A Year in a Golden Cage - Chapter One
Draft Aug 2006
On the third day there was a party. The invitation was informal and welcoming, especially after the pressure of meetings and the business of finding out where things were. Jill found the invitation in their pigeonhole, their cassier she was now learning to call it.
She stood in the late summer sunshine, comfortable in t-shirt and shorts. She had never known a term that started like this before, no kids to be seen and time to pass the time.
“Oh, hi. You must be Jill – I’m Bunnie, in Paul’s department.” The younger woman held out a hand. “Bunnie and Mike Collins, three small kids, apartment over there.” Bunnie pointed somewhere out of the building then she looked at the card. “Oh, Duncan. He does like to meet the newcomers.”
“Where does he live?”
“Next building, top floor, right at the end.”
Once you got into the building and reached the top floor it was difficult not to find the party. There were two ways in, one via a fire escape where people leaned with their drinks over a handrail and watched others arriving. The kitchen had been turned into a bar and a tall, thickset man welcomed them. He was wearing a floral apron over beach shorts.
“Hello there, I’m Donald. He held both hands up, open wide as if to say what’s mine is yours.
“What would you like?”
“G and T.”
“A beer please.”
He pointed Paul in the direction of a stack of cans then lifted a bottle of gin from the middle of the worktop and found a glass. He concentrated hard as he poured the drink and made much of handing it to Jill.
“Not too strong I hope.” She smiled.
“I’ll manage.” They laughed and Paul returned.
“This is nice.” He looked around. “Do you have parties like this every week?”
“At least twice.” They laughed again. He almost meant it.
“What about the kids?”
“All noise mostly. No idea how to party. We ought to run classes for them, show how it should be done.”
People were still arriving. The Coopers had started to move away when a slightly built woman squeezed past into the kitchen area; Jill noticed something proprietorial about the way she stood there amongst the drinks.
“Hi. Yolande Clements.” She held out a hand to Paul. “Roy’s back in the apartment, settling the girls. He’ll try and put in an appearance later.”
“Paul and Jill Cooper.” Jill too was allowed to shake hands.
“Let me see that Donald’s organised then I’ll come talk to you.”
A tall American lady smiled a welcome. Paul had sat near her at a meeting the day before. He had been aware of her clear, careful French and the way other teachers had listened to her. This evening she was almost wearing a party frock and you would never, he had already decided, you would never refer to her simply as a woman. This was a lady.
“Hello again. My wife, Jill. Jill this is Mary who took care of me yesterday.”
“Hi Jill. You two getting settled?”
“Sort of. Really waiting for the kids to arrive.”
“Don’t you worry about the kids – they’ll arrive soon enough.” She looked at Jill’s small glass which was still half full, then at Paul’s empty hand. “Come on, I’ll get you another beer.”
The room filled and the Coopers spent much of the time in separate conversations, conversations about previous jobs, about holidays, about visits home – most of the staff here were from the UK, and gossip, former colleagues who had walked out or just moved on. For a while there was some fitful dancing. Donald tried to get as many of the women as he could to dance but found only Yolande was sufficiently bothered to stay on her feet. Then a group of them had made their way out onto the balcony from where they had watched the last of the light on the lake and the darkning of the French mountains across the water. Back inside there were their new friends and their easy talk.
Later they stepped into Donald’s hallway with another English couple, Andy and Penny Johnson. They had looked for Donald to say goodbye but he was not to be found. Behind them the sounds of conversation continued and, for a moment it seemed very quiet where they were standing. Andy stepped forward to pull open the outer door of the apartment which led out into the empty boarding house. Paul followed. To the left of them somewhere there was the beginnings of a sound, the creak of some furniture and then two voices screamed out on the brink of some discovery. For a fraction of a second Paul thought their attention was being drawn to this excitement and he pushed the open door on their left and took one set into the room.
They had found Donald. There was no doubt it was their host – the Scots voice and the light he had left on saw to that. From what he could see of the woman beneath him, it was the slight and lithe Yolande. It was the one failure of politeness that evening for neither performer took the trouble to acknowledge their audience. Paul turned away from the doorway and left Donald to pump away. Behind the others he pulled the door to before they all folded with laughter.
Penny Johnson spoke first.
“Don’t think this is compulsory at staff parties, it’s just Donald being his exuberant self.”
“Didn’t Yo, er Yolande say her husband was hoping to get along?”
“Just words, Paul, just words for the form of the thing. It’s just their way.” Andy shrugged his shoulders. “Not most people’s.”
They had reached the outer door of the building now and turned to go their separate ways. Penny spoke again.
“Donald’s got a good heart so people don’t condemn him. If it wasn’t him, it’d be someone else. That’s how folk have to be around here. If it doesn’t affect you, leave well alone.” Paul thought back to the pleasure he had just touched against and tried to remember the name of the woman’s husband. Some sort of understanding he supposed but he found it hard to appreciate. Penny continued. “They’re just like a lot of the kids really; never seem to get jealous over their private lives.”
“Hope the kids keep their lives more private than those two.”
There was more laughter and the two couples parted and went their separate ways.
Paul had seen the place once, when he had flown out for the interview. They had heard of the school but did not really know much about it until he had returned with an offer of a job. By the time the two of them had driven out from England at the end of August, Jill had agreed to take on a girls’ boarding house. They were going to live in an apartment there anyway.
After breakfast on the first morning, Liz the nurse had taken Jill over to the sanatorium. They sat in a large room with cupboards and a chest of drawers, Jill in a reclining chair and Liz folded neatly onto an office chair behind her desk.
“Not meant to be formal, it’s just easier like this.”
“That’s ok.” It was all so strange and yet all right. None of the kids had returned and the quiet of the place was disturbing somehow; Jill remembered visiting an abandoned zoo. There was much to find out.
“Looks really quiet now, but you wait till classes start, not when they first get back. No, once classes start they’ll all be over here first thing after breakfast with colds and headaches, asking for notes.”
“Don’t they call you out before then, during the night if they’re really ill.”
“No. Illness rarely bothers them at night. It’s first thing in the morning if they’ve forgotten homework or want a pill.”
“A pill? Not the morning after pill?”
“Wish it was the morning after pill.”
This was all rather new. Girls away from home, was that the problem? She thought of her own grown-up daughter, back in England.
“Why? Do they come in if they’ve slipped up?” Liz shook her head.
“No. that’s the problem. It’s usually me – I notice them putting on weight, or being sick. Too late then, so it’s off home for some family reason. Parents don’t say much. All dealt with very quietly.”
“And the school? Don’t they worry about that sort of thing?”
“They don’t like it, but they prefer not to make a song and dance about it, especially with this lot – there’s not much you can do about it – they’ve got to have some freedom and they’re buggers for getting their own way.”
Jill was still surprised by the nurse’s matter of fact approach.
“Doesn’t anybody care about what they get up to?”
Liz turned to a chair to one side and handed over a glossy magazine.
“Most of them read this – some try to live like it. Celebrity, like a drug for some of them. Anyway, you think the kids don’t care – you wait until you see some of the staff in action.”
She flicked the magazine away, back onto the pile.
“Keeps them quiet when they’re waiting to see me. Horrible rubbish, but they won’t read much else.”
They had left the flat in Moscow in a hurry. Her father had driven them to the airport and had taken them all the way to the check-in. She remembered wondering why he had kissed only her goodbye. “See you Princess.” He had smiled then turned to her mother. “I’ll come out and see her as soon as I can. I’ll call sometime next week.” It was later, years later when her mother really made an effort to explain but, for the time being, she had been content with her mother’s presence and company.
It had been good fun at first, a winter holiday in the sun which had greeted them from over the sea the first morning, and there had been games to play on the beach while her mother talked to her young aunt. It had been strange, this sudden warmth after the settled winter life in the Russian capital with its routine of kindergarten and the homes of friends. Now she remembered what must have been loneliness, no babushka around the corner where the nanny, a large country girl, used to take her. The nanny had not come with them and, in any case it was her young aunt, Sophie, who had taken her out and about for the last two weeks in Moscow. For part of that time both her parents had been away and she had wondered where they had gone. When she had asked Sophie she had been told that they would explain when they returned but they had not done so and the question no longer troubled her once they had returned.
It must have been in the second week when her father came back. No one had told her that he was coming and he appeared suddenly early one evening just as they were starting dinner. He held a small case and a heavy winter coat was draped over his arm. The maid took the coat and Vicky remembered her father said something to her which she could not understand. Then he turned to her and there was the touch of his stubble. At the other end of the table her mother ignored him. Then her aunt took her out of the room and it was bedtime. “Mummy will come to say goodnight as soon as she can.”
Next morning, her mother stayed behind in the apartment while her aunt took her out to look at the sea. She had spent time at the seaside before, but not as an escape from winter, and, even after a few days, she had still to acclimatise herself to this sudden spring and the lightness of the sea, charging up and down the beach, liquid and free. A car door slammed and there was her mother waving frantically from the road at the top of the beach. She felt her aunt’s hand tighten and she was pulled away from the water. Back at the apartment the maid had packed their cases and her father was watching a driver load another black car. Her mother looked up suddenly as she entered her bedroom. “Oh there you are Vicky. Daddy’s come to take us back to Moscow.” She saw for a moment the look on the child’s face. “ And we’ve arranged a treat for you. We are going to spend a few days in Switzerland on the way home. Daddy’s got to do some business there and you’ll love it.”
The plane turned above a dirty landscape, a piebald land, and a long, grey lake slid into view. “Just down there Vicky, can you see that town and those dark trees?” Aunt Sophie pointed at the window with a folded arm. That’s where they spend the summer – in the winter they go up to the mountains where there’s real snow. That’s where they go skiing. That’s where we’re going.” The little girl looked over her aunt’s shoulder. Her mother was looking intently out of the window and her father was gathering together his paperwork which was piled on the seat between them. She looked out again at the lake which was trying to hide beneath the clouds. An air hostess walked past and soon they were bumping along the runway at Geneva.
“Look, Vicky. That little plane over there. Isn’t it gorgeous.” Through the windscreen of the airport limousine they could see the tiny jet parked ahead of them. The child turned to her mother who was looking out to one side. In the front her father directed the driver.
“We’ll have the plane all to ourselves, just the four of us.”
The little girl allowed the hostess to take her on board. There were just a few comfortable-looking seats. On one there was a large teddy bear. The woman said something and smiled. Vicky looked around – her aunt had one foot on the bottom step of the aircraft. She followed up the aisle, looked over her shoulder again for her aunt, squeezed past the teddy bear and sat down. Outside her father was facing her mother who was pointing at something. She was unsure just what it was then realised that her mother was pointing at the little set of steps which she could not quite see through the window. Daddy was going to make them late again. She pushed the bear back in his seat and tried to get past her aunt who took her hand.
“Where are you going little one?”
“I’m going to tell Daddy to hurry up. We’re late.”
“No, you come and sit down with me and Teddy. Let’s make him put on his seat belt. By the time Teddy had been made to sit still and had allowed Vicky to tighten his belt the girl’s mother had joined them. There was the click of a door closing and a buzzing in her ears. Her mother sat down across the aisle and she heard her aunt settle behind. From the tarmac her father waved and the aircraft nudged forwards.
“Oh, Daddy’s going to miss the plane.” Her father was standing to one side now. He noticed her face in the window and waved when he realised that she was looking in his direction. “Don’t worry darling, he’ll come and see you soon.” Her aunt was speaking through the space between her and the teddy. Across the aisle her mother looked straight ahead. “Oh Mummy, you can’t see Daddy from there.” She looked around again and he had gone.
Soon the blotchy land below gave way to a continuous blanket of snow. It was not like the snow back home, piles of it everywhere, dark and menacing. This snow lay folded around a magic landscape. It lay under a piercing blue sky and hurt the eyes. Aunt Sophie produce a pair of sunglasses for Vicky and another for the bear which she gave to Vicky to put on. More comfortable now, the girl and her aunt looked down on the peaks over towards the horizon and the slopes which dazzled them with midday light. Below them, below the peaks, the snow lay too in the valleys where little dark roads led from one village to another.
“Vicky.” Her mother was smiling again now. ”There are boys and girls from all over the world here. Just think what it would be like to come to school here.” For a moment her daughter thought about school and the other children back in Moscow. Her mother was thinking of the converted building and the noise and the dirt.
The hostess appeared beside them from her cabin at the back of the plane, sat down in front of them and fastened her seat belt. She spoke in Russian and told them to look out of the right of the plane. Vicky leaned over towards her mother. “That’s Altenberg, the village I think. Look, it’s just like a picture book, up above the town. Can you see that Vicky, look, it’s an ice rink. And see, over the other side you can see the boys and girls skiing.” Wherever she looked Vicky seemed to notice shapes peppered in lines down the mountainsides.
“Look Vicky, just look at all those people on holiday, enjoying themselves.” This time it was her mother who was pointing things out to her. She seemed more excited now, as if she were going off on holiday. Below them there were trails everywhere. Vicky felt her mother’s hand tighten; “Can you see those little coloured flags down there, look just by that cabin, they’re having a race.” The woman remembered the purpose of her visit. “Wouldn’t it be fun to learn to ski like that with the boys and girls in your school.” Vicky looked again at the slopes. They were close enough now to see individuals and their colour and movement. As they came in to land, she sensed the fun that came from this landscape and the movement across it.
From the air-strip they were driven along a narrow road that looked as though it was trying to burrow its way through the tall dark houses of a village. At the edge of the village the snow was piled deep on each side of the road but, in the village itself, the shops looked as if they had just been set down neatly on a freshly cleared stretch of ground. Vicky noticed a dairy with its big picture of a cow. People here seemed to be dressed in cheerful, bright colours, like the characters in some of her storybooks. Her father had brought some home with him once after a long spell away. She watched a woman, dressed much like her own mother, pulling a sledge along the pavement with two girls of her own age sitting back and calling out.
The driver paused, then swung them to one side and onto a bigger road. There was a rush of small fields and farm buildings and then they were negotiating the town. They turned down a side street alongside a grey river that splashed white as it poured itself over the rocks towards the bottom end of the town, like the output from a large washing machine. The car turned sharply upwards and to the right. The driver swung them over to the left and they came to a halt outside a large chalet. They got out and the driver swept on up the driveway to find somewhere to park. A group of children stumbled quickly along the path to one side and paused to look at Vicky. One of them, a year or two older, examined Vicky more closely, then rushed after the others. She heard the girl shout out and one of her companions, a little boy, stopped to hold open the door of the main building. She could not understand a word but she felt drawn into this world of strange excitement.
She could understand what her parents said to one another, about the paying some money, about bedrooms and something about other children and their homes. Were they going to be pleasant companions? A man with a funny little beard, a lot shorter than her father, led them back into the snow and showed them the chalet next door. He said something to a woman who met them at the doorway, and walked away. The woman spoke to her mother and her aunt and for a moment she could see that they did not understand very well. What was the woman saying, something about classes only being in the morning up here, sports now, before tea? She peered between the adults, trying to look into small, bright classrooms. In one there was a doll left propped up on a desk and she tried to untangle her mother’s grip on her own small hand, but her mother was trying hard to listen to what the woman was saying and would not let go.
They climbed up three floors, up stone steps that went on forever. At the top she peered all the way down through steel railings and could hear the slap and scrape of another pair of feet that seemed to be following them. They stopped downstairs and Vicky could hear someone set off quietly along the carpet on the floor below. Her aunt called anxiously hurried back to her. “Come on my little one.” They walked along a plain corridor panelled in wood where someone had mounted children’s pictures on large sheets of brightly coloured backing paper and stepped into a bedroom.
There were six beds, two hand basins and two windows which looked out over a valley where lights twinkled in the last of the afternoon light. On each side of the valley, she could see the dark slopes of pine trees which blanketed the feet of the mountains. Away in the distance there were pinpricks of red light where a stream of cars lost themselves in the dusk. She thought of a Christmas card she had received. She had kept it by her bed long after Easter and had often looked at it, wondering who lived there. They had gone away for a long summer holiday that year, just her with her mother and her aunt, and when they returned she found that the maid had cleared the card away.
Her aunt called to her and her mother watched as she was shown the view. “Look at that, my darling. What a nice place to come to school.” Her mother said nothing and Vicky began to realise that her parents were going to leave her here. She looked around at the woman in the doorway who smiled back at her. Her mother said something which she could not understand and they walked back towards the stairs.
From below them came the sound of children’s voices and the shuffling and stamping of small feet. A door slammed and then the sounds of the voices reached up to them as a flood of small children poured itself into the bottom corridor. Halfway down the stairs they met these children who paused as they passed on the corners of the stairs and another woman’s voice called after them. Back on the ground floor they sat to one side in a dining room and the adults talked while the children they had just met made their way back down the stairs in ones and twos, came into the dining room and found their places.
When they had settled, the woman called one of the girls over. She was a couple of years older than Vicky. The woman spoke to her briefly and Vicky heard her use her name. The girl smiled and spoke to her in Russian. “Come and sit with us.” She got up and walked over towards the other table where two other girls were sitting. Before she sat down, Vicky looked around at her mother and her aunt. They were watching her. She turned and sat down with the other children.
It was a relief to get away from the adults and from their incomprehensible conversations. One of the other children spoke a little Russian so there was a conversation of sorts, punctuated by interruptions from the other children at the table whom Vicky could not understand. Anna, this new friend explained. “You’ll soon learn some French and then some English, then you will have no problems.” It was as easy as that. Vicky was not sure.
Later she went back with her mother and her aunt to the man with a beard who sat in a small office. While the adults talked Vicky found her way out to the corridor which was plain and dark, apart from black and white photos of children skiing. The skiers were frozen against the snow, leaning one way or another and rising and falling from the knees as the photographer tried to catch their movement. They wore helmets and, most of them, sun glasses so these shapes that a camera had caught looked like a sort of winter sports gibbet, with the bodies hung out as evidence that they had been dealt with, as if there were a list of things to be done to young people at this place.
Further along the corridor she could see the head of the stairway which had brought them up to these offices but she decided not to explore any further and returned towards the voices that she hear but not understand. The man stood up as she entered, smiled at her and executed a mock bow. He grinned and she understood that he was trying to play with her. She could not understand what he was saying to her mother and her aunt who made no attempt to explain. Warily she accepted his proffered hand. “We must go now Vicky.” Her mother took her hand and the little man followed them down the stairs. By the car he spoke again to her mother and waved to her.
On the way to the hotel she sat between her aunt and the window and watched the winter world slide past. Set up above the town there was a fairy castle – her aunt had pointed it out as the car zigzagged its way up the hill and they could see its pale turrets lit up against the darkness of the trees and the mountain. Inside, Vicky ignored the hotel’s spaciousness and kept close to the others. She was used to moving in and out of hotels and knew that her questions would have to keep until there was a meal to see to, or until one of the adults in her life came to say goodnight. At the door to their suite of rooms a maid greeted them and Vicky found herself sat down in front of a television screen on which cartoon figures chased one another around the screen. “We’re just going out for a little while Vicky, the maid will take care of you.”
The door clicked shut and the maid smiled then went into an adjoining room. She returned with a small tray on which Vicky could see bright drinks and some cakes and biscuits. The maid said something which she could not understand and Vicky shook her head. Over breakfast the next day her mother and her aunt explained that she would be coming to school at La Clementine after the Easter holidays.
©2009 Peter Inson
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