Matt Whyman - The Savages

As he headed for the classroom, Ivan spotted his sister approaching. The pair made eye contact, which was about as friendly as they could be at school. It was only as he passed that Sasha glanced over her shoulder with some concern.

‘What’s he up to?’ she muttered to her friends. ‘I know that look.’

By the time the bell rang again, Ivan was waiting for his classmates to file in. They found him standing at the teacher’s desk, as if preparing to take the lesson. With his schoolbag open at his feet, he was holding an object in his hands that some of them had seen at magic shows.

‘It’s a finger guillotine,’ he announced, as people took to their seats. ‘With a difference.’

‘Here we go,’ whispered one girl to her friend.

Nobody thought that Ivan was dangerous. They just considered him to be a bit different. He wasn’t a popular boy, but nor did he easily attract enemies. If anything, most people just kept a little distance from him. On this occasion, however, Ivan had a captive audience. When no pupil accepted his invitation to volunteer, he shrugged and announced that he would perform the stunt himself.

‘Now, this could be bloody,’ he said, ignoring the groans and the sound of exercise books being opened in readiness for the teacher. Ivan was disappointed to see that only a few of his classmates were paying any attention at all. Most were pretending not to notice. With the guillotine placed on the desk, he stood behind it and slipped his index finger through the hole. ‘Observe closely,’ he announced, and raised the handle that lifted the blade. With one final glance at the class, where he was pleased to see a few more eyes on him, he squeezed his eyes shut and prepared to slam down the blade. He held his breath, counted to three in his mind, and then opened his eyes with a start when a voice commanded him to stop what he was doing right away.

‘Ivan, this is no time for tricks!’ his teacher barked, a man with a mouth that everyone said looked too large for his face. ‘Sit down right away!’

The boy glanced across at the rest of the class. Now everyone was looking at him.

‘But it isn’t a trick,’ he grumbled, and reluctantly withdrew his finger from the guillotine.

The device was to make a second appearance later that day, at the back of the school bus home. According to those who witnessed the episode, Ivan was asked to move from his seat. It wasn’t a threat, by all accounts. It’s just that’s where the Year 10 boys liked to gather. Most kids in Year 7 would’ve moved without question. Instead, Ivan showed some reluctance, and that’s when things turned nasty.

‘Am I going to have to make you move?’ growled a redheaded boy called Thomas, who had come to accept being called Ginger Tom by everyone including his teachers.

‘You can try,’ said Ivan, matter-of-factly, ‘but you’ll regret it.’

Ginger Tom looked back at his mates. He wasn’t a bad lad at all. It’s just he’d got himself into a position where he couldn’t back down. Turning back to Ivan, he saw a way that might persuade the boy to shift that didn’t involve physical force.

‘Let me help you.’ Snatching Ivan’s bag, before he could be stopped, Tom opened it up and peered inside. ‘What’s this?’ he asked, on spotting the little guillotine in among the school books.

‘Don’t play with that!’ Ivan lunged at it, but Ginger Tom was too quick for him. He jerked it away and then held it aloft, grinning.

‘There’s only one magic trick you need to perform,’ he said. ‘And that’s a disappearing act. Now give me the seat and you can have it back.’

Ivan held his gaze for a moment.

‘It isn’t a magic trick,’ he said.

‘Oh right,’ said Ginger Tom. ‘It’s for real, is it?

‘Yep.’

By now, Ginger Tom’s mates were pressing around him for a closer look.

‘Stick your finger in it,’ someone suggested. ‘Give it a go, Tom.’

Grinning, Tom rested the guillotine on top of the seat rest in front of Ivan and inserted a digit.

‘I wouldn’t do that,’ said Ivan, who watched with interest nonetheless.

‘Or what? You’ll look like a liar?’

Returning his attention to the guillotine, Tom lifted the blade. A phone camera appeared over his shoulder, fired up to film the event.

‘ Do it, Ginger Tom. Do it! ’

He glanced at Ivan one more time, but didn’t look so gleeful any more. Tom’s attention moved back to the guillotine, with calls of encouragement still filling in his ears. One last look at the Savage boy was enough to change his mind. It was the gleam in his eye, coupled with the faint trace of a smile, that told Ginger Tom this wasn’t a good idea at all. Snatching his finger from the guillotine, much to the disappointment of the crowd, he quickly reached inside his school jacket and produced a pencil. Without a word, he jabbed it into the slot and slammed the handle down.

The blade cut through the pencil as if it was made from butter. In the brief moment it took for the sharp end to drop to the floor of the bus, every single witness had fallen silent.

When his face went on to make the newspapers, Vernon English didn’t seem like the kind of person a company would hire as a private investigator. With his soft leather cap, worn at an angle, his flattened nose and stubbly, hangdog chops, he looked more like a boxing trainer ready to throw in the towel.

‘Could passengers move along the aisle, please? We can’t close the doors if people are pressing against them.’

Vernon was cheap, however, which made him attractive to a struggling organisation at the mercy of a hostile takeover. Just then, the man responsible for moving in on the company was travelling to work by tube. Vernon could just about see him across the crowded carriage. When the company’s boss had first called Vernon’s office, which wasn’t an office at all but the mobile phone in his pocket, the man sounded desperate. Titus Savage is set to pounce on us, is what he told the private investigator. Everyone knows he’s unconventional in the way he does business. We need to prove he’s actually breaking laws if we stand any chance of survival. Get the dirt, Mr English. Do whatever it takes so we can persuade the man to prey elsewhere.

‘The gentleman in the cap and quilted bodywarmer. Will you please find some space or step off and wait for the next train. There’s one right behind.’

It took a moment for Vernon to realise that the conductor on the Tannoy was addressing him directly. He glanced around. Everyone was looking in his direction. Much to their annoyance, he used his considerable weight to push himself further into the carriage.

‘Sorry,’ he grumbled, as the doors finally closed. ‘Sorry, is that your foot?’

There was no way that Vernon was going to lose sight of Titus Savage. He’d been on the case for just a short time, but already there had been a suspect exchange in a back alley. Vernon had noted it all from his favourite observation post, which was on a high stool facing out of a coffee shop with a grande latte in one hand and crumbs from an almond croissant all down his front. Now he had chosen to follow Savage home. It was important that he built a complete picture of the man, not just at work but also at play. As the tube pulled away, Vernon reached up from the throng to grab the rail. Beside him, level with his armpit, a young woman closed her eyes, crinkled her nose and evidently tried to picture herself in her special place. Vernon pretended not to notice her. He did the very same with the bald man in the silk scarf further down the carriage. Titus was standing over a couple in matching anoraks who were consulting a map of London. He too was holding onto the rail, and seemed totally lost in thought. The private investigator paid him no more than a cursory glance. Titus lived some way out from the city, and would be travelling eight more stops. Until then, Vernon assured himself, while gazing at an advert for laxatives, his target wasn’t going anywhere.