06 Educating Jack

by Jack Sheffield

  Rosy apple, lemon, pear,

  Bunch of roses she shall wear,

  Gold and silver by her side,

  I know who will be her bride.

  It was then that I thought of my bride. Just over three months ago I had married the beautiful Beth Henderson, another village-school headteacher, and, like me, in her thirties. Beth was about to begin her new academic year at Hartingdale Primary School and I prayed all would go well.

  I leant my gangling six-foot-one-inch frame against one of the twin stone pillars by the wrought-iron gate and surveyed the scene. Our school was a Victorian building of weathered red brick with a steeply sloping, grey-slate roof and high arched windows. Dominating the roofline was a tall belltower waiting once more to announce the beginning of yet another school year.

  Opposite the school was the village green with a white-fronted public house, The Royal Oak, in the centre of a row of rustic cottages with tall chimneys and pantile roofs. Off to my left down the High Street, the village was coming alive. Amelia Duff was about to open the Post Office and, next door, Diane Wigglesworth was sellotaping a photograph of Toyah Willcox to the window of her Hair Salon. Nora Pratt was standing in the doorway of her Coffee Shop while the number-one record, ‘Eye of the Tiger’ by Survivor, was blasting out from the old juke-box. She was chatting with her brother Timothy, who was arranging a line of enamel buckets with military precision outside his Hardware Emporium. Meanwhile, Eugene Scrimshaw, supervised by his wife Peggy, was washing the front door of the village Pharmacy and Old Tommy Piercy was directing his grandson, Young Tommy, to sweep the forecourt of his Butcher’s Shop. Finally, at the far end of the row of shops, Prudence Golightly was watering the colourful hanging basket that hung from the canopy over her General Stores & Newsagent. Ragley village looked a picture with its wide High Street bordered by grassy verges and the colours of early autumn, and I reflected that I had found happiness here. This gentle corner of North Yorkshire had its own sense of time and space and I was content in my world.

  The peaceful scene was shattered by a screech of brakes. It was Petula Dudley-Palmer, by far the richest woman in the village. The back door of her Oxford Blue 1975 Rolls-Royce Silver Shadow opened and her two daughters, ten-year-old Elisabeth Amelia and eight-year-old Victoria Alice, jumped out. ‘Good morning, Mr Sheffield,’ she said. ‘Sorry, must rush into town,’ and she roared off towards the York Road.

  ‘All fur coat an’ no knickers, that one, Mr Sheffield.’

  I looked behind me. It was our new temporary caretaker, Mrs Earnshaw. Her daughter, Dallas Sue-Ellen, two months short of her third birthday, was running behind with the remains of a Curly Wurly bar gripped in her tight little fist and completely unaware of the two green candles of snot that adorned her chocolate-smeared face. ‘Reight uppity that one,’ added Mrs Earnshaw in her distinctive Barnsley accent.

  ‘Mrs Dudley-Palmer is a good supporter of our school, Mrs Earnshaw,’ I said by way of the mildest of reprimands. After all, good caretakers were hard to come by, particularly one as hardworking as this tough lady from South Yorkshire.

  ‘Any road, Mr Sheffield,’ continued Mrs Earnshaw, completely undeterred, ‘ah’ve finished m’first shift so ah’ll be back later t’put t’dining tables out. Ah’ve been t’see Ruby an’ she’s told me all about t’routine, so no need t’fret.’

  ‘Thank you,’ I said. Mrs Earnshaw had recently won an arm-wrestling competition in the taproom of The Royal Oak, so it was never a good idea to get on the wrong side of this formidable lady.

  I glanced at my watch and hurried back to the entrance door. In the playground, Mrs Crapper was chatting with the mothers of the other reception class children.

  ‘What are them then?’ asked five-year-old Ted Coggins, the farmer’s son, pointing down at Patience’s ankles.

  ‘Leg warmers,’ said Patience bluntly.

  Ted looked down at his short ankle socks and old leather sandals. ‘Burrit’s not cold,’ said the sturdy little boy.

  Patience looked at Ted and decided he would join the long list of those who would never be her friend. ‘Ah don’t like boys,’ she said bluntly.

  ‘Ah can whistle,’ said Ted proudly.

  ‘Ah still don’t like boys,’ replied Patience scornfully.

  Ted realized he had played his trump card too early and shook his head sadly. Suddenly the church clock announced it was precisely nine o’clock, and Vera took the ancient rope in both hands and rang the school bell that had summoned children to their lessons for the last hundred years.

  For this was 1982. The birth of Prince William had cheered the nation, the twenty-pence coin was in circulation and E.T., Steven Spielberg’s lovable extraterrestrial, wanted to ‘phone home’. However, all was not well. Thirty thousand women protestors were destined to form a human chain around Greenham Common and unemployment was over three million. Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, after the euphoria of victory in the Falklands, was turning her attention towards a certain Arthur Scargill, who, as President of the National Union of Mineworkers, had announced defiantly, ‘We shall oppose all pit closures’. Meanwhile, the Queen had been startled to find an intruder had broken into her bedroom. The spirit of goodwill was also waning in Wales, where police in Gwent announced they were to cease their campaign of stopping drivers and giving them pens for good driving. Instead, they had decided to use unmarked cars to catch speeding motorists and simply fine them.

  Roy Jenkins had become leader of the SDP and Coca-Cola introduced something called ‘Diet Coke’. On the popular music scene, Barbra Streisand’s Love Songs was the bestselling UK album of the year and a strange man called Ozzy Osbourne decided to bite the head off a bat during a live concert. The world was changing, but in the quiet North Yorkshire village of Ragley-on-the-Forest the sun was shining and eighty-six children hurried into school to begin another school year.

  In my classroom, Theresa Ackroyd and Alice Baxter were waiting for me. ‘Y’said me an’ Alice could run t’tuck shop, Mr Sheffield,’ said an insistent Theresa.

  ‘That’s right, you can,’ I said. The pupils in their final year at Ragley took on extra responsibilities and shared out the monitor jobs between them. These were not to be underestimated, as they carried considerable status. So it was that Debbie Clack became register monitor, Dean Kershaw was appointed official bell ringer, Amanda Pickles was delighted to become the person who ran from class to class delivering occasional messages and Sarah Louise Tait, by virtue of always remembering to wash her hands, became hymn book monitor.

  It was a busy morning throughout the school with the usual excitement of new exercise books, tins of Lakeland crayons and selecting reading books. In the reception class, Anne realized that, as usual, her four-and five-year-olds were already years apart in their reading and writing skills. Whereas Patience Crapper couldn’t read a word and had no intention of writing a single letter, Katie Icklethwaite had written in neat printing, ‘I love my Daddy. He’s a bit fat now but he can still tie up my shoes.’ Rufus Snodgrass had produced his longest ever sentence, ‘I love my granddad because when he reads me a story he doesn’t miss out bits like my mum does at bedtime.’ Meanwhile, Ted Coggins, in large forceful printing that had nearly gone through the paper with the pressure of his pencil strokes, had written, ‘i love my grandma because even when i’ve been naughty she always gives me a kiss.’ Anne sighed when she looked at four-year-old Mandy Kerslake’s writing. Mandy, a shy little girl, had written, ‘I wasn’t born I was adopted’. It was then she pondered on the lives of the children in her care, and, briefly, the problem she had been wrestling with all day was put to the back of her mind.

  At morning break the children went out to play and I walked into the staff-room as the telephone rang. Vera picked up the receiver. ‘It’s Mrs Sheffield,’ she said.

  I looked up, momentarily confused. ‘My mother?’

  Vera raised her eyebrows and smiled. ‘No, Mr Sheffield … your wife!’

  ‘Ah, sorry,’ I sai
d with a grin. ‘Still haven’t got used to it.’

  Beth and I had married at the end of May, a little over three months ago, and we were still getting used to her new married name. ‘Good morning, Mrs Sheffield,’ I said.

  ‘Hello, Mr Sheffield,’ she said cheerfully. ‘Jack, Leeds University have been in touch and my first course on the M.Ed programme begins next month.’ During the summer Beth had been interviewed for a place on the part-time Master of Education degree course at Leeds University. This included two years of taught modules followed by another year, supervised by a personal tutor, to complete a lengthy dissertation. Unlike me, Beth was determined to move up the career ladder.

  ‘That’s good news,’ I said. ‘Congratulations. I knew you’d do it.’

  ‘Thanks … and are you sure you don’t mind?’ she asked, a little cautiously.

  ‘Of course not,’ I said. ‘I’m thrilled for you. It’s what you wanted.’

  ‘Yes, it is,’ she said. ‘Well, must rush. See you tonight. There are some chops in the fridge if you’re home first. Bye,’ and the line went dead.

  ‘Something to celebrate?’ queried Vera.

  ‘Beth’s on that degree course in Leeds,’ I said.

  ‘She’ll go far, just you wait and see,’ said Vera as she heated the milk for our coffee on the single electric ring.

  At lunchtime, Shirley Mapplebeck, the school cook, looked concerned. ‘We’ve got eighty-six on roll, Mr Sheffield, an’ only fifty-seven are staying f’school dinners – so, sadly, it’s more packed lunches.’ Since the cost of a school dinner had gone up to fifty pence our numbers had dropped and it was often the case that the children who most needed a hot meal weren’t getting one.

  ‘So we’re trying t’introduce choice, Mr Sheffield,’ said Shirley, ‘to make t’meals more interestin’ for t’children.’

  When I queued up for my lunch Shirley’s assistant, Mrs Doreen Critchley, was serving the sweet course. The muscles in her mighty forearms bulged as she lifted another tray of jam sponge on to the counter.

  ‘D’you want custard?’ growled Mrs Critchley.

  ‘Oh, well, er, what are my choices?’ I asked hesitantly.

  Mrs Critchley gave me the look that regularly caused Mr Critchley to quake in his boots. ‘Yes or No,’ she replied bluntly. Mrs Critchley was always economical in her use of the English language.

  After lunch, in the staff-room, Vera was scanning the front page of her Daily Telegraph and shaking her head in dismay. A sixteen-year-old girl, caned by her headteacher for smoking, had complained to the European Court of Human Rights that the punishment was ‘inhuman’ and therefore ‘unlawful’. Also, Berkshire Education Authority had announced that Buddhism was to be taught in their schools. ‘I wonder what it’s all coming to,’ murmured Vera to herself as she picked up her cup of Earl Grey tea.

  ‘So what do you think of the new caretaker, Vera?’ asked Sally.

  Vera paused for a moment, clearly intending to choose her words carefully. ‘Well, Mrs Earnshaw is definitely different to Ruby,’ she said with a knowing look. She held up a sheet of paper covered in childlike printing. ‘And I’ve just removed her notice from our crockery shelf.’ It read:

  AFTER TEA BREAK

  STAFF SHOULD EMPTY POT

  AND STAND UPSIDE DOWN

  ON DRAINING BOARD

  I grinned. ‘Yes, it does seem a bit extreme, Vera.’

  ‘Precisely, Mr Sheffield,’ said Vera and dropped the notice into her wicker waste basket. ‘I’ll have a word, shall I?’

  It was during afternoon school that Patience Crapper made her mark. While Anne was busy in the classroom, Patience blocked up the sink in the reception class cloakroom with her leg warmers and water was swimming everywhere on the tiled floor.

  ‘Oh no!’ said Anne and immediately asked Vera to contact Mrs Earnshaw to clear up the mess.

  ‘And your boots and socks are soaked, Patience,’ she said. ‘Take them off and we’ll dry them on the children’s washing line.’

  During afternoon break, in the staff-room, Anne was quietly fuming. ‘I’ll give her patience,’ she muttered.

  Sally looked up from her Art & Craft magazine. ‘Patience,’ she said, ‘the state of endurance under difficult circumstances.’

  ‘Too true,’ said Anne through gritted teeth.

  At the end of school, the parents of the children in the reception class wandered into school to collect their offspring. While Anne was talking to Mrs Crapper, Vera saw Patience trying to put on her pixie boots.

  ‘Come on, I’ll help you,’ said Vera.

  After a huge struggle Vera managed to pull on both boots. ‘They don’t fit very well, do they?’ she said, getting a little exasperated.

  ‘’Cause they’re on t’wrong feet,’ said Patience.

  ‘Oh dear,’ said Vera and pulled them off. Getting them on again seemed an even greater struggle. Vera was feeling exhausted.

  ‘What about m’leg warmers?’ asked Patience.

  ‘Leg warmers?’ said Vera. ‘Where are they?’

  ‘In m’boots,’ said Patience.

  ‘In your boots!’ exclaimed Vera. ‘Why are they in your boots?’

  ‘’Cause Miss said put ’em there t’keep ’em safe,’ said Patience in a matter-of-fact tone.

  ‘Oh no,’ said Vera, pulling off the boots once again.

  Eventually, fully attired with leg warmers and boots, Patience tottered off with her mother.

  Back in the staff-room we all gathered to relate the events of the first day and Vera regaled us with her story of the pixie boots. Her patience had finally run out. She half closed her eyes and quoted from memory, ‘Jesus might display his unlimited patience as an example for those who would believe on him and receive eternal life.’

  ‘Point taken, Vera,’ said Anne.

  ‘First Timothy, chapter one, verse sixteen,’ said Vera.

  ‘And that’s the problem, Vera … eternal life.’

  ‘Ah,’ said Vera as the penny dropped.

  We all stared as, for no obvious reason, Vera suddenly put her arms round Anne and gave her a hug. ‘I understand, Anne,’ she said kindly. ‘I’ve just been through the same thing, except another decade down the line. I sent you a card in the holidays.’

  ‘Yes, thanks Vera,’ said Anne, ‘as you always do.’

  ‘And without a number on it,’ added Vera quietly.

  There was a pause as Anne nodded.

  ‘Ah, I see,’ said Sally.

  ‘Me too,’ said Jo.

  ‘Well, I don’t,’ I said.

  They all gave me that ‘well-he’s-only-a-man’ look, and shook their heads.

  ‘Oh, Jack, haven’t you worked it out yet?’ said Anne. ‘I loved being in my forties … and now I’m bloody fifty!’

  It was then I realized that the problem with patience is that some days are better than others. It was also the first and last time I ever heard my deputy head swear.

  Chapter Two

  A Decision for Vera

  The Revd Joseph Evans recommenced his weekly RE lesson. Major Forbes-Kitchener, school governor, visited school to discuss tomorrow’s Harvest Supper. County Hall requested responses to their discussion document ‘The Need for a Common Curriculum’.

  Extract from the Ragley School Logbook:

  Friday, 17 September 1982

  VERA TOOK HER two-pint baking dish from the kitchen cupboard, propped her handwritten recipe book alongside it and then paused to look out of the vicarage kitchen window. Whispers of morning sunlight flickered through the branches of the high elms in the nearby churchyard.

  It was Friday, 17 September, the day before the annual Harvest Supper in the village hall, and there was the small matter of an apple courting cake. Vera wrote a list of ingredients to purchase at Prudence Golightly’s General Stores & Newsagent, called to her brother, Joseph, to hurry up, checked her appearance in the hall mirror, bade a fond farewell to her three cats, Jess, Treacle and Maggie, then walked out to
face a new day that she was destined never to forget.

  A mile away on Ragley High Street, the queue of villagers in the General Stores was becoming restless as ten-year-old Heathcliffe Earnshaw and his nine-year-old brother Terry finally made an important decision.

  Heathcliffe clutched a five-pence piece and stared intently at the glass jars of sweets, including sherbet dips, penny lollies, giant humbugs, dolly mixtures, aniseed balls, chocolate butter dainties, jelly babies and liquorice torpedoes. ‘Two lic’rice bootlaces please, Miss Golightly,’ said Heathcliffe, ‘an’ please can we ’ave three penn’th o’ aniseed balls please in two bags, please.’ Heathcliffe always emphasized the word please when he spoke to the kindly sixty-five-year-old Miss Golightly. She appreciated good manners and he gave her his best fixed smile. It was the one he had perfected over the years and also the one he had been told by his Aunt Mavis from Doncaster that, if he kept doing it, his face would stay like that.

  ‘And here’s a sherbet lemon for being such polite boys,’ said Miss Golightly.

  ‘Thank you, Miss Golightly,’ said the two brothers in muffled unison as they left the shop, sucking their sweets with occasional synchronized crunching.

  Next in the queue was Betty Icklethwaite with her five-year-old daughter, Katie. ‘Ah want t’spend a penny,’ said Katie.

  ‘Everything on the bottom shelf is a penny,’ said Miss Golightly, pointing to the liquorice laces, gobstoppers and penny chews.

  ‘No,’ said Mrs Icklethwaite, her cheeks flushing rapidly. ‘I think she actually does want t’spend a penny, Miss Golightly … if y’take m’meaning,’ and she grabbed her daughter’s hand and rushed out.

  Finally I reached the front of the queue. ‘Good morning, Miss Golightly,’ I said. The diminutive lady had a set of wooden steps behind the counter and she stepped up to be on the same level as me.

  Prudence knew her customers well and had already folded my copy of The Times. ‘And good morning to you, Mr Sheffield,’ she said. ‘I trust Mrs Sheffield is well.’

  ‘Fine thank you, Miss Golightly.’ Then I looked up at Yorkshire’s best-dressed teddy bear sitting on his usual shelf next to a tin of loose-leaf Lyons tea and an old advertisement for Hudson’s soap and Carter’s Little Liver Pills. ‘And good morning, Jeremy.’