(20/20)A Peaceful Retirement (9 page)

'Lovelily,' I said automatically, lifting my case from the car. 'Beautifully, I mean.'

I was back sure enough.

The familiar school smell greeted me as I crossed the threshold, accompanied by my vociferous companions. It was a compound of coke fumes from the welcome tortoise stoves, disinfectant, which Mrs Pringle puts in the water to wash the lobby floor, and the general odour of an old building. It was wonderfully exhilarating, and I felt at home at once. I was surprised not to see Mrs Pringle, but a note on my desk explained all.

'Off to Caxley on the early bus. See you dinner time.'

M. Pringle

Mrs Richards had not yet arrived. I banished the children to the playground, while I surveyed my old surroundings.

Basically, it was much as usual, but there were several innovations. For one thing, the ancient long desk that had stood at the side of the room for many years, had now gone. It had been a useful piece of furniture. The children put their lunch packets and fruit in season there, plums and apples from their gardens, or blackberries and hazelnuts collected on the way to school.

Toys, books and other treasures from home rested there, and at this time of year long strings of conkers festooned its battered top. I missed it. It was a relic of the past.

There was a very efficient-looking shelf of nature pamphlets which was new to me, and the framed pictures had been changed from such old friends as
The Light of the World
by Holman Hunt (so useful as a mirror with its dark background) and
The Angelus,
to modern prints of the French Impressionists. I had to admit that they added lightness and charm to the walls, and remembered that the office had urged us to take advantage of the service of supplying pictures which could be borrowed for a month or more.

I unlocked the desk and took out the register. Something seemed strange about the desk, and then I realized that the ancient Victorian inkstand with its two cut-glass ink-wells, one for blue ink and one for red, was no longer in place.

The heavy object, with its great curved brass handle, had vanished, and although I had never used the thing, relying, as no doubt Jane Summers did, on two fountain pens for the marking of the register, I felt a pang of loss.

At that moment Mrs Richards arrived and greeted me with a smacking kiss. Half a dozen children who had come in with her, despite my express order for them to stay outside, were entranced by this display of affection.

The great wall clock, mercifully still in its accustomed place, stood at ten to nine. Joseph Coggs burst into the room and stood transfixed. A slow smile spread across his gypsy face and he took a deep happy breath.

'Can I ring the bell?' he said, as he had said so often to me.

I nodded assent. School had begun.

By the time the dinner lady arrived bearing shepherd's pie and cabbage, with bright yellow trifle for pudding, I felt that I had been back for weeks.

The dinner lady was as welcoming as the children had been, and even Mrs Pringle, when she arrived to wash up, managed a small smile.

'Got Fred in bed again,' she announced. 'Same old chest trouble, wheezing like a harmonium. I popped in to get his subscription made up at Boots.'

I expressed my sympathy with the invalid, and told her about Jane Summers' progress.

'Well, I only hope she don't try to get back too soon. Mind you, she's bound to be worried with someone else muddling along. She's very tidy herself. Everything in apple-pie order here
now.'

I did not care for the emphasis on the last word, but said nothing.

"You looked in the map cupboard?' she enquired. 'It's a sight for sore eyes. All them maps tidied up neat and labelled, and none of that mess of raffia and old plimsolls as used to be there encouraging the mice.'

'Good!' I said briskly, and walked away before I received any more broadsides. Reluctantly Mrs Pringle returned to her labours, and I set about preparing for the afternoon's work.

Driving home soon after four o'clock, I was alarmed at the tiredness which overcame me. I put the car away and put on the kettle. I lit the fire, and was thankful to sit in my comfortable armchair a few minutes later and to sip my steaming tea.

I reviewed the day. It had been interesting to see the changes my successor had made. She was certainly efficient and up to date, and from the remarks of the children she was obviously well liked. I liked her myself, appreciating her brisk cheerfulness and energy. It seemed that even Mrs Pringle approved, and that certainly was something.

This glimpse into my old world had done a great deal to confirm that I had been right to go when I did. It was plain that I just did not have the physical strength needed for sustained and energetic teaching. And what about my mental attitude, I wondered? Was I really forward-looking? Did I relish going on refresher courses, studying new methods of teaching various subjects, or even attending local educational meetings? The honest answer was a resounding 'No', and had been for more years than I cared to contemplate.

Not that I had been completely inactive, I consoled myself, but I had to admit that I had never been thrilled with the idea of leaving my fireside on a bleak winter's evening to listen to someone telling me how to improve my methods of teaching reading, for instance. In most cases, I well remember, the advice was 'to let the child come to reading when ready' and 'to provide reading matter well within the child's comprehension.'

I could think of a number of erstwhile pupils who would
never
have been ready to come to reading without coercion on my part, and a great many more whose reading matter would have been only comics if left to their own devices. Years of teaching had shown me that for every child who takes to reading like a duck to water and needs no help at all, there are half a dozen or so who need sustained daily teaching in the art, and a very hard slog it is for teacher and pupil alike.

I had done my duty for all those years to the best of my ability, and with many failings, but the pupils now there were getting a better education than I had been able to give them in the year or two before I left. I went to wash my tea cup, full of goodwill to Jane Summers and her little flock.

The next day the vicar called at the school and took prayers. Afterwards he told the children how lucky they were to have me back with them. Especially, he added, as I had not been too well myself.

This, I knew, would be related by my pupils to their parents with dramatic effect, so that Fairacre would assume that I was at death's door, and in no shape to take over from Jane Summers, even temporarily. However, there was nothing I could do about it but smile at the kindly vicar, and thank him for coming.

The second day passed more easily than the first, and I had time to notice how well the new families had settled. A Housing Trust, of which Amy's husband James was one of the directors, now owned several new houses in Fairacre, and the children of primary school age were now pupils at Fairacre school. The coming of these children had solved a problem which had beset the village for some years.

As numbers fell it had looked as if the school would have to close. The village, and I in particular, owed a great deal to the Trust and the families they sponsored. Fairacre school looked safe for years to come.

It was such a mild afternoon for November that I decided to take the children for a nature walk, and Mrs Richards joined us with the infants' class.

It was quite like old times tripping along the village street towards the downs. I was really indulging myself, for I had always enjoyed these excursions from the confines of the classroom, and it did one's heart good to see the boisterous spirits of the children as they relished their freedom in the bracing downland air.

Of course, there was not the same natural bounty to be had as a nature walk in the summer. Then we would return with such treasures as brier roses, honeysuckle or cranesbill. We might even find an empty nest whose function was now past, and convey its miracle of woven grass, moss and feathers to the nature table at school.

Nevertheless, there was still treasure to be found such as berries from the wayfaring-tree and hips and haws. Someone found a snail's shell, another found a flint broken in half so that a granular silicic deposit glittered in the light.

We toiled up the grassy slopes until we were high above the village. It was too wet to sit on the grass, but we stood for a few minutes to get our breath back, and to admire the view spread out below us.

There was not much activity to be seen in Fairacre. Washing was blowing in some gardens. Mr Roberts' Friesian cows made a moving pattern of black and white as they grazed, and a red tractor moved up and down a nearby field as bright as a ladybird.

We returned to the village carrying our gleanings. John Todd had discovered a Coca-Cola tin among the natural beauties, and was prevailed upon to deposit it in the bin provided outside the Post Office, which he did under protest. The rest of the garnering was displayed on the nature table, and very attractive it looked.

By common consent I read a story from
The Heroes
by Charles Kingsley, which Jane Summers, I was told, had just started with them, and all was delightfully peaceful.

I was conscious of more attention being given to the newly decorated nature table than Theseus's exploits, but who could blame them?

That afternoon I arrived home in much better shape. Downland air and exercise? Or simply getting back into my old groove? It was impossible to say.

On Wednesday afternoon I arrived home in time to share a pot of tea with Mrs Pringle before running her home. As always, the place was immaculate. Mrs Pringle was a first-class worker, and it was worth putting up with her tales of woe.

After getting up to date with the state of her ulcerated leg (no better, and the doctor worse than useless), we proceeded to the reaction of the inhabitants of Fairacre to my present duties at the school.

'Great shame about Miss Summers everyone agrees. She was getting them children on a real treat.
And
they had to behave!'

I agreed that all seemed to be going swimmingly.

'Mr Lamb reckons that she's as good as a headmaster. Keeps them down to work. None of this skiving off for so-called nature walks.'

I ignored this side-swipe by offering the plate of scones.

'Not for me. I'm losing weight.'

I looked at the clock, and Mrs Pringle took the hint, rising ■with much effort and going to fetch her coat.

"Well, at least it's only for a week we all tell each other. Can't do much harm in that time.'

On the way home, she changed the subject of my inadequacies to the troubles of her niece Minnie Pringle, who lived at nearby Springbourne with a most unsatisfactory husband, named Ern, and a gaggle of unkempt children.

'She's looking for another cleaning job. Ern's keeping her short of money.'

I was instantly on my guard. I have suffered from Minnie's domestic methods on several occasions.

'Why is Ern keeping her short?'

'Hard up, I suppose,' said Mrs Pringle. 'I told her flat that she's not to worry you. Lord knows there's enough to do in your place each week, but I can cope without her muddling about.'

'Thank you, Mrs Pringle,' I said humbly.

Bob Willet appeared one evening that week, bearing some fine eating apples.

'They're good keepers,' he assured me. 'Lovely flavour.'

1 complimented him on such fine specimens, but he halted me in mid-flow of thanks and admiration.

'They're my neighbour's. New chap's just moved in. Nice enough, but don't know a thing about gardening. A townee, you see.'

'He'll learn, I expect.'

Bob looked gloomy, and puffed out his walrus moustache in a great sigh.

'I doubt it. Do you know he's bin and dug up a great patch by the back door for what he calls "a car-port". It was the only bit of ground there as grew a decent onion. Enough to break your heart. I told him so when the cement-mixer arrived. D'you know what he said?'

'What?'