08 Silent Night

by Jack Sheffield

  ‘Is it a boy or a girl?’ I asked.

  ‘It’s a girl, Mr Sheffield,’ said Hayley. ‘She’s called Sparky the Second.’

  ‘What happened to Sparky the First?’ I asked . . . then wished I hadn’t.

  ‘M’dad ’it ’er wi’ a shovel, Mr Sheffield.’

  ‘Oh dear,’ I said.

  ‘She got out an’ ’e thought it were a rat.’ Hayley sighed at the memory. ‘But ’e said ’e were sorry so, like m’mam says, no ’arm done.’

  It struck me that some children were old before their time. ‘I see,’ I said, wincing at the image that had come into my mind.

  I decided not to mention this conversation to Sally prior to her ‘Kindness to Animals’ assembly. It was then that Sparky the Second looked up at me sadly and I wondered if she had heard the bit about the shovel.

  The school office was like an ice box and Vera, seemingly undeterred, was wearing a warm coat and scarf.

  ‘Good morning, Mr Sheffield,’ she said. ‘I’ve rung John Paxton about the loose tiles.’ She pointed to the ceiling. ‘Fortunately they’re above this wing of the school and not a danger to the children.’

  John Paxton was the village handyman and could repair hinges, fix broken desks, unblock gutters, replace broken windows and mend fences and gates. He was a reliable Jack-of-all-trades and honest as the day is long.

  ‘Thanks, Vera,’ I said with relief.

  ‘I’ve telephoned the office, but there is a new and exceedingly irritating administrator answering the telephone at County Hall and redirecting calls,’ said Vera testily. ‘He is not proving helpful.’

  ‘Don’t worry, I’ll have a try,’ I said, blowing into my hands to get some feeling back into my fingers.

  ‘Also,’ continued Vera, glancing down at her notepad, ‘the school boiler is playing up, which is why the office is so cold. However, Ruby says she can keep enough heat in the classrooms for us to be able to survive today.’

  ‘Oh well, that’s something,’ I said.

  ‘The engineer will come in during half-term,’ said Vera, ‘and to top it all we have to respond to this today.’ She held up a smart, spiral-bound laminated booklet with the North Yorkshire Schools crest; it was titled ‘A Policy for the Efficient Heating of Village Schools’. ‘There’s a questionnaire in the back.’

  I shook my head in disbelief. ‘Well, at least it will be warm in the staff-room,’ I said, trying to find a ray of comfort.

  ‘Oh yes,’ said Vera, ‘almost forgot . . . we can’t go in the staff-room today as the school optician will be in there using it for eye tests.’

  I smiled while groaning inwardly, then sat down at my desk and dialled the number for County Hall in Northallerton. It was picked up immediately, which was encouraging.

  ‘Good morning, Jack Sheffield here from Ragley Primary School,’ I said.

  ‘Jeffrey Stank here,’ was the chirpy reply. ‘Jeffrey-with-a-J,’ he added.

  Undeterred by the irrelevance, I pressed on. ‘I simply need authorization to replace a couple of roof tiles – it’s urgent,’ I explained.

  ‘Ah well, Mr Sheffield – there are procedures,’ he said. ‘You’ll need to complete an SW909 for the Small Works Department.’

  Jobsworth, I thought.

  ‘Well, can you send one out to me?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Jobsworth, ‘and you should receive it within five working days.’

  ‘I need to get it fixed now,’ I said.

  ‘As I said, Mr Sheffield, we have to have procedures.’

  When I first arrived at Ragley in 1977 I had found a useful ally in County Hall. He could authorize these simple jobs without recourse to the North Yorkshire County Council secret police. In consequence, no one would knock on my door and seek an explanation for the lack of paperwork to support the payment of two pounds and fifty pence for the repair of a broken desk. This, in turn, would avoid the need to purchase a new desk at a vastly inflated price.

  However, I guessed the days of completing any simple human activity such as this without the need for a trail of half a tree’s worth of paper were numbered. The completion of official forms was becoming a significant and unwelcome aspect of my professional life and I wondered where it would end.

  ‘Fine,’ I said, unable to hide my irritation. ‘So please could you put one in the post?’

  ‘Have you got a pencil, Mr Sheffield?’ asked Jobsworth. ‘You need your reference number.’

  ‘Reference number?’

  ‘Yes, every call has a reference number.’

  The bell rang. ‘Sorry, must go, I’m teaching now,’ I said and replaced the receiver. An appropriate expletive came to mind but, as Vera was the vicar’s sister, her presence curtailed any profanity.

  The fact that it was colder than usual in school didn’t seem to deter the children. As the morning progressed, the excitement in my class was growing.

  ‘It’s snowing again, Mr Sheffield,’ Dawn Phillips called out as the pattering against the window increased in volume.

  ‘Looks like that proper snow that meks good snowballs,’ said Frankie Spraggon.

  ‘An’ snowmen,’ said Sam Borthwick.

  ‘An’ igloos,’ added Danny Hardacre with the ambition of youth.

  The children stood up and looked out of the windows.

  ‘It’s definitely settlin’, Mr Sheffield,’ observed Mo Hartley.

  ‘It’ll be good at dinner time,’ said Harold Bustard. ‘That’s if you’ll let us go on t’field, Mr Sheffield.’

  ‘Please can we, please?’ begged Ben Roberts. He had learned long ago that a double helping of please often produced positive results.

  ‘Finish your SMP and we’ll see,’ I said.

  As if I had flicked a switch, the children all bowed their heads and gave full concentration to their School Mathematics Project workcards.

  Meanwhile, in Class 3, Joseph Evans was pleased the discussion about ‘Heaven’ had gone so well. As playtime approached the children packed away their exercise books and gathered near the door to file out to the cloakroom.

  However, Damian Brown had stuck out his tongue at Jemima Poole. ‘How do you think you’ll go to heaven behaving like that?’ asked Joseph light-heartedly.

  Damian gave this some thought. ‘Well, Mr Evans, we could run in an’ out o’ t’pearly gates reight fast an’ keep slammin’ ’em.’

  ‘Oh dear,’ said Joseph, ‘and why is that?’

  ‘Well, St Peter will say, “Mek y’mind up – come in or stay out,” jus’ like our mam says.’

  Suddenly the children were gathering around Joseph, full of questions.

  ‘Mr Evans,’ asked Jemima Poole brightly, ‘is Sunday a day of rest?’

  ‘Yes, Jemima, it is,’ said Joseph benignly.

  Jemima considered this for a moment. ‘So why do we ’ave t’go t’Sunday School?’

  ‘An’, Mr Evans, does God ’ave a las’ name?’ shouted Stacey Bryant.

  ‘An’ what about dead people, Mr Evans?’ added Ryan Halfpenny, going off at a tangent.

  ‘Dead people!’ exclaimed Joseph. He was rapidly losing the will to live.

  ‘Yes,’ said Ryan. ‘Why doesn’t God stop lettin’ people die, ’cause then ’E wouldn’t ’ave t’mek new ones?’

  The logic of young children never ceased to amaze Joseph. ‘That’s a good point,’ he conceded with good grace.

  At morning break Mrs Fazackerly was waiting for me in the school entrance hall.

  ‘It’s our Madonna, Mr Sheffield,’ she said. ‘She’s at ’ome wi’ a rash an’ it’s a sight t’be’old.’

  ‘I’m sorry to hear that, Mrs Fazackerly,’ I said. ‘That’s a shame, because she was fine yesterday.’ Mrs Fazackerly had a reputation for keeping her daughter at home for a wide variety of reasons.

  ‘Well, ah’m tellin’ y’straight, Mr Sheffield, it’s as true as true can be,’ she protested. ‘An’ may I be struck down dead in m’best shoes if it’s not.’

  I found m
yself glancing down at her footwear, presumably to gauge the quality, but the downtrodden heels and scuff marks suggested she would live another day.

  The office was freezing and all the teachers called in to collect a warm mug of coffee from Vera. Just above our heads, John Paxton, known locally as Whistling John, was hammering to his heart’s content while whistling Johnny Tillotson’s 1960 hit, ‘Poetry In Motion’.

  I glanced at Vera’s Daily Telegraph. There was a photograph of Sir Clive Sinclair, who had recently launched his C5, a battery-powered electric tricycle with a top speed of 15 mph. On the same page it mentioned that the BBC proposed to launch a new soap called EastEnders next week. Like the tricycle, I couldn’t see it catching on.

  ‘This cup of coffee is for the optician,’ said Vera, putting it on a tray with two digestive biscuits. ‘She said it was a bit stuffy in there but she’ll manage.’

  Meanwhile, I had lost all feeling in my toes.

  ‘I’ll take it in, Vera,’ I offered. I thought I would check to see if the eye tests were going to plan.

  As I popped my head round the door the heat hit me like a welcome sauna and for a few moments it was bliss. ‘Is everything all right?’ I asked politely, putting the tray on the coffee table.

  The optician gave me an abrupt nod. ‘A little too warm in here,’ she said, ‘so I turned the gas fire to the LOW setting.’

  I smiled through gritted teeth. ‘Fine,’ I said, ‘just see Mrs Forbes-Kitchener in the office if you need anything.’

  She nodded curtly and carried on. Zoe Book was staring at a large chart of assorted letters in descending order of size. The optician pointed to the third line from the bottom. ‘And can you read this line?’ she asked.

  ‘Yes, thank you,’ said Zoe politely.

  The optician looked up at me with a why-are-your-children-like-this? smile and she didn’t say thank you for the coffee.

  After break I called in to Anne’s classroom, where Billy Ricketts was standing by the number apparatus cupboard. He had pushed two wooden Cuisenaire counting rods up his nostrils and was pretending to be a walrus.

  I suggested he take them out, wash them under the tap in the art corner and put them back in the box, while secretly admiring his convincing mime.

  Meanwhile Anne appeared much more active than usual. It later emerged that she had sent off for a Multi-Exerciser from a mail-order address in Melton Mowbray in Leicestershire. It promised to ‘reduce tummy flab and trim your figure’ and it appeared to be working.

  By lunchtime the temperature was dropping fast and in the school office a cruel wind rattled the wooden casements as we gathered to share news.

  ‘Jack, have a look at this.’ Tom had a computer magazine open at a page with a photograph of young children using computers as if they had been born to it. ‘There’s some new educational software and it’s compatible with Commodore 64, Spectrum 48K and BBC B Computers.’

  Anne gave me that familiar wide-eyed smile she assumed whenever Tom seemed to speak in a different language.

  ‘It’s all there, Jack,’ he said, pressing home the point. ‘Numbers, letters, shapes, measuring money, reading and telling the time.’ He looked across at Anne. ‘It’s perfect for our two classes, Anne, and I’m happy to help you until you get the hang of it.’

  Anne smiled again. ‘Thanks, Tom. I realize I have to move with the times, but you might need some patience with me.’

  Tom grinned shyly. ‘Don’t worry, we’ll be fine,’ he said. ‘I’ll pass on all I know.’

  Anne looked at Tom with curiosity.

  There was silence as we considered the meaning at different levels until Vera broke the spell. ‘Tea anyone?’ she asked.

  I decided to put on my coat and scarf and go out on to the playground to check all was well. John Paxton gave me a friendly wave from the rooftop and, like the children, seemed oblivious to the sharp wind and gusting snow.

  ‘Y’can’t beat a bit o’snow, Mr Sheffield,’ shouted an excited Billy Ricketts. His bare knees looked purple with cold and his cheeks were the colour of rosy apples.

  On the other side of the school wall Old Tommy Piercy walked by and waved.

  ‘Windy day, Mr Piercy,’ I shouted as another gust bent the branches of the horse chestnut trees.

  ‘Wind?’ retorted Old Tommy. ‘This is nowt. When ah were a lad we ’ad winds that’d tek fleece off a sheep’s back. Now that were proper wind.’

  ‘Oh well, have a good day,’ I said.

  ‘Any road, ah’m off to T’Royal Oak for a bit o’ food,’ he said. ‘It’s one o’ Sheila’s specials – venison pasty.’ To my surprise, he passed a parcel to me through the school railings. ‘It’s an ’ot pie, Mr Sheffield, for John on t’roof. One o’ my prize-winning growlers,’ he added without a hint of modesty and wandered off.

  I smiled. These were the small gestures of friendship I had learned to know and appreciate in our village community – a helping hand here, a kind word there and a warm pie on a cold day.

  On the other side of the village green a familiar Rolls-Royce moved smoothly from the Morton Road into the High Street. Petula Dudley-Palmer looked preoccupied as she pulled up outside Piercy’s butcher’s shop. She had just spoken to her husband Geoffrey on the telephone but he hadn’t ended the call by saying ‘Love you’ as he usually did and Petula was thinking about their early courtship when they used to laugh and hold hands.

  Old Tommy Piercy was a member of the SAS – the Sausage Appreciation Society – and was very proud of his prize-winning sausages. His grandson, Young Tommy, was gradually taking over and he had just displayed a tray of the famous sausages in the window next to the pigs’ trotters and speciality black pudding.

  Young Tommy had grown into a handsome man and he treated his lady customers with polite grace and charm. When he served Petula she felt that thrill again – the kind she recalled when Mr Parkinson, the student science teacher, had let her and Emily Poulton use a Bunsen burner. He would pass round a box of Swan Vesta matches and tell them to use only one . . . one match, one chance, one opportunity to light the blue flame. She and Emily had professed undying love for the young, slender Mr Parkinson, while he was entirely oblivious of their teenage passion and racing hormones. However, unknown to them, he went home each evening to a nurse from Wythenshawe who knew a lot more about sex than he did about copper sulphate crystals.

  The last time Petula had visited the shop Old Tommy had said knowingly, ‘In a village like Ragley there are no secrets.’

  Oh yes there are, thought Petula.

  When she returned home she closed the curtains and the measured ticks of the clock counted out the heartbeats of her life.

  Back in school, Scott Higginbottom and Patience Crapper were standing in the dinner queue. ‘Would you like to be my girlfriend?’ asked Scott.

  Patience looked at him with disdain. ‘No,’ she said firmly.

  ‘Ah’ve gorra tortoise,’ said Scott, as if this would seal the engagement.

  ‘Still no,’ said Patience.

  ‘Why not?’ asked Scott.

  ‘’Cause ah’m not like a tortoise.’

  ‘’Ow come?’

  ‘Ah can choose.’

  Conceptually, this left Scott on the starting line in the art of wooing.

  After school dinner a commotion on the playground attracted my attention and I hurried out. Ben Roberts and Harold Bustard had made a slide in the frozen snow outside the boiler-house doors. Harold had fallen and cut his head and the dinner lady, Mrs Critchley, was tending him as I stepped through the crowd to see what was happening.

  ‘’Arold ’as split ’is ’ead open, Mr Sheffield,’ shouted Ben.

  ‘Will ’e die, sir?’ asked Scott Higginbottom.

  ‘It’s a lot of blood,’ added Rosie Spittlehouse, fascinated by the small cut on poor Harold’s forehead.

  ‘There won’t be much left,’ said Ted Coggins knowingly.

  ‘Will ’e lose ’is memory, Sir?’ asked Barry Ollerens
haw.

  ‘An’ would ’e know ’e’d lost it, Sir?’ added Damian Brown.

  ‘Is ’e con-shush?’ Rufus Snodgrass wanted to know, and so it went on until normal service was resumed. We contacted Mrs Bustard and kept a careful watch on Harold until his mother came in to collect him.

  Afternoon break proved a little more encouraging. Shirley appeared from her kitchen and surprised us with a plateful of piping hot buttered crumpets that provided the perfect accompaniment to Vera’s excellent milky coffee. Much refreshed, we all returned to our classrooms.

  In Class 1 Anne opened her illustrated copy of Squirrel Nutkin. ‘Where did we finish the story yesterday?’ she asked. ‘Do you remember, Billy?’

  ‘Give us a minute, Mrs Grainger,’ said Billy Ricketts, screwing up his face in concentration. ‘My ’ead’s trying t’tell me.’

  In Class 2 you could have heard a pin drop. Tom was reading Charlotte’s Web to his children and they were spellbound as Wilbur the pig continued his magical journey through life on the farm.

  Meanwhile, up the Morton Road in her state-of-the-art conservatory, Petula Dudley-Palmer was reading an article in her Woman’s Realm under the headline ‘Where the quality of family life matters most’. She wondered if there might be answers here to bring back a little romance into their marriage. Geoffrey had seemed very distant lately and she didn’t know why. She sipped her coffee and reflected on her life. She had taken her daily dose of Vykmin multivitamin capsules to ensure good health . . . but she still felt depressed.

  Then she chose her favourite wicker chair and settled down to read The Growing Pains of Adrian Mole and found that the author, Sue Townsend, cheered her up a little. Later she coated four pieces of chicken with Crosse & Blackwell Southern Style seasoning, so a tasty evening meal was in store. In the fridge was a Black Forest gateau that she had been saving for an intimate soirée with Geoffrey.

  It was then that the telephone rang and Geoffrey told her he would be late and not to worry about dinner.

  Oh well . . . The girls will enjoy the gateau, she thought.

  It was five o’clock and I was in the school office, wading through paperwork, when the telephone rang. ‘We don’t appear to have received your completed questionnaire on school heating, Mr Sheffield,’ said a strident voice. It was Jobsworth.