Forbidden Lessons Part 15

Sheer, raw panic.

Everyone froze.

Darius snuffed the candle. Charlotte gripped Laura's hand in terror.

"h.e.l.lo? Who's in there?"

Jenkins obviously hadn't got the key to the padlock. The front windows which looked across the fields were shuttered so he couldn't see in from that side at least. They heard him walk around the building to the back windows.

The stillness. The terror.

Eight of them stuck in the freezing darkness of the wooden building facing exposure at any moment.

The broken window wasn't shuttered but it was closed, and it was a smaller window than the front ones. The moon was also s.h.i.+ning on the front ones rather than the back. If they remained in the shadows, completely still, and Jenkins couldn't see in clearly then perhaps, perhaps he wouldn't see them.

Except the smoke. The d.a.m.n cigarette smoke. It must reek in the night air, Laura thought. Would he have a torch with him?

She closed her eyes; it was actually hard to breathe properly. The fear in the room was sobering. They had felt invincible but the reality was instant expulsion if they were discovered: catastrophic for the St Duncan's Sixth formers who were mid-way through university applications.

The eight of them waited for several minutes. Jenkins had gone past the window and round to the front again, rattling the door one more time.

"If there's anyone in there I'm calling the police."

Then there was silence.

Cat-like, Susie made her way to the front windows and managed to peer through a tiny c.h.i.n.k where the wooden shutter had warped.

"He's gone. He's half way back to the gate."

Laura felt like crying. There were plenty of oaths under people's breath.

"We'll have to get out quickly, he might come back with reinforcements," Julian said.

"And the key."

One by one they clambered out of the window as quickly and quietly as they could. Darius and Julian pa.s.sed the remainders of the feast through, mainly empty bottles and crisps.

"Hold on," said Susie. "Someone has to p.i.s.s in there."

"What?" Charlotte looked at her as though she was mad.

"Jenkins knows there was someone in here. They'll be over this place with a toothcomb first thing tomorrow, probably with the police too. We need to make them think it's a tramp."

She grabbed an old rug from the pavilion that they'd been sitting on, and trampled it into the mud below the window. Then she poured some beer dregs on it and tossed it back into the room. "That's his bed. Now throw in a couple of f.a.g ends and one - no two - empty bottles. Now one of you boys go in and do the business."

At a nod from Julian one of the three rugby players went back in. They all waited for him.

"In the corner and a bit on the blanket. Let's hope that does it," he reported on exit.

"Short of throwing a battered old hat and a spotted kerchief on a stick to completely over-egg the pudding, I should think we're done," Darius said.

Laura was simply horrified by the whole situation. It was bad enough to sneak out but to foul the place up was unbearably wrong.

She wasn't even aware, nor did she really care, how the boys got back to the gate. She, Charlotte and Susie hurried off back to Michaelmas House trying to keep to the shadows as far as possible. They took their shoes off at the bottom of the fire escape to climb up with minimum noise. They crept into the dorm where Margery was gently snoring and slid into their beds, fully clothed.

Everything was flas.h.i.+ng in Laura's mind when she tried to sleep. She kept imagining the worst scenarios. And what was Mr Rydell going to say if she got expelled? She hadn't been able to tell him about the party as they hadn't spoken alone since half term How she wished she could be with him now: safe, holding her, soothing away the fear.

24. Covering tracks.

They were disarmed the next morning by a surprisingly sincere apology from Susie. "I should never have dragged you guys into it, it was totally unfair. I know you didn't really like the idea. I thought I had it all sorted and I didn't. Actually that's not quite true, I knew it was a huge risk which was part of the fun, but it was totally unfair to put that on you."

"It's ok, we agreed to come and it was your birthday. You don't owe us an apology," Charlotte said.

"I do. And the tramp thing, it's foul to have done that on school property. I never meant that to happen but I was running out of ideas."

Laura had woken up that morning feel less revulsed and more relieved by Susie's strategy. "I think it was smart, actually. Otherwise they would start sniffing around and the pressure might get too much."

They all knew she meant Margery. Not that Margery would tell directly, but she might give the game away by her reaction to any questioning.

"Who ended up winning by the way?" Charlotte asked.

"I was ahead by a mile, more's the pity. The boys will be toasting old Jenkins for years to come."

"We'll look on this one day and laugh," Laura said. "Happy birthday by the way."

"Thanks. It will be a happy one if we continue to get away with this," Susie said.

Charlotte looked at Laura anxiously. "Will you tell Mr Rydell?"

It was something Laura had been uncertain about. She had had so little time to speak with him since half term and Susie's plan had been so last minute.

"I'll probably mention it, but not every detail."

"He won't tell will he? He might feel obligated." Charlotte was worried.

"Of course he won't tell. If he felt some overwhelming moral duty to report misbehaviour he'd start with himself. Keeping quiet about an illicit party pales in comparison to s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g one of your pupils, doesn't it?" Susie said.

Laura felt conflicted. She realised that it could compromise him to tell him certain things. He still had his duties as a teacher and it was dangerous enough for him to be in a relations.h.i.+p with her. She couldn't make him complicit in their rule-breaking as well.

"You know thinking about it I don't think I'll say anything. Not now anyway. Maybe ages later in the future when it really doesn't matter anymore," she said.

After all, he must have secrets he didn't tell her. He must hear things about her friends from other teachers, or know things that he didn't burden her with. Ultimately it was Susie's secret: her birthday, her idea, and she who had done her best to save them all from disaster.

Susie was in two minds about attending detention that day. It was her birthday after all, and spending valuable leisure hours cooped up yet again did not seem appealing or fair. She knew that the flawless work in her Geography exercise book was a growing gun.

The end of term exams were also going to be interesting. She would easily top the cla.s.s by a mile if Mrs Ayers marked her fairly. Susie was certain however she would not. But a wrongly marked exam paper would be in a very different league from a spiteful C on a homework essay.

Susie wondered what Mrs Ayers' defence would be if that happened. Would they just let her get away with it? Put it down to an unfortunate error of judgement? She was aware how little weight she carried against a teacher of many years - decades - who must have some value to Francis Hall if she had lasted so long with such a malevolent personality.

To Susie's delight Teresa Hubert was also in detention that week. Teresa had been caught copying answers in Maths. Which wasn't stupid in itself, everyone did it from time to time, but it was immensely stupid when the person she copied from, Andrea, had even more miserable mathematical abilities than Teresa's. Identical wrong answers were an obvious giveaway. Of course if Teresa was less stupid, Susie thought, she would have copied them from Mary Rudge or someone who was good at Maths.

"What are you in for?" she asked Teresa, knowing full well what the answer was.

"A misunderstanding," Teresa said.

"A little misunderstanding in Maths?" Susie asked with a falsely polite smile. Teresa scowled at her.

"Why are you here?" As Teresa did German and not Geography, she knew nothing of Susie's feud with Mrs Ayers.

"Sheer pleasure," Susie said.

It turned out to be closer to Her Majesty's Pleasure that afternoon, since detention was taken by Mrs Grayson. Although the Headmistress was liked and respected, unlike teachers such as Mrs Ayers and Miss Quayle, no one dared breathe out of line when she presided over an event. Susie's racy novel would have to stay out of sight today.

Mrs Grayson's patience had already been tried that morning by Jenkins and his absurd and alarming account of a tramp invading the pavilion. The police had been round to investigate but found nothing much. It seemed a window had been forced.

"Stinking mess it was too, not as I like to say it out loud but he'd used it as a facility so to speak," Jenkins had said.

Jenkins had been instructed to clean the room and fix the window as well as check various other windows and locks around the school as a priority, but Mrs Grayson remained troubled. A vagrant breaking into a girls' school might have more sinister motives than shelter for the night. She needed to put the school on higher caution without creating alarm. Schoolgirls were p.r.o.ne to drama and she didn't want to make mountain out of a molehill and trigger a slew of false alerts and ma.s.s panic.

Yet she was troubled. Something seemed wrong with the school that term but she hadn't been able to pinpoint what it was. There was the disruption from Miss Vine's plan with the school play of course. Yet nothing untoward had arisen from that so far beyond a few friends.h.i.+ps developing between pupils of the two schools. Mrs Grayson was of the mind that these things would happen anyway among young people - just look at Romeo and Juliet - so it wasn't a major concern. Better, all things said and done, to know what was going on. She didn't want another Lucy Martin on her hands.

She looked at the dark head of the new pupil on the back row, seemingly intent on her work. Of course Susie Clarke wasn't the only new pupil that term, there was an entire intake of new girls in the youngest cla.s.s. But she was the only new girl in her year.

She remembered what Grace Grant had said to her about Susie's endless detentions. Looking at her now the phrase "b.u.t.ter wouldn't melt" came to mind but Mrs Grayson had been a schoolmistress far too long to take anything at face value.

Going over to Susie's desk to see what she was working on the Headmistress noticed a birthday badge pinned on her jersey. Badges weren't strictly allowed but an exception was usually made for birthdays.

"Is it your birthday today, Susie?" Susie said it was. "A very happy birthday then. I should have thought you would have taken more care to stay out of detention to celebrate your day."

Susie saw Teresa Hubert smirking but was unfazed. "Yes, is it unfortunate," she told the Headmistress.

It wasn't the response she would have expected from most girls but looking at Susie, cool and composed, Mrs Grayson felt some of the reservations that Grace Grant had had. It was to be expected, perhaps, that given Susie's near-expulsions from other schools she wouldn't be the most ordinary or most easy girl. But whereas defiance or disobedience might have been antic.i.p.ated from such a case, this was something else.

It needed some careful thought. The Headmistress determined to speak with Grace Grant again, and meanwhile make her own observations of Susie.

Mr Poynter had asked some of his history cla.s.s to volunteer to help mend old books in the library on Sat.u.r.day afternoon. He used Mars Bars as a bribe but those that signed up to help actually did so because they liked him. The weather was awful anyway and there were no other activities planned that weekend.

Susie of course had detention, Charlotte had hockey and Margery wanted to do some homework so Laura was the only one of the four to volunteer.

Mr Poynter started referring to it as the Bookbinding Club and Laura hoped with a heavy heart that it wouldn't become a too-frequent event. As school societies went it would rank below even the prayer circle and the knitting group in terms of social cachet.

Feeling fairly ambivalent but with nothing better to do she made her way to the library. She walked by herself as the other girls taking part were from different houses.

As she crossed into the main school buildings Mr Rydell came up beside her. "Heading anywhere interesting?" he asked. He was still wearing his work clothes. Teachers rarely ever wore casual clothes around the school even if they were off duty.

It was thrilling to get a brief moment with him alone. "Only the library," she said. "Mr Poynter wants us to help him mend some old books. He bribed us with chocolate and a future school excursion."

"That's where I'm going too. Though Charles - Mr Poynter - roped me in with the promise of some beer."

As she walked next to him - this tall, athletic, good looking man - Laura wished the whole world could know that she was with him, that he was hers. They pa.s.sed Miss Quayle and Miss Vine in the courtyard and she wondered what they would think if they knew. They were his colleagues, on the same level as him, and she was just a pupil. Yet she was the one closest to him, with the most intimate knowledge of him. It gave her a strange pride when she thought about it.

They had reached the library steps and he ushered her in first.

"It's not quite what I would plan for a date but if it gets me an afternoon with you, Mr Poynter has my every thanks," he said.

The History teacher was delighted to see them all. "Welcome, welcome. Great to see so many dedicated book lovers."

It was easy to contrive to sit next to one another at one of the shared tables. As they got to work with tape, scissors and the various bookbinding materials he could press his leg against hers. Just being in physical contact with him was wonderful.

Being in the library also gave them a green light to talk in low voices.

"How has your week been?" he asked.

She couldn't answer this truthfully without mentioning the midnight feast which she had decided not to tell him about for now, least of all at a time like this.

"Lessons pretty much as usual," she said. She hated having a lie between them, or an absence of truth, and for a moment felt badly towards Susie for putting her in such a position. But if it wasn't for Susie hardly any of her time with him would have been possible, in fact the whole thing might never have happened if Susie's advice hadn't helped Laura pluck up her courage.

So on balance, Susie had helped her. And Laura more than owed it to her to keep silent about the party. Put like that, as a debt to Susie rather than a lie to Mr Rydell, it didn't seem so bad.

"None of the others joining you today?" He referred to her dorm mates.

"All busy. Susie has yet another detention. Mrs Ayers again."

"That woman is a blight," he said. He spoke so low that no one could hear him except Laura.

"That's exactly what Charlotte says," she told him.

"The way I saw her treat you after you had fallen that time, I felt violent with anger. Even if it hadn't been you I would have been furious."

"Did you already know by then how you felt? About me?"

"I knew from the start. I couldn't get you out of my mind. When I called you back to my cla.s.sroom I was tempted to make a move even then," he said.

"I wanted you to."

He linked his foot around her ankle. "I want you right now. Isn't there some dark corner or long lost book vault we can find?"

"No, only upstairs and it's always busy." The upper level of the library was reached by a spiral staircase. Anyone could go up there to get a book, but only Sixth Formers were allowed to work on the desks up there. It didn't look as though anyone was up there currently, but you couldn't see the whole area from where they were sitting.