Authors: Jack Sheffield
I sat down at my desk opposite her and smiled. ‘Interesting lady,’ I said.
‘Just like her mother-in-law, I’m afraid,’ said Vera. After over twenty years as school secretary, Vera knew every family in the village.
‘And the little girl is well named … she’d try the patience of a saint,’ I said.
‘Through patience a ruler can be persuaded and a gentle tongue can break a bone, Mr Sheffield,’ recited Vera. ‘Proverbs, chapter twenty-five, verse fifteen.’ Vera seemed to have a quote from the Bible for every eventuality.
‘Oh well, Vera, let’s hope for a better year than the last one.’
She smiled wistfully and bowed her head. I noticed her beautifully permed hair was now greying at the temples. However, while the cool fingers of time had touched this remarkable lady, she showed no sign of losing enthusiasm for the job she loved. ‘I agree,’ she said with feeling.
‘And how are you, Vera?’ I asked.
She looked out of the window into the distance. ‘I’m fine, thank you, Mr Sheffield,’ she said reflectively. ‘Fully recovered and ready to begin.’ I smiled as Vera continued to call me ‘Mr Sheffield’. She had always insisted this was the proper manner to address the headteacher. ‘I just wish Ruby could be here as well,’ she added with a hint of sadness. ‘But she’s making good progress and I’m going to visit her again this evening.’ Vera had been a regular visitor to York Hospital and we had heard that Ruby would be home soon, although resuming her duties as caretaker would take more time.
‘Well, Mrs Earnshaw seems to have settled in quickly to the temporary caretaker’s job,’ I said, ‘so we should be fine until Ruby’s return.’
‘Yes, although she’s had to bring her little girl in with her, I see,’ added Vera with a frown.
‘I think it’s just for today.’
She sighed, took the cover from her electric typewriter and began to type her first letter of the school year. There was no doubt that Vera was the heartbeat of Ragley School and a wonderful secretary. Recently, we had all been thrilled that she had at last found true love. After a lifetime looking after her brother, the Revd Joseph Evans, our local vicar and chairman of the school governors, she had finally accepted a proposal of marriage from Major Rupert Forbes-Kitchener, a retired soldier and local landowner in his early sixties. Rupert’s wife had died many years ago and he had found a new happiness with our school secretary.
‘Also, just a thought, Mr Sheffield,’ added Vera, looking up from her desk with a wry smile, ‘but I wonder if I might be allowed to ring the school bell this morning. When I was in hospital it crossed my mind that I have never rung it before and it would be a way of announcing that my prayers had been answered … something of a symbolic gesture you understand.’
‘A wonderful idea, Vera,’ I said. ‘You can let the whole village know that you’re back where you belong … fit and well.’
Ragley’s two other teachers suddenly walked into the office to collect their registers. Jo Hunter immediately gave Vera a hug. ‘We’re so pleased to have you here again safe and sound,’ she said. Jo, a diminutive, athletic twenty-seven-year-old, taught the top infant class and took responsibility for physical education and science. She flicked her long black hair from her eyes and picked up her registers.
‘And we were so worried,’ said Sally Pringle, giving Vera’s hand an affectionate squeeze. Sally was a tall, freckle-faced forty-one-year-old with bright ginger hair and a penchant for bright colours. Today she was wearing a frilly lime-green blouse, purple cords with a generous elasticated waistband and a vivid yellow waistcoat. Sally had never quite grown out of her flower-power days and, much to Vera’s disapproval, loved outlandish outfits. She had also never quite regained her figure following the birth of baby Grace, now nineteen months old and leading Sally’s mother a merry dance as she looked after her very mobile granddaughter. Meanwhile, Sally had returned to teaching the lower junior class, the eight-and nine-year-olds. She loved her work, especially art, music and history. ‘By the way,’ said Sally, ‘what’s up with Anne? She looks a bit preoccupied.’
‘Yes,’ said Jo, ‘a bit out of sorts … not like her.’
Vera looked up as if something had just occurred to her, but then, with a shake of her head, she handed Sally her new registers. ‘Anne’s probably got a lot on her mind,’ said Vera, ‘perhaps with the new admissions.’
I glanced up at the clock on the wall. ‘I think I’ll go out to check on the early arrivals,’ I said.
The old oak entrance door creaked on its Victorian hinges as I walked under the archway of Yorkshire stone with the date 1878 carved on its rugged lintel. The tarmac playground was bathed in September sunshine and surrounded by a low wall topped with high wrought-iron railings and decorated with fleur-de-lis. Around me, energetic children, healthy and sunburned after their summer holiday, waved in acknowledgement as I walked down the cobbled drive to the school gate. I breathed in the clear Yorkshire air and felt that familiar deep sense of contentment. There is a steady and reassuring rhythm to the life of a village headteacher. The autumn, spring and summer terms follow on in a regular pattern and the heartbeat of the seasons formed the framework of our life in this village community. It was also the job that I loved, and I smiled as I watched the children playing.
In the playground four girls from my class were enjoying the morning sunshine. Alice Baxter and Theresa Buttle were winding a skipping rope while Amanda Pickles and Sarah Louise Tait skipped like newborn lambs and chanted an old rhyme:
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 said 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.