Death of a Teacher (8 page)

She tried to cry out in anger, but another kick landed on the back of her head and forced her face into the mud. She felt the pressure on her nose and the dirt ramming into her left eyeball. Her right eye was shut but she opened it for the last time as her head was jerked backwards.

She was pulled by what seemed like a hundred little claws and then thrown forward. She knew immediately she had landed face down on the mattress.

Suddenly she writhed, raising her head half an inch. Through her battered and stinging left eye she saw the little hand and the flash of the knife. Then she lost consciousness.  

O
n Sunday morning at six o’clock the phone rang in Ro’s cottage.

‘There’s been a murder, Ro.’ Suddenly she was wide awake.

‘Sergeant? Where? Who was it?’

‘A woman called Brenda Hodgson. Teaches at St Mungo’s. Body’s in a heck of a state. Knife wounds. You need to get into work. There could be panic about this. You were there at St Mungo’s yesterday morning, weren’t you? Some vandalism thing? Well, forget about that now. We’re going to need you to visit the head teacher and some of the key staff. This is one occasion when a PCSO could actually be useful.’

Shock had a funny effect on people, Ro thought. Sergeant Liddle had betrayed his feelings about the role of the PCSOs, but this wasn’t the moment for her to react.

‘Anyway,’ the sergeant went on, ‘Jed Jackson’s been here since the early hours when some revellers found the body. He suggested I call you. He seems to think you could be some help. Let’s see if you can do anything. Get over to the station now.’

Suzy Spencer and Robert Clark had gone to church early that morning without hearing the news. At the end of the service the vicar came up to Suzy.

‘Molly goes to St Mungo’s in Pelliter, doesn’t she? Something dreadful has happened to one of the teachers there. The rector in Uplands has been there most of the night and called me this morning. You’ll want to check it out and speak to Molly.’

Suzy and Robert hurried home and put on Radio Cumbria. Brenda Hodgson’s body had been found at two o’clock in the morning and reporters were already at the scene. It was a big story already making national news. The usual crimes of a Saturday night were nothing compared with the brutal knifing and mutilation of a blameless middle-aged schoolteacher.

Upstairs, where the girls were sharing a bedroom, all was suspiciously 
quiet. There was a TV there too. Suzy raced up but it was too late. Molly and Becky were sitting on the bed, pale-faced, hunched over Molly’s mobile phone, the TV news in the background.

‘So you’ve heard about Miss Hodgson?’ Suzy asked.

‘Oh, Mummy!’ Molly began to cry uncontrollably and Suzy threw herself on the bed between the two girls. Molly plunged her head on to Suzy’s shoulder and grabbed her arm.

‘I didn’t like Podgy Hodgson,’ Molly sobbed. ‘No one did. But getting murdered is horrible.’

‘We got a text about half an hour ago while you were at church,’ Becky explained. ‘Since then everybody’s been texting everyone else.’

Suzy hugged them both to her. ‘I’ll go and make some hot chocolate for you. Don’t watch any more TV or read any more texts. Come downstairs.’

Left behind on the bed, Molly started to shake. Becky held her arm in a fierce grip. ‘No one knows about us. We mustn’t say anything….’

The two girls stared at each other. Becky’s eyes looked huge and Molly felt as if she was falling into them.

Philip and Judith Dixon were enjoying breakfast in bed. Becky’s friendship with Molly Spencer was a real boon, Judith thought. It gave them a
well-earned
break when they could talk about things like the Dodsworth House scholarship. She knew it was on Phil’s mind – he had gone out for a long walk the night before to think about it. Judith was desperate for Becky to go to a nice private school. She had always worried that Becky might make
unsuitable
friends, like her mother had done. Judith had never had any illusions about Samantha’s attraction to a wild lifestyle. But she’d be damned if Becky went the same way. But then Samantha had always been a handful – spoilt by her soft-hearted father from an early age because he thought she was so ‘creative’.

Judith had seen to it that Becky was never spoilt like Samantha. And in any case, Becky was stronger and smarter than Sam had been. Becky had
inherited
Sam’s artiness, but also Judith’s common sense. And whoever Becky’s father had been, Judith recognized that he had given her granddaughter a sharp, practical intelligence, as well as her thick dark hair and sparkling eyes. Becky wasn’t arty-farty and pretentious like Samantha. Judith had loved her daughter in her way, of course. But Sam had always irritated the heck out of her, and since their first argument, Judith had always suspected and feared the worst for her.

Phil was putting the tea tray on the dressing-table. ‘Shall we put the radio on?’ he asked. It was such a treat not to be woken by the alarm at 6.30 in the morning that the radio seemed intrusive. This was one of the few Sundays 
when Phil had decided not to go to church and, after all, they were supposed to be having a lie-in.

‘Oh, let’s hear the nine o’clock news,’ Judith said. ‘We might as well.’

The first headline was Brenda Hodgson’s brutal murder.

At the same time, in one of the new detached houses in Minster Mews, head teacher Ray Findley was drinking tea with PCSO Ro Watson. He looked tired. He often couldn’t sleep these days, he told Ro. He had spent a large part of the previous night outside, watering the borders. The garden had been Sheila’s hobby before her breakdown. The police team had called round at the house to talk to him at the crack of dawn about Brenda Hodgson’s death. At the sergeant’s request Ro had followed up the police’s questioning with a visit to talk about how the school should respond.

Ro knew all the details. Miss Hodgson’s body had been easy to identify. Her purse with all her personal details was still intact, along with fifty pounds in the inside pocket. So robbery wasn’t the motive, and in that case why would a thief have mutilated the body with a knife? Brenda’s brother, the retired priest Father Peter Hodgson, lived in a decayed but grand Victorian house on Pelliter’s main street.

‘He kept wringing his hands and talking about the dirt,’ Jed Jackson had said. ‘It’s odd how it takes people, the sergeant says.’

But Ray Findley had been surprisingly calm when Ro arrived at his home, though she reminded herself that he’d had a few hours already to absorb the news. Like most people in Pelliter that morning, he had both the TV and radio on, but in the Findleys’ house they were at very low volume.

‘My wife had a breakdown earlier this year,’ the head teacher said. ‘I need to keep anything that could be upsetting away from her. She worked with Brenda Hodgson for quite a few years.’

‘And you did, too. You must both be very upset.’

‘Yes, of course.’ Ray Findley looked surprised that anyone should consider his feelings. ‘But I must admit that I wasn’t close to Brenda. She was a very capable teacher and there were very few problems with her classes. She just got on with it. Do you have any idea yet who could have done this terrible thing?’

‘It’s early days, Mr Findley. And I’m a PCSO so I’m not involved with solving crime. I’m here to ask what you want to do about your school.’

Sometimes people could bridle when PCSOs tried to help, but Ray Findley just looked at her blankly. Ro went on, ‘Our advice is not to do anything dramatic yet. Maybe you could close for a half day or something like that, in her memory, later on.’

Ray Findley nodded. He still stared a little glassily at Ro, but she could see 
that he was beginning to think beyond the walls of his own home and his own problems.

‘Maybe you could get the children together and tell them about Miss Hodgson first thing in the morning. We have a form of words you may like to use. Her own class might need counselling. We can help you with that. And you’ll need someone to teach them.’

‘I’ll speak to Mrs Rudder about all this. I might have to stay at home with my wife.’

‘But it’s your school, Mr Findley. You need to be in control. Look, this is a massive press story too. Journalists will be sniffing around everywhere. There are already TV and radio reporters at the Marshes. I used to work in public relations. I know they’ll be all over you like a rash. You need think about what you want to do.’

Ray Findley nodded slowly.

‘They’ll want you to say something about Miss Hodgson. I’m sure you have protocols about talking to the press, but I doubt the Local Education Authority will be up to speed on this one on a Sunday morning. You need to make sure your staff members aren’t talking to all and sundry, too. There needs to be some leadership. You’re the head teacher.’

‘Yes, that’s quite true.’ A woman’s voice came from behind her. Ro turned to see Sheila Findley standing in the doorway. She was a tall, thin, dark-haired woman. She might once have been slender, but now she was haggard, with a long pale face and heavy shadows under her eyes. She said, ‘Ray, you can’t leave this to Liz Rudder. And you need to contact the Education Authority. The policewoman’s right.’

I’m not a policewoman, Ro thought, but I am right. She turned back to look at the head teacher. He was staring at his wife. ‘Sheila … are you all right?’

‘Yes, I am. Which is more than you can say for poor Brenda Hodgson. It sounds truly awful.’ Sheila Findley pulled up another chair and joined them at the kitchen table. ‘You need to take charge, Ray. As the lady pointed out, it’s your school.’

Callie McFadden was usually woken on Sundays by the kids screaming or someone banging on her bedroom door wanting something. But this time the house was silent when she finally drifted out of sleep. Her mouth was dry and her head ached.

Then she heard the rumble that meant the telly was on in the front room downstairs. But instead of the usual shouts and arguments, there was quiet.

Callie padded down the stairs. Unusually, the living-room door was shut. She pushed it open. She could tell at once that something had happened. Her 
daughter was in her nightdress, with a can of lager in her hand, and her boyfriend was there too. They were both transfixed by the screen. There were no kids around.

‘Hey, Mam, look, Pelliter’s on the telly.’

‘Yeah,’ said the boyfriend, taking a swig from his can. ‘There’s been a murder. In the Marshes. Frigging unbelievable. We’re on the map now.’

‘There’s a TV crew at the bottom of the road, Mam. Jonty’s down there now. You must have heard it on the radio.’

‘No. I haven’t heard it on the radio.’

‘Has no one rung or texted you, Mam?’

‘No, no one has rung or texted me neither.’ Callie sat down heavily, pushing some dirty washing and
Heat
magazines off the only armchair in the room.

Her daughter’s head jerked towards the screen. A snap of Brenda Hodgson on a school trip, with the faces of the children marbled out, stared at them. Brenda looked at them with the sort of forced smile she used on school
occasions
.

‘Miss Hodgson. It’s just been confirmed. Relatives have been informed.’ Callie’s daughter loved TV cop shows and knew all the jargon. ‘Awful, innit? She was your mate, wasn’t she? Fat Miss Hodgson. Brenda Hodgson. I didn’t know her name was Brenda.’

‘We’ll get the details from the net,’ said the boyfriend with relish. ‘The reporter talked about a knife though. My mate texted me about it. He said it were a cat skinner.’

‘Where’s Jonty?’ Callie suddenly jumped up. ‘Where’s he gone?’

‘I told you, Mam: he’s down at the Marshes.’

‘So get off your fat bottom, and go and bring him back here. I don’t want him hanging around down there. It’s not nice. Go on, pronto. Get Jonty.’

Ro’s session with the Findleys had been exhausting, but Jed Jackson had briefed her well. He remembered Miss Hodgson as a teacher and he certainly knew her as one of Pelliter’s fixtures. He’d kept up with the school gossip and knew all about the Findleys and Sheila’s breakdown.

What he didn’t know was that Sheila Findley had lost a baby and that had catapulted her into depression. While her husband was phoning his staff, Sheila Findley had walked Ro around the garden and told her all about it. ‘It started with a miscarriage. I’m on medication for depression. And
astonishingly
it’s working.’

‘Well, it does, you know!’

Mrs Findley had smiled. ‘Until recently I thought I would never come out of it. There was nothing to live for. I thought that expression was a stock 
phrase until I felt it myself. But now, I hope to be teaching again in September. I haven’t told Ray yet. He’s very protective of me. He’s really a very nice man.’

Her eyes met Ro’s. ‘OK, maybe he’s too nice. He’ll tell everyone what a wonderful teacher Brenda Hodgson was. But she was never very good.’ Sheila Findley laughed at Ro’s raised eyebrows. ‘What’s the point of lying? The only good thing about depression is that you don’t give a toss what you say. Poor Brenda was all right – she never caused any trouble. That was the best you could say for her. Liz Rudder is far more subversive. Liz would use Brenda from time to time to make trouble. They were so-called best friends, but Liz has dropped Brenda like a stone lately, or so I hear. Poor Brenda. She idolized Liz. Tell me what really happened to her. I can take it.’

Ro had told her. Already an exaggerated version was going round the pubs and social clubs of Norbridge to whet the appetite for Sunday lunch, dwelling on the knife wounds to the teacher. Why did people enjoy all this so much? Ro wondered. Was it the change to routine and the excitement of it all? Or the joy at still being alive? Or some sort of voyeurism? But there was also a glee which she found hard to understand. It made millions of people relish the gruesome details in books about serial killers. Did big, macho, scary evil take your mind off the real thing in its nasty, petty, most insidious and frequent form?

‘We all need to sing from the same hymn sheet at school,’ Ray Findley said, coming out to join them, suddenly decisive after his phone calls.

‘Yes,’ Sheila Findley said. ‘You should invite someone from the Education Department to come here to discuss what to do. I can make a cold lunch.’

If Ray Findley felt he was in control, that had to be good, Ro thought, and if Sheila was helping him that was even better. She felt she could leave them now.