AFTER a short tea break, Hilda Annersley, who had been murmuring quietly to her partner, rose to her feet. The room fell quiet immediately, much to Len’s envy. She was a good disciplinarian herself, but she knew she lacked the sheer presence that was so much a part of the Head’s innate authority.

“Girls,”- Daisy and Stacie exchanged amused glances- “thanks to Daisy’s clarification of the situation, I believe we are now in a position to discuss possible solutions. Let us assume that Grainne decides to keep the child and bring it up. What options do we have in dealing with both? Remember Grainne must be able to combine motherhood with her school work, and we don’t want her social life to be ruined by this either. Any ideas to start us off with?” Hilda resumed her seat, and looked expectantly at them.

There was a blank silence, and Nell Wilson grinned openly.

“Come, girls, this won’t do,” she told them briskly. “You aren’t prefects being asked to decide on this year’s Sale, so there’s no excuse for this!”

There was a general laugh which eased the tension that had returned to the room with the end of the tea break. Then Len looked up.

“What about yourself, Auntie Nell?” she asked innocently, but with a twinkle.

“I did have one thought,” ‘Bill’ returned promptly, much to the disappointment of Len and Con. “Hilda, have you been in touch with Mrs O’Malley again this week?”

Everyone looked at Miss Annersley. “I have.” Her voice was icy, and the younger members of the gathering shivered. “Rosalie sent a cable to her after we had Daisy over. The reply came this morning.”

“Well?” asked Len eagerly.

“It wasn’t ‘well’ at all!” snapped Matey, who had been with Miss Annersley at the time. “It was very ill. The woman told us she washes her hands completely of Grainne, and that she was all ours. Or words to that effect. She said if we needed any money, to contact her bank, but otherwise not to bother her. Completely in character!”

“Poor Grainne!” The pitiful comment came from Felicity, and they turned to look at her guiltily. Most of them had forgotten she was even there. She gave a faint smile. “You needn’t worry, you know,” she remarked. “I’ll keep it to myself. We’ve always been told to keep anything we hear about school out of school to ourselves,” she reminded the Heads, who nodded in agreement.

“Poor Grainne indeed!” said Con, ignoring the latter part of her sister’s speech. “What about her dad, Auntie Hilda?”

“He doesn’t know she’s here.” The comment came from an unexpected source, and they all gaped at Stacie Benson, who flushed a little. “He doesn’t know she’s here,” she repeated. “That is, assuming that this Grainne *is* the daughter of Gerard O’Malley, who works in the Irish government?”

Too astonished to speak, Len nodded.

“I met him a couple of weeks ago in Oxford when I was at those conferences,” Dr Benson explained. “We got to chatting. He told me about his daughter, who was at a Convent School in Dublin, and I told him about here. Surely if he knew she was here, he’d have said something?”

“Why didn’t you tell us this before?” Matey demanded sternly, and Stacie wilted a little, before pulling herself together.

“I didn’t get back from Oxford until yesterday morning,” she reminded the older woman. “Even if I had been here, I probably wouldn’t have made the connection- it was only what Hilda said about her parents that reminded me. And the name!”

Miss Wilson looked at Stacie with interest. “Do you think he would help the child?” she asked abruptly.

Stacie shrugged. “I honestly couldn’t tell you. He didn’t say much about her. I got the impression that he cares for her, but because he spends so much time away from home, due to his job, he expects his wife or the school to see to her. I gathered as well that his marriage is hardly a satisfactory one, and from what you’ve said, it sounds like Mrs O’Malley is perfectly capable of not telling him about Grainne’s change of schools.”

“Perhaps she didn’t want to embarrass him, due to the nature of the situation,” Rosalie suggested charitably.

“Perhaps,” agreed Stacie. “I really couldn’t tell you one way or another.”

“More to the point, do you know how we could get in touch with him?” Matey wanted to know.

Stacie shook her head. “I’ve no idea. Through the Dail, I’d imagine. I know he was going off again somewhere, but I’ve no idea where. Would you like me to make enquiries?”

“If you could do that, Stacie, we’d be very grateful,” Miss Annersley said crisply. “In the meantime, we need to face the fact that regardless how good his intentions may be, Mr O’Malley may be of no more practical use to his daughter than his wife. Which brings me back to my original question. What should we do?”

“Reg is building onto this place,” Len told her. “It really is too small. She and the baby could always live here, if she wanted to, and travel into school with me on a daily basis. But I doubt the extension will be done until late autumn, which doesn’t help you much.”

“Thank you, Len. We’ll bear that in mind. Anything else?”

Felicity looked up. “Couldn’t she just stay at school?” she suggested. “I mean, it’s not as if no-one knows what’s happened and it has to be kept a secret, is it? We all know she’ll have a baby around Christmas time.”

“Do you think the girls will accept that?” Len asked.

“I don’t see why not. They accepted what Auntie Hilda said the other day.”

“Did they? Or did they only seem to?” mused Con.

“I think most of them accepted it. After all,” and Felicity’s eyes went to the Head, “Auntie Hilda asked them to be kind and to accept her back again. She said it wasn’t Grainne’s fault. They’ve mostly taken that on board, from what I’ve heard. All the more so,” Felicity added thoughtfully, “because it was Auntie Hilda who said it.”

Everyone apart from the Head herself took this easily. She looked askance at her brevet niece. “Was that supposed to be a compliment?”

Felicity grinned at her. “I suppose. What I mean, is that you made it clear that you believed that none of this was Grainne’s fault- and the School will take its cue from you. That’s all.” She gave a shrug, and Nell repressed a grin at Hilda’s bemused reaction to Felicity’s very matter of fact statement.

“Would Grainne and the baby staying in school be an option?” Nell demanded of Hilda and Matey.

Miss Annersley began to think quickly. “It could be,” she admitted after a moment. “There are those rooms near the San, Gwynneth- they’re not being used at the moment, are they? And they’re far enough from the dormitories and the sick rooms to prevent disturbance.”

Matey looked uncertain. “How many rooms were you thinking of?”

“Probably just the one. If Grainne and the baby slept together in a small dormitory- we could furnish it nicely for her- then she can still take a full part in school life, but have the baby with her- for a while, at least. Obviously it wouldn’t do as a long term solution, but hopefully we won’t need to think that far ahead.”

“What would happen to the baby during the day?” Ruey asked from where she was cuddling her little neice.

“Jo could probably take it,” Matey said suddenly. “Alternatively, Biddy and Hilary could take the infant in with their own crowd. I’m sure they’d agree.”

Len looked at the Heads. “You know,” she began hesitantly, “I’m probably not going to be the first married Staff member with kids. In time, there’ll be more. Would it not be an idea for the School to set up a crèche, attached to the kinder? If you did that, Grainne’s baby could go, and I’d send Gina as well.”

“Evie too,” added Con. “When we’re here.”

“That’s a good idea, Len,” Hilda said. “Biddy would send her small people to us as well. I know it’s an idea that has been discussed before from time to time, but as you say, chances are we’ll have more married Staff now, and they’d need to be provided for. Although that would apply for accommodation as well, of course. But we could certainly start some sort of small scale crèche in the autumn term and see how we get on.”

“And if Grainne’s near San and has any trouble, then Nurse and Matey are both on hand,” Felicity observed.

Miss Annersley agreed with this, but they could all tell that she still was not completely convinced.

Miss Wilson had had a sudden thought. She looked at her friend. “Hilda, supposing we don’t get hold of Mr O’Malley, what will happen to Grainne over the summer break?”

“She’ll have to stay here, of course,” returned Matey.

Hilda gave her a faint smile. “She will, of course. I’d thought of that one myself. I know you Maynards are going to be well and truly scattered this summer, so you can’t help, but Nell and I aren’t going anywhere. Grainne can move into the Annexe with me. It might actually be rather pleasant,” the Head finished pensively. “You’ve no idea how eerie the School can feel when you’re there alone!”

At that moment the sound of wheels could be heard. They looked at each other. “Probably Joey back,” commented Daisy.

“It is,” Stacie confirmed, having half risen to check.

“She’ll have to be told shortly,” Matey said. “But not yet. In the meantime, do we have enough practical ideas to put to Grainne? We want to give the child a choice!”

They agreed quickly that enough possible solutions had been evolved. There was little more they could do until Grainne herself was consulted, but Len had a sudden idea. “Auntie Hilda, could Grainne stay with me for a while before she decides one way or the other? Maybe if she actually experiences life with a small baby for a time, it will make the whole thing seem more real to her, and she’ll be in a better position to make a decision.”

This idea met with a certain amount of acclaim, and just as Hilda was telling Len to phone her later that evening to discuss it further, Joey Maynard entered in her customary breezy fashion, and they turned to other matters.

Gateway is published by Paul Edmund Norman on the first day of each month. Hosting is by Flying Porcupine at www.flyingporcupine.com - and web design by Gateway. Submitting to Gateway: Basically, all you need do is e-mail it along and I'll consider it - it can be any length, if it's very long I'll serialise it, if it's medium-length I'll put it in as a novella, if it's a short story or a feature article it will go in as it comes. Payment is zero, I'm afraid, as I don't make any money from Gateway, I do it all for fun! Should you be kind enough to want to send me books to review, please contact me by e-mail and I will gladly forward you my home address. Meanwhile, here's how to contact me: paulenorman@yahoo.co.uk

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