Free One Young Fool in Dorset by Victoria Twead Page B

up straight, it’s no good slouching, I’ll still know if your
skirt is too short.”
    “But Matron, I’ve got big knees...”
    Reluctantly, Corkscrew (as we called Cindy on
account of her curly hair) straightened up. Along came Matron with
her ruler, measuring the distance between hemline and floor. Snort
passed, and I, too, passed easily as my mother belonged to the
buy-it-much-too-big-she’ll-grow-into-it-eventually school of
thought. My hemline was probably a good two inches below the
knee, not above.
    Corkscrew’s hemline failed, being a racy three and a
half inches above the knee. Corky was told to wear her PE culottes
and her mother was summoned and ordered to buy a new dress.
    There was still another job to do before
breakfast.
    “Don’t forget to strip your beds, gels!” Matron
called.
    Even now, I’m usually one of those sleepers who
barely disturbs the bed. I’m not the type who kicks off the
bedclothes or tosses and turns during the night. So I deeply
resented the fact that we had to completely strip our beds every
morning. Just pulling the covers back to let the bed air should be
enough, surely?
    7.30 Breakfast bell.
    Now it was time to line up outside the dining hall,
juniors on one side, seniors on the other. As we filed in, Matron
dished out an orange tablet to each girl, a multi-vitamin, cod
liver oil concoction called Haliborange. My mother thought vitamin
supplements were a waste of time and money, so I was not given one.
I rarely suffer from colds or ill health now (touch wood) ,
so I wonder whether perhaps she was right.
    Mrs Driver and Matron sat at a separate table, and
we girls were seated in long rows. Brandy the Chihuahua roamed the
dining hall, looking for feet to hump. Then Mrs Driver or one of
the prefects would say Grace, always the same words:
    For what we are about to receive, may the Lord make
us truly thankful.
    Amen.
    Once, when my sister became a prefect and it was her
turn to say Grace at the midday meal, I couldn’t believe my ears.
We all put our hands together and bowed our heads, waiting for her
to speak.
    “God bless this bunch as they munch their lunch,”
she said.
    The dining hall gasped. Snort and I exchanged
glances, waiting for the fallout. Mrs Driver and Matron flicked
glances at her, but said nothing.
    Breakfast consisted of cornflakes, eggs and toast.
On Fridays there was steamed fish that made my stomach heave. In
the winter, we queued into the kitchen to receive a dollop of
porridge, which I loved.
    By eight o’clock, we were well into our breakfast.
Mrs Driver twiddled with the knob of the huge radio on the shelf
above her. First it crackled, the signal for us to fall silent.
Then, exactly on the hour, came the pips.
    This is the BBC World Service. Here is the news.
    Whatever the prime minister, Harold Wilson, said in
parliament, or the fact that the village of Milton Keynes was to be
developed and declared a ‘New Town’ passed over my head. Snort and
I were more interested to hear that police raided the home of
Rolling Stones musician Keith Richards, following a tip-off from
the News of the World , and charged him and Mick Jagger with
the possession of drugs.
    After breakfast, we raced up the stairs back to the
dorm. I’d tried to disguise the fact that I hadn’t stripped my bed
but somebody had been in while we’d been at breakfast and stripped
it completely. We then set about remaking our beds.
    If it was a Thursday, we had to take off the bottom
sheet and replace it with the top. Then we’d collect a clean sheet
from the laundry cupboard. Snort and I helped each other making our
beds, both hoping that there was a diamond shape in the centre of
the clean sheet when we unfolded it. If there was, that meant good
luck for the week.
    We made our beds with hospital corners, which would
be checked by Matron. Then we tidied our lockers, ran downstairs to
sort out our school satchels and were then ready to slip through
the woods, past the Biology pond,