It would not, Louise decided, be a very good idea to single Simon out in the circumstances, so she did not take him from any of his classes for their talk. But as soon as the buzzer went for break she left her office and went to the playground. She saw Simon, he saw her – and he began to run.
‘Simon?’ At first she did not call loudly, because she did not believe her eyes. Then he glanced over his shoulder, definitely and directly at her face, and went on running. She let out an impressive hoot: ‘Simon! Simon Mason!’
Other children stopped their games and looked, but Simon disappeared behind the school. Miss Shaw, without another word, pushed back through the double doors, strode smartly across the width of the building, and emerged by the biology room. She was just in time to see him ducking round the corner ten metres away, heading straight for her. The shock on his face was comical.
‘No!’ she said, as he began to turn away. ‘A game’s a game, Simon, but if you run off now there will be trouble! Stand still!’
He stopped, gazing at the tarmac at his feet. As Louise approached she noticed how odd and pale he looked, how miserable. He had probably had enough of adults frightening him for one day, she thought.
‘Simon,’ she said, her voice much softer. ‘I only want to talk to you. Things are getting out of hand, aren’t they? I’ve had a chat with Mr Kershaw about yesterday. About David Royle and the sandwiches. We’ve got to do something.’
They were face to face. Simon did not reply, and Louise put a hand out to touch him. She was going to lift his chin. Simon flinched.
‘Come on,’ she said. ‘I’m not going to punish you. I’m not going to rant and rave at you. Tell me about it. What happened with the sandwiches? And the rock?’
She dropped her hand and Simon, seeing this, raised his eyes, not quite up to hers. His face was tortured, as if he was fighting tears. He was, in fact, not sure exactly what he felt. He was in a turmoil. The kindness in her voice confused him most.
But in the end he did not respond to it. His fists clenched, his chin jerked sharply upwards, and he shouted into her startled face.
‘What’s the use of telling you? No one believes me anyway! What’s the point?’
‘Simon, Simon!’ said Louise, but he was unstoppable. His face had reddened, his eyes were wide and wild.
‘All the kids say I killed the gerbil, and Mrs Stacey thinks so now! You heard her! She’s going to expel me when I never did a thing! You pretend to believe me but you think I’m a liar, too! And that Mr Kershaw. I never chucked the rock, it was for self defence! They were going to smack me in!’
Even behind the school, Miss Shaw was acutely aware that they might be overheard. She did not want that, she wanted to protect this boy from himself. She made shushing sounds, she raised her hands to soften him, although she did not try to touch him this time.
‘Well, never mind that now,’ she said. ‘Just calm down a bit. I don’t believe you killed the gerbil, honestly. I—’
‘But you don’t believe that they did, do you? Now they’re going to bash me up, aren’t they? They had a trial!’
‘A trial? Simon, please, stop this now! You’re talking nonsense! No one’s going to beat you up, you silly boy. Who do you think would do it, little David Royle?’
He looked into her face with withering scorn. But his shouting fit had passed. He shook his head.
‘Not David Royle, Anna Royle. Anna and Rebekkah, who do you think? They bully me. They always bully me. I told you, didn’t I?’
The buzzer sounded, and Louise let him go. Around the corner, Anna and Rebekkah just had time to corner him before the next lesson started, and demand to know where he had been the night before. It was a short and vicious meeting.
‘We sentenced you,’ said Anna. There was an odd smile on her lips. ‘We found you guilty and we chose a fitting punishment, and we’re going to give it to you after school tonight, understood?’
Rebekkah also smiled.
‘If you try to get away,’ she said, ‘it will be the worse for you, much worse. This time we’ve told our parents. About the rocks you chucked, and everything.’
‘My dad’s a lawyer,’ Anna added. ‘You know that, don’t you? He says that you’re in trouble, Simon. Deep, deep trouble.’
She pinched him, hard and painfully, to drive the message home.
Linda Mason, Simon’s mother, rang the school at lunch-time to speak to Louise Shaw. She had thought about what she would say for ages, and had been worried that she would make herself look foolish. But Simon had said he was sick, Simon had not wanted to go to school, Simon had said there were some children out to ‘get’ him. What did it all add up to? Very little. But Miss Shaw had seemed a nice woman, sympathetic. Surely she would not mind a little chat about it? It was worth the risk.
Unfortunately, Mrs Stacey also wanted to talk to Louise Shaw, and Louise – knowing this – had left the school at the end of morning classes on the pretext that her car needed looking at. The secretary who answered the phone to Mrs Mason told her this, and asked if she could take a message. Mrs Mason, flustered, said not to bother, she would try later, maybe. It was not important.
She wondered for a few more minutes if she should walk up to St Michael’s, to make sure that Simon was all right. But that was really silly, she decided, he would be furious. Still worrying, she put on the kettle for a cup of tea.
At afternoon break, Louise – quite deliberately – set out to corner David. He was not so fast as Simon, nor yet so canny. Until she had him trapped, he had not even realised that she was after him. She moved him gently round a corner near the rubbish skips, which were out of bounds. He looked longingly towards the noise of playing kids, then gave in. He still had no inkling that the next few minutes might be deadly difficult.
‘Well, David. That was quite a talking to Mrs Stacey gave us this morning, wasn’t it?’
He blinked. It was a typical teacher’s question. What was he supposed to say?
‘About bullying,’ she continued. ‘You’ve been bullied, haven’t you? What do you think?’
The first flickers of panic began to gnaw at him. Had he been bullied? When? What was she referring to?
‘It’s okay,’ he said.
‘What! Being bullied! It’s okay?’
‘I don’t mind,’ he said. ‘Not much. You know.’
He was mumbling, head well down. Anna would kill him when she knew he’d been talking to Loo-roll on his own. She’d told him not to, to avoid her like the plague.
Miss Shaw waited.
‘You have been bullied, haven’t you?’ she asked. ‘You do know what I’m talking about? David?’
She watched in fascination as a slow blush spread up his temples to his ears. He hunched his chin even deeper into his neck.
‘Your sandwiches,’ she said. ‘Did they taste nice, all muddy? That was bullying, surely, wasn’t it? That was the sort of thing Mrs Stacey had in mind. Or did you think she was on about the gerbil?’
Really, thought Louise, she should not be doing this. In its own way, this was bullying, as well. It would not have worked on Anna and Rebekkah because they would have known exactly how to handle it. She was picking on the weakest link.
‘You went into the resources centre, didn’t you?’ she said abruptly. ‘Were you with Anna and Rebekkah, or did you go alone?’
His head jerked up.
‘No!’
His eyes were bright with terror. His teeth snapped shut on anything else he might let out. After a second or two, he shook his head.
‘We never did,’ he said. ‘We never went in there. You ask Anna, Miss. You ask Rebekkah. It was Simon’s fault, not ours, it was Simon. You ask Anna and Rebekkah.’
Louise could not go on. Whatever part poor David might have played, he was not the culprit, anyone could see that. Oddly, he reminded her of Simon.
‘Oh, run along now, David. Playtime will be over soon. Run along and meet your friends.’
He did not run, he walked. Another bit of fear and misery I’ve spread, thought Louise sadly. She, in her turn, needed to find a friend. Perhaps Brian would have a sensible opinion.
As it turned out, Louise did not speak to Brian until after she had made her mind up, and done what she had decided would be best. She had also had a brief confrontation with Mrs Stacey, which had been unpleasant. The headteacher had asked her coldly if she had come to terms yet with the fact that Simon Mason was a bully, and what punishment she had in mind for him. Louise had bitten her lip, and said the situation was at the forefront of her mind.
She went to the playing fields during the last part of the afternoon, tracking Brian down by the garish blueness of his tracksuit. Free from duty for the moment, he was doing kick-ups with a ball. He raised his eyebrows at her.
‘Seventy-eight, seventy-nine, eighty!’ He let the ball drop to the grass. ‘I could have done a hundred if you hadn’t interfered!’
‘Oh shut up,’ she said. ‘This is serious.’
‘Okay, if you say so. Look, I’ve got to go and make some phone calls in a minute, I was putting it off.’
Louise blew air between her lips.
‘I’ve just made one,’ she said. ‘I’ve got a parent coming after school. A steaming one.’
‘Mrs Mason?’
‘Worse. Anna and David Royle’s mother. She’ll probably bring Rebekkah Tanner’s, too. And a lawyer, from the way she went on on the phone.’
Brian picked the ball up in one large hand, and tucked it underneath his arm. He began to walk towards the school.
‘Sounds bad. Why did she phone you? Have the kids been complaining about dear Simon?’
‘You don’t listen. I phoned her, I said. I phoned her about bullying. I said it was notoriously difficult to pin down, but I was concerned about something that was happening.’
‘Hold on. What are you suggesting? Surely not her two precious kids…? Phew!’
Louise kicked a clod of earth, spattering mud on her shoe and tights.
‘I didn’t get the chance. She didn’t exactly hit the roof, but her voice was like acid. She said she knew all about the bullying, and that it had gone much too far already. Her children had begged her not to make a fuss about it, they’d been absolutely noble. Those were her actual words. But she was their mother, and it was time to override them. She’s coming after school. As close to four o’clock as she can make it.’
They had reached the edge of the grass, and stopped for a moment before stepping on to the tarmac.
‘Oh well,’ said Brian. ‘Is it such a bad thing, in the end? If she hadn’t decided to do something concrete Beryl Stacey would have done quite soon, I guess. And like it or not, if little Simon keeps using stones and things… Louise, it could end up very serious.’
‘It’s not him,’ she replied. ‘I’ve spoken to him, Brian, and I’ve spoken to David Royle. You can mock me if you like, but I’m certain. They killed the gerbil, too. The Royles and Rebekkah. At least, they left the cover off the tank.’
‘Ouch,’ said Brian. ‘And Mrs Royle’s on her way, is she? To hear you say that. Ouch.’
‘You don’t believe me, do you?’
He bounced the ball, once, on the hard surface of the playground.
‘I’m not the problem, am I?’ he said. ‘Have you got proof?’
‘No,’ said Louise Shaw.