by Carla McKay
Judith agreed reluctantly. She had hoped to put all that behind her but as soon as people knew you had taught, they felt they could make these kind of demands. Perhaps I should ask Gillian to come round for an hour to do my housework she thought malevolently. She had spoken to Rose briefly at the barbeque, feeling a bit sorry for her slouching around on her own. The girl was rather lumpen and shy and clearly hated being dragged around with her shrill, fussy mother and moronic father who aspired to part of the ‘social whirl down here’ as Gillian referred to it. Still, give me the girl rather than her mother any time, she thought. I’d better mug up on ‘Romeo and Juliet’ before she comes. With a pang she thought of the last time she had taught the play.
8
The summer term – that final summer term at The Chase over a year ago now – had started badly. The weather had been foul. Every morning, or so it seemed, one awoke to the tap-tap-tapping of light drizzle on the slate roof. Looking out of her bedroom window high up in the Victorian gothic building that had seen better days as the Railway Hotel in the prosperous Midlands spa town in which it stood, Judith thought the sky resembled one of the old grey woollen blankets still found on the sanatorium beds. She found it intolerable. In her waking dreams, she basked under an adamantine blue sky, so blue and cloudless that it hurt the eyes.
The girls were listless, the staff edgy and irritable. Every tennis match, every rounders fixture was cancelled or called off at half-time; every frippery of summer like the school fete or the sixth form garden party had to be indefinitely postponed. Only Veronica Templeton, with her indefatigable energy, seemed to be in high spirits, organising alternatives, suggesting changes, exclaiming, exhorting, demanding, whirling from one end of the school to the other down brown linoleum corridors, shiny with age, with her high-speed walk, clip board and brave smile.
Judith was transfixed by her. She was a one-woman laser show, a solo son-et-lumière. The previous term she had arrived out of the blue to replace the ailing Miss Bowen as headmistress of The Chase. Recently widowed, though only in her early fifties, she had arrived from Kenya where she had been much admired for turning around a once-marvellous girls school gone to seed. The governors of The Chase had been impressed by her get up and go and her enthusiasm for injecting new life into old (and lifeless, it was inferred) institutions.
The Chase Girls College was the kind of school at the end of the l9th century whose Principal had exhorted the young ladies in her charge ‘to smile, bow and pass on’ if they had the mischance to encounter any young gentleman in town. By the 1960s, Miss Bowen felt able to advise the girls to counter any mild compliment with: ‘How very nice of you to say so,’ before swiftly moving on – this, even whilst London rocked and the young coupled casually in public parks. By the millennium, all the school could usefully do was to instruct the nursing sister to hand out contraceptive advice and occasionally get the blushing young chaplain to give a talk on the importance of love in marriage.
The type of girl who boarded at The Chase came from the same kind of moneyed families who had always sent their offspring there. Only now their fathers were venture capitalists rather than squires, and their mothers were too busy sunning themselves abroad to sew on nametags. Whereas in Miss Bowen’s heyday, the school had outperformed most similar institutions in academic performance, sending forth into the world a disproportionate number of doctors, dentists and vets, nowadays the school had steadily trickled down the league tables until one had to search for its name in the Top 500 rather than the top five.
Standards, in other words, had slipped, and the lacklustre atmosphere that now prevailed, meant that numbers were down and the waiting list was confined to eager Asians with brilliant mathematical abilities but poor linguistic and social skills, and the boorish offspring of Russian mafia who must have thought that an English education was just the thing for fledgling gunrunners. Veronica Templeton meant to change all that.
On an especially grey day, Judith calculated that she had now clocked up almost 16 years at The Chase. How many school assemblies, school dinners and school reports was that? It didn’t bear thinking about. The last five years, she had been the Deputy Head thanks to her longevity of service. It was a career by default, and she knew it. In truth it had suited her independent and scholarly nature perfectly well. She had been able to pretty well coast through her days there, gaining pleasure from teaching those who were receptive, and largely ignoring those who weren’t. There was not much pleasure to be had nowadays.
She had a few friends amongst her colleagues on the staff but was always anxious to escape to her small flat within the main school building at the end of the day where she relaxed by cooking delicious meals for one and writing poetry. But the real bonus, of course, were the long holidays during which she happily explored France or Italy, and usually stayed for a while with her old university friend Jane and her husband Roger in a house they rented every year in the Languedoc not far from Montpellier. It was a contented life, if not a very stimulating or demanding one. But that, had she but known it, was about to change.
Judith’s GCSE class that year were doing Romeo and Juliet for their set Shakespeare text. It was probably the easiest of the plays to teach to teenagers. Most of them could at least relate to a story of doomed young passion and they certainly enjoyed the idea of two rival gangs fighting in the streets. The other bonus was that there were two very good film versions of the play which were helpful to those who found the language difficult.
She had just finished teaching her English double lesson at the end of one Friday and was clearing her desk when Veronica tapped on the classroom door and walked in.
‘Hello Veronica,’ she smiled. ‘What can I do for you?’
Relations between the two of them were friendly but formal, since Veronica’s appointment there had been very little time to get to know each other socially. Veronica was an exceptionally striking woman, Judith thought now with her intelligent green eyes and quick mannerisms. She had already infused both staff and girls with a fresh sense of purpose and the governors were very hopeful that under her new regime things would improve.
Normally, she seemed totally in control; this evening, however, she looked exhausted and unsure of herself. ‘Judith’, she began, then faltered. She looked as though she might topple over. ‘Veronica, are you all right?’ asked Judith, looking concerned. ‘You look absolutely done in.’
‘I don’t know what the matter is with me’, admitted Veronica. ‘Things are beginning to get on top of me, I think. There’s so much to do here and so little time to do it and today I’ve had nothing but complaints about one thing and another – from parents, staff, girls and the chairman of the governors who is on my back night and day. Next thing I know, the cleaning ladies will walk out or the kitchen staff go on strike.’ She smiled wanly, but Judith could see that she was close to tears.
‘Poor you’, said Judith. ‘I’m sorry – look, if you’re free now, we could talk about it… why don’t I make you a cup of tea – or maybe something stronger?’
That was the start of their friendship. In Judith’s flat during the next hour or two, Veronica, for what seemed like the first time in weeks, relaxed enough to confide in Judith about all the problems she was facing and how she was beginning to think that she might not be able to cope after all after such a promising start. A good listener, and a veteran of the school, Judith was able to offer useful advice and allay some of Veronica’s fears. It was flattering to be confided in to such an extent and she found herself warming to this new Veronica who suddenly seemed so needy. Evidently Veronica too felt that she had gained a friend and ally. ‘I’m so grateful to you, Judith’, she said as she was leaving. ‘I should have talked to you weeks ago instead of thinking I could shoulder all this on my own.’ Briefly, she touched Judith’s shoulder. ‘Could we do this again sometime?’ Of course, Judith told her, whenever you like.
After that there were many such meetings and Judith often found herself in Veronica’s private wing
at night after supper sharing a bottle of wine and talking over everything, not just school matters. She was delighted to be on such terms with someone she had considered rather remote and over-controlled. Veronica’s now evident vulnerability touched her and to her surprise, she found herself confiding details of her own life – something she rarely did with anybody, even Jane.
‘I feel a bit like Meursault, Camus’s anti-hero in L’Étranger, she told Veronica one evening. ‘Always the outsider, always detached in some way from my own life as well as everyone else’s. I sometimes feel I walk through life on remote control, missing out on the deeper colours, the deeper sensations and invisible threads that draw everyone else towards positive, even dramatic action on occasion – towards passion, I suppose.’
‘Is that why you’ve never married?’ Veronica asked quietly. ‘Yes, I imagine so,’ admitted Judith. ‘I’ve just never felt strongly enough about anyone to do so. Again, it’s like I’ve always been looking in at both myself and other people from outside, with interest sometimes, but hardly ever with any sense of engagement. I’m an observer, not an unhappy one, but perhaps a rather bemused one most of the time. I’ve certainly never been overwhelmed by passionate love for example. I’ve been too busy watching what I was feeling to actually feel it.’
‘In a way, you’re lucky,’ replied Veronica. ‘To love people is to suffer because there’s always that risk of losing them. Love is dangerous all right, but you’re only half alive if you’re afraid to love. I’ve felt rather more alive lately.’
Looking back on it, it was this conversation, together with the way Veronica had been looking at her and the emotion in her voice that made Judith realise finally that Veronica was falling in love with her.
It was a curious revelation and one that she wasn’t sure she could cope with. She knew of course that some women loved other women but she hadn’t given it much thought. Now she wondered what a physical relationship with a woman might be like. Her experience of physical love with men had been limited and perfunctory. At university she had had a brief though unmemorable affair with a medical student; sex hadn’t repelled her, but neither had it excited her. She knew when she went to bed with him that she wasn’t feeling the right things, but she assumed it would get better. It was he who gave up on her first though telling her she was ‘cold’. She hadn’t had the experience or the energy to argue. Her friend Jane, with whom she discussed it, told her she just hadn’t met the right man, and she accepted this. Somehow the experiment wasn’t repeated.
Now, it occurred to her that she might have been barking up the wrong tree. Perhaps sex with another woman was the answer, although if that were so, it was odd it hadn’t cropped up before. She’d had a half-hearted crush on a prefect at school but that didn’t mean a thing. The Veronica business was puzzling though. She admired her and had become very fond of her. She could see objectively that Veronica was an attractive woman and now she was certain that Veronica desired her. If only she could reciprocate, perhaps she too would fall in love. In fact, knowing that Veronica desired her was in itself rather intoxicating; it meant that she now had to imagine what making love to her would be like and, to her surprise, she discovered that she would like to find out. With a small shudder of excitement, she decided that she would be receptive to any advance that Veronica might make.
She didn’t have to wait long. Possibly sensing that Judith’s attitude to her had changed, Veronica had taken her out to a small restaurant one Saturday night in a nearby village. Towards the end of dinner, they ordered brandies and Veronica had put her hand over Judith’s on the table. ‘I hope you know how much you mean to me’, she murmured. Shortly afterwards, mellow with good food and a great deal of alcohol, they had returned together to Veronica’s flat. As soon as they were inside, as Judith knew she would, Veronica took her face in her hands and kissed her, tentatively at first, but when Judith responded, with increasing passion.
The next morning, Judith awoke in Veronica’s bed feeling as though she had been shot, so bad was her hangover. She lay still, not moving, trying to recall her seduction and remembering disappointingly little about it. Certainly, she thought, she had enjoyed the new sensations at the time and dimly she thought she remembered Veronica telling her she loved her. God, how was she going to face her this morning? One thing she knew for sure was that she didn’t reciprocate the feelings Veronica had for her. Last night had been an experiment, that was all.
By the time she opened her eyes, Veronica was out of bed in the bathroom. When she returned the atmosphere was awkward. It being Sunday, they both had to attend morning church at the abbey in the town where the school held its services. They dressed quickly, not looking at each other or saying much before Judith left to tidy up in her own flat. Already she was experiencing her usual detachment from the situation. What had happened now seemed positively dreamlike. How could she have been so stupid as to allow all this to get so out of hand? It was totally inappropriate to have a sexual relationship in this setting. Veronica had been so silent and tense this morning that she guessed she was regretting it too. She sighed heavily, cursing herself. One thing she was sure of was that there would not be a repeat performance. This was the end of something, not the beginning.
9
After the bedroom-scene as Judith referred to it in her mind (not quite so romantic as the balcony scene in Romeo and Juliet, but a turning point, nevertheless), her relationship with Veronica changed for the worse. It was disappointing that there had been no epiphany between the sheets. The sex had been warm and comforting, an act borne of close friendship rather than passion on her part at least but she still felt very attached to Veronica and hoped that the two of them could continue their friendship.
Veronica, however, had behaved oddly, unable, it seemed, to look at her or talk to her properly. In the following week, they had been alone together only once when Judith sought her out in her study one afternoon. Judith had tried to be natural and affectionate, seeking only to reassure Veronica of her friendship. Veronica seemed tearful and distracted. ‘I don’t really want to talk about what happened,’ she told Judith in a strangled voice. ‘I think we both know that it won’t happen again because I now realise that we want different things. I wish I knew what you wanted Judith, but I don’t. I can see, however, that it’s not me.’
‘I’m so sorry, Veronica, I would love us to continue the way we were – to be friends,’ blurted out Judith, knowing, even as she spoke, how inadequate those words were. That single word ‘friends’ which has tolled the death knell for countless hopeful lovers through the mists of time. She loves me and I don’t reciprocate that love, she thought. How corny is that? And what does it say about me, yet again?
As she left, Veronica raised her head mutely and Judith could see that her eyes had tears in them.
She could not have predicted what happened next, and it happened with such speed that she had no time to reflect on whether it was fate or somehow malignly orchestrated. A sixth former had been sent to fetch a book from Judith’s desk in her study whilst she was on a school outing. The girl, Camilla Reid, a stoat-faced troublemaker, had apparently ‘found’ some love poems that Judith had written for a new collection. Boldly, she had photocopied them and distributed them among some tittering friends as evidence that Miss Hay ‘loved’ Mrs Templeton.
Their many meetings and little outings had not gone unnoticed and the fact that Judith had been spotted leaving Mrs T’s flat early one morning before breakfast solidified a good rumour. Parents were alerted who thought it less amusing than their daughters, other staff gossiped, and finally the governors were notified.
At the beginning of June, just before the end of the school term, Judith was called in to see the chairman of the governors, Charles Forres, a pugnacious little ex-naval commander who prided himself on running a tight ship, to account for herself. She had no idea what was coming:
‘It has come to our attention,’ he started, ‘that a somewhat odd situation ha
s developed – a relationship to be blunt, between yourself and the Head. I’m afraid some of the parents take a dim view.’
‘What can you mean?’ asked Judith, completely taken aback.
‘I mean that some, how shall we put this, ‘love poems’ have been found in your possession which we have reason to believe were written to and about Mrs Templeton by you. She has confirmed this, saying only that you appear to have developed “some tender feelings” towards her this term which, unfortunately, have been noted by many of the pupils. Without wishing to put too fine a point on it, she intimated that an attempt at seduction had been made which she felt was totally inappropriate.
‘But those poems were nothing to do with Veronica,’ said Judith. ‘They were written for my next collection – I’m a published poet. And as for any “feelings” between us, you must ask Veronica what the real situation is.’
‘I realise this is an extremely delicate matter,’ continued Sir Charles without giving any sign that he had heard her, ‘but we, the governors, have put our total confidence in Mrs Templeton. We believe she is doing a splendid job here at The Chase and we feel that this unfortunate incident cannot be allowed to interfere with the way we want the school to be run. I’m sorry to have to put it like this, but of course, we will have to consider your position here very seriously.’
Angry tears sprang to Judith’s eyes. It was monstrous. She had been utterly betrayed by Veronica of all people. It was also, she saw, completely useless to argue. Her defence would not be listened to or required. She’d been tried and convicted in her absence. They wanted, indeed, needed, to believe this particular version of events.
‘Don’t bother to consider anything,’ she cried. ‘I resign here and now. I can see that there’s no point in trying to put my side of the story.’ Later, she couldn’t remember leaving the room or finding her way, blurred with tears, back to her flat where she lay on her bed crying with anger and humiliation. Veronica, she was told, was conveniently away at a conference when she tried to find and confront her. Clearly, her job had been more important to Veronica than any personal feelings – certainly when they weren’t really reciprocated. She had understood that her career was threatened and had decided that Judith must be sacrificed. In a way, Judith felt sorry for the woman. I wouldn’t want to live with myself if I were her, she thought. Her betrayal had been breathtaking and damnable.