by Lulu Taylor
‘But Will was. He was driving. Perhaps she felt she ought to apologise on his behalf.’
Tom snorted. ‘I’m surprised she’d ever blame Will for anything. If she hadn’t worshipped him quite so devotedly his whole life, perhaps he might be less of a shit sometimes.’ He flicked his gaze up to her. Usually when he said something like this, she rebuked him immediately, made excuses for Will. But she said nothing. ‘Sorry,’ he said, as though he was prepared to go through the usual routine even if she didn’t play her part. ‘I know I shouldn’t – not when Will is lying in hospital in a coma.’ He closed his eyes, and screwed up his face, then opened them again. ‘Christ, I can’t believe I really just said those words. This is a totally terrible thing, Em. I want you to know that I’m behind you every step. I might not have been Will’s biggest fan, but I wouldn’t wish what’s happened to him on anybody. He’s going to get better, I know it. You’re going to get your life back on track.’
She stared at him. But I don’t want him to get better. And my life will never be on track again.
‘So what did she say?’ Tom asked.
‘What?’ She was confused. Her brain still felt as though it was on a two-way system, her involvement with the outside world moving sluggishly while her interior mind raced and talked almost incessantly.
‘Diana. When she came to see you yesterday. What did she say?’
Emily remembered. Diana, elegant in a blue skirt, white blouse and grey cardigan, her white hair as carefully styled as ever, had sat by the bed, her hands, veined and liver-spotted, folded in her lap. Her hazel-green eyes, just like Will’s, were anxious, full of strain and sadness.
‘Oh Emily,’ she had said in her soft patrician tones. ‘Oh my dear girl. You mustn’t worry. He’s going to get better. I have absolute faith. We’ll get through this together.’
They had never been very close but now the gulf between them felt so vast, they might as well live on different planets. Emily could sense her mother-in-law’s deep need for her son to return to her but she understood it only in the vaguest way. She was completely untouched by it.
‘Well?’ Tom pressed.
‘She said we’re to go in for a talk from the doctors about Will’s condition. They’ve been doing all their tests – the scans, the imaging, MRI. They’re going to give us the long-term prediction.’
Tom reached out and took her hand again. She could see his sympathy for her all over his face. ‘Em, I’m so sorry. This is so hard for you. But Will’s young and strong. If anyone can recover from this, it’s him. But . . . brain injury.’ He seemed to wince at the thought. ‘God, what a nightmare.’
‘I have to think about what will happen if he doesn’t come back,’ she said. She sipped the hot coffee, letting it burn her tongue before she swallowed it. Will can’t do this, she thought with a tiny pang of triumph that she was able to lift a cup to her mouth, savour the taste of the coffee, feel it track its hot path down her throat.
Tom nodded seriously.
‘There’s so much to sort out,’ she said, and the surge of sickness returned to her stomach. How long will I have this house? How long will money come out of the bank machine? What about the bills?
‘Don’t think about that now,’ Tom said stoutly. He squeezed her hand and let it go. ‘Let’s just concentrate on getting you all better.’
She nodded, vaguely comforted. If Tom was happy to postpone the moment of truth, then she would be docile and let him protect her from it. But it seemed as if a small wailing siren of panic, one that only she could hear, was sounding from the hall, where the pile of letters waited on the console table.
All I want is the children home. Once they’re back, I’ll get the strength to look.
Chapter Four
‘So, Miss Fellbridge, I hope you’re not feeling too disappointed.’
Cressie stared at the headmaster, a man who seemed older than her father. In fact, all the staff seemed extremely old. ‘Well, I—’
‘Lady Atwell said you were rather keener on the primary school.’
‘Yes, I had thought . . .’ She’d envisaged herself at the huge old Victorian school down the road, surrounded by the shining faces of very young children as she taught them their alphabet and multiplication tables. ‘That’s what I thought,’ she finished lamely.
The headmaster smiled at her. He had white wisps of hair around a shiny bald head and there was something that repelled her about the pink and grey tint to his complexion. But he seemed kindly enough. ‘Of course. I know that women are drawn more naturally to the care of the younger ones. And the teaching is not as rigorous as we require in a school like this. Do you know much about us?’
‘Nothing,’ she said blankly. She had arrived at St Mary’s primary school in Forest Gate that morning, taking an Underground train from Liverpool Street out to Upton Park, a part of London so far from home it was hard to believe it really was still part of the city. She’d enjoyed her tour around the school, the headmistress pointing out the classrooms full of children hard at their books, and she’d watched them racing and squealing in the playground. She’d seen the dear little things lining up for their milk break and noticed how many of them were in patched or too-tight clothes, some with an air of skinny grubbiness, and she’d longed to rush in and make it all better.
But at the end of the tour, the headmistress had suggested that if there was time, she might like to see Fleming Technical College just a short walk away, and had told her that the headmaster, Mr Granville, would be glad to see her. In fact, she’d been bold enough to tell him to expect her. There was no call for extra staff, even volunteers, at the primary school but the college would be glad of additional help, particularly in their English department, and wasn’t reading and writing where Miss Fellbridge wanted to offer her services? Wasn’t her diploma in literature?
Cressie had been bewildered by the turn of events but could think of no reason why she shouldn’t go, and a child from the oldest year had been commandeered to take her there.
‘Thank you so much for coming to see us,’ the headmistress had said, shaking her hand. ‘I only wish there were more people like you, willing to give up their time to help us in our work.’ But the headmistress’s smile made Cressie suspicious that she was actually glad to have shaken her off so easily. ‘Billy will take you to Fleming. Billy, come straight back, do you hear?’
Billy had marched ahead of her, hands in the pockets of his frayed shorts, and muttered commands when they reached the road – ‘Watch yerself, miss, there’s the gutter’ and ‘Mind the bus, miss’ – then walked her around a corner and up to the front gate of a large, red-brick building with a boxy regularity that lacked the charm of the primary school but was nevertheless impressive with its three storeys and rows of many-paned windows.
Billy had scampered off before she could thank him and now, after a quick walk around the school with a teacher, she was here with the head in his study.
Mr Granville looked at her over the top of his spectacles. ‘We were founded in 1921 as the Fleming Day Continuation Institute, and occupied the congregational hall down the road.’ He smiled. ‘We’ve grown a little since then. These premises were built in the thirties, and luckily for us escaped the bombs. Now we’ve assimilated another school and have become a technical college. Do you know what that means?’
She shook her head. Her own experience of school seemed vastly simple. She’d arrived at her girls’ day school in Kensington at the age of four, smart in shiny Mary Janes, a blue blazer and a miniature straw boater, and had left it fourteen years later, educated. Her brothers had gone away at seven and made their smooth journeys from prep to public school and then to university. But she knew there was a whole other world beyond her experience where things were not so straightforward.
‘The pupils here have passed the Eleven Plus, but not with such distinction that they’re considered grammar school material. Those who failed entirely, of course, are at the secondary modern. The childr
en we have here are smart and show potential, but they’ll never be top academic material. We hope to cater for them by paving the way to rewarding careers that require brains and skill – engineering, design, technologies and so forth. We don’t look to the humanities as much here as you would expect in a grammar school.’ The headmaster smiled at her again, this time with a conspiratorial air. ‘I’m sure you understand me.’
‘Yes,’ Cressie said. Her spirits swooped downwards. She pictured a mass of eleven-year-olds, still such young children, herded off onto their inexorable paths towards a life in trade, or in skilled work, or else towards university and a profession. Who had the right to decide all this for them? What about their choice, or their potential to grow and develop? Was any child fully formed at eleven? She imagined a child who somehow, unexpectedly, managed to pass the exam and became condemned to the misery of failing expectations, and another who didn’t pass despite a clever brain and afterwards was never allowed to use his talents. It didn’t seem right somehow that such a big decision was made so early and was then unchangeable.
Mr Granville fixed her with a piercing look. ‘This must be very different from what you’re used to.’
‘Yes . . . I suppose it is.’ She felt ashamed somehow, as though she was displaying her pampered upbringing in every expression that crossed her face. Do I look horrified? I don’t mean to.
‘The boys and girls here are from a variety of backgrounds but mostly modest. You mustn’t feel too sorry for them. They don’t expect or want more than this, I can assure you of that. Many of them resent school, and don’t particularly want to be here. Their parents have little understanding of the value of education, and most want their children to leave and begin work as soon as possible. My job – the job of all of us here – is to give those children a solid knowledge of the things they will need to support themselves decently in the future. They must be made to be responsible members of society, men and women who can raise and support families. They need us to help them with firmness and insistence on work and standards. Do you understand that?’
‘Of course.’ She didn’t like the way his voice was taking on a hectoring edge and was filled with a disdain for him because he implied such superiority over the children in his care. Why was he so adamant that their aspirations were so limited? She suddenly saw that his suit was saggy at the seams and his waistcoat had a button dangling by a thread. She noticed hairs in his ears and wondered what he had eaten for lunch and whether he cleaned his shoes himself in the evening. Then she caught herself up, mortified. But I’m as bad. Sizing him up. Judging him. Wondering if he’s a gentleman or not. We’re all trapped by wherever we’ve come from. I hate these boxes. Why can’t we get out of them?
The headmaster said, ‘Then if you would like to offer your services here, we’d be very glad of them. We can’t pay you, unfortunately, but if you have expenses – bus fares and so on – you can submit them and we shall reimburse you. You may have a lunch here at the school if you require it. We only ask for a commitment of the hours we need for at least a term.’ He smiled at her, his eyes bright again, his authority mysteriously restored to him. ‘How does that sound?’
She stared at him, flummoxed. She’d intended to work with small children and here she was in a world of adolescence, where education was no longer about the simple certainties of ABC and 1 + 1, but a more serious opening of minds to the complexities of life, the wonders of learning, and the adult world that awaited them just beyond the school gates. Self-doubt fluttered around her. Was she really up to this task? What did she know of the world that most of these boys and girls would grow into, with her life in the tall house in Kensington, looked after by maids and cooks, her allowance paid no matter what. But, she said to herself, that doesn’t mean I’m forbidden to offer whatever I can.
‘Of course,’ she said firmly. ‘I should like to very much.’
Mr Granville’s smile broadened. ‘Excellent. Then let’s go at once to the office and make the arrangements. You can start as soon as you like.’
Cressie left the school feeling oddly invigorated, as though someone had just told her that without any training and barely any equipment she would have to climb a mountain, and she felt a kind of fearful excitement at attempting something so difficult.
She walked back to Upton Park Underground station. Along Queen’s Road, there were newly built houses, smart and square, squatter than the old Victorian terraces that flanked them. Opposite was a large stretch of allotments. The bombs had probably flattened a great many of the houses around here, and gradually the old sites were being cleared and developed. She was glad to see it: a new London for the new generation. Something would be done about the lot of the poor. Things would be better when the crumbling old slums harbouring mould and diseases had been ripped down and clean, modern housing with good drains and electrics were put in their place. A new start.
That horrid old man, she thought, remembering Granville, the headmaster. Writing off all those children just because they’re working class. As though they haven’t got dreams and aspirations like everyone else. As though they’re not capable of living like civilised people because they’re not going to the grammar school.
She wanted fervently to change things and make a difference. She saw herself opening the eyes of the wondering youngsters of Forest Gate to the beauties of poetry and Shakespeare, to books and history. They would step out into the world finer and nobler because of it.
Could I? Is it possible?
Her face flushed with pleasure at the thought that she might achieve something, change lives. Her father thought she was dallying with teaching, just marking time until she married Adam, or someone like him. He was so powerful, so determined, that it was hard to resist his vision of her future. But perhaps she would find the strength to forge her own path. She wouldn’t marry at all. She’d devote her life to teaching, create wonderful new methods of imparting knowledge to children, alter hundreds, even thousands, of lives. Perhaps she’d end up as the head of a famous school or college, a distinguished elderly lady, the kind whose portrait hung in the entrance halls of their institution . . .
Cressie drew up short with a gasp. ‘Oh bother it! Oh crumbs . . .’ She looked at her watch. ‘It’s impossible, I can’t do it.’ Cursing her stupidity, she tucked her handbag under her arm and ran as fast she could towards the station.
She emerged red-faced and hot in the late afternoon sun, the station steps leading out into a different world from the one she had descended from in Upton Park, the Georgian elegance contrasting with the wreckage and poverty of East London. She didn’t have time to consider it, but instead peered at the letter she was holding, rereading the spidery copperplate hand and deciphering the scrawled map. The black arrows directed her away from the station and the busy main road lined with shops, up the gentle hill and around to the right. Within moments, she was in a quiet leafy neighbourhood of large Regency houses in various states of repair, some spruce and well kept, others fading and bedraggled. The little map pointed her towards a church, the golden spire of which rose high against the blue sky and into a road that skirted the churchyard and led into a near silent street, where only birdsong ruffled the air. The houses were large and white-painted, with tall arched windows. Cressie consulted the letter again. The house she was looking for was number 16, and she found it easily, set back from the road and obscured by a large tree. She peered towards it curiously, looking out for signs of life behind the window. There were none. Pushing open the black wrought-iron gate, she went cautiously up the garden path.
This is horribly embarrassing. She looked at her watch. It was well after four o’clock and she’d been expected at half past two. She considered turning around and going home. She could send an apologetic note saying she’d been unavoidably detained somewhere. After all, what did she owe anyone? This whole thing had not been her idea. In reality, she didn’t want to do it at all. It was nothing more than a bore, a stupid distraction from thing
s that really mattered.
As she stood on the path, she saw a flicker of movement behind the glass of the window and realised that now she’d been seen she couldn’t leave. Taking a deep breath, she walked along the grass-edged path, up the stone steps to the front door and pressed the bell marked ‘Few’.
There was no noise from within and her mood switched from humble apology to irritation.
Well? Where is he? Has he just gone out? Or is he pretending not to be there?
She could hardly blame him if he had gone out, but really, after the long journey back into town and out again, all the way to Blackheath, when she could now be at home having tea and getting ready for the exhibition she was supposed to be attending tonight, if he was playing silly games because he was cross that she was late . . . Well, honestly . . .
Then from within came the sound of a door opening and strong determined footsteps crossing a hard surface, and the front door opened. There he was, one hand on the door frame, the other on the handle, in a strangely relaxed attitude. He wore a white shirt under a plain black jumper that was flecked with paint, and black trousers. His brown shoes were spattered with dots of colour: white, scarlet, blue and green. He stared down at her, a smile flickering over his lips.
‘Hello,’ he said.
Cressie stared up; she stood lower than him on the front step so that he towered above her. He was tall anyway but he seemed to loom over her. She felt the world around her disappear. Everything narrowed down to only him. ‘Oh!’ she gasped.
He raised his eyebrows. ‘Do you have the right place? Or are you selling something? Because I shan’t be buying, I’m afraid, unless you are particularly charming. But I’m notoriously hard to please.’
‘It’s you!’ she said, her voice breathless with astonishment.
‘Of course it is,’ he returned. ‘And you are you too.’ He smiled again as though they were playing some kind of mysterious game