THE CLIMBING FRAME

by MARY HOCKING

  Chatterton was shocked. Drew’s reaction to his visit had been quite different to what he had anticipated; and if nothing else had been apparent to him, he had been only too aware of the man’s physical discomfort as they sat opposite to each other. The room was too small for so much torment. Chatterton was repelled by passion. As he drove back to his office, he reflected that there were things about Drew which he had not fully understood; and, not understanding, he now asked questions about the man. Was he, in fact, suited to be head of a school? Might it be true that his judgement would desert him at a crucial moment? Chatterton felt that in the last sphere of life where he had believed he could still relax and take his ease, he had suffered a defeat; he had always thought that he could solve most emotional equations, but this one was beyond him. But whatever private reservations he might have, he would not allow Drew to become a scapegoat; that kind of thing had never happened during his regime and he would not be a party to it now. And yet, it would be easy, particularly now that he could be said to have honest doubts, to say to Rudderham, ‘Look, this is a very unfortunate situation, but what can we do? The Head has handled this badly, but we have to back our heads on such occasions.’ This would be understood, it would be a dignified way out for him. He drove slowly. Lately the sun had the effect of making him giddy; it was as though it touched a nerve in his head and sent a quiver through his brain. At this moment, he would very much have liked a way out.

  When he got back to his office, he found a pile of messages on his desk. Miss Deane said apologetically, ‘It’s been a terrible morning. I tried to stem the flood, but there are three which are urgent. The County Treasurer telephoned to ask why he had not received an advance copy of the report on the establishment of the Department; Bunce telephoned twice and asked why no one was ever in the office; and Wicks telephoned to complain because you were not present at the Managers’ meeting at St. Saviour’s School yesterday afternoon.’

  ‘Did you put them on to Ellis?’

  ‘Yes. And they were all annoyed that they could not speak to you personally. I’m only telling you this because I think I overstepped the mark with Wicks and he will no doubt inform you.’

  ‘What did you say to Wicks?’

  ‘I told him that you couldn’t be in two places at the same time.’

  ‘That is the least of my failings, I’m afraid,’ Chatterton sighed. ‘You don’t know what Bunce wanted, do you?’

  She did not, but Bunce had made this clear to Ellis.

  ‘I am just amazed.’ He had paused to marvel at his own amazement, and Ellis, who understood him fairly well, had waited for him to spell it out. ‘I am on the Managing Body of the Eastgate Primary Schools, and although I don’t think I have ever over¬burdened the office in my capacity as Leader of the Minority Party, I am the Leader of the Minority Party, and I would have thought, I really would have thought,’ he repeated the phrase with a tut-tutting emphasis, ‘that I would have been informed in advance of the affair at Crossgate Primary School. Instead of which, I hear nothing about it, except that Rudderham assured me earlier this week that the whole thing was now under control, until I switch on my radio this morning . . .’

  While he paused to let this have its full effect, Ellis intervened, ‘I was going to telephone you about this in a few minutes as it happens.’

  ‘To telephone me now is all very well.’ Bunce had no intention of allowing himself to be placated so easily. ‘What I want to know is why nobody telephoned me days ago.’

  ‘I had to get the full picture,’ Ellis said equably. ‘I have been rather on the fringe of this affair, I’m afraid.’

  ‘I’m not interested in which individual officers have been concerned, this is a matter for you to sort out among yourselves . . .’

  ‘I’m sorry about this,’ Ellis said, with a hint of steel. ‘But if you want to talk about the way in which the case has been handled up to now, I am not in a position to help you. The Chairman has specifically requested that the Chief Education Officer should deal with it personally. But after this morning’s broadcast, and the further report in the paper, I had a word with County Councillor Wicks and it has been agreed to hold a meeting at this office this afternoon. The Chairman will be there, of course, and County Councillor Wicks, and it seemed to me that you would like to be present . . .’

  ‘I certainly should!’ Bunce was still aggrieved, but there was a slight shift of emphasis; Ellis was no longer his target. ‘I don’t mind telling you that I’m not at all happy about the way this has been handled. I don’t want to go any further than that at this stage; but I shall have one or two points to make . . .’

  ‘At three o’clock,’ Ellis said.

  He had one or two points to make himself and wanted time to develop them.

  In the event, they had to listen to Bunce.

  ‘I’ve never been one for listening to tittle-tattle,’ he said, with his air of severely strained reasonableness. ‘No one can say that I listen to tittle-tattle. I’m not one of those members, and there are some of them, I won’t mention names but we all know them, but I’m not one of those members who encourage people to come to them with every grievance however petty. If you have a grievance, you should go to the office and get it sorted out, is always my answer. But I do imagine,’ he spoke even more slowly and emphatically, approaching his climax, ‘I do imagine when I say this, that the office will sort it out. And this incident, I don’t like to say this, but it must be said, this incident has shaken my confidence.’

  Wicks said, ‘We’re all very concerned, that’s why we are here.’

  ‘If someone had been concerned at the start, we shouldn’t need to be here,’ Bunce pointed out.

  ‘If someone hadn’t leaked information to the press, there would probably have been no follow-up report,’ Rudderham said angrily.

  ‘Leaked information ?’ Wicks raised his eyebrows. ‘That’s rather a serious accusation, isn’t it?’

  ‘In my view it is. But it seems to be becoming common practice,’ Rudderham retorted. ‘And how otherwise did the Recorder become aware that the teacher in question was a supply teacher and that we had been discussing whether or not an accident form should be completed?’

  ‘It can’t have been all that confidential,’ Bunce said. ‘Jacob Horam knew about it when I saw him at lunch time.’

  ‘I think I may have mentioned it to Jacob.’ Wicks screwed his face up, as though trying to draw something from the dim recesses of memory. He abandoned the effort with a shrug of the shoulders. ‘In any case, one should be able to trust one’s fellow members.’

  ‘Jacob Horam is practically a Communist,’ Rudderham said angrily.

  ‘Oh come,’ Wicks admonished. ‘You’ll get into trouble with Fred here if you say that kind of thing about Jacob.’

  Bunce, who had rather enjoyed this exchange, merely shook his head and smiled wisely. Chatterton sketched a picture of Bunce on his pad and Wicks took a sly glance at it. Apart from this, Chatterton appeared to have opted out. Ellis took over.

  ‘I think we ought to make one or two things clear from the point of view of the office,’ he said. ‘A head is responsible for the running of his school; as you all know, it is not the practice, either of officers or members, to interfere in so far as anything to do with the day-to-day organization of the school is concerned, or with the curriculum. And these rights are jealously guarded by the teaching profession. Probably quite rightly. Whatever may have happened at Crossgate, and whether or not it was really wise for Drew to put a supply teacher in charge of that class, it was not a matter with which the office could have interfered even if it had known what was going on. As to what happened afterwards, we had a statement from the Head and, unless we have much stronger grounds than we had at the time of receiving that statement for questioning the information given, it is our normal practice to accept heads’ statements. If we behaved differently, Mr. Chairman, I think we should merely make trouble for you by creating a bad atmosphere between your
officers and your heads. But we must, of course, assume that heads will co-operate with us fully and will be very careful about any statements they may make to us. In this respect, we are entirely dependent on them. Unfortunately, it does seem to me in this particular instance, that the Head has let us down. Unintentionally, no doubt. Heads don’t always see things from our point of view, they are rather far removed from the administrative scene and sometimes I think a little removed from the hard facts of life, and they do not always appreciate the importance of public relations. In this case, it was undoubtedly most unfortunate that Drew did not see the woman when she called at the school, the whole trouble springs from that. He’s a good head, we all know that, but like all gifted people he has his little idiosyncrasies and an occasional abruptness of manner is one of them. It is also a pity that he did not go into the matter more thoroughly subsequently. Or perhaps he did. He is very loyal to his staff and no doubt this loyalty extended to Miss Smith, and he may not have wished to divulge anything which might have affected her. One can only honour him for that, but of course it placed the office in an unfortunate position.

  ‘It has also placed members in an unfortunate position. As I see it, there are two alternatives open to you.’

  He paused. Rudderham was regarding him like a child who has had a story broken off at the most exciting point. Wicks looked respectful of a good performance. Bunce nodded his head sagely as though all this had occurred to him and it was nice to hear it put into words. Chatterton sat with a pencil poised over a sheet of paper, his head bent. Ellis continued:

  ‘You have to decide, and only you can decide, to what extent you intend to support the Head in this. You can either support him up to the hilt, whatever private doubts you may have; or you can issue a statement which will go some way to meeting the criticisms which have been made without actually admitting any of the allegations.’

  ‘I don’t see how we can do that.’ Rudderham looked hopefully at Ellis.

  ‘You could state that the matter has been very carefully investigated; that it must be appreciated that there are points to be made on both sides and that there has been a certain amount of exaggeration on Miss Cathcart’s part, but nevertheless there are one or two aspects about which you are not entirely happy and which have arisen because of the difficulties of staffing with which schools are faced; that you are at all times most concerned for the safety of the children—or perhaps “well-being” would be a less emotive word in the circumstances—and that any action which is considered necessary in this case will be taken.’

  ‘Well,’ Rudderham expanded with relief. ‘I must say that is the most constructive idea yet put forward.’

  ‘Could we have it drafted so that we can have a look at it?’ Wicks asked.

  ‘We should want to add to it a little, shouldn’t we?’ Bunce said. ‘Not too much,’ Ellis said. ‘I think it would be a mistake to deal individually with any of the allegations made.’

  ‘Do you think Miss Deane would be good enough . . .?’ Wicks looked at Chatterton. ‘After all, it is rather confidential. We don’t want an ordinary shorthand typist on this job. I know the Chairman will want to avoid any more leaks.’

  Chatterton put his pencil down on the pad, did not seem satisfied with the position and gave it a little twirl; he watched it as though it might have been a roulette wheel on which his fortune was staked. It came to rest with the point facing Wicks. Chatterton addressed Wicks.

  ‘I’m sorry. I could not possibly subscribe to any of this.’ He turned courteously to Ellis. ‘I am afraid I failed to keep you fully in the picture, or you would not have put this suggestion forward. You must forgive me, there has been so much to do lately.’

  Ellis’s face burnt, but his eyes were cold as slate.

  ‘Can’t subscribe to it!’ Rudderham repeated.

  Bunce said, ‘I may be a very slow-witted countryman, and I admit that I am no administrator, but I really can see no objection to this.’

  ‘Perhaps Mr. Chatterton will tell us the objection,’ Wicks said silkily.

  ‘The effect of the statement which has been proposed is to shed blame on the Head Master. As I see it, the Head is not in any way to blame. The crux of the whole matter is that Drew has been looking after a child who should have been in a special school. In this case, the mother would not agree to the child being examined at the Child Guidance Clinic. But in the past Drew has accepted a number of children who were actually ascertained as maladjusted but for whom we could not find a place in a special school. He may, as Ellis has said, have his idiosyncrasies, but he is an extremely able head and he has been outstandingly successful with these very disturbed children. He has had to take them into his school, like many other heads, because in this country we have dismally failed to make adequate provision for maladjusted pupils. We cannot reward him by letting him take the blame the first time that a difficulty arises with one of these pupils.’

  ‘I find this a very touching picture of the Head,’ Wicks murmured. ‘But I am not convinced.’

  ‘I’ve always been a bit uneasy about Drew,’ Bunce said. ‘His 11+ results are too good.’

  ‘I don’t care about that,’ Rudderham snapped. ‘But in view of what we now suspect about his private affairs . . .”

  ‘And what worries me most of all,’ Bunce had not finished yet, ‘is the implication that because a child is maladjusted we are not to be concerned at any . . . well, let us say irregularities . . . in the treatment he receives.’

  ‘No!’ Chatterton seemed to realize from this moment that his influence over them had gone and that little was to be gained by trying to retrieve the position in so far as he himself was concerned. ‘Don’t let us say “irregularities”. The use of that word will get you into a great deal of trouble.’

  ‘I beg your pardon . . .!’ Bunce was, for once, very nearly speechless.

  ‘You may do this against my advice if you wish. I can’t stop you. But it will not be me with whom you will have to argue matters out eventually.’

  ‘You mean the Head?’ Wicks was amused.

  ‘I mean the union.’

  Chatterton was amused. Ellis was annoyed. Ellis, Chatterton was glad to note, had still one or two things to learn about administration and looking right round a problem was one of them. Chatterton proceeded to give him his lesson.

  ‘You are virtually saying in that statement that the Head Master has been negligent, and that one of the reasons why he has been negligent is because a supply teacher was on duty at the time the incident occurred. The union will never let you get away with that. There are supply teachers in every school, many of them undertaking work far more potentially dangerous than supervising a group of infant children in the playground. Furthermore, in addition to taking on the union, you will have seriously undermined your relations with your teaching staff. Every teacher who has a trouble- making child in his class will see himself threatened by this. If you don’t stand firm now, you will be faced by a far more serious issue later. You depend probably more than you realize on the goodwill of your teachers.’

  ‘You think Drew would go to his union if we issued that statement?’ Wicks asked.

  ‘Of course he would. And so would Miss Smith.’

  ‘I’m prepared to take on the union if necessary,’ Rudderham blustered.

  ‘Well, I’m not.’ Wicks shook his head. ‘Particularly if our chief officer isn’t going to support our case.’

  Bunce said, ‘Well, of course, if anyone had troubled to put me in the picture, if I had known that the child was so very disturbed

  ‘We’ve got to issue a statement,’ Wicks said. ‘What’s it to be?’ He was looking at Chatterton. ‘What statement does our chief officer feel he could . . . subscribe to?’

  Chatterton said, ‘I think you will have to say that you have investigated the matter very carefully and that the allegations are quite unfounded.’

  No one liked it. They had to accept it, but they would never forgive him.
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  Wicks made a wry face. ‘Pity we didn’t do this in the first place, isn’t it?’

  ‘You can make the point that an interval has been necessary in order to carry out a full investigation. If you had denied it immediately it would then have been said that no one had taken the trouble to look into it.’

  ‘No one is going to believe us either way,’ Rudderham said bitterly.

  ‘It will rumble on for a while,’ Chatterton agreed. ‘You know what these cases are like. Look at all the coverage there has been on girls with ear-rings being sent home, boys with long hair being told to cut it. And that tiresome case in a neighbouring area where it was maintained that children were not allowed into the school to go to the toilet during break. We shall have a period of unpopularity, but it will pass.’

  ‘Officers can afford periods of unpopularity,’ Wicks pointed out. ‘The poor politician can’t.’

  The County Council elections would be held next spring. It was on all their minds, but as Rudderham reflected when he went away from the meeting, only Wicks would have been tasteless enough to refer to it. And he wished the man would not refer to them as politicians, Rudderham had always made a great point of the fact that politics should not come into local government. And that went for the tactics of politicians, too. Leaking information to the press! Wicks had been responsible for that, even if he had not himself talked to one of the reporters. Now this wretched statement was to be issued which would not satisfy anyone, and it would be issued in Rudderham’s name. Just for a moment, Rudderham thought wearily that he would not mind very much if he did lose the chairmanship; it would be a relief to let someone else take the kicks. There wasn’t much else but kicks to public service these days.