The Girl from Hard Times Hill (6 page)

I shook my head. ‘The worst thing,' I said with a gasp, ‘is that sometimes I've wished Shirley
would
die. Well, not that she'd be
killed
exactly. But I've definitely wished she'd never been born.'

I waited for Dad to recoil in shock and horror. To my surprise, he laughed.

‘I know just how you feel.
I
once pushed my little brother into a canal. I was really disappointed when my best friend fished him out again.'

I giggled. I couldn't help it. ‘What had he done?'

‘Oh, getting up my nose as usual, I expect. Believe me, Megan, everyone has those feelings.'

I felt a lot better. But then something else occurred to me. Something almost as bad.

‘Dad, what about the doctors' bill?'

Whenever somebody was ill, and they had to call out the doctor, Nana and Grandpa always worried about paying the bill. And Shirley was actually staying in hospital – that must be horribly expensive. And maybe Mum and Dad couldn't pay. Dad had given up that good job in Newcastle…he couldn't earn much selling dog food…and it was all my fault again...

With these thoughts jittering round my head, I almost missed Dad's reply.

‘Well, as it happens, Megan, you've chosen a good time.'

‘What do you mean?'

‘You must know there's a National Health Service now. We don't have to pay a penny.'

I twisted round to look at him. ‘Really? We don't have to pay
anything?
'

‘No. It's a wonderful thing. I remember what people used to suffer, all because they couldn't afford a doctor.' Dad put his arm around me. ‘All the same,
Megan, I'd as soon we didn't make use of our new National Health Service
too
often, if it's all the same to you.'

I knew he was teasing. I managed a small smile, but then something else occurred to me.

‘I bet Mum's mad with me, isn't she? And I know you didn't want to stay here. You're both angry with me, because you wanted to go to Newcastle. It was only Nana persuaded you to stay.'

‘You're wrong, Megan.' Dad looked serious again. ‘Shall I tell you something? When I was your age I was good at my schoolwork, especially figures. But there wasn't money for me to go to the Grammar, even though I passed the exam, not even enough to buy the uniform. I had to leave school and join the Air Force as soon as I could. Now you've got this chance at an education, and I'm going to make sure you take it.' He paused. ‘It wasn't Nana persuaded us. It was me.'

‘Oh,' I said. Then, to my surprise, I told him something I hadn't even told Nana. ‘The truth is, Dad, I don't want to go. I mean – I am working hard, like I promised, but I don't want to be at a different school from Pam. We've been best friends since forever.'

‘It is hard,' Dad agreed. ‘Life is hard sometimes. And maybe it shouldn't be that way. But as you've got this chance, then you must take it, Meggy.'

‘And – do you really not mind selling dog food?'

‘Not for the moment. But I do need a more secure job.' He looked at me sideways. ‘That's why I was in Cardiff today. I was meeting an old Air Force chum, but I was also finding out about opportunities there. Your mother and I were having tea to talk things over. We think that once you've taken your Eleven Plus,
if
you pass, you could transfer to a good school in Cardiff, and I'd be able to get a decent job. I know you'll miss Nana and Grandpa, and your friends too, but you'd still be able to see them sometimes. It's much closer than Newcastle.'

He was being really kind. Besides, after all that had happened, I couldn't refuse to go.

‘All right,' I muttered.

‘Mum and I know it's hard. But we want us all to be a family again.'

I nodded. Then I leaned my head against Dad's shoulder.

After that we just sat quietly. For a while I brooded about moving to Cardiff, but then, to distract myself, I started looking around the hospital. It was an
interesting place. Through an open door, I could see a young man having his hand stitched. A nurse was pouring some kind of medicine into a bottle through a funnel. Two doctors walked past, deep in discussion of the operation they were due to perform in the morning.

‘I wouldn't mind being a doctor,' I said, surprising myself. ‘I'd like to do operations.' Then I blushed and waited for Dad to laugh at me.

‘Well, if you go to the Grammar, anything's possible.'

‘
Really?
'

I thought it was one of his jokes. But he said seriously, ‘Yes, really, Megan.'

‘But girls don't do things like that. Or anybody we know.'

‘Things are going to be different now. Anyway, if you want to do it, then I'll be behind you all the way.'

I thought about this. If I could be a doctor one day… Well, maybe it would be worth putting up with the silly uniform and the homework, or even going to a different school from Pam. I sighed.

‘Everything's changing.'

‘I know,' Dad agreed. ‘But some things stay the same. That reminds me…' He began rummaging among the coats and bags that he and Mum had left on
the seat next to me. ‘I told you I went to see a mate of mine in Cardiff. He's just come home from Germany too. I asked him to bring me something.'

He handed me a package. I pulled off the brown paper and opened the box.

‘Roller skates!'

Dad grinned. ‘Yours were past repair, I'm afraid. So I wrote and asked my mate to bring some back.'

I examined them. ‘They look different.'

‘That's because they're from Germany. We've beaten them in two World Wars, but they're still marvellous engineers. I reckon these will be a great little pair of skates.'

‘Do you mean I can still go skating?'

‘Well, you can't waste them, can you? But,' Dad added judiciously, ‘it might be wise to keep them out from under your mother's nose. And your grandmother's. Maybe after the Eleven Plus – '

And that's when it struck me.

‘It's the Eleven Plus tomorrow!'

‘Right,' said Dad briskly, glancing at his watch. ‘Let's get you home straight away!'

Four months later, I sat on the top deck of a Cardiff bus, peering out of the window at the smoggy, unfamiliar Cardiff streets, feeling absolutely awful.

It seemed such a long time ago since I'd left Nana and Grandpa's. It wasn't, really – but it already felt like a different life.

It had been such a wonderful summer, after school had finished. Dad had found a job in Cardiff, and he and Mum and Barbara had moved into a flat there. Shirley and I were to join them in time for the new school term, once they had settled in and got everything straight. But in the meantime, it had been just like the
old days. I was out with my friends every day from dawn to dusk, skating or climbing trees. We'd be hanging around Mrs Morgan's shop every Wednesday to be first to get a copy of
Crystal
or
School Friend
(Tom would be waiting for
Dandy
or
The Beano
) and going to the pictures every Saturday morning and sometimes midweek too. In the evenings, after Shirley had gone to bed, it was just me and Grandpa and Nana, listening to the radio or reading. Even though I knew it wouldn't last forever, I almost believed it would.

Only, as Nana says, ‘all good things come to an end'.

The goodbyes had been the worst thing. Pam's was the noisiest. She sobbed all over me, and gave me her precious white rabbit's foot that she claimed brought her good luck. I'd given her my roller skates. It was a real wrench, but I wasn't sure I'd be able to use them in Cardiff. They were fantastic skates – Dad had been right about that. ‘They're still yours!' Pam wailed. ‘I'll just look after them!' Then we hugged and promised we would always be best friends.

Davy Levenson had come round and given me his copy of
Swallows and Amazons
. I'd been all tongue-tied at first, and just stood there, blushing. For it hadn't been a wonderful summer for the Levensons. It had
been a terrible one. Not long after Davy had got the wonderful news that he had come top of the whole county in the Eleven Plus, Davy's father had killed himself. Nobody had known how to understand it. And while it was dreadful, of course, nobody had known Mr Levenson very well, for he never went down to the pub for a drink like most men, or stood chatting on the pavement. I knew Nana had taken flowers and cake to Mrs Levenson. But, like most people, I'd hardly seen Davy or his family since.

‘Thank you,' I'd whispered, taking the book. And then I'd blurted out, ‘I'm so sorry about your dad.'

Davy just nodded.

‘How's your mum doing?'

‘Better.' Davy was looking very white and thin, and there were shadows under his eyes.

‘It's awful for you. Sometimes, these last months, I've felt
I
was living on Hard Times Hill. But I never was, really. It's you that's had the hard times.'

Davy said nothing for a while, and I was worried that I'd offended him. But then he said, ‘It's been bad. But the truth is, Dad's never been happy since the War. He was always thinking about the people left behind.'

I nodded. I'd known for a while that the Levensons had relatives and friends in Germany, and that many
of them had been killed in the concentration camps. But it had never seemed real until now.

‘Mum's trying to decide whether we should stay in Wales, or whether we should make a new start. Some of her relatives from Germany live in Israel, now – you know, that people used to call Palestine.'

‘I hope you stay,' I said, and Davy said he hoped so too. He liked Wales, he said, and he was looking forward to grammar school, and besides, he didn't want to have to speak a different language.

After he had gone, I realized that I was going to miss Davy far, far more than I would ever have expected.

Strangely enough, I was going to miss Miss Bulmer too. She had given me a lovely diary with a leather cover to write things in, and I had given her a homemade bookmark with a picture of an owl on it.

Of course, the very worst goodbye was to Nana and Grandpa.

The night before I left, Nana helped me pack. Then first Shirley then I had a bath in front of the fire: Grandpa bringing in the metal tub from the coal shed, and filling it up with kettles of hot water from the range, and Nana helping to scrub our backs and wash our hair, although I am really too old to need a helper
at bath-time. Then, when Shirley was all tucked up in bed, and Grandpa was emptying the bath tub in the yard, I sat wrapped in a towel in front of the flames, while Nana brushed my hair.

‘I can't do it!' I cried suddenly. Everything blurred as the tears rose up behind my eyes. ‘I want to stay with you!'

‘I know just how you feel,' said Nana gently.

‘No you don't! You can't!'

‘Don't you remember,' Nana said, ‘that I once went to Cardiff myself?'

Of course I knew. Nana had often told me about how she had gone into service after she'd left school, and left her own family in the countryside and lived as a servant in Cardiff.

‘That was different,' I said impatiently. ‘You were
much
older!'

‘I was twelve. Hardly any older than you.'

‘Oh.' I twisted round to look at her. ‘What was it like?'

‘Very hard,' said Nana grimly. ‘I'd never been away from home before. And I didn't know anyone in Cardiff. I was a nursemaid, and I had to look after two small children, all by myself. They had a mother, of course, but she didn't do much, except give them a
kiss when they were bathed and brushed and ready for bed. The father did even less.'

‘Did you never get time to play?'

‘I had one afternoon and evening off a week.' Nana narrowed her eyes, remembering. ‘I used to go to the music hall. I would go on the bus, but I'd walk back along the streets. The lights would be on in the houses, but the curtains were still open, and I'd look in at all the beautiful rooms, with gleaming chandeliers and velvet-covered furniture.
Far
grander than the house where I was working. And I used to hum some of the songs I'd heard while I was out.
Daisy, Daisy, give me your answer do – I'm half crazy, all for the love of you
. The next morning it would be back to scrubbing and cleaning and trying to keep those children in order.'

‘Oh Nana…' I swallowed, as I remembered how I'd resented looking after Shirley for even an afternoon.

Nana smiled. ‘It's different for you, Megan. You'll have your mum and dad, and your sisters, and you're going to school. You did so well in your exams. We're very proud of you, you know.'

Because that was the astonishing thing. Despite Shirley's accident, and all the upheaval, and feeling really tired the next morning, I had passed my Eleven Plus. I was going to be a grammar school girl.

Then Nana twisted my hair into rags so that it would be curly in the morning. (I protested that there was no need – it wasn't a party, or even Sunday school, just going to see Mum and Dad, but Nana insisted.) And the next morning, beribboned and curled and dressed in our Sunday best, Nana and Grandpa saw us onto the Cardiff train, travelling in care of the guard. I still didn't like to remember their faces, as the train pulled out. And I hadn't been able to bring myself to write anything to Nana – except for a very quick postcard – since.

And now here I was, peering out of the windows at what might be the very same houses that Nana had once walked past, and I hated Cardiff, and I hated school, and I just wished I could be back with her again.