The Girl Now Leaving

by The Girl Now Leaving (retail) (epub)

  The stiver turned out not to be a sixpenny piece, but a florin, which Lu later slipped into the pocket of Mr Strawbridge’s bag in which were her accumulated earnings from strawberry picking, her bag of gifts, slippers and new clothes.

  * * *

  Seated in his big armchair in the living room at the back of The Bells, Dick Briardale pulled Peggy down on to his lap.

  ‘I thought you were supposed to be up at the nets this afternoon.’

  ‘I am. There’s time.’ With one hand up her skirt and the other feeling her belly, he said, ‘Well, I suppose we’d better put this chap on a proper footing.’ He looked pleased enough as he pulled down the easy-going top of his barmaid’s gypsy top. ‘Not that I reckon it’s a good deal for me having somebody else horning in on these.’

  Peggy – who had always surmised that expectant women wouldn’t want that kind of thing, and was surprised at the intensity of her own sudden and strong needs since she had become pregnant – eased herself into a position where they could be comfortable for half an hour. The hell with his cricket, they’d have to wait for him. Perhaps it was ditching the cap, or maybe ditching the gin bottle that made her like this. It didn’t much matter, things were looking up, and Dick was beginning to learn a thing or two about holding on and making the fun last, and he had been pleased as punch that they had had the accident. She had told him it wasn’t safe, so it had been his own fault for keeping going anyway. He knew that, but he was pleased anyway.

  ‘Peg Briardale sounds all right, don’t it?’

  ‘It sounds lovely, Dick.’

  ‘Best get on with it soon as we can, then.’

  * * *

  Hec stopped his lorry for a minute on the top of Portsdown.

  ‘Well,’ Charlie Barrit said, ‘do you still hold to the fac’ that there’s nothing between here and World’s End?’

  Lu grinned. ‘I don’t know whether it’s me or the country that’s changed.’

  Charlie Barrit, inarticulate and unimaginative, without children of his own, seeing something of note in the ripening cornfields and the girl’s plump golden arms which he would have liked to put into words, said, ‘Queer old world.’

  Lu, having recently become aware of the different ways in which words could be arranged, had taken great care with the birthday entry in her record book. ‘My old child’s self has not gone, but has gone into making the girl who is me now. This one is like the dragonflies at The Swallitt Pool, the new self climes out of their old self, but leaves that old self still there clinging to the rushes looking the same. Perhaps when/if I come back next summer I shall see me crouched down in the shallows watching Duke Barney and, I think, him knowing I was there on Midsummer Day when I was twelve.’

  Such reflections flew from her mind when she arrived home. She had imagined that her mother would be standing on the pavement, probably talking to Dot next door, she had expected to jump down and astonish them with her new frock and looking so well.

  The real scene was that Dotty next door was waiting in the doorway of Number 110 and saying gravely that Lu wasn’t to worry or take on, but her mum had had a bit of a set-back and wasn’t up to getting out of bed at the moment. ‘She’s not ill or nothing, Lu, but she’s weak. But, Lord love us, you’ll be a tonic to her and that’s no lie. I shouldn’t a hardly known you except for your hair, and that’s grown a foot.’

  Lu raced upstairs and discovered her mother in bed propped up by pillows, her eyes dark and deep, her cheeks hollow and her arms pale and thin. ‘Oh, Lu,’ she said, ‘I have been looking forward to seeing you. We were all like peas rattling around in a bucket without you.’

  For a moment, Lu was transfixed at the sight of this woman who she knew to be her mother, but who looked so frighteningly ill and who was wearing a proper nightdress and a pretty bed-jacket. Then she recovered and gave her mother the kind of hug and kiss she had learned to give from a thousand given and received by May. ‘You’ll be all right now, Mum. I learnt from Uncle Ted and Aunty May and Mr Gabriel what you have to do to build people up. I’ve got a box downstairs with bees’ honey and Cowslip butter.’ She grinned. ‘You don’t know what that is, I’ll tell you later… but I’ll keep giving you what they gave me till you’re as better as I am. I’ve got that many things to tell you. And before you go to sleep at night, I’ll bring you warm milk with bees’ honey, and I’ll get out my Children’s Golden Treasure Book and I’ll read to you every night so you will have lovely dreams.’

  Vera Wilmott looked at her changeling daughter and smiled. ‘Oh, Lu, what a stupid I was to wonder if I was doing the right thing sending you to a place right out there in the country.’

  ‘I’m sure Aunty May would have you there and make you better.’

  Vera, for all the assurance given by the gynaecologist that she would soon pick up, felt certain that one miracle per family was about all that would be given.

  ‘That won’t be necessary, Lu, for it feels as though you have brought a breath of the country right into this room.’

  Lu had seen enough of the ailments and diseases of poverty to know that her mother was very ill indeed. So, she wrote to May and Ted and asked them if sometimes they would send some butter and honey by train and that if it was all right with them, she could come and work off what she owed next strawberry picking. ‘But please, Aunty,’ she wrote with great perception, ‘don’t send it by Uncle Hec; it will only make the aunts be jealous, but none of they are ill.’

  As May said when she received Lu’s note, ‘That operation wasn’t ever going to do her any good if you ask me. She was probably suffering from anaemia, it’s going to take months for her to get on her feet again.’

  May guessed that she was whistling in the wind. Vera had been a sick woman for years.

  1931

  Two years have passed, it is summer, and the weather has grown heavy with threatened thunderstorms. Trees are stilled, their leaves drooped. People are crabby and children restless. Lu Wilmott left Lampeter Church of England Girls’ School for the last time at the end of the summer term. She has had a last girlish fling with Bar Barney in the fields, woods and ponds around Roman’s Fields.

  But that stands out like a full-colour illustration in a book of dark lino-cuts.

  Not that Lu has been doleful; she has been too busy for that.

  On her return to Lampeter Girls’, to the surprise of her teachers after her long absence, Lu surged ahead with her lessons, so that by the time she reached the age of thirteen, the headmistress, Miss Lake, was sure that she at last had a girl capable of winning a place at the grammar school. However, when she entered the living room of 110 Lampeter Street, to discuss the prospects with Louise Wilmott’s mother and her elder brother, and saw the state of health of the girl’s mother, she wondered if, yet again, she would be told that the girl must leave school and go to work because the family couldn’t do without the girl’s pay.

  But Miss Lake did not know Vera Wilmott, or her early history. Vera had put on a little make-up, pearly earrings and a brooch, and got out her one good dress which, although it hung about her spare chest, was clean and well pressed.

  Ray, in his working suit but with a clean shirt collar, opened the door at the first knock. ‘Come in, Miss Lake. I’m afraid my mother don’t find it too easy to get up out of her chair.’

  Cynthia Lake never ceased to be surprised at what she discovered lay behind the rows and rows of slum houses in her ‘parish’. Often the shock was at the degradation and poverty in which the Lampeter Girls and Infants lived out their lives, but in Number 110 she found what she perceived to be the last remnants of the knowledge of a better life.

  ‘I’m sorry not to get up, Miss Lake,’ Vera Wilmott smiled apologetically, ‘I’m afraid I’m a bit of a crock at the moment. Please take a seat. Ray, shall you get us a cup of tea? Ray is my elder son, he is a clerk with the Southern Railway.’

  Miss Lake, taking the thin, pale hand politely offered, thought, she can’t be much older than I a
m. ‘I understand that your husband is in the Navy?’

  ‘Yes, it’s a long time since he made Portsmouth. He sends us cards.’ She pointed to the small collection of picture postcards slipped into the frame of a mirror. ‘Actually, he is due home… but of course we need to get this thing with Lu settled before then.’

  The room of four cracked walls, a splintery floor coloured with dark woodstain, and an ill-fitting door and window-frame, was poorly furnished, but, like many of the houses in the area, the tell-tale boxes of piece-goods and made-up items for the corset factories told the story of sweated-labour outworkers. Cynthia Lake thought that this woman hardly seemed capable of making any kind of living. How could any child of such a household hope to keep up in a grammar school? But Louise was not just any child. She was a girl who, when she had gone down in the diphtheria epidemic, had seemed to be an average child constantly in trouble for scrapping like a boy with the pathetic Grigg girl, but who had returned after some months with a quite astonishing application to her lessons, and an apparent desire to learn anything and everything. Which she did at great speed.

  When Cynthia Lake had questioned the girl in a friendly way about her lessons, she had replied, ‘Well, I’m not far off fourteen, so I haven’t got much time left, have I?’

  And when she had hesitantly pushed the matter further by saying, ‘There are, of course, scholarships to the grammar school,’ the girl had seemed to hold her breath.

  ‘You mean girls out of Lampeter Street?’

  ‘Yes… girls from anywhere. The entrance examination is open, which means it is for anybody to try.’

  Without hesitation, the girl had said eagerly, ‘Yes please, miss.’

  The elder son returned now with a wooden tray that must have come from a school woodworking class, and some tea and biscuits which he offered with a nice politeness, not forced. ‘Thank you… should I call you Raymond?’

  ‘Ralph.’

  ‘Ah, thank you then, Ralph.’

  ‘It has to be Ralph who decides, because if Lu gets a scholarship, it is going to fall a lot on his shoulders. I’m afraid my husband is just an able seaman.’

  Cynthia Lake knew this to be as near to useless as pay can go – no fat for grammar schools – and although she would have no truck with the idea of a deserving and an undeserving poor, she felt that there was something admirable about Mrs Wilmott and her children. There were those who would have considered that here was a woman imprudent enough to keep an entire house of living room, scullery and one and a half bedrooms and not rent out at least one or take in lodgers. Miss Lake knew that, had she been in Mrs Wilmott’s situation, she would have done anything to cling on to her remnants of decent family life. Overcrowding of the sort that went on in this slum area was what was killing to both body and spirit, to decency and respect.

  Ralph said, ‘It’s not if she gets it, Mum. She will get it. She’s capable, isn’t she, Miss Lake?’

  ‘Oh, yes, she’s perfectly capable. She is a very clever girl.’

  ‘All my children are.’ Miss Lake saw the pride gleaming from within the hollow of the mother’s dark eyes. ‘Ray got a white-collar job, and my other son is apprenticed at the Co-operative, the funeral directors – he’s just learning to drive.’

  And Miss Lake saw too the affectionate look the smart young clerk gave his mother. These were nice people. Why shouldn’t they be? Poverty was a state, not an inborn characteristic. She had always believed that the country’s greatest talent was in its working people, who were being scandalously wasted because the capitalist system was so blinkered, and the class structure too self-seeking to share anything with families such as these. Wasn’t it for this very reason that she had applied for the headship of one of the least promising of the Church’s many schools?

  ‘Louise’s academic capabilities are not in question. My reason for asking to see you to discuss whether the application should be made is… well, a free place means that there are no fees to pay, but there are expenses.’

  She noticed Mrs Wilmott flick a look at the son, but he kept his eyes upon herself and said straightforwardly, ‘The thing is, even with my money, we aren’t too well off. Kenny’s money will go up in time, but now he hardly gets enough to keep himself. Could they amount to a lot, the fees?’

  ‘I’m afraid that they are often the reason why scholarships are not taken up, even by better-off sections of the community; but in Louise’s case I very much hope that she will receive a full bursary. What we have to think of are the extras: sports equipment, items for use in the science laboratories, aprons and caps for domestic science for girls.’

  Miss Lake saw the pain of disappointment in the mother’s eyes. ‘Those are the very things that go to make the education a whole thing.’ She smiled almost apologetically, ‘I went on to school myself… I was to have been a teacher…’ She stopped herself. ‘But now Lu might have the same chance. Have you any idea how much would be involved? It wouldn’t matter too much to have some things second-hand… I mean, a tennis racquet is a tennis racquet, and I could probably run her up aprons and such. There might be ways…’

  Miss Lake had decided that, if it looked hopeless, then she herself would pay for the girl. But here, confronted by their pride, she could see that their independent honour would be damaged by a crude sum of money. They would accept for the girl’s sake, but Cynthia Lake did not wish to see them humiliated, so she plunged into her lie. ‘There is a fund. If you would agree then I could apply as Louise’s head for a grant to buy all her uniforms and equipment.’ Again the son exchanged a slightly embarrassed glance with his mother, who said, ‘Charity, you mean?’

  ‘Think of it as being in receipt of a legacy, Mrs Wilmott. A grant is a gift from someone who likes to share their good fortune.’

  ‘Oh, I don’t mind, Miss Lake, you get used to it. Nobody in these parts can get far without a bit of charity. It’s just asking for it that is hard.’

  Mrs Wilmott minded all right. The more proud and sensitive the person, the better the face they put on things.

  ‘You wouldn’t need to ask. I would make the automatic application through the school. You need not be involved.’ Mother and son nodded at one another. Perhaps they had been over this ground in anticipation of her visit. Mrs Wilmott smiled at her son. ‘Well, that don’t sound so bad, Ray.’

  ‘I did make enquiries whether there was any fund I could apply for through my union. If Lu had been my daughter, I could certainly get things like free travel if the school was out of the area. Unions are very good, but of course, she’s my sister.’

  ‘Ray’s a big union man, aren’t you, Ray?’

  ‘Not exactly “big”, Mum.’ He turned and Cynthia Lake had her own gaze engaged by his proud one. ‘I’m a shop steward, and usually get to represent the branch at conferences.’

  ‘Which union?’

  ‘The NUR – National Union of Railwaymen.’

  ‘Of course. A good strong union. Were you a member at the time of the ’twenty-six strike?’ Unexpectedly, she smiled. ‘I’m sorry if that sounded like a trick question… I am interested. One doesn’t often get the opportunity of getting an opinion direct; even the most honest journalists are given to bias.’

  His look was very direct. ‘To be frank, Miss Lake, I think if my union had held on, things would be very different now.’

  ‘You mean the laws making general strikes illegal?’

  She saw that he was intrigued at her interest; she knew it must be surprising to him because of the very nature of her position as head of a C of E school.

  ‘Yes, Miss Lake – that, and depriving the unemployed who were not “genuinely seeking work” of benefit. How can a man genuinely seek work when there is none to be had?’

  ‘Or woman.’

  ‘Women won’t be unionized.’

  ‘I don’t agree. It is bad employers and the huge surplus of women workers that don’t allow them to be unionized.’

  She watched his sharp eyes weig
hing her up, then he said, ‘I have only attended one congress, and I felt that the railway unions still have a long way to go before they are forgiven by the other unions.’

  ‘Then, in my opinion, if you don’t mind me saying so, the other unions might do better to look for enemies elsewhere than within their own family. Oh dear… we are supposed to be considering Louise’s future, and here I am carried away. Shall we say, yes, then, Mrs Wilmott… Ralph? We agree that when the time comes I shall do my best to see that Louise gets what extras are necessary?’

  ‘That would be very kind, Miss Lake. Thank you.’ Ralph conducted her the few steps to the front door and held out his hand. ‘Miss Lake, thank you for giving Lu the leg up she’s capable of taking. You know what I think? Her thanks are going to be in the example she will set for other children from round here. One day people are going to realize all the talent that is going down the drain.’

  ‘I realize it, Ralph. I see it every day.’

  As Ray said later to Ken, ‘You could have knocked me down with a feather. You don’t expect a headmistress of a girls’ school to have any politics, but she’s red hot.’

  ‘Do you think it’s on then, our Lu going to the grammar?’

  ‘Miss Lake don’t think there’s much doubt about her getting a full scholarship.’

  ‘I’d help if I could, Ray. A bit later on I’ll be able to. You’d think the Navy would do something for sailors’ kids.’

  ‘They do, but I don’t reckon they’re going to give Lu a place in a boys’ college.’

  Kenny laughed. Kenny laughed easily. ‘Our Lu’d give them a run for their money.’

  Ray nodded, pleased that Kenny at last seemed to be growing up and understanding that the world wasn’t all football.

  * * *

  Lu started at the grammar school, feeling conspicuous in the uniform that her mother was so proud of; she left early in the morning and came home with it hidden as well as she could. She knew that she would get used to it, but at the moment it felt as though she was doing a ‘duchess’, which was something no Lampeter girl would wish upon herself. But, hardly had she been there long enough to sort out her timetable and her way about the huge school, than it came to an abrupt halt.