Keep the Home Fires Burning

by S Block

  ‘If anyone can get him downstairs in a fit state to leave,’ Sarah had said, ‘it’s them.’

  Frances hadn’t been offended by the remark. It was true. Since Noah had come to live with Frances they had certainly grown closer, but she nevertheless lacked that carefree spark he so readily responded to in both Claire and Spencer, and which drew him closer to them than to her.

  It’s almost certainly their age. They’re young. On the cusp of having children themselves. He’s far closer to them in age than he is to me. It’s perfectly understandable. And it isn’t as if he never comes to me for affection and reassurance, because he does. Or that he doesn’t like my company, because I know he does.

  Frances had often heard Noah and Claire, or Noah and Spencer, laughing uncontrollably together in another part of the house, or in the large garden where they played nearly every day. When she first heard them she had felt jealous, but had quickly realised that having a whale of a time with Claire and Spencer needn’t mean Noah had a subdued, sombre time with her. He simply had a different sort of time. It was perfectly natural. Frances marvelled at how adept Noah was at fitting in perfectly with the different personalities and moods of the adults he lived and mixed with. It was a very ‘Peter’ characteristic.

  ‘Like a little diplomat,’ Frances had said to Sarah.

  Sarah worried it might mean Noah would struggle to assert himself at boarding school, forgoing establishing his own personality as he attempted to fit in with stronger personalities around him. She had raised this as an argument for Noah perhaps not going to boarding school at all, but remaining in Great Paxford and attending the village school. Both Claire and Spencer agreed with Sarah’s concern and her suggestion that Noah might not leave, but Frances had dismissed the idea.

  ‘The independence will do him the world of good,’ she had said. ‘He’ll find his own level.’

  The sound of Noah crying upstairs made such optimism seem unfounded. Claire had tried another tack to persuade Frances not to send him away. She had decided to address Frances towards the end of the evening, when she’d had a couple of Scotch and waters. Frances remembered it clearly.

  ‘I know it’s not really my place to speak about this, Mrs Barden, but you’ve asked Spencer and me to help look after him and we’ve done our best and have become very close to him in quite a short time.’

  She had paused to allow Frances to tell her to be quiet and send her out of the room, as was her right as Claire’s employer. But the Scotch had done its work and Frances was reflective enough to hear Claire out.

  ‘You’ve done wonders with him, Claire. Whether at the WI or at the house, you must feel free to speak your mind.’

  Claire had decided not to gild the lily and spoke from both her head and her heart.

  ‘Well, given how much Noah’s been moved from pillar to post the last few months, do you really think yet another move to live with yet another set of people is the best thing for him?’

  Frances had looked at Claire for a few moments, considering her question. It was one she had asked herself a number of times.

  ‘Whatever you or I might think about the issue, my dear, this is what Peter wanted for him. We have become Noah’s custodians, yes. But I feel an obligation to follow what Peter would have done with him had he remained alive.’

  And that had been the end of the conversation.

  Hiding behind my dead, philandering husband is an utter disgrace. I should be ashamed of myself. Why can’t I admit the truth? I’m sending him away because I’m scared of getting too close to him. Boarding school isn’t for his sake, it’s for mine. Coward, Frances. Admit it.

  Frances and Sarah looked up towards the landing when Noah stopped crying.

  ‘They’ve done it,’ Sarah said quietly.

  Neither she nor Frances looked happy. Both sisters felt complicit in an episode in which a child’s will had been, if not entirely broken, then at best twisted to accommodate a decision with which neither felt comfortable.

  Coward, Frances.

  ‘I’ll go and tell the taxi driver we won’t be long.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  Sarah was glad to assume a task that would take her out of the house for a few moments. It would mean she wouldn’t have to watch a red-eyed, wet-faced Noah being led downstairs by Claire and Spencer doing their utmost to put a gloss on a mistake.

  Frances watched Sarah go, then looked up the stairs and waited for Noah to appear. She could hear Claire’s low murmuring becoming more coherent as they approached the stairs on the upstairs landing.

  ‘. . . you’ll be running around with the other boys in no time, you’ll see.’

  And then Spencer.

  ‘Two days. Three tops. That’s how long it’ll take before you’ve forgotten us completely.’

  Finally, Noah appeared at the top of the stairs and looked down at Frances. She thought he had the look of someone who had been betrayed and who had become resigned to both the betrayal and its dire consequences. Though her heart broke to see such emotions plainly visible in his expression, Frances thought the kindest thing was to see this through.

  He’s made peace with it. Don’t mess him around. That would be crueller. Let him go and get on with it now. Spencer is right. In three days he will be as happy as Larry and will have forgotten all about us. This is for the best.

  She hoped it wasn’t simply a lie one tells others to console oneself.

  Claire and Spencer led Noah carefully down the stairs towards Frances. When they reached the bottom stair she said, ‘Ready?’ Noah looked at her with his red, glistening eyes and nodded meekly. Frances glanced at Claire and saw she was using all her willpower not to cry. Spencer wasn’t finding this at all easy either. Frances felt a wave of regret build in her abdomen and rise into her chest and throat. To stop herself from telling Noah to go back upstairs and unpack she put her arms around him and held him tightly. His little body felt hot in her arms and he smelled of soap. He didn’t move, simply stood as if paralysed, refusing to hug her back as he normally would. This was his judgement on her decision.

  ‘I’ll miss you,’ she whispered.

  Frances imagined this is what her mother must have felt when she had said goodbye to her and Sarah when they were girls. It was little consolation that she had never felt as sad when leaving as a child as she did saying goodbye to Noah now.

  Noah said nothing. Resistance broken, he simply stood waiting for the process of transferral from house to school to begin.

  Five minutes later, Noah was gone. Frances and Sarah had dutifully waved off the taxi containing Noah and Claire and Spencer, who had offered to escort him to his new school and help settle him in. Frances had wanted to go but couldn’t trust herself to see the job through without completely falling apart. Besides, she knew Spencer and Claire would make a better job of amusing him into relaxing and looking forward to reaching the school. Even so, Frances had never felt such gut-wrenching sadness as when she watched the taxi chug up the drive and turn into the road. Once they had all disappeared completely from view, Sarah made her excuses and went home, clearly upset.

  Frances walked slowly back to the front door and returned inside the house. The air was silent and still. She walked into the drawing room and calmly poured herself a large Scotch and water. She took it over to the cream sofa, sat in the middle and took a sizeable, numbing gulp. She felt confused. On the one hand she agreed with Peter’s decision to send Noah away to school. It’s what would have happened to any children they might have had together. They had agreed as much long before it became apparent they were unable to conceive. On the other hand, she wanted Noah in the house, near her. She knew it was selfish, but there it was. She wanted to be surrounded by his laughter and chatter and cheek. She wanted to learn what he thought about things, and answer all his questions about whatever he didn’t understand. But . . . this was what Peter wanted. Her mind clung on to this single consoling thought as a shipwrecked sailor clings on to a rock.
/>   Frances sipped at her Scotch and wondered what Noah was doing now, in the taxi. Laughing at one of Spencer’s silly knock-knock jokes, perhaps.

  Knock-knock. Who’s there? A broken pencil. A broken pencil who? Never mind – it’s pointless.

  Frances took another gulp of Scotch and let out a long sigh.

  Knock-knock. Who’s there? Etch. Etch who? Bless you!

  Frances remembered how easy it was to make Noah giggle and smiled.

  Will you remember me in a week, Noah? Yes. Will you remember me in a month? Yes. Knock-knock. Who’s there?

  Frances stared at the opposite wall. Tears pricked her eyes as she suddenly realised her greatest fear.

  What if he forgets me altogether?

  Sitting in the armchair, Frances made a conscious effort to bring Noah’s face to the forefront of her mind so as to concentrate on every feature, and imprint his visage in her memory.

  I should have had a photograph taken of him.

  He had seemed so small walking hand in hand with Claire and Spencer towards the taxi, diminishing with every step away from her. When the taxi drove away, all Frances and Sarah could see were his eyes peering back at her over the back seat, and his forehead, and the small top of his head – as if he were vanishing before them. They had waved, but he hadn’t waved back.

  She lifted the tumbler to her lips for another numbing slug of Scotch, but nothing poured into her mouth. She reached for the whisky decanter to refill her glass but it too was empty. She looked at the gin decanter. It was half full but it was too early for gin.

  She sighed and sat back. She thought of everything that lay ahead for Noah now she had placed him beyond the Luftwaffe’s reach. New things to learn. New sports to play. New friendships to make. Last night she had sat on his bed and had told him these were all opportunities that would enrich his life.

  But with Noah gone, Frances suddenly viewed them as obstacles, hurdles, tripwires and traps the world placed before the unwary, which only the most robust children could successfully negotiate. She had only known Noah here, in the protected surroundings of her house and care. Out there, he was alone. Her eyes widened as if seeing a glaring truth for the first time, and her mouth dropped open as if to speak it. But no words came. There was no one to speak them to.

  Oh God, what have I done?

  Chapter 24

  ‘Mrs Barden . . . ’

  Dr Derek Nelms, MA (Oxon), the headmaster of Noah’s boarding school, already sounded defensive, and the conversation was only two words in. It would not have mattered what time of day Frances telephoned, Nelms’s tone became immediately wary the moment his secretary informed him Mrs Barden was on the line.

  ‘Good morning, Headmaster. How are you today?’

  Frances knew he didn’t look forward to her telephone calls but it didn’t deter her from making them. Her priority was Noah, and how he was getting along. Was he happy? Was he making new friends? Was he coping with the workload? Could she speak to him? To which Dr Nelms’s responses were: ‘Yes’, ‘Yes’, Yes’, and ‘I think that would be a little destabilising at this moment in time.’ That she called every day was the issue.

  ‘I am feeling well, thank you for asking, Mrs Barden. As is young Noah.’

  Frances could tell he was trying to pre-empt her enquiries. She didn’t appreciate being ‘managed’ at the best of times by men who saw her as an irritant, least of all by one who barely concealed his growing antipathy to her calls.

  ‘I’m very glad to hear it, Headmaster. Could you be a little more specific?’

  Was that a sigh? Is the man now openly sighing down the telephone at me? Is he trying to be confrontational?

  ‘How specific would you like me to be, Mrs Barden? For example, would you like me to itemise what Noah ate at breakfast this morning? Or—’

  Frances didn’t appreciate his tone.

  ‘There’s really no need to be facetious, Headmaster. I am simply a concerned parent telephoning to make sure the child for whom I am responsible is not unhappy. It would help us both if you would treat me with a little less annoyance, and a little more respect.’

  There was silence on the other end of the line while Dr Nelms ran through his options. He had run through them before on several occasions, but none of them had worked out as he might have wanted. Being indulgent merely encouraged Frances to keep calling. Being brusque merely got her gander up.

  ‘I’m not trying to be facetious, Mrs Barden,’ he said, trying to sound emollient.

  ‘If that’s true, you’re not trying very hard.’

  ‘It is just that, as I have explained several times since Noah began at the school, you call far more frequently than the parent of any other child. Consequently—’

  ‘Could that be because I care more about my child than they do about theirs?’

  Frances knew this was unlikely to be the case, but she regarded ‘care’ and ‘anxious’ as interchangeable.

  ‘I don’t think that would be a fair assessment, Mrs Barden. And I suspect, neither do you.’

  Frances didn’t want to have an argument. She never wanted to have arguments with all sorts of people she eventually had arguments with; it was simply her nature to be more challenging of other people’s positions than they were used to. It put them on the defensive, and an argument would inevitably ensue.

  ‘I don’t wish to be confrontational—’

  There was a sudden snort at the other end of the line. Like the sound of someone choking on their tea, perhaps.

  ‘Is everything all right, Headmaster?’ Frances asked.

  ‘Everything is fine, Mrs Barden. A piece of biscuit went down the wrong way, that’s all. Do continue. You were telling me how non-confrontational you wish to be.’

  Frances caught the faintly mocking tone in his voice and decided a different strategy was called for. All she wanted was to be taken seriously as Noah’s guardian, and receive the information she requested, without editorial comment from Dr Nelms.

  ‘Dr Nelms, I know I am a great deal older than many of the parents who leave their children in your charge. And I am a widow, which means I perhaps lack the advantage of other couples, in that I have no one at home who can assuage my anxieties about Noah when they spring up. I suppose I am – to some extent – using you in this regard. If you find that onerous I apologise.’

  Frances could hear a clock ticking in the background.

  ‘It isn’t you I find onerous, Mrs Barden. You are evidently a highly intelligent, delightful woman. But the frequency of your calls is – if I may be frank – becoming counterproductive. Because—’

  ‘I understand that,’ Frances interrupted.

  ‘It doesn’t help that you scarcely allow me to respond to one point before you jump in with something else.’

  Frances felt chastened.

  ‘I do apologise. Please, finish whatever it was you were saying before we get back to the subject of Noah’s well-being.’

  That probably sounds more antagonistic than I want to sound. But I don’t care any more. Let the man waffle on if he must. I won’t be diverted.

  ‘Your daily calls, Mrs Barden, are entirely unnecessary. And, if I am completely honest, they eat away into time I need to be spending on other issues.’

  ‘Is that so, Headmaster? Such as?’

  ‘The school is home to many boys whose fathers are away, fighting. Some of those boys mask their anxieties admirably and try and get on with life here. Others are not so adept, and need a lot more consideration. Only yesterday one little chap in the fourth form learned that his father had perished in the Atlantic, protecting a food convoy targeted by a German U-boat patrol. The boy was distraught, as you can imagine. His mother was too . . . ’

  Dr Nelms’s voice trailed off for a few moments. Clearly, the episode had affected them all. Frances felt awful. She waited for the headmaster to speak, but he did not.

  ‘I’m so sorry,’ she said, softening her tone. ‘I didn’t realise.’

 
; ‘There is no reason why you should. Under any other circumstances I would try and respond to your concerns as they present themselves, but with a lot of our younger housemasters gone off to the Forces—’

  He broke off at this point. Frances wondered what was happening.

  ‘Headmaster?’

  When he came back on the line, his voice was less assured than it had been a moment ago.

  ‘It isn’t only boys we have here, Mrs Barden. Since the outbreak of war we have lost three outstanding members of staff in the fight against the Luftwaffe. Again, I don’t wish to minimise your concerns over Noah, but that has had a tremendous effect on the morale of my remaining staff. These brave young men were much admired by their colleagues when they signed up, and loved by the pupils . . . ’

  Frances felt sick with remorse.

  ‘I’m so sorry, Dr Nelms.’

  ‘I really didn’t want to get into this with you. But—’

  ‘I left you with no choice.’

  ‘Well—’

  ‘I’m so sorry, I interrupted you again.’

  The line went quiet.

  You’re such an idiot. Let the man speak.

  ‘We have a great amount to deal with on a day-to-day basis – let’s just leave it at that.’

  Frances nodded, sympathising greatly with everything the headmaster was telling her. When she next spoke, her voice was soft, almost pleading for him to help her deal with her own personal crisis of confidence about having sent Noah away.

  ‘But I can’t just leave it, Headmaster, can I? How can we find a happy medium with my concern for Noah?’

  ‘Can we agree that I will telephone you directly if there is any cause to? And if I have had no cause to, why don’t we arrange a round-up conversation at the end of each week, if only to completely set your mind at rest?’

  Frances could be horribly stubborn when she wanted to be. Yet terribly understanding when the mood struck her. She finally realised that calling every day was, indeed, counterproductive.