by Jay Nadal
The sound came again. Sian still couldn’t place where it was coming from. It seemed to echo off the walls of the corridor. “Standby, Sarge, I can hear something.” Sian crept forward placing one foot carefully and slowly in front of another. “Hello, it’s the police. Anyone here? Identify yourself.” The silence continued.
“Everything okay, Sian? We’re just parking up; will be with you in two minutes.”
He struck silently as she walked past a large instrument cupboard that sat against one wall of the corridor. She saw the dark figure from the corner of her eye, but he had a second or two on her, which gave him the element of surprise.
A sharp pain erupted from deep within her, spreading out over her back, shocking her limbs, leaving her arms lifeless and loosely hanging by her sides. The knife had travelled in deep beneath the bottom of her stab vest, rising up and under, penetrating her lower back. Sian crumpled to the floor, her face hitting the dusty concrete.
Her mind willed her to move, get up, run, run you idiot, but her body froze. Everything moved around her in slow motion. Shock left her motionless, a spectator. Fuck, fuck, fuck. The pain had subsided, masked by the rush of adrenaline that now coursed through her veins.
Footsteps, she heard slow, steady footsteps. Someone stood by her face. Black shoes, I can see black shoes and green trousers. Her mind willed her to move her head, to look up, to identify her attacker. She tried, but there was no response. A spot of blood dripped onto the floor by his shoes. My blood, my fucking blood. Help me, help me, she pleaded in silence as she stared at his shoes.
He didn’t move. He stood there for what seemed an eternity, but in reality was only a few seconds. Then it dawned on her, he’s going to kill me, that’s why he’s still here, he’s going to kill me. Panic washed over her, her heart thundering like a steam train on its inaugural trip, her lips drier than a desert. A gurgle emanated from her throat.
And then he was gone, walking away faster than he’d approached. Disappearing into the blackness that was his camouflage.
“Sian, are you there? Sian?” Abby called out over the radio.
From somewhere deep within, her fingers found their motion. It was the same hand that seemed to have locked itself around her radio before being struck. I can’t move it…I can’t move it. Her numb fingers searched out the top of the radio. Between the volume button and small rubber aerial was the red emergency button. Sian mustered all her strength, and pressed down clumsily with her index finger. Nothing’s happening…harder, work you fucker. Her mind willed her on.
Her body felt loose, limp and void of all strength. Press again, you can do it…I don’t want to die…come on try, try again. Yes. She now had clear uninterrupted access to the airwaves for thirty seconds. The control room kicked in, barking orders, trying to locate her whereabouts using GPS. The voice faded in and out, swirling around her like a rampant storm. Confusion clouded her thinking. Was it coming from the radio? Or was someone coming to her aid?
Drawing on all the strength she could muster, she yelled “help” in the vain hope they could hear her before darkness filled her vision and her eyes closed. The commotion of the control room trying to reach her and Abby’s voice screaming fell on deaf ears. The sounds of heavy footsteps racing towards her and then the words, “Officer down…officer down,” faded away as her world fell silent.
41
A deathly silence descended like a dark mist on a cold winter’s night. For what felt like an eternity, Abby knelt on the cold, hard floor cradling Sian’s head. Her body felt heavy and cold as the seconds passed and Sian’s life ebbed away.
“Stay with me, Sian. You hear me…stay with me. Don’t you go anywhere,” Abby repeated, hoping her words were reaching and registering with Sian at some level.
Those few seconds of sanity were fast replaced with Scott requesting immediate backup and an ambulance. It was all hands to the pump. The control room diverted all available units from Brighton and Lewes to the area. Officers were being pulled off all non-essential jobs and were being diverted to Ditchling.
Torn between staying with Abby and Sian, Scott pondered pursuing the assailant. In his mind’s eye, he knew he needed to stay with his officers but the assailant was here, somewhere around them, and vital seconds were being lost. He knew it would be too late once units had made their way towards Ditchling. Even on blues, the journey would take at least fifteen minutes, and the nearest NPAS helicopter wouldn’t be here much sooner.
His fists clenched, his breathing exhaling in rapid pants…think…think. He was already treading a fine line with his superiors, having been branded reckless and cavalier on more than one occasion. He’d been criticised for putting results over officer safety, a claim that he’d fiercely refuted. He never saw himself as such; he had preferred to describe himself as pragmatic and energetic.
Sensing the dilemma within her boss, Abby shouted, “Go…go, we’ll be fine! Go get the fucker who did this.”
Scott hesitated, his next decision would be the one that would be scrutinised the most. “You sure?” he said, glancing down at Sian’s pale, lifeless face.
“Yes, we’ll take the flack later…together if we have to.”
Scott didn’t need to be told twice. He turned and raced down the corridor, his loud footsteps rupturing the silence. Silence laced with terror and death. He felt shit. He struggled to think straight. In the back of his mind, a hazy, haunting image flashed up almost stopping him in his tracks. The lifeless figures of his family sprawled across the road, the car that had mowed them down disappearing into the distance. At the time, he’d been torn between duty and being there for his loved ones. History seemed to be repeating itself once again, as if some higher being was putting him to the test once more.
A fire raged in his belly. His eyes narrowed. “Not this time,” he said through gritted teeth as he sped up, flying through several sets of double swing doors before shoulder-charging a fire exit door that propelled him outside. He stopped for a moment to gather his bearings as he rubbed his sore shoulder. He couldn’t see anything and the only sounds he could hear were those of birds singing and chirping innocently in the trees that backed on the rear edge of the school.
He ran to the forest edge. He looked hard, his eyes searching amongst the dense woodland for any sign of movement. Was he too late? The helicopter would be here in a few minutes. The crew would scan the forest for any discernable heat sources that the dogs could be diverted towards. If the assailant had doubled back around to the front of the school, then there was a chance that uniformed units would pick him up.
“Fuck!” Scott cursed.
Scott raced back into the school to find Abby and Sian. Abby looked a disconsolate figure, her eyes were heavy with sadness as she glanced up, hopeful. He shook his head. “He got away. Sian?”
“Not good, Guv. Her pulse is weak. I don’t think she’s…we need paramedics now.”
“They’re minutes away. They’re just coming off Coldean Lane. There’s a fast response unit a minute or two away as well.”
For a fleeting moment, a change in the wind direction carried the approaching tone of a siren.
Scott barged through Collier’s door, seething, his anger threatening to spiral out of control and engulf him like a violent whirlpool. If Scott was honest with himself, he was to blame. The job always carried risks. Any enquiry an officer went out on had the potential to turn nasty. They never knew what would be around the next corner or who would open the next door they knocked on. A seemingly innocent visit to follow up on ongoing enquiries had the potential to go horribly wrong no matter what level of risk assessment was undertaken beforehand.
He knew all that. Christ, he’d drummed that into all his officers, but now an enquiry had gone horribly wrong and it was on his watch. He needed to find an outlet for his anger, and Collier was in Scott’s cross hairs. He panted, his muscles edgy and tense. Adrenaline coursed through his veins like a raging river in storm, spiking his fight or flight response
and he knew that he was moments away from doing something that he’d later regret.
He didn’t give a shit.
Scott’s eyes darted around the room, searching for Collier. To begin with, he was certain that Collier had bolted, done his disappearing act. Then from the corner of the room Scott heard the red leather chesterfield creak.
“Ah, Inspector…I wondered how long it would take until you appeared at my door,” came the measure toned of Collier.
Scott could see just a few wispy strains of grey hair poke up above the back of the chair. He paced over to Collier, grabbed the back of the chair and spun it round so hard to face him the chair trembled under the attack. Collier clung onto the armrests as his eyes widened and his lips parted in a gasp. Their eyes locked in a gladiatorial battle, invisible messages of hate and taunting passed between them. Collier’s lips broke into a smile that did a poor job of masking defeat.
“Do you know I have an officer fighting for her life on your school premises, and you have the gall to sit here as if everything is okay?” Scott said through gritted teeth. Their faces were an inch or two apart as Scott gripped the man’s suit lapels pulling him even closer. “At every opportunity, you’ve done your hardest to skirt around my enquiries, spinning me yarns and holding back on me. You’re going to tell me everything, because if you don’t, I’ll throw you out of the window now so help me God.”
Scott shook. With anger. And fear. Fear for Sian. If she died, he couldn’t be held accountable for what he might do to Collier. Cold shivers raced down his spine like bolts of lightning. His hands trembled through a heady mixture of rolling emotions. But the fear worried him the most, the fear of going too far, even though he knew he’d already done that.
42
Collier looked a resigned and disconsolate figure. His eyes drooped as he looked down, afraid to look Scott in the eyes any longer. All around them, the wail of sirens echoed as emergency vehicles converged on the school. The fight had all but deserted the old man, his stiff, methodical persona crumbling in front of Scott’s eyes. He didn’t look like the firm, disciplinarian principal that Scott had known to this point. Collier looked tired, weary and helpless.
“There’s no way back from this, Mr Collier. I think it’s high time you were straight with me. You see, you and I both know that you’ve been holding back on me. You’ve sidestepped my questioning from the very beginning. This school is in lockdown now. The school’s reputation has been damaged beyond belief and you’ve just spent your last day as the principal of Edmunston-Hunt School. You and I both know that the school governors will back a vote of no confidence in you…so that’s it. It’s over.”
Collier’s lips broke into a thin smile as he shook his head. “Checkmate, Inspector. It appears that my options are limited. This school has been my life,” he said, waving his hand lazily in the air. “It’s been my home, my castle and my establishment since I was a boy. I’ve protected it fiercely; I would have laid down my life for this school.”
In Scott’s view, Collier had already done that. He knew nothing about the world outside these four walls, and doubted that Collier had been past the gates of the school in a long time.
“Mr Collier, I’d love to sit here and reminisce, but I’ve got to track down a violent criminal and identify the person who’s attempted to murder one of my team,” Scott said sternly, a sense of urgency in his voice as he spoke.
There was a lengthy pause as Collier reflected. With a heavy sigh, his chest heaved. “This has always been a school that prided itself on discipline. Keeping boys in line is built into the fabric of the school and it’s taken as a given. I saw it with my own eyes…and to be frank was on the receiving end of it when I was a young lad here. But it set me up for what I was about to experience in my military career. Even when I came back here as a teacher and housemaster, I knew it was still carrying on.”
“Right under your nose…and you never did a thing? You turned a blind eye?” Scott asked.
Collier puckered his lips. “I guess so. It was the done thing.” He shrugged.
“And the pupil who drowned? What happened?”
Collier nodded slowly. “Peter Jennings, the name has stuck with me. The prefects at the time took their initiations and discipline a little too far.”
“Hardly a little too far,” Scott remonstrated. Collier ignored the suggestion.
“It was they who were responsible for Jennings’s death. They threw him into the pool, but they knew full well that the lad couldn’t swim. They pushed him away every time he tried to get to the side. They laughed as he fought to survive. After he drowned,” Collier continued, pausing for a moment, “we covered up the unfortunate incident. We blamed it on Jennings breaking school rules. An unavoidable accident was how it was described.”
“I understand he was found naked, his clothes?”
“Hidden in the flue of the chimney in the old music room. It was a very dark period in the school’s history, but we did well to manage the situation.”
Scott was incredulous. Collier sounded as if he was pleased at the school’s damage limitation strategy. He shook his head in disbelief, Collier seemed to operate in a parallel dimension where the boundaries of respect, decency, ethics and moral responsibility had been distorted beyond recognition, like a hall of mirrors at a fairground.
The heavy thunder of footsteps behind him broke the temporary silence. Scott glanced over his shoulder to see Mike and several uniformed officers at the door. Armed officers brandishing their Heckler & Koch carbines stood either side of Mike, their sights trained on Collier. At this stage, anyone was a suspect, and to arriving officers, Collier could easily have been the one carrying a weapon.
“Why Jennings?” Scott asked.
There was another lengthy pause. Collier was in no hurry. In a perverse way, he appeared to be enjoying the attention he was receiving. “He was allegedly having an unhealthy relationship with another pupil.”
Scott’s brow furrowed as he glanced towards Mike who looked equally perplexed. “Unhealthy relationship?”
Collier cleared his throat loudly and shifted uncomfortably in his chair. “He was a poof, Inspector.”
“Based on what evidence?”
“He was always seen with another boy. They both were frail, weak and effeminate, always shying away from playing rugby. They’d both find excuses not to participate and were always the last in inter-house cross-country competitions. Poor exam results, spent all their time together and so on. You get the drift.”
“And on that set of weak assumptions, you questioned his sexuality?” Scott asked.
“Well…yes, but the prefects had seen them in a disgusting embrace.”
“So the prefects were judge and jury?”
“It’s behaviour that we don’t tolerate in this school, Inspector,” Collier replied as he glared at Scott.
It was all starting to become very clear to Scott. The weakest in the school were punished. Those unable to defend themselves became soft targets for the bullies. The lasting image of Matthew sobbing raced through Scott’s mind. How many others had suffered over the years?
Scott crossed his arms. “And the prefects were?” Knowing full well what names would likely be put forward.
“Christopher Johnson, Giles Rochester, Alex Winterbottom…” Collier paused for a moment. “And Laurence Goddard.”
Scott shook his head in frustration. “This could all have been stopped before it got this far. And what was the name of the boy that Peter Jennings was allegedly involved with?”
“Timothy Marchant, a weak individual with no backbone. Plump, round face, dark hair, large forehead. There was no place for his kind in my establishment.”
“And what happened to Timothy?” Scott asked, ignoring Collier’s last comment.
“The very next day we shipped him out of here. His father was a government official based at the British consulate in Turkey. But the lad stayed with his mother who resided here in this country. Kent, I be
lieve. Tonbridge to be precise.”
“More damage limitation?”
“Hmm, something like that. I’ll give him credit. He showed his metal in the end and didn’t go quietly. He was angry, didn’t want to go, but equally was too upset to stay. Dithering idiot. I would have wiped the scowl off his face had it been under different circumstances.”
“And this was sanctioned by the governors as well?”
An expression of guilt crept over Collier’s face as he diverted his gaze towards the window, the silence that ensued suggesting otherwise.
Scott leant in forcing Collier to press back into the chair. His eyes shot daggers at the principal, every sinew in his body hated the man, but he was here to uphold the law.
“You’ll be charged with withholding information, and perverting the course of justice. And that’s just for starters. Get him out of here, but don’t take him back yet.”
43
Scott left Collier in the capable hands of Mike and the uniformed officers, whilst organising other officers to do a more detailed search of the old music room in the disused part of the school. The claustrophobic atmosphere of Collier’s room had been replaced by the frenetic activity at the front of the school. Police vehicles littered the front drive, parked at curious angles where they’d stopped in their haste to bail out and assist. He could hear police dogs barking in the distance and fast radio chatter as information was coming in.
The school was in lockdown. Armed officers assisted their unarmed colleagues who were stationed on the front gate. Other officers roamed the grounds looking for any evidence of the assailant or his weapon.
An officer that Scott hadn’t seen before interrupted his thoughts. “Sir, one of the dogs has picked up a scent heading into the forest behind the main building.”
