A Thousand Cuts (15 page)

So anyway, that’s why she did it. She wanted Samuel to show some passion, to show that he had feelings for her. Deep down, that’s what she wanted. She told me she was over him. She told me and I suppose I believed her. She had stopped talking about him. Or if she talked about him she also laughed about him. Our little chats went back to how they used to be. I stopped switching rotas. If I switched at all, it was to bring mine into line with Maggie’s. I genuinely thought she was over him. Clearly, though, she wasn’t. Clearly she wasn’t because how else could you possibly explain her decision to go to bed with TJ?

Here’s how Samuel found out. This was May probably, late April, the end of April. Maggie had been going with TJ for about a week or so. Don’t ask me how it started. Basically Maggie was lonely and TJ was sweaty and they happened to run into each other when they were both in the mood for sex. End of story. Although it wasn’t. It should have been. It should have been just that one time. Guess where they did it by the way. I shouldn’t tell you this but guess.

Yes but not just in the school. I’ll tell you where they did it. They did it in the boys’ changing rooms. Can you believe it? I mean, it’s disgusting really. It smells of adolescents in there, of mud and festering towels. But I shouldn’t have told you that. Promise me you’ll delete that bit. I should have made you stop the tape, shouldn’t I?

What was I saying? Oh, I remember. Maggie and TJ. You remember what I was saying about Maggie, about Maggie and men who need mothering, who behave like children. Well, TJ is a case in point. And also there was this thing underneath, this urge to make Samuel jealous. So it should have ended when it started but it didn’t. If she had told me right away I would have said something. I would have asked her what on earth she was thinking. TJ is basically a body and a pair of shorts. There’s nothing going on upstairs. So one time you could maybe understand. You know, if you were really in the mood and there were no strings attached and you could be sure that no one else would ever find out. But he’s not a keeper. Not for someone like Maggie. Except she did keep him and she’s still with him, although now it’s because she realises what she’s done and she can’t bring herself to admit it, not even to herself, especially not to herself. She’ll be with him for another month, no more than that. Just long enough to hide from herself any association with what’s happened.

Samuel found out the same time I did. As we all did. It must have been killing TJ, not telling Samuel. That’s the other thing, you see. You have to wonder about TJ’s motives too. I mean, Maggie is one of my best friends and she’s a wonderful person but she’s no Audrey Hepburn. If she could lose some of that weight she’s carrying on her hips, maybe shift a bit of that to up top. But I can hardly talk. I’d move it the other way if I could. So you have to wonder, that’s all I’m saying. Maggie has asked him to keep quiet, begged him probably, pleaded with him, and for a week or so he’s managed. For TJ, that’s quite some achievement. Particularly when you consider their history, his and Samuel’s. But it’s like dieting, isn’t it? You starve yourself for as long as you can manage but then someone brings in a tray of Krispy Kremes and there’s chocolate glaze and caramel glaze and hundreds and thousands and it’s still an hour to go until lunchtime and you’ve got a fresh cup of coffee and everyone else is having one so you’re going to indulge yourself, aren’t you?

He slapped her bottom.

In the staffroom, in front of everyone who was in there, which is me, Vicky, George, Janet I think, Matilda was there and Samuel of course. There may have been a few others. And everyone’s sitting around the table and we’re all talking, just chatting, I can’t really remember what we were talking about. Samuel’s not chatting but he’s following the conversation so when Maggie gets up and says, does anyone want a drink, and TJ reaches over and whacks her on the rump, Samuel sees it just like the rest of us.

The sound of it. That’s what reverberates in my mind. He gave her a good old whack did TJ and the sound was like he’d slapped her naked skin. So I remember the sound and I remember Maggie’s face. It was like she’d walked into a classroom and suddenly realised she was naked. Which we’ve all dreamt about, by the way. All of us teachers. We did a poll once and every single once of us said we’d had exactly the same dream. Except Samuel and the headmaster, who didn’t take part, and George, who probably had dreamt it but didn’t want to admit it, and Janet, although Janet once dreamt that she was naked in front of the headmaster, which for her amounts to the same thing.

TJ’s face too. I remember TJ’s face. He looked like a kid who’d farted in assembly. Which also happens sometimes and some of them, they know it’s foul, but also they think it’s hilarious. And just like one of the kids would, TJ brings his fingertips to his lips. You can see he’s smiling though. It’s obvious to everyone that he’s smiling. And he looks at Maggie and Maggie glares at him and both of them turn to look at Samuel.

Samuel’s face. I mean at first I’m staring at Maggie and probably I look as shocked as she does but then I realise what’s going on, what’s been going on, so like them I look at Samuel. And for once Samuel doesn’t look away. Normally, if you so much as caught his eye, that’s what he would have done. Instead, though, he’s sort of frozen, you know like computers sometimes get when you click on too many things at once, when you give them too much to think about, well he’s the human equivalent of that. His eyes sort of flick, left right, left right, left right, like he’s looking at Maggie, then at TJ, then at Maggie, then at TJ, then at Maggie.

Maggie leaves. She’s out of the door. TJ gets up. He makes to follow her but he can’t resist another look at Samuel before he goes. I don’t watch a lot of western films, they’re not really my thing, but my husband does and I’ve seen those shots they always have, you know those close-ups. Samuel and TJ, their eyes drawn together, it reminded me a bit of that. Like at the end of the film, before the shoot-out, before the showdown, and the goodie’s there and the baddie’s there and the director, he takes you right in so you can see their eyes. It’s cheesy, in the films, but that’s what I was reminded of at the time.

After that, TJ gave Maggie a whack every time she and Samuel were both in the room. To the point where Maggie wouldn’t get up before TJ did. Although even then TJ would feint or spin or lunge so that he always managed to get a hand to her. She’d shout at him, yell at him to knock it off but it was a game for TJ after that, you see, which means it was a competition, which means he always had to win. And he did win. If you watched Samuel’s face when it happened you could see that every time was like another defeat. He didn’t react, not outwardly, but that’s exactly my point. TJ was taunting him and he thought Maggie was taunting him and he could only put up with it for so long. The Donovan thing, I’m not saying that wasn’t part of it, I mean it was hard for Samuel, the entire situation, but the thing with the kids, that was just a fuse. He shot Donovan but only on his way to the stage. He was trying to shoot TJ. TJ or Maggie. Either way, you see my point. Samuel was in love and Samuel was betrayed and Samuel couldn’t stand it any more. It’s the oldest story in the book.

‘Lucia.’

‘I’ve made up my mind.’

‘Lucia.’

‘I mean it, Philip. I never should have joined in the first place.’

‘Then we never would have met. Which means you and Nabokov never would have met. Which means you would still be reading crime novels. Police procedurals. Whodunnits.’

‘I still read crime novels.’

‘No you don’t.’

‘I do. I read Ian Rankin and Patricia Cornwell and Colin Dexter and I’ve even read
The Da Vinci Code
.’

‘Lucia!’

‘And I enjoyed it too.’

Philip took hold of Lucia’s elbow and guided her towards the kerb. ‘At least keep your voice down when you talk like that.’ He nodded towards the building they were passing. ‘I’m known by people in there.’

Lucia read the sign. ‘You’re known in Sotheby’s?’

‘Well, no. I’m a barrister not an oil baron. But the security guards have seen me lurking and I would rather their suspicions about me were not confirmed.’ He gestured with his chin. ‘Down here.’

They turned on to Bond Street and almost immediately Philip jerked to a halt. Lucia had taken two steps on. She stopped when she realised her companion was no longer at her side.

‘What’s wrong? What are you looking at?’

‘That suit.’

‘Oh.’ Lucia moved closer. ‘It’s nice.’

‘Not that one. The blue one, there.’

‘That one’s nice too.’

‘It’s not nice, Lucia. Look at the cut. Look at the cloth. Look at the stitching on the cuff.’

‘Why? What’s wrong with it?’

‘Nothing’s wrong with it. It’s exquisite. To describe such a thing as nice is like describing the Millennium Star as shiny.’

‘It’s a suit, Philip. You wear it to work.’

Philip shook his head and turned away from the shop window. ‘This is what happens,’ he said. ‘This is what happens when you forsake literature and take Don Brown to your bedside. Your vocabulary shrinks and your taste buds wither.’

‘Dan. It’s Dan not Don.’

Philip wafted his hand in the air, as though just the name carried with it a stench. ‘Is there something you’re not telling me, Lucia?’

‘No. What? What do you mean?’

‘What’s happened? Why are you suddenly talking about resigning?’

Lucia stopped to allow a Japanese man dressed in Burberry to take a photo of his wife at the entrance to the Burberry store. Philip strode through the shot and gestured for Lucia to catch up.

‘You know what’s happened,’ Lucia said. ‘What’s happened has happened. It’s enough.’

‘You don’t agree with your boss. If that were enough, Lucia, half the workforce would be handing in their notice. It’s left here. Not far now.’

‘Don’t you have people to do this sort of thing for you?’

‘Alas,’ said Philip. ‘None of my people has the same inside leg as I do. A visit to the tailor is something I must endure myself. Although the inside-leg bit I must admit I enjoy.’

Lucia tutted, rolled her eyes, forced a smile. They walked on in silence until Philip once again came to a halt.

‘What now?’ said Lucia. She turned to the shop they had been passing. In the window were lingerie and ladies’ night-wear and several unidentifiables that were predominantly fluffy and pink. ‘Or perhaps I don’t want to know.’

‘Let’s find somewhere to sit,’ Philip said.

‘Sit? What about your suit? Didn’t you say you had a meeting to get back to?’

‘The suit can wait. The meeting can wait. This way.’ He took Lucia’s hand and guided her back the way they had come. They crossed Bond Street and passed along a side road lined with art galleries and car showrooms until they came to Berkeley Square. They found a crossing and then a gate into the island park. The grass was yellowed and brittle and strewn with office workers, Starbucks cups and Pret A Manger carrier bags. Most of the benches were similarly occupied but Philip guided Lucia to a seat tucked in a corner and only half decorated by the birds from the trees above.

‘Sit,’ Philip said.

Lucia sat.

‘Talk,’ Philip said.

Lucia was silent.

Philip glanced warily at the bird muck. He brushed a palm over the cleanest section of the seat and then checked his hand. He lowered himself close to Lucia. ‘Talk,’ he said again.

Lucia could feel Philip’s leg against her own. His bony shoulder pressed against hers. She shuffled to her right until the arm of the bench poked against her ribs but with a glance at the mess on the bench beside him Philip followed. Lucia thought of Walter and tensed so she would not shudder. She turned her face away and found herself watching a man in a bedraggled black suit sharing crusts of bread with an equally unkempt pigeon. He threw one then ate one, then ate another and threw another.

‘It’s not me, Philip. I thought it was but it isn’t.’

‘What isn’t you? Which bit?’

‘All of it. The people. The work. The choices.’

Philip laughed a weary laugh. ‘That’s life, Lucia. That’s how it is everywhere, with everything. It’s not just the police force.’

Lucia shook her head. She sighed and looked up and found herself suddenly irritated by the clouds above. It was hot still, stifling, and the storm that threatened was like a sneeze that would not come. It was all suspense, Lucia thought. All suspense and no release.

‘No,’ she said. ‘It’s more than that. I was wrong. About Samuel. About the school, about the headmaster. I think I was wrong.’

‘You weren’t wrong.’

‘I think perhaps I was.’

‘You weren’t,’ Philip said, a conviction in his voice that Lucia craved but no longer felt.

‘How would you know, Philip?’ Lucia stood. She paced. ‘All you know is what I told you.’

Philip nodded. ‘That’s right.’

‘So did it occur to you that I might have left something out? That I might only have told you the evidence that supported the case I was trying to make?’

‘Must I keep reminding you, Lucia? I’m a barrister. Of course it occurred to me.’

‘Well then. Exactly. So I was wrong. You don’t know that I wasn’t wrong.’

Philip got up. He flicked a hand across his trouser leg, picked at a speck that was not there. ‘You did what we all have to do, Lucia. In any walk of life. Faced with a dilemma, we have to consider the evidence and make a judgement. I know you weren’t wrong because I trust your judgement. Perhaps not in novels but in general I trust your judgement.’

With a gesture, Lucia batted away Philip’s attempt at humour. ‘You shouldn’t,’ she said. She continued pacing.

‘Lucia. I know you. You’re only questioning yourself now because it’s easier to believe you were wrong than to ignore the fact that you were right.’