The Little Village School Read online

  ‘She did make a point of having a word with Miss Brakespeare,’ continued the school secretary mischievously, enjoying the caretaker’s clear irritation at not getting a mention. ‘She told her how she hoped they could work together.’

  The caretaker laughed in a mirthless way. ‘Huh. I’ll tell you this, Miss Brakespeare will have to buck her ideas up now, by the sound of it.’

  ‘Yes, I guess she will,’ agreed the secretary. And so will you, she thought to herself. ‘The school needs a fresh start,’ she said, ‘and this new woman will no doubt give it, although I wonder how parents and people in the village will react. She’ll not be everyone’s idea of a head teacher.’

  ‘No,’ agreed the caretaker, rubbing his jaw and sniffing again. ‘Red shoes with silver heels. I just hope she doesn’t start walking on my parquet floor with her silver heels. It’s taken me an age to get it to the state it’s in.’

  The school secretary allowed herself another small smile. The state of the parquet floor in the school hall, she thought, was the least of the caretaker’s worries. ‘One wonders, of course,’ she said, ‘why someone so well qualified and already a very successful head teacher in a large city primary school should want to move to a village in the middle of the country. I saw her references and they were very good, very good indeed. I mean, there’s a drop in salary for a start, then the cost of moving house.’

  ‘Is she married then?’ asked the caretaker.

  ‘Well, she’s “Mrs” on the application form,’ the school secretary told him.

  ‘Perhaps her husband’s got a job in the area,’ suggested the caretaker. ‘She might—’

  ‘Well, no,’ interrupted Mrs Scrimshaw. ‘I had to copy the application forms and the references for the governors and I couldn’t help but notice that where it asked for marital status she had written, “Single”.’

  ‘She must be divorced, then?’

  ‘Appears so, unless she’s a widow.’

  ‘Well, it’s a bit of a mystery and no mistake,’ said the caretaker.

  ‘It is indeed,’ agreed the school secretary thoughtfully. ‘It is indeed.’

  A small voice could be heard in the corridor.

  ‘Excuse me, Mr Gribbon, I’m sorry to interrupt your conversation but may I have a quick word with Mrs Scrimshaw?’

  The caretaker moved away from the door to let a small boy into the office. He was a bright-eyed, rosy-cheeked child of about or eight or nine, his hair cut in the short-back-and-sides style and with a neat parting. Unlike the other junior boys in the school, who wore jumpers in the school colours, open-necked white shirts and long grey flannel trousers, this child was attired in a smart blue blazer, a hand-knitted pullover, grey shorts held up by an elastic belt with a snake clasp, a white shirt and tie, long grey stockings and sensible shoes. He could have been a schoolboy of the 1950s.

  ‘Hasn’t your mother arrived to collect you yet, Oscar?’ asked the school secretary irritably.

  ‘No, not yet, Mrs Scrimshaw,’ replied the child cheerfully, ‘but I am sure she will be here directly. She has a great many commitments on Fridays and she said she would be a little late.’ He had a curiously old-fashioned way of speaking.

  ‘Yes, well, I have to get home,’ Mrs Scrimshaw told him sharply, glancing at the clock on the wall yet again. ‘I really shouldn’t have to wait around until your mother decides to collect you. I’m going out this evening and I wanted to be off promptly.’

  ‘Anywhere nice?’ asked the child cheerily, oblivious to the implied criticism of his mother.

  Mrs Scrimshaw sighed impatiently. There was a slight raise of the eyebrow and a brief lift of the chin. ‘Perhaps I ought to give your mother a ring,’ she said.

  ‘She’ll be on her way,’ the child told her. ‘Friday is when she does her counselling and she sometimes runs a little late.’

  ‘Well, what do you want, Oscar?’ asked Mrs Scrimshaw.

  ‘I just wanted a quick word with you about the new head teacher,’ replied the boy.

  ‘Oh yes,’ said the school secretary, exchanging a glance with the caretaker.

  ‘Miss Sowerbutts told us yesterday in assembly that the governors would be appointing a new head teacher today,’ said the boy cheerfully.

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘And she said we had to be on our very best behaviour.’

  ‘Did she?’

  ‘And that whoever gets the job,’ continued the boy, ‘will probably be calling in at the school some time next week to meet the teachers and the children and to have a look around.’

  ‘Well, what about it, Oscar?’ asked Mrs Scrimshaw.

  ‘Well, it occurred to me,’ said the child, ‘that it would be a really good idea to make a big poster that we could put in the entrance hall to greet our new head teacher for when he or she visits. It would make them feel welcome, don’t you think? I could do it over the weekend. I’ve just been given some paints for my birthday by my Uncle Julian. And I could write a poem of welcome.’

  Mrs Scrimshaw exchanged glances again with her colleague. He rolled his eyes and jangled his keys. ‘I think you would need to ask Miss Sowerbutts about that, Oscar,’ said the school secretary, imagining the expression on the face of the head teacher when such an idea was suggested.

  ‘Well, I could do the poster and the poem and bring them in on Monday,’ persisted the boy, ‘and run it past her.’

  The school secretary knew exactly what Miss Sowerbutts would think. The head teacher had been in a terrible mood all day, having been obliged to vacate her room for the interviews in which she had not been involved. The last thing she would want was a big poster and a poem welcoming her successor.

  ‘I think that’s a very good idea, Oscar,’ said the school secretary. ‘You run it past her on Monday. Now why don’t you go and wait in the entrance for your mother and read your book.’

  ‘So, did the governors pick a new head teacher, Mrs Scrimshaw?’ asked the boy without moving.

  ‘Off you go, Oscar,’ the school secretary told him with a tight smile of dismissal. ‘You’ll find out soon enough.’

  ‘It’s just that I could put her name – or it could be the man of course – on my poster,’ the child told her.

  ‘Go on! Off you go!’ said the caretaker sharply. ‘And do as you’re told.’

  ‘Actually I’m glad I’ve seen you, Mr Gribbon,’ said the boy, ignoring the instruction. ‘I’ve noticed that one or two of the paving slabs on the school drive have cracked and could be a health and safety hazard.’

  ‘Have you indeed?’ The caretaker grimaced.

  ‘A bit sticks up in places. I nearly tripped over and I could have hurt myself,’ continued the boy.

  ‘Well, you should look where you’re going then, shouldn’t you?’ said the caretaker.

  ‘It’s just that if someone does trip up and falls over they could break a bone and then the school could get into a lot of trouble. My father was telling my mother at breakfast this morning about someone in the office where he works who slipped on the wet floor and broke her leg and she’s taking the company to court. He said she could get a lot of money in compensation. I think it would be a really good idea, Mr Gribbon, if you replaced those paving slabs.’

  The caretaker opened his mouth to reply but the boy smiled widely and said, ‘Well, I think I can see my mother at the school gates. I’ll get off then.’

  ‘Goodbye, Oscar,’ sighed the school secretary, slowly shaking her head.

  ‘Oh, goodbye, Mrs Scrimshaw,’ the boy replied. He turned to the caretaker. ‘Goodbye, Mr Gribbon, and you won’t forget about the broken paving slabs, will you?’

  ‘Now look here, young man—’ started the caretaker, scowling, but before he could complete the sentence the child was out of the door.

  ‘I do hope the lady in the red shoes is our new head teacher,’ shouted the boy from the corridor. ‘She looked nice.’

  Miss Hilda Sowerbutts, to avoid being there at the time of the int
erviews, had left the school that morning before the first candidate had been called into her room to face the appointment panel. She was curious to see the candidates, though, so she had looked them over as they sat in the corridor but had said nothing. They were a motley group, she thought to herself. She had left the school and arrived back after the candidates and governors had departed at lunchtime, had not asked Mrs Scrimshaw who had been offered the position, and had closeted herself in her room for the remainder of the day. At the sound of the bell signalling the end of school she strode down the path, seething malevolently like a giant wasp, without saying ‘Good afternoon’ to the school secretary and ignoring the school caretaker, who attempted to catch her attention as she rattled through the gate. She was furious with the governors, of course, but Mrs Scrimshaw had annoyed her with the excessive attention she had paid to the candidates and by the obsequious way she had followed the Chairman of Governors around like some fussy little lapdog.

  Miss Sowerbutts walked briskly through the village, past the village store and post office and the Blacksmith’s Arms, to arrive at her small cottage at the end of the high street. After pouring herself a large extra dry sherry, she sat in the small tidy living room simmering. To be treated like this by the governors after all her years of loyal service to the school, to be slighted in such a way, was quite unforgivable. When the Chairman of Governors had informed her the week before that she was not to be involved in the interviewing process, she had, for one of those rare moments in her life, been lost for words.

  ‘So, you see, Miss Sowerbutts,’ the major had said, tugging nervously at his moustache, ‘it was felt by the governing body that it would be for the best if you distanced yourself, so to speak. We thought it appropriate if you were not involved.’

  ‘Distance myself?’ she had said when she had found her voice. She had stiffened, her face rigid. ‘Not be involved?’

  ‘That’s right,’ he had told her with a contrived smile. ‘To leave the appointment in the hands of the governors, if you follow my drift.’

  ‘No, Major!’ she had snapped. She had prickled with irritation. ‘I am afraid I do not follow your drift. Might I remind you that I have been head teacher in this school for twenty years?’ She had tensed with indignation. Her tone of voice had been glacial. ‘Furthermore, I have taught at Barton-in-the-Dale for thirty. Does that not mean anything?’ The major had felt it politic not to reply. He had stared at her glassily. ‘I guess it does not,’ she had informed him coldly.

  ‘It’s a tad delicate, Miss Sowerbutts,’ the major had started, smiling awkwardly, and then had begun again to tug at his moustache. ‘You see—’

  ‘Please allow me to finish,’ she had interrupted, with exaggerated disdain. ‘I should have thought that my opinion would count for something and at the very least my advice would have been sought.’

  ‘You see,’ the major had tried to explain, ‘the representative of the Local Education Authority, Mr Nettles, felt very strongly that it might be for the best if you were not involved. As far as I am concerned, I have no objection to your being party to the appointment, indeed I suggested the same, but one has to take the advice of Mr Nettles. After all, he has attended many interviews and does guide us in these matters. As he was at pains to point out, he is the locum tenent—’

  ‘The what?’ Miss Sowerbutts had asked, sharply, her eyes slitted to contain her anger.

  ‘He stands in for the Director of Education,’ the major had endeavoured to explain, ‘there to advise us and see that things are done properly. I am told it is not usual for head teachers to sit in on the appointment of their successors.’

  ‘Then you have been sadly misinformed, by this local tenement or whatever he styles himself,’ she had told the major testily, her mouth dry with resentment. ‘If it is not usual for head teachers to sit in on the appointment of their successors, then why was Mr Whyman sitting in on the interview for the headship at Tanbeck Wood Primary School last year?’

  ‘Ah, yes, well,’ the major had blustered. ‘I think that was something of an exception to the rule, if you follow my drift. There were special circumstances at Tanbeck Wood, I gather, in that particular situation.’

  ‘Which were?’ she had asked tartly. The question was like a pistol shot.

  ‘I beg your pardon?’

  ‘What were these “special circumstances”?’ she had demanded, emphasising the last two words.

  ‘I’m not privy to that, Miss Sowerbutts,’ the major had told her feebly.

  ‘Really? Well, I should be very interested to know what they were,’ she had persisted.

  ‘You would have to have a word with Mr Nettles about that,’ the major had replied, glancing at his watch to avoid her Medusa stare. How he had longed to be somewhere else.

  ‘So, then, I am not even to see the application forms or give an opinion about who I think should be on the shortlist?’ There had been a wary resentful look in her eyes. ‘Is that what you are saying?’

  ‘We … we … felt … Mr Nettles felt, that is,’ the major had told her, thinking to himself that it would have been easier to face a squad of battle-hardened soldiers than tackle this woman, ‘that it is better if you are not involved in the appointment.’

  ‘Well, Major, let me tell you,’ she had said, a look of distaste passing over her features, ‘and I hope you will convey this back to the governors and to this Mr Nettles, that I feel personally and profoundly insulted. In my considered opinion you have not treated me with the proper respect and attention. I feel betrayed and I am extremely angry.’

  ‘I am sorry you feel this way,’ the Chair of Governors had said. ‘Although you will not participate in the actual appointment, I do hope you will be involved to the extent of meeting the candidates, showing them around the school and answering any questions they may ask.’

  Miss Sowerbutts had stared at him coldly. ‘I think not,’ she had said.

  The major had departed with his tail between his legs.

  On the day of the interviews Miss Sowerbutts, on arriving home, looked out over her neat little garden, the smooth green lawn, carefully trimmed hedges and tidy borders she so carefully tended. She bristled with suppressed anger as she recalled the disagreeable meeting with the major. Lifting the sherry glass to her lips, she emptied the contents in one great gulp.

  The phone rang.

  ‘Yes?’ she answered sharply.

  ‘It’s me,’ a small voice came down the line. It was the deputy head teacher. ‘I didn’t get a chance to see you after school and I just wanted—’

  ‘Did you get it?’ Miss Sowerbutts asked quickly.

  ‘No.’

  ‘No!’

  ‘The woman in the red shoes got it, a Mrs Devine.’

  Miss Sowerbutts received the news with a face as hard as a diamond. ‘Well, I think it is disgraceful,’ she said angrily. ‘Disgraceful!’

  ‘She seems very nice,’ Miss Brakespeare told her hesitantly. ‘She was very pleasant and took the time to have a word with me after the interviews.’

  Miss Sowerbutts did not listen as she tried to take in the shocking news. ‘I just cannot believe it.’

  ‘It might be for the best,’ Miss Brakespeare said. She sounded almost cheerful.

  ‘I’ll see you tomorrow, Miriam,’ said Miss Sowerbutts, and without a word of commiseration, she banged down the receiver.

  What was surprising to her was that the deputy head teacher had not sounded at all disappointed that she had not got the job, in fact she had sounded not only resigned to the fact but distinctly light-hearted.

  Miss Sowerbutts was not the sort of woman to let things lie. She considered herself well-respected in the village, indeed held in awe by many, and believed that she still had a deal of influence in many different circles. If the major and this woman with the red shoes and the black stockings thought they were in for an easy ride, then they had another think coming.

  2

  The Reverend Atticus, rector of Barto
n, surveyed his tea, which had just been placed before him, through the thin lenses of small steel-framed spectacles. In the centre of the plate was a weeping chunk of boiled ham, half a hard-boiled egg with a blob of sickly-looking mayonnaise on top, two circles of dry cucumber, a radish, an over-ripe tomato and a fan-shaped piece of wilting lettuce edged in brown.

  ‘Is there something the matter with your tea, Charles?’ asked the vicar’s wife.

  She was a plain woman with a long oval face and skin the colour of the wax candles on the altar in the church, but her redeeming features were the most striking jade green eyes and her soft Titian hair.

  ‘No, no, my dear,’ the vicar replied, raising a smile. I am sure someone starving somewhere in the world would be glad of this repast, he thought, but it looked deeply unappetising to him. Of course, he didn’t say anything but picked up his knife and fork. ‘I was just thinking,’ he said.

  ‘About what?’ asked his wife, spearing a radish.

  ‘Oh, what I might make the theme of my sermon on Sunday.’

  ‘Well, I hope you will make it a great deal shorter than last week’s sermon,’ his wife said rather petulantly. ‘It went on for far too long. And I do wish you wouldn’t spend so much time talking outside the church after the service. The Yorkshire pudding tasted like cardboard when we eventually sat down to eat.’ She crunched on the radish.

  His wife’s culinary efforts frequently tasted like cardboard, thought the vicar, but he remained silent and poked the tomato to the side of his plate as if it were some insect that had crawled out of the lettuce.

  ‘I mean,’ continued his wife, ‘how many in the congregation understand or indeed are remotely interested in what you say?’

  The comment stung. ‘One hopes that they take in something, my dear,’ replied her husband. He stared out of the window at the pale green pastures, dotted with grazing sheep and criss-crossed by grey stone walls, that rolled upwards to the great whaleback hills and gloomy grey clouds in the distance. The scene had a cold and eerie beauty about it. He recalled a snatch of text: ‘I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my help.’