It was wonderful for teaching Macbeth – especially when blood-curdling screams came unexpectedly from the corner of the room.

 

I was very involved in the Students’ Christian Association and ran a fund-raising activity for them. One afternoon, I locked my tape recorder as well as the money from the fundraising into my back room. There was about R400.00 in cash (R26,000.00 or $17,000 in today’s money.) And then I locked the door of my classroom.

 

When I got into my classroom the next morning, it took me a few moments to realise something was wrong. At first I noticed a handful of rubber bands strewn across my desk, and I saw that the drawers were open. Then I realised that the storeroom behind me was standing open as well. To my horror, my tape recorder and all of the cash was gone. I hurried down to the office to report it, and discovered consternation there as well, as someone had been in the offices during the night, and things were missing. There was no sign of a break-in, so it meant that someone had master keys.

 

The Headmaster, Jimmy Geddes, was the best boss I ever had. He immediately called in the police. Before they agreed to start investigations, they required that he lay a formal charge. Then investigations began. The headmaster called in the two men who lived on the property and asked them if they had seen anything. One of them said that he had come up to collect some milk from the staffroom, and had seen two boys walking around the property. He did not know their names, but he knew they had been in the school the previous year. So we found the school magazine for the previous year and he looked through the photographs, and identified two boys. It was quite a remarkable piece of work.

 

As news of the burglary spread through the staffroom, the history teacher exclaimed, “Do you remember last November that I came into the staffroom waving the exam papers of these two boys in the air and saying: ‘These boys must have cheated – there’s no way they could get these marks in my exam. They must have seen the exam paper.’ Now I know that they must have had master keys and gone into my storeroom.”

 

I went on with my day’s work, and then went home. That night I went out on a date, an returned home at about 11 pm. I had no sooner walked in the door than the phone rang, and a woman’s voice said, “You will find your tape recorder at the front door,” and immediately hung up. I went to the front door and there it was. But the cash was not there. I waited a while, and the phone rang again. The same voice said, “Have you got the tape recorder?” Afraid she would hang up again, I quickly said, “Yes, but there is still R400 in cash missing, and we know who took it.” At that, she did indeed hang up.

 

The next morning, the phone rang again, and this time the woman was willing to talk for longer. She told me that she now had the money, and asked if we could meet somewhere for her to give it to me. She admitted that her son and a friend had done the burglary, and asked if we could possibly withdraw the charges. She said that her husband had a bad heart condition, and that she feared he would die if he found out what his son had done. I said that it was not in my hands, as it was the headmaster who had laid the charges, but I would try to get hold of him and see what we could do. She still would not give me her phone number, but agreed to phone back in half an hour. So I called the headmaster. He agreed that we could meet at school at 10 o’clock, and that he would try to have the police there. The woman phoned back and we arranged for the meeting.

 

At 10 o’clock we all met at the headmaster’s office – the headmaster, myself, the police, two very distraught women, and two very unhappy looking young men. The mothers handed over the R400 in cash and then asked the headmaster if he could possibly withdraw the charges. Before the headmaster could answer, the police officer cut in and said, “This is a criminal charge, and it is not in the power of the headmaster to withdraw it. This is now in the hands of the state, and, because the boys are over 18, the case must come to court.” The mother I had spoken to then repeated what she had told me about her husband’s heart condition. The police officer looked at her steadily and said, “The boys should have thought of that before they did this. This is a criminal charge, and we cannot drop it.” Mr Geddes then said that the two boys obviously had master keys of the school, and that he would like them back. The boys sheepishly produced the master keys. He asked them how they had got hold of the keys, and they said they had taken an impression in soap of the history teachers key. I felt that their case would have been stronger if they had produced those keys before being asked. I was surprised that Mr Geddes at no time brought up the question of the history exam papers. It is possible that they may would have failed matric without those marks, but the topic was never brought up.

 

Mr Geddes was a complete gentleman. No one called him by his first name. He had had a very bad bout of yellow jaundice, and often looked very yellow and exhausted. Yet he always found time for his staff, and he taught me many lessons. Whenever I was looking stressed or harassed, he would say, “You are not indispensable. Never think you are. West Park Cemetery is full of indispensable people.” Another lesson he taught me was that when somebody is angry with you, take time to listen to their point of view before trying to explain yourself. I remember once that I was due to go to a conference, and made a mistake about the date – I thought it was the following week. By the time I realised, it was already two days into the conference. I phoned the organiser, a man called Mr Rousseau. He was furious with me, and told me there would be a black mark put in my file in education department. This was not good news for me in my first year teaching, at a time when the Transvaal Education Department (“Uncle TED”) was a very powerful bureaucracy. When I asked if I could come to the conference the following week, he told me that that was impossible, as that he was totally booked out. Then he put the phone down on me. All I could do was go to Mr Geddes. One of his great strengths was to notice when his staff were feeling stressed, and he saw how stressed I was. He immediately dropped what he was doing and asked for Mr Rousseau’s phone number. I sat in his office and listened to the conversation. For starters, Mr Geddes spoke in Afrikaans, which I had not done. He then listened to Mr Rousseau’s list of woes, and because of his gentle understanding way, was told all sorts of personal stuff. Only when the man had finished pouring his heart out to my boss did Mr Geddes, almost as an afterthought, turn to the subject of my problem. He explained that I was a very good young man, and that I was quite upset to have got it wrong. He wondered if there was any way Mr Rousseau could fit me in the following week. Mr Rousseau then began apologising to Mr Geddes for getting angry with me, and said he would fit me in with pleasure.

 

The Monday afternoon after the burglary, Mr Geddes told me about the thesis he had done for his Master of Education degree. He had drawn up a list of twenty “problem” children in the classroom. These included the bully, the slovenly child, the class clown, the one who sits in the corner and says nothing, the one who sits at the front and dominates discussions, the one who never has the right books and has seldom done his homework, the insolent one, the class clown, the one always talking to someone else when you’re talking, and so on. He then handed this list to 100 school teachers and asked them to arrange them in order of seriousness, as they saw it. He then gave the same list to 20 psychiatrists and asked them to arrange them in order of seriousness. The results were startling. Most of the teachers put the noisy, bullying, cheeky and destructive types of pupils at the top of the list. The psychiatrist, by contrast, without exception put the silent one who sits in the corner and says nothing at the top of the list. These are the pupils who never verbalise their problems or feelings, but keep them all bottled inside. They have few friends and little social outlet. So their feelings ferment, and then one day they boil over. Mr Geddes said that it was not at all unexpected to him that the two perpetrators of our burglary turned out to be of the silent, lonely type.

 

Down the 40 years since these events, I’ve made it a habit of following the stories, frequent in America, of mass school shootings. Almost without fail, the perpetrators are described as loners who never said much at school, and were seldom noticed. Often, in stuff found in their rooms afterwards, it becomes evident that they carried a deep sense of resentment against the popular groups in school – especially the “jocks.” They felt that they had been ignored and discounted. So they began to fantasise about taking revenge on society, and eventually did so in brutal manner.

 

It took about six months for our case to come to court. The school cleaner and I were the only actual witnesses – others were not called, because the two boys had admitted their guilt. Mr Geddes came as well, although he was not a witness. In a slightly perverse way, I had looked forward to the court case. I looked forward to the drama of the courtroom, and imagined myself giving an eloquent speech about everything that had happened. And a part of me wanted to see the boys get what they deserved.

When we got into the courtroom, I was quite startled to see how faded and reduced the boys had become over the last six months. The two mothers, sitting in the observers’ seats, looked to have aged five years.  

 

With regard to drama, the court was a great disappointment. The judge took everything down in longhand, so I ended up dictating at writing speed. A great deal of the drama was lost. He did the same for every other witness – it was excruciating. When all the evidence was in he asked the boys if they would like to say anything before he passed sentence. They simply shook their heads. Then, as the judge was taking a breath to start speaking, Mr Geddes stood up and said, “Your Honour, I was the boys’ headmaster. I wonder if I could say a few words.” The judge looked a little surprised, but nodded his head, and Mr Geddes came to the witness stand. There was actually very little you could say in favour of the boys, as they had been very non-contributing members of the school. But up until this incident, they had not given much actual trouble. Mr Geddes made much of this fact, and made a plea for the boys to be given a second chance. He looked at the boys and commented on how haggard they looked, and that he believed they had already suffered considerably. In a word, like Portia in the Merchant of Venice, he pleaded the quality of mercy. He was also picture to me of Christ our advocate standing before the throne of judgement pleading for us.

 

When Mr Geddes had finished speaking the judge looked at the two boys. “You have admitted your guilt, but I would have found you guilty anyway on the basis of the evidence that has been received. You are very fortunate that your headmaster has spoken so kindly in your favour. I was about to pass judgement on you, but because of what your headmaster has said, I am going to do something quite unusual. I am going to suspend the passing of sentence for two years. What that means is that if you keep yourself clean for two years, this case will be removed from the books, and you will not carry a criminal record into the future. I hope you realise how fortunate you are.” With that he banged his gavel and walked out of the court.

 

Strangely, I don’t recall anything that happened after that. I don’t remember if I spoke to the boys, or if they or their mothers spoke to Mr Geddes. I only know that I took home with me a very deep impression of what can be for others when a compassionate man, especially one in a position of authority, is willing to speak up on their behalf.