When Jack recommenced interviewing Nancy, he only succeeded in broaching the issue of the threat to slash Purdey before the solicitor intervened, demanding to know if the horse had in fact been harmed and wanting sight of the written statement of complaint, from the horse’s owner or from any other interested party, that related to the alleged threat. ‘And I mean “interested” in the legal sense of the word,’ the solicitor added.
While
Nancy’s smirk grew, Jack was forced to admit defeat on both counts and, soon, compelled to release both girls. Charlotte left the police station with her hair in disarray, her clothes limp with perspiration and her face blotched with tears and streaked with mascara. Nancy, dry-eyed and cool, strutted out ahead of her, flame-red hair glowing and green eyes hard with triumph. She sat imperiously in the back of the police car that was to return them to school, making an obscene gesture as it drove from the yard.
Avril
O’Connor was barely less hostile when she opened her front door to his summons. ‘The neighbours said you’d been hammering on the door earlier,’ she told him accusingly. ‘And last night young Dewi Prys was here, looking for our Sean.’
‘
Right on both counts,’ Jack replied with a tired smile.
‘
If you’re wanting our Sean
again
,’ Avril said meaningfully, leaning on the jamb as if to bar his entry, ‘he isn’t in. He’s gone to Tesco to do my shopping, like he does every Saturday. He’s a good son.’
‘
I’m sure he is,’ agreed Jack.
Narrowing
her eyes, Avril peered up at him. ‘Have you spoken to Paula yet?’
‘
Not personally, but one of my colleagues has.’
‘
Well?’ she demanded. ‘Is our Sean still under suspicion?’
‘
No.’ Jack smiled again. ‘He never was, really.’
Avril
sagged against the frame. ‘You’d best come in, then,’ she muttered, sniffing. Her eyes brimmed with tears.
Just
like the other morning, he followed as she padded into the kitchen. Today she was baking. A tray of buns in paper cases was ready to go into the oven and a wooden spoon stood on end in a big Cornish-ware bowl where she was mixing fruit and dough for a bara brith. ‘Sit down,’ she invited, then turned her back to open the oven door. ‘Cup of tea?’ she asked, picking up the bun tray.
‘
If it’s not too much bother.’
Without
replying, she put the tray in the oven and filled the kettle before returning to the table. She picked up the spoon. ‘If you’ve talked to Paula,’ she said, stirring the fruit mix, ‘why d’you want to see our Sean again?’
‘
I don’t. I thought
you
might have things to tell me you wouldn’t feel right saying in front of Sean.’
‘
Did you, now?’ she commented. ‘What sort of things would those be, then?’
Jack
shrugged. ‘Women’s stuff, I suppose,’ he said vaguely.
Avril
smiled. ‘That’ll cover at least half the world’s business, won’t it?’ She moved two lined loaf tins within reach and began spooning the mixture from bowl to tins.
Jack
could smell the spices and tea in which the fruit had been steeped. ‘Personal stuff, then,’ he said, watching her level the loaves with the back of the spoon. Next, from a small white bowl filled with thick, clear liquid, she brushed on glaze. ‘Women notice an awful lot,’ he added encouragingly.
She
opened the oven, checked the buns, then placed the loaves on the shelf beneath them. Once that was done, she rinsed her hands at the sink and turned her attention to making tea, saying nothing.
‘
If I were you,’ he remarked, ‘I wouldn’t feel obliged by any sense of loyalty to the school. Dr Scott said she’d sacked you because your work wasn’t up to scratch, but I’ve only got to look around your house to see she was giving me a cock-and-bull story. You’ve obviously got very high standards of cleanliness and so on.’
‘
Stop flannelling,’ Avril said. ‘I like housework. I always have. It’s satisfying. A clean, tidy house and regular meals make life easier. You can’t relax with dirt and clutter at every turn and your stomach rumbling with hunger, can you?’ She lifted the teapot lid to stir the brew. ‘I’ve always thought these women’s libbers got it all wrong.’
‘
You mean they chucked out the baby along with the bathwater?’
‘
Something like that.’ She nodded. ‘They’d probably call me every name under the sun for looking after our Sean the way I do as well. But you see, it’s all about give and take. I do what I’m good at, he does what he’s good at, and when you work out who’s actually done what, his share’s often bigger than mine.’
‘
You’ll miss him an awful lot when he gets married, won’t you?’
Avril
poured out the tea. Putting milk and sugar within Jack’s reach, she said, ‘He was barely a week old when I realised I’d be spending the next twenty years —perhaps more — rearing him just so he could one day up sticks and leave home. But that’s what having children means, doesn’t it?’ She smiled. ‘Anyway, when I’m not cooking man-size meals every day I might even lose a bit of weight. I certainly won’t take so much trouble just for myself.’
‘
It’s still sad,’ Jack said.
She
nodded. ‘It’s still sad, but at least I know I’ve done my very best for him, which is more than Dr Skinflint’ll ever be able to say
she’s
done for any of those girls at the Hermitage.’ Picking up her tea, she gazed at him over the rim of the mug. ‘Did she really call me a slattern?’
He
was about to say not, but changed his mind. ‘I suppose she did, in so many words.’
‘
She wants to be careful,’ Avril commented. ‘I might even ring up and remind her what slander means.’
‘
Did she ever give you a written warning about your work or anything like that?’
‘
Did she heck!’ Avril said disparagingly. ‘She didn’t have cause. I told you yesterday, she got rid of most of us to save money and it wasn’t much of a surprise when she did, either. We’d seen the way the wind was blowing when she sacked the two assistant matrons. They were both qualified nurses, so they cost her. Instead, she took on two young chits just out of school with barely a brain between them.’ After a moment she added, ‘Matron told her at the time she was storing up trouble, but Dr Skinflint wouldn’t have it. Told Matron to mind her own nose and get on with her work, or else
she’d
be needing another job, too.’
‘B
it of a bully, is she?’ Jack suggested.
Avril
eyed him up and down. ‘You mean to say you haven’t found out yet? What have you been doing since Thursday, then?’
‘
We’ve heard there’s some bullying among the girls,’ he replied.
‘
Only “some”?’ she commented tartly. ‘Still, I suppose people have different ideas of what “some” means, don’t they?’
‘
Did you come across much of it?’
‘
I’d hear about it more often than actually see it,’ she told him, ‘and it wouldn’t be fair to say they were all at it. But then, you don’t need many to make life hell for everybody. Maybe six or seven of them ruled the roost and that was it. When they left, the next lot moved up — there was always another group in waiting, so to speak.’
‘
What sort of things did they do?’
‘
What bullies usually do.’ She rose, rather quickly, and went to the cooker and when she opened the oven door the smell made Jack’s mouth water. She removed the tray of buns and put them on the counter, leaving the loaves of bara brith to bake a while longer, and standing with her back to him, began laying out the buns on a cooling rack. ‘Plus taking advantage of what opportunities came their way because of being in a girls’ school,’ she added slowly. ‘I dare say you’ve heard stories about what goes on in women’s prisons, so you’ll know women can be very vicious with each other in a sexual way.’
‘
Are you talking about lesbian rape?’ he asked.
She
ran a bowl of fresh dishwater and put the tray to soak before replying. ‘I don’t know about actual rapes,’ she said, turning to face him, ‘but there were whispers about a sort of ritual called “breaking in” when a girl started her periods.’ Taking the few short steps back to her seat, she went on, ‘I was on my way home one evening when I saw this girl creeping up the path with her skirt pulled between her legs. She made me think of a woman I’d seen in the hospital when our Sean was born — like she’d just given birth and could barely move because of all the stitches she’d had. She was on her way from the sports hall, so whatever was going on probably happened there. Anyway, the caretakers were forever complaining about soiled knickers blocking the drains.’ Seeing Jack’s expression, she remarked, ‘You might well look sick but like I said, women can be very vicious.’
‘
Can you remember the girl’s name?’
‘
They used to call her “Charlotte the harlot”, on account of her mother’s goings-on, so I heard. She must be in the sixth form if she’s still there.’
‘
Did you ever talk to her about what you’d seen?’
‘
I tried,’ Avril said. ‘The very next day. One of the other cleaners found her bedding soaked with blood, so I used that as an excuse, but she just blanked me — too terrified to open her mouth, in my opinion.’ With a grim smile she added, ‘So I took it upon myself to tell Matron and I let Dr Skinflint know, but I don’t expect for one moment that either of them did anything.’ She took a few more sips of her tea. ‘But don’t set too much store by all this where young Sukie’s death is concerned,’ she cautioned. ‘Bullying there may be, and stomach-churning stuff at that, but I’d be surprised —
really
surprised — to find there’s any connection.’
‘
Would you? I’d have thought the connection’s obvious.’
‘
Then you’re not reading things right. Dr Skinflint controls the bullying like she controls everything else. She lets it go
so
far, but never far enough to cause
her
grief.’
‘
She’s up to her eyeballs in grief at the moment,’ Jack said. ‘Maybe she isn’t so clever after all.’
‘
Or maybe somebody else is
more
clever.’
‘
Like who?’ he asked.
‘
Somebody desperate to hide something?’ she suggested. ‘Somebody desperate to
have
something, maybe. People can be made very single-minded by what they want.’
‘
Sukie didn’t seem to own anything especially covetable,’ he told her.
‘
Somebody could want something that you or I wouldn’t look at twice,’ Avril said. ‘Like clothes, for instance. Our Sean said about that dog of yours sniffing out a girl in one of Sukie’s old skirts.’
‘
We’ve been told that handing on outgrown clothes is common practice.’
‘
Outgrown
uniforms
, maybe, but those girls hang on to their other clothes like grim death. I’ve seen plenty of fisticuffs because one of them’s “borrowed” something or other, usually when they were cleaning the seniors’ rooms. There’s an awful lot of pilfering.’
‘
There’s nothing missing from Sukie’s belongings. We’ve checked.’
‘
Well, if I were you,’ she advised, ‘I’d check again.
And
again, after that. Now,’ she went on, getting up from the table, ‘can I tempt you to another cup of tea and a bun with a dollop of cream under the top?’
‘
Butterfly cakes?’ Jack asked, his eyes lighting up. ‘I haven’t had those since I was a child.’
When
McKenna sent her away early, Nona was both angry and dismayed: angry because she would probably miss her favourite Saturday evening television and dismayed by the prospect of being alone with Daisy. By the time she had made a half-hearted trawl of the Bangor shops, in a fruitless search for the kind of stylish clothes Janet wore, she was positively dreading what the night might hold.
Gwynfor
was watching football on television. ‘You’re home early,’ he remarked, keeping his eyes glued to the screen. ‘I wasn’t expecting you before five.’
She
threw her bag on the nearest chair. ‘McKenna’s making me do a split shift,’ she said bad-temperedly. ‘I’ve got to go back for eight.’
‘
Why?’ Gwynfor jerked his head back and forth, following the progress of the ball.
‘
They’ve had to put one of the girls in seclusion in the staff flats and I’m babysitting.’ She sat down beside him. ‘Overnight.’
Absently
he patted her knee. ‘Tough.’
‘
Tough’ was the right word, Nona said to herself, as for the umpteenth time she tried to find something that would keep Daisy occupied for more than two minutes. She felt completely exhausted, partly because she had been too keyed up to doze off at home, even for a couple of hours, but mostly with sheer tension.
Before
she left, Janet told her that Daisy had spent the afternoon quietly reading magazines in the bedroom. She had chatted desultorily while they ate the evening meal that was sent over from the school, but retreated again to the bedroom when the washing-up was done. Once the door closed behind Janet, however, Daisy emerged. She spent almost an hour mercilessly harassing Nona like a spoiled toddler, before agreeing to watch the programme Nona was desperate not to miss. Sitting cross-legged on the floor, Daisy stared at the television for no more than ten minutes before announcing that the programme was ‘shit’. She picked up the remote control and began punching buttons, her eyes skidding back and forth across the screen and, Nona was sure, taking in nothing. When she tired of channel hopping, Nona suggested doing the jigsaw they had found in one of the cupboards. Daisy co-operated long enough to sort the edge pieces, but suddenly scooped them back into the box.
Watching
her, Nona felt a confusing mix of emotions. The incongruity between Daisy’s behaviour and her appearance was unsettling, for although she looked like a young woman, albeit one rather bruised and battered, her limited attention span and constant need for novelty brought to mind the disturbed children Nona helped to process through youth court or met in the children’s homes.
Shortly
before ten she took respite in the kitchen. The school had provided a pint of milk, six teabags, a tiny jar of instant coffee, an old jam jar half filled with instant chocolate, four sandwiches wrapped in cling film and a packet of digestive biscuits. She unwrapped two tuna and mayonnaise sandwiches, made tea for herself and poured a glass of milk for Daisy. Then, supper over, she began persuading Daisy to get ready for bed.
Daisy
ignored her. Restless and irritable, she roamed about the small flat, poking into dusty cupboards, pulling out empty drawers, going back and forth to the kitchen for biscuits, another glass of milk.
‘
Make that your last drink now,’ Nona told her. ‘I don’t know when we’ll get more milk and we need some for the morning.’
Daisy
’s tongue snaked around the milky moustache on her upper lip. ‘Suppose they forget about us?’ she lisped. ‘We’ll starve.’
‘
Don’t be so silly!’ Nona said snappishly and was instantly afraid she had unconsciously aped that awful voice.
Had
she said ‘Don’t be tho thilly!’?
‘
We will!’ insisted Daisy. ‘We daren’t go out in case the killer’s lying in wait.’ A frown creased her high forehead as she munched the last segment of biscuit. ‘They could be outside right now, ready to kick down the door and batter our heads in.’
Chills
ran up Nona’s spine, lifting the hairs at the back of her neck. She opened her mouth, then closed it, trying to compose a reply that contained no sibilants. ‘Time for bed,’ was all she could muster, her voice wavering between false cheerfulness and optimistic determination.
To
her immense relief, Daisy rose and carried her glass to the kitchen. ‘I won’t sleep,’ she announced, but made her way reluctantly to the bedroom.
Nona
followed her, to collect blankets and pillows for the couch, where she would spend the night. ‘Don’t run off all the hot water when you have your bath,’ she said, as Daisy dragged her towel off the bed.
Daisy
stood as if turned to stone. ‘No
way
am I having a bath!’ she breathed.
‘No
way!’
‘
Why ever not?’ Her arms full of bedding, Nona closed her eyes in near despair.
‘
Because the killer could break in and hold me down in the water until I drowned like Sukie!’
‘
Oh, for heaven’s sake! Have a shower, then.’
‘
I had one this afternoon.’
‘
Have another!’
‘
I was going to!’ Tossing her head, Daisy stalked to the bathroom.
For
almost an hour she fidgeted between bathroom, bedroom and sitting room, while Nona, flicking through one of the magazines she had taken from the bedroom, tried to ignore her periodic and pointed reappearances. At last the bedroom door clicked shut, the bed thudded as Daisy threw herself down and the flat grew quiet.
That
quietness soon became disturbing. All Nona could hear was the wind, fussing with the trees that grew almost close enough to scrape the windows, and her heart, which fast began pounding in her ears. Pulling herself together, she breathed deeply and steadily until her heartbeat subsided to a slow throb, then switched on the television, just loud enough to convince her she was not alone in this sinister little world.
The
lumpy divan in the staff flat was even less comfortable than Daisy’s cot in the dormitory. Lying atop the covers, she wriggled this way and that, staring at the fuzzy, yellowy oval the bedside lamp threw on the ceiling and, terrified Nona would sneak away at the first opportunity, listening so hard for sounds of life that her ears started to, hum, only relaxing when voices began to chatter quietly from the television. Next, footsteps made for the bathroom, the lavatory flushed, the shower ran briefly, a toothbrush rasped against teeth and the light cord snicked. Soon afterwards the television was addressing a snoring audience and, once more, she felt frighteningly alone.
As
she drifted to the brink of sleep, a lightning-strike of her own electricity cut her from head to toe, leaving her empty, nauseous and wide awake, and, as ever when that happened, she saw herself like the dead frog she had galvanised back to life in first-year biology. Touching electrodes to the frog’s legs, she had watched with utter astonishment as the corpse bounded off the bench. Besotted with her Frankenstein power, she retrieved the cold, flaccid body and repeated the experiment again and again, laughing frenziedly each time the corpse jumped. When Alice intervened, standing between her and the teacher who, her voice hoarse with shrieking, was about to slap down her hysteria, Daisy was furious.
That
was the first time Alice rescued her from her own excess, but now Alice, at the end of her tether, had finally abandoned her. Threshing about on the bed, Daisy wanted to beat herself to a pulp for opening her mouth.
Nona
had dozed off, slumped on the couch with her hands folded across her chest, and she woke with her head hanging over the side and a vicious crick in her neck. Momentarily disorientated, she sat up slowly, massaging the pain, squinting at inane antics on the television screen. Then, remembering where she was and why, she switched off the set. Into the silence, noises intruded from the adjoining room. ‘Oh, hell!’ she muttered, struggling to her feet. ‘What’s she up to now?’
Daisy
was hunched against the bedhead with her knees drawn up and her eyes awash with tears. Her bare feet looked cold.
‘
What’s the matter?’ Nona asked.
‘
I can’t sleep.’
‘
D’you want some hot chocolate?’
Nodding,
Daisy slid off the bed and trailed after her to the kitchen.
‘
You must find being cooped up here very strange,’ Nona remarked, filling the kettle. ‘I expect you’re missing your friends in the dorm.’
‘
I don’t miss Alice. I hate her!’
‘
That’s only because you two had a fight,’ Nona said. ‘I used to feel the same when I’d had a bust-up with my best friend, but we’d be back to normal in no time at all.’
‘
I
do
hate her!’ Daisy insisted. ‘She gets on my nerves. She coughs all the time.’ She imitated Alice’s irritating, asthmatic cough. ‘I feel like strangling her. And she nags, in that horrible voice of hers. It’s like a rusty hinge.’
‘
She probably only nags because she worries about you. Friends are like that.’ Nona unscrewed the lid of the chocolate jar and spooned powder into two cups. Daisy lolled against the counter, the bright overhead light exposing the tear tracks on her cheeks. ‘Why were you crying?’
‘
I wasn’t!’
‘
There’s no need to bite my head off! You look a bit peaky, that’s all.’
‘
I’m due soon.’
‘
Why didn’t you say, then? Have you got stomachache?’
‘
No. I never get it.’
‘
Lucky you,’ Nona remarked, pouring boiling water into the cups. ‘I have dreadful cramps and I throw up.’ She stirred the chocolate vigorously until froth billowed over the rims. ‘When did you first get your periods?’ she asked, making her way to the sitting room with a drink in each hand.
‘
Four years ago.’
‘
You were very young.’ Nona put the cups on the floor, then sank on to the couch. ‘I was thirteen.’
Daisy
sat beside her. ‘Alice hasn’t started yet and she’s nearly fifteen. There’s probably something wrong with her.’
‘
I doubt it. People develop at different rates.’ Gazing at her companion, she added: ‘You’re a big girl, anyway.’
‘
That’s what Matron says. Bitch!’ Daisy stared at her feet. ‘When I’m due, my boobs get so swollen and sore they actually bleed if I do gym or games, and all
she
says is, “Big girls have to grin and bear it.”’
‘
It strikes me,’ Nona said slowly, ‘that it’s a good thing she’s had to retire.’
‘
She’ll probably come back as soon as your lot go. So will Dr Scott.’ Daisy picked up her drink. ‘That’s what Miss Knight thinks, anyway. I heard her talking to Bebb after breakfast.’ She paused. ‘They live together, you know.’
‘
So I gather.’
Licking
chocolate from her lips, Daisy said, ‘Miss Knight seems fairly normal, but you can tell Bebb’s a dyke from a mile off.’
‘
What’s that got to do with anything?’ Nona frowned. ‘I expect they live together because they’re sisters.’
Daisy
shrugged. ‘It’s useful when you can tell just by looking.’
Tentatively,
Nona said, ‘From what I’ve seen of her, Torrance looks
very
normal. She’s actually been told off for flirting with Sergeant Prys.’
Daisy,
her face buried in the cup, said nothing. ‘Still,’ Nona went on, ‘people can swing both ways, can’t they?’
‘
I wouldn’t know.’ Daisy drained the cup, dropped it in the saucer with a clatter, then rose quickly. ‘I’m going back to bed,’ she said and almost ran from the room.
Daisy
’s breasts felt more swollen and tender by the moment; by Monday, when her regular-as-clockwork period would begin, she would not have been surprised if they had burst like overripe melons. Whichever way she lay, sat, crouched, or contorted her body, they hurt, and she realised she could barely remember a time when eight days out of every twenty-eight were not girded first by this burden of pain and then by the outpouring of blood, that made her stink like a barrel of rotting fish before stopping so abruptly it was as if someone had turned off a tap.
She
tried to lie on her back, but the weight of her breasts was suffocating, so she rolled off the bed and picked up her bra from the pile of discarded clothes on the only chair in the room. Once the engorged excrescences attached to her chest were again harnessed in the pearly grey silk and lace, she buttoned up her pyjama jacket, then stood by the chair, wondering why she could still barely breathe. When she realised the drawn curtains at the single window must be cutting off the air, she ripped them apart and, throwing open one half of the casement, leaned out, savouring the touch of the cool wind and a totally unfamiliar view.