by C. P. Wilson
DI Stephen’s lean-steeple invariably appears a moment or two before he asks her a question she won’t like.
“Just ask, Detective,” she states flatly, unable to suppress her chagrin. Without looking at Armstrong Frankie adds, “And can you not put that bloody phone on silent?”
Stephen’s left eyebrow pops up a little, but his expression remains largely neutral.
“Ok, Ms Malone. Have you ever seen Mr Black act in a way that’s inappropriate?”
“No.” Frankie’s reply is immediate.
“Not to any member of staff or any of the pupils?”
“Absolutely not. Not even once,” she states firmly.
“Has Mr Black ever touched you in a non-professional manner? An arm around you, a pat on your body?”
Frankie can’t help herself. She leans forward, an imitation of Stephens’ own posture and pretends to think about the question for a moment, her fingers steepled and tickling her top lip. Her manner is playful, her facial expression severe, and her voice drips venom.
“Dougie Black is a wonderful teacher, a good, kind man, and a very good friend.”
Stephens sits straighter in his chair. He remains silent.
“Yes, he has hugged me, and I him. I’ve been upset, and he’s done the human thing and comforted me. I’ve also done so for him when he has had a hard time.”
Frankie sits back up, narrowing her eyes. “It’s called being a human being, Detective. You should try it sometime.”
Stephens’ neutral expression remains almost entirely in place, aside from a little subconscious tic of his cheek. Armstrong’s tapping ceases whilst he steals a sidelong glance at his boss, who then resumes.
“Have you ever seen Mr Black comfort any of the pupils?” Stephens waggles two fingers of each hand in the air, framing the word in air quotes.
Frankie decides that DI Stephens isn’t just irritating, he’s a mean-spirited bastard.
Frankie stands before she knows she’ll do it.
“Yes, yes, I have.” Frankie closes the gap between herself and Stephens, coming to stand over him. She glares down at the detective
“Loads of times. I watched him escort a first year down to first aid. She’d broken her nose falling in the corridor and Dougie had one arm around her shoulder while he helped her pinch her nose and walk ‘cos she couldn’t see for tears. I helped him pick up a fifth-year girl from the floor of his class. She’d fainted when he was describing the pathway of blood through the circulatory system. The kid was a little dizzy afterwards so Dougie and I hooked an arm each under her arms and helped her to her feet. He felt her forehead with the back of his hand and placed a palm on her cheek to gauge her temperature.”
Frankie scowls at Stephens.
“This other time I saw him place his hand on the back of a kid’s shoulder. The kid was crying. He’d just come back to school after his dad’s death and Dougie’s class was the first he’d been in. I was observing the class at the time. The pupil was inconsolable and needed someone to look after him.”
Frankie crosses her arms and glares down at Stephens. “I’m sure the twenty other kids in his class saw just fine, and would be able to tell you that Dougie didn’t grope his arse or anything.”
Stephens has the good grace to look marginally embarrassed. Rising to stand, he moves forward as though to speak then steps back, deciding on a different approach.
“I’m very sorry we have to ask these questions, Ms Malone. When an incident like this occurs, when the person involved has young people in their care, we have to look at all possibilities.”
“Bollocks! You lot are just reacting to the nonsense circulating on social media.”
Frankie strides aggressively towards the seasoned detective. “It’s absolute bollocks,” she repeats. “I’m sure you’ve interviewed Harry by now, he’ll tell you. Mr Black was nothing but kind…”
Harry’s name, coming from her own lips, causes a painful lurch in Frankie’s chest. A loud sob comes from her. The weakness of the moment, now when she is feeling so indignant and bloody angry, couldn’t be more unwelcome.
Stephens softens his tone. “I can’t discuss anything Harry Jardine has told us, ma’am, but I can say that this hasn’t come from Jardine. These really are just standard questions.”
For several long, uncomfortable seconds, Frankie glares at Stephens, who has abruptly become the focus of all the pain and anger of her day.
“I’m done here,” Frankie states. A nod, an agreement she doesn’t require, from Stephens prompts Frankie to march past him. “Right,” she snaps, shoving past the detective who leans to roll with the push, allowing her to pass.
The sound of Frankie’s footsteps echo and recede along the corridor. Armstrong places his phone on his lap then glances up at his boss. His expression is one of mild amusement. “That went well.”
Stephens merely shrugs, a flat smile on his face.
“Let’s get back to the office.”
Chapter Sixteen
“Thank you very much, Ms Ferguson.”
Lisa Ferguson smiles tiredly at Gilmour. “That’s quite alright, Detective.” Mr Storrie stands, inviting Ms Ferguson to do likewise. “You did brilliantly, Lisa. Go home and get a rest.”
“Or a drink,” she replies with a humourless laugh. Storrie nods, forcing a flat smile of his own.
“It was nice to see you again, Bethany,” Ms Ferguson says to McCreadie. “Despite the circumstances.”
McCreadie places a hand on her former teacher’s forearm.
“You too, Miss.”
Storrie leads Lisa Ferguson out of the room before coming back in.
Gilmour and McCreadie meet him near the door.
“That’s everyone,” he tells the pair. “Everyone we wished to get through today, at any rate.”
Gilmour regards the tall head teacher before asking, “How are you coping?”
Storrie shrugs a single shoulder, “I’m ok, thanks for asking.”
Storrie jabs a thumb over his shoulder, indicating the main entrance.
“Apparently, the media are camped outside the school, so I’ll have to speak to them again, no doubt.”
“Would you like us to give you a prepared statement?” Gilmour asks.
Storrie declines. “I’ll manage. Look, I assume that you two can find your own way out, yeah?”
“We may take another look at Mr Black’s classroom before we leave.”
Storrie lifts his suit jacket from the back of his chair. Slipping it on, he speaks as he’s leaving the room. “The kids are all away home, so please feel free to move around the school as you need to.”
“Mr Storrie!” McCreadie yells after the head teacher. Still buttoning up his jacket, Storrie’s exhausted face reappears. He’s clearly repressing his frustration.
“Thanks for today, sir, and please call us if you need any support for you, the teachers or the pupils.” McCreadie’s eyes search Storrie’s. “We have people who can help counsel after this kind of crime.”
His mild annoyance dissipates and Storrie nods. “Thanks, Beth. I’ll make sure to pass that along.”
Storrie takes off down the corridor, leaving the detectives to pack up their belongings.
“He’s doing well,” Gilmour observes as they gather their things.
“Yeah,” McCreadie replies absently. “He’s always been a good man.”
“How are you doing?” Gilmour asks.
“About the same as you are, I’d imagine.” McCreadie attempts a supportive smile. “Heard from Stephens?”
Gilmour checks his phone.
“He’s finished at the Royal and headed back to Fettes.” McCreadie continues to gather the last of their things, whilst Gilmour texts their boss.
Tucking his phone away, Gilmour accepts his bag from McCreadie.
“Thanks. I’ve told him we’ll be back to Fettes in an hour or so. Shall we get a look at this class again? Verify the details the kids have given us?”
McCr
eadie nods.
“You’ve done well today, Beth. You were good with the kids. Much better than I am. First attempted murder?”
McCreadie shakes her head. “Third,” she states.
Gilmour nods.
“Nowhere near your experience yet, Lewis.”
Gilmour smiles. She wants to hear about the Tequila case. They always do.
“Ask me about that another time,” he says. “C’mon.”
McCreadie grins and follows him out into the corridor.
Chapter Seventeen
“C’mon Dougie.”
Frankie has pulled her chair over by Dougie’s bedside and has been lying with her head rested on her arm on his bed beside the line of his leg. Lifting her head, she moves her eyes along his face and chest. Wires and tubes, once so alien and obtrusive, have become a familiar part of the landscape of her friend’s body these last few hours. His breath, still coming steadily, as well as the choir of electronic beeps and whirs, form a reassuring, comforting rhythm that Frankie misses when she leaves to visit the bathroom or canteen.
“C’mon Dougie,” she says again. “Just wake up.”
Fearful of what lurks on her iPhone, Frankie flicks her eyes up to the clock on the wall. Nine p.m.
The day has both dragged and rocketed past her in a cacophony of blood and pain and tears and relief. A teacher for ten years now, Frankie thought she knew what emotional and physical exhaustion felt like, and regularly. After today, she realises how privileged her life has been. How free of genuine terror and heartbreak and uncertainty her world has been before today.
Frankie sits upright and reaches out to touch Dougie’s face. His peaceful expression suddenly represents for Frankie what his face genuinely looks like without his wit, intellect or character to manipulate the flesh, and seems so contrary in every way to what her mind’s eye sees Dougie’s face as. The disparity between his face at rest, his real face, and the one she has seen him wear for almost ten years causes a sudden shift and shake in her perception of him. Abruptly, the new perspective has her considering if there’s yet another facet to her friend she has been unaware of until today.
Frankie reclines back into her chair. Shoving at the floor with her feet, she subconsciously puts a little distance between herself and the bed as her mind begins mentally scrolling through the Facebook posts she read hours earlier.
John’s obvious concern needles at her. He seemed so certain: it’s very unlike her husband to make demands of that sort of her. He’s actually one of the most easy-going people she knows. It’s also unlike John to read something on social media and react to it in the way he has to today’s events.
Frankie’s hand strays to her phone, hovers for a moment, and then returns to her lap, forming a clasp with the other.
Frankie’s eyes unfocus and images of encounters with Dougie throughout the decade she’s known him cascade and fall past her mind’s eye.
She once entered his room, and he had his arm around a sixth-year girl. The girl’s face was puffy and red; she’d been crying. She had stiffened and locked her eyes on Frankie as she’d entered the room. Dougie hadn’t reacted at all to her presence, he’d merely removed his arm, but leaned in to voice something quietly to the kid.
Frankie had thought nothing of it: just another upset senior pupil around exam time. Dougie had a lot of kids come to him with their worries and he handled them well. In hindsight though, were there several emotions vying for prevalence in the girl’s eyes? Had Frankie mistook fear for embarrassment?
Frankie shook her head as though the gesture could shake loose the unwelcome thought.
No. Your mind’s just remembering things badly because of what you’ve been reading online.
Despite her reluctance to allow her thoughts to go to that place, Frankie slips away once again, flicking back to previous similar encounters, to consider how closely he worked with a lot of the kids in their school. Dougie had very little life that anyone knew of outside his work. Despite how closely they had worked together, he had shared very little of what took up his time outside school with Frankie.
Little shrugs or brush-off phrases like not much or pretty quiet were standard when asked about his weekend or holidays.
Frankie has heard that Dougie had lost his wife a few years back, but having never met Mrs Black she really has no tangible notion of what kind of family man Dougie is. She has never seen him with his own kid, who he rarely mentions. It hasn’t really bothered her before now, hasn’t occurred to her at all that he’d be anything other than who he is in school.
What did he fill his time with though? Who did he spend his free time with?
Questions she’s never needed answers to or even considered begin to press urgently on Frankie, rotting the bond she’s spent years forming with her mentor. Frankie is beginning to feel foolish that she can call Dougie a friend when he’s clearly worked very hard to exclude her from his non-work life.
Dougie had come along on staff nights out, to meals, theatre trips, even to her home for dinner one time. John had like Dougie. A lot. He was the same man in social situations as he was in school. Kind, funny, reliable. Was he that same man when in private? Had he ever really been that man, the one she thought he was, at all?
Frankie rises to her feet and leaves the increasingly oppressive ICU suite. In the corridor, she leans on a window sill, looking out over the rows of suburban homes beyond the Little France compound of the hospital. As the sun melts and flattens down onto the horizon, Frankie’s sprits disappear with the light, replaced by uncertainty and suspicion where trust once resided.
Suddenly aware that she has her phone in her right hand, Frankie sighs and activates the screen. A cursory scan across the day’s headlines from the BBC, Sky, the Guardian and the Scotsman, and Frankie finds simply factual reports of the assault. Where it occurred, when and that they have a sixteen-year-old in custody, Mr Black’s condition unknown. There’s no suggestion in the mainstream media that Dougie is under suspicion for anything. Frankie selects the Scotsman’s article. Posted not long after Harry attacked Dougie, the article doesn’t speculate, it’s a mere relaying of facts. The incident at the school, here’s what we know. Frankie scrolls down to the comments.
Bring back the belt.
Teachers don’t get paid enough for this.
The least we can expect is to be safe in our workplace, especially when that workplace is a school.
The SNP’s failure to invest in education is to blame.
Frankie sighs, but a sense of normality returns with reading the comments, which are what one would expect in a report of that type. There are some trolls joking about teachers and more paid time off, but most people seem shocked at the attack occurring in a school.
Frankie closes the news app and performs a quick Scottish news search with the school’s name as her search phrase. Scrolling through a series of headlines, her finger pauses above the Reporting Scotland headline, written for the early evening bulletin.
Was Cambuscraig High teacher involved with his pupils?
Frankie scans further down the list and clicks on several more pages, before returning to click the Reporting Scotland link. It’s the only link she can find from mainstream media that’s reporting anything other than there’s been an attack at the school.
Taking a deep breath, Frankie clicks on the story.
Rumours have been circulating on social media that Mr Black, the teacher injured today at Cambuscraig High, was involved in inappropriate relationships with his pupils.
It’s unclear at this time if any witnesses have stepped forward to confirm Mr Black’s abuse of his position, but comments and posts stating that Mr Black may have had a personal relationship with the boy who attacked him are present on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
More as we have it.
Frankie’s stomach lurches and growls. Ignoring it, she scrolls down to the comments at the foot of the article.
Fuckin’ beast
Burn i
n hell.
The council has a lot to answer for.
How’d this guy get through disclosure?
Christ, my kid’s at that school.
Frankie Malone darts towards to the toilets as her stomach shoves up an afternoon of cheap hospital coffee and chips. When it’s over, cold and clammy, on her knees on the floor of a toilet stall, Frankie presses her face against the relative coolness of the door one second before her brain decides she’s had enough for one day and treats her to blessed unconsciousness.
∞∞∞
Still unsteady, Frankie wraps her arms around herself as she steps through the swishing electronic doors, out into the plaza. The cold air revives her instantly and clears her head. Unsure why she has left the ICU and the hospital building, other than to put a distance between herself and the crushing closeness of Dougie’s room, Frankie lean-sits against a short wall. A young guy dressed in too-tight black trousers, trainer socks with a gap between the end of the trousers and top of the sock, check black and red shirt, and too-large woolly hat, glances over at her.
“Ye awright?” he asks between puffs on his cig.
She nods.
The kid holds a cigarette out for her. Habit almost makes her refuse, but instead she reaches for the cigarette and places it into her mouth. The young man lights it for her. Shielding the flame from the wind he uses the moment to scan her face. Deciding that she’s fine, he returns to sitting on the wall a few feet from Frankie.
Frankie hasn’t smoked in twelve years. Despite this, despite the cold night air, the unending onslaught of the day’s events and the continuing aftershocks, despite the insidious doubts that have taken root in her thoughts about the integrity of one of her oldest friends, Frankie invests herself in the pure enjoyment of smoking this single cigarette. Leaning back, she accepts the delicious burn and fulfilment of her smoke.
