by
Austin Mitchell
I can tell everybody that I’m still shocked by what Harden did. I was principal of Mc Cauley High School out in Keswick in St.
Catherine. Harden joined our staff in my fifth year as principal. All his records were checked and they seemed okay. The minute he was employed he got right down to business. He taught Information Technology, Principles of Business and Accounting. His students got very good grades and his classes were the most sought after. I had a feeling that other students
from nearby schools were relocating to Mc Cauley because of the good grades we were getting.
It was now more than a year since Harden was at the school. He was also a first class chef and I remembered going to some of his cookouts. He told us of his travels to all parts of the world and of the various culinary skills he had picked up.
He had a friendly demeanour and was a very persuasive fellow. Harden was still getting his grades and I was pleased with that.
We first started to think that something was amiss when Dailyn Russell, a student attending a Kingston school but resident in Keswick, disappeared. Then Raquel Nolan a twelve grader from our school disappeared. I knew that both Raquel and Dailyn were neighbors. Both girls had behavioral issues. Raquel had to seek counselling at least twice. I heard about Dailyn and the trouble she was giving her parents.
I knew that Harden had security around him. They would check him at the school every break time and accompany him home in the evenings.
“When I returned home, I had to put out a step-brother of mine. He was living at my house and refusing to pay the utilities. I found that the light and water had been bridged. He’s been threatening me ever since I put him out.”
I didn’t object to him having security checking him on campus or having a panic button on him.
One evening I was at school when a man with a foreign accent drove up and asked for Harden. I told him that he had gone home. The man looked like one of those Latinos to me. I had visited quite a few of those countries to know how the typical Latino looked and spoke when he was not speaking his native tongue. I put nothing to it, reasoning that Harden would have made many friends on his numerous travels abroad.
Then Joylene Parchment, a student from probably the most prominent high school in the Corporate Area, disappeared. She was from Keswick but living in Kingston. She only came up some weekends to visit her parents. It appeared that she took a minibus and came off part of the way where she was whisked away by a waiting motor car. Then I heard a rumor that Harden had been involved in the disappearance of all three girls.
“My God, who told you that, Russell? It’s a lie.” “Have the police said anything to you?” I asked him. “The police have better sense than to go off rumors.”
I let it rest, but I knew I would be watching him from now on. During the summer holidays he declined to teach Summer school, but went abroad. He had taught Summer school last year, so I don’t know if it was because he was travelling this year why he declined my offer. In early August, a girl by the name of Delene Nugent disappeared. She was not from Mc Cauley High but from a nearby school.
Harden returned from his holidays looking as fresh as ever. He told us of having visited friends in Ghana, Nigeria and Zimbabwe and of how good they treated him. Things started off normally, being the beginning of the school year.
For some time nothing happened, but the police still felt that something was wrong. A group of well thinking persons from several communities had formed a group to help the police patrol at nights. None of us were armed as we were just volunteers.
One night the police spotted a car and signalled the driver to stop, but he disobeyed and sped away. Despite the police chasing the car they never caught it. About a month later they signalled another car to stop. Who should emerge from the car, but Harden, he told us that he was coming from a friend’s house.
In the last term of the school year we were again on patrol when we saw two cars on another road. As we drew close the cars sped away. We caught one of them. In the car were two young girls and two men. The two girls were strangers to me, but I was nevertheless concerned. The men told us that they were coming from a party. The two girl’s parents were called.
At the police station when the trunk of the car was opened it contained two suitcases. The two girls broke down and confessed that they were going away. The two men confessed that they had been paid to take them to the airport. The car was identified as being owned by Harden! Harden denied everything. He said the car was his and the men were his employees. He didn’t know what the two girls were doing in the car. However the police were able to show that Harden had actually paid for the tickets for the two girls. He was arrested and charged a few days later. He refused to tell us what happened to the girls who had disappeared. At the moment he is in jail awaiting trial.
The End