War Orphans Read Online Free Page B

wait for her friend there.
    Silence reigned in the big square room, the smell of ink and chalk hanging in the air. The classroom was full of light. One wall was occupied by a series of tall windows. Dominating therear wall was a map of the world, upon which the countries belonging to the British Empire were shaded in red: Canada, Australia, New Zealand, India, Africa and many more. The map was surrounded by pictures painted by the children and diagrams of fractions, shapes and the whole sequence of times tables, all the way from two to the twelve times table. A huge radiator occupied the wall nearest the door, and the blackboard the other wall behind Sally’s desk.
    Sally squeezed herself into the space beside Joanna, vaguely aware that this might have been her desk when she was a pupil here.
    ‘Why are you crying, Joanna?’ She didn’t repeat what Susan had told her but preferred to hear it from Joanna herself.
    Joanna kept her face hidden. She liked Miss Hadley a lot but even her soft words failed to heal the hurt in her heart.
    Sally had always considered Joanna a smart girl and on the whole well cared for, but that was before her mother had died and her father remarried.
    Just of late her hair, her clothes and the spark she’d seen in her eyes seemed to have faded. She’d also noticed she was usually the last to leave the classroom, and the last to leave the playground at four o’clock when the children swarmed like bees towards the school gate and home.
    ‘That’s a girl who doesn’t want to go home,’ she’d once remarked to Miss Burton, the headmistress.
    Miss Burton was a solid figure with a gentle face framed by cotton fine grey hair. A misty look came to her eyes. ‘There are many children with a less than ideal home, Miss Hadley,’ she said. ‘I’ve learned over the years that it’s best to keep focused on one’s vocation. It’s difficult not to get emotionally involved, but one has to try.’
    Sally stroked the girl’s hair back from her eyes, aware that her attention was above and beyond the call of her profession.
    ‘Is it really so bad?’ she asked gently.
    Joanna came out from behind her hands, sniffed and nodded.
    Sally felt her heart lurch at the look on the little girl’s face. Joanna had seemed markedly different when she returned to school on Monday. Perhaps it was time to have a talk with her parents, even though Miss Burton had warned against that too.
    ‘I’m warning you. They won’t thank you for it.’
    Sally pushed Miss Burton’s warning to the back of her mind.
    ‘Tell you what,’ she said, placing an arm around Joanna’s shoulders. ‘How about I walk home with you and you tell me exactly what the matter is.’
    Joanna nodded. Her foremost hope was that Miss Hadley could persuade her stepmother to get Lottie back. If she could do that she didn’t care about anything else.
    ‘Did you bring a coat today?’
    Joanna shook her head. The cardigan she was wearing had holes in the elbows and was hand knitted from thin wool. Her dress was of cotton and faded from many washes. Sally wondered whether she actually owned a coat.
    ‘Never mind.’ Sally went to her desk to pack the last of the children’s exercise books into her attaché case. She buttoned her jacket, part of a teal-coloured costume that was her daily uniform. ‘The rain’s stopped now. Come on. Let’s go.’
    She held out her hand. The little girl took it pensively, her big blue eyes still moist but her sobs less than they were.
    Together the two of them crossed the empty playground. Joanna looked towards the school gate to see if Susan had waited for her. If she’d been alone she would have been disappointed to see that Susan had not waited. Miss Hadley’s presence helped her cope with that too.
    ‘Feeling better now?’
    Joanna shook her head.
    ‘Has someone been nasty to you?’
    Joanna bit her bottom lip. Should she tell her about her stepmother?
    Sally had enough experience to sense that Joanna was