Chapter 2

We sat until I could stand, and she helped me to go to the dorms. I could hardly go up the extra stairs alone, but a long shower and some liniment helped me regain a steady posture. I sat on my bed and looked at the article until I had a bit more understanding. It looked like Bastien was under suspicion for drug trafficking and a possible murder. The Spanish and Portuguese police had a lot of circumstantial evidence but nothing concrete.

The next day was the first day of first year. We started the day with breakfast in the dining room, then had ten minutes to brush our teeth before we all stood with the rest of the school and all the teachers in the main hall. The Head made a speech of welcome back, and a welcome to the first-year intake. She then gave us a rundown on the basic rules. There were no songs, for which I was grateful. Then we were off for our first lesson, which was maths for me. I had worried when I saw how long the lessons were, with only five or six a day.

I found that our maths teacher, Roy “Chalky’ Benson, was not backward in living up to his name as the first student who was heard talking had a piece of chalk hit him on his head. As a teacher, though, he was brilliant. I soaked up his explanations on why and how things were done. I could see me learning a lot from him over the year.

Peter Pell was not so flamboyant, but taught English without the boredom of learning by rote. He could weave his words into wonderful pictures. I could see his English Literature lessons being equally interesting. This school took the language into new territory with a special course in Creative Writing led by Miss Rosemary Harrigan. The ‘Harridan’ started the year with an essay to be handed in at the lesson next week. It had to be based on ‘The Worst Bed I Ever Slept In’. That made it easy for me to write something truthful but unbelievable.

My last class lesson of the day was Art. This was a catch-all name for Art History, Art Appreciation and actually doing something ourselves. The first time we had Sam ‘Stromboli’ Richards was rather funny. He was a big man who wore a sports jacket with a big red spotted hankie poking out of his breast pocket. He was quite easy-going until someone raised his ire. That’s when he would erupt. He would shout “You boy!’ and throw whatever was at hand. He had laid in a ready supply of texta pens and erasers, which the offender would have to pick up and take back to the front. As the term continued, I found that I had a hidden talent for drawing. The last class of the first day was gym, where we were all graded in what we were good at.

That one started with everybody running the track, the ones dropping out being given other things to try. Penelope and I were still running when a halt was called so that we could hit the showers. The next time we had gym there was a list of other things we would try. I had to learn how to throw a javelin that time, along with Charles and a couple of other boys.

And so, the term progressed. I took Spanish as my elective and was ahead of the rest of the class by a country mile. I found out that my pronunciation was rural, and some of the words I knew were no longer in normal usage. The female lessons were difficult to start with. At the dressmaking class I declared that I had never used a sewing needle or a sewing machine. All the girls were set to making a blouse, with Charles and I making a shirt. When we had completed that, the roles were reversed, our teacher telling us that you can never know just what would happen. The year carried on with us all doing alternate items, trousers and slacks, shorts, and skirts.

Both Charles and I took the cosmetic elective. He wasn’t up for needlework but had hairdressing instead. I thought that the elective would be just everyone being taught how to do make-up. It started with the basics of what ingredients were in various cosmetics, when you used parts of flowers, and how to pick and process the contents. It appealed to my chemistry interest, and I found it worthwhile. As we progressed, we were taught the art of application, which was very difficult for Charles and me when it was our turn to be models.

Music was a bit of a rest. ‘Lofty’ Matthews was hardly taller than me, and word was that his walk was caused by a spinal injury from his time in the Falklands. I found that difficult to believe, considering his height, and also the way he talked with his hands. He would allow us to do our homework while listening to one of the classical masters. As most of the best pieces went for close to an hour, it worked out perfectly for everyone.

With religious instruction, half of the first year claimed to be atheist, and most of the others said they were pagan. That caused a shifting of classes in the third week, with us having history for an hour, then, instead of being able to do our homework, we had an hour of pagan, wicca, and druid history, with descriptions of various bloody rituals. It was a lot of fun and very informative. This school didn’t miss a trick to round out your education.

Miss Smithers was our teacher for general science. Each week we rotated through physics, biology, and chemistry. In third year, we would be specialising when we moved to the other side of the building. I was engrossed in my studies, with everything made interesting. I could see how they did so well in the final exams. Talk about exams, we had one every few weeks in every subject, to gauge how well we were doing so that remedial teaching could be set up.

The first time the gates were opened for a cross-country run I was ready, now doing three to four thousand metres on the track with ease. The cross-country run, however, had all of the runners in the school, many that I had never seen run. I took it as a training run, without being competitive, but still found myself finishing in the top ten, against runners four years older and much bigger. The track took us out into the big park, with dips and hills, woods, and open land. I loved it.

By the end of the first term, I could design and make a suit, talk fluently in Spanish but was still behind on the written word and punctuation. I was in the top five in every other class, but my main achievement was art. My drawing had come good in leaps and bounds. I was in demand by the dressmaking girls to draw the ideas they were dreaming up. I had also shown that I had a steady hand in the cosmetics class.

The first break was only a week or two, and we had around two-thirds of the school leaving for time with their folks. Penelope and I hadn’t left, so we spent some of the days taking the bus that passed the school and going into Warwick. She had been right when she said that shopkeepers love couples, especially pre-teeners with a little money to spend. When we hit the fashion shops, I could now offer knowledgeable advice.

In the second week, we went to see a new film that she wanted to see. We sat close together, and she didn’t mind when I put my arm across her shoulders. The credits were scrolling as we had our first kiss. Although we held hands on the way back, we separated as we got to the school. My mind was in a whirl, wondering about how easily we got on. We liked it so much; we went to see another film the following afternoon and didn’t wait for the credits to exchange saliva.

On the weekend before the second term, Bancroft came to see me and said that Bastien had never been declared dead, as it was thought that he had transferred to another vessel and gone overseas. He had the contacts, and the reason, to make it work. There were rumours of him being seen in Brazil and Venezuela, but nothing certain. If he was in this country, there was no record of his entry. Bancroft thought that he may have been using local muscle if he was behind the murders.

In the Christmas break, I was one of about forty left in the school. Penny had gone off to have Christmas with her parents but had left me a card and a gift. I had bought her a silver friendship ring which was in with the card she took with her.

Some of us went into Warwick to see the decorations and lights. We had planned to go in again to see a film but some of our group had nasty coughs, so we didn’t go. What was odd, was that the bus we would have taken lost its brakes and ran off the snow-covered road, going into a roadside ditch and rolling. Bancroft came to the school the day after, along with a detective inspector. They asked me if we were going to be on that bus, and why we didn’t take it. He told us that the brakes had been sabotaged and that the accident was a deliberate act. It was lucky that nobody was badly injured. Who could tell what the outcome may have been with twenty extra bodies on board. The newspaper called it an unfortunate accident, but I suspected that the killers may have found where I was.

The next incident happened in the spring. We had been running regular cross-country school events, but there was to be an interschool race, with the top ten of each of three local schools competing for a handsome cup and bragging rights. I had been in the top ten of most of our runs, but only because bigger boys had passed me in the last mile or so.

The race was a big event, with the public crowding the park and the three schools crowding our grounds. When we got away, I was in the first ten out into the park. There was a place where the track ran downhill between trees and my smaller body was usually able to get ahead. On this occasion, I turned my ankle on a tree root as we got near, which slowed me down while I decided if I could finish. Four guys from one of the other schools passed me and I slotted in behind them. At my favourite downhill section, I was thinking about a passing move when the leading runner stopped dead and dropped to the ground.

We all stopped to see what had happened. One of the other runners went back a little bit to push the following runners around the scene. It didn’t take long for a paramedic to come and see what had happened. I expect that he thought that it may have been a heart attack. I knew that I had been the target as I stood next to the piano wire stretched across the track, at the perfect height to have taken my head off. The leader had a deep cut across his chest and the paramedic called the police.

Our group didn’t complete the race. One of the others went with his friend to hospital and a policeman took statements from the rest of us. I could see that he thought that it was just vandals. Bancroft and the police inspector were back in the school the following day, and I was pulled out of a class to talk to them. I told them that when I stood next to the wire, it was a perfect height to cut my throat. I was still limping and had a compression bandage around my ankle, so they could see why I slowed down and lived.

The upshot of this was that there was a funding appeal for better security around the school. A month later, there was a double gate at the entrance, with the hut used by the gatekeeper having some screens to watch, showing the road outside in both directions. There were other camera placements to cover the running track gates. A row of razor wire was installed on the top of the already secure fence. We still ran the park track, but every race was preceded by a guy in a motorbike with a sharpened bar bolted to the head-stem.

I wasn’t allowed to go to Warwick with less than five others, which made it difficult for my relationship with Penny. We made the best of it and carried on with our learning. At the end of my first year, I was in the top five of my class, and in the top ten for the year. I could design and make a dress, which I had done for a few of the girls. I could sew, and do embroidery, all the things that the girls could do. I was getting very good with my Spanish, to the point that I would be able to talk to my relatives there, should I live so long.

For the summer break, Penelope had talked her parents into taking me with them on a long cruise. Bancroft agreed that I should be safe on board, and we set sail for a month visiting exotic places. Penny and I were able to carry on our relationship as well as a couple of twelve-year-olds can. I liked her parents, who would drag us around handicraft shops in every port. I think that I grew up a lot on that trip.

When we arrived back, Bancroft was at the port and took me on a grand tour of my heritage. I was taken to see the administrators, meeting them for the first time. We then zigzagged around the county to visit every shop, where I was introduced to all the staff. It ended with a quick trip to Europe to visit the shops there. I could understand the reasoning behind all this. I was shown to be a real person, who just needed a few more years before I took charge. If asked, I told everyone that I wouldn’t change a thing and that everybody’s jobs were safe. It was during this tour that I was shown the numbers, and the numbers were staggering. I was destined to be rich when I turned eighteen.

The thing that made me blub was when we went to see my house. I remembered it well and the sight of it brought back all sorts of memories that I had suppressed in my time with the Johnsons. We couldn’t go in, as it was rented out to a business couple. When I got to eighteen, I would be able to talk to them about the lease, or just leave it as a rental and buy a place of my own. It was the rent that was funding my day-to-day expenses with a little left as spending money, while my share of the business profits was going into a trust fund. I had learned to be frugal, while living in the closet, and that wasn’t going to change.

I had turned thirteen before we started second year. We had to move to another dorm, making sure our old one was clean for the new intake. Our new dorm was bigger, with ten beds and a bigger personal space. Next to it was a large bathroom with ten showers, so we could leave our washing items in place. Next to that was the activity room, this time with ten computers so that we could do our homework and save it, printing it for handing in. These quarters were close to a set of stairs that led straight to the ground floor, which we were told to use, so avoiding any contact passing the girls. There was only nine of us ‘Doe Boys’ as a couple had transferred to a different school, no doubt complaining to their parents about having to do female subjects.

Most of the classes ramped up a level that term, with the female subjects getting more involved. The girls now did one on feminine hygiene, while I had the cosmetic elective changed to hairdressing. My language classes now alternated between the Spanish and French. My art classes also saw me move from drawing to painting in different mediums and then concentrating on water colours.

A few of us had a new class to attend, which we were told to keep quiet about. Officially, it was called ‘hand/eye coordination’ and we were to say that it was apparatus gymnastics if asked. It was held in the basement of the school, a labyrinth of tunnels and rooms. The part we used was a shooting range, and we started with air rifles and pistols, moving through small calibre guns and on to larger calibre ones. By the end of the year, I could strip and rebuild several types of firearms and get every shot inside the rings.

When I spoke to the other boys, and they were all boys, I found out that most of them were either children of diplomatic envoys or from a military family, destined for placement in a good regiment when they left Longburrow. I was the only one from Doe House.

I say that I finished the year. It nearly didn’t happen and my last couple of months were just me with the firearms instructors, after normal class times. This was due to another attempt on my life.

I haven’t said much about the Magic classes. Over the first few months we were taught how to listen, with various teachers giving a monologue and us having to take a test on what we had heard. Later on, that monologue was given with a CD player pumping out popular tunes, so that we had to concentrate. Then there was TV sets showing stuff, the music and two teachers talking. It sounds daft, but I found that I was able to pick up conversation in a crowded classroom and follow it, blocking out other noises.

In second year, we started going to visit people outside. The evening of the murder attempt was a surprise visit to a children’s hospital towards the end of the second term. It was six of us ‘Doe Boys’, dressed as rabbits, complete with a fully covered head, fluffy tails, and big ears. Charles and I were Mopsies, with the other four as Flopsies. We went in a minibus, fully dressed, and played with the children for a few hours. Before we got into the bus to go back, Miss Smithers got a call on her phone which made her face go pale. Instead of going to the school, we went to the police station, going in the back way. We got out of our costumes and were given overalls to wear.

We were put up in a large cell, and given a good meal, while Miss Smithers told us not to complain while she went off. In the morning, she was back, with Bancroft and his friend, the police inspector, along with two of the three boys who shared the dorm. After we all had breakfast, we were taken to a lecture room and given the facts.

While we were entertaining the kids, there had been a gas leak in the heaters for our dorm. Only one of the other boys had been in the room when they thought that an ignition device had triggered a gas explosion that killed him and destroyed the room. The other two had been in the activity room at the time. The only news that had been given out was that there had been a gas explosion and that the police were trying to establish how many had died.

The other boys were now told about the previous attacks on my life and that this was the time to flush out the killers. One of the boys was given my bunny suit and a quick lecture on what we had done. He was changed into a set of overalls and joined the other five in the bus, all told that my life depended on their keeping the secret. The final lad was told the story he was to give the papers. That he had been in the activity room while the dead lad and me were in the dorm. The police would announce that two boys had died in a terrible accident, although they had found the remnants of the ignitor and the loosened gas connection.

I stayed in the police station while the remaining lad was taken back to the school in the back of a police van. I was sitting in the police canteen with a mug of tea when I asked Bancroft the question uppermost in my mind.

“What now?”

“Now, we make sure that nobody can recognise you. Then you go back to the school as someone else. There has to have been someone who told the killers which dorm you were in, and how to get to it. Either someone blabbed in the pub or was paid a handsome sum for the information. In the next couple of days, we will have trained police walking the perimeter fence to see where they got in. You, my lad, will be spending time at drama school, learning to be a proper young lady, then we can slip you back into Longburrow to complete your studies until the killer shows his face.”

“What about my friends. What about Penny?”

“She can’t be told until we catch the killer. I’m sorry, Tom, but you’re going to have to be strong until then. There will be a memorial service for the two of you, and the unfortunate lad that did die will get a proper funeral. His family will get a compensation package from the school, and a press release will go out to say that all the gas heaters will be replaced with electric ones. The school will replace all the clothes and personal effects of the other seven, and you will start with a completely new wardrobe. Your computer in the activity room will have the memory copied so that you can keep up with your studies while you’re training.”

Later on, he drove me to London, in the back of a car with darkened windows. My destination was one of his own buildings, where I was shown the room where I would sleep, given a cotton nightie that looked like a long tee shirt, pointed to the bathroom, and told to have a good shower, and a good cry if I wanted to, and to come back in the nightie and the robe that was also handed to me.

I took my time, the only tears being for what Penny will go through. I had no problem with the shampoo and other items in the shower, having studied them in first year. When I was dry and dressed, I went back to my room to find a girl hanging things in the wardrobe.

“Hello. I’m Elizabeth Mottram and I’ll be your teacher while you’re here. These are your new outfits, and I have all your new underwear and shoes to put away. Do you want to help me?”

“Hello Elizabeth. I guess that I’m either Francis Valerie or Valerie Francis. Maybe I’m Frances Thomas or someone else altogether. I can put my things away. While I do that, maybe you can tell me what happens now.”

Marianne Gregory © 2024