Authors: Benita Brown
Memories of You (12 page)
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Helen put her pen down on the blotting paper. She was sitting at the table in the kitchen. The skies outside were dark and when Eva had opened the back door to go home a gust of wind blew in, bringing with it the smell of soot mixed with something else. Eva said it was the smell of snow. She was convinced there would be snow by morning and she had shovelled more coal on the fire in the range than she ought to have done so that Helen would be warm and cosy.
Neither of the girls thought it likely that âthe missus' would venture into the kitchen that evening, not now that she had instructed Helen to answer the call of the bell just like Eva did. It suited Helen very well to stay in the kitchen on her own. She could spread her school books on the table and get on with her homework.
She got up and warmed a pan of milk. It was time to take Aunt Jane her cup of cocoa. She also made one for herself and, duty done, she returned to her letter. She had mixed feelings about what she had written. She knew she had not been entirely candid. She had led her brothers to believe that she was happier about Elsie's situation than she was.
Everything their old neighbour Mrs Andrews and her new friend Eva had said was true. Elsie would be much better off with the Partingtons than with Aunt Jane. But this would never compensate for the fact that she missed her little sister dreadfully and she believed with all her heart that she should have found a way for the family to remain together.
She did not feel guilty about making light of her own situation. All she had said was true. She had found a friend in Eva, and although Aunt Jane could sometimes behave like a wicked stepmother in a fairy tale, she wasn't actually cruel in any physical sense. She was simply totally uncaring. Helen suspected that the Partingtons were paying her aunt some sort of allowance and that might explain the ninepence a day for her lunch. If that were true she ought to be grateful. She
was
grateful, she supposed.
was
grateful, she supposed.
Ninepence a day was more than ample. She had begun to put a little bit by towards buying Christmas presents. Her list was small: her brothers, Mrs Andrews, Eva, and her school friend Eileen. She had agonized over whether she could send anything to Elsie and had decided that she couldn't. Then finally she had added Aunt Jane's name. After all, Christmas was Christmas.
Helen picked up her pen, dipped it in the bottle of ink, and resumed writing. She sent the boys her love and urged them to write to her as soon as they could. To encourage them to do this, she slipped a couple of pages of writing paper and a stamped envelope in with the letter. Not wanting to risk more conflict with Aunt Jane, she had gone back to the telephone kiosk to find the address of Haven House. She would post her letter on the way to school in the morning.
Helen wiped the pen, put it in her pencil box, put the top back on the bottle of ink and put them in her schoolbag along with the writing pad, blotting paper and her books. She put out the milk bottles, banked up the fire and went to bed. She did not say goodnight to Aunt Jane. Eva would deal with the used cup in the morning.
Her brothers' answering letter came only a few days later. Helen blessed the fact that the postman called long before her aunt was up in the morning. She didn't have time to read it before she went to school and at break time she was on cloakroom duty, so the letter had to wait until she was seated at her usual place in the Cosy Café.
The writing on the envelope was near perfect. Danny's, Helen guessed. Even though the younger twin was left-handed, his writing was much neater than impetuous Joe's. Maybe it was because Danny had had to try harder when learning to write from left to right across the page. She opened the envelope and had to tug at the pages to get them out. The boys had filled not just the sheets of writing paper she had sent for them but had obviously torn pages from a school exercise book, too. Helen hoped they wouldn't get into trouble for it.
She glanced through the letter quickly and smiled when she realized what they had done. They had taken turns, and even if the handwriting had not been so different it would have been easy to tell which boy was writing at the time.
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Dear Helen (Joe began)
We were really pleased to hear from you. Well, you needn't worry about us. No, not at all. The beds are clean, there's plenty of grub and the lessons are just like at our old school. The teachers are pretty much the same as teachers anywhere but the headmaster, Mr Ridley, is a bit of a curious old coot. He wears his gown all the time just like the beaks in the comics and he never seems to know quite what is going on, or what he's supposed to say. Sometimes he opens the door of a classroom, everybody stands up, but he doesn't say anything. He just blinks and stares for a moment and looks as though he's forgotten why he's there then he leaves again. What a hoot! That rhymes with coot!
Mr Ridley is what you would call an eccentric. (Danny had taken over.) I think he is one of those very clever people who don't quite fit into everyday life. He leaves a lot of the running of the school to the deputy headmaster, Mr Jenkins. Mr Jenkins is the chap who came to collect us. He's OK most of the time but he has a problem. He likes a little tipple and when the drink takes him it's almost as if he becomes a different person. He can get quite nasty. But don't worry about that, Helen. It's never anything personal, and the other boys here have learned how to deal with it. Personally I think it's because he's very unhappy. I don't think this is the sort of life he planned for himself.
Yeah, (Joe again) Jenkins is one to avoid when he's been shut up in his room with his friend the bottle, but we've all learned to scarper when we see him coming and we make extra sure that he won't find anything to complain about. I'm sure you'll be pleased to hear that! Now over to Danny who wants to tell you a bit about the surroundings.
It's really nice here on the coast. About a hundred years ago a rich ship owner built Haven House for himself and his family. The trouble was, all his sons and daughters died before he did, so he left the house to a charity to set up a school for boys. The house is at the far end of the town on the way to the lighthouse and from the upstairs windows there is a marvellous view of the sea. You would love it, Helen. On fine days the water seems to sparkle and on dull days the sky and the sea seem to merge into each other so you can't tell which is which. And as for stormy days! Joe is just about to snatch the pen. There, he did it! The ink blots are his fault!
Had to stop him before he went all soppy! (Joe wrote.) But he's right. This is a grand place to live and we're not exactly prisoners here. We can spend any free time we have exploring the cliffs and the beach and the caves. One fly in the ointment is that once a week we all have to go out for a run, no matter what the weather. Some of the lads are really keen to be first one back. Not because they don't enjoy the run. They do! It's because they want to be the winner. The one who gets back first the most times gets a trophy cup at the end of each term. Honestly! Who wants a cup that you can't keep? And in any case, once it's handed over Ginger says that they just lock it up in old Ridley's study again. They don't even put your name on it. He says that even though we'll never be toffs, they're trying to run the place like a public school. Whatever that is. Over to Danny, who will try and explain.
Joe's friend, Ginger, said that rich boys who go to something called public schools have it much harder than we do. They have to have cold showers and the food is terrible and their parents pay a fortune for this. Furthermore the older boys are allowed to beat them. At least we only get caned by the headmaster. I don't mean that's a regular occurrence here! As Joe said before, this is just like any school except we can't go home at night.
And also we have to work for our keep! (Joe had taken over again.) Well, not exactly our keep. We have to do jobs in the house, like cleaning windows or peeling spuds, and in the gardens. There's a front garden to keep tidy and a massive kitchen garden. There are greenhouses too. Some of the boys really like this and want to get jobs as gardeners when they leave. Some lads hate having to do anything at all and there's one lazy waster called Tod Walker who gets away with it. He persuades other boys to do his work for him and then has the nerve to take half the pay as well. Oh, yes, we get paid for this work. It's supposed to teach us that you work for what you get in life. We don't get very much, but it's like getting pocket money. Danny and I are planning to go into town and do some Christmas shopping in Woolworths. I'm handing over to Danny to sign off.
We'd better go now; we've got some homework to do. Please write again soon, Helen. We really miss you and Elsie but we're sure we'll be together again one day just like you promised.
Love,
Your brothers Danny and Joe
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Helen was torn between laughter and tears as she folded the letter and put it back in the envelope. Laughter because the different characters of her brothers were so plainly revealed in how and what they had written, and tears because no matter what they wrote they were determined to show her they were making the best of it.
She was glad that they had made at least one friend. Or had they? Danny had referred to the boy they called Ginger as âJoe's friend', not his own. But of course Danny, for all his quiet ways, had always been the more self-sufficient of the two, content to stay in the background and let Joe lead the way.
Then what was she to make of this boy called Tod who âpersuaded' other boys to do his chores and then kept half their pay? That didn't sound good at all. She couldn't imagine Joe ever consenting to an arrangement like this and neither would he allow Danny to be bullied. Was this lad a bully? Helen hoped not, and then tried to console herself with the thought that even if he was, Joe would be able to deal with it.
âYou've let your rice pudding go cold.' Helen looked up to see Margery standing over her. âMust have been a very interesting letter. From your boyfriend, is it?'
Helen smiled. âI haven't got a boyfriend. It's from my brothers.'
âDon't they live at home with you?'
âNo. After our mother died we were . . . well, we had to be split up.'
âOh, I'm sorry, pet. Listen, give me that pudding and I'll pour some warm milk on it. And how about a spoonful of jam to jazz it up a bit?'
Helen smiled her thanks and as soon as she had finished she hurried back to school. She found it hard to concentrate on the afternoon's lessons. As Joe and Danny had reminded her, Christmas was coming and she didn't know how she would be able to bear this first Christmas without her family around her.
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On Saturday the twenty-first of December Helen got up early and took the tram into the town centre. Eva was put out that they didn't have time for what she called their regular âchinwag', but Helen wanted to be out of the house before Aunt Jane came down for breakfast and found some task for her to do or an errand for her to run. Mostly the tasks were sewing and mending or going to the shops for such items as buttons, elastic, hairnets, or fancy cakes for the Sunday teatime treat. Aunt Jane had never actually said that Helen couldn't go out on errands of her own, although she was sure if she asked there would be some objection. So she left the house early to avoid a confrontation.
Helen loved going to the Grainger Market. The huge covered market was an endless source of delight with interesting people in every alleyway and arcade of shops. Even though she had arrived early the market was in full swing. She hurried through the butchers' quarter with its strong smells of blood mingled with sawdust to the greengrocers' stalls already stacked high with fresh fruit and vegetables. Helen breathed in the wonderful tang of the oranges and marvelled at the varieties of nuts all ready to be bought for the Christmas table.
Some of the stalls had Christmas trees for sale. Helen remembered one Christmas when their mother had told them they couldn't afford a tree. They had been disappointed but, not wanting to upset her, they had made the best of the bunches of holly and mistletoe she had bought in this very market. Then, on Christmas morning, they had come downstairs to a wonderful sight. Perhaps it was the smallest Christmas tree ever but there it was, in the front parlour, the light from the fire reflecting on the coloured spheres of glass. Their mother never told them how she had managed to do this. She insisted it must have been Father Christmas who found he had one left on his sledge so decided to leave it for the Norton family.
Helen and the twins no longer believed in Father Christmas but they had kept up the pretence for Elsie's sake. Elsie . . . What sort of Christmas would she have? Helen was sure Mrs Partington would do her best to make it a wonderful time for her. And what of Joe and Danny? From their letter Haven House didn't sound such a bad place. She hoped there would be a party of some sort and that the boys might even be given presents. They would certainly get presents from her.
Reluctant to go back to Aunt Jane's house, Helen mingled with the crowd and found herself listening to snatches of conversation and imagining the stories behind them. She decided to treat herself to a cup of tea and a toasted teacake in the mezzanine café, and as soon as she was settled at a table where she could look down on the busy scene below she took her notebook and pencil from her pocket and started making notes about anything or anyone who interested her or caught her eye. She couldn't remember when she had started doing this, but often these snippets developed into full-blown stories.
Her mother had encouraged her in this and would often say things like, âGo on, Helen, what happened next?' or âWhat was she wearing? Was she really beautiful?' Or âNo, I didn't think she would do that.' She used to joke that listening to Helen's stories was as good as going to the pictures and that she could enjoy them in front of her own cosy fire.
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