No Talking after Lights Read online

‘And hang on to all our things. I’ll be livid if anything of ours gets pinched.’

  The twins joined hands and ran back to their form-room, their short white socks flashing, their bunches bobbing stubbily.

  The summer days became warmer, started earlier and ended later. The school settled into its disciplined routine and even Constance found herself adapting, despite herself, to the pattern of days divided into forty-minute sections. The teachers began to emerge from anonymity and assemble themselves as distinct figures, those she liked and those who liked her. They ceased to be merely ‘grown-ups’ among a crowd of hostile girls. In the first week of term she had learned to recognize their faces and put names to them, then to identify their handwriting, and finally she was able to anticipate what a lesson would be like - who was strict and made you sit still and keep quiet; who let you muck about; who gave generous marks and who jumped on every weeny mistake or untidiness. The English mistress, Miss Worthrop, was her favourite, and not just because she praised Constance’s work and encouraged her to read. She suggested it was time to move on from animal classics and stories of happy families to more rewarding books like Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights. Constance devoured these in greedy gulps.

  ‘I envy you,’ Miss Worthrop had said, ‘reading Jane Eyre for the first time. Don’t forget to tell me what you think of it.’

  Serious but with shining eyes, Constance had told her.

  ‘And did they write any other books?’ she had asked.

  ‘Quite a lot, yes. But you may find them a bit difficult for the time being.’

  Constance, to prove her wrong, had started The Professor, and found that Miss Worthrop was right; the story seemed turgid by comparison. But it didn’t stop her reading. She dived into books as though entering another world, one in which she could blot out her loneliness. She could forget her surroundings more easily in the pages of a book than in becoming a tree. Tree-ness was becoming harder to achieve. She was no longer simply instinctive, able to tune in to anything at will. Instead she browsed in the school library; she read Pride and Prejudice, Sohrab and Rustum, and Salome, as Miss Worthrop had recommended, but also the Herries Chronicle and Mazo de la Roche, Peter Abelard and Georgette Heyer, and Green Dolphin Country by Elizabeth Goudge, which she loved. She devoured them all, following them like pageants, incorporating them into her mental furniture. She no longer hung around the junior common-room, or bothered to go up to the pets’ shed in the hope of being asked to join in a game. She spent her evenings sitting under, or in, a tree, looking up from her book to see wild rabbits venturing out in the early dusk or the seniors frowning over their mottled brown revision files as they crammed for their imminent exams.

  From a perch above their heads she would hear snatches of conversation as people passed below: ‘Promise you won’t split?’ and ‘Cross your heart and hope to die and I’ll tell you who I think …’ She learned that she was a prime suspect for the thefts. This stung, for Constance had been brought up to be scrupulously honest, according to her father’s old-fashioned code, and would no more have touched someone else’s things than made an apple-pie bed -the trick that was played on her one evening. Too proud to complain, and unable to make a joke of it, she spent the night curled up in the top half of her bed, cramped and uncomfortable, but with the satisfaction of knowing that the girls who had done it derived no pleasure from her humiliation. ‘Spoil-sport,’ someone muttered, but Constance knew it was one up to her.

  The books saved her from the misery which had smothered her first three weeks at school. In fact, to her surprise, she found that it was easier once her parents and Stella had left for Kenya, extinguishing the last small hope that she might somehow, miraculously, go with them after all. It even made the loss of her pen easier. The knowledge that her mother wouldn’t hear about it for weeks was better than having to confess within days. Constance said nothing, just in case it should somehow turn up in her desk, her locker, or blazer pocket, though she had searched them all.

  It had still not turned up when the Head summoned her.

  ‘Ah, yes, Constance King,’ said Mrs Birmingham as Constance entered and sat down nervously on the far side of her imposing desk.

  ‘You’ve made a very good start, my dear, and your teachers are very satisfied with your work. Well done. You seem to be settling in.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Constance, for it was true.

  ‘Let’s see … English, history and geography seem to be your best subjects. Maths not so good, Latin not bad, considering you’ve never done it before. Biology not so good. Art…’

  ‘I’m hopeless at art,’ said Constance. ‘I can’t draw for toffee.’

  ‘Well, if you can’t draw pictures you’ll have to learn to write vividly, won’t you? I expect you’ll manage that. You seem to be good with words. But you ought to do something creative with your hands. There’s needlework, or dressmaking, or … would you like to take up pottery?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Constance. She had looked through the windows of the pottery hut and seen girls with squelchy worms of wet clay oozing through their fingers, and it looked fun. She’d seen their absorbed expressions. Yes, she’d like to have a go at that.

  ‘Now, games. Good at athletics, not good at team games. Why’s that?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ said Constance. ‘I’ve never played rounders before. Or tennis. But I like swimming.’

  ‘I should hope so too,’ said Mrs Birmingham. She smiled. ‘Everyone likes swimming. Now, what about your parents?’

  Constance, startled, drew down the shutters.

  ‘They’re all right.’

  ‘I’m sure they are. What about you? Still homesick?’

  ‘I’m all right,’ said Constance, adding unexpectedly, ‘I’ve lost my pen. I’m dreading telling them. They’re going to be absolutely livid.’

  ‘“Livid” is a much misused word. Its dictionary definition is dark blue, purplish. A bruise is livid. Do you mean your parents will be angry?’

  ‘Furious,’ said Constance. ‘It was fearfully expensive.’

  ‘I’m sure they won’t be furious. Perhaps it wasn’t your fault.’

  ‘Last Monday I couldn’t find it, but I know it was in my pencil-box on Sunday because I used it to write home. It must have gone after that, and I’ve looked everywhere.’

  ‘I’m sure you have, dear. Keep your fingers crossed that it’ll turn up. Have you tried looking in the confiscation cupboard?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Well, then. Now, what about friends? Have you made friends?’

  ‘Not really. Sort of, a bit, with Rachel and Jennifer. They’re jolly decent to me but they’re friends with each other. They don’t need me.’

  ‘Nonsense. We all need friends. “No man is an island, complete unto himself.” You wouldn’t know who wrote that?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘John Donne. A very great poet and preacher of the seventeenth century. You’ll enjoy reading him one day. I think you’ll find poetry a friend.’

  ‘I do already.’

  Mrs Birmingham looked up, and saw that the child was serious.

  ‘Good. Try Browning. Not Elizabeth Barrett. Robert. Look up a poem that begins, “Grr, there go, my heart’s abhorrence! Water your damned flower pots, do!’”

  ‘Didn’t he write “The Pied Piper of Hamelin”?’

  ‘Good girl. That’s right. This is a few steps on from that. Run along to the library now, and look it up before you forget. We’ll have another chat in a few weeks’ time.’

  As the door closed behind Constance, Miss Roberts said, ‘Another pen missing?’

  ‘Yes. She hasn’t lost it, poor little mite. It’s been taken. So have a silver photograph frame, a leather writing-case, another pen, half-a-dozen glass animals, and a ten-shilling note pinned inside a birthday card.’

  ‘Will you talk to the school?’

  ‘I suppose it’s time I did.’ Mrs Birmingham sighed heavily. ‘There’s always one rotten apple.’
/>   ‘She’s a clever child, Constance King. She’ll be a credit to the school one day. Pity she’s not getting on with the Lower Fourth.’

  ‘Well, she is a bit of an odd-bod. What can I do, Peggy? I can’t possibly move her down, but I can’t put her up with the fourteen-year-olds, either. She’ll just have to find her level. Shame about her pen - but a bit of a relief as well. It means she is unlikely to be the thief.’

  That seemed unlikely anyway.’

  ‘You’re right, though. It’s time to talk to the school.’ Dear God, prayed Henrietta, show me Thy wisdom, give me an understanding of the hearts and minds of others. Fill this my school with Thy goodness …

  ‘Fill this Thy school with Thy goodness and fellowship, that it may be an example of a Christian community to all who live and serve within it. For the sake of Thy son, our Lord Jesus Christ…’

  ‘Amen,’ intoned the school.

  Once they had left the common-room, teachers and girls, safe from being overheard by one another in form-room or staff-room, began to speculate.

  ‘Poor girls,’ said Miss Worthrop. ‘It’s horrid when everybody’s under suspicion. They all looked guilty.’

  ‘If you ask me, it’s Charmian Reynolds,’ said Sylvia.

  ‘We’ve got absolutely no evidence about anyone so far. Let’s try and remain fair and open-minded,’ said Miss Valentine. She hated her own form being under suspicion and privately thought Charmian far too vapid to carry out a series of thefts. ‘You are only accusing Charmian Reynolds because you don’t like her.’

  ‘That’s untrue and uncalled for. I think you should withdraw that remark,’ said Sylvia.

  ‘Withdraw, withdraw. There goes the bell. Into the fray, everyone!’

  Waiting for the first lesson, the girls buzzed with drama and outrage.

  ‘No sweets for anyone!’ said Fiona. ‘Gosh, I think that’s a swizz.’

  ‘Me too,’ said fat Rachel.

  ‘Won’t do you any harm,’ said Charmian.

  ‘Mean pig,’ said Jennifer.

  ‘My pen’s gone too,’ ventured Constance, admitting it for the first time.

  ‘Are you sure?’ said Flick, nastily.

  ‘Of course I’m sure.’

  ‘OK, OK, keep your hair on. Hey, quick, shut up everyone, here comes Batey Parry!’

  ‘What do you make of this?’ asked Henrietta Birmingham, passing a letter across to her Deputy. Peggy read the letter rapidly: ‘“Deeply distressing time for all of us … despite our best efforts … forced to the conclusion … fear I must ask you to break the news to poor Charmian … bound to be terribly upset at first … probably best if she can spend half-term with a friend to help her get over the shock … sending her to my sister for the summer … Yours sorrowfully” –Sorrowfully! She’s got a nerve! “Fay Reynolds.”’

  ‘What are we supposed to do about it? It’s not Charmian I’d like to talk to, it’s her mother!’ said Henrietta.

  ‘That goes for many of the parents,’ said Peggy Roberts. ‘There’s several I wouldn’t mind having a word with. Paying off guilty consciences or just plain indifference by sending their daughters here. And then they tell them they aren’t really homesick and furthermore how lucky they are.’

  ‘They are lucky, in many ways,’ said Henrietta. ‘When I think of my own education … crumbs from my brothers’ table.’

  ‘Will you break the news to Charmian?’

  ‘It looks as though I shall have to. I’ll think about how best to do it for a day or two first.’

  ‘You don’t think she could be stealing, as a reaction to what’s going on at home?’

  ‘How could she? She doesn’t even know about it yet. No, she may be a silly child, but I don’t think she’s a wicked one. Much more likely to be one of the lonely or unpopular ones.’

  ‘Sheila?’

  ‘Could be. Who knows? It could be almost anyone. Well, I must tidy myself up. I’m expecting a couple of prospective parents in ten minutes.’

  Constance had finished her prep ahead of everyone else and gone to sit in the tiny library, where she knew she could be sure of being alone for twenty minutes before the supper bell rang. She had discovered The Rubáiyàt of Omar Khayyám on the shelves, drawn by its exotic title (what was a Rubaiyat?), and was entranced by its lush and sensuous language. ‘And Wilderness is Paradise enow …’ Enow somehow it’s far more mysterious than enough. At table you’ve had enough, but enow …I’ll never have enow.

  Why, she thought, why is everyone happy except me? How do they do it? They giggle and chat and muck about. They do things together - pets and gardening and things - and they all sort of belong, all except me. Why is it so hard to be happy? She remembered the simple, light-hearted time when she was living at home and going to the school up the road, when she too had skipped and played and joined in. During special treats with Mummy and Daddy, when it was all too wonderful for her to take another breath, she used to shut her eyes and try to blank out for minutes on end, thinking, I’ll store this; I won’t enjoy it now, I’ll put it away for later, when I need it.

  Now, she tried to summon up those stored moments - at the circus, or on Christmas Eve after she’d heard her father tiptoe in with the fat, crackling stocking and pin it to the end of her bed; or when her parents were playing tennis with friends and she was ballboy and her father had said ‘Well done, Constance! You are a good ballboy!’ She’d wanted to burst with pride at hearing him say it in front of everyone. Sitting on the floor, an open book on her knees, she twined her arms round herself, put her head down and shut her eyes, breathing deeply to bring back those precious, stored moments. Nothing came.

  ‘Well done Constance!’ she whispered, trying to recapture Daddy’s voice. ‘Well done, Constance!’ but it was her own whisper she heard inside her head. The lovely moment was gone. Her bottom was cold on the stone floor and the book was sharp against her cheek and no happiness came flooding back.

  Someone was running down the stairs. Into the library, light and airy, all trailing tendrils and swinging skirt, came Hermione. She stopped when she saw Constance.

  ‘Gosh, you do look mis, poor old sausage. Cheer up! What’s the matter?’ she asked.

  ‘Sorry - aren’t I meant to be here?’ said Constance.

  ‘I’ve no idea. I don’t know who you are, but so long as you’re not a squit you’re allowed to be in here. Anyhow until the bell goes.’

  ‘I’m not a squit, I’m in the Lower Fourth. I’m Gogs,’ said Constance.

  ‘Poor you.’

  ‘Well, I’m Constance King really, but they call me Gogs.’

  ‘Never mind; they call me Hermy-One.’

  ‘I know,’ said Constance, not daring to add, ‘Do you mind your nickname?’

  ‘Oh, gosh, I haven’t a clue where the soppy old poetry books are,’ said Hermione, with an appealing air of helplessness. ‘I can’t think why Miss Worthrop sent me. I’m the last person who’d know.’

  ‘Here,’ said Constance. ‘Are you looking for anyone special?’

  ‘Michael Arnold? Malcolm Arnold? Arnold some-body-or-other.’

  ‘Matthew. Here.’

  ‘I say, well done, Constance!’ And Hermione smiled her careless, magic smile as she pranced out.

  ‘Hermione’ murmured Constance to herself, pronouncing it right. Not Hermy-One! How wonderful she is, how kind and lovely. I shan’t tell anyone. Hermione.

  Opening the door of the staff-room on her way to marshal the supper queues in the Covered Way, Sylvia Parry was rewarded by the sight of Hermione Mailing-Smith cantering along the corridor towards her. She is like a young racehorse, thought Sylvia; her beauty compels devotion, it is so perfectly appropriate.

  ‘Sorry, Miss Parry,’ said Hermione, slowing to a walk and flashing a perfect smile as she passed.

  Is it possible for people to be happy? wondered Sylvia. Suppose my wildest dreams were realized and that beautiful creature belonged to me, would I be happy? No, because in my dreams I wan
t her to love me and me only, for ever; to live with me and cherish me; to depend on me and cleave only unto me, as long as we both shall live. She stood motionless in the corridor as other girls hurried past. Well, all right, if that happened, would I be happy? Yes, but I have designed for myself an impossible happiness, in which there is no secrecy, no jealousy, no change, no boredom: just an eternity of loving Hermione. It is impossible. Other people can be happy, but not me.

  She began to walk slowly towards the queues lined up for supper, their high-pitched hum of talk and giggles muted by her arrival.

  ‘Silence!’ she shouted at the top of her voice, entering the Covered Way. The next person to speak has an order mark. I want total, complete and utter silence until the bell goes. Is that quite clear?’

  Under their breath, one or two girls muttered, ‘Batey-batey!’ or, ‘OK, OK, keep your hair on …’ but fortunately Miss Parry didn’t hear them.

  Mrs Birmingham, after a difficult and tearful half-hour with Charmian, told the child to go to Matron and say she’d been sent to lie down. Matron had been warned of this possibility and would, she knew, give her a ‘tonic’ to make her drowsy. Best to sleep off the immediate effects of a catastrophe.

  Why do people expect to be happy? wondered Henrietta. Why should that flighty, fading little woman, Charmian’s mother, believe she has any right to happiness? How dare she send her daughter adrift, distress her husband, abandon her home and ensnare another man, in the belief that she has any entitlement to happiness? They have everything, these women -husbands, children (how many of my generation missed out on those?), wealth, comfort, attention; and in spite of all that they are bone idle and mindlessly greedy. With their fastidiously painted finger-nails they constantly reach out for more.

  Happiness is not our lot in life. Love of God and our neighbours, being true to our word, doing our duty, that is our lot. Happiness has nothing to do with it. Was my beloved brother Jamie ever happy? No. Or my parents, with half a son left out of three? No. Is Lionel happy? No, alas. James …? O dear God, let my son James be happy, of Thy goodness and mercy I pray Thee. Not for myself I ask it, but of Thine own great love for Thy son.