Different Class (37 page)

Dr Blakely smiled. ‘I think that may be a discussion we have to keep for another day. For the moment, let’s reconvene – let’s say as soon as possible, John?’

Harrington nodded. ‘I’ll make a date.’

And at those words, a Century of duty and teaching were dismissed – by an upstart in a shiny suit and his pair of lackeys. The Chaplain had the grace to look awkward, and tried to catch me as I went out, but I was far too angry (and beneath that, too afraid) to deliver more than a curt
Goodbye
. I went through the business of today like an automaton; smiling; talking to the boys; taking tea in the Common Room. But there was a bleakness inside me.

This is how it begins, I thought. Just as it did twenty years ago, a Juggernaut fuelled by rumours and spite, crushing good men beneath its wheels. Just as it did with all of us. Just as it did with Harry Clarke.

10

October 14th, 2005

The golden lion of autumn is unusually subdued this year. Head tucked quietly over his paws, like a bronze statue over a grave. The dead walk in October; and not just on All Hallows’ Eve. Even the boys are oddly subdued. They sense the coming of winter. I sense it too, deep in my bones, just as I knew instinctively, when Colin Knight went missing last year, that I would never see him again—

Colin Knight. That wretched boy. I thought perhaps I’d put him to rest. But as Hallowe’en approaches, I find myself remembering the dead. Colin Knight. Harry Clarke. Even Lee Bagshot – although he was not one of ours – perhaps even
because
of that.

With the passing of time, I find that the concept of
belonging
becomes less and less easy to believe in. I once belonged to St Oswald’s. I was a part of it, heart and soul. Now I am in the shadows, contemplating the darkness. Harry, too: now, even in death, he is a pariah. Our sense of belonging is nothing more than bright reflections on water; on a sunny day, we can see the sky; the clouds; each other. But dark water lies in waiting for the unwary; for us all. Dark water doesn’t discriminate.

My hearing with the New Head has been confirmed for next Monday. I already know what it will bring. The presence of my Union representative (Dr Devine in person) suggests that I shall receive a written warning, pending further enquiries. Ms Buckfast is already collecting ammunition – she thinks I don’t know about this, but I do. The trace of her scent between lessons betrays her visits to room 59; besides which, my Brodie Boys see everything, and report to me accordingly.

This was why I was unsurprised, returning to room 59 after my usual cup of tea after School in the Common Room, to find La Buckfast herself at my desk, reading a book of Latin verse.

‘You’re looking a little tired,’ she said.

‘Really? I’ve never been better.’

Ms Buckfast put down the Latin book. ‘I was hoping we might have a chat.’

I did not reply immediately, but instead went to my desk drawer and found a bag of Liquorice Allsorts. I offered her one. She took a pink coconut ice. Funny. I hadn’t thought of her until then as a pink person.

‘So, what is it today?’ I said. ‘Boys not co-operating? Some complaint about irregular verbs? School mash not lumpy enough? Or just another pep talk on the inevitability of Progress?’

La Buckfast smiled. It occurred to me once again that Ms Buckfast reminds me of our erstwhile Miss Dare. Beneath all that professional veneer, there’s something else in hiding.

‘Benedicta Wild,’ she said.

‘Ben, to her friends.’ My heart sank. ‘You’re not telling me
she’s
made a complaint, are you?’

That smile again. ‘No, Roy, she hasn’t. But the Headmistress, Miss Lambert, feels she’s spending rather too much time with you and – what do you call them? Your Brodie Boys?’

‘I work in my room at lunchtimes,’ I said. ‘Boys – and anyone else – are free to stay and socialize, if they please. As for
Call-me-Jo
, I thought she was only too happy to see her girls fraternizing with our boys.’

‘It really depends on which boys,’ said Ms Buckfast. ‘Benedicta’s –
circumstances
mean that a friendship with Allen-Jones may not be the kind Mulberry House wants to encourage. She’s going through a rebellious phase, and—’

‘You mean a
homosexual
phase?’

‘Roy, please,’ said Ms Buckfast. ‘I think you ought to step away.’

There’s something about her tone of voice when she uses my Christian name. A kind of soothing, coaxing note, as if addressing an old horse. I found myself bristling at the sound, and the invisible digit that always lurks, ready to prod at my breastbone, gave an angry little twitch.

‘You’re being ridiculous,’ I said. ‘We’re here to teach the pupils, not to determine their sexual orientation. It seems to me that
Call-me-Jo
and Harrington are far too interested in things that are not remotely their business. I’ll deal with my pupils in my way, as I’ve always dealt with them, which means that unless their predilections affect their Latin homework, I shall ignore them completely. And I’ll thank you and the other Suits not to interfere.’

That would have worked against Dr Blakely. Ye gods, it was my Bell Tower voice, the one that reduces boys to pulp. But La Buckfast held my gaze.

‘I’m sorry you think of it that way,’ she said. ‘But this isn’t a suggestion. You’re a fine form-master, Roy, but I think you have a blind spot regarding certain members of your form. Nowadays, it’s considered unwise for a teacher to spend quite so much time with the boys. After all, isn’t that the mistake made by your friend, Harry Clarke?’

‘Who told you that? Was it Harrington?’

La Buckfast shook her head.

‘John’s at a seminar today. But you’ll see him on Monday, of course.’ She smiled, and once more I saw a gleam of that feline, disconcerting charm. ‘Believe it or not, Roy, I sympathize,’ she said, and touched my shoulder. ‘Perhaps you ought to take a break. You’re really looking quite unwell.’

The old Straitley might have protested. But I was feeling a little tired.
Do
I spend too much time with my boys? In Harry’s day, to spend time with boys was a natural, even a good thing to do. How quickly things change. There were School trips; field days; informal chats over tea and cake. To be a St Oswald’s Master was to be available at all times; to be at the same time a teacher; social worker; detective; confessor; father, sometimes, even a friend. At least, Harry Clarke was all those things. Others, like myself and Eric, settled for a lesser role. But even we had our share of that. In my case, it’s my Brodie Boys – Allen-Jones, Sutcliff, Tayler, McNair. Where would I be without them? Where would they be without
me
?

‘I’ll take it under advisement,’ I said.

She smiled. ‘I think it’ll do you good. Take the weekend off. Clear your head. Get a bit of perspective.’

Perspective
. Is that what I lack? In the old days, we ran on instinct. But now, we have guidelines to follow, for our safety and that of the boys. Between them, Bob Strange and Dr Devine have removed the peril from teaching. Never speak to a boy alone. Always keep the door ajar. No physical contact with boys, not even to offer comfort (or, as Eric would have preferred, to clip them around the ear). No fraternizing at the pub, as generations of Games teachers were wont to do in Harry’s day. No impromptu trips, or at least, not without risk assessments, consent forms, dietary sheets and a mass of assorted paperwork designed to predict (and likely, prevent) any possible diversion from the humdrum. And yet, as any Master knows who
doesn’t
spend his time staring at a computer, teaching is the essence of risk, the home of the unpredictable. There is no risk assessment for Life. And Life is what we are teaching.

I walked home through the park again, hearing the sounds of night in the trees. The cold air smelt of woodsmoke; the leaves were wet beneath my feet. I’d almost reached the end of the park, where Millionaires’ Row turns on to Westgate. A little group of teenage boys in hooded sweatshirts and knitted hats were standing under the lamp-post near the swing-set in the children’s playground, looking up to no good. Of course, that’s how teenage boys
always
look whenever adults are around. It’s a kind of default setting, comprised partly of guilt and partly of resentment. But sullenness breeds more of the same, and I have always made a point of treating teenagers the same way I would treat any adult. My boys tend to appreciate it, and although I could see that this little group was made up of Sunnybankers, I assumed that they would too.

I smiled and said: ‘Good evening.’

The boys said nothing, but stared at me. One of them, a freckled boy with long hair under his knitted cap and a cigarette stub between his fingers, smirked and said something under his breath. The other boys sniggered unpleasantly.

The freckled boy said: ‘
Pervert
.’

I felt a trickle of unease, all the more galling for the fact that I was on my own ground, less than three hundred yards from home. But boys are like house-cats, gentle by day, unpredictable by night. A schoolmaster, on the other hand, is always a schoolmaster; at home; in town; in the post office queue; in the park in the evening. Boys do not really believe, deep down, that Masters have a life outside St Oswald’s. They secretly imagine us hanging like bats, upside-down in our stockrooms, emerging only to mark books, to collect detention slips or to hatch inscrutably evil schemes to bring about the downfall of the young.

I summoned my best schoolmaster’s voice and levelled my sternest gaze on the boy. ‘I
beg
your pardon?’

The freckled boy sniggered again. He looked about fourteen; half-grown, with nicotine stains on his fingers. ‘Fucking pervert, chatting up lads.’ He gave me a look like that of a dog unsure of whether to bite or run. Alone, he probably would have run; but the presence of the other boys gave him a kind of bravado.

‘Give us a tenner and I’ll not report you,’ he told me, his grin broadening.

‘Give him twenty and he’ll suck you off,’ chimed in one of the other boys. ‘Assuming you can still get it up.’

For a moment, I stared at them. Yes, I’ll admit it, I was shocked. Not so much by the language – after all, St Oswald’s boys can swear as roundly as the best of them – but by the hard and cynical look in those teenagers’ faces. Some of it was a joke, I knew; but beneath was a stratum of knowledge. Boys may be children during the day, but at night they can become predators. And in a world that turns on fear, suspicion and entitlement, they have learnt to manipulate those levers that make adults afraid.

Afraid of
what
? They were only boys. I work with boys almost every day. And yet, boys have an instinct for fear; they sense it as a shark scents blood. I’ve seen it happen often enough at St Oswald’s – at St Oswald’s and elsewhere. Teaching is a game of bluff, in which the smallest weakness shown can mean the end of authority. And everyone has a weakness. Mine was a word. Just a word, but a word that can tear a schoolmaster apart.

Pervert
. There’s a dangerous word. Of all the accusations that could be made against a Master, that’s the one that does not need the slightest shred of evidence. Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words –
that
word – can obliterate every part of a man’s life; every good deed; every kindness; as if the man had never lived.

I tried to summon my schoolmaster’s voice, but for once there was nothing. No sarcasm; no anger; no joke; not even a Latin epithet. I’m ashamed to say that I actually
ran
– head down, as if against the wind – hearing their laughter behind me and with the invisible finger pressing against my breastbone with a dreadful persistence.

A thirty-second run is as long as I manage nowadays. Even so, it was enough to take me out of their orbit. I slowed to a shamble behind a row of laurels and finally reached the gates of the park, my heart now beating uncomfortably fast, and bent over like a runner at the end of a long race.

I must cut down on the Gauloises, I thought. And maybe the cheese, and the claret. I remember a time when I could have run from St Oswald’s to the clay pits without so much as breaking sweat; but that was a long time ago. The clay pits are gone, and so is that boy, whom Eric called ‘Straits’ because he was constantly falling foul of the authorities.

Well, I’d rather not fall foul of them now, especially not for chatting up boys in the park on a Friday night. I went back to my house on Dog Lane with a fluttering sense of doom, almost expecting to find those boys waiting for me with the police.

I know. It was ridiculous. But as I opened my garden gate to see the shadow of a man in blue standing by my little porch, I felt all the air in my lungs rush out. The only coherent thought in my mind was once again:
Just like Harry Clarke.

11