Free No Talking after Lights by Angela Lambert Page A

Madeleine: ‘… so then this girl, she’s an orphan you see - I think that’s it - yes, and she’s fallen on hard times and she has to go and be a typist because she hasn’t got any money and she’s so ashamed she changes her name. That’s so no-one will know it’s her. But the boss’s son - he’s a lord really, only his father’s making him start at the bottom - well, he keeps noticing her ‘cos she’s so pretty and sad and everything, and …’
    The other two listened bright-eyed, eating mechanically.
    That’s not how you told it to me, Charmie,’ interrupted Sheila. ‘You said it was her who was the duke’s daughter, only…’
    â€˜Oh, shut up, who cares anyway, it’s my story.
You
didn’t see the film. Quick, take my fish, I don’t want it.’
    I don’t want it either, thought Sheila, crumbling the shiny yellow flakes on her plate. She turned them over so that the black skin was on top.
    â€˜Pass your plates along, everybody!’ commanded Hermione, the senior at the head of the table.
    â€˜Whose is this? Who hasn’t eaten their fish?’
    â€˜Please, Hermione, Sheila hates fish. Do let her off,’ said Charmian.
    â€˜Sheila Dunsford-Smith, is this your plate?’
    â€˜Yes, Hermione.’
    â€˜Well, sit here and eat it or you won’t have any pudding.’
    Torn between the desire to obey Hermione, thus earning her fleeting approval, and her disgust at the sight of the mangled fish, Sheila answered, ‘But I don’t want pudding.’
    â€˜That’s got nothing to do with it. You know the rules.You can ask for a small portion, but you must eat what’s on your plate.’
    Conscious of having been scrupulously fair, Hermione turned back to her neighbour.
    Long after the others had scattered for the last forty minutes of their day, Sheila sat over her congealing plateful. At last she was released by Diana Monk, who glanced into the dining-room and was moved to pity by her slumped shoulders and trapped expression. Five minutes later, enclosed within the warm red brick walls of the kitchen garden, Sheila knelt by their plot, turning the earth with a fork as listlessly as she had picked at the fish.
    â€˜Sheil! Sheeeeei-la!’ she heard, and saw Charmie up by Pets, beckoning to her urgently. ‘Quick! Only ten minutes left and Mick’s just started counting. Here.’ As Sheila joined her she smiled radiantly and said, ‘Gosh, you were super to get me out of that stinky fish!’ Together they raced off to crouch behind the garden shed, arms round each other’s shoulders, panting and flushed under the rose-pink evening sky.
    The last rays of the sun soaked into the plump rectangular cushions on the bay-window-seat. The Head and her Deputy sat in their usual armchairs over a pot of weak coffee, the wireless tuned to the Third Programme.
    â€˜You were right about Sylvia Parry,’ said the Head. ‘There is something threatening there. No wonder she frightens the girls. That little one - third-former, Katherine —’
    â€˜Wilson?’
    â€˜Yes, little Katherine Wilson, she’d been sent out to stand in the corridor yesterday. I happened to come across her. She was petrified. Shaking like a leaf. She isn’t yet ten. I can’t employ a woman who terrorizessmall children. Why is she doing it? Frightening little girls … is the woman right in the head?’
    â€˜She’s responsible for more order marks than any other member of staff,’ said Miss Roberts. ‘And she and the unfortunate Diana Monk are up to something.’
    â€˜Well, perhaps. You could be right, though personally I doubt it. In any case one couldn’t dismiss her for that. They’d both deny it.’
    â€˜But one’s never very happy about it,’ said Miss Roberts vehemently.
    The Deputy Head’s unmarried state resulted from the