Deadly Lessons. David Russell W.

      I walked in and, as a reflex habit checked my mailbox for messages. There were four from parents informing me they were keeping their kids at home for the day. I couldn’t blame them. Today was going to suck.

      “Good morning, Winston,” said Fiona, the school’s matronly head secretary and unofficial surrogate grandmother to students and staff.

      “Good morning,” I returned glumly. “How are you doing?”

      “I’m okay. I have to be. Students will be in here all day. How about you?”

      “I’m all right. This is going to be pretty horrible, I’m betting.”

      “Yes. It will. You didn’t teach her?” It wasn’t really a question. Like most public schools, there was always one secretary who held the fabric of the institution together and knew what was happening. Fiona was ours. She would already have known not only that I hadn’t taught Tricia, but also everyone who had. Those teachers would get special acknowledgment from Fiona when or if they arrived.

      “No,” I replied, “I didn’t.”

      “Lovely girl. Good family. Her mother is on the parent advisory council. She’s . . . she was a terrific young lady.” Fiona did her stoic best to maintain her always present poise.

      “That’s what I hear.”

      “Staff meeting’s in the library,” Fiona said, snapping back to attention.

      “Thanks,” I said, gathering the stash of messages, memos and assorted school paperwork and turning for the door.

      The staff assembled in the library was not the normal, chipper group of colleagues who traded bullshit, gossip and grievances in the lounge. You would think a group of people who work with teenagers day in and day out would be used to the idea that at some point something bad would happen to one of them. The school had not escaped its share of tragedy in the past. There had been students killed in car crashes, and one or two had suffered an untimely end due to illness. But from the muffled conversations around the room, I gathered that no J. Mac kid had been killed during the school year for many years.

      I looked around the room for Carl but didn’t see him. Within a few minutes of my arrival, nearly the entire faculty and support staff were gathered, and still there was no sign of my colleague-turned-client. I was about to slip out the door to phone him at home when Don McFadden, Sir John A. Macdonald’s bland and generally considered inept principal, arrived to start the meeting. There was no effort to arrange tables in the room for people to sit in any sort of formal fashion. It was enough just to give Don attention for a few moments so he could begin the proceedings.

      “Good morning,” Don began. “Thank you everyone for coming in early this morning. This is one of those things they don’t prepare you for in principal school.” Murmurs of acknowledgment emanated from the gathered staff. As Don resumed speaking, I looked up with some relief to see Carl slip quietly into the library. He took a seat on an easy chair next to the rotating rack of pulp fiction by the window.

      “As you know, I’ve assembled us here this morning to discuss some tragic news that was given to me last night.” Don paused. I can’t say I was a fan of my new boss, but at this moment at least, he seemed much more human than he had since I’d first met him during my interview. “By now, you are all aware one of our Grade Twelve students, Tricia Bellamy, was killed yesterday. There is no easy way for me to say this, so I’m just going to come right out and say it. According to the police, Tricia was murdered.”

      The expected gasps, murmurs and sounds of disbelief flowed out of the collected staff. A slight buzz travelled around the room as some teachers had their speculations confirmed while others reacted with disbelief that one of our own could have found her end through murder. Don raised his hands to the staff to regain the room’s attention, while I glanced over to Carl to gauge his reaction. He caught my eye, and in his I detected genuine sadness.

      “People, please,” Don continued, “students will be here shortly, and I really want to get through this.” The buzz of quiet conversations began to diminish as people returned their focus to the principal.

      “Don, what happened?” asked George Kyle, the head of the math department.

      “I don’t have a whole lot of information for you. And that’s important, because there will be lots of speculation among the kids, and I don’t want to start any kind of false rumours floating around out there.”

      “What do you know?” came a second question. This one came from Carl.

      Don paused and looked slowly and carefully at Carl for a moment before responding. “The police contacted me at home about nine last night. Tricia’s body was found in the middle of a soccer field at a park close to her home. A neighbour walking her dog caught sight of her and called the police. She . . . umm . . . she had her student card and driver’s licence with her, so . . . identification was made very quickly. The police got in touch with me only about five or ten minutes after the body was found.”

      A teacher towards the back of the room was no longer able to contain herself and broke down in tears. She was quickly comforted by colleagues around her, plunging the room into an uncomfortable silence. I eventually broke it.

      “Don,” I asked, perhaps a bit too clinically, “do we know how she was killed?”

      “Yes. We do. And we should be as clear as we possibly can when students ask, without traumatizing them any more than absolutely necessary.” He paused a moment to check the notes on paper he held in his slightly quaking hands. “The coroner’s preliminary examination indicates the cause of death was strangulation.”

      “Oh, God,” came the voice of another teacher who couldn’t contain her emotions and joined the first teacher in tears.

      “And, because it is likely to come up from scared students, there is, as yet, no indication of . . . umm . . . . sexual assault,” he continued.

      “At least she didn’t suffer that,” one of the school’s senior teachers of home economics added to the discussion.

      “Have the police made any arrests?” I pressed further, trying to focus the conversation away from details of the crime.

      “No,” Don replied. In that moment, for a very brief second, Don flashed a glance towards Carl. The look was so fleeting, I wondered if I had imagined it. “They have not arrested anyone. But, from what I have been told, they do not believe this was the act of a random killer. They do have suspects.”

      “It’s not anyone at the school, is it?” one of the counsellors asked.

      Don left an uncomfortable pause, seemingly unsure of how to respond. “I’m afraid I can’t really say at the moment,” he finally managed.

      “What?” Christine from the English department demanded. “What the hell does that mean? Are you saying the police think Tricia was murdered by someone at the school?”

      “I’m not saying anything like that,” Don countered. “I’m saying the police have instructed me not to say anything at all about suspects. That’s all I can tell you.”

      “Don,” Christine protested further, “if there is a student in the school who may be dangerous to other students or to ourselves, we deserve to know. How am I supposed to teach my classes when I’m worrying about one of my kids being a killer?”

      Similar comments of outrage followed Christine’s. “People,” Don cried out. “People, please! Listen to me.” The room quieted down again, and he continued slowly. “I don’t have any reason to believe that one of our students is a threat to anyone in the building. The police do not believe this is a random act. They will be here today. They will likely conduct interviews with all of Tricia’s teachers.” This time it was unmistakable, as Don shot another furtive glance towards Carl. “They will also probably be talking to her friends. So if a police officer comes to your door and wants to speak to anyone, please, just cooperate.”

      No