Maxwell's Return (2 page)

‘Hello?’

‘Hello. Helen, Max here.’

‘Max!’ He could hear the grin on her face. ‘I didn’t think you were back just yet.’

‘Back in body, dear heart. My head is still on a pillow somewhere in Los Angeles. We’ll get back together soon, I hope.’

‘How are Jacquie and Nolan?’

‘I gather that small boys don’t do jet lag. He is off with his mate on a sleepover. Jacquie is catching up on emails, calls, you know how it is. How are you?’

‘We’re fine and before you ask me, so is the Sixth Form. We only
had one pregnancy … oh, I think you knew about that before you went …’

‘Tamzin?’

‘No, in that case, two pregnancies, I suppose I should say. The results look as if they will be up this year – talking of which, Paul and Hector got on like houses on fire and the historians are all doing well. It was like having you around, but less trouble.’ Her chuckle warmed his ear. ‘You have missed some great weather – apparently we are in for an Indian summer, so you won’t feel it too badly.’

‘Feel it?’

‘The cold.’

‘My dear woman, I have never been so cold in my life as I have been for the past seven months. Air conditioning has kept us in Arctic temperatures. It was like the Donner party all over again. I’d eaten Nole’s leg before I realised what was happening. The only time the
real
temperature kicks in in California is during the quick dash to the car and from the car at school or at the shops.’

‘The Mall.’

‘Wash your mouth out, Mrs Maitland. I have managed to retrain half of one of America’s largest cities to use correct vocabulary – I don’t want to have to start again with you. I did inform them that the only Mall in the world was the Pall variety that leads directly to the Palace.’

‘The staff at Leighford are all expecting you to come back with an
American accent. I should qualify that,’ she said hurriedly, as his indrawn breath threatened retribution. ‘The younger staff. Hector has been telling them how his colleagues have been training you in the finer points of Yank Speak. The rest of us know that you will have been training them on how to Talk Proper.’

‘You betchya,’ Maxwell drawled, much after CletusSpuckler from
The Simpsons
.

Helen laughed. ‘I hope you did that deliberately, Max,’ she said. ‘I have fifty pee riding on you.’

‘Fifty pee!’ he said, horrified. ‘Fifty pee! Surely you have more confidence in me than that? Oh ye of little faith.’

‘They capped the bet,’ she said. ‘As always, you have kept everyone guessing! But you rang me for a reason, I would imagine. You must have lots to do.’

‘Most of the luggage isn’t here yet. We sent it on by carrier; I’m not quite sure how we managed to leave with a suitcase each and now need DHL to get us back, but apparently there was a lot of stuff we couldn’t leave behind. Nolan’s scooter, for example.’

‘He’s that age, Max. He’ll be cycling around behind you soon, you just wait.’

‘So, to answer your question, there isn’t a lot to do. We managed to dislodge Mrs Troubridge eventually. Hector seems to have actually trained Mrs B to clean, so the place is like a new pin.’

‘Hector has been doing his own cleaning, I understand,’ Helen said.

‘Mrs B …’

‘Mrs B is in what you would doubtless call rude health,’ Helen reassured him. ‘She didn’t hold with cleaning for foreigners, especially them Yanks wot got her auntie into trouble in the War and then left her holding the baby. Them Yanks don’t care, apparently. No woman’s safe with them, even when they look like they couldn’t knock the skin of a rice pudding, like that Mr Gold. Her family wouldn’t have her in the house along of him. It wasn’t right.’ Helen Maitland couldn’t do an impeccable Mrs B like Maxwell could, but it was near enough, although the spectacle did make him feel slightly nauseous.

‘I suppose Hector was a little short-sighted,’ he mused.

‘Yes,’ Helen agreed, ‘but not stone-blind. In fact, he was happy to fend for himself. I understand it was how he managed at home anyway.’

Maxwell had met his wife – he could believe that.

‘He was sorry to have to go back. We were wondering…’

‘Yes?’

‘Well… it wasn’t anything you did, was it? That the school wouldn’t spring for another year?’

‘No.’ Maxwell was outraged. He had dragged that school kicking and screaming back years. ‘No, it was all to do with funding. They were cutting staff and I didn’t think it was fair that Hector’s post should be judged by me. And of course, with the divorce going through…’

‘He seemed very pleased with that.’

‘Rightly so, I should think. No, it was time we got back. Jacquie was having a good time, a few lectures, working with the DA; all good for the CV but not what she’s used to. We’re not sorry to be back.’

‘So … I suppose you’re after the goss.’

‘If you have the time.’

‘Not for all of it,’ she said. ‘But I suppose you’ve heard the main points, anyway.’

‘Not really. You know me and emails. Paul and Hector just got on with it and obviously you had no problems, so I haven’t really been in touch with anyone.’

‘Well, Legs hasn’t done anything too heinous, you might be glad to hear. Charlotte …’

‘Who?’

‘Thingee Two,’ Helen Maitland translated. ‘Afternoon Thingee. You know, the one with blonde hair.’

‘Of course,’ Maxwell said, clicking his fingers. ‘Pregnant?’

‘Naturally. She was an accident waiting to happen.’

‘Andrew Baines, PE.’

‘Good Lord, Max!’ She was astounded. ‘How on earth did you know that? I’ve only just found out.’

‘Ah ha,’ Maxwell tapped the side of his nose, despite the fact that there was no one to see, ‘We have our ways. Body language, heart, body
language. I won’t embarrass you by mentioning the thinness of track suit bottoms – let my nuance be enough.’

‘I’ll know where to look, next time,’ she muttered. ‘Where was I?’

‘Lascivious PE teachers.’

‘Hmm. Let me think. You saw the thing about Bernard Ryan in the paper, I expect?’

Maxwell blinked. ‘What thing?’

‘You missed it? I thought Sylv was sending you the
Leighford Advertiser
out.’

‘She did, but for some reason, our neighbour took rather a shine to it, so it often disappeared from the letterbox.’

‘Oh, well, if you missed it … it’s a bit complicated, Max. It will take longer than a phone call to fill you in. Look, why don’t …?’

A shrill peal rang through the house. ‘There’s someone at the door, Helen,’ Maxwell said. ‘I’ll get that and give you a call later. Bernard
Ryan
, you say?’

‘I do,’ she said. ‘Answer the door, Max, and I’ll wait to hear from you. I’ll see if I can find some backnumbers so that I can get everything in the right order.’

The bell shrilled again, accompanied by Jacquie’s call, asking him to answer it. ‘Must go,’ he said, putting the phone down. Trust him to have used the only non-cordless in the place. Then he made for the stairs, muttering ‘Bernard
Ryan
?’ to himself, trying to make it sound like sense.

Maxwell reached the bottom of the stairs just as the bell pealed for the fourth time. He threw open the door to remonstrate with whatever lowlife was outside but instead of a neighbourhood urchin, his doorstep was decorated with Sylvia Matthews and two bulging Asda bags. They stood there for a moment, grinning at each other before Maxwell dived forward and grabbed the shopping, which he dumped in the hall before grabbing Sylvia in a hug which was once all she longed for. He planted a kiss on each cheek and pulled her inside.

‘Where’s Guy?’ he asked, sticking his head out and looking ostentatiously left and right.

‘In Brighton,’ she said. ‘He has a new job, Head of Department, no less, and he has gone in to suss out his office. Bless him, he’s taken in a little bit of carpet for under his desk. He’s learned a lot from you, over the years.’

Maxwell’s square of carpet was famous throughout Leighford High School. School hierarchy dictated that only the most upper of the upper echelons had carpet in their office, so Maxwell had provided his own. It was a physical symbol of the Revolt of the Middle Managers. Along with a kettle that boiled in less than thirty minutes and a tin to keep the biscuits dry. Of such things are legends made.

‘Well, it’s lovely to see you,’ Maxwell said. And it was; they didn’t make school nurses like Sylvia Matthews any more. He ushered her up the stairs. ‘I’ll leave the bags down here, shall I?’

‘No, no,’ she said, turning. ‘It’s stuff for you. I know Hector was going to fill the fridge but he is so …’

‘… American,’ Maxwell completed her thought. ‘Yes, he is a tad, oops, a little. However, Nolan was delighted to find a fridge full of Gatorade and a cupboard full of Oreos and granola but personally if I never drink another crocodile pee I shall be a happy man.’

‘Crocodile pee?’

‘I always assumed that that was the main ingredient in Gatorade, but I may be wrong.’ He peered into the bag and saw with delight rashers of unsmoked bacon, thick cut and gave her another hug. Home at last. ‘I must take issue with you, though, Sylv,’ he said. ‘Why didn’t you let me know about Bernard?’

‘I did. I sent you the
Advertiser
. It knows more or less what I know.’

‘We didn’t get that issue. The chap next door took rather a shine to the rag and pinched it half the time.’

‘Strange neighbours you must have had. I wonder what he liked about it?’

‘I think he thought it was deeply satirical. Remember our favourite headline?’

‘
Spaniel Uninjured
,’ they chorused.

‘So, you missed the story,’ she said.

‘Yes. Fill me in.’

‘I don’t know all the ins and outs,’ she said, ‘but it all started back in June, or at least that’s when we heard of it. I understand that the actual beginning of it all was before that.’

‘Tell me as if you were writing it down,’ Maxwell advised, pointing at a chair for her to sit on. ‘Begin at the beginning and go on till you come to the end: then stop, as the King of Hearts would say.’

‘All right, then. I’ll do my best. Hindsight is a wonderful thing.’

‘Twenty twenty,’ Maxwell agreed and settled back, looking expectant.

Sylvia looked at him. ‘Do you know anything about this, Max?’ she asked.

‘No,’ he said, frowning. ‘Why?’

‘Because this isn’t some juicy goss about him running away with one of the dinner ladies or similar. It’s serious.’

The Head of Sixth Form sat up straighter and looked her in the eye. ‘Go on,’ he said. ‘I really am listening.’

‘Well,’ she began, ‘it turned out that Bernard had been doing some home tutoring. Not for the money, one would assume, on his salary, but for the satisfaction, company, whatever it might be. He didn’t advertise, just took on kids whose parents knew him or friends of theirs knew him –
word of mouth, you know, the usual thing.’

‘He lives alone, doesn’t he?’ Maxwell checked.

‘Yes. I think in the early days he used to have a lodger, a flatmate, call it what you will. But since he became first deputy, he hasn’t needed the money and I think like most of us he didn’t really like virtual strangers in the house.’

‘No girlfriend?’

‘Again, possibly at one time, but not at the moment. Where was I?’

‘Bernard tutoring.’

‘Right. Yes. So, he did a bit of tutoring and he was coming up to the exams so he wasn’t doing so much. One evening, or so the story goes, he was getting ready to go out when one of his tutees – is that a word?’

‘Possibly,’ Maxwell said, doubtfully.

‘One of the kids he tutored came round in a state. She was crying, a bit hysterical, in fact, and begged him to let her stay. He was doubtful but he has been a teacher now for …’

‘Allegedly,’ Maxwell put in.

‘Indeed, but even he knows the score re kids and homes, I should hope. Anyway, he was doubtful, but he mopped her up and heard her out. Apparently, some family member, he wasn’t sure who, was … well, behaving inappropriately towards her. This person had always been touchy feely, but had recently upped the game.’

‘Nasty,’ Maxwell agreed. ‘One of ours?’

‘No. She went to St Olave’s, along the coast.’

‘That’s a boarding school, surely?’

‘Well, yes,’ she agreed. ‘But they do have about 20 percent day girls. She was one of those. So, as you know, Bernard has nothing to do with pastoral, especially the girls, so he was at somewhat of a loss. She was adamant that she didn’t want the police involved, in fact she said if he called the police, she would deny it and accuse him if any medical examination should show that she had had sex.’

Maxwell looked serious. ‘Don’t tell me he called the police and she … how old is she, by the way?’

‘She was fourteen.’

‘Was?’

‘I’m jumping ahead in my story. He calmed her down and said she could stay the night as long as she told her parents where she was. She wouldn’t do that, but she did agree that she would let them know she was safe, but not tell them where. He settled for that, because he could see that otherwise she would just run and he preferred that she was somewhere safe, not wandering the streets.’

‘How do you know so much?’

‘Again, Max, story, in order, telling of.’

‘Sorry.’

‘He had to go out, a long-standing arrangement, or so it seems, that he couldn’t break. When he got back, in the wee small hours, she was
gone.’

‘Note?’

‘Nothing. He assumed she had gone home, had second thoughts, whatever happens in the heads of fourteen year old girls. He had worried that … well, perhaps she had designs on him. You know what they can be like.’

‘Bernard?’ Maxwell’s eyebrow disappeared under his hair.

‘You don’t use the same eyes as a teenager, Max. Bernard is not unattractive in a … well, he is attractive to some, I’m sure.’ She raised her hands and let them fall. ‘I’ve lost my thread again.’

‘She had gone.’

‘Yes. Right. The next morning, he came to see me about it. To ask me what he should do. I advised that he should ring the parents, find out if she was all right, and do it now. He rang from my office.’

‘And?’

‘And Henry Hall answered the phone. The girl, whose name was Josie Blakemore, by the way, had been found dead on the beach that morning, by the rather clichéd man walking his dog. Bernard tried to bluff it out, but of course, DCI Hall couldn’t help but wonder why he was ringing and so it all came out. At least, I assume it did, because I haven’t seen Bernard since the police came to pick him up from school.’