Miss Clare Falls Ill

Term was now several weeks old. Jimmy, Joseph, and Linda had settled down and played schools, space-ships, and shops in the playground as noisily as the rest.

Mrs. Coggs had taken a job at the public house down the lane. Each morning she spent two hours there, washing glasses and scrubbing out the bar and the bar parlour, while the baby slept in its pram in the garden where she could keep an eye on it.

This arrangement had happy results for Joseph. For three or four weeks he had brought slices of bread to school for his lunch and sometimes an apple or a few plums to enliven it; and this dreary meal he had eaten sadly, his dark eyes fixed upon the school dinners that his more fortunate fellows were eating.

But now, with money of her own in her pocket, Mrs. Coggs was able to rebel against her husband's order of 'No school dinner for our Joe!' and to everyone's satisfaction Joseph returned to the dinner table, a broad smile on his face and an appetite keener than ever.

The weather had been fine all through September. The harvest had been heavy, the stacks were already thatched and housewives were hard at it bottling and jamming a bumper crop of apples, plums, and pears.*

But one morning I awoke to a changed world. The grass was grey with frost. The distant downs had disappeared behind a white mist and below the elm trees the yellow leaves were thickening fast into an autumn carpet.

During the morning the sun shone feebly, its rays falling across the children's down-bent heads as they struggled with their arithmetic. It was very quiet in the classroom.

Suddenly we were all frightened out of our wits* by a heavy banging at the door. It was Mr Roberts, the farmer, and one of his men, Tom Bates. Each carried a stout sheaf of corn. Behind me, the children chattered excitedly.

It has always been the custom here for the children of Fairacre School to decorate the school for Harvest Festival.

Immediately the children squatted among the straw like hens, their fingers busily arranging the corn into neat bunches. Next door the infants were employed in the same way. Suddenly the door of the partition opened a little and a dark eye appeared. I waited to see what would happen.

Gradually the crack widened and Joseph Coggs, finger in mouth, gazed silently at me. He stood stock-still and then beckoned to me urgently.

'Say!' he called in his husky voice, 'Miss Clare's fallen over!'

Panic gripped me as I fled into the infants' room. It was very quiet in Miss Clare's room. The children stood round her chair gaping, while their teacher lay slumped across the table, her white hair lying in a pool of water from an over-turned vase. Her lips were blue and she moaned incessantly.

'Take your bunches,' I said hastily, 'and go into my room.' They moved away slowly as I bent over her. At this moment she gave a little sigh and raised her head. Voices floated through the door.

I shut the door firmly. Miss Clare looked at me with a wan smile.

'A drink,' she whispered.

I filled a mug from the drinking bucket. The colour gradually crept back into Miss Clare's cheeks as she sipped. I sat on the front desk and watched her anxiously.

'Will you be all right for a minute while I go across to fill a hot bottle?'*

'There's no need,' protested Miss Clare, flushing pink at the thought of leaving her post in the middle of the afternoon, 'I can manage now. This isn't the first time this has happened; but luckily it's never happened in school.'

'Just sit still for a few minutes and I'll be back,' I told her, and went to the children. It was a relief to enter this normal buzzing atmosphere and to breathe the homely smell of straw.

'Get on quietly,' I said as I walked through. 'I'll be back soon.'

I switched on the kettle and rang Miss Clare's doctor. By a miracle he was in and promised to come at once. He arrived as I was tucking the rug round her on the sofa. I poured them some tea and returned to school.

*

It's a funny thing, but faced with a crisis, children always behave better.* Perhaps the sudden removal of adult supervision lessens the tension and they feel relaxed and happy. I can't account for it, but it has happened to me many times. This afternoon was no exception, and thankfully I passed round the sweet tin.*

Cathy collected the bundles of straw and I wondered what message to send by the children to their parents about their early home-coming. It was inevitable that the news of Miss Clare's illness would spread quickly, but I did not want any visitors during the next hour or so.

'Tell your mothers,' I announced, 'that you are home early as Miss Clare is not very well this afternoon. I expect she will be back tomorrow.'

*

Dr Martin, I noticed with some annoyance as I entered the kitchen, was drying his hands on my clean tea-towel. He was whistling to himself.

'How is she?'

'She'll be all right now; but I'd like her to stay here for the night if you can have her.'

'Of course.'

'I'll call in to see her sister* on my way back. It might be as well* if she could stay with her for a week or two, though I doubt if she will go there. It's a pity they don't hit it better.'*

Dr Martin is now in his seventies and knows the histories of the village families intimately.

'Has she needed to call you in before?' I asked. 'She's said nothing to me about these attacks.'

'Had them off and on for two years now,* the silly girl,' said Dr Martin. He faced me across the kitchen table.

'She will have to give the school up, you know. Should have done so last year,* but she's as obstinate as her father was. Do your best to make her see it.* I'll call in tomorrow morning.'

He put his head round the door of the living-room.

'Now, Dolly, stay there and rest. You'll do,* my dear, you'll do!'

*

Dr Martin must have put a match to the fire for its cheerful light was the first thing I noticed in the quiet living-room. Miss Clare was lying back on the sofa with her eyes shut, and I thought that she slept.

'I heard,' she said, without opening her eyes; and for the life of me I could say nothing — nothing of comfort* to an old tired woman who was facing the end of more than forty years' service. For a minute I hated my own good health that seemed to put up a barrier between us. She must have thought from my silence that I had not heard her, for she sat up and said again:

'I heard what Dr Martin said. He's right, you know. I shall go at Christmas.'*

I was afraid to speak, lest she should hear my trembling voice. She looked anxiously at me.

'Or do you think I should go at once? Is that what you think? Do you wish I'd gone before?* You must have noticed that I was not doing my job as I should.'

This had the effect of loosening my tongue,* and I told her how groundless were these thoughts.

'Don't think about plans tonight,' I urged her. 'We'll see what the doctor says about you tomor­row and talk it over then.'

But although she agreed about the post­ponement of her own arrangements, her mind returned to school affairs.

'Should you phone to the office,* do you think, dear? It closes at five, you know, and if you need a supply teacher — '*

'I shall manage easily tomorrow on my own,' I as­sured her. 'Don't worry about a thing.' I got up from the end of the sofa to go upstairs to get the spare room ready for her. She sat very still with her head downbent. There were tears on her cheek, glistening in the light from the fire.

Дата добавления: 2015-11-16