It appears that Mrs Bodega does not entirely agree with that. She fixes me with a very quizzical stare which lasts rather too long. I would look elsewhere except that that ghastly Mr Plummer also seems to be looking at me with considerable distaste as well. This awkward moment lasts what feels like at least half a minute before Mrs Bodega eventually raises her eyes to the ceiling and breathes loudly before rising from her chair. She comes right up in front of me and fixes me with a very menacing stare.

​

She hisses, “I do believe, Harris, that you may be overlooking some of the more pertinent facts surrounding what happened yesterday.”

​

I open my mouth to protest but she silences me with a wave of the hand.

​

“You cycled out of the school gates, that much is true. You then took a right up to the crossroads. So far, we’re on the same page.”

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She turns away momentarily then swings back.

​

“They tell me you were singing at the time. Why?”

​

I’m quite taken aback. What has that got to do with anything?

​​

“Well,” I stammer, “I’m a music teacher. I appreciate the great classics, and I feel that they bring a certain joy to the occasion.”

​​

I have the distinct impression that adding in my current state of euphoria at the prospect of starting a new chapter of life together with Isabel may not be the best direction to take right now. I’m spared anything further by a new question from Mrs Bodega.

​

“And could you explain why this should have been such a distraction that you did not notice the old lady at the side of the crossroads?”

​

“You can’t just sing music,” I start, explaining patiently as I do to the more culturally devoid of my pupils. “You have to draw in the music and make an active attempt to express it inside yourself, for yourself. And I should explain that was very much the case here since I was performing a particularly intense piece from, ‘Tosca’– "

​

“Shut up!” she screams out of nowhere, losing her temper completely and in my view at least, quite inexplicably. “I couldn’t care less if you were singing, ‘Tosca’ or on your way to bloody Tesco’s!”

​

Tesco’s? Oh for goodness’ sake. I’m very much a Waitrose man myself. Or at least Marks and Spencer. You certainly shouldn’t expect to find me ferreting around in the likes of Tesco.

I’m not left with a lot of time to reflect on my shopping preferences.

​

“You, you clueless wonder, cycled up to the crossroads and promptly stuck out your arm, literally punching a senior citizen in the face! Since you had knocked her to the ground, she dropped the lead she had been holding which was attached to her pet bulldog. For whatever reason – I’m not quite sure at the moment – she was one of those people who take their dogs out on these little wheeled skateboard things. Seems kind of stupid to me but regardless, the dog immediately rolled away, down York Gardens.

​

“In the meantime, you somehow failed to notice the existence and hence departure of the dog although at least you did cotton on to the fact that there was an old lady lying on the ground in front of you. This should have been some sort of relief, but it seems that it prompted you to try to administer something presumably intended to be first aid.”

​

“I believed she was having a heart attack,” I explain.

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“Oh you did, did you? I suppose it never occurred to you that having been punched in the face and knocked to the ground, and having lost her precious dog, she might have been a shade perturbed and breathing heavily?”

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“She was passed out.” I state emphatically. “I had to administer chronic pulmonary revival.”

​

“CPR is cardiopulmonary resuscitation, you moron!” she glares. “What’s more, you don’t normally administer it – or attempt to administer it – when someone is still fully conscious! She wasn’t passed out, as you claim, until you shoved her back onto the ground and started pounding her upper chest. On the right side where the heart isn’t even located!”

​

That might explain why she didn’t seem to revive much at the time, I suppose.

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“So after beating her up and unfortunately losing much of her upper body clothing, you then decided to, as you put it, administer the kiss of life. Which presumably means that you thought you were resuscitating her by blowing air into her mouth while holding her nose shut?”

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“I do believe so, yes,” I state in slightly downbeat manner. I don’t think I like where this is going.

​

“Well she certainly recovered consciousness. After a good while of what most onlookers thought equated to you trying to suffocate her with a French kiss, it seems that one of your fingers slipped some way up her nostril. Given that you had consumed a ham and mustard sandwich for lunch and, I assume, forgotten to wash your hands subsequently, she sneezed violently. This must have reversed the process of you sticking your tongue into her mouth because hers appeared in yours, just as your teeth clamped shut. At least the ensuing pain made sure that she woke up.”

​

Mrs Bodega stops for a moment to pierce me with an increasingly malign stare. The woman certainly knows how to intimidate. Images of Isabel’s smile are still sustaining me although keeping love on top of everything is proving a little harder to manage than I had been imagining earlier today.

​

“In the meantime, and a minor detail which you omitted to mention earlier, the dog had set off on its way down York Gardens. Reaching the end of the road, it quickly crossed Hotwell Road, accelerating all the way until it reached the edge of the Cheddar Gorge.”

​

Oh dear. I do know about this aspect of the story, but I don’t need it spelled out for me. Cheddar Gorge, with its majestic sides and the Avon River running through it have always been a dear part of the mystic welcome which Bristol extends. I feel as if there is something almost eternally special there which sets my mind at ease when I see or think of it. Nothing has ever changed that since first I saw it.

​

At least, not until yesterday.

​

“It seems that the speed of the dog and its board was far too great for them to stop at the edge of the gorge, and they went straight over. That you were directly responsible for the inevitable demise of the dog was bad enough. Given how most of reality seems to flow by your existence though, I’d like to remind you of what happened next.

​

“The dog descended the hundred or so metres down to the bottom of the gorge. At that point, a small river cruise boat was passing, on which a reception was being held with drinks and a buffet of refreshments, notably including a hot dog stand. Whether ironically or not, the dog crashed into that stand, splitting it into two and spraying the ensemble in pork sausages, not least I understand, across the vegan counter.”

​

I suppose it’s a vaguely amusing fact although I can’t for the life of me imagine how she would know that.

​

“Rather more importantly, the other half of the stand contained the cooking fuel and heating elements which fell from the upper deck onto the outer engine deck below and ignited the main fuel pipe. Thankfully, the resulting explosion somehow channelled itself downwards and so nobody was caught in it. But it did blow a hole in the bottom of the boat which sank in about three minutes flat.”

​

That was a shade unfortunate, yes, but I daresay somebody’s insurance will cover it. It’s not as though anybody died in the end. I don’t suppose the police would have let me go so quickly if that had been the case.

​

Mrs Bodega seems to be challenging me to reply but I don’t respond. I have a feeling that there’s more to come.

​

“Do you know why Mr Plummer is here, Harris?” she asks. It’s not quite what I was expecting.

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“I suppose this is a matter of some concern to the Governors,” I reply. That would make sense.

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“Oh very much so,” she starts with a sinister air. “Something you may not have gathered – and you’re pretty good at missing out on relevant details – is that the cruise boat had been hired by the Board of Governors of this school for a social evening event.”

​

Oh dear. I admit that I had not quite taken that detail on board. It would explain how come Mrs Bodega is so well-informed as to what happened on the boat, but this certainly is not looking too good.

​

“It didn’t help matters much that the woman who swam to the shore naked, along with the captain, with whom she’d been making love in his private cabin at the time of the explosion, happened to be the wife of the Deputy Chief Governor either.”

​

I cough markedly. I really don’t see how I can be blamed for this element, but it is a rather startling revelation. If only people would behave themselves in a decent fashion. I really can’t imagine Isabel or myself ever even dreaming of carrying on in such a way.

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“Exactly,” Mrs Bodega adds, cutting into my thoughts with the icy touch of a razor-sharp knife.

​

She walks away from me and returns behind her desk. She picks up a pile of newspapers and looks at the cover of the first.

​

“It seems that a combination of violence, sex, exploding boats and dogs on skateboards falling out of the sky, all stemming from what is supposed to be a respectable, private school, does not escape the attention of the local press. In fact, given the lack of too much else happening right now in the world, it hasn’t escaped the attention of the national press either. I haven’t seen the American newspapers yet but given how much the British press has been enjoying the event, I would not be entirely surprised if this becomes an equally entertaining distraction from whatever the United States Congress happens to be debating at the moment.”

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She starts to read through the headlines.

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“It’s Raining Pratts and Dogs.”

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“OAP-dophile in Horrific Gran Bang Incident.”

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“That’s One Hot Dog!”

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“Bristol’s Poshest School Dogged by Disaster.”

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“Snogs, Dogs and a Bit of Pooch-ini!”

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She pauses and looks straight at me.

​

“The journalistic corps may find this very entertaining, and I understand that one of the main reasons why the police did not press charges was that the officers detaining you were finding it too hard to stop laughing in order to do so.

​

“However, the Board of Governors, represented by Mr Plummer here, and I do not find this quite such a cause for hilarity.”