Alice Teale is Missing

by H. A. Linskey

  ‘Perhaps the head promised him something better in his new role,’ Miss Barton said matter-of-factly.

  ‘His current head, do you mean?’

  ‘Yes.’ Then she added, ‘Well, they knew each other from before.’

  ‘Did they?’

  ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘I’m sure they worked together. I think that was one of the reasons he was so keen to be off.’

  ‘Wait a second, you’re saying that Mr Keech and Mr Morgan worked together previously – that the headteacher of his current school had dealings with Keech before?’

  ‘Yes, I’m sure they did,’ she replied. ‘I thought that was the main reason Keech left.’

  Beth collared Black on the way to the lift. They walked there together and rode down to the ground floor while she told him all about the call.

  ‘This could be big,’ she told him. ‘When we spoke to Morgan, he gave us the impression he would happily fire Keech for his indiscretions and, at best, that he disapproved of – possibly even actively disliked – him. Now it turns out that not only did he appoint the man, he knew him of old.’

  ‘That is interesting,’ Black conceded. ‘He did act as if Keech was someone who’d been there long before him, an irritant he had inherited and couldn’t get rid of. If Keech was as uncooperative as he said, then why take him on in the first place?’

  ‘And I don’t think a man like Keech would suddenly start having flings with female pupils when he arrived at Collemby. Pamela Barton said he was close to some of his girls and a bit lechy. I don’t think she realized how close. Behaviour like that is probably ingrained.’

  ‘This needs checking. Find out what year Morgan became head and when Keech started at Collemby, but do it discreetly,’ he warned. ‘I don’t want them to know we’re on to them.’

  ‘Leave it with me.’

  She was about to go back into the building when he said, ‘Do it later. I need you to do something for me now.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Be my lookout.’

  ‘What? Where?’

  ‘At the school.’

  ‘We’re going back to the school?’ she asked.

  ‘Exactly.’

  48

  Black didn’t say a word on the drive over to Collemby School.

  ‘Are you going to tell me what we’re going there for?’

  ‘There’s something I want to check out,’ he told her.

  ‘You said that,’ she reminded him, ‘but didn’t enlighten me any further, so why the big mystery?’

  ‘Because it might be nothing.’

  They got out of the car, and Black moved purposefully towards the building, with Beth following him doubtfully down the main pathway towards the front doors, which, as expected, were locked. There was no sign of life anywhere in the building. Just before they reached them, Black veered off and took the path to the side of the building. They walked past the scaffolding that covered a good section of it. The lowest sections were blocked behind a temporary wooden construction which covered them. There was a rudimentary door and Black tried it, but it was locked to prevent anyone messing about on the scaffolding.

  ‘What are we doing?’ she asked. ‘Forget that – what are you doing?’

  ‘I want to take a look at something,’ he said.

  ‘The scaffolding?’

  ‘The roof,’ he said. ‘Alice Teale went up on it at least twice, remember?’

  ‘Of course I remember.’

  ‘Why would she do that?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘Any ideas?’

  ‘No.’ He didn’t enlighten her further. ‘But we still have that twenty-minute window that’s unaccounted for.’

  ‘If Simon Nash is telling the truth,’ she reminded him.

  ‘And if he is, Alice must have been somewhere.’

  They walked quickly down the side of the building and reached the spot at the rear where the headteacher usually parked his Jaguar. It was empty now.

  ‘Don’t we need a warrant?’

  ‘Nope.’

  Beth felt uneasy. ‘Please tell me we’re not breaking into the school?’

  ‘Technically, I’m not,’ he assured her, and took off his jacket then handed it to her for safekeeping.

  ‘Technically? What does that mean?’ But Black was too busy looking up at the wooden slats, which formed a cage that encased what looked to Beth like an old water tank that was stuck to the side of the building. There were small gaps between the planks and he seemed to be evaluating them. When he failed to give her an answer, she asked, ‘What do you want to look at?’

  ‘The view,’ he said, then he smiled at her and began to climb.

  Black wedged his toes between the gaps in the wooden slats and levered himself upwards, then grabbed the highest point of the wooden cage and pulled himself higher. Seconds later he was standing on top of the water tank and surveying the gap between it and the school roof, which was directly above, perhaps thirty feet from the ground below him.

  ‘You’ll never get up there …’ But before she had even finished her sentence Black took a couple of steps back, followed by a running jump at the wall, his front foot hitting it and propelling him upwards so his hands could grasp the ledge above him. He managed to grab it with both hands and hold on. With a slight grunt of exertion, he pulled his body upwards and positioned one elbow on to the ledge, then the other, and from that point it was a simple matter to get on to the roof.

  He got to his feet, turned and looked down at her.

  ‘What are you doing?’

  ‘Alice Teale went up on the roof at least twice. Chris saw her up there, and Jessica Pearce, who said Alice gave her reason for being there as the view.’

  ‘You said she thought Alice was being cheeky.’

  ‘And maybe she was,’ he conceded, ‘but perhaps she wasn’t. I want to see what she was looking at.’

  ‘Okay, but don’t be too long. I feel like your accomplice.’

  ‘No one could spot me up here,’ he told her. ‘Except the old biddies in the Aged Miners’ cottages, and I’d be surprised if they can see beyond the backs of their gardens. Just give me a shout if anyone comes.’

  ‘Okay.’ She started to walk back round the side of the building. As Black turned away, he heard her call, ‘Be careful up there.’

  ‘It’s nice to know you care.’

  He couldn’t see her any more but heard her shout back, ‘I haven’t got time to do your work as well as mine.’

  Black looked at the roof. It seemed sturdy enough. The surface had been covered with thick sheets of felt that had been stuck down firmly, and nothing gave when he trod on it. If he just avoided stepping on to the glass skylights that were dotted about, he would be fine.

  From where he was standing, it was still light enough to see the view from the rear of the building, which consisted of little more than a couple of old school outbuildings and one of its playing fields, which had goal posts at either end. A barbed-wire fence marked its boundary and there were some fields beyond, but there wasn’t much to see here.

  Black turned back and walked to the front of the building. As he crossed the roof, he noted he was on a lower section that was level with the third floor, so there was a sizeable wall to his right. From here, he could tell that the higher section of the roof was less inviting. It was sloping and had roof tiles that didn’t look stable, along with an assortment of obstacles in the form of Velux windows, television aerials, air vents and heating ducts. Black couldn’t imagine Alice Teale scrambling around up there, so he would restrict his exploration to the section of the roof he was already standing on.

  When he reached the front of the school he stood close to the edge and gazed out at the view. Beneath him and to his right was the main path leading from the front door, which meant the staff room had to be right next to him, but he couldn’t see into it without stepping off the roof on to the rickety scaffolding, and he didn’t fancy that because the drop, if he slipped and fell, was
considerable.

  He followed the path with his eyes till it veered off towards the car park and the road beside it. Beyond the road was another large expanse of fields that stretched for miles. It wasn’t a bad view, but not so spectacular that it warranted a climb on to the roof, and he was almost certain that was not what Alice had been talking about, so he transferred his attention to the Aged Miners’ cottages.

  He wondered if Alice could have seen something from the roof that alarmed her. Had she then confronted someone about it? Could she see her grandfather’s house from here? Black squinted. Just.

  Maybe Alice had better eyesight than he did, but he could only make out the buildings, their doors and windows. He couldn’t see inside them from here.

  An old lady was standing in her garden looking towards the school and it was then that a thought struck him. Alice would have been able to see if someone went into one of the cottages, probably even be able to tell who they were. Was that what she had meant by ‘the view’?

  ‘What did you see, Alice?’ he asked himself quietly. ‘What grabbed your eye?’

  He glanced off to his left, but all he could see was more playing fields and a netball court enclosed by a tall wire-mesh fence. There was nothing else here, so it had to be the cottages, surely.

  Unless.

  Black took a look at the side of the building to his right. It was here that the scaffolding started, and it went all along the front of the building till it took a sudden left turn then went inwards where the school formed its uneven U-shape. He didn’t want to do it. The scaffolding looked unstable and was designed to accommodate nerveless, experienced men who were used to working at heights. His first instinct was to climb back down, but he had to do this.

  ‘Christ,’ he muttered as he reached out and placed a hand against the cold metal of the scaffolding pole. He grasped it firmly and, trying not to look down, stepped off the side of the building. For a moment, there was nothing but air between Black and the ground below. With a slight jump, he landed with his left foot on the wooden scaffold, wrapping both arms round the pole and holding on for dear life.

  Below him, Beth called out in alarm, ‘Lucas!’

  He eased his body round the pole until both feet were on the scaffolding. There was no wooden cage this high up, just open spaces between the poles that he could easily fall through if he tripped or grew careless.

  ‘I’m fine,’ he lied.

  Black inched his way gingerly around the scaffold, keeping as much distance as possible from the edge. He stopped by the first window he reached, went down low and peered in. The staff room was, of course, empty and there wasn’t much to see, just a few chairs and battered sofas, along with a table that held a kettle and a dozen mugs stacked up on it.

  Black went further and passed three more classrooms before he reached the end. He checked each one, but they were almost uniform in their blandness, with rows of tables and chairs, a few books on the shelves and a blackboard on the wall.

  This was going to be a waste of time, he realized that now, but he kept going until he reached the corner of the school then took a right turn and walked further along the scaffolding, which wobbled alarmingly and became springier at this point. He hoped this bit hadn’t been put together by a careless apprentice, or they would be scraping him off the pavement later.

  At least here some of the front sections were lightly protected by sheets of tarpaulin that hung down and were tied in place, reducing the risk of falling, but not every section was covered. Black walked past three sections of scaffolding with tarpaulin over them until he reached a place where it was open once more and he could look out at a spot to the rear of the U-bend where the windows of the school were close enough to peer into again.

  It hit him then, suddenly and in a rush, and he almost lost his balance in the exhilaration he felt at that moment. Grabbing the scaffolding pole to ensure he did not fall, Black steadied himself and looked more closely at the sight which greeted him.

  ‘Oh my God,’ he said quietly, because now he understood what Alice Teale had been doing up here and what she had been talking about when she mentioned the view.

  49

  Beth watched as Black carefully climbed down from the roof and felt relieved when his feet touched the ground again.

  ‘Anything?’ she asked him.

  ‘Not much,’ he said, ‘at first. It’s just fields at the back, and a similar view at the front, apart from the cottages. Then I realized that just because Miss Pearce and Chris both saw Alice on the section of roof I was standing on, it doesn’t mean that is the view she was referring to. From there, you can climb on to the scaffolding and go right round that part of the building. Most of the time, you’re shielded from view by its height and some pieces of tarp that cover the walkway, and very few people out front are facing the building, particularly when all the kids have gone home.’

  ‘You reckon Alice went on to the scaffolding. Why?’

  ‘Because you can follow it round into that bit the kids call the U-bend. If you do that, you get a bird’s-eye view into a row of classrooms.’

  ‘Which ones?’

  ‘That’s the interesting bit,’ he said. ‘The library, the drama room, the English teachers’ rooms and, if you go right to the edge, the room they call the punishment block, where all the bollockings and detentions happen.’

  ‘You think she was spying on something going on in one of those rooms?’

  ‘What else could be of interest to her up there? The view from the roof? No, there’s nothing there. If she was suicidal, she wouldn’t throw herself from that height. I was scared of falling, but it’s survivable. It’s not high enough to be sure it would kill you. The only thing of any interest up there is the scaffolding and the view it gives you, and I think that’s where Alice was, during that crucial time between the darkroom and the point when Jessica Pearce saw who she thought was Alice leaving the school.’

  ‘She saw something up there that mattered,’ deduced Beth. ‘Something that led to her death. You think that’s her big secret? But what is it, and how will we ever know?’

  ‘That’s the problem. She’s no longer around, so we can only guess what it might be, but one of the teachers must have done something pretty bad. She guessed, or found out about it somehow, but needed to see it with her own eyes to fully believe it.’

  ‘Alice Teale was killed for a reason,’ said Beth, ‘and you might just have found that reason.’

  ‘But we don’t have any proof.’ His tone betrayed his frustration.

  ‘Proof!’ said Beth, and her eyes widened. ‘Remember when we read the first page of her journal? There’s something I need first. That’s what she wrote, and we both agreed it was proof.’

  ‘We did.’

  ‘But simply seeing something isn’t proof. You can’t just tell people you saw something when it’s your word against someone else’s.’

  ‘What are you getting at?’

  ‘The camera,’ said Beth. ‘I didn’t think it was significant, but a camera went missing from the darkroom. Simon Nash told me about it. Alice’s own camera was broken. Daniel showed me it in her room. Nash also said Alice had been asking him the difference between telephoto and zoom lenses.’

  ‘You would need one,’ he told her. ‘No ordinary phone camera would do the trick from up there. Alice took the camera,’ he concluded. ‘She must have. She went up on to the scaffolding with it, looked into one of those rooms and saw what was going on.’

  ‘Then she took a picture,’ said Beth. ‘There’s her proof.’

  Black took a deep breath as they both let that sink in. ‘But where’s the camera now?’ he asked.

  ‘If someone caught Alice and killed her, then they took the camera and destroyed it,’ Beth offered. ‘That would explain why we can’t find it.’

  He thought for a moment. ‘I don’t think so. Put yourself in their shoes and ask yourself what you would do. You’ve caught Alice, you’ve killed her and you’re g
oing to have to dispose of the body. That’s your prime concern, and nothing else matters right then.’ He started speaking slowly, as if he was beginning to put the pieces together. Beth wondered where he was going with this. ‘If you saw her with the camera, if you found it, you wouldn’t try to destroy it, would you? If it’s one of those old ones that need film – all you’d have to do is open the back and pull out the roll. It would be destroyed as soon as light hit it, or you could burn it later. That’s far easier than trying to smash the camera and get rid of the pieces. Without the film, it’s no use to anyone as evidence. You could just put it back or say you’d found it lying around somewhere and some kid or other would get the blame for being careless.’

  ‘I’ve been along every inch of that scaffolding,’ he added. ‘There’s no nook or ledge big enough for her to hide a camera.’

  ‘Then where could it be?’ asked Beth and, suddenly, it hit her. ‘They didn’t see the camera!’ She almost shouted it.

  ‘What do you mean?’

  She became animated then, talking in a rush. ‘Alice is on the scaffolding and sees what she sees. She takes a picture, maybe several, and the person she’s photographing doesn’t spot her, not then.’ She held up a finger as if she were thinking it through bit by bit. Black listened without interrupting. ‘She puts the camera away and makes to leave. Did the killer see her then, but only then? Was it her movement that alerted him, and he came after her, but he didn’t know about the camera?’

  ‘Her bag,’ said Lucas. ‘It was in her bloody bag!’

  ‘It was,’ said Beth, ‘but it isn’t now.’

  ‘Harry,’ said Lucas. ‘We need to get to Harry.’