Chapter 16

Just over the border between Southhamptonshire and Wessex stood the school “St Benedicta’s School for Ladies”. It was private, fee-paying, exclusive, well-off, and had an excellent reputation for producing young ladies of very good breeding with an excellent education. It was currently run by Doctor Phineas Andrews, who had a string of letters after his name. He was married to Mrs Andrews, who did, in fact, do all of the administration at the school.

Many of the middle class parents in that part of the county sent their girls into Wessex for the excellent education. Jack was of the opinion that his duty was to the children of the county rather than to inspect the schools of the county. Therefore he should at least check the school. He had a feeling its reputation was too good to be true; “Perhaps I am becoming cynical” he thought; but he wrote a letter to the Wessex Schools Inspector anyway.

It happened that Major Michael Morrison believed that a woman’s place was in the home, making dinner, or lying back and thinking of England; in that order. Food being closer to his heart than sex. There was little else that a woman need do; so he wasn’t interested in inspecting girls’ schools. When the subject was raised, as the political climate began to expect that girls’ schools should provide more than a holding cell for girls until they could be married off, MMM, as he was known, stated point blank that he would not waste his time “Inspecting a load of establishments for so bl**** stupid, empty headed, females who would be better off learning how to make a good stew”. Mr Tichmarsh, the chair of the council, did not ask again. Instead he appointed Miss Pritchard as assistant inspector. She could visit the girls’ schools. She quickly found that MMM passed her the responsibility of inspecting primary schools too, since he was bored with listening to barely sentient ninnies spelling A.P.P.L.E very slowly.

Andrea Pritchard had joined the council as a typist, and reached the dizzy heights of ... typist, in her five years. The council regarded women as a necessity rather than a useful addition. Mr Tichmarsh enjoyed watching the typists in their long skirts and tight white blouses. Mr Killmorgan liked to drop things on the floor so they bent over to pick them up. He was rumoured to need a desk with a modesty screen at the front since his hand was frequently inside his trousers when the young ladies were bent over. This was only a rumour; not all rumours are uninformed tittle-tattle, this was, in fact, absolutely true. He lived with his mother (who was seventy) and the laundress often found his undergarments rather stiff at the front. He was repressed by a mother who felt that no female temptress was good enough for him. Mr Killmorgan had one week’s holiday on his own each year; he would go on walking tours and send his mother postcards. His walking tours frequently encompassed the red light districts of towns. The postcards were always of local beauty spots of course.

At eleven, Andrea Pritchard had contracted German Measels and nearly died. She came through having missed two terms of formal education, but had read voraciously as she recovered. As she reached puberty, the doctor confirmed that she could not have children. She never had a period and felt a lesser woman for not having achieved ‘the curse’. All through her remaining education, she lied to her friends carefully so no-one knew. When her mother died of diptheria, in the same epidemic that killed her doctor, she became the only person who knew her secret. Her father still resided with her, making a reasonable living as a shopkeeper. He often suggested she should marry, or give up work and look after him; it amounted to the same thing – become a housewife, an unpaid housekeeper. They paid for a housekeeper, and Mr Pritchard thought that a needless expense right up until the time he found himself in bed with Mrs Baxter the housekeeper. He stopped bemoaning the cost then. Remarriage was never on the cards but they were two mature adults who needed sexual relaxation periodically. Miss Pritchard became aware of the lessening complaints about the cost, the more pleasant atmosphere when Mrs Baxter was visiting to work, and the encouragement to attend work: “Don’t want to be late, do you?” She wanted to put two and two together, but was sure she was wrong.