The Evacuee Christmas. Katie King

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      She contented herself instead by saying she was sure that he and Barbara were doing the best thing and that they would have broken the news of evacuation to the children in exactly the right way.

      Nearly everyone, she’d heard, was going to evacuate their children out of London and so it wouldn’t be much fun for those that didn’t go, she added, as they wouldn’t have any playmates, while schooling would be a problem, too as the government was going to try and make sure that all state schooling was taken out of the city.

      Peggy thought she saw the glint of a tear in the corner of one of Ted’s eyes as she spoke, but then he cleared his throat sharply as he averted his head, and added quickly that he had to go or else his pay would be docked, and with that he walked away curtly before she could say anything else or bid him farewell.

      Peggy remained where she was standing, wondering if Barbara had had long enough on her own with the children, or if she could go and call on her now. She felt she had been on her feet for quite some time already that morning and over the last few days she had grown a bit too large not to be having regular sit-downs.

      Then she saw Susanne Pinkly hurrying in her direction, with a cheery sounding, ‘Peggy, I need to talk to you but I’m late for school – can you walk over to St Mark’s with me? I was going to come and see you at lunchtime, but this will save me an errand if you can spare me a couple of minutes now?’

      Peggy and Susanne Pinkly were good friends, having been at school together from the age of five, and later in the same intake at teacher’s training college before they finally simultaneously landed jobs at the local primary school where they had once been willing pupils.

      They’d also spent an inordinate amount of time during their teenage years discussing the merits of various local lads and how they imagined their first kiss would be. Susanne was fun to be with, and was never short of admirers who were drawn to her open face and joyful laugh. Peggy had often envied Susanne her bubbly nature that had the men flocking, as Peggy was naturally more serious and introverted, and so when Bill had made it clear he thought her a bit of all right, it was a huge relief as she had been fast coming to the conclusion that the opposite sex were hard to attract.

      Although some schools wouldn’t let married teachers work, fortunately this hadn’t been the case at St Mark’s Primary School. While Susanne was still an old maid, being positively spinsterish now at thirty-one, Peggy had married Bill just a term into her first job without much thought as to what this might mean for her in the working world. Luckily St Mark’s didn’t have a hard and fast policy as regards making married female employees give up work, as some schools did, which Peggy found herself very pleased about, and increasingly so when she didn’t become pregnant for such a long time. She couldn’t have borne being stuck at home on her own and without anything to do – she would have felt such a failure, she knew.

      However, when she fell at last with the baby, Peggy had had to stop working at the end of the summer term as her nausea had got so bad, and since then she very much missed her lively pupils and the joshing camaraderie of the staffroom. Bill spent long hours at the bus depot, and he was rather fond of a tipple with the lads on a Friday and a Saturday night if he wasn’t rostered on the weekend shifts. Barbara’s time was taken every weekday by her job at the haberdashery, and so quite often the days felt to Peggy as if they were dragging by. She discovered all too quickly that there was only so much layette knitting an expectant mother could enjoy doing.

      It was still up in the air whether Peggy would ever be able to return to work following the birth of the baby, as most employers didn’t want a mother as an employee, and Peggy knew that if in time she did want to return to her classroom – after the war with Germany was over, of course – then she would have to make a special plea to the local education authority that she be allowed to go back to work.

      Before that could happen, she and Bill would have to decide between themselves that she should resume her job, and then they would need to sort out somebody to look after the baby during the day, which might not be so easy to do.

      Bill didn’t earn much as a bus driver (his route was the busy number 12 between Peckham and Oxford Circus), and aside from the fact that Peggy missed her pupils, and she knew she had been a good teacher, she suspected too that one day she and Bill might well feel very happy if she could start to add once again to the family pot by bringing in a second wage.

      Peggy turned around and, linking arms with her friend, she walked along with Susanne, who wanted to see if Peggy was going to evacuate herself.

      When Peggy nodded, Susanne cried perhaps a trifle too gaily, ‘Music to my ears! I’m having to stay behind to work at the bakery, as you know Ma’s been taken poorly and Reece is leaving today with your Bill. But if you’re choosing to be evacuated and are planning on going on Monday as most people round here seem to be, then St Mark’s needs another responsible adult to help escort the children to wherever they are being sent to, and I couldn’t help but think of you! So far there’s Miss Crabbe and old Mr Hegarty to look after them – well, Mr Jones is going too, but he won’t want to be bothered with the nitty-gritty, as it were, and in any case, he’s coming back just about the next day. One-Eye Braxton will be there and the kiddies run rings round him – and so I thought you would be the perfect person to go and keep an eye on both pupils and teachers.’

      There was definitely a logic to this despite the chirpy tone of Susanne’s words, Peggy could see, as she was familiar with the children and they with her, and she knew the quite often crotchety Miss Crabbe (‘Crabbe by name, and Crabby by nature’ was Peggy and Susanne’s private joke about her) and the ancient Mr Hegarty (who was increasingly doddery these days after teaching for over forty years) would make for dour overseers for the evacuation journey for the children, and with headmaster Mr Jones planning on not sticking around…

      And if Peggy went with the children of St Mark’s, then it would probably mean that she would end up being billeted near where Jessie and Connie would be, and this would be reassuring for Barbara and Ted; and for herself too, it had to be said.

      They’d reached the school gates, and Susanne nodded and then smiled encouragement at Peggy, obviously willing her to say yes.

      ‘Let me think about it overnight, and I’ll let you know first thing in the morning as I’m not quite certain about the other options for the evacuation of expectant mothers,’ Peggy said, trying to look resigned and as if she shouldn’t be taken for granted, but failing to keep the corners of her mouth from turning up into the tiniest of smiles.

      Then Peggy caught Susanne looking pointedly at her expanded girth so she added, ‘I think it’s probably fine for me to come with your lot, but I just want to consider it for a while as I don’t want to promise you anything I can’t actually do.’

      Susanne was already nipping across the playground towards the steps up to the girls’ entrance as she called over her shoulder, ‘Honestly, Peggy, it’s just to make sure they don’t get up to too much mischief on the train – and that’s just the teachers! And Mrs Ayres will be there too, and Mr Braxton, and so you won’t be too heavily outnumbered by the kiddies.’

      This latest comment wasn’t necessarily as hugely reassuring to Peggy as Susanne probably meant it to be, because although as sweet-natured a widow as Mrs Ayres undoubtedly was, she was a gentle soul, and even the youngest children could boss her around with absolutely no trouble, while Mr Braxton, who had had such a severe facial injury in the Great War that meant he’d lost an eye and part of a cheekbone, and who now wore a not very convincing prosthetic contraption that attached to his spectacles, also had problems in keeping the children in line, in large part as they didn’t really like looking directly at him.

      Peggy СКАЧАТЬ