Nicholls’s beautiful car had still been gracing the forecourt when McKenna crossed on his way to Matron’s flat, but some time within the last hour, both man and car had departed. He walked along the administration corridor, the keys that Jack had taken from Nicholls in his hand, ready to give him access to whatever secrets Freya might have hidden in her study. Reaching her door, he found it wide open, with the deputy headmistress seated stiffly behind the desk.
‘
Can I help you?’ Miss Knight asked, her face as vinegary as her voice.
‘
I see Mr Nicholls has gone,’ McKenna said. ‘I thought he intended to address the school.’
‘
He changed his mind.’ She sniffed. ‘The task has been delegated to me.’
‘
And when do you propose to do it?’
‘
I haven’t yet decided.’
‘
I don’t think you should leave it
too
long,’ he advised. ‘The girls, and the staff, have a right to the facts.’
‘
I’m perfectly aware of their rights, thank you.’
‘
I hope you’re equally familiar with the facts,’ he remarked. ‘Please ensure that no one is left with the misapprehension that Imogen killed Sukie.’ Nodding to her, he retraced his steps back to the lobby, where he stood by the double doors deciding what to do next now one set of plans had been thwarted.
Therese
and Justine came into view, from the direction of the stables. Justine’s boots were crusted with sand, Therese’s shapeless jeans and scruffy shirt bespattered with dirty splashes. As they neared the doors, he could almost see the stamp of Matron’s huge hand in the ugly welt on her left cheek.
They
were speaking to each other in German. When he asked Therese if she had been to the stables, unconsciously she responded in that language. ‘
Ja
,’ she said and began to say more, still in German, before switching to English. ‘I have been grooming. Picking out hooves, washing tails and manes. A
child
is less demanding of time than a horse, I am sure.’
‘
I didn’t realise you had one,’ he remarked.
‘
I do not have a horse
here
,’ she told him. ‘At home, I have a Hanoverian stallion, but I am not allowed to bring him to school.’
‘
Why not?’ He fell into step beside them, his nose assailed by the pungent smell of sweating horse that clung to Justine’s clothes.
‘
There is no stallion pen,’ she replied, giving him a look that questioned his common sense. ‘He would cover the mares if he ran with the others.’
Justine
stopped at the foot of the stairs, her face drawn. ‘Is there any more news of Imogen?’ she asked. ‘Sergeant Prys told us earlier only that she is still alive.’
‘
No,’ he said. ‘That’s all we know. But Torrance has regained consciousness.’
She
shrugged. ‘Torrance is tough.’ With a huge sigh she added, ‘Imogen is not. She’s very, very fragile.’
Therese
turned towards her. ‘We thought Vivienne was weak, but look how she has surprised us all.’ Then, with a frown in McKenna’s direction, she asked, ‘Where
is
Vivienne?’
‘
Still at the hospital,’ he said. ‘Sergeant Prys may he able to tell us more about Imogen when he comes back. He’s gone to see Torrance.’
‘
That will please her,’ Therese remarked. ‘She is a little in love with him, but not as much as she is with Tonto. She has the T-shirt to prove
that
!’ A wicked grin momentarily transformed her, then her habitually lugubrious expression was back in place. ‘That is a joke,’ she went on. ‘A play on words. A horse’s height is measured in hands. Her T-shirt has a horse’s head on the front and on the back, the words “I like 16 hands between my legs”.’ She stared at him, a keen and surprising intelligence in her somewhat piggy eyes. ‘It is vulgar, yes, but I am not telling you this to suggest she is unwholesome.’
‘
Are you sure about that?’ he asked softly. ‘This is a very unnatural environment with little room for proper outlets. Things must get quite overheated at times.’
‘
But not with Torrance. She isn’t interested.’ Therese paused. ‘She is truly more interested in horses. It may be what people call displacement, but I do not think so. She loves to be with them. Perhaps they help her to forget being human.’ Again, she stared at him. ‘And here, that is good. It keeps her sane. It is a pity Imogen had no such safety valve,’ she finished meaningfully.
‘
Why say that?’ he asked. ‘Do you believe she killed Sukie?’
‘
No!’ Suddenly, Justine sat down on the stairs, collapsing like a puppet with broken strings. ‘We do
not
, however much Dr Scott tried to persuade us.’ She looked up at him. ‘I’m
glad
she’s gone and I very much hope she never comes back. I’m not sorry about Matron, either.’
He
turned to Therese. ‘How did Mr. Nicholls know Matron had hit you? Did you tell him?’
She
shook her head. ‘It was Daisy Podmore. She was loitering on the landing when he arrived. She must have heard Matron shouting at me about Charlotte’s clothes. But then,’ she added, ‘she is
always
snooping.’
‘
Matron told me,’ he began, ‘that you were after Nancy and Charlotte simply because there’s friction and bad blood between you. Is that all there was to it?’
‘
No, it isn’t,’ Justine exclaimed. ‘She deliberately misled you. We were going to punish those two because they’d driven Imogen beyond endurance with their bullying. It was the last straw.’
‘
Were they also using Sukie as a punchbag?’ McKenna asked. ‘Someone was. The pathologist found the evidence when he cut her up.’ At that bald, brutal statement, Justine put her hand to her mouth as if she were about to vomit.
Mournfully,
Therese nodded. ‘But she was not alone. Ainsley has suffered; Daria too, before she hit back, and Vivienne. Many of the little girls are also their victims.’ She gulped, and a tear slid down her cheek and dropped from her chin. ‘We have done what we could to stop them, but whenever we complained to Dr Scott, she would simply tell us that “the wheat must be sorted from the chaff”.’
Justine
let her hand fall to her lap. Her face was ashen. ‘If you remember,’ she said to Therese, ‘she
also
accused us of deliberately misconstruing the natural follow-on to her damned “Make or Break”.’ Her gaze rested on McKenna then. ‘Every year, the seniors put the first formers through this test of physical and mental endurance, and grade their performance. Dr Scott took the idea from military training.’
‘
And I suppose Nancy and Charlotte passed with flying colours?’ he asked.
‘
No, they didn’t,’ Justine replied. ‘They were bullied mercilessly for a long time. They learned the hard way how to survive.’
‘
Do you know why Sukie was being bullied?’
‘
Because she was there. Because it was her turn, just as it might be her turn to be Daisy’s crush. These things go round and round for ever.’
‘
Why “Daisy’s crush”?’ McKenna asked.
‘
Oh, she has a new crush every few weeks. She’s famous for it.’ Justine smiled wanly. ‘Her passions are almost like phoenixes. The old bird consumes itself as the new one rises from the ashes.’
‘
And is Daisy another bully?’
‘
I don’t think so; not yet. But she’s taunted about her lisp and the size of her breasts, so I expect she’ll turn the tables when she gets the chance.’
‘
What about Alice Derringer?’
‘
That
one!’ Therese rolled her eyes. ‘Everyone leaves her alone. She is a little scorpion.’
‘
Tell me what happened to Imogen,’ he urged. ‘
How
had she been driven beyond endurance.’
‘
With utter wanton cruelty,’ Therese replied curtly.
‘
You see,’ Justine said, ‘Imogen was always a brilliant swimmer, and when her stump had healed enough and the weather got warmer, she started going to the pool. She’d leave her crutches on the side.’ She stopped and brushed a hand across her eyes. ‘Nancy, or Charlotte, or one of their gang, used to run off with them. Imogen would flop about like a dying fish while they danced in front of her, calling her “Peg Leg” and “Cripple”, prodding her with the crutches but making sure they kept just out of reach. Yesterday,’ she added, her voice trembling, ‘she decided it was time Nancy had a taste of her own medicine. If only she hadn’t missed!’ she finished bitterly.
‘
Did Dr Scott know?’
‘
Of
course
, she did!’ Therese said contemptuously. ‘We
told
her! She said, “Imogen must learn to accommodate her new situation and its implications.”’
There
was little he could do but leave them with their grief and guilt and anger. He returned to the mobile incident room, wondering if the grief would stay with them long enough to become almost a friend and thought it probably would, although the guilt would not be so kind.
‘
Is there a motive in there?’ he asked Jack, when he had finished relaying the story.
‘
Only if Nancy or Charlotte were lying at the bottom of Menai Strait with a dented head.’
‘
You don’t think Sukie’s death could be simply bullying that went too far?’
Jack
thought for a moment. ‘You’re suggesting manslaughter at most, whereas I’m positive it was far more deliberate. Eifion’s found pressure marks from where she was held down in the water, as well as a probable trainer imprint on her jeans.’
‘
I see.’ McKenna pulled out a cigarette, then carefully put it back in the packet. ‘Nonetheless, the contemptible Nancy and her detestable sidekick warrant interrogation, but as they’re both over eighteen, we’ll do it at the station. Just make sure there’s a nice big audience when you take them away.’
‘
I was planning to visit Avril O’Connor.’
‘
There’s nothing to stop you. Those two can cool their heels in the lock-up for a couple of hours. It might do them a world of good.’
Shivering,
Martha trudged along the bank above the foreshore, where the uncut grass was sodden from yesterday’s rain. Cold crept through the soles of her shoes, the wet hems of her trousers slapped against her ankles and she ached from head to foot, with the bone-deep pain that seemed to have been her lot for ever.
The
trees ahead grew so close to the water she could barely make out the bruised passage through the grass. Pushing aside the drooping branches, shying when the cold leaves slapped her in the face, she inched forward, scared of sliding helplessly into the Strait. She searched the ground before each step to make sure there was purchase in the squelching mud, while the water rushed past on her right. The tide was coming up in a hurry, driven by a thin north-westerly that had stolen all the warmth from the morning and was harrying more rain clouds about the mountains. Ever distrustful of her body and the sudden spasms that might afflict knees or hips or ankles, she crept gingerly forward, eyes firmly on the ground. The racing tide on the periphery of her vision made her dizzy and she staggered alarmingly more than once.
‘
Why am I doing this?’ she muttered. ‘Why the
hell
am I bothering?’
Alice
was a little ingrate, a spoiled, silly, nasty brat who had clearly decided to throw in her lot with the others of her kind infesting Freya’s proving ground.
‘
And what else did I expect?’ Martha demanded, without expecting a response from the alien forces of nature that surrounded her. ‘She was seven when I sent her away. What right have I to expect her to feel anything for me?’ Because I feel so much for her, she thought, answering her own questions. She’s my child and I
won’t
abandon her.
She
bore on through the trees, with the same dogged persistence that made her fight the constant pain, sagging with relief when the tangle of mossy trunks and smothering foliage fell away to expose the entry to a small glade and a golden sandbank, where the furrows ploughed earlier by the galloping horses were not yet obliterated by the swirling tide. When she heard Alice, from somewhere near at hand, she stopped in her tracks. Carried by the wind, the words came to her with total clarity.
‘
Of course,’ she was piping, ‘I knew immediately what had
really
happened to Dr Scott. When Mummy sacks someone on the spot, she says so-and-so is “considering their position”. The guff about extended leave is just to explain their sudden disappearance.’
‘J
eez!’ Daisy exclaimed. ‘What
don’t
you bloody know?’
‘
When you’re telling the truth!’ There was a sharp, shrill note in Alice’s voice.
‘
Nobody
knows that,’ Grace said then with a giggle. ‘Not even Daisy herself.’
‘
Fuck you!’ Daisy screeched.
Martha
heard someone whisper what sounded like ‘touché’ and a moment later the sound of flesh slapping flesh. She rushed forward as the screaming began, to find Alice and Daisy fighting furiously, while Grace, clad like the others in blue jeans and white T-shirt, straddled a rotting tree trunk, watching.
‘
Stop that!’ yelled Martha. ‘This instant!’
Neither
of them took the least notice. They went on tussling and kicking and punching, moving ever nearer to the edge of the bank. Grace, however, waved her hand and said, ‘Hello, Mrs Rathbone.’
Martha
ignored her. She strode through the wet grass to where her daughter and Daisy were now rolling on the ground, locked in each other’s arms, a hair’s breadth from tumbling into the water. She snatched hold of the back of Alice’s shirt and, with every ounce of her strength, tugged and pulled until she had freed her from Daisy’s embrace. Suddenly released, Daisy spun like a wheel, right over the lip of the bank.
Horror-struck
despite herself, Martha dropped to her knees. She crawled forward until she had Daisy in view, expecting to find her dashed on a rock or already snatched by the tide. Laughing uproariously, the girl was spread-eagled on the sand, her eyes alive with devilment.