Forbidden Lessons (16 page)

To Mr Peters’ surprise and delight Susie had chosen John Donne’s The Flea, replete with its sexual innuendo and imagery. Hearing her recite
"loss of maidenhead"
nearly pushed him over the edge.
 

"It suck'd me first, and now sucks thee,
 

"And in this flea our two bloods mingled be
."

Susie’s recital was quite brilliant and she was only too aware of the ulterior meaning of the lines. Noticing Mr Peters’ reaction, Miss Wingrove regretted not having encouraged her to pick a slightly less controversial poem.

"Thank you Susie, that’s coming on nicely." She called the next girl up for her practice.

Mr Peters sidled up to Susie.

"That was quite a stunning performance, Susanna. I really felt that you understood Donne’s verse, his passion, his sensuality."

Susie had her own plans for Mr Peters though she didn’t intend to put them into action just yet. But keeping him on the boil for now - or a light simmer at least - suited her needs.

"I was wondering if I should reference the typographical pun in some way?" she asked him.

The "s" of "suck’d" was printed as "
ſ
" in Donne’s era resulting in a deliberate visual obscenity.

Mr Peters wet his lips at the thought of Susie uttering such profane words. "If you would like any extra help with your performance I would be only too happy to oblige," he said.

He really was a disgustingly creepy old goat, but she treated him to a suggestive smile.
 

"I’ll let you know Sir."

Grace Grant went to see Mrs Grayson about the situation with Susie and the geography teacher. To her frustration Mrs Grayson was rather dismissive.

"The problem is, Eleanor, that Susie’s work is really exemplary. She’s also ostensibly very well behaved. The reasons given for all the demerit points and detentions are just absurd."

"You know as well as I do that there are many ways for a pupil to show insolence," the headmistress said.

"I do. I don’t disagree that Susie is likely deliberately infuriating Pat Ayers. But these endless detentions aren’t fair, and they’re not wise."

Mrs Grayson had long known that Mrs Ayers was a problem. She was extremely unpopular with the girls but on the other hand she tended to get excellent results. Two girls had even won places at Cambridge last year following her personal tuition.
 

While the headmistress thought it was wiser to get results through respect rather than fear, she couldn’t deny that Mrs Ayers got them. Personality clashes may have been common but the girls did at least have the option of changing to German if they truly couldn’t bear her.
 

If only Susie had chosen German: but as a new girl she obviously hadn’t been forewarned of the Geography teacher’s bad temper.

Then of course there were the pranks. Since the foul-smelling curtains rumours of other ones had reached Mrs Grayson’s ears. Did the Geography teacher suspect Susie Clarke was behind them?
 

"I’ll keep an eye on things. And have a quiet word with Pat at the right moment," she promised Grace Grant.

* * *

Friday, the eve of Susie’s birthday, was bitterly cold. November frost had frozen the grounds and there were biting winds all day with rain setting in after supper. The thought of creeping out of a warm dorm in the middle of such a night to the unheated pavilion had minimal appeal.

"The cold will keep us alert. Besides we can hardly not show up with a carload of Dunks boys arriving," Susie said.

"A carload?"

"I don’t know, Darius said they’d bring some people over. He didn’t say the number, just as many would fit."

"He’d better be driving a mini then," Charlotte said.

They had already scoped out the pavilion and stashed some provisions there. It was padlocked but there was a window with a faulty latch around the back. There was also no light and no heating.

"We can’t use light anyway, it’ll have to be something dim like torches or candles. And not many. We don’t want to light the place up like a beacon."

"What would someone do if they saw?" Laura asked. "Would they come and investigate or just call the police?"

"Investigate I should think. They wouldn’t want the scandal if the police showed up." Charlotte said.

Susie allowed herself a moment’s fantasy of Mrs Ayers showing up in a nightgown and overcoat, screeching loud enough to wake the entire school. The instant expulsion would be worth it just to experience that sight. But she had the others to think of. Besides, Whitsun House had no view to the pavilion so unless the Axe was out taking a midnight stroll she would be among the least likely teachers to discover them.

* * *

They had gone to bed in jeans and warm clothing but it was still an ordeal leaving warm blankets for the freezing night air as they crept down the fire escape.

The night had cleared and there was a bright moon. It made the grounds look vast and it raised their spirits. Having successfully escaped Michaelmas House it seemed like the worst hurdle was over. The remoteness of the pavilion was reassuring: they certainly wouldn’t be overheard.

Breathless from the cold they clambered through the window into the dark building. Charlotte lit a candle.

"Make sure you put it in a jar, we don’t want to burn the place down. Oh I can see them coming," Susie said.

"How many?"

"Five it seems. I don’t recognise the others."

To Laura’s relief the other three boys didn’t include Jonathan. They were three more St Duncan’s rugby players, very much in the mould of Julian and Darius, and had hauled an impressive amount of beer with them. They already seemed fairly drunk.

The discussion soon got onto gambling as Susie’s win over the previous exeat had become the stuff of legend. There were jibes over whether it was luck or cheating and demands for the chance to win it back.
 

The noise level was increasing with the alcohol. Susie was the only one of the three girls really enjoying herself. Laura and Charlotte were still too on edge. Laura constantly thought she heard footsteps outside.
 

"It’s just an owl or something," Julian said.

Darius had brought playing cards with him and by the dim candlelight the five St Duncan’s boys started a game with Susie. As the other two didn’t know how to play they sat and watched.

It was the poker game that saved all their skins.

Conversation lulled to near silence as the players focused on the hands, both Darius and Julian determined to win back their pride and Susie resolute in repeating her success.

"Anybody in there?"

There was a loud rattle at the door. In the stillness of the night it was like gunshot.

It was Jenkins, the school handyman.

Oh God.

Sheer, raw panic.

Everyone froze.

Darius snuffed the candle. Charlotte gripped Laura’s hand in terror.

"Hello? Who’s in there?"

Jenkins obviously hadn’t got the key to the padlock. The front windows which looked across the fields were shuttered so he couldn’t see in from that side at least. They heard him walk around the building to the back windows.

The stillness. The terror.
 

Eight of them stuck in the freezing darkness of the wooden building facing exposure at any moment.

The broken window wasn’t shuttered but it was closed, and it was a smaller window than the front ones. The moon was also shining on the front ones rather than the back. If they remained in the shadows, completely still, and Jenkins couldn’t see in clearly then perhaps, perhaps he wouldn’t see them.

Except the smoke. The damn cigarette smoke. It must reek in the night air, Laura thought. Would he have a torch with him?

She closed her eyes; it was actually hard to breathe properly. The fear in the room was sobering. They had felt invincible but the reality was instant expulsion if they were discovered: catastrophic for the St Duncan’s Sixth formers who were mid-way through university applications.

The eight of them waited for several minutes. Jenkins had gone past the window and round to the front again, rattling the door one more time.

"If there’s anyone in there I’m calling the police."

Then there was silence.

Cat-like, Susie made her way to the front windows and managed to peer through a tiny chink where the wooden shutter had warped.

"He’s gone. He’s half way back to the gate."

Laura felt like crying. There were plenty of oaths under people’s breath.

"We’ll have to get out quickly, he might come back with reinforcements," Julian said.

"And the key."

One by one they clambered out of the window as quickly and quietly as they could. Darius and Julian passed the remainders of the feast through, mainly empty bottles and crisps.

"Hold on," said Susie. "Someone has to piss in there."

"What?" Charlotte looked at her as though she was mad.

"Jenkins knows there was someone in here. They’ll be over this place with a toothcomb first thing tomorrow, probably with the police too. We need to make them think it’s a tramp."

She grabbed an old rug from the pavilion that they’d been sitting on, and trampled it into the mud below the window. Then she poured some beer dregs on it and tossed it back into the room. "That’s his bed. Now throw in a couple of fag ends and one - no two - empty bottles. Now one of you boys go in and do the business."

At a nod from Julian one of the three rugby players went back in. They all waited for him.

"In the corner and a bit on the blanket. Let’s hope that does it," he reported on exit.

"Short of throwing a battered old hat and a spotted kerchief on a stick to completely over-egg the pudding, I should think we’re done," Darius said.

Laura was simply horrified by the whole situation. It was bad enough to sneak out but to foul the place up was unbearably wrong.
 

She wasn’t even aware, nor did she really care, how the boys got back to the gate. She, Charlotte and Susie hurried off back to Michaelmas House trying to keep to the shadows as far as possible. They took their shoes off at the bottom of the fire escape to climb up with minimum noise. They crept into the dorm where Margery was gently snoring and slid into their beds, fully clothed.

Everything was flashing in Laura’s mind when she tried to sleep. She kept imagining the worst scenarios. And what was Mr Rydell going to say if she got expelled? She hadn’t been able to tell him about the party as they hadn’t spoken alone since half term

How she wished she could be with him now: safe, holding her, soothing away the fear.

They were disarmed the next morning by a surprisingly sincere apology from Susie. "I should never have dragged you guys into it, it was totally unfair. I know you didn’t really like the idea. I thought I had it all sorted and I didn’t. Actually that’s not quite true, I knew it was a huge risk which was part of the fun, but it was totally unfair to put that on you."

"It’s ok, we agreed to come and it was your birthday. You don’t owe us an apology," Charlotte said.

"I do. And the tramp thing, it’s foul to have done that on school property. I never meant that to happen but I was running out of ideas."

Laura had woken up that morning feel less revulsed and more relieved by Susie’s strategy. "I think it was smart, actually. Otherwise they would start sniffing around and the pressure might get too much."

They all knew she meant Margery. Not that Margery would tell directly, but she might give the game away by her reaction to any questioning.

"Who ended up winning by the way?" Charlotte asked.

"I was ahead by a mile, more’s the pity. The boys will be toasting old Jenkins for years to come."

"We'll look on this one day and laugh," Laura said. "Happy birthday by the way."

"Thanks. It will be a happy one if we continue to get away with this," Susie said.

Charlotte looked at Laura anxiously. "Will you tell Mr Rydell?"

It was something Laura had been uncertain about.
 
She had had so little time to speak with him since half term and Susie's plan had been so last minute.

"I'll probably mention it, but not every detail."

"He won't tell will he? He might feel obligated." Charlotte was worried.

"Of course he won't tell. If he felt some overwhelming moral duty to report misbehaviour he'd start with himself. Keeping quiet about an illicit party pales in comparison to screwing one of your pupils, doesn't it?" Susie said.

Laura felt conflicted. She realised that it could compromise him to tell him certain things. He still had his duties as a teacher and it was dangerous enough for him to be in a relationship with her. She couldn't make him complicit in their rule-breaking as well.

"You know thinking about it I don't think I'll say anything. Not now anyway. Maybe ages later in the future when it really doesn't matter anymore," she said.

After all, he must have secrets he didn't tell her.
 
He must hear things about her friends from other teachers, or know things that he didn't burden her with. Ultimately it was Susie's secret: her birthday, her idea, and she who had done her best to save them all from disaster.

* * *

Susie was in two minds about attending detention that day. It was her birthday after all, and spending valuable leisure hours cooped up yet again did not seem appealing or fair. She knew that the flawless work in her Geography exercise book was a growing gun. 

The end of term exams were also going to be interesting. She would easily top the class by a mile if Mrs Ayers marked her fairly. Susie was certain however she would not. But a wrongly marked exam paper would be in a very different league from a spiteful C on a homework essay.

Susie wondered what Mrs Ayers' defence would be if that happened. Would they just let her get away with it? Put it down to an unfortunate error of judgement? She was aware how little weight she carried against a teacher of many years - decades - who must have some value to Francis Hall if she had lasted so long with such a malevolent personality.