“Little girl in blue in the front row.”
Her next-door neighbour gave her a nudge. Flossie was startled.
“What’s your name?”
“Flossie Elk.”
The whisper was so minute that no one heard it.
“Come here. I can’t hear you.”
Flossie came gingerly forward. Her head hung down.
“Now. What’s your name?”
“Flossie Elk.”
“Oh.” Miss Elder looked at the face, and moon-coloured hair, and the neat little blue frock, and the well-fed body. ‘Comes from such a sad poor home.’ She recalled Miss Green’s sugary tone as she said it. “Sentimental fool,” she thought, “ought to be too used to children to be carried away by prettiness.” Flossie, puzzled by the pause, cautiously raised her enormous lashes and peered up at Miss Elder through them.
Miss Elder had a face like a horse, long and narrow, with a good deal of it given up to jaw. Her skin was red, and tight, her hair a wispy yellow, she was short-sighted, so pince-nez were clipped to the end of her nose, and to insure that good money should not be thrown away on repairing glasses, were also attached to her bosom by a fine gold chain. She had never possessed even the transitory prettiness of the small child, her face in middle age was as easy to look at as at any other period of her life. In self-defence she lived by a slogan ‘Beauty-is-the-cause-of-much-sorrow.’ ‘Oh-the-sorrow-I-have-seen-caused-by-a-pretty-face!’ She had never seen anything of the sort, but since she had her needs and longings like the rest of the world, she found a slogan a preventive against soaking the pillow with futile, idiotic tears.
Even as Flossie peered up at her, so Miss Elder gazed down at Flossie, and found herself looking for the first time in her life at real, incontestable beauty, and in that moment her Salvationist’s spirit swelled. Beauty could not be cured like a nasty habit, or a tendency to steal; but it was possible to see that a face like that was not let loose upon the world without its owner being aware of the danger of what she possessed.
“Wait here,” she said severely. “I will speak to you when I have dismissed the other girls.”
She took Flossie to her room. It was so like Miss Green’s room, even to its furnishings that Flossie looked hopefully at the drawer in which chocolates should live.
“My child,” Miss Elder paused effectively, “I have brought you in here for a little talk. You did not listen to a word of my address this morning. That was doubly wrong, first because it was bad-mannered — ‘A-child-always-listens-when-a-grown-up-is-speaking,’ and secondly because what I was saying was of particular value to you. Tell me, of what were you thinking, that was so much more important than my remarks?”
Flossie was so scared by the tone of voice used for this homily, a tone for which life in the infant school had not prepared her, that she took refuge in the only defence she knew. Her eyes filled, and she raised them to Miss Elder.
Miss Elder had a stiff fight with herself. She could not look into those eyes, tear-filled by her harsh words, and not feel a brute. But her common sense pulled her together, and showed her in a flash how right her slogan had always been. “What a danger,” she thought. “Why, even I was weakening.”
“Flossie,” her voice was sterner than ever, “of what were you thinking? When I ask a question I expect an answer.”
Flossie’s brain went round like a Catherine wheel. Of what had she been thinking? She was doing what she always did, letting thoughts run in and out of her head, none of them stayed long enough to remember. Her new blue frock recalled that she had moved up into ‘The Girl’s.’ Suddenly a light came into her face, she had remembered, all would now be well.
“I was thinkin’ that there weren’t no boys in this school.”
Miss Elder looked puzzled. What a curious answer.
“Naturally not. This is a girls’ school. You know that?”
“Yes.” Flossie looked down, a reminiscent smile at the thought of many sweets just curving the ends of her lips. “But I likes boys.”
Miss Elder, conscious of peering eyes behind curtains, walked into the shop. George was arranging apples, a polished pile, red cheeks to the window. He laid down the one he held, wiped his hands on his apron, and came forward with a questioning ‘Good afternoon.’ Miss Elder looked at the window, and at random ordered six oranges.
“Seven that is,” George corrected her, wrapping them up. “Seven for sixpence they are.”
“Quite.” She watched him swing the bag round till its corners formed two brown ears, and knew that in a moment, from his point of view, she should be gone. She gave a slight unnecessary cough. “I am Flossie’s head teacher.”
“Indeed, ma’am.” He handed her the fruit. “Anything more I can serve you with to-day?”
“No.” She did not take the bag. “I am so glad to have this chance of a word with you, Mr. Elk. I pass this way twice every day, and I so much admire your fruit.”
George looked disparagingly at the window.
“Don’t look so well just now. Just winter greens, though the apples and oranges make a nice bit’ter colour. But you ought to see it in May, ma’am, and June, that’s the time.” He nudged her with the paper bag. “You ever been ter Covent Garden when the stuff’s coming in?” She shook her head. “You should, it’s a picture. Peas, beans, tomatoes, lettuces, watercress, radishes, the ’ole bloomin’ shoot, put a name to anything an’ you can have it. And the fruit!” His voice trailed away, hushed by the glory of strawberries and raspberries seen in the mind’s eye.
It is pleasant in winter to be warmed by summer’s magnificence. It made Miss Elder forget her chilblains.
“And the flowers too, I hear they are wonderful.”
“Oh them.” With a gesture George dismissed all flowers to a limbo for the unedible.
The conversation was obviously finished as far as he was concerned. Desperately she looked for a new opening. “Curious,” she thought, “how omnipotent one felt with parents who came to the school, and how awkward and tongue-tied when one met them outside.” George politely held out the bag. To take it she felt was the equivalent to shutting the door; she must not let that happen, so undignified to set out on a mission, and instead, achieve seven oranges. She firmly pushed the bag back at George. “One moment, Mr. Elk, I want to see you, and to-day needing oranges––. I do think teachers and parents should work together for the good of the children, don’t you?”
George looked at his pile of apples–time he was getting back to them, he thought.
“Ah, it’s Mrs. Elk you’re wantin’. She’s only stepped up the road, be back any minute.” He wondered what the teacher needed, a confused jumble of requirements, school tunics, pencil boxes, a violin, formed in his mind. “Something you was wantin’ for our Floss? Anythin’ she needs that I can manage she can have.”
‘Comes from such a sad poor home.’ Miss Elder’s back stiffened at the ludicrousness of the description.
“No,” she said firmly. “It is not her bodily needs I am anxious about, Mr. Elk. It’s her spiritual ones. ‘Beauty-is-the-cause-of-much-sorrow,’ you know.”
George was surprised at the turn the conversation had taken, but at least it was a subject with which he felt at home.
“It’s a lure of Satan,” he agreed.
Miss Elder felt this to be a little strong. She managed an uneasy laugh.
“Well, I wouldn’t speak of Flossie’s face quite like that.”
George stared at her.
“‘Oo’s speakin’ of Floss?”
Miss Elder saw her road clear at last.
“I was, Mr. Elk. You have a remarkably beautiful child.”
“Now look ’ere.” George tapped her arm with his finger. “I do hope you won’t go sayin’ nothin’ of that kind to Mrs. Elk. She talked about Floss very silly for a time, very silly, but she’s forgot
ten all about it now, and there ain’t nothin’ gained by rakin’ it up.”
“Oh, but I––”
“I’m not blamin’ you, ma’am, ladies gets silly ideas, but I’ll tell you now, what I told her then, all I want for my Floss is that she grows up a nice sensible girl as’ll make a good wife for some man. A face is given us from on ’igh ter see with, smell with, eat with, and hear with, and makin’ a show of it is goin’ beyond what’s intended.”
Fanny came in by the side door, she left Flossie swinging on the gate. She went into the kitchen to put on the kettle, the door was open, and across the passage she heard George’s last words. She put down the kettle, and crept over and peeped through the shop door. Miss Elder was just taking her oranges. She felt she had been put in her place, she never allowed the children’s parents to put her in her place, so her voice became both frozen and condescending.
“Good-bye. I see we are in complete agreement. If I should––” Her pause on the word showed the improbability of such a contingency, “need any help, I shall come and see you again.”
George looked after her with a puzzled frown. “Queer woman,” he thought, and went back to his apples.
Fanny came in, she crossed to the shop exit, and looked after Miss Elder.
“That’s the teacher from the school.”
George rubbed an apple.
“That’s right.”
“What’s she want?”
“Oranges.”
“But I heard you talkin’, carryin’ on shockin’ you was. What was you talking about?”
“Faces.” He rubbed fiercely. “I told her and I tell you, all I want for our Floss is to grow up a good woman.”
“Oh.” Fanny went back to the kitchen, she picked up the kettle but instead of filling it, she carried it with her to the window, and put it on the ledge, leant on it, and stared out over it, through the grimy glass at Flossie, swinging on the rusty, iron gate. She stared at her until she became nothing but a blurr of scarlet and pink and gold, and with her went the Fordham Road and its mean little houses, years of toil done regardless of pain, shabby clothes, and worn furniture, and in their place were things seen in the theatre, read of in books and papers, and half imagined and dreamt. A world where houses were not cramped, and where rooms were large, and so built that neighbours could not hear each other, a world where other people did your work for you, where there were lovely clothes, even the underclothes beautiful, the world of motor-cars, scents, a world unimaginable, seen dimly, like a shape in smoke.”
“Fanny. Fanny. What about a cup of tea?”
With a start she was back in the kitchen.
“Comin’, George.” Mechanically she filled the kettle.
CHAPTER III
Flossie had measles. She was no worse with it than the average child, but she made a great fuss, and her howls of misery and boredom from her darkened bedroom drove Fanny nearly distracted with worry, and caused George to go to the unheard-of extravagance of bringing her, from the market, large purple grapes. When she was finally allowed out of bed, things were not much better; she felt, and looked, a misery; dull hair, blotchy face, and tears over everything. The doctor said that she should get out, that the fresh air would soon put her right. Fresh air may be a panacea, but it did not look an attractive cure in the Fordham Road at the end of March. The gardens, to glorify the plots of earth in front of each house, were at best, noticeable for neatness, and at worst, for cats and broken bottles. They were discouraging bits of ground surrounded by iron palings, damp and dark, though in one or two there was a clump of irises, or a patch of London pride. The Elks had a rose-tree. George had planted it; it was not a success as the ground was stony for roses, but he grew it as the next best thing to vegetables. The usual way of using the ground was to plant an euonymus, or leave the euonymus standing that was there already. No one in the street grew bulbs, there were no snowdrops and crocuses to soften the bleakness of January and February, no daffodils or hyacinths, still less a prunus, as tokens, however bleak the March weather, that winter was over.
“Now, Floss, put your things on and go out and have a nice play.” Fanny said, looking hopefully at the street up which the wind was driving a flotsam of torn papers. “The doctor says it’ll do you good.”
Flossie looked out of the window.
“Don’t want’er go out.”
“Now you be a good girl, ’tisn’t what you want, it’s what’s right for you.” Fanny pushed the child through the door and slammed it.
George, looking out over his array of oranges and apples, saw Flossie, with tears pouring down her cheeks, walk aimlessly up the street. He watched her dragging feet, and hunched shoulders, and came to a decision which startled himself. There were no customers in sight, so he went in search of Fanny and found her making their bed.
“Fan, our Floss needs a bit’er sea.”
“Sea!” Fanny looked at him stupidly over the quilt she was holding.
“That’s right, sea. I bin thinkin’ I could manage a fortnight for you both, and maybe come down at the week-end meself. What do you say to Brighton?”
Fanny dropped the quilt and flushed slowly. Before the advent of Flossie they had been to Southend for a week every August. But Brighton!
“Well, I must say it will be a treat. Brighton too, so classy.”
Flossie found Brighton entrancing. Fanny bought her a spade and pail, and while she sat in a shelter out of the wind, listening to the band, left her to dig on the beach. She was happy at first making her own lop-sided mounds, then that palled, and she hung about, talking to, or watching the other children dig.
One morning, running down to a pool to fill her pail, she found three small boys constructing an edifice which was as different from her effort as Buckingham Palace to the homes in the Fordham Road. She put down her pail, and watched the builders. The smallest boy turned and saw her.
“This is a prison,” he said, “where they keep bad men.”
The tallest boy did not stop his furious digging, but spoke while he worked.
“Shut up, Gerald.” He looked at Flossie, and added politely: “He is so silly, this isn’t a prison, it’s a castle.”
“And a ’normous ogre lives in it,” Gerald piped up, refusing to be snubbed.
“Don’t be so silly, Gerald,” the third boy broke in. “Ogres don’t live in castles. Kings do.”
The tallest boy stopped digging for a second and looked shyly at Flossie.
“Like to help?”
She nodded, and took her place in the ring round the castle, and dug up a minute portion of sand, then paused to watch the three energetic spades beside her. At once she spotted that hers was by far the smallest spade, and that the eldest boy’s was a most grown-up affair of tin, which shifted sand at unbelievable speed. She straightened her back and nudged him with her elbow.
“I could dig much better if I had a spade like that.”
He looked at her, and felt a quite inexplicable wish to please. He held out his spade.
“You can try if you like.” Flossie said nothing, but took the spade, and began to dig. He watched her. “Tell you what, you can keep it if you like, I like digging better with wooden ones.”
His two brothers stopped working, the second boy stuttered, he was so shocked.
“Oh, John, Daddy will be angry, he’s only just given it to you.”
Gerald looked hurt.
“You wouldn’t even lend it me to try, and now you’ve given it to her.”
Flossie might have been deaf, she went on digging, paying no attention to the argument, and when Fanny called her to go home, she picked up her pail and went off without a word, carrying the spade, and never even gave John a smile.
Fanny was determined that this opportunity to see a town like Brighton should not be missed.
“It’s a wicked waste, Flossi
e, to be hanging about all the time on that beach, when there’s that beautiful Dome to see and the shops and all.”
With the coming of May, the weather turned warm, and one day Fanny got out Flossie’s white frock and bought her a straw hat trimmed with daisies, and though she still had to wear her winter coat, the landlady beamed when she saw her, and said she looked a perfect picture.
Fanny looked at herself and Flossie in the long glass on the wardrobe, and thought: “My skirt may not be so tight as some, and it hasn’t got that split they’re ail wearing, but with the way my inside drops, it makes me stick out a bit in front, and too tight a skirt wouldn’t look quite nice, but nobody can’t say my new costume isn’t tony. I’m glad to get it on; it would have been a disappointment if it had stayed too cold. Really, looking at us both, we might be anyone and that’s a fact.”
Looking as she knew they looked, there could be, in Fanny’s opinion, only one road suited to them, and that was the Western Road. It was her favourite walk at any time, the shops were so smart, and so up to date, so unlike anything they had at home, and to-day looking at them had an added pleasure.
“There! See that costume, Flossie, it’s got just the cut of these sleeves. Oh, look there, Floss! There’s a coat with just my waistline.”
Flossie, bored, dragged along behind her, until her attention was caught by a photographer’s window, filled with portraits of children. Fanny would have hurried by, but the photographer happened to be in his doorway, he gave a quick look at Flossie, and then smiled at Fanny.
“Won’t you and the little girl step inside, madam, and inspect the photographs?”
Fanny twittered with pleasure, she had been right; dressed as they were, they might be anybody, even the sort of people who had expensive photographs taken in the Western Road.
“Pleased, I’m sure.” She took Flossie’s hand. “Come along, dear.”
In a very short time Flossie was bored with the photographs, and wandered round the room, and finally stood in the sunlight in the doorway, staring at the people and traffic. The photographer waited until she moved away, and then drew up a chair facing Fanny.
It Pays to Be Good Page 2