by George Friel
He felt the cheeks of her bottom pressed just above his kneecap. He was sure he was blushing. He was uncomfortable. He put his arm lightly round her in case she fell off, and she was so thin above the waist, she had so little on, he thought he could have counted her ribs if he had dared to squeeze her. But he didn’t want to frighten her. He shifted his hand and fingered the pinna of her left ear. She drank through a straw a surplus bottle of milk left inadvertently in his classroom, and chatted about her father and family between imbibitions.
So soon does the new become a habit that in a week, when she came at lunchtime with his rolls or pies or sandwiches, she sat on his knee as a matter of course for five minutes and talked to him. She did it without any shyness, no fuss and no comment, did it calmly and casually. He was the one who felt guilty. He got into a drill of waiting for her at the door to his room and locking it swiftly when she came in. She would walk past him, slender, unsmiling, slightly splay, put the poke on the table and count out his change. By that time he had reached his chair and sat down, ready to receive her.
She perched herself on his left knee, her toes just touching the floor. He was sure there must be a more comfortable position, and he was always uneasy. Yet he was disappointed any day she didn’t do it.
One day she sat right across his lap. It may have been the way he was sitting or it may have been her angle of approach. But there she was. He believed her voluntary session sanctioned him to show more affection. Her legs and knees were convenient to his gangling hand, her slightly-parted thighs were settled trustingly across his. He imagined his hand moving over the unseen limbs. He would be gentle and loving. But his nerve failed. He couldn’t. He thought it would be wrong. He put his arm round her waist and his hand stroked her lean flank.
‘Oh Rose! I do love you!’ he whispered, his mouth against her ear.
He felt at once he was silly to have said it. He tried to unsay it.
‘But don’t tell anybody,’ he added, smiling as if it was only a joke.
He put his finger on her nose and followed the line of it down to her nostrils. To make it clear he was only teasing, he tenderly flipped a fingertip at her chin. She smiled.
Then an impulse beat him. Sitting across his lap, she was so accessible in a way she had never been when they were standing up together that he plunged at her. He kissed her, not on the mouth but on the forehead, somewhere above the right eye. It was a shot badly off target, but he felt he had done something tremendous.
Like all that had gone before the kissing too became a habit, with all the necessity of a habit. At first he kissed her only when he gave her a halfcrown at the end of the week for doing his errands. He looked forward to Fridays as payday. He was sour if anything happened to prevent his rite, as when some leech of a classmate came back with her and hung around. Usually it was Senga Provan, and he came near to disliking her as much as he had disliked her brother. To make up for those unkissing Fridays he began to kiss Rose during the week whenever he got a chance, whenever she didn’t seem in a hurry away, for he needed time to create the dialogue of lovers’ talk that was properly ended in a parting kiss.
Sometimes he worried over what he was doing. He was afraid she would tell her mother or a classmate. It would make him look ridiculous. Her mother might think it worse than ridiculous. She might think he was trying to entice Rose on to something wicked.
He went over it every night between waking and sleeping, recalling how his love had been born, in her sudden burst of confidence, unexpected and unpredictable, when they first met. Nobody had ever spoken to him like that before. It was she who had started their love affair by the way she chatted to him, by her rare trusting smiles. It was all her fault. How could he refuse to love her when she urged him to it? But he believed that what she urged him to was a father’s love. She was no precocious miss just trying to provoke him. She spoke to him like a daughter, and his kisses were chaste, like a father’s kisses.
He loved her very name. Rose Weipers seemed no less worthy than Rose Aylmer to appear in a poem, and she herself no less possessed of ‘every virtue, every grace’ than that earlier Rose. But he never found time to write a poem to or about her, though he kept on intending to consecrate some faultless lines to his love for her. He settled for making her name his talisman, a pious and even apotrapaic ejaculation in moments of temptation. When he was accosted after the last pub of his nightly crawl was closed, or when he found himself in Blythswood Square or Hope Street, not drunk and yet not sober, he remembered Rose and said her name aloud to the darkness. He believed she would be shocked, or at least disappointed, if she saw him go off with a woman who had to be paid. The fact that she couldn’t know what he did made no difference. She was to him like God, who knows and sees all things, even our most secret thoughts. So he never went with even the youngest prostitute he met. Rose was the only person he wanted.
Day and night he was the victim of his autumnal love, a love that seemed at one and the same time to exclude and include the possibility of sexual pleasure. Rose, its only object, had to be female or he could never have fallen in love with her. He could never have loved a boy her age. The idea disgusted him. He knew boys too well. He thought pederasty ugly. But Rose had a girl’s face, not a boy’s face, a girl’s body, not a boy’s. That was why he could love her. Yet he had no desire to proceed beyond his constant awareness of her sex. The awareness was its own pleasure. A boy could never have interested him. His love was a heterosexual love. Therefore a normal love. To love Rose seemed natural and pure in a way that loving a boy would never have seemed to him.
He was pursuing these meditations round the alcoholic confusion of his skull one night when he was importuned on his way home after the pubs were shut. He knew he ought to have gone straight for a bus instead of wandering about to ask for encounters he didn’t want.
‘Looking for someone?’ she said pleasantly, suddenly in front of him.
He put his palms under her elbows, rocking and beam¬ ing.
‘No rose in all the world, until you came,’ he sang into her powdered face.
Then dried up and lurched away.
She gaped after him. She was fed up with men who mooched round dark streets and loitered in doorways and closes and floated off when she spoke to them.
‘Away hame, ya stupit big bastard!’ she shouted after him.
CHAPTER TWENTY
Rose Weipers leaned against a wash-hand basin in the girls’ toilet at morning-break whispering with Senga Provan. They had agreed to stop going to the playground. To walk there was like wandering across a battlefield where Amazons ignored the rights of non-combatants and blithely mowed them down. They wanted a quiet corner and the chance of a confidential talk.
‘I get right fed up with the pair of them at times,’ Senga was saying. ‘You’d think, my goodness it’s years ago now, you’d think they’d forget it.’
Wanda Clouston, a mammose wench in third year, waddled to the door of a cubicle and tore a yard of toilet-paper from the fixture. Flushed with hebetic vulgarity she draped the streamer round Rose Weiper’s neck and made to kiss her on both cheeks in a gallic award.
Rose recoiled.
‘Aw, for Christ’s sake,’ she said. ‘Be your age.’
She scattered the paper with a cross hand and smacked Wanda. Wanda pulled her hair. They wrestled. Wanda broke away, getting the worst of it, and delved a hand under her blouse.
‘Ach, you! You’ve bust ma bra, ya bitch!’ she yelled.
‘It’s no’ a bra you need,’ said Rose, still cross. ‘It’s a couple of hammocks.’
‘Think you’re somebody?’ Wanda asked. Bellona.
‘Ignore her, Rose,’ said Senga. Grave-eyed Pallas Athene, goddess of good counsel. ‘I wouldn’t demean myself talking to the likes of her.’
Rose looked straight into Wanda’s rash eyes. A petrifying Medusa. Wanda turned, sniffed, and waddled off.
‘Think because your big sister goes wi’ a toffee-boy,’ she muttered v
aguely.
‘You see, I made a mistake,’ Senga said. ‘As I was saying when I was so rudely interrupted. You’d think they’d forget it. I happened to say he was all right. He could make a joke now and then. I quite liked him. You should have heard them! You’d have thought they were going to put me out the house.’
‘You should never take school home,’ said Rose. ‘I never do.’
‘But it was them raised his name first,’ said Senga.
‘They make me sick. Every night. How’s that big dope, says Gerry. And my mother, she’s not a bit better. Just because he once tried to belt her darling boy. Calls him a mean-minded big bully.’
‘I could tell her he’s not mean,’ said Rose. ‘He gives me half-a-crown every week. Sometimes more. Just for going down to the shops for him.’
‘I don’t like taking money from teachers,’ said Senga. ‘I always feel they can’t afford it. Especially Alf. Did you ever look at his shoes?’
‘It would hurt him if I refused,’ said Rose. ‘That’s what I feel.’
‘He’s a daft big lump,’ said Senga. ‘Remember the morning he walked in wearing one brown shoe and one black? I bet he had a hangover. They say he’s a terrible drinker. Anyway, it showed he’s got two pairs of shoes. But neither of them’s any good.’
‘I’ve sometimes smelled drink on him,’ said Rose.
‘Can’t say I have,’ said Senga. ‘I just know what they say.’
‘It’s when I go back and the room’s empty,’ said Rose, ‘and I’m right close to him.’
‘Of course,’ said Senga. ‘I think he likes you.’
‘You know what he said to me once?’ said Rose.
‘No,’ said Senga. ‘What?’
‘If I was an orphan he’d adopt me.’
They smiled together.
‘O-la!’ said Senga. ‘I’d hate to live in the same house as a teacher.’
‘When he gives me the half-crown,’ said Rose, ‘you know what he does?’
‘No,’ said Senga. ‘What does he do?’
‘He gives me a wee kiss,’ said Rose. ‘I feel right daft, the way he does it. It’s not a smacker. Not even on my cheek.
It’s a kind of peck at my forehead. But what can I do? I’d hate to hurt him.’
‘I wish somebody liked me that much,’ said Senga.
‘I can remember my dad used to kiss me like that at bedtime. When I was wee. But then he went away. Sometimes I don’t wonder.’
‘I can just see my dad kissing any of us,’ said Rose. ‘Mind you, he’s not bad. Even when he comes in with a drink on him on a Saturday night he’s not drunk. I suppose he’s fond of us all right. I know he thinks the world of Martha.’
‘Martha’s a lovely girl,’ said Senga. ‘Anybody would know you two were sisters. It’s just Martha’s hair is different. It’s really gorgeous.’
‘Funny thing,’ said Rose. ‘Talking about kissing. You know, I’ve never seen my dad kiss my mum.’
The bell rang and they snailed out. Wanda slipped stealthily behind them, kicked Rose on the bottom and bounced off to her line. Rose turned to identify the assailant and sighed patiently.
She didn’t mean to be disloyal when she told Senga Mr Alfred had a habit of kissing her. She didn’t mean anything. She was only talking. Perhaps she had an urge to boast she had an elderly admirer, perhaps it was the intimacy induced by a tête-à-tête in the toilet made her say too much.
Whatever its reason, her casual confidence to Senga had a result neither of them expected. Senga wasn’t exaggerating when she said her mother and brother were always on about Mr Alfred. They were at it again that night. She had made a mixed grill of bacon, egg, sausages and black pudding for tea, although she herself had no appetite. She was in the middle of a difficult period. She felt sick of living and eating. The only person who gave her any sympathy was Rose Weipers. She had vowed to be faithful to Rose for ever. And since Rose was Mr Alfred’s favourite, she was committed to defending Mr Alfred too.
At first she said the minimum when she was asked as usual about the day’s events at school. She knew they were hoping she would bring home some grievance that would let them make another complaint about Mr Alfred. Her inscrutable crosseyed face concealed how much the idea amused her, and the brevity of her answers made Gerald determined to annoy her.
‘You mean to say he hasn’t strapped you yet for nothing?’ he said.
‘That’s right,’ said Senga.
‘It’s only because he’s feart,’ said Gerald. ‘He knows what would happen now if he did.’
‘He knows better than to put a finger on a Provan,’ said Mrs Provan. ‘That’s why.’
‘Aye, we sorted that big bastard all right, didn’t we, maw?’ said Gerald.
‘That’s not a nice word,’ said Senga.
‘He’s not a nice man,’ said Mrs Provan.
‘He’s just as nice as anybody else,’ said Senga. ‘Nicer than some I could mention. Anyway, all the girls in my class like him.’
She knew she was getting heated, she knew she was liable to be provoked into some indiscreet remark if they heckled her too much, but she couldn’t stop herself.
‘Ho-ho, she’s going to start a fan club for big Alfy,’ said Gerald.
He laughed. With a lycorexia that offended her he forked bits of bacon, egg and black pudding together and bent his muzzle over his plate as he shoved them into his wide mouth.
‘I don’t need to start anything,’ said Senga.
‘Well, don’t,’ said Mrs Provan. ‘I don’t want that man’s name raised in this house.’
‘It’s you keeps on raising it,’ said Senga. ‘You say he’s mean. That’s one thing he’s not.’
‘Oh?’ said Mrs Provan. ‘Who says so?’
‘Rose Weipers,’ said Senga. ‘He gives her money every week. Just for going to a shop for him.’
‘Oh yes?’ said Mrs Provan.
‘He treats her like a father,’ said Senga. ‘Something I haven’t got.’
‘That’s enough,’ said Mrs Provan.
‘If she had no father,’ said Senga, ‘he’d take her home he said.’
‘He’d what?’ said Mrs Provan.
‘Adopt her,’ said Senga. ‘Of course you wouldn’t understand. Somebody being fond of somebody. Him kissing her, you’d think he was just a sloppy old man. The idea of affection, of anyone showing affection I mean. It would never occur to you two.’
‘Kissing Rose Weipers?’ said Gerald. ‘Haw, maw! Did you hear that? Big Alfy kissing the girls and giving them money. The dirty old man!’
‘I heard her,’ said Mrs Provan.
‘Ee-ya! Rose Weipers!’ Gerald howled.
He gloated over the name with teenage lust, a loaded fork at his mouth.
‘And who’s Rose Weipers, tell me,’ said Mrs Provan.
‘Martha Weiper’s wee sister,’ said Gerald. ‘You must have seen Martha, maw. She’s the talk of the district. Doing a line with a toff student lives in wan o’ the big hooses oot in Old Tordoch. A right wee snob, so she is.’
‘She’s not,’ said Senga.
‘She’s a smashing blonde, maw,’ said Gerald. ‘Rose is no’ a blonde but she’s a good-looking wee bit. They’re both sexy dames.’
‘I understand,’ said Mrs Provan.
Gerald leaned across the table and flicked a finger under Senga’s nose to hit her plumb between the nostrils.
‘I bet he doesn’t kiss you,’ he said.
‘I never said he kissed Rose Weipers,’ Senga wriggled. ‘All I said was if he did what you two would think.’
‘He’s a dirty old man, isn’t he, maw?’ said Gerald.
‘He’s not a man should be teaching girls,’ said Mrs Provan. ‘And I’m the very one will let that be known.’
Senga wept.
‘You keep out of it,’ she wailed.
‘Don’t worry,’ said her mother. ‘I’ll keep out of it all right.’
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Mr B
riggs read them both twice, the Director’s letter and the enclosure, the one leading him to the other, forward and backward.
‘Oh, my God! Not that man again!’ he cried.
He handed them to Miss Ancill. She was always with him first thing in the morning. She opened his mail, gave it to him in descending order of importance, and stood by in case he needed her help while he took it in.
The senior members of his staff resented not so much the confidence he put in Miss Ancill as the confidences he gave her. They didn’t mind her opening his mail if that was part of her job. What they didn’t like was his habit of discussing it with her, of making her his chief counsellor in every problem and the first recipient of his intentions concerning administration and staffing. She had only a diploma in shorthand and typing, but they had an Honours degree in this and that, and some of them had double degrees in Arts and Science. They thought they had a higher claim to be consulted.
But Mr Briggs always needed Miss Ancill at his side when he dealt with his correspondence. After all, she was his secretary. She was there for him to talk to. He couldn’t think unless he was talking. And in time of trouble he liked talking to a woman.
‘What am I to do about that, tell me,’ he said.
‘There’s a problem.’
Miss Ancill of course had read the Director’s letter and the enclosure when she opened the mail before Mr Briggs came in. But she read them again as if she hadn’t, taking her time, very slow and very serious. The Director’s letter asked the headmaster for a prompt investigation and report on the charges contained in the accompanying anonymous complaint which accused Mr Alfred of giving money to girls in the school and using indecent practices with them, particularly one Rose Weipers. The anonymous letter was a rambling piece of vernacular prose without punctuation. Some words were badly misspelled. But the errors were so uncommon they seemed to arise from the writer’s desire to support anonymity by bogus solecisms.
