The Child Who by Simon Lelic Page B

teacher gave a twitch that was almost a wink ‘ – then, as I say, I would perhaps have some insight that you might find instructive. He is not, I am sure, the most cooperative of clients.’
    Leo resisted his instinct to agree. ‘I’m still not sure I follow. I don’t want to sound ungrateful but what insight could you offer?’
    ‘We taught him,’ the head teacher said. Then, when Leo began to dissent, ‘Not most recently, I concede. But he was here, for about as long as the boy has spent anywhere.’
    ‘Here? But . . .’ But this was his daughter’s school. It was a good school. A state school but as reputable a state school as a parent could hope for. Leo shook his head. ‘When?’
    ‘He started his secondary education here. We excluded him after a term. This is all on the assumption, of course, that we are indeed talking about the same boy.’ The head teacher studied Leo. She gave him seconds to respond. ‘But you will have access to the boy’s records,’ she said when Leo did not. ‘You will be able to confirm the precise dates, I’m sure.’
    Ellie would have known him. No, not necessarily. It was a big school, one of the biggest in the county. She will have seen him, though. She will have passed him, brushed against him. He will have seen her .
    ‘Did you teach him?’ Leo said. ‘Why was he expelled?’
    ‘I am denied, in my role, the pleasures of classroom contact.’ The head teacher twitched her lipstick. ‘But certainly I had dealings with the boy. He was, shall we say, a regular visitor to my office.’
    ‘He caused trouble?’
    ‘When he was present, Mr Curtice, yes, he certainly did. We’d heard about his reputation before he started here so we thought we were prepared. But when a child will simply not allow himself to be taught, there is very little that we can do.’
    ‘Not allow himself . . . What do you mean?’
    ‘I mean he was abusive, disruptive, entirely lacking in deference. A real attention seeker. Our strategy was reduced to restricting the impact his presence would have on the children around him.’
    ‘He was isolated?’
    ‘He isolated himself. His attendance record was woeful, as I say. When he was present, he may as well not have been.’ The head teacher shook her head and her hair, sprayed rigid, moved not a jot. ‘Such anger. Such visceral, unaccountable rage. He attacked a teacher, Mr Curtice. That’s why, in the end, he was excluded. An unprovoked attack, by all accounts but the boy’s.’
    Leo frowned again, waited for Ms Bridgwater to continue.
    ‘The teacher, Miss Dix: she asked him to read aloud. Just a simple passage from a text the class was studying. The boy was subdued that day, which for him amounted to his best behaviour, and poor Josie sensed an opportunity to involve him.’ The head teacher made a face, like really her colleague should have known better. ‘She asked, gently, and the boy refused. She persisted and the boy insulted her. He called her an s-l-u-t, Mr Curtice. Josie was admirably restrained in her response – far more restrained than I would have been, I assure you – but when she approached the boy’s desk and set an open book in front of him, the boy hurled it aside and flung himself at Josie’s throat. He throttled her – or would have, had the other boys in the class not restrained him.’
    ‘So he was excluded?’
    ‘He was excluded.’
    ‘Permanently?’
    ‘Permanently.’
    ‘But after a term, you say? A single term. Is that, I don’t know. Is that not unusual?’
    ‘Ordinarily perhaps but not given the boy’s history. And we were warned about him, as I say. We expected trouble. We were prepared, all along, to take extreme measures should they be called for.’
    ‘Well,’ said Leo, ‘clearly. But expulsion, I’d always assumed, is a last resort. Isn’t there a process? A gradual escalation in sanctions?’
    ‘Sanctions escalate in line with the behaviour that warrants them. It was not his first offence, by