Free 04 Village Teacher by Jack Sheffield Page A

the elbows of my sports jacket.
    ‘Pity you didn’t let me smarten you up … new Eighties spectacles, new suit.’
    ‘I never was a knight in armour, Laura … just a village teacher.’
    The soft breeze lifted a few strands of her long brown hair and she flicked them behind her ears in the same way as Beth. ‘I thought you said you weren’t the marrying kind.’
    There was a slam of a car bonnet in the distance. ‘You’ve got Desmond now, Laura.’
    ‘I know,’ she said softly.
    ‘He’ll give you whatever you want.’
    ‘Will he?’ There was a hint of sadness in her green eyes.
    ‘I don’t understand.’
    She smiled and replaced my spectacles. ‘You never did, Jack … That’s part of your charm.’
    Her high-heeled boots crunched on the gravel as she walked quickly back to the house. I leant back on the fence and glanced up at the house. A still figure was looking down at me from Beth’s bedroom window. It was Diane.
    When Desmond and Laura roared off back to London, she gave a fleeting wave but didn’t look back. That evening Diane and Beth laid out a cold supper buffet of fresh-baked bread, ham, pickles, beetroot, carrots, a potato salad and a magnificent Victoria sponge with butter icing. The conversation inevitably returned to possible school closures and wedding plans.
    ‘I think you’re wise to wait,’ said Diane; ‘so much is uncertain at present.’
    That night, when I finally turned out the light and lay back on my pillow, I wondered if Diane Henderson had ever compared Beth and Laura to Austen’s contrasting sisters in
Sense and Sensibility
– the cool, sensible Elinor and the passionate, idealistic Marianne. It wasn’t difficult to work out which was which.
    On Monday morning, we said our goodbyes and it was time to head home. The miles rolled by and, finally, in the far distance, the bulk of the North Yorkshire moors lay heavy on the horizon. The purple swathes of heather had long gone now, replaced by a golden haze as the bracken turned. The season had changed and I was back in God’s Own Country. It was good to be home.
    That night, after saying goodnight to Beth outside her cottage in Morton, I sat by a log fire in Bilbo Cottage and reflected on the weekend and the fate of two sisters. While I had played a part in their destiny, deep down I knew our journey had just begun.
    We had walked in Jane Austen’s footsteps … but the final chapter was still a long way off.

Chapter Five
    The Ashes of Archibald Pike
    Miss Barrington-Huntley, chair of the Education Committee, will be our official guest for the opening of the school extension on Saturday, 8 November. Miss Evans has offered to prepare a time capsule to be inserted in the new wall. The school choir will be singing at the Remembrance Day service at St Mary’s Church on Sunday, 9 November
.
    Extract from the Ragley School Logbook:
Thursday, 6 November 1980
    ‘LET’S HAVE A time capsule!’ exclaimed Anne.
    It was four o’clock on Thursday, 6 November, and we were enjoying a welcome cup of tea in the staff-room prior to our impromptu staff meeting to discuss the official opening of the school extension.
    Jo looked up from the article ‘Domestic science for infants’ in her
Child Education
magazine. ‘Did you say
time capsule
?’
    ‘Yes,’ said Anne. ‘The builder said it’s all the rage and he’s left a space in the cavity wall behind where the official plaque is to be mounted.’
    Vera sipped her tea thoughtfully. ‘What a good idea,’ she said. ‘It could be a record of the life of Ragley School.’
    ‘That’s right, Vera,’ agreed Sally. ‘We could get the children involved.’
    ‘With writing and drawings,’ added Jo, warming to the idea.
    ‘And a school photograph,’ said Vera.
    ‘Then let Miss You-Know-Who put it in the cavity space at the opening ceremony,’ said Anne, ‘and my John can screw the plaque on the wall.’
    Everyone seemed to be talking at once. ‘Hang on a minute,’ I asked,