-outs; I also knew the cleaner had a problem with punctuality, though not the reason. But the most interesting thing I discovered seemed to me a policy worth adopting at Wrayford itself: every family whose child had been offered a place at Wray Episcopi school had a home visit from one of the staff – sometimes even with Maggie Hale, the head, if it was felt there might be problems with either location in a very rural area or with a family known for a less than co-operative attitude to authority. The plan was not to snoop around, but to introduce to the child and its parents a member of staff whose name and face would be familiar on the child’s first day at school. It was also a chance for the parent to raise issues about behaviour, illness or allergies. A handwritten appendix to the file showed that this was not a universally popular policy: one extremely rich local worthy had been so incensed by the idea of what he wrongly construed as a check on his granddaughter’s home life that he’d paid for a private school place instead. Another noted that as a result of the teachers’ visit the RSPCA had been summoned to check on the family dogs. Clearly all was not going to be straightforward, and I suspected that some of the Wrayford governors would be against the idea from the moment I first mooted it, unless I did so with extreme tact – otherwise known as low cunning.
I would certainly need the chair of governors on my side.
Brian Dawes and I had enjoyed an uneasy association from the moment I was appointed: at times he’d shown downright hostility, with his massive head and threatening shoulders unnerving me, but on other occasions he’d proved a wise and committed professional. There was no doubt he’d been as shocked and horrified as I by a series of tragic events resulting in the loss of several promising pupils – the death, indeed, of one of them. Chastened, perhaps feeling a modicum of guilt, he’d recently been more constructive than destructive in any criticism of me or my colleagues. As well as being my generous landlord he had also invited me to a number of social events, which probably caused no little gossip in the village, though I could have assured anyone interested that our friendship, if so it could be described, was strictly platonic.
As was my relationship with someone for whom I’d once had far from platonic feelings: Pat Webber. For a long time he’d been my utterly reliable – relionable, indeed – police contact for when my ex-husband forced his way back into my life yet again, finding me wherever I’d moved to. At last, however, Simon was tucked away in Durham jail, and, after I’d changed my name and as much of my appearance as I could manage without actually going under the knife, Pat’s bosses, mindful of their budget, no doubt, thought I could look after myself. Pat had plenty of other work to do, and perhaps other personal responsibilities I still didn’t know about. It was those he had to deal with, one way or another, to his own moral satisfaction; in any case, officers like him were never supposed to develop personal feelings towards their vulnerable clients – and certainly not act on them if they did. There was talk that an officer’s initiating a sexual relationship – Pat with me, for instance – would become a criminal offence, with a jail sentence for the offender.
Meanwhile I needed to work out whether I was genuinely attracted to Pat or simply profoundly grateful for all he’d done. So like fairy-tale lovers we’d separated for a year and a day. Seriously, we’d not spent any time together for about six months now. OK, we’d had the very occasional contact by text or email. How he felt about mine, I can’t tell. Once I’d held my breath till the next one from him. Now I was accustomed to not hearing from him, and I’d pretty well ceased to imagine reporting a particularly weird or pleasant incident to him. Actually, even without Pat on the horizon, Brian didn’t stand much chance. I needed solid friends more than risky love affairs – and if I did date him, what if the relationship ended? No, it was best for us to be strictly professional in our doings.
I was preoccupied too with the alterations to my new home. Or lack thereof. I was working through a succession of builders who might, you’d have thought, have leapt at the chance of several weeks’ solid work. The one on whose assurances I’d gone ahead with the purchase went bankrupt within two days of the cottage becoming my property; another refused point-blank to have anything to do with the project. Was it because it was remotely likely to attract historical officialdom? They never replied. Several insisted that they were committed to projects that would mean no work on mine till next Easter.
Add to that the complications of even builders taking normal summer holidays, my progress was slow to non-existent. Now I could speak firmly down the phone, perhaps my progress would be better. Perhaps.
In fact, the whole village seemed to be in a state of suspended animation, the natives being replaced by visitors in search of quaintness cheek by jowl with the advantages of urban living. They couldn’t believe there were no shops, no post office – nothing but the pub. Even the church was relying on visiting clergy, as Brian remarked when we met – by chance – in the Jolly Cricketers’ bar.
‘And now we’ve got damned Operation Stack again, too!’ he added venomously, as if the M20 being used as a car park for hundreds of vehicles waiting to cross into France was somehow the fault of the Church of England.
‘What’s the reason this time?’ I asked. It wasn’t just one major road being blocked, as media reports might have implied: access to others was severely limited, and some minor roads were gridlocked as drivers sought to beat the appalling jams only to find bigger, better ones lying in wait. Last time the delay had been caused by insufficient security staff to check travellers’ documentation and search cars, if necessary. I missed all the chaos because of my virus, of course.
Brian shrugged those huge shoulders. ‘Which one this time? Migrants trying to get into the Tunnel and closing it? A broken down lorry? Striking French fishermen blockading the port of Calais?’
Diane shook her head. ‘Rioting refugees. A boy was killed in the Tunnel. Some sixteen-year-old trying to ride a lorry. The dreadful irony is that he was entitled to come over here anyway – he has family in the country already. But officialdom just took too long …’
Our sympathy for the boy, hardly more than a child, didn’t chime in with Brian’s mood, so she added dryly, ‘And I hear our government doesn’t think there’s sufficient demand for a lorry-park to be cost-effective.’
‘They should try living down here,’ Brian snorted. He turned to me, effectively cutting Diane out of the conversation. ‘What’s this I hear about you having an accident, Jane?’
I wasn’t sure how I felt about his narrow-eyed scrutiny. ‘Some idiot knocked me off my bike,’ I said. ‘I landed in a good solid hedge, so there was no real damage done – except to my dignity,’ I added ruefully. ‘They’ll be able to repair the bike and my skin’s healing.’
At last he seemed to register my linen trousers and prettiest long-sleeved top – there seemed no point in displaying my scabs to the world. ‘You’ve not been cycling long – did you wobble at the wrong moment?’ His laugh was meant to be indulgent.
‘I certainly wobbled when the SUV hit me. On my side of the road.’
‘Hit and run!’ Diane put in, passing me a Pimm’s she would put on my tab.
‘Exactly,’ I said.
‘Any idea who did it?’ Brian asked seriously.
Diane, giving me a wink, moved off to take food orders at the far end of the bar.
‘I’ve wracked my brains. I can think of any number of people I’ve annoyed,’ I said with a self-deprecating grin, ‘but I’d rather people moaned to my face than upended me on a public road. Anyway, a passing motorcyclist rescued me, so here I am.’ I was being economical with the truth, of course. I was rattled by Brian’s assumption that it was my fault, of course, but for some reason I didn’t want to bring Doreen and Harry into the anecdote, just in case I blabbed about their elusiveness. And I still tried to block from my mind the idea that the whole thing might not have been a genuine accident.
At this point a cheery voice greeted us all: Ed van Boolen’s.
Brian bristled like a hostile dog as Ed approached us, greeting me with a kiss and a rather sweaty hug. When I’d seen him earlier, he’d been leading his teammates in a vigorous fielding practice. But now he was back in gardening mode: when was work going to start on the new place so he could turn my tangled garden into paradise?
Pointedly ignoring the double entendre I spread my hands: ‘No one seems to want to tackle the job. If it was new-build I think they’d be interested. But it’s simply renovation: I’m not changing the footprint of the existing cottage. Diane contacted one of her friends, but they were booked up well into the new year. Come on, Ed, you must know people round here: if people need pretty cottage gardens, it stands to reason that at least some of them have bought cottages to go with them. Give it some thought, lad. And you, Brian, of course.’
Though he almost blushed, Brian was at his most repressive. ‘The firm that did mine is tied up over in St Margaret’s Bay. Long term.’
‘More of your empire, Brian?’ Ed asked dryly. Presumably Brian didn’t use his services. When he got no reply, he continued, ‘As it happens, I do have an idea. Leave it with me, Jane – I’ll see what I can do.’ He downed his shandy in one draught and, patting me on the arm, strode off, as if already on his mission to rescue me.
Part of me could have wished that Ed had eaten at the Cricketers too: it would have spared me an impending tête-à-tête with Brian, who would assume, as he always did if he found me here, that he was welcome to join me and then insist on paying the bill, becoming tetchy if I declined. But tonight I was spared any embarrassment. Just as he was reaching for the menus, his phone rang. Excusing himself, he turned aside to answer it. He frowned, and then, with no explanation or even courtly apology, he headed off into the still warm evening.
CHAPTER THREE
Although I should have been working, the next day was so lovely that I couldn’t resist collecting my newly repaired bike and tootling off – with my camera switched on – to the place where I was knocked off in the first place. To be strictly honest, I was really more interested in Doreen and Harry’s cottage. Actually, in them.
After a trip mercifully without incident I propped the bike up against their fence, but decided it was pointless to venture further. Or was it? Despite the heat, all the windows were firmly closed. When I peered through the kitchen window, I could see that the dishcloth was still draped over the mixer tap. But it seemed to me that the deep tracks I’d noticed before had been ground a bit wider by a vehicle somewhat larger than a Fiesta – which hadn’t, as I recalled, been kept there anyway, but on the side drive. The oil patch was no longer fresh. All of which added up to precisely nothing that was any of my business. Why did I feel uneasy? For one thing, they were such a garrulous pair, Doreen particularly, that I was surprised they’d not mentioned a forthcoming holiday – especially when I’d asked for their contact details. For another – well, that was probably enough. And once again I was snooping, and indeed trespassing. Switching on my helmet camera, I set off home. Slowly. Not just because my joints had stiffened. I was keeping an eye out for another cottage that might loosely be described as neighbouring. Nothing. So blow me if I didn’t turn round and cycle equally slowly in the other direction. Nothing. What a strange isolated life they must lead, even with a car. After my recent brush with silence, it certainly wasn’t one I’d choose.
I headed back, guiltily, to Wray Episcopi to assuage my conscience with some work.
As I propped my bike up by the school gate, an Audi pulled up, the driver waving. With a grin I trotted over: it was Jo Davies, whose policeman husband Lloyd had been immensely supportive during an outbreak of vandalism centred round the school. Now Jo was not just a friend but also an invaluable part-time maths teacher busily improving Wrayford Primary’s results.
‘So this is the latest outpost of your empire! Can I come and have a look?’ She zapped the car’s central-locking system with some intangible panache as she walked with me – for so short a woman she had a very long stride. She stopped abruptly as she stepped into the entrance hall, so small it was barely a vestibule. ‘God, why do schools always smell the same? Even when there are no kids around? Every single one I’ve ever taught in smelt like this. And you can’t blame it these days on overcooked cabbage or burnt rice pudding.’
