“When we met, he was charming. He tried hard to woo me. Flowers every day and expensive meals. He even wrote love poems. He was an English teacher after all. I fell head over heels for him. And we married within a few months.
“The first time his mask slipped was on our honeymoon. I got friendly with another couple in the hotel and suggested we join them for a meal. He went mad.” Gaby wipes away tears with her fingers. “I didn’t know what I’d done wrong. He held me down on the bed and bent my fingers back. He made me promise I only wanted to dine with him.”
The vision of a powerful Carl Brock bearing down on his fragile bride fills my mind. I hand her a tissue. “And after the honeymoon?”
“He could be charismatic and loving one minute, aggressive and abusive the next. He made me give up work. And he’d throw terrible rages if he thought I wanted to spend time with other people. I wasn’t allowed to go out, except with his sister, Linda, and he wasn’t even keen on that. He wanted to control every aspect of my life. He told me what to wear, how to do my hair and wouldn’t let me wear make-up except to cover up the bruises.” She rubs the green bruise in her eye socket.” I remember the tidy bathroom cabinet stocked with heavy foundation and concealer. I twig why we didn’t find any lipstick. Brock didn’t allow it in the house.
“After you gave up work, what did you do all day?”
“Cleaning. Carl liked the house to be tidy.”
I think of the pristine house – a terrible legacy. “What about your yoga?” I ask.
“He stopped me going to evening classes but he let me keep my books and videos. He didn’t see them as a threat.”
I see deep into the empty brown eyes. If only Carl Brock had known the role yoga would play in his wife’s alibi for his murder. Is Gaby thinking the same thing?
“Didn’t you try to leave him?”
“He’d phone me from school at breaks and lunchtimes to make sure I was at home. He took my purse, my car keys. He said that if I ever left him, he’d find me and kill me. No matter how long it took, he’d get me. Once he told me that if I left, he’d kill himself and I’d have to explain it to Linda and her children. But he knew I’d never leave. He’d spent so long telling me I was useless, I believed it. He said I was nothing without him and I couldn’t make it on my own.”
“Why didn’t you tell someone?” I ask.
Gaby spreads her hands, palms up, on the table. “Who would have believed me? Carl was everybody’s favourite teacher, devoted to his pupils, adored by them all. Everyone thought he was a loving husband. He was good at keeping up appearances.”
“Didn’t Linda suspect anything?” I ask.
“Why would she, his own sister? Maybe if I’d known about her ex-husband. There might have been a chance.”
I think back to Gaby’s uncharacteristic outburst when Linda Parry recounted her abusive relationship with husband Eddie. If only Gaby had known sooner, Linda might have been sympathetic to her plight and she might not now be facing a murder charge.
“You could have come to us,” I say. “I’ve seen your medical file. There was enough physical evidence to prosecute Carl.”
“The physical abuse wasn’t as bad as the mental. It was the anticipation of fear as much as the fear itself. His drug-taking increased. The cocaine made him more unpredictable.”
“Did he cause your miscarriage last year?” Hendersen asks gently.
Gaby squeezes hard on the tissue. “Things were better at first. He was excited about the baby. He kept his fists off me for nearly two months, just the occasional slap in the face.” Her matter-of-fact tone sends a shudder through me.” Then one day I was suffering with terrible morning sickness. Carl didn’t like me to go to the supermarket on my own. But I couldn’t face cooking what he’d bought. He always left a £10 note in the house for emergencies, but I wasn’t supposed to use it. I didn’t think; I wasn’t feeling well. I should have known better.”
“Tell us what happened,” I say, resting my hands over Gaby’s.
“I ordered Carl a take-away meal. I paid the delivery boy with the £10 and put the food in the oven to keep warm until Carl came home. Then I went to bed. I woke up when I heard him shouting. He met me at the top of the stairs.” She shreds the tissue.
“The medical report said your face got burned,” I say.
“He pressed a hot chicken leg from the take-away into my face. I fell.”
The interview room’s silent for a moment; the three of us lost in our private thoughts.
Gaby Brock speaks first. “Things were much better again for a while. I thought we’d be okay. He was sorry about the baby. He knew it was partly his fault.”
Partly. I squeeze her hand again. Even after everything she’s been through, she still only “partly” blames Carl Brock for her baby’s death.
“But eventually he went back to his old ways?” I prompt.
“The usual. I broke a couple of bones.”
I note again her failure to blame Brock – surely he was the one who broke her bones. “And how did you feel when he started up again?”
“It was like the baby had left a hole in me. I didn’t know what to do. The only solution was to kill myself.”
“But you didn’t,” Hendersen says with less sympathy than I expected.
“I found out I was pregnant again. If I killed myself, I’d be killing the baby, too. I’d already lost one.”
I look at the tiny figure sitting opposite me. Never has the word pathetic seemed more apt. I formulate my next question in my head but am reluctant to ask it. It will be the beginning of the end for Gaby Brock.
“Was it then that you saw another way out?”
“The only person who was going to rescue me was myself,” she whispers.
I cast my mind back to the rows of romantic paperbacks nestling among the yoga manuals on the Brocks’ bookcase. How long did she wait for a knight on a white charger to rescue her?
“It was after he set fire to Pipkin,” Gaby continues. “I knew then that he would target anything I loved in order to control me. If I managed to dodge the punches long enough to carry this baby full-term, it would only be a matter of time before he turned on our child to get at me. I might be too weak and stupid to stop him using me as a punch bag, but I couldn’t let him do that to my son or daughter.”
“I must remind you that you are entitled to a solicitor,” the DCI interrupts. He’s taken the words from my mouth. I’m comforted he recognizes the victim in Gaby Brock, not just the crime she’s committed. To the disappointment of us both, Gaby once again declines a lawyer.
“Please tell us what happened on the night of Sunday, the 17th of June.”
“He’d given me a beating that morning.”
The older bruises on her arms and legs make sense. The vase of roses in the Brocks’ lounge must have been Carl’s last peace offering. He found a garage forecourt or a roadside stall doing decent flowers on a Sunday. Perhaps he didn’t have to search; he knew where to go from previous experience.
“I made sure I didn’t fall asleep that night,” Gaby explains. “At about two a.m., I got up and put the key in the back door. I woke Carl and suggested a drive out. We used to go to Martle Top for midnight picnics before we married. He’d been a gentle lover then.” She hesitates for a moment as if recalling an older, happy memory.
“He couldn’t believe his luck. I hadn’t initiated anything romantic for months. Normally he had to force me to … He practically dragged me out of bed and into the car – which was what I wanted; the more bruises I picked up the better. As we stopped in the lay-by, I told him I’d changed my mind. That gave me two black eyes. I jumped out of the car and ran into the field on the other side of the ditch. I’d hidden a kitchen knife there earlier. As he climbed up the ditch towards me, I stabbed him.”
“Why didn’t we find any blood traces on your pyjamas?”
“Carl cut his hand on Saturday morning when he tried to hit me. I can’t remember why. It hardly matters n
ow. His punch missed and he caught his knuckles on the table edge. He wiped his bleeding hand on his shirt, so on Sunday night I put on the bloodied shirt before I woke him up. He didn’t notice; it was dark and he was eager to get out to Martle Top. The sleeves were too long, so I grasped the knife over the material. I did the same when I smashed the back door window and turned the key after I got home. That’s how you found his blood there. I wanted it to look like a break-in. I put the shirt in the washing machine with several other shirts. I figured that if the blood didn’t wash out completely and you decided to analyse it, you’d think that the blood came from his earlier cut.”
I’m at a loss for words. I didn’t expect this level of planning.
“How did you get home from Martle Top?” Hendersen asks.
“A few days before, I took a bicycle from a garden in the next avenue and rode up there. I hid it in the ditch with the knife, out of sight of anyone who might park in the lay-by. It only took an hour to walk home. I was home in plenty of time, before Carl got in from school. I rode the bike back on Sunday night after I’d killed him and dumped it outside the house I’d taken it from.”
Mrs Perkins and her incredible vanishing bicycle. It hardly registered at the time.
“We didn’t find soil or pollen on any of your shoes.”
“I was wearing Carl’s trainers when I took the bike up there. I was barefoot when I went back with Carl. I had a shower when I got home.”
“Then you set about faking your own assault,” Hendersen says.
“I knew you’d find out about Carl’s involvement in drugs sooner or later, so I made it look as if Carl had been taken by drug dealers and that they’d made Carl tie me up.”
“And you helped us along with the ‘You need a lesson of your own, teacher’ quote, drawing us straight into an investigation at Swan Academy. You could have just let us find drugs at your house. That would have speeded us along,” Hendersen says.
“There weren’t any in the house. Carl brought in what he needed for a deal or his own hit. He kept the rest at his allotment.”
Brock’s allotment. Another thing Mrs Perkins mentioned and I failed to follow up. She told me that Brock had an untidy allotment near her husband’s. I pray the DCI doesn’t notice the omission.
He says nothing and I fill the silence. “How did you get Carl’s prints on the chains and the key?”
“They were his chains and handcuffs,” she whispers. “He used them on me sometimes.”
I put my head in my hands, trying to shake off a vision of Gaby’s suffering.
“I see.” Hendersen coughs. “Why didn’t we find your prints? And how in Hades did you place the key in your own pocket?”
Gaby reaches forward and touches the two exhibit packets on the table. They’re the ones I took from Steve Chisholm and contain the toilet tissue and the fragment of cotton thread found on the Brocks’ lounge carpet. Danny Johnson joked that they were signs of a sloppy housewife. But it was the immaculate carpet below that spoke volumes about Gaby’s housekeeping. The carpet she cleaned as if her life depended on it. Perhaps it did.
“I placed tissues over my hands and drew the keys up to my pocket on two threads of cotton. I swallowed most of the thread and one of the tissues. The rest fell on the floor.”
I picture the preparation she must have done, the winter pyjamas she wore because they had the appropriately positioned pocket. How long has she been waiting to do this? The pyjamas are brand new – I imagine Gaby somehow saved the money and bought them while Carl was at work – but heavy nightwear like that would not have been available in the shops for several months. Gaby must have bought them long ago. I harden my heart.
“And you planned to frame Bartholomew Hedges?”
“At first I didn’t mean to frame anyone. I’d seen two different men at our house with Carl. One was the man Carl wanted me to be nice to and the other was the one you’ve arrested. I thought they must both be dealers. I had no idea what Carl had done to Bartholomew Hedges’s son. When you showed me the police photos and I did the video ID parade just now, I recognized them and assumed I was right about them being dealers. Dealers are killers anyway so what did it matter if they were arrested for the wrong murder.”
I see her logic, although she’s only half-right. Hedges is innocent, but for the other man, the one she had to be “nice” to, she picked out Samuel McKenzie’s mugshot. A creeping, cold memory works its way up my spine. Be nice to me, why not, you want it too … I clench my fists. My feelings for McKenzie and all men like him go beyond loathing. If only Gaby had just framed McKenzie and not dragged Hedges in to it.
“Why didn’t you come to us?” I ask. “We could have helped you. Couldn’t we, sir?”
Hendersen coughs again and ignores the question. “Mrs Brock, you need to get yourself a decent lawyer. You will stand trial for your husband’s murder and like as not will go to prison.”
Mrs Brock looks up into his face. “Carl’s already been my judge, jury and executioner. My life ended two years ago.”
Step, shuffle, ball change, stamp.
It’s ten p.m. I almost stamp through the floor of the dimly lit studio, making my ankles ache. I repeat the steps over and over with increasing ferocity. In my mind I go through DCI Hendersen’s lengthy debrief.
Well, constable. Your hunch was right this time, but don’t rely on Agatha Christie to help you again. CID is about asking questions, putting together pieces of information, and gathering evidence.
And don’t mislead witnesses by saying we wouldn’t pursue cases where the suspected perpetrator is dead. You practically tricked a confession out of her.
You’d better brief DI Bagley about McKenzie being Brock’s dealer, but I doubt she’ll get anywhere. McKenzie’s slippery lawyer will make mincemeat of Gaby Brock’s evidence. The statement of a killer carries little weight.
And get the dear lady to bring me the head of Dr Tarnovski, our so-called police surgeon. Only a third-rate medical student would fail to spot Gaby Brock’s pregnancy and previous beatings. And what possessed him to send you her medical records? He needs to get out in the field more. He’s spending far too much time in the office. Can’t imagine what he finds so fascinating. To hell with the paperwork, that’s what I say.
And I wouldn’t go having too much sympathy for Gaby Brock. We’ve only her word about their relationship. She killed her husband in cold blood. Planned it in the finest detail, right down to her getaway bicycle – And I want to talk to you about how we came to overlook that piece of evidence – It wouldn’t surprise me if she hadn’t goaded Brock into swinging a punch and cutting his hand so that she had the bloodied shirt.
Besides, you shouldn’t promise what we can’t deliver. It was pointless telling her everything would have been all right if she’d reported the abuse. Only one in one hundred domestic violence incidents we attended last year resulted in a prosecution.
Step, shuffle, ball change, stamp.
One in one hundred, stamp.
So this is what getting a CID result feels like. Bagley grudgingly offered to crack open more champagne, when I told her the news, but I declined it. Detection work had left a foul taste in my mouth.
Matthews wasn’t in the mood for celebrating either. Although he acknowledged my success with a surprisingly hearty thumbs-up across the desk, he spent the rest of the day sulking behind his computer. He’s about as content with the result as I am.
Step, shuffle, ball change, stamp.
One in one hundred, stamp.
“Philippa, you’ll damage the floor.”
I wheel round to see my father with Jamie.
“Dad, what are you doing here? And out with Jamie this late.”
“Your chief inspector phoned me. Said you’d had a hard day and needed some company.”
“Hendersen said that?”
“He’s old school, your chief inspector. I like him,” Edward says. “What happened? Did he give you a …?” He puts his hands over Jamie
’s ears before mouthing the end of the sentence, “bollocking?”
“No. Well, yes. But I solved a case, a murder.” I pick up my towel and head for the studio door.
“Really? You solved a murder in your first week,” Edward says. “I knew you had a brain.”
“You mean you put a baddie in jail, Pip?” Jamie runs excitedly behind me.
I pat his head before pushing through the door. “If only, Jamie.”
Acknowledgements
Thank you for reading The Good Teacher. I hope you enjoyed it.
I wrote the book a few years ago. I’d like to thank my editor Finn Cotton at HarperCollins for helping me rewrite and update it, and my agent Marilia Savvides at PFD for seeing something in the original version and making sure the story saw the light of day again. I’m also grateful to eagle-eyed copy editor Janette Currie.
I’d like to give a big shout out to all the book bloggers who promote books for the sheer joy of it. Their support helps bring unknown authors like me to a wider audience. Thank you also to everyone who has taken the trouble to post a review of my writing.
Not long ago I took a course in Creative Writing at Lancaster University. Meeting fellow MA students Fergus Smith, Peter Garrett and Gillian Walker changed my writing life. We continue to support each other and I’m grateful for their wise advice on this book.
As always the biggest thank you is for my husband Nigel for his boundless encouragement and his practical help in PR and proofreading.
If you’d like to know more about my writing and reading, please visit my website at:
www.rachelsargeant.co.uk
I’m also on Twitter:
@RachelSargeant3
If you’d be willing to write a short review of The Good Teacher, I would love to read it on Amazon.
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