by Phoebe Wynne
Rose surveyed the class as a few of them nodded. ‘Does he?’
‘Yes.’
A girl in the middle smiled beatifically, and a few others near her smiled too. Rose couldn’t help but look across at her ceramic owl for support.
‘And is “Hope” a nickname for Caldonbrae Hall?’
‘Yes, Madam,’ Daisy chimed in thoughtfully. ‘You know, we don’t ever get new teachers. You should know that things don’t change here. This is a place of tradition.’
‘Daisy,’ Nessa wrinkled her freckled nose, ‘sometimes you actually sound like the prospectus.’
‘So are we supposed to look up to you, then, Madam?’ Freddie leaned forward, her tawny eyes flashing at Rose. ‘Is there something you’ve got to teach us?’
‘Yes, Madam. Tell us, what have you got that we need?’ added Josie in her deep voice.
Rose felt her chest stir as her cheeks burned at this barrage of words and challenges, questions she couldn’t possibly answer. Every day there were fresh lashings of persecution. But she answered, ‘I would have thought that you could trust your Headmaster’s judgement in choosing me.’
‘Yes, but, Madam,’ Freddie’s eyes stayed on Rose, ‘he doesn’t have to sit here and translate Latin for an hour each week.’
Rose looked at Freddie for a moment.
‘Okay then, girls. You want to know a little bit about me. That’s fine.’ Rose didn’t trip over the words this time; after this, she hoped she’d no longer have to repeat her short biography: ‘Caldonbrae Hall is my second school. I taught in a state school before this, and trained in two others. I’m originally from Kent, I’ve studied in London and in Rome. Your Headmaster and the governors chose me.’ Her cheeks flushed again. ‘And I can tell you, there aren’t many young female teachers out there as dedicated or as passionate as me.’
Rose wheeled around to the blackboard, hearing a slow murmur of surprise from the room behind her. She started to write. Her vain hope that this lot would be any better than her other classes seemed laughable now.
‘Yes, but, I mean, are you even married?’ asked Daisy.
Rose called out cheerfully from the blackboard, ‘Not at all.’
‘Oh, really?’ Nessa asked. ‘Then why have they sent you to teach us?’
‘Let’s find out, shall we?’ Rose turned to face the room, continuing to write without looking. ‘For now, though, silence. And copy this down.’
She nodded at them, before glancing at the books on her bureau: Sophocles’ Oedipus, Euripides’ Medea, Homer’s Iliad. One way or another someone was going to get eaten alive here, Rose realised. She’d be damned if it was her.
3.
Later that morning, Rose could sense the girl following her as she paced along the main corridor. Empty but for the two of them, the corridor was endlessly long, guttered with stone and lined with oak wainscoting that in turn presented decorative noticeboards or doors to classrooms and offices. Its ceiling was cavernously high; any footsteps and voices disappeared up into its tall reaches.
Rose focused on the space in front of her. Behind was the same girl that had stared at Rose at the main doors days before – but that stare now seemed daring, accusatory. She had been continually hovering behind Rose every day this week.
Rose had just left the staff common room after a difficult conversation with one of the senior teachers. She’d mentioned her predecessor – who was she, and more importantly, why had she left the department in such disarray? The paperwork, the classes, even the piles of textbooks? But the dismissive woman had cut Rose short, and Rose had left, shamed by the very thing she didn’t understand.
Since then the girl had resumed her place behind Rose, seemingly tethered by an invisible bind. She was a sixth-former – Rose could tell by the soft blue dress drawn tightly over her tall, gaunt figure. Her hair wasn’t as coiffed as the others’; instead, it hung straggly beyond the bony ripple of her shoulders, her face sallow underneath the decoration of her make-up.
Every time Rose had turned to challenge her, the girl whipped herself away. She hadn’t yet followed Rose up to the classroom, though. Rose knew she had more to worry about than one girl’s peculiarities, but those translucent eyes, the dark shadows stamped beneath them, made her heart stammer.
At the corridor’s halfway point, the entrance hall, Rose’s gaze was drawn up to the glass dome of the ceiling above the Great Stairs. The silent scrutiny of that strange eye, twisted with metal and mottled glass, was better than the curious gapes of the staff in the common room, or the hanging shadow of the girl behind her.
The bell rang.
Rose stopped at the foot of the stairs, taking a long look at the Headmaster’s study door across the hallway. Her fourth day, and she still hadn’t been invited in.
A muddled crowd of Junior girls bumped past her, identical in their white pinafore dresses and pretty silver-ribboned plaits. Rose gripped the dark oak of the bannister as a scuffle of voices came from the stairs.
‘Isn’t that her?’
‘Look at her messy hair!’
‘Hardly any bosom at all!’
Stepping higher past them, Rose glanced down at her chest in spite of herself. Not much there, she had to admit. She’d never minded – at their age she’d been forced to attend rallies burning other people’s bras, her mother shouting her on.
‘Harriet!’ an adult voice called out behind Rose. ‘Remember your manners. This is our new member of staff.’ Rose turned to see the deputy head scrutinising the girls as they hopped down the steps.
‘Of course. Good morning, Madam!’ One of the small girls turned to smile up at Rose, showing all her teeth.
‘Well done, Harriet.’ Vivien’s handsome face was severe as the girls swung around the bannister at the bottom of the stairs. ‘As for the rest of you – heads up, backs straight or I’ll get the books. What’s that?’
Vivien bent her slim figure over two of them, frowning as a blonde-haired girl clutched at her watery-eyed friend, muttering in the deputy head’s ear.
‘Homesick? For heaven’s sake, it’s only been a few days. Tell her to stop weeping or she’ll cry all the lovely blue out of her eyes.’
Rose turned to climb higher up the stairs.
‘Good morning, Madam,’ Vivien called over as the Junior girls moved away. ‘I trust your first week is going well. We’ll have to find a moment to see how you are.’
‘Good morning, Vivien,’ Rose replied sheepishly. ‘I’d really like that. I was hoping to see the Headmaster for an introductory meeting.’
Vivien’s face seemed to tighten. ‘That’s all very good. But please don’t address me in that manner in front of the girls. It’s “Madam” for every female teacher here.’
Rose opened her mouth to apologise. But Vivien’s head had tilted – she’d spotted Rose’s quiet follower, frozen in place on the bottom step. Vivien’s face flitted from the student to Rose, before dragging her eyes back to the girl with a steely stare.
‘Bethany,’ she said quietly, ‘come with me.’ The ice in Vivien’s voice gave Rose an involuntary shudder as the sixth-form girl drew towards the deputy head. They moved away in the next moment.
Bethany, Rose said to herself.
On the middle landing she halted at the library’s carved double doors; behind her the Great Stairs split into an extravagant double sweep to the floor above. Rose stayed where she was, still thinking, relieved to be free of her follower. She pushed through the library doors with surprising force.
Shafts of dusty light fell on the bookcases like a blessing. The place had been empty all week and was fast becoming her favourite spot. Rose adored the symmetry of the space: the wealth of books that lined the walls up to the tall oak ceiling, the long window seat that overlooked a quad, the mezzanine floor that ran around the entire shape of the room, the two symmetrical spiral staircases
that led the readers up.
But today Rose moved away from the books, past the desks and armchairs to stand in front of the expansive wall opposite, where a huge map was inked across a large spread of parchment. Hope, it decreed. Rough at the edges despite the vast glass casement, it revealed the misshapen enormity of the school. With her eyes she followed the blueprint’s lines and squares to make out the chapel in the south wing, close to the long dining hall and opposite four wide boarding houses labelled Verity, Temperance, Prudence and Clemency. Then the scattered multitude of classrooms throughout, threaded by corridors and passageways. The northern section of the school held a sports hall, a theatre, and two more boarding houses – Honour and Chastity – embedded within the north wing. Founder’s Hall was neatly ensconced there too, like an abscess buried just above the heart of the school.
There was a date at the bottom of the map, but Rose couldn’t quite make it out.
She frowned up at the massive spread of parchment. Speak to me, she thought. Let me learn how to live here.
Later that afternoon, Rose slammed down a pile of books as she entered the Classics office. Emma was bent over her own work against the wall opposite. She looked over.
‘Anything wrong?’
‘Well, yes.’ Rose’s brass ring of keys slid from her pile to the wooden desk with a metallic clunk. Her veneer of calm was slipping now that she was alone with her colleague.
‘What’s happened?’ Emma asked cautiously, turning towards Rose and lifting her glasses off her face.
‘Where’s my Upper Sixth class? I’ve only seen them once, and apparently they’re not here tomorrow.’
‘Oh, they’ve gone to London. They always go in September.’
‘London?’
‘To be presented, yes. It’s an initiation sort of thing, to start off their final year. It’s tradition.’ Emma waved her comment away with her hand. ‘Not to worry, you’ll have to excuse them.’
Rose was aghast. ‘But what about their lessons?’
Emma answered steadily. ‘There are some who would say that the ceremony in London is more important. The girls get a lot out of it.’
‘And would you? Say it’s more important?’
Emma looked disconcerted for a moment, then said, ‘Every school has their traditions.’
Rose sat down and glared at the mess on her desk. ‘It doesn’t set a very good precedent, does it? I haven’t got through any of my lesson plans this week.’
‘Ah, yes.’ Emma gave a wry smile. ‘I don’t think I’ve written a lesson plan in years.’ She swung back to her work, hooking her glasses back on her face.
Rose couldn’t keep the sharpness from her voice. ‘I’m so surprised by all of this, Emma. I’ve met all my classes, now, and the girls are—’
‘What?’
Rose blurted out, ‘They don’t seem to want to learn.’
Emma didn’t turn around as the statement hung in the air.
‘Of course the girls want to learn, Rose. But they are teenagers. You have to win them over, play along a bit. That’s what we’re paid for, after all. And of course, our young ladies,’ Emma nodded, her eyes still on her work, ‘are extremely busy.’
‘Busy?’
‘And I suppose the teaching in the department has been a bit lacklustre in the past …’
‘Yes, what did happen to my predecessor?’ Rose’s voice lifted higher. ‘What was her name?’
‘Jane was her name.’ Emma looked up this time; she passed her glasses over her thick skirt, rubbing them on the fabric. ‘You’re right. She wasn’t up to it. We always got on very well, but she was troubled and became very unhappy here. She – she couldn’t really stay.’
Rose squinted at Emma. ‘Oh, come on. You’re going to have to give me more details than that.’
‘Well.’ Emma tilted her head. ‘Hope is rather remote, the system is unique … we all live here together. It is a lifestyle choice – it needs dedication. Things got badly out of hand for Jane. She simply had to go.’
Rose checked the view outside the long mullioned window. The light was already fading, the wild sea turning grey with the gloom. Leaning forward cautiously, she tried again. ‘Can’t you tell me why?’
Emma placed her glasses back on her nose.
‘It’s confidential, I’m afraid.’
‘Is this why I was recruited so quickly?’
‘You were an extraordinary candidate. Highly recommended. Our first new teacher in over a decade, and a fine choice. Your father, too, was a prominent academic.’ Emma reeled off the words as if she’d learned them by heart, then added, ‘Vivien and I liked you immensely when we visited your previous school for the interview.’
Rose didn’t take the compliment. ‘Why didn’t you take the head of department role? You’re much more qualified than I am.’
‘Oh goodness, no.’ Emma turned back to her work. ‘I need to limit my academic responsibilities. I was once considered for a housemistress role, which would have been fabulous. But I can’t do too much.’
‘Why not?’
‘Well,’ Emma huffed, and Rose wondered if she was pushing it too far, ‘I do a good deal of pastoral work, outside the curriculum, in the boarding houses, in the afternoons.’ Emma shook out her shoulders. ‘Your timetable will change, once you’ve settled in and passed the probationary period.’
‘Yes, I’ve been told.’ Rose kneed her desk in a frustrated movement. ‘Next term, then?’
‘Should be, yes,’ Emma nodded. ‘That’s how it was for me, back in the day.’
But Rose wasn’t listening. Her knee had loosened a stiff drawer she’d been trying to open a few days before. She waited for Emma to go back to her work before tugging it out and checking the contents. First was a pile of marking, pages of unreturned translations with frayed, yellowed edges, a teacher’s spidery writing scrawled over the students’ mistakes. But there was something underneath – a flattened, stained handkerchief, its edge stitched in blue, the corner bent out of shape. Rose traced her finger over the initials ‘BdV’. No ‘J’ then, for Jane?
Rose dropped the handkerchief and shunted the drawer closed, feeling her beating heart in the tips of her fingers.
‘That reminds me, Rose,’ Emma asked suddenly. ‘Have you had a proper meeting with the Headmaster?’
Rose breathed out quickly. ‘Oh. No, not properly.’
‘Well, he’s away with the Upper Sixth now. We’ve got the staff meeting Monday lunchtime, he’ll introduce you properly then. But you ought to see him privately. Incidentally,’ Emma sat back in her seat with a triumphant look, ‘isn’t it wonderful news about your mother?’
Rose’s quivering heartbeat seemed to reach her throat. ‘My mother? What … news?’
‘Moving to a private clinic, of course.’
‘What private clinic?’
‘Oh, haven’t you been informed?’ Emma’s face fell a little. ‘HR should have told you in a memo. They’re moving her. She’ll have her own dedicated nurses, her own private room, everything.’
Rose choked out, ‘How do you know about my mother?’
‘It’s in your dossier,’ replied Emma nonchalantly, turning away, ‘and I think you mentioned her when Vivien and I interviewed you. If you don’t mind my saying, it’s very unfair that you had to sell your family home to cover her treatment … but then there are some things that the NHS doesn’t—’
‘Emma,’ Rose couldn’t hide her mortification, ‘what do you mean she’s been moved? She was fine where she was.’
‘I’d ask one of the secretaries if I were you. It’s all been arranged. One of the perks of being here.’
‘Perks?’ Rose snapped back.
‘Well, look at me.’ Emma splayed out her hands. ‘Hope certainly takes care of my husband – he’s in our family home while I’m here during term-time.
The governors, too, arranged for my two boys’ private schooling,’ she added proudly, ‘and entry to their respective universities.’
Rose shook her head in amazement. ‘But – no, I don’t want them to take care of my mother. That’s my job.’
‘Oh Rose, you are funny.’ Emma gave her a renewed smile. ‘In order for you to do your job, you need to have no distractions. Surely knowing your mother is in the best possible place will ease your mind? That’s the beauty of Caldonbrae. That’s the extent of its reach. You should be grateful. I know I am.’
Rose pressed her lips together and touched her hot cheeks with one hand. She wanted to tear out of the office and scream down the stairs, rush into the main office and interrogate the secretaries. She was almost certain she’d never mentioned her mother, or the financial burden of her care, to Emma or to the deputy head when they’d visited her for their interview. But had she intimated something? Even so, how on earth did they find out she’d sold their house? What right did they have to move her mother without informing Rose?
A knock at the office door interrupted the tangle of Rose’s thoughts. The door pushed open with such force that it slammed into a pile of old textbooks. Emma bolted upright; Rose flinched at the woman’s sudden movement.
‘Frances!’ Emma exclaimed. ‘So good to see you.’
Frances seemed to invade the space with her height and her confidence. Her white-blonde hair was wiry against her broad cheekbones; the stretch of her mauve dress suggested an athlete’s figure. Rose stood up to mirror the other two.
‘Yes, good to see you, Emma,’ said Frances at once. ‘Sorry for any absences. I was late to arrive, and I’ve been keeping my head down, but I’m here now.’
‘Ah, Frances, this is Rose,’ Emma announced loudly.
Frances thrust out her arm to shake Rose’s hand. Her demeanour reminded Rose of Susan Sarandon’s Louise – older and more competent than her friend Thelma.