Fearful Symmetries (25 page)

Susan entered the classroom then, and shut the adult world out. She immediately felt calmer. She looked out across the children, all of them eyeing her warily. Little girls in pretty blouses, boys big before their time with dirty faces and dirty fingernails.

“Good morning, class,” she said. And they all got to their feet then, and mumbled good morning back. She hadn’t expected that. She rather liked it. She hoped she’d kept it off her face, that surprise, and that pleasure. She was sure she had.

“My name is Miss Cowley,” she told them. “And I’m here to look after you.”

She looked through the cupboards. The children helped her. There were the books, as Miss Bewes had promised. There was also a map, as big as the blackboard. There were drawing pads. There was a whole colony of wooden abacuses.

She put the map up on the wall. It was an old map, and she knew some of the countries didn’t exist anymore, not since the war. The children were still able to point out some of the better ones, like France and Spain, and show her where England was. Afterwards, she set the children on to the drawing pads, told them they could draw whatever they liked, and use crayons to colour the pictures in. Some of the drawings were really rather good, and she took the map down and put the drawings in its place.

After lunch she asked the children what subjects they most liked, and they all said they liked stories, and that meant history. So she told them an Arthurian legend. The children listened, quite spellbound, as if they’d never even heard of Sir Gawain or his green knight, and at one point the realisation that these thirty young strangers were hanging on her every word made Susan freeze with stage fright; they waited patiently; she recovered; she began to enjoy herself. Already in her head she was planning other stories she could share with them the next day, and the day after that, and all the days following.

It only went wrong towards the end of the afternoon.

Susan suggested they move on to mathematics. She was pleased that none of the children groaned, or looked unhappy at the prospect; by this point, it seemed, they would have followed her anywhere, even into the realms of simple arithmetic. “Why not show me what you already know?” she said. “Who here would like to stand before the class, and recite the times tables with me?”

No one volunteered. But then, no one resisted either. “How about you?” she asked a little girl sitting near the front, and the little girl got to her feet quite happily.

“What’s your name?” she asked the girl. But the girl just shook her head.

“Don’t be shy,” said Susan. “We’re all your friends here. Do you know the five times table?” The little girl looked at her blankly.

“I’ll demonstrate,” Susan said. And she began to recite. “Once times five is five. Two times five is ten. Three times five . . .”

“Fifteen,” said the little girl.

“That’s right.”

“Four times five is twenty. Five times five is twenty-five.” And on the girl went, all the way to a hundred.

Susan gave her a little clap. “Well done,” she said. “Does anyone else want to . . .?”

The little girl took a deep breath. And then she started on the six times table.

“Yes,” said Susan. “All right.”

“Ten times six is sixty. Eleven times six is sixty-six.”

“That’s very good. Well done!”

“Fifteen times six is ninety. Sixteen times six is ninety-six.”

“Big numbers now! Can you go any further?”

But the girl stopped dead, looked at Susan, frowned.

“That’s very good,” said Susan once more. “Yes. I shall give you a merit point. What is your name, again . . .?”

And the little girl, once again, was taking a breath of air. A deeper one this time. The effort of it meant she had to clutch on to the teacher’s desk, and her face turned red. A great wheeze there was, and Susan thought it sounded like it came from an old man, an old man close to death, and the girl’s face was contorted with the force of it—she hunched over, gripping at her stomach, and Susan reached out for her, and the little girl just pushed her away. She steadied herself. She calmed. She looked her teacher right in the face.

“One times seven is seven,” she informed her. It was almost conversational. “Two times seven is fourteen.”

“Yes,” agreed Susan.

And onwards. “Thirteen times seven is ninety-one. Fourteen times seven is ninety-eight.”

Susan felt the question rise within her—does she know the eight times table? “Thank you,” she said, and she hoped from her tone it was clear that the thank you was conclusive.

But the little girl had gone back to the beginning. She was reciting the seven times table again, and this time it was faster, more confident.

“Three times seven is twenty-one, four times seven is twenty-eight, five times . . .”

“You need to sit down now,” said Susan.

“. . . ninety-one, fourteen times seven is ninety-eight, one times seven is seven . . .” There was no pause for breath this time. Two times seven, three times, four, and there was a smile on her face, as the pace began to accelerate still further.

“You need to sit down now,” said Susan. “That’s enough.”

“Ten times seven is seventy, eleven times seven is seventy-seven, twelve . . .”

“I said, enough!”

Susan looked at the class, to see how they were reacting to this open display of mockery. They didn’t seem amused, and that was good, she supposed—they didn’t seem shocked, or even interested. They stared out at the little girl with frank indifference.

And still the girl was tearing into the seven times table, so fast now that the words were starting to blur, the numbers running into each other and in the collision causing bigger numbers yet to appear, and Susan had her hands around the girl’s shoulders and she was shaking her, “Stop!” she said. “Stop this instant!” She looked at the class. “Fetch me my cane.”

No one moved.

“I said, the cane!” And a few of the children exchanged glances, and one boy at the front got to his feet, walked slowly to Susan’s desk, so slow it was nearly insolent, but not quite, nothing quite so obvious; he pulled open a drawer, and took out an ugly thin wooden stick.

The little girl was babbling out the words now, but she didn’t look afraid, she was exultant. “Don’t make me do this,” said Susan. “I don’t want to hurt you. Do you hear me? Stop. Stop. Hold out your hand. Hold out your hand.”

And, without pausing, the numbers still spilling forth, the little girl did so, she opened her palms ready for punishment.

Susan hit her. She didn’t want to hit her hard. But the stick was
designed
to hurt, and as it swung down it made the air crack, and the explosive pop it made against the little girl’s hand seemed too loud and too too angry, and Susan at once regretted it, but it was too late.

The girl stopped immediately, somewhere between forty-two and forty-nine. She looked at Susan in bewilderment. Then down at her hand, and Susan could see that the blow had broken the skin. She looked back up at Susan, and there were tears in her eyes, and there was disappointment too.

“That’s enough now,” said Susan quietly. “Sit down.”

The little girl did so.

“I will not,” said Susan, “tolerate insubordination. Not in my class. I’m here to help you. I want to help you.” She added, “And I read to you all about Sir Gawain!” It didn’t come out too plaintively, she hoped.

For the rest of class she had them read to themselves. There was only another fifteen minutes to go. The children were all perfectly silent, but Susan felt relieved when the bell sounded. She dismissed them, and smiled at them as they filed out, to show that everything was forgiven and forgotten. And the children seemed to hold no grudges, quite a few of them smiled back, even the little girl she’d beat.

Valerie Bewes made stew for them that evening. Susan did not want to discuss the incident with her, but there was no one else she could tell. Valerie laughed at the story, and told her not to worry.

“They’ll always try something,” she said. “It was your first day, and they have to find out how hard they can push you. I say you made it perfectly clear! Well done, you!” She helped Susan to another helping of stew. Susan didn’t like it much, the vegetables were nearly raw, the chunks of beef too stringy.

“I must go to bed,” said Susan. “I’m tired.”

Valerie looked disappointed, just for a moment, and then she smiled. “Of course. First day of term is the worst, you know! It’ll be easier tomorrow, you’ll see!”

Susan thanked her for supper, and went up to her room.

The room had changed. Susan stood in the doorway and stared at it. And then she heard Valerie chuckle, she hadn’t realised she’d come up the stairs behind her.

“I did a bit of furnishing for you!” she said. “Miss Fortescue left all her pictures behind. She’ll probably come and collect them at some point, but until she does, you may as well benefit from them . . .! She liked natural history. Natural history was her favourite subject.”

“Yes,” said Susan.

There were a dozen different paintings on the wall, and all of birds. Some of them were life studies, some of them were anatomical examinations. But even the skeletal bodies still had their wings intact, jutting out the sides, and that gave Susan the oddest impression that the poor creatures had had their skin and organs only selectively removed. She didn’t know what type of birds they were. She recognised an eagle.

“It makes the room feel more lived in, doesn’t it?”

“It does indeed.”

“Do you like it?”

“Very much.”

Valerie was pleased by that, and seemed about to start another conversation. “Good night,” said Susan, quite firmly, and Valerie nodded, gave a flash of a smile, and closed the door behind her.

Susan lay on the bed. No matter how tightly she drew the curtains, enough light got in to pick out the birds. The eyes seemed to follow her, and if they had no eyes, then the eye sockets followed her instead. When shadows passed over the feathers it made them come alive, to flex and ripple; the rain spattered hard on the windows, and sounded like the flutter of a thousand wings.

When Valerie knocked at the door, maybe half an hour later, Susan was almost grateful.

“I’m sorry,” said Valerie. “I’m sorry. I don’t want to disturb. I’m sorry. May I come in, my darling?”

“Just a moment,” said Susan, and she put on her dressing gown, turned on the light, and answered the door.

Valerie was smiling at her, but it was a brave smile; she had been crying. She came with a bottle of brandy, and two glasses. “I’m sorry,” she said again.

“What’s the matter?”

Valerie came in, and sat upon the bed. In her beige dressing gown, with her hair loose and messy over her shoulders, she looked even older than she had by day. She smelled of brandy, and Susan supposed she’d had rather a lot of it.

“Sometimes I have bad nights,” said Valerie. “May I confide in you? Can I trust you enough so I can confide?”

“I imagine so,” said Susan.

Valerie then burst into tears, and told Susan some ghastly little story about how she’d once worked as a governess, many years ago now, and how she had been seduced by her employer—or perhaps she had seduced him, the story wasn’t very clear. She had fallen pregnant, much to the horror of the man, who had thrown her out of his house and away from his children, denouncing her as a slut. She had tried to lose the baby, she really had, she’d drunk gin, she’d even thrown herself down the stairs once. But it was no good, the baby had been born, and had been taken away from her.

“Would you drink with me?”

“No, thank you.”

“Please drink with me! So I’m not drinking alone . . .!”

Susan sipped at her brandy, and it didn’t sit well with the stew, and she felt a little sick.

“My life was over,” said Valerie. “Until I found this place. The school took me in. They forgave me.”

“Yes.”

“Did something like that happen to you, my darling? Do you need to be forgiven?”

“No,” said Susan. “Absolutely not.”

If Valerie was offended by the vehemence of this, she didn’t show it. She just nodded, poured herself another glass. “I’m sorry,” she said. “The first day of term does this to me. Seeing the children again. And thinking, one of them could be mine! Do you see? Any one of them, how would I ever know? I’ve never told anyone this before,”—and Susan rather doubted that, Susan imagined Valerie Bewes told the same story to every new teacher who arrived, maybe that’s why Miss Fortescue had fled H___ Priory as soon as she got the chance—“but you’re like a little baby, aren’t you? You look just like a baby doll. You could be my daughter. You could be. I know you can’t be, you’re too old, but. You could be mine.” She stroked at Susan’s cheek.

“Yes,” said Susan.

“May I stay here tonight?”

“No.”

“No. Of course. You need to sleep. Yes. I’ve been selfish. I’ll see you in the morning. Yes.”

Susan didn’t think Valerie was all that drunk, she got up from the bed and made it to the door steadily enough.

Before she put out the light, Susan removed every bird picture from the wall, and put them, face down, under the bed.

Most nights Susan dreamed of Edwin. And sometimes they weren’t nightmares. Sometimes she actually missed him.

Susan hadn’t much liked Edwin Exley at first. She preferred his little sister, Clara. Clara was six, and shy, and not very pretty, and Susan’s heart went out to her. At eight years old Edwin was already tall and arrogant; Mr. Exley told Susan on her first day that Edwin was going to have a stellar career in the army, and that there was no limit to what the boy would achieve for his country. Edwin himself certainly seemed to believe that. His father had already taught him a lot of the basics of being a soldier, and when he met his new governess he stood to attention, and gave her a salute that Susan suspected was a little too clipped and far too ironic.

Mr. and Mrs. Exley were kind to Susan. They let her eat with them of an evening, and treated her quite like she was an elder daughter rather than an employee. They gave her a comfortable bedroom, with a soft bed, and drapes, and lots of pretty pictures on the walls. When the family took a few days in the south of France during the autumn, they wanted Susan to come with them; she still was required to teach the children in the mornings, but the afternoons were her own, and they encouraged her to sit on the beach with them and enjoy the sun.