by Mike Kent
After thirty minutes of enthusiastic play, dark clouds began to gather above the playground and fat drops of rain threatened to stop the match, although neither team showed the slightest inclination to stop playing. Badger assured me it would just be a light shower, and pointed out that everyone could have a good rub down with his PE towel when they went back upstairs. I’d almost made up my mind to stop the game for a while when there was a shout from Rouse, who had bent down to catch the ball and was now waving frantically at the bowler.
‘‘Old it, ‘old it,’ he called, ‘‘Oo’s this?’
He straightened up and I saw that he was holding the arm of a very young, chubby faced girl with a mass of blonde curly hair. The game stopped and every face turned to look at her, though she seemed perfectly content to hang onto Rouse’s arm and gaze at him happily. Rouse was far less content, and stared at her as if she were something objectionable that had just risen from the asphalt. I tucked up the collar of my coat, and felt the rain drip down my neck.
‘Who is she?’ I said.
‘I dunno, do I,’ Rouse replied mildly, looking down at the child in bewilderment. ‘I was fieldin’ ‘ere and she just appeared and grabbed me arm.’
‘She’s ‘is girl friend,’ jeered Adams, ‘Only ‘e don’t like ter say so!’
Rouse rounded on him angrily. ‘No she ain’t! I told yer, I dunno ‘oo she is. ‘Ow should I know ‘oo she is?’
‘She’s ‘is girl friend all right,’ Adams concluded confidently.
‘Yeah, she’s about ‘is size,’ Susan Davis added dryly.
Rouse suddenly became very angry, and he threw the ball down hard on the ground.
‘You shut up!’ he yelled. ‘I told yer, I dunno ‘oo she is. I ain’t never seen ‘er before. Get on with the game.’
He resumed his position as backstop, waved for the game to begin again, and tried to pretend the child wasn’t there. The little girl immediately grabbed his arm and smiled at him sweetly. Rouse stood up, put his hands on his hips wearily, and looked at her in exasperation.
‘Why don’t you take ‘er to the pictures?’ Badger suggested.
‘Look, you’ve really ‘ad it in a minute!’ Rouse shouted. ‘‘Ow’d you like it if she kept ‘angin’ onto you?’
‘Well, she ain’t my girlfriend, is she.’
‘She ain’t mine either!’
‘Yeah, I bet!’
Rouse picked up the rounders bat and moved towards Badger, intent on changing his opinion. Badger stepped back in alarm and I swiftly moved between them. Susan Brennan took the little girl by the hand and knelt down.
‘Where’s your mum?’ she asked softly.
The child pointed in the direction of the gate, smiled, and then ran back to Rouse. She pulled the bat from him and stood ready to join the game.
‘What’re we goin’ to do?’ Fred gestured hopelessly.
The children were quickly becoming restless at the rain and the interruption of their game, but it seemed pointless to carry on until the problem of the child had been solved. It was obvious she wasn’t going to be content with watching the game and I couldn’t leave her simply standing there.
‘Take over the game, Jamie.’ I said to Dudmish. And if the rain gets any worse, go under the shed.’ I took the child’s hand, firmly led her away from the class, and called to Rouse.
‘John, take this child to the gate and see if you can find her mother. I’ll have a look at the other entrance. Everybody carry on playing until I get back. Susan, see that nobody argues, will you?’
‘What are you goin’ to do if you can’t find ‘er mum?’ asked Badger with interest. ‘I could take ‘er to the police station for yer.’
I shuddered at the thought. ‘I don’t think that will be necessary, Alan. It would be helpful if you just got on with the game.’
Rouse took the child’s hand, and she walked beside him obediently and happily. I hurried across the playground to the entrance where most of the mothers normally waited for their children, but the street was deserted. Very aware that I couldn’t leave the class unsupervised for long, I ran to the small supermarket on the corner, hoping to spot a mother in search of her child, but all seemed perfectly calm. I decided it would probably be best to stay with the game for the last few minutes of the lesson in case the mother spotted her child from the gate. If not, I’d have to take the child into the infants department at playtime to see if anybody knew her. Happier now that I had a plan of action, albeit a weak one, I hurried back across the playground to my class.
It was obvious, even from a distance, that a new development had taken place. The game had been stopped, and the children had gathered round an enormous woman in an old brown coat that had stretched with time in an attempt to accommodate her very ample form. Her cheeks, full and round like weathered pouches, were an angry red, and she poked Badger continually in the ribs with a battered umbrella as he tried to reason with her. Eventually he gave up, shook his head in resignation and walked away, muttering loudly and indignantly to Adams. The woman turned quickly on me as I approached.
‘You this lot’s teacher?’ she said sharply, shaking the point of her umbrella at me as the rain streaked into my face.
I opened my mouth to reply, but the umbrella approached my nose dangerously, and I felt it might be best simply to nod in agreement. The children, now oblivious to the rain, watched with interest to see how the situation might develop.
‘Shall we go under the covered area and discuss this quietly?’ I suggested cautiously. ‘There doesn’t seem a lot of point in us standing here and getting soaked.’
‘You just tell me what you’ve done with my Tracey,’ she shouted menacingly. ‘I just brought ‘er out of school to take ‘er to the ‘ealth Centre and she’s bleedin’ disappeared.’
I put my hand on the woman’s arm in an attempt to communicate a sense of calm. She snatched her arm away immediately, as if I had been attempting to pass on a disease.
I tried again. ‘Just wait a moment,’ I said, ‘let’s think about this calmly for a moment Mrs…’
‘Mrs Garrett,’ said Adams. ‘She lives in my flats. She don’t pay her rent.’
‘That’s got absolutely nothing to do with it, and absolutely nothing to do with you,’ I snapped.
‘Okay, Sir. I was only sayin’…’
‘Well don’t.’
‘Okay, I was just…’
‘We ain’t got Tracey, Mrs,’ Badger interrupted, a pained expression in his voice.
‘What do you mean? You said she was standin’ ‘ere with you, didn’t you?’
‘Yeah, she was. I bin tryin’ to explain,’ Badger persisted, shaking his rain soaked curls. ‘I told yer, she’s gone with Rousey. ‘E’ll be back in a few minutes.’
‘She came up to us in the playground,’ I tried to explain. ‘One of the boys went with her to the gate to see if he could find you.’
‘Which gate?’
‘The main entrance.’
‘Well what the ‘ell did ‘e go down there for? I stop to speak to Mrs Stoddart for two minutes about the lumps on ‘er legs and then I find Tracey’s bin wanderin’ about in ‘ere.’
‘There’s really nothing to worry about,’ I said, far more calmly than I felt. ‘He’s only gone outside the gate. Do you mind if we stand out of the rain?’
‘Never mind the bloody rain! We’re late as it is.’
She raised her umbrella forcibly, and strode ahead of me. Suddenly aware that the entire class was likely to turn and follow me, I ordered the children under the bicycle shed and told them not to move until I came back. As I hurried after Mrs Garrett, I was fascinated to find that she looked exactly the same from the back as she did from the front.
‘It’s not bloody good enough,’ she grumbled, adjusting the position of the umbrella with a large meaty hand. ‘You ought to know
better. These kids are supposed to be in your charge. One of ‘em could be run over.’
Though I knew that the woman was reacting from concern about her daughter, I found myself becoming increasingly tense, though more from the woman’s attitude than the disappearance of her child.
‘Aren’t you overreacting a little?’ I said impatiently. ‘We know where she is. I just…’
‘Over bloody reacting? My child disappears and you call it over bloody reacting? You young teachers. Think you know everything. I can’t see why you’ve got ‘em all out ‘ere anyway. It’s pouring with bloody rain?’
‘They wanted to stay down here. Anyway, it’s not raining that hard now.’
‘That’s the bloody trouble with you teachers today. The kids do what they bloody well like. Well, where is she?’
We’d reached the gate and Mrs Garrett looked up and down the street several times. To my horror, neither Rouse nor the little girl were in sight. Worrying visions flitted through my mind. Perhaps Rouse had tried to take her home. Perhaps he’d taken her for a nice ride on a bus. Perhaps he had been kidnapped…
‘Stay there, just in case they suddenly appear,’ I said, trying to give myself a moment to think. ‘I’ll be back in a minute.’
I ran across the playground and under the shed, to find that a violent argument had broken out about who was supposed to be batting next.
‘The game’s over!’ I shouted, surprising myself at the ferocity of my voice. ‘You’ll have to help me look for this child.’
‘I thought Rousey was with her?’ said Susan Brennan, disappointed.
‘He was. I can’t find him, either.’
‘Aw Sir,’ muttered Susan Davis. ‘It’s messin’ up our game.’
‘I can’t help that. You’ve only got a few minutes left anyway. It’s messing up my last afternoon with you, too. Spread out and look for them. They can’t be very far. But don’t go near the main road, and I want you back here in ten minutes.’
‘Sir, Sir,’ called Badger, ‘p’raps ‘e’s taken ‘er to the police station…’
‘I doubt it,’ said Adams seriously. ‘They know ‘im down there. They’d prob’ly keep ‘im in there.’
I sighed impatiently. ‘Look, just find Rouse. There’s five hundred pounds for the first one to find him.’
There was a whoop of excitement and the children hurried across the playground. For a moment, I wondered whether I’d done the right thing. How would Dorothy have coped with this little problem, I wondered? Perhaps I should have gone upstairs and fetched her. I looked up and saw Mrs Garrett hurrying back towards me, head down underneath the umbrella as if she was going to charge me first and then beat me over the head with it.
‘Well, Tracey ain’t there, is she!’ she shouted.
‘No,’ I snapped back. ‘And I’ve got the entire class looking for her. Wait a minute.’
‘I’ve waited long enough. She’s probably wandered off into the main road. Gawd, I’ll bloody ‘ave you if she ‘as.’
My patience and worry was stretched to breaking point and it suddenly snapped. Inexperience took over and I lost control of my temper.
‘Look!’ I roared, ‘She’ll turn up in a moment. I can’t look after everybody else’s kids as well as my own class, can I? I’ve got thirty children to teach, not just one to wander down to the Health Centre with. If you’d done something simple like holding your child’s hand she wouldn’t be missing, would she? Now it looks as if I’ve lost your child and half the class I’m supposed to be looking after. Keep quiet for a minute and we’ll find her.’
Mrs Garrett’s mouth opened and closed like a goldfish seeking extra oxygen.
‘Right! Right! I’ll see what the ‘eadmaster ‘as to say about this. I’m not ‘avin’ you talkin’ to me like that. Bloody cheek! You shouldn’t be in charge of kids at your age!’
Susan Brennan suddenly appeared at the bottom of the steps, waving her arms, and shouting at me.
‘It’s alright, Sir,’ she called, ‘We’ve found them. They’re upstairs in class.’
Susan hurried back up the steps and the playtime bell rang as other classes began to come into the playground. Mrs Garrett charged up behind me, ploughing through the children coming downstairs and pushing them to each side of her like Tarzan hacking through dense undergrowth. The exertion quickly tired her, and by the time I reached the classroom she was still two staircases behind, panting with exhaustion and struggling to catch her breath.
Inside the room, Tracey was sitting propped up on a table, a cushion from the book corner thrust behind her back and a large bar of chocolate in her right hand. She looked blissfully happy. Rouse, standing beside her, looked up and grinned sheepishly as he saw me.
‘I brort ‘er up ‘ere, Sir. I couldn’t see ‘er mum, an’ then she said she ‘ad a sister in the Infants so I was goin’ to take ‘er down there, an’ then she kept cryin’ so we went to the shop and I got ‘er a bar o’ chocolate and then I thort it ‘ud be best to bring ‘er up ‘ere where there was a bit o’ peace and quiet. She stopped cryin’, then.’
His voice dropped and he looked deeply apologetic.
‘Don’t you realise how worried we’ve been?’ I interrupted him angrily. ‘And what on earth did you take her off to the shop for? Anything could have happened. You might at least have come and told me you’d found her.’
‘I was goin’ to, Sir, but what with the rain an’ all that I jus’ thort it’ud be a good idea to bring ‘er up ‘ere. I mean, she’s only a little ‘un,’ he added limply.
Susan Brennan looked at the little girl and then at Rouse. After a moment she nodded seriously, impressed with the effort Rouse had made. Susan Davis took out a grubby handkerchief and began to wipe chocolate from the child’s face. When she was satisfied that most of it had been removed and Tracey looked presentable again, she stuffed the handkerchief back in her pocket and sniffed.
‘Wouldn’t surprise me if she was sick after that lot,’ she muttered, staring pointedly at Rouse. He thrust his hands into his pockets and stared at Susan.
‘Blimey, I miss me game lookin’ after this little kid, an’ all I get is a load of naggin’ women,’ he objected.
‘But you don’t seem to realise how worried we were,’ I said, not sure whether I was included in Rouse’s sweeping generalisation. ‘As it is, I’ve got half the class all over the place still looking for you.’
‘They won’t look for long,’ he said miserably. ‘They don’t like me much anyway.’
‘Of course they like you, you silly boy. I like you too. It’s just that sometimes you don’t think very carefully.’
‘He did try his best though, Sir,’ said Susan Brennan. ‘I mean, if you think about it, he did look after her.’
‘Yes, I know he did. But Tracey’s mother was very worried. And so was I. I’ll admit it was a kind thought, though. The chocolate, I mean.’
Several other children from the class came hurrying into the room, followed by Mrs Garrett, who clung desperately to the door frame and panted loudly, unable to say anything at all. Tracey climbed down from the table and ran to her mother, who gave her a hefty cuff round the ear that spun the child around and sent her into a flood of tears.
‘Bleedin’ nuisance, you are,’ she gasped at Rouse. ‘If you’d ‘ave left ‘er where she was we could ‘ave bin at the ‘Ealth Centre and gone back ‘ome by now.’
Rouse looked decidedly hurt. ‘Gawd!’ he exclaimed, ‘if I’d known you was goin’ to make this much fuss I’d ‘ave left ‘er in the road.’
Tracey, who had obviously taken a great liking to Rouse and was upset at the verbal abuse he was receiving, retaliated by kicking her mother in the ankle. She received a second, much harder, clout on the ear and then Mrs Garrett wagged a finger at Rouse.
‘I’m seein’ the ‘eadmaster about you,’ she shouted, now fully r
ecovered from the climb. ‘And ‘im,’ she added menacingly, looking in my direction.
‘Whaffor?’ Rouse objected, immediately springing to my defence. ‘‘E never ‘ad nothin’ to do with it.’
‘Don’t you give me any more of your bleedin’ cheek!’ she snapped, waving a finger in front of his nose. ‘Some of you kids need teachin’ a bloody good lesson. Come on Tracey.’
She grabbed the child’s arm and gave it a savage jerk, like somebody trying to launch a kite on a calm day. Tracey was extremely reluctant to go, and shouted defiantly at her mother as they left the room. There was an awed silence for several minutes, broken eventually by Rouse.
‘Well, all I can say is, it’s lucky you ain’t stayin’ ‘ere, Sir. After all, in a couple o’ years time you might ‘ave ‘ad to teach ‘er daughter.’
Just for once, I found myself completely in sympathy with Rouse’s point of view.
(iv)
The time taken up with the incident had reduced my break to a mere three minutes. There was nobody in the staffroom and I poured myself a cup of tepid tea. I was surprised to find that my hand was shaking. The door suddenly banged open and Brian hurried into the room, dumping the bats, balls and hoops he was carrying onto the large table in the corner. He took a deep breath and sighed.
‘Honestly, you say to ‘em, make sure you don’t leave anything in the playground. You might as well talk to yourself. In fact, some of the time I think I am talking to myself. Are you really sure you want to be a teacher, Mike? Why don’t you do something a lot easier? Like being a nuclear physicist?’
‘I might just do that. I’ve just had my first run-in with a parent. A Mrs Garrett.’
Brian looked up and grinned. ‘Oh, dear old Doris? Lost her kids again has she?’