A Vicarage Family: A Biography of Myself

  ‘I thought I’d let you find out for yourselves. She is – tremendous – isn’t she?’

  ‘I never knew anyone could look so elegant,’ said Isobel.

  ‘The girls say she always looks like that.’

  Their father came in. Victoria noticed that he seemed tired.

  ‘Well, how was it?’

  Again the sackful of news was poured out. But when the girls spoke of Miss French, he seemed surprised.

  ‘Tremendous,’ he said thoughtfully, turning over Victoria’s word. ‘Is she?’

  Victoria, much as she loved him, felt on this occasion her father was being dim.

  ‘Of course she is, Daddy. Look at her clothes. Even you must have noticed them.’

  ‘Clothes!’ He sounded surprised. ‘No, I don’t think I did. What I felt about her came from what she said. She seems to me such a sincerely good woman.’

  His daughters looked sadly at their father. Victoria turned to her sisters.

  ‘I suppose if all you look for is goodness, it’s all you see.’

  ‘Couldn’t you see how different her clothes were from Mummy’s?’ Louise asked.

  ‘No.’ Their father put an arm round their mother. ‘To me, nobody ever looks as nice as she does.’

  The girls exchanged glances. Of course Daddy loved Mummy, but not to see the difference between her clothes and Miss French’s was going too far. Their mother answered for them.

  ‘Now you children can see why I say it doesn’t matter what I wear.’

  10

  Miss French

  Quite soon the new school began to seem less perfect than it had on that first day. Only a few weeks later the girls had a grumble as they walked home.

  ‘Everything nice seems to happen after we’ve gone home,’ Victoria complained.

  ‘Sometimes they dance,’ said Isobel.

  ‘Not in my form,’ said Louise. ‘They just go to bed, but they have pillow fights. I wish I’d got someone to have a pillow fight with.’

  Isobel had a piece of news.

  ‘Did you know we are doing a Greek play?’

  Victoria caught Isobel’s arm.

  ‘A play! When? Have they chosen people to act in it yet?’

  ‘Me,’ said Louise. ‘Miss French came into our form and she put her hand under my chin and looked at me and said to Miss Black: “I think this little person will look splendid as the boy in our play, don’t you?”, and Miss Black said “Yes” but she always says that, whatever Miss French says.’

  Victoria was outraged. She was the family actress, it was all wrong that she should be the last to know a play was being acted, and it was certainly all wrong that Louise should be given a part before she was.

  ‘Do you think Miss French will ask which of us can act?’

  Isobel knew the answer to that.

  ‘It’s a play they’ve done before. We do it in the garden, all the speaking parts are taken by the top form.’

  Louise skipped to catch up.

  ‘Except me.’

  Isobel ignored the interruption.

  ‘But everybody in the school is in it. We have our hair done by a hairdresser and wear Greek dresses.’

  ‘It sounds boring,’ said Victoria. But though she had barely spoken to Miss French, she had at that time almost a crush on her, so anything Miss French planned she was prepared to accept. ‘Did you know Miss French goes round and kisses every girl goodnight?’

  ‘Well, Daddy and Mummy kiss us,’ Isobel pointed out.

  Victoria kicked a stone into the gutter. She loved Isobel but why was she always so contented? Couldn’t she see what fun the boarders had? That it would be easier to be one than to be sort of half in half out as they were, with home to worry about as well as school?

  As if she could read her thoughts Isobel said:

  ‘I do hope Cousin Alexander isn’t there. It’s awful pretending not to hear him shouting in the study, when he’s making the doors shake.’

  Louise giggled.

  ‘What would Miss French say if she heard him?’

  The other two laughed, for one of Miss French’s strictest rules was that no pupil of hers must ever on any occasion raise her voice. One of the greatest crimes that could be committed at Laughton House was to scream while playing a game. Cousin Alexander (sickening for Dick’s tortoise to have the same name, Louise had said) would indeed have come off badly had Miss French had anything to do with him.

  Cousin Alexander was a churchwarden and a distant cousin, and exceptionally low church. Every smallest change made by the children’s father he regarded with suspicion, and when suspicion was borne out by fact he rushed around to the vicarage and stormed into the study. He gained nothing, for the children’s father, where what he believed in was concerned, was a rock against which all could hurl themselves in vain. But Cousin Alexander was exhausting, so too often lately there had been a feeling of strain when the girls got home from school.

  Cousin Alexander was not there that night, so both their father and their mother came into the hall to greet them. But, although they seemed outwardly full of interest, both Isobel and Victoria noticed they looked tired.

  The truth was that a great deal about the new parish was not easy. The last vicar had been ill a lot, so many people had got into the habit of running things their own way and intended to go on doing so.

  Eastbourne was a very different parish from St Leonard’s-on-Sea. It was well-to-do, and the vicar of the parish church was a leading figure in the town, so everybody of the calling class left cards. But the town was scattered, the residential areas split by a golf course and a stretch of downland. The majority of those who left cards were what the children’s father jokingly called ‘carriage folk’, which was an expression used when he was a boy. Some indeed, of the more modern townspeople had motor cars.

  The children’s mother looked dismally at the silver bowl full of calling cards. How ever was she to get around to return all these calls? The buses seemed never to go in the right direction. It was maddening that she had to go out paying calls now, when there was so much that wanted doing in the garden, but she kept her worries to herself. The suspected trouble at the induction service had not happened, but too well she could see that almost every hour of the day there was some nagging worry waiting for the vicar.

  ‘The trouble,’ he told her, ‘is that there is too little love; this whole parish wants loving and playing with.’

  That was the kind of statement which the children’s mother found hard to take. But she knew her husband and what he could do.

  ‘You’ll win them in the end, darling, you know that.’

  Her father told Victoria part of his problem. He ran into her at the bottom of the stairs one evening when she was on her way up to bed.

  ‘There is a rather depressing Mother’s Union group here, I mean they never seem to have an outing or any fun. But they do have a tea party next month. Do you think you could arrange a little entertainment, Vicky?’

  Victoria looked at him with a we-understand-each-other expression.

  ‘You know how Isobel and Louise are, except of course Louise could play the piano. I suppose Isobel and I could do a duologue. What a pity John isn’t here. It would be better to start with something good.’

  Her father smiled at that.

  ‘They won’t have very high standards – next Christmas will be the time for flying high.’

  Victoria knew he was feeling sad in a way he had never done in the old parish; she laid a hand on his sleeve.

  ‘We’ll do something terrific.’ Then a colossal idea came to her. ‘We could use masses of the parish children.’

  She was rewarded for at once her father lost his sad look.

  ‘Now that would be something. We’ll do it on Boxing Night. Can’t you see all the parents streaming in to watch their children?’

  ‘Isobel can design all the clothes and we’ll write the play between us.’

  Her father kissed her.

&
nbsp; ‘Dear Vicky, you are a great comfort to me.’

  Victoria saw herself again sitting by Grandmother’s bed, and heard her say: ‘You could help him in lots of little ways.’

  ‘Truly? Am I truly a comfort to you?’

  He made a face at her.

  ‘Sometimes. But you’re like the little girl who had the curl right down the middle of her forehead. When she was good she was very, very good, but when she was bad she was horrid.’

  Isobel was cheering her mother up.

  ‘Isn’t there anybody you’ve met who could draw a map or something to show where all these roads are? You could get through masses of calls, if you found which people live near each other.’

  Her mother, disgusted, turned over the cards.

  ‘It’s such a waste of time when there’s so much to do in the garden, and they’re such grand people and I haven’t the right clothes.’

  Isobel picked up the bowl to put it back on the hall table.

  ‘If I were you I’d get them finished with. They will only haunt you if you don’t.’

  That night Victoria went to sleep with a singing heart. She was improving, there was no doubt about it, she was stepping away from childhood just as Grandmother had said she should. She was being a comfort to Daddy. He had said so.

  Her happiness was short lived. She was disturbed at three in the morning by Isobel calling breathily from the next room.

  ‘I’ve got an attack, Vicky. It’s bad, I can hardly breathe. Get Mummy.’

  One knock on her bedroom door and the children’s mother had on her dressing gown and slippers.

  ‘Is it Isobel, Vicky?’

  ‘Yes.’

  Her mother turned back to the bedroom and called out:

  ‘Go to sleep, darling. Isobel has asthma, I’ll see to her.’

  In a sickroom the children’s mother could be superb. Quiet, confident, knowing just what to do. In no time the blotting paper soaked in crystals was burning, Isobel had swallowed her medicine, she was propped up so that she could breathe more easily, and she was relaxed because her mother was there.

  ‘I’m afraid,’ said her mother, pulling back the curtain, ‘you forgot to shut your window, and it’s raining. Damp blowing in is enough to give anyone asthma.’

  Now that there was no schoolroom the family breakfasted together. The children’s mother, who was not strong, was feeling tired after her disturbed night with Isobel. Victoria, perhaps because she had been disturbed in the night, came down with what is known as having a black dog on your shoulder. The weather was frightful, rain lashing against the window. At once Miss Herbert started to fuss.

  ‘As Isobel can’t go to school today, and it’s too wet for the other two to walk, I think I should be happier if I took the girls. They have never yet been on the motor bus.’

  Victoria, feeling black dog-ish, took that as an insult.

  ‘Thank you very much, Louise and I are quite capable of going on the bus by ourselves.’

  ‘Vicky,’ said her father sternly, ‘that is not a nice way to talk.’

  ‘No, indeed,’ her mother added. ‘You can’t imagine Miss Herbert is suggesting going out in this weather for pleasure.’

  Victoria did not want to be scolded, she wanted to be loved and to hear her father say that she was a comfort to him, but it was as if she was on a slippery slope and could not stop.

  ‘Fuss, fuss, fuss! One minute you say I ought to have a sense of responsibility and the next I can’t even take Louise on a bus.’

  ‘Perhaps,’ said her mother coldly, ‘we’ll feel more like trusting you when we see some sign that you have a sense of responsibility.’ She turned to Miss Herbert, ‘Thank you very much, Miss Herbert, and perhaps you would go in to Laughton House to see the girls change their stockings.’

  That stirred even Louise.

  ‘Oh Mummy! We aren’t babies. We can change our own stockings.’

  ‘Imagine what fools we’ll look with Miss Herbert having to watch us.’ Victoria turned to her father: ‘Please Daddy, if we promise to change our stockings, need Miss Herbert come further than the bus stop?’

  The children’s father seldom interfered in his family’s day-to-day arrangements, thinking that their mother’s business, but now something in Victoria’s agonized look touched him.

  ‘I think, Sylvia, for Miss Herbert’s sake, it will be enough if she sees them on to the bus. I think we can trust the children to get off it safely.’

  But even having won that concession did not take the black dog off Victoria’s shoulder. In those days, if there were rubber boots, the children had never worn them, instead they wore goloshes over their shoes, which were tiresome to pull on, and wretched to get off, when they were wet and muddy. Mackintoshes were bought to last, so they came halfway down the girls’ legs, and the sleeves had to be turned back like cuffs. Also, since mackintoshes had no hoods, the girls had to carry umbrellas – objects Victoria detested. So one way and another she was in a bad mood when she entered her classroom for the first lesson.

  On Miss French’s instructions, if possible nothing was to be said or done to put Victoria’s back up.

  ‘I imagine she was difficult at her last school,’ Miss French had told Miss Brown, Victoria’s form mistress, ‘but I also think she was stupidly handled. So pass the word round that unless it is something serious I want her to be left alone until she loses her “agin authority” feeling.’

  So far Miss Brown had found nothing to complain of and neither had the other mistresses. Victoria, enjoying the new school, was alert and behaved well. But that morning, even as she marked the attendance book, Miss Brown could sense that Victoria wanted trouble. ‘And that, my lady, you shall not have a chance to make,’ she thought.

  Then she turned to the class to discuss what she supposed to be a non-controversial subject.

  ‘As it is wet Miss French wondered if some of you would like to sort out the properties for the Greek play.’

  That was just the opening Victoria wanted.

  ‘I would have thought before people were chosen to act in the play someone would see if any of the new girls could act.’

  There was a gasp from the class. The play was Miss French’s from start to finish. She produced it every four or five years, chose the cast and, though this would be the third time she had put it on, never once had she even asked her staff for their opinion; she was the high priestess and ruled alone.

  Miss French was so strong a personality that her staff was made up of women who preferred to be organized. Each form had a mistress, who taught not only her own form but in her particular subject, the whole school.

  A large proportion of the teachers came from outside, usually from London, two or three times a week. Miss French made no secret of the fact that she found the company of the outside teachers more congenial than that of her staff, talking to the language specialists in her beautiful French or Italian or discussing science with the scientist. Though the expression was not used at that date, her teachers – and still more their young assistants – were apt to have ‘inferiority complexes’. Now, looking rather like the White Rabbit in Alice in Wonderland, Miss Brown gazed in nervous wonder at Victoria.

  ‘The actresses are all six formers, dear.’

  Ordinarily that would have been sufficient answer for Victoria, but today her black dog drove her on.

  ‘I call that silly. People who act in plays should be chosen because they can act, and not because of which form they are in.’

  Miss Brown could see that if not checked Victoria would argue all the morning.

  ‘What you may think is neither here nor there, Victoria. Now, girls, hands up those who would like to help sort the properties.’

  Every hand except Victoria’s was raised.

  ‘Thank you,’ said Miss Brown. ‘Many hands will make light work. Now, if you will open your history books, we will get on with our lesson.’

  Victoria had cut off her nose to spite her face. It was no
fun when morning lessons were over having to watch her whole class follow Miss Brown to the basement, leaving her alone in the hall. There was no one to teach her to play knucklebones, no one even to talk to. Then, while she was wondering what to do, Louise came down the stairs with her fellow Black Beetles. She looked in surprise at Victoria who had so far been popular with her class, so was never on her own.

  ‘Where’s your form, Vicky?’

  Victoria scowled.

  ‘What’s that got to do with you? Go and play with the other babies.’

  Louise sang to the tune of Nuts in May:

  ‘Vicky’s been sent to Coventry. Vicky’s been sent to Coventry.’

  All the frustration of the day fused together and came out in blind anger. Once, Victoria in a temper had banged Louise’s head on the nursery floor, and Louise had never forgotten it. She saw now the look in Victoria’s eyes and ran from it up the stairs, along a passage, down another flight of stairs – anywhere to escape. The rest of Louise’s class tried to bar Victoria’s way; they failed, but it gave Louise a start. Light of foot, she shot down the small flight of stairs, at the bottom of which was Miss French’s study, ran into the day girls’ cloakroom, banged the door and locked it. Victoria, guessing what Louise planned to do, tried to catch her by jumping the last few steps; instead she caught her foot and fell, spraining her ankle. The pain was excruciating.

  Victoria let out a howl. Miss French opened her door. Since the beginning of term she had been looking for an occasion to make friends with Victoria. But now she thought of nothing but the noise Victoria was making. In a voice that seemed to have ice in it she said:

  ‘What is the meaning of this noise, Victoria?’

  Victoria was swinging to and fro holding her ankle.

  ‘It’s my ankle. I think I’ve sprained it.’

  Miss French’s voice was more icy than ever.