No Talking after Lights by Angela Lambert Page B

to find the time for that, with over a hundred books to mark every week?
    â€˜Well, let’s leave that aside for the present,’ Mrs Birmingham said. ‘I asked to see you because certain disturbing rumours have reached me, not for the first time, about your demeanour in class. Your handling of the girls. I thought it would be helpful to hear in your own words if there is any cause for concern. Anything I ought to know about.’
    â€˜There’s been another outbreak of stealing, mainly in the Lower Fourth. Fountain-pens disappearing, the usual sort of thing.’
    â€˜I was referring to your own conduct, Miss Parry, rather than to that of the girls.’
    â€˜Girls can be very excitable. They can be - how shall I put it? - melodramatic.’
    There was no answering smile.
    â€˜I was under the impression that it was you who are excitable, Miss Parry. That you frequently lose your temper. That some of the girls are afraid of you.’
    â€˜No bad thing,’ said Sylvia, attempting another conspiratorial smile.
    â€˜On the contrary,’ said the Head coldly, ‘it is a very bad thing …’
    Does she imagine I don’t know what a very bad thing it is? Does she think I was born this caustic, dangerous spinster?
    One freezing Gower winter, Mother caught pneumonia. Small wonder, the times she stood out in the cold hanging sheets on the line as they snapped backinto her face, or trudging along, head down against the wind, to and from chapel or the grocer. She continued stumbling through her duties, hacking and wheezing, and I don’t remember that my father or I took much notice. Now, as then, I cannot feel guilty about her. Finally one day we came back from school together, me bundled up on the front of his bicycle, feeling his strong body pedalling rhythmically against me, and she wasn’t there. He went upstairs and found her lying on their bed, frightened by her collapse, the loss of control. The doctor came and took her off in his own car to the hospital at Swansea. He said she was very ill.
    Then we were on our own. We divided up the chores and kept the place spick and span. Mother would have been proud of us. We didn’t need the neighbours, though I heard them behind my back saying I was a brave girl and the parson’s wife would bring round a cake or a pan of soup, still hot from her own stove. We drank cups of tea together, my father and I, just the two of us, while I listened to
Children’s Hour
, and for supper we ate the parson’s soup, or bread and meat paste, tinned sardines and hard-boiled eggs — things that didn’t need cooking. I’d clear away the table while he marked exercise books and prepared lessons. I never asked for his help with my school work. He was busy, and besides, I could do it easily.
    When it was my bedtime he’d tap his watch and go up to draw the curtains and run my bath. I undressed and he folded my clothes in a tidy pile on the chair in my bedroom. I’d sit in the bath - this wasn’t every night, of course, only about twice a week - and he would soap the flannel and wash me, making swirls of lather across my skin like the patterns on the matted coats of the white Gower ponies. Then I’d step out of the bath into the towel, and he’d close his arms andhug me inside it, rubbing my back and legs.
    â€˜Are they done?’ he’d say. ‘No, I don’t think they’re quite done.’
    I liked it, and giggled as he dropped the nightdress over my head.
    One night when she’d been away about a week, maybe ten days, he read a story, as usual, cuddled me and kissed me good night and after he’d gone downstairs I got out of bed quietly, so as not to hurt his feelings, because he’d forgotten my prayers. I knelt down beside the bed and folded my hands and leant my forehead on them. I shut my eyes and said, ‘God bless Dada and God bless Mummy and make her better, and make me a