A Little Learning

by Anne Bennett

  Betty’s brow was puckered with anxiety, but Brendan said, ‘Why shouldn’t she have a new desk, a new desk for a new school, not some old, scratched thing her teacher’s throwing out? I’ll make her one, and if I set it into the window it will take less off the room. She’ll need a bookcase too, I’d say, with all that studying.’

  ‘Go and see Miss Wentworth and explain,’ Betty said to Janet. ‘Thank her for her kind offer and say your uncle is making you a desk. Tell her he’s a carpenter.’

  Janet stared at her. The last place she wanted to go was to see Claire Wentworth, who she’d not set eyes on since the day she’d come up with the grant forms. Also, she didn’t know how Brendan was going to fit a desk in her room, for wherever he put it it would mean there was no room for Sally. ‘I can’t have a desk,’ she cried, ‘not from anyone. Sally will …’

  ‘Sally will stay beside my bed for now,’ Betty said, ‘as you all did. When she’s older Brendan will build her a small bed in the alcove in our bedroom that goes over the stairs, and your dad will fit a curtain for privacy later.’

  ‘Oh,’ Janet said, and her heart lightened in relief. She loved Sally, loved her with a passion she’d not felt for the twins, and she talked and read to her, even confided her worries to the baby who gurgled in her arms, but she wanted her room to herself.

  ‘Are you sure, Mom?’ she said.

  ‘Dad and I think you need your own space and a bit of privacy,’ Betty said. ‘After all, it isn’t every day a daughter gets to the grammar school.’

  So Janet had been dispatched to Claire Wentworth. She didn’t want to go and she could think of a thousand and one reasons why she shouldn’t, but she knew that not one of them would satisfy her mother.

  She felt a traitor to herself as she cycled up that Saturday afternoon in July. She was taking no chances and rang the front doorbell. Miss Wentworth was a long time coming, and Janet was just beginning to think she wasn’t in and she could go thankfully home again when suddenly Claire stood in the doorway.

  She wore a loose, flowing dress in a swirl of pastel colours with straps over the shoulders to hold it up. Her hair was coiled back from her neck and secured with a bandana to match the dress, her brown legs were bare and strappy sandals were on her feet.

  Janet’s heart gave a lurch. Miss Wentworth looked lovely, cool, in complete control and very beautiful. Janet was aware of the sun beating down on her head. She was hot and sticky, the palms of her hands were damp with sweat and so were her armpits, and she felt suddenly very young.

  ‘Janet, how nice to see you,’ Claire said, and though she smiled, her voice was guarded. ‘Come through, we’re in the garden, and I’m sure you could do with a glass of lemonade.’

  Janet should have been warned by the word ‘we’ but she wasn’t. She followed Claire, mesmerised, like a moth flutters around a light, and was unprepared for the man who lay stretched out on a blanket on the lawn.

  ‘David, get up and meet Janet,’ Claire said, and the man rose, loose-limbed and easy. Janet recoiled, but he appeared not to notice.

  ‘Hello,’ he said, ‘I’ve heard such a lot about you.’

  Janet had been prepared to despise the panting, perverted man she’d last seen lying on top of Claire Wentworth. She imagined he’d be embarrassed when they met, but Claire had not told him what Janet had seen, so he was completely at ease with her. Janet couldn’t believe it. She would have liked him more, she thought, if he’d shown a measure of discomfort. If he’d mumbled an apology or gone red or something, but he just smiled at her. She noticed that his face was tanned, his eyes deep brown and his jet-black hair swept back from his head. She decided that though he looked very fine, he was callous and unfeeling.

  She sat there in the garden in the sunshine, feeling uncomfortable to be with them in their loose, light things. She herself felt dull and stupid and too hot in her thick, hard-wearing clothes and sturdy shoes. She told them of her Uncle Brendan and how he was building her a desk and bookcases while she drank the lemonade Claire had poured.

  She suddenly noticed that, while they listened and were interested in what she said, they seemed always to be aware of one another. She saw the glances that passed between them, the soft, lingering look in their eyes, and the way they touched one another. Sometimes their fingers entwined, or David’s hands would rest for a moment on Claire’s shoulders and her hand would brush his arm. Janet felt excluded from this inner circle, this magic club with just two members.

  She jumped to her feet. ‘I’ve got to go.’

  ‘Not yet,’ Claire said. Janet had thought David and Claire were only aware of one another, but in actual fact Claire had been covertly watching Janet since she’d arrived. She’d sensed the girl’s hostility and knew she resented being there, and she wished she knew of a way to break down the barriers she had raised.

  ‘I’ve got to get back,’ Janet said, and Claire knew that if she allowed Janet to rush away now she would have lost her.

  ‘I’ve got a record I’d like you to listen to,’ she burst out suddenly.

  ‘A record!’ echoed Janet, turning to Claire. She missed the quizzical look David threw her. Something was up. He could almost feel the tension in the air between Claire and her protégée. He wondered if they’d had a row. She’d not mentioned Janet for ages and that in itself was strange.

  Then Claire turned to him and said, ‘Didn’t you have something to do this afternoon, darling?’ Yes, he bloody did, David thought. He’d planned on lazing side by side on the grass with the woman he loved, and then slipping upstairs for a spot of lovemaking. Then later they’d go out to the pub for a few jars with their friends. He sighed. It wasn’t to be, obviously, for whatever was wrong between Claire and Janet would have to be sorted before Claire would have any time for him. It was just how she was. He caught the pleading look she threw him and decided he could afford to be generous.

  ‘Yes, I really must be off,’ he said, and smiled to show her he was playing her game, whatever it was.

  ‘What sort of record?’ Janet asked flatly. She ignored David and spoke only to Claire.

  ‘A classical piece,’ Claire said, ‘the sort of thing they’d probably play in the music appreciation lessons at Whytecliff High. They did that sort of thing when I was at grammar school, anyway.’

  Janet said nothing. She looked anything but pleased, and David couldn’t work it out. He’d hero-worshipped a master at school when he was a boy and firmly believed he would have laid down his life for him if required to do so. But this Travers girl was refusing to even be polite to Claire and he couldn’t understand why Claire put up with it. He knew better than to interfere, though. He’d done that before and Claire had bitten his head off. He’d let them sort it out between them.

  ‘Claire,’ he said.

  Claire tore her attention from Janet and said, ‘Hadn’t you better be off, darling?’

  Bloody hell! David thought. He covered his bad temper with effort – maybe they’d have time together later – and regarded Claire with tolerant amusement.

  ‘Okay,’ he said. ‘Are you going to see me out?’

  They walked together, arms linked, to the gate, and as he bent for a goodbye kiss Claire said, ‘Thanks for this, David. Come round later tonight. I’ll make it up to you, promise.’

  ‘It’s okay,’ David said, ‘but what’s up with happy Harriet today?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘Miserable little devil if you ask me.’

  ‘Well, I didn’t ask you,’ Claire said. ‘She’s best left to me. Go on, I’ll see you later.’

  Janet did look miserable, though, Claire had to admit, and out of place, embarrassed to be there. She waited for Claire to reach her and then said, ‘I don’t want to listen to any record.’

  ‘Okay,’ Claire said. ‘I won’t make you, but can we talk?’

  ‘What about?’

  ‘Oh, Janet, don’t be difficult,’ Claire said impatiently. ‘I want you to come back and see me again.
We haven’t many weeks before you’re off to Whytecliff, and there’s a lot we haven’t covered.’

  Janet knew that was true, but ‘I don’t need to know any more,’ she said.

  ‘You don’t need it, no,’ Claire agreed, ‘but it might help.’

  ‘What about him?’ Janet said rudely.

  ‘Do you mean David?’ Claire remarked sharply. ‘He has got a name.’

  ‘Well,’ Janet said, ‘I’m not coming back if he’s going to be here all the time.’

  Claire knew that if David was there he’d resent the time she spent teaching Janet anyway. He could get very jealous of things like that. He liked Claire’s free time to be spent with him, so if she was going to coax Janet back and keep David happy, she’d have to keep them apart.

  ‘Oh, Janet,’ she said, ‘what am I to do with you?’

  ‘You can “oh, Janet” all you like, Miss Wentworth, but I’m not coming if he’s going to be here,’ Janet told her stonily.

  Claire Wentworth was silent for a minute, and then she said: ‘All right, I’ll see he doesn’t intrude.’

  It was an olive branch that Claire was handing out, and Janet recognised it as such. Suddenly she wanted to come back and work with Claire again. She hid her eagerness; she wasn’t going to go overboard. ‘If you want I’ll come,’ she said grudgingly, but it was enough.

  So later, when the teachers at Whytecliff High School were staggered by the depth of Janet’s knowledge, she knew she owed it all to Claire.

  On their last evening together, in the middle of August, just before Claire’s marriage to David Sunderland, Claire gave Janet a package. When she unwrapped it, she saw it was the silver locket she’d had for her eleventh birthday.

  ‘Please take it,’ Claire said. ‘I gave it to you because you became my friend rather than my pupil. It will mean a lot if you accept it.’

  Janet knew she was being asked to accept more than a locket. If she took it, she would have to try and forget the scene she had witnessed between Claire and her fiancé. She would never understand Claire’s behaviour, and yet she couldn’t just spurn the woman who’d given up so much time to teach and coach her.

  She put out her hand. ‘Thank you,’ she said, and added, ‘I’m sorry.’

  ‘No,’ Claire said, and Janet heard the emotion in her voice. ‘Don’t apologise, just come and see me in your fine school uniform and tell me how it is.’

  ‘I will,’ Janet had promised, but as the autumn term dragged on and the misery bit deeper, she confided only in her baby sister, who she seemed to draw comfort from. The others were no good. Duncan viewed anything to do with school with the patronising air of one almost done with such fripperies. He would be thirteen in November, and with the world of work almost in his grasp, the gap between brother and sister widened.

  Her mother was proud of her but was too busy to worry about her. In any case, in Betty’s opinion, Janet was too clever to have problems. Bert was delighted with his intelligent daughter and boasted of her often, but sometimes he didn’t know how to talk to her.

  ‘All right, love?’ he’d say ineffectually.

  ‘Yes, Dad.’

  ‘Not working you too hard at that school, are they?’

  ‘No, Dad.’

  ‘Still enjoying it, are you?’

  ‘Yes, Dad.’ Janet wondered what the hell else she could say. Could she admit that all that work put in by her and Claire, and the sacrifices her family had made, was all for nothing?

  ‘That’s all right then,’ Bert would say, reassured.

  Only the baby knew what was in Janet’s heart. ‘When it’s your turn, Sally,’ she promised her gurgling sister, ‘I’ll be there for you. You won’t need a Miss Wentworth in your life. You’ll have me.’

  Claire wouldn’t have been fooled by the façade of happiness she drew round herself to satisfy the family, so Janet went to see her at Christmas, only when she felt the festivities could successfully hide her dejection. She’d come top or near the top in her end-of-term exams, and though Claire was pleased, she had news of her own.

  ‘I’m expecting,’ she said, eyes shining, and Janet felt her heart plummet like a stone.

  ‘Congratulations,’ she forced herself to say, but she knew it would never be the same between them again, and her isolation, even in the midst of the Christmas revelries, felt more acute than ever.

  January was bitterly cold, with snow driven into drifts by buffeting winds, and the buses were often late or full. Gales gushed around the school and icy draughts came in through rattling, ill-fitting windows and seeped under doors, freezing feet and wrapping clammily around stocking-clad legs. Faces were pinched and grey with cold, and Annabel, Millicent and Belinda began a baiting campaign against Janet.

  ‘Funny smell in here … oh, it’s just the charity case bringing in the smell of the gutter she was dragged up in,’ Annabel said one day when other jibes had failed to get a reaction.

  ‘What is it with you?’ Janet, stung at last, yelled at her. ‘What’s your problem?’

  ‘You, my dear,’ Millicent said, her voice dripping with sarcasm. ‘Pushing your way in here where you don’t belong.’

  ‘I’ve as much right as you.’

  ‘Hardly, I’m paid for.’

  Janet felt the other girls’ eyes upon her and knew that the mood of the class was dangerous. This was Janet Travers the scholarship girl, fair game for taunting and teasing, some fun to be had in the cold and gloom of winter.

  Janet glared at them and anger flowed through her. ‘You’re a lot of stuck-up bleeding snobs,’ she cried, and heard the shocked gasp of the girls before the cruel laughter followed her down the corridor as she fled.

  The snow turned to grey sludge, the icicles melted, the winds dropped and snowdrops and crocuses pushed their heads up through the frozen earth. Spring was on its way and Janet came to terms with the fact that she couldn’t fight the whole class. Her hat was snatched from her head countless times as she left school, just as a prefect was coming into view. It warranted an immediate detention with lines to write: ‘I must wear my hat as it is an integral part of school uniform.’

  ‘Why don’t you learn, squirt?’ one sixth-former asked her quite kindly when she’d been booked by her for the third time.

  Janet shrugged. She was no telltale. When someone pulled the chair away just as Janet was about to sit down, no one knew who’d done it. In the same way, no one knew who loosened the lid of the salt cellar so that the contents were deposited on Janet’s dinner, but seven pairs of glittering eyes around the table, and their explosive laughter, told her that they all knew about it.

  Just before Easter, her games kit disappeared from her peg in the changing room. The games mistress was furious. ‘I was going to try you out for the hockey team today,’ she said. ‘Judging by your previous performances, you had a good chance. Write out two hundred times, “I must not forget my games kit.”’

  ‘But I didn’t,’ Janet protested. Later, her kit was recovered from the drainpipe, filthy dirty and wet.

  After the Easter break, it was Annabel’s foot that tripped Janet in the dinner hall. As she sprawled she landed in her dinner. Mashed potato, cabbage, meat pie and gravy clung to her skirt and jumper, and a blob of something glutinous had landed on her chin. The laughter rippled and swelled in the hall and Janet wanted to die. A few days later, Millicent’s hand slipped as she was pouring the water, and it flooded over Janet’s plate, rendering her meal inedible.

  At home, she kept to her room as much as possible, for even Betty and Bert had noticed her despondency. Betty had remarked tight-lipped one night, when she bawled the twins out for some mild misdemeanour, ‘It’s a pity an expensive education doesn’t teach tolerance, that’s all I can say.’

  ‘I don’t know where they are going to attack next,’ Janet told Sally, who toddled about her room holding on to the furniture. Sally smiled and raised her arms to be picked up.

  ‘You’re no help,’ Janet said, and hugged
her tight. But in reality, Janet didn’t know how she’d have gone on without the baby.

  The next day her gaberdine coat disappeared from the cloakroom. She waited until it was emptied of people, with only the shoe bags swinging on the pegs to search properly, but no coat had fallen to the floor, or been pushed behind the pipes. She had to find it, she knew it had cost a fortune, and she scoured the classrooms and ran along the corridor in a frenzy.

  ‘What you lost, lovey?’ a cleaner asked, watching her.

  ‘My coat. Have you seen a raincoat?’ Janet asked anxiously.

  But she hadn’t, and Janet went off to search the playground. Remembering her games kit, she shoved her hand up the drainpipe, but it was empty. Returning to the building, she was met by the cleaner who’d spoken to her earlier. The woman was holding a bedraggled coat in her hands.

  ‘Found it tucked behind a radiator in the toilets,’ she said.

  Janet took it from her in disbelief. It was grimed with dirt and very crumpled, and there was a rip in the lining.

  ‘Playing a joke, likely,’ the cleaner said, but she was seething inside and added, ‘Don’t cry, lovey.’

  Janet hadn’t been aware she had been crying and scrubbed at her eyes fiercely with her fist and she carried her coat home, for she couldn’t wear it. She hoped her dad was going to the club so that she and her gran could work on it before her mom saw it.

  She saw her gran glance at her strangely when she took the garment from her arm and hung it up, but Sarah said nothing. No sooner had the door slammed behind her father than Janet was down the stairs. Her gran had already taken the coat from the peg and was staring at it as if she couldn’t believe her eyes.

  ‘What in the name of God happened to it?’ she asked, and glared at Janet.

  ‘Don’t ask,’ Janet said wearily.

  ‘I will ask,’ Gran said angrily. ‘Have you any idea what a coat like this costs?’

  ‘Gran, please. It was a prank that went wrong. It won’t happen again.’

  And it won’t, Janet promised herself. I’ve stood by long enough and let people walk over me. Tomorrow morning I’m going to dish out my own punishment.