“What’s your name?” she asked the girl. But the girl just shook her head.
“Don’t be shy,” said Susan. “We’re all your friends here. Do you know the five times table?” The little girl looked at her blankly.
“I’ll demonstrate,” Susan said. And she began to recite. “Once times five is five. Two times five is ten. Three times five…”
“Fifteen,” said the little girl.
“That’s right.”
“Four times five is twenty. Five times five is twenty-five.” And on the girl went, all the way to a hundred.
Susan gave her a little clap. “Well done,” she said. “Does anyone else want to…?”
The little girl took a deep breath. And then she started on the six times table.
“Yes,” said Susan. “All right.”
“Ten times six is sixty. Eleven times six is sixty-six.”
“That’s very good. Well done!”
“Fifteen times six is ninety. Sixteen times six is ninety-six.”
“Big numbers now! Can you go any further?”
But the girl stopped dead, looked at Susan, frowned.
“That’s very good,” said Susan once more. “Yes. I shall give you a merit point. What is your name, again…?”
And the little girl, once again, was taking a breath of air. A deeper one this time. The effort of it meant she had to clutch on to the teacher’s desk, and her face turned red. A great wheeze there was, and Susan thought it sounded like it came from an old man, an old man close to death, and the girl’s face was contorted with the force of it—she hunched over, gripping at her stomach, and Susan reached out for her, and the little girl just pushed her away. She steadied herself. She calmed. She looked her teacher right in the face.
“One times seven is seven,” she informed her. It was almost conversational. “Two times seven is fourteen.”
“Yes,” agreed Susan.
And onwards. “Thirteen times seven is ninety-one. Fourteen times seven is ninety-eight.”
Susan felt the question rise within her—does she know the eight times table? “Thank you,” she said, and she hoped from her tone it was clear that the thank you was conclusive.
But the little girl had gone back to the beginning. She was reciting the seven times table again, and this time it was faster, more confident.
“Three times seven is twenty-one, four times seven is twenty-eight, five times…”
“You need to sit down now,” said Susan.
“…ninety-one, fourteen times seven is ninety-eight, one times seven is seven…” There was no pause for breath this time. Two times seven, three times, four, and there was a smile on her face, as the pace began to accelerate still further.
“You need to sit down now,” said Susan. “That’s enough.”
“Ten times seven is seventy, eleven times seven is seventy-seven, twelve…”
“I said, enough!”
Susan looked at the class, to see how they were reacting to this open display of mockery. They didn’t seem amused, and that was good, she supposed—they didn’t seem shocked, or even interested. They stared out at the little girl with frank indifference.
And still the girl was tearing into the seven times table, so fast now that the words were starting to blur, the numbers running into each other and in the collision causing bigger numbers yet to appear, and Susan had her hands around the girl’s shoulders and she was shaking her, “Stop!” she said. “Stop this instant!” She looked at the class. “Fetch me my cane.”
No one moved.
“I said, the cane!” And a few of the children exchanged glances, and one boy at the front got to his feet, walked slowly to Susan’s desk, so slow it was nearly insolent, but not quite, nothing quite so obvious; he pulled open a drawer, and took out an ugly thin wooden stick.
The little girl was babbling out the words now, but she didn’t look afraid, she was exultant. “Don’t make me do this,” said Susan. “I don’t want to hurt you. Do you hear me? Stop. Stop. Hold out your hand. Hold out your hand.”
And, without pausing, the numbers still spilling forth, the little girl did so, she opened her palms ready for punishment.
Susan hit her. She didn’t want to hit her hard. But the stick was designed to hurt, and as it swung down it made the air crack, and the explosive pop it made against the little girl’s hand seemed too loud and too too angry, and Susan at once regretted it, but it was too late.
The girl stopped immediately, somewhere between forty-two and forty-nine. She looked at Susan in bewilderment. Then down at her hand, and Susan could see that the blow had broken the skin. She looked back up at Susan, and there were tears in her eyes, and there was disappointment too.
“That’s enough now,” said Susan quietly. “Sit down.”
The little girl did so.
“I will not,” said Susan, “tolerate insubordination. Not in my class. I’m here to help you. I want to help you.” She added, “And I read to you all about Sir Gawain!” It didn’t come out too plaintively, she hoped.
For the rest of class she had them read to themselves. There was only another fifteen minutes to go. The children were all perfectly silent, but Susan felt relieved when the bell sounded. She dismissed them, and smiled at them as they filed out, to show that everything was forgiven and forgotten. And the children seemed to hold no grudges, quite a few of them smiled back, even the little girl she’d beat.
Valerie Bewes made stew for them that evening. Susan did not want to discuss the incident with her, but there was no one else she could tell. Valerie laughed at the story, and told her not to worry.
“They’ll always try something,” she said. “It was your first day, and they have to find out how hard they can push you. I say you made it perfectly clear! Well done, you!” She helped Susan to another helping of stew. Susan didn’t like it much, the vegetables were nearly raw, the chunks of beef too stringy.
“I must go to bed,” said Susan. “I’m tired.”
Valerie looked disappointed, just for a moment, and then she smiled. “Of course. First day of term is the worst, you know! It’ll be easier tomorrow, you’ll see!”
Susan thanked her for supper, and went up to her room.
The room had changed. Susan stood in the doorway and stared at it. And then she heard Valerie chuckle, she hadn’t realised she’d come up the stairs behind her.
“I did a bit of furnishing for you!” she said. “Miss Fortescue left all her pictures behind. She’ll probably come and collect them at some point, but until she does, you may as well benefit from them…! She liked natural history. Natural history was her favourite subject.”
“Yes,” said Susan.
There were a dozen different paintings on the wall, and all of birds. Some of them were life studies, some of them were anatomical examinations. But even the skeletal bodies still had their wings intact, jutting out the sides, and that gave Susan the oddest impression that the poor creatures had had their skin and organs only selectively removed. She didn’t know what type of birds they were. She recognised an eagle.
“It makes the room feel more lived in, doesn’t it?”
“It does indeed.”
“Do you like it?”
“Very much.”
Valerie was pleased by that, and seemed about to start another conversation. “Good night,” said Susan, quite firmly, and Valerie nodded, gave a flash of a smile, and closed the door behind her.
Susan lay on the bed. No matter how tightly she drew the curtains, enough light got in to pick out the birds. The eyes seemed to follow her, and if they had no eyes, then the eye sockets followed her instead. When shadows passed over the feathers it made them come alive, to flex and ripple; the rain spattered hard on the windows, and sounded like the flutter of a thousand wings.
When Valerie knocked at the door, maybe half an hour later, Susan was almost grateful.