CHAPTER FIFTEEN: Sweet Sixteen

Despite my intention to make myself indispensable in the shop, I very quickly reverted to my old ways; in fact, my behaviour deteriorated and I became moody, rebellious and defiant.I was discontented with my life and with my looks and would spend hours in front of the bathroom mirror viciously squeezing pimples, deriving a perverse pleasure from making myself look as ugly as I could. Because my life seemed pointless, I had no enthusiasm for anything and my school work began to suffer as a result. I lost interest in all my subjects, even art: we’d been working with modelling clay which was a medium I disliked intensely and so I made no effort at all. At home, I flew into a rage if my sister interfered with any of my things and depite my mother’s nagging, my bedroom was so untidy that, regularly, she’d storm into it, hurl everything that wasn’t already there on to the floor and then sweep the whole lot on to the landing and down the stairs in a great, engulfing tidal wave of clothes, shoes, make-up, books and other paraphernalia; all I could do was to look on in a kind of awed silence. Auntie Frances remarked that I’d grown very cynical of late and that it didn’t suit me; however, the more I was criticised, the worse I became.
The situation wasn’t helped by the fact that, owing to a new form mistress, it was a very unsettling time at school not only for me, but for the whole class. She was a young woman and because she had all the zeal of a new broom, I expect it was her first teaching appointment. However, from the moment she stepped through the door, events did not augur well for a good relationship. It was a strictly observed rule of the school that pupils should rise whenever an adult entered a room so, when our new teacher appeared, we dutifully scrambled to our feet - all, except, of course, Jenny. With a stern, unsmiling expression which was no doubt meant to convey authority, the young woman regarded us; suddenly, her gaze fell upon Jenny and, eyes widening in indignation, she made a silent gesture for her to get to her feet immediately. Jenny grasped the sides of her desk with her hands and, with much clattering and scraping of chair legs, hauled herself to her feet. It was lamentable that not one of us had the courage to speak up and thus save not only Jenny from humiliation but also our new form mistress from the embarrassment of having to apologise to her in front of the whole class and I despised myself for my cowardice. It was an unpleasant incident and it seemed to me, in that moment, that the class had made an unspoken pact to be as disruptive and unco-operative as it could with this new teacher.
I’m ashamed of myself when I look back at the hard time we gave that poor woman. We disobeyed her flagrantly and the more upset she appeared, the more we tormented her. It was as though we were fired by a strange excitement, a feeling of exhilaration, at having the upper hand and it was a very good thing that, eventually, we grew tired of persecuting her and settled down again to concentrate on our impending G.C.E. examinations. I, too, pulled myself together and made a determined effort to work as hard as I could.

When Falmouth School of Art advertised Saturday morning classes for schoolchildren interested in taking up art as a career, I signed on eagerly. The teacher was a young man, full of enthusiasm for his subject, who declared that anybody could draw or paint and that one person’s efforts were no less deserving of merit than the other’s. I found this philosophy hard to understand and rather resented his opinion that the work of all of us was of equal standard when it manifestly wasn’t. After a few weeks, those who didn’t possess much ability dropped out so that only the keenest of us remained. One of these was a boy, slightly older than I was, on whom I had formed an enormous crush. In his presence I was so overcome with shyness that I could never bring myself to speak to him but one evening, as I was making my way to Gillian’s house, I bumped into him. He was wearing the uniform of an Air Training Corps. cadet and he looked so handsome that the wild confusion in which I suddenly found myself left me utterly deprived of speech and I could barely give an intelligible reply to his friendly greeting.
I assumed that he was on his way to the Drill Hall for a weekly meeting in which case, if I contrived to be in the same place at the same time on the following week, I’d bump into him again.
So, on the same day of the next week, after taking considerable care with my appearance, I sauntered, with exaggerated nonchalance, along the road where I’d previously encountered him and, sure enough, before very long he appeared. Once again, he greeted me cheerfully and, once again, I was overcome by acute shyness. This state of affairs continued for several weeks and just as I was about to give up all hope of ever getting anywhere with him, one Saturday after art class he asked me if I’d like to go to the A.T.C. party at the Drill Hall. I floated home in a daze of ecstasy, hardly able to believe that he’d actually asked me to go out with him. I was determined to look my best for the occasion so spent a long time in front of the bathroom mirror experimenting with make up. When my mother said that I’d look better without any of that muck on my face after I’d asked her for advice, I decided to consult Jenny, who was an expert on such matters. She’d once turned up to school with her auburn hair dyed a vivid shade of red after having rinsed it with the contents of a bottle of vermilion drawing ink and how she’d got away with it I never knew; school rules regarding the wearing of make-up and the colouring of hair were so rigidly enforced that Miss Jacob had, on one occasion, dismissed from the class some girls who were still wearing the barely visible vestiges of the previous evening’s lipstick.
‘What you need to do,’ said Jenny, ‘is to underplay the lips and exaggerate the eyes. Try applying a pale foundation, a pale pink lipstick and then do up the eyes with lots of smoky shadow and lashings of mascara.’
So, armed with the much appreciated advice of the connoisseur, I trotted off to Woolworths to purchase a stick of very pale foundation and a lipstick of the palest pink I could find. Hours before I was due to set off for the party I locked myself into the bathroom and set about transforming myself. With my array of cosmetics laid out before me, I proceeded to dab, smooth, paint and smudge but when, some considerable time later, I stood back to inspect my handiwork, I was dismayed: the effect was truly disastrous. The thick, chalky foundation had whitened my face so much that, together with the corpse-like effect of the lipstick and the contrast of the blackened eyes, I resembled a ghoul that had suffered a nasty shock. Frantically, I rubbed at my face with cotton wool to try to remove some of the foundation but, the more I wiped, the more it seemed to spread. In desperation, I scrubbed my skin vigorously with a face flannel only to reveal a complexion which was inflamed and blotchy as a result of so much friction. At that moment, my mother hammered on the door to tell me that I’d been in there long enough and that other people wanted to use the bathroom.
‘What am I going to do?’ I wailed.
‘I don’t know,’ she replied, ‘I always had good skin when I was your age and never needed to wear all that muck on my face.’
I went into her bedroom, helped myself to a generous scoop of her Nivea cream and smeared it on to my face in the hope that, by the time I’d done my hair, my complexion would have calmed down. Unfortunately, my hair, when I’d removed the rollers, refused to do want I wanted it to and the double crown at the back of my head, no matter how much I sprayed and backcombed, remained stubbornly on end, with the scalp exposed, making me look like a moulting cockatoo. By the time I was dressed and ready to go, all my confidence had vanished and I wished that I’d never been asked to the party in the first place. When my father dropped me off at the Drill Hall he told me that he’d be back at nine-thirty on the dot to pick me up and that I’d better be ready. Full of trepidation, I went inside to find that only a few people had arrived and since I didn’t know anyone apart from the boy who’d asked me, I pretended to be interested in a pile of gramophone records on a table. Gradually, the party livened up and a few couples began to dance. My partner suggested that we joined them but I protested that I couldn’t dance and turned my attention back to the records. Not long afterwards, I was surprised to see another girl from the High School walk in. Although she was in the same year as I was, I didn’t know her very well and had hardly ever spoken to her. She was a tall girl who was so thin that she looked like a skeleton; her best feauture was her soft, brown hair which, when it was newly washed as it was on this occasion, framed her face prettily, softening the sharp, jutting angles of her bony features. Just as I was attempting to summon the courage to talk to my partner, another boy came up to me to tell me that my father had arrived to take me home. Embarrassed, I rushed outside.
‘Please let me stay a bit longer!’ I pleaded.
‘No!,’ he replied, ‘You’ve got to come right this minute.’
‘But it’s not fair!’ I wailed. ‘I’m not a child any more and no one else has left yet.’
‘Come on! ‘ insisted my father, getting annoyed.
Humiliated, I returned to fetch my coat and say goodbye to the boy who’d invited me; I couldn’t see him at first, then, to my utter dismay, I spotted him on the floor dancing with the skeletal girl from my school and they seemed to be getting on so well that I simply slunk away without a word. It served me right that he preferred someone else since I’d hardly spoken a word to him all evening. What a dead loss he must have thought me! Miserably, I went to find my father who was waiting impatiently by the car.
My pride had been so wounded that I resolved never to speak again to the boy who had deserted me for another girl but at the Saturday art class I overheard the tail end of a conversation he was having with another boy.
‘I thought she was lovely when we were snogging under a lampost,’ he was saying, ‘ but when I saw her again in broad daylight she was so bloody ugly that I nearly threw up!’
My injured feelings were greatly mollified and when I next saw my rival, I regarded her with pity.

There was no doubt in my mind that art was to be the career I wanted to pursue and I already had my future mapped out: I would leave school after I’d completed my ‘O’ levels to do a pre-diploma course at Falmouth School of Art. The art school didn’t have college status at that time and so, eventually, I would have to seek a place at one which did; that, however, was way into the future and I didn’t have to concern myself about it yet. In the meantime, in order to obtain the five necessary passes for the course, I decided to concentrate on only those subjects at which I was best.
The General Certificate of Education ‘O’ level examination was very different from today’s General Certificate of Secondary Education and when I was teaching and had my first sight of G.C.S.E. paper, I couldn’t believe how easy the questions were. Our work involved far more thorough, detailed study and required a great deal of learning by heart, especially in subjects like English Literature; for example, we had to be able to quote long passages from Shakespeare’s plays and also some of the most important sonnets, something so thoroughly done that I can quote them still even to this day. We were also studying the work of the war poets, such as Siegfreid Sassoon and Wilfred Owen, and because I found their verses so inspiring, I was able to memorize them easily. Gillian had fallen in love with Rupert Brooke and was outraged that the life of such a gifted, handsome young man should be so cruelly cut short. In Latin, we also had to learn long passages from Vergil’s Camilla and Homer’s Odyssey. There were certain lines from these verses which I found particularly beautiful, such as the description of Camilla, the virgin queen of the Volscians in Roman legend, so fleet of foot that she could run over a field of corn without bending a single blade. Penny and I both had romantic yearnings and it was words like these which fired our fertile imaginations.

When the visiting schools’ doctor asked me if I’d a career in mind and I told her that I planned to go to art school, she was disapproving. Because of my brittle bones, she declared, the rough and tumble of college life would be too much for me and that it would be better to opt for a more sedate profession, such as nursing. Nursing! I was aghast: it was the very last career I’d have chosen for myself. Ignoring my expression of horror, she leaned forward to carry on talking to my mother.
‘It’s such a worthwhile profession’, she enthused, ‘and employment is guaranteed, unlike art where you can never be sure of getting a job. Besides, you wouldn’t have to worry about Margaret if she was in a hospital environment, would you?’
Beaming with a smug satisfaction which made me long to kill her, she turned to me.
‘Remember, dear,’ she said, ’you can always keep up your art as a hobby. So much more enjoyable that way, don’t you think?’
I burned with resentment at her implication that art was a profession less worthy of others and was more determined than ever to abide by my original decision to go to art school. Not long afterwards, all the girls in my class were interviewed by the Headmistress to discuss what they’d be doing after the examinations. When I informed her of my intention to leave school, her reaction was similar to that of the doctor.
‘But, Margaret,’ she protested, ‘when we join the Common Market, the country will need girls like you who are good at languages. You must take your ‘A’ levels and go on to university. Besides, you can always keep your art as a hobby.’
So, then, she too thought that an artist was of no worth! But I was not going to be deterred and the more she tried to change my mind, the firmer I became in my resolve. The argument continued until, after an interview with my mother, a compromise was reached: I would not leave school that year but return in the autumn to study art at ‘A’ level and sit for the exam at the end of one year instead of the customary two. I’d also continue to attend English Literature and French ‘A’ level classes in case I had a change of heart about not wanting to go to university. No chance of that! I wasn’t happy with the arrangement but I acceded to the proposal, reluctantly, when the Principal of the art school suggested that, if Miss jacob approved, I attend classes there once or twice a week. The ‘A’ level art wasn’t a necessary qualification, he said, but it would be a feather in my cap if I did get it.

Although I’d decided to put all thoughts of boys out of my mind until I’d completed my ‘O’ levels, a major distraction was about to disrupt my life. Penny had an older brother who was a pupil at Falmouth Grammar School and, through him, she was able to meet a number of boys. I wasn’t surprised, then, when she confessed to me that she’d taken a liking to one of them. When he sent her a message to say that, by consensus of general opinion, he thought it would be a good idea if they went out together Penny was delighted and even more pleased when he sent her a hand-drawn valentine card depicting the door of a public convenience with a sign on it saying ’vacant’ which, when you pulled a tag, changed to ‘engaged.’ Kenneth, the author of the card, was obviously extremely witty but, I thought, secretly, it wasn’t a very romantic way to proposition a girl. Still, I was curious to meet him and agreed to accompany her when she told me that she was a bit nervous about going on her first date with her new boyfriend. When I saw Kenneth for the first time my initial impression was that he was wearing some kind of comic mask comprising an exaggeratedly enlarged nose attatched to a pair of heavy, black-rimmed spectacles. The mask effect was heightened by the stark contrast of the utter normality of the rest of him: he was neither too thin nor too fat, neither too tall nor too short. I tried not to let Penny see how startled I was by his bizarre appearance and I wondered what she could possibly see in him.
As we strolled around the town, I discovered that Kenneth was surprisingly easy to get along with; also, he had a good sense of humour and a keen intelligence which, I guessed, was what had attracted Penny to him. When he suddenly put his arm around her shoulder I took it as my cue to make a discreet departure. I’d been a little embarrassed about having to play gooseberry and I’d been waiting for a suitable opportunity to leave. I was just about to excuse myself when, to my astonishment, he put his other arm around me and pulled me towards him. Penny and I were both so startled by this that we threw him a simultaneous look of surprise. He, however, was oblivious and strutted along, obviously proud of the fact that he had two girls in tow. The unusual situation in which I found myself made me feel very uncomfortable and I was relieved when, at last, I was able to make my departure. The incident preyed on my mind and I was still thinking about it when I went to sleep that night; by morning, however, I’d forgotten all about it.
The following day was Sunday and that evening we were surprised by a knock on the door. My mother opened it and, a few seconds later, I looked up in astonishment to see Kenneth standing there. He asked me if I’d like to go for a walk so, assuming that he wanted to talk to me about Penny, I agreed. We strolled around the town, as we’d done on the previous evening, chatting amicably, but no mention was made of Penny. Just as I was beginning to wonder about the purpose of his invitation to escort him, he suddenly put his arm around my shoulder and drew me close. My first reaction, apart from surprise, was indignation; I’d given him no encouragement whatsoever yet he evidently assumed that I found him attractive. What an extraordinary presumption! Did he not realise that his physical appearance would repulse any girl? Because it was Sunday, the streets were quiet and, also, it was getting dark; I was glad of this because I was afraid of being seen in this situation by anyone I knew. But just as we were making our way back to Killigrew Road, I was horrified to see some girls from my class on the other side of the road. I shrank into the shadows, praying that they wouldn’t see me, but as they passed I heard one of them gasp:
‘Did you see who that was? Margaret Walker! What’s she doing with him? ‘
My heart sank because I knew now that there would be no hope of Penny not finding out about what had happened. Oh, it was so unfair! I’d done nothing to get myself into this situation yet I was sure to get the blame for it. Kenneth seemed quite unconcerned.
‘Don’t worry about it!’ he said, cheerfully.
Anxious to get home, I was relieved when, at last, we came to my back gate. I wished him goodnight but, just as I was lifting the latch, he grabbed me and planted a firm kiss on my mouth. There was now absolutely no doubt about his intentions: he fancied me and he had the audacity to assume that the attraction was mutual. If I’d not been such a coward and if I hadn’t been in awe of him because he was older than I was, I’d have told him to his face that I found him unattractive and that I considered him to be not only not good enough for me but also definitely not good enough for Penny. It would have given me the greatest satisfaction to send him packing, there and then.
‘Who on earth was that? Or should I say what was that?’ demanded my mother when I went indoors.
‘No-one to do with me,’ I replied. ‘He’s a friend of Penny’s.’
‘What’s he doing hanging around you. then?’
‘He just wanted to talk.’
At school the next day I kept my head down and avoided Penny. I strained my ears to hear any whispered conversations but nothing appeared to have been said and I felt more hopeful that my secret might not be revealed. However, that afternoon, after lunch, I saw Penny look in my direction several times and I knew that the cat was out of the bag; coward that I was, I didn’t have the courage to face her and explain what had happened. That evening, Kenneth called again but I excused myself by saying that I hadn’t finished doing my homework. The following lunch break I was sitting on top of our air raid shelter, my favourite spot for sunbathing, concentrating on my revision, when a movement startled me and I looked up to see Kenneth’s grinning face. So far, all our encounters had been evening ones and because artificial illumination is far more forgiving than the harsh light of day, I hadn’t appreciated just how wierd his appearance was and if, before, I’d found him merely unattractive now I discovered that he was repulsive to me. I studied his features with a kind of fascinated horror. His hair was lustreless and mousy with a stiff, matted look as though it hadn’t been washed for some while; the length of his sharply pointed nose was greatly accentuated by the hideous, heavy, black-framed spectacles he wore, the thick lenses of which concealed eyes which were deep-set and too close together; his skin was badly affected by acne and the inflamed, red spots which covered his chin had yellow centres which looked as thought they might erupt spontaneously and his loosened collar revealed a neck which was punctuated by a row of blackheads; his mouth was distorted by crooked teeth which had curious green stains on them. I wasn’t surprised when, later, he boasted that not only had he never had dental treatment but also that he never needed it.
‘I thought you said he was Penny’s friend,’ said my mother, accusingly, after he’d gone. ‘Don’t you dare go getting mixed up with the likes of him!’
But every day - sometimes twice a day - Kenneth continued to haunt me. One lunch hour he appeared with a glistening globule of nasal mucous suspended from his nostril and every time he drew breath or exhaled, it quivered gently like a breeze-blown leaf on a tree. He turned up again later that evening and I was astonished to see that it was still there, only dried up. I found it difficult to disguise my revulsion and I couldn’t understand how he could be so uncaring of his appearance never to look in a mirror; also, I had a growing conviction that he didn’t wash.
When my sister first saw Kenneth, she gaped at him in undisguised amazement.
‘He’s a queer gink!’ she declared, using a popular expression of the time to describe a weird person. She christened him with the name ‘Lesser Spotted Dunkweed’ - later abbreviated to ‘The Dunkweed’ - because, she said, he looked too peculiar to be considered human. Auntie Frances was more startled by his acne than anything else about him. To give him his due, there wasn’t a lot he could do about that, although regular washing might have helped. At that time there was no treatment for acne, other than exposure to ultra-violet radiation which, these days, would probably make dermatologists throw up their hands in horror at the very thought. My mother grew daily more anxious about my association with him.
‘People are starting to talk,’ she warned me. ‘You’ll never get a decent boyfriend if you’re seen around with someone like that. He’s uglier than a toad.’
Gillian told me that she’d been asked by another boy from the Grammar School:
‘What’s a nice girl like Margaret doing with the likes of him? ‘
I was, indeed, beginning to feel concern about the fact that Kenneth was haunting me. Besides, there was a boy I had my eye on and I knew I’d stand no chance with him while someone else was hovering in the background. There was no getting away from him: he knew my routine and my movements so well that wherever I went, he was there. Again and again, I chided myself for being such a coward that I couldn’t face up to him and I longed to make it up with Penny. One day, I accepted - with some trepidation - his invitation to go to his parents’ house for tea and was astonished to find how extremely nice - how surprisingly normal - they both were. I hadn’t known that they had a younger son whom I recognised as the rather unpleasant and furtive boy I’d often seen hanging around the street behind our house in Clare Terrace. He’d aroused the suspicions of the neighbours and they’d hinted darkly at misdeeds too shocking to mention. How unfortunate, I thought, that someone as nice as their mother should produce two such awful sons.
Kenneth’s parents were fond of motoring and at weekends they invited me along, too. I was familiar with most of the popular tourist spots of Cornwall because I’d visited them with my parents or Harry and Ethel, but now I found myself in places, as yet undiscovered, that I hadn’t realised existed. We walked over sand dunes beneath huge skies exultant with larksong to wide, deserted beaches pounded by Atlantic surf; we explored disused quarries where there were deep, mysterious pools and granite landscapes of ancient sites and standing stones. On the more gentle, southern part of the county we wandered through spring woods carpeted with bluebells and anemones or walked along the shoreline below pretty, creekside villages. I loved these outings so much that I was able to endure Kenneth simply for the privilege of being able to accompany his family. He, however, took it for granted that it was his company I preferred.
After a while, he began to find fault with me and to criticise me. For example, he told me that, in his opinion, my paintings were childish; my friend, Gillian, he said, was always beautifully dressed, implying that I wasn’t; he asked me if I was aware of the annoying habit I had of interrupting his father when he was talking. The comments stung but I was too gullible and ignorant of the ways of the opposite sex to realise that this was his way of breaking down my self-esteem in order to exert his dominance of me. Often, when I strolled through the town, I would make a detour in order to look in the window of a certain antiques shop where an unusually beautiful fan was displayed. It wasn’t very expensive and I’d told Kenneth that I was saving up to buy it. One day, however, I was dismayed to see that it had gone and when I told him how upset I was at its disappearance he confessed that he’d bought it himself in order to prevent me from doing so because, he said, it was too good for me and that if I owned it I’d only break it, as I did with all my possessions.
The impending G.C.E. examinations provided me with a good excuse not to see Kenneth and, furthermore, my mother forbade him from coming to the house. At last, I was able to devote all my concentration to my revision so that when the time came for us to sit for our exams, I was quietly confident. My sister had not fared so well with the eleven-plus and on the day she received notification that she hadn’t passed, she was afraid to come home after school. When it began to grow dark our mother was so concerned that she decided to notify the police; at that moment, however, Jean appeared and, silently and shamefacedly, handed her the slip of paper informing our parents that she’d failed. I’d expected my sister to suffer the full force of our mother’s wrath but, to my surprise, although disappointment was written all over her face, she said not a word. Because Jean had failed her eleven-plus, I took it for granted that the promised pony wouldn’t be forthcoming and was therefore greatly surprised, and not a little indignant when, some time later, our mother took out a loan so that she could purchase a pony. I thought it most unjust that I should have received nothing, not even the piano lessons I longed for, for passing my eleven-plus whereas my sister, who had failed, was being rewarded with a pony. I brooded for some while until it dawned on me, after hearing our mother boasting to a customer, that the pony was simply a means by which she could elevate her status and I had to concede that the phrase ‘my daughter’s piano lessons’ sounded far less impressive than ‘my daughter’s pony.’
Every summer, my mother nagged me to get a holiday job and this time there was no getting away from it. I dragged myself, reluctantly, to what was then referred to as the Labour Exchange where I found that the only temporary employment available was washing up in hotels and other boarding establishments. It was hard, physical work and I hated it. I strained my back, which had always been weak, lifting heavy trays of cutlery and had to consult our doctor who prescribed a foul-smelling, mustard-based liniment which was to be applied to the affected part. The warming effect of the mustard was pleasant but the smell was so appalling that it made me retch and so I decided I’d rather put up with the backache. In due course, the ‘O’ level results arrived and I was gratified and relieved to discover that I’d got distinctions in languages and art and that there was now nothing to stop me from becoming an art student.
It was strange returning to school as a sixth-former, one of that élite band of whom I’d always been so much in awe. I felt as though I were an imposter, belonging neither to the High School nor Falmouth School of Art and although I was supposed to attend French and English Literature classes, I had no intention of devoting my time to either of these subjects because I wanted to concentrate on my art in order to make the year pass as quickly as possible. I didn’t like the unsettling sensation of being in a state of limbo, neither here nor there. From the ‘A’ level syllabus I chose those subjects at which I was best, such as plant drawing, imaginative composition, calligraphy and so on: I also decided to make a marionette, the given theme of which was ‘Fire’. I spent a long time poring through books for inspiration and sketching ideas
for my puppet. The most important part of a marionette is, obviously, the head; it has to be able to convey some sort of expression so I modelled the features of mine to be powerful, imperious and rather severe. When I painted the finished, papier måché head, I paid particular attention to the eyes, which I wanted to blaze, and it was while I was applying the finishing touches that it occurred me that my puppet’s features bore a striking similarity to those of Miss Jacob. Perhaps, subconsciously, she had been my inspiration. For my puppet’s head-dress and flowing robes I’d collected a selection of pieces of transparent fabrics in appropriate, fiery colours and to achieve a realistic effect of fire I was going to cut out flame-like shapes from sheets of red and orange acetate. With so much time to devote to my efforts, I was confident that I’d achieve a good pass in the final exam.
When I went for my first lesson at the art school I had the idea that I’d be joining the other students; instead, I was shown into a small side room by a rather impatient tutor who gave me a perfunctory demonstration on how to draw from life using negative as well as positive shapes. He then disappeared and I was left alone for the next couple of hours. My mother had acquired a second-hand duffle coat which, she assured me, was what every art student wore. It had about as much fashion appeal as a horse blanket and I hated it. When I went into the cloakroom to retrieve it after my lesson, I overheard two girls talking about it.
‘Who on earth wears a duffle coat these days?’ asked one.
‘I certainly don’t know anyone who does,’ replied the other.
I stuffed the detested coat into my bag, resolving never to wear it again. Outside the main building, on the wall by the pavement, was a display cabinet featuring the work of some of the fashion students. I found their drawings even more interesting than the work of the other students on display inside and wondered, wistfully, if the day would come when my own drawings would be exhibited.
Kenneth had left the Grammar School to begin a course at a college in Coventry but if I’d imagined that, at last, I was going to be free of him I was mistaken: he hitchhiked home on the Friday evening and was on my doorstep the next morning. This routine continued well into the winter months and even when the country was brought to a standstill by a bout of severe weather, somehow he managed to make his way back to Falmouth. Lately, I’d noticed that he seemed to be paying a great deal of attention to Jean and this disturbed me greatly because I knew that if my mother had the slightest suspicion that he was taking an unnatural interest in her, all hell would be let loose and she would make the most dreadful accusations. These concerns prompted me to sever the relationship as quickly as possible so, one Saturday afternoon as Kenneth and I were sitting on a pavement bench, I took the bull by the horns and told him that I didn’t want to have anything more to do with him. I was totally unprepared for his reaction. He said nothing then, suddenly, he threw his head on to my lap and with great, choking sobs began to weep. I was horrified. I’d never imagined that he was capable of making such an exhibition of himself. When a passing motorist pulled up to ask if anything was the matter and I had to reassure him that everything was all right, I could have died of shame and embarrassment. I feared that, at any moment, someone might walk past us and so, in desperation, I told Kenneth that I hadn’t really meant what I’d said. Instantly, he stopped howling, stood up and carried on in his usual, cheerful manner as though nothing had happened.
The incident had embarrassed me so much that the following Saturday morning when he knocked on our door I told him I didn’t want to see him, turned my back on him and went upstairs to my room, shutting the door behind me. At this, he promptly sat down on our stairs and began to weep and my mother, who was doing the housework at the time, was obliged to vacuum around him.
‘For goodness’ sake get rid of that bloody boy!’ she hissed from the landing and so, once again, I had no alternative but to tell Kenneth that I hadn’t meant what I’d said.
This state of affairs could have gone on indefinitely had his college work not begun to suffer as a result of his weekend trips from Coventry to Falmouth, forcing his parents to forbid him from coming home. Even so, I was not to be free of him and soon found myself receiving letters. Lately, I’d discovered that my mother had been intercepting and opening all my correspondence and although I was beside myself with fury and outrage, I didn’t have the courage to confront her about it. There was a prurient side to Kenneth’s nature and I was terrified that she might get hold of one of his letters. One day, my worst fears were realised when I spotted an envelope with his handwriting on it protruding from the pocket of her apron. Panic stricken, I ran to Jean to beg her to try to retrieve it while I set up a distraction. The ploy worked, thanks to my sister’s nimble fingers, and it was just as well that the operation was successful because the contents of the letter, had she read them, would have enraged her to the point of apoplexy.

In the spring, Ethel invited me to spend a few days in London with her and Harry and I was so excited at the prospect that I could hardly contain myself. When I boarded the Paddington train at Truro I was wearing the smart new coat, made from a soft wool in a flattering shade of red, that I’d been given for Christmas. It was a far cry from the school uniform that I’d been forced to wear on my last, unaccompanied railway journey and I felt very grown-up and sophisticated. The train was quite crowded but when we reached Plymouth all the other passengers in my compartment disembarked. While we were waiting for the dining carriages to be attatched, I was reminded of a family journey by rail from London to Falmouth made some years ago when Jean and I had been little girls. In the days of steam, the big locomotives pulling the trains from Paddington to Penzance were replaced with smaller ones when the dining cars were detatched at Plymouth. The operation took about twenty minutes and so passsengers often used to take advantage of the wait by getting out to stretch their legs. On this occasion, our parents went off to get a cup of tea leaving us alone in the compartment but with the assurance that they’d be back long before the train was ready to leave the station. However, during the process of exchanging engines, the carriages started to move and Jean and I were convinced that the train was going and we’d been abandoned to some unknown fate. We stared at each other in horror, not knowing what to do. Jean burst into tears and my panic was so great that I overcame my fear of adults to call out of the window to ask a passer-by if the train was leaving.
My reminiscences were interrupted when a noisy group of servicemen entered my compartment followed, a few moments later, by a man in a business suit who sat down next to me. We left Plymouth and some time later, as we were speeding towards Taunton, he stood up to reach for his briefcase in the overhead compartment. I assumed he was getting ready to disembark at the next station but, after removing a magazine, he replaced the briefcase and sat down again. For half an hour or so it remained unopened on his lap then, out of the corner of my eye, I saw him remove a pen from his pocket. A few minutes later, I became aware that it had gone very quiet in our compartment and, glancing sideways, I saw that the man had opened his magazine, which featured explicit photographs of naked women, and was meticulously circling their nipples with a red, ball-point pen as he turned each page.
‘Are you going all the way to Paddington?’ he suddenly asked, startling me so much that I jumped. I nodded and turned away, hastily. A few seconds later, he began to shift about and I realised that he was edging his way towards me; the next moment, I felt his hand brush against my thigh. At this, one of the servicemen sitting opposite me stood up, crossed over and, with great deliberation, sat down between me and the man. I smiled at him with gratitude and when we reached Paddington, he and his companions escorted me from the train, to the astonishment of Ethel who was waiting to meet me. What had occurred was to be by no means my only unpleasant railway encounter: during my student years I travelled a great deal by train and I discovered that it is a form of transport which has an irresistible attraction for men with unusual sexual tendencies. Fortunately, I learned how to deal with them.
Harry was the caretaker of the large block of flats where he and Ethel lived in a pleasant part of Islington, not far from Sadler’s Wells Theatre. They were Londoners born and bred and were very proud of their city. They showed me to all the famous places - the Tower of London, Hyde Park, Buckingham Palace and so on and Ethel took me to Madame Tussaud’s and, best of all, the London Planetarium which thrilled me beyond words. One evening, as a surprise, we went to Covent Garden to see a gala ballet performance and I couldn’t believe that I was actually seeing, with my very own eyes, famous dancers whom I’d only ever seen before on television or in photographs. The gala included as its highlight a performance by a legendary dancer called Antonio who gave a wonderfully exciting display of a fusion of ballet and flamenco to the music of Ravel’s Bolero . I was so thrilled by everything that I’d seen in London that, when I returned home, I thought Falmouth the dullest place in the world.

One day, at school, the fire alarm sounded and in accordance with the drill which had been practised several times, all the girls filed out in an orderly manner. On these occasions I always stayed behind to give Jenny a hand and so we were accustomed to being the last ones to leave the building. This time, however, as we stepped outside we were greatly surprised to see a fire appliance parked there. We asked the firemen if the school was on fire but they laughed and told us that they were there as part of the drill. Some of the men were young and very handsome and we spent several enjoyable minutes chatting and flirting with them. A day or so later a girl came into the art room where I was working to tell me that Miss Jacob wanted to see me in her study. Quaking in my shoes, wondering what it was that I’d done, I knocked on her door, timidly. To my infinite relief she was smiling when I entered. She told me that the firemen who’d attended the drill had been very impressed because I’d stayed behind to help my friend, not knowing whether or not there was a fire, and that I’d been commended for bravery by the Fire Service. I could barely suppress a smile because no one knew better than I what a coward I was! I was flattered by the praise but, at the same time, slightly offended: fire or no fire, did they really believe I’d have left my friend to fend for herself?
Towards the end of my last term at the High School we had an open day to which parents, families and friends of the pupils were invited. My mother insisted on being shown around the school, even though she’d inspected it thoroughly on several previous occasions, and I had no choice but to trail around after her feeling very self-conscious and embarrassed by the fact that she was wearing what she referred to as her ‘costume’, even though it was a warm, summer’s day, with the rubber girdle underneath. As we came out of the main building into the sunshine I saw Jenny sitting on a low wall surrounded by a large group of girls from our class. She was laughing and chatting happily and didn’t notice us as we passed or hear my mother call out ‘Hello Jenny!’
On the way home, my mother was very quiet and from her grim, tight-lipped expression I could tell that some kind of trouble was brewing. I never fully understood what happened afterwards because I wasn’t told but I believe my mother wrote Jenny a letter expressing her disgust that she’d been deliberately ignored by her at the open day. But I knew perfectly well that it hadn’t been the fact that she thought she’d been snubbed which prompted her to remonstrate in this manner: she’d been motivated by sheer jealousy. The huge popularity which Jenny enjoyed, plus her irrepressible happiness, her vitality and exuberant good nature had been plain to see and my mother hadn’t liked it. My father was appalled by what she’d done and for the first time that I could recall, he confronted her.
‘That poor, crippled girl! ‘ he said. ‘That poor, courageous, crippled girl! How could you?’
This time, my mother evidently realised she’d gone too far because she wrote another letter to Jenny to apologise. Her suspicious, jealous nature invariably led to some kind of unpleasantness, usually in the form of unfounded accusations. For example, she was in the habit of hiding money in food packets, such as custard powder, which she’d then replace on the shelf. When the contents of the packets were used up, she’d throw them away, together with the money, and later, when she found that the hidden notes had disappeared, she’d accuse someone - usually a particular friend of my sister who happened to live in a council house and couldn’t, therefore, be considered trustworthy - of having stolen it. It was a wonder that Jean and I had any friends at all.

At the end of term assembly on my last day at the High School most of the girls who were leaving cried. I regarded them somewhat contemptuously, feeling quite unmoved by the occasion. It wasn’t until some time later that I realised just how much my life had been influenced by the happy years I’d spent there: the school had been the one, cohesive force in my childhood, giving me not only the privilege of a first class education but also the security and stability I’d never had at home. Now that I was no longer part of that sheltered and untroubled environment, I suddenly felt afraid.

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