Settlement

Despite the 27 years that separated them, the two women who stood on the immaculate burgundy carpet, flanked by parquet flooring that had enjoyed the benefit of years of meticulous attention, in the warmly and subtly-lit wood-paneled corridor at Great Kingsford College for Girls, could well have passed for sisters. The young mother's looks belied the 45 years during which she had brightened the lives of those around her, whilst her 18-year old daughter, only 6 months away from her nineteenth birthday, could easily have passed for a young woman in her mid-twenties, having inherited not only her Mother's elegance and fresh-faced good looks, but also a hint of her Father's eye-catching maturity.

In many ways, however, the two women were very different in terms of their individual styles, the elder of the two still favouring nuance over bold statement in terms of her attire, whilst the younger, even in the immaculate uniform which she was wearing, officially, for the last day, managed to create an appearance of discreetly-tailored defiance, the knot in her tie being just slightly out of line and the top button on her shirt being left undone, albeit invisibly to all but the most inquisitive onlookers.

Their conduct also brought them close together in terms of age, since the very low murmur of their voices in the hushed environs of the corridor was characterised by warmth, humour, excitement and, to a degree, sadness, for this was Sophia Louise's last day at school, before leaving for her gap year and before going up to Aberdeen University to read Medicine.

However, the day did not simply represent a critical waymark on Sophia Louise's passage through life, but also in the lives of her mother, Eleanor, and of the school. This was, in fact, also the last day in office for the Headmaster, Mr. Alistair Mackinnon, and the caretaker, Mr. Brian Harding, both of whom had been conspicuous at the school, not only because they constituted half of the permanent male members of staff, but also on account of the respective manners in which they had served this impressive educational establishment.

In educational circles, the profile of the Great Kingsford College for Girls had risen steadily, from a high starting point, over the 28 years since the arrival of Mr. Mackinnon, at the age of thirty-seven. The career of this softly-spoken native of the Isle of Skye had included a three-year appointment at a college in Seville and a two-year post at a Lyons Lycée, before taking up his appointment as Head of the Foreign Languages Department, under the eagle eye of Miss Helena Frobisher.

The formidable former Headmistress had been a keen and strict disciplinarian who had produced results, both academically and socially. She had been almost universally adored and revered by pupils, governors and parents alike and there were rumours that she was blessed with a wicked sense of humour. She had also been a widely-acknowledged judge of character and this had led to the appointment of Messrs. Mackinnon and Harding to their respective posts, for she had seen qualities in these two gentlemen that she admired.

Although she had been a staunch defender of a campaign to advance the status and quality of life of young women through good education and training, with nurture of individuality, Miss Frobisher had also recognised how unhealthy and unbalanced it could be to expect up to 280 girls to go about their school lives in surroundings that did not in some way reflect the gender mix in Society and which did not offer good male role models outside the immediate families of her pupils.

There was also a handful of former alumnae who could testify to her devastating accuracy with the cane, an implement that had been used on extremely rare occasions and the effect of which had been to instil a sense of genuine respect amongst pupils at the school, both for discipline and for academic standards. In point of fact, the cane had never, at any time, been used as a punishment for failure to achieve academically, since Miss Frobisher had felt that this was a barbaric misuse of an effective form of disciplinary control. Such restraint had not, however, extended to the use of The Dragon, as it had been labelled in school lore, in cases where girls had been foolish enough to lapse into unjustifiable violence, abuse or flagrant breaches of standards of public behaviour. She had always been meticulous in her investigation of misdeeds warranting corporal punishment. However, once she had reached her conclusion, execution of sentence had always been a swift, painful and memorable experience that had left its imprint in several ways upon the girls who had left her Study in tears, to inspect the outcome of their encounter with her.

The appointment, two years later, of Mr. Mackinnon to the post of Headmaster, following Miss Frobisher's retirement, had sent ripples through the educational establishment and had raised concerns amongst certain parents, yet such was the trust in Miss Frobisher's judgment that no one was ready to deny him the chance to prove that the decision had been wise.

He had not failed. In fact, he had excelled and both academic and disciplinary standards had not only been maintained, but improved. Interestingly, this had been achieved, ultimately, without the threat of corporal punishment, which he had abolished three years into his appointment, after a long discussion with Mrs. Helen Marlow, the young Physical Education teacher whom he had appointed to the post of Deputy Headmistress. He had not, in fact, used or ordered corporal punishment to deal with any pupil. His look alone seemed sufficiently effective to convey the legendary message of his predecessor and recourse to the penultimate sanction had never been needed.

The departure of Mr. Harding was also of significance to the school, since he had overseen the running of the school estate in a manner that had encouraged pupils to take an interest in such often-overlooked matters. With his impeccable manners and great depth of knowledge of both horticulture and wildlife, he had introduced many a young mind to areas of interest that might otherwise have escaped them, earning high regard from teachers, pupils and parents alike.

Eleanor had particular reason to remember Mr. Harding since, when he had arrived as a fairly young and not-long-married young man, he had been at the centre of a controversy that had resulted in the one case of what ultimately transpired to be a miscarriage of justice during Miss Frobisher's headship. However, the story was not as simple as it might at first have seemed.

In 1975, just a year after his appointment, Mr. Harding had been suspended from his post pending investigation of a most embarrassing incident.

His rugged and youthful weather-beaten looks had earned several admiring gazes from girls at the school, particularly those on the point of departure for university, whom he had unwittingly prompted to ponder, in greater depth than was possibly healthy for them, the freedoms that lay ahead of them. Flirtatious remarks had been addressed to him, all of which he had brushed off, somewhat bashfully, with a smile and a rapid return either to a safe neutral subject or to his work. There was, however, one girl at the Great Kingsford College for Girls who had not played by the rules and who had, in fact, earned the loathing of many of her peers due to the high-handed and cavalier attitude she had adopted towards 'that gardener'.

Julia Beaulieu lacked nothing in the self-confidence department and, whilst this enhanced her attractiveness to younger, less confident pupils, it had earned a healthy measure of disdain from older peers, who had come to like Mr. Harding and who appreciated his genuine and totally innocent desire to encourage them to discover the wonders of Nature that were there in their own gardens.

Julia also had an unproven record as a deceitful manipulator. Circumstantial and anecdotal evidence was there in abundance, but Miss Frobisher was not the sort of woman to act on such unsubstantiated material and she had, until the final dénouement of this unfortunate episode, confined herself to reminding the arrogant girl that pupils at her school were strictly forbidden to abuse any member of her staff.

Julia also engaged in a number of unapproved extra-curricular activities, including supposedly secret assignments with her boyfriend, whom she would meet amidst the cluster of outbuildings from which Mr. Harding ran his side of school life so efficiently. These, however, were a well-guarded secret and only two pupils had spotted her one lunchtime when, on the pretext of feeling slightly unwell, she had asked to be excused from the communal meal so that she could go and rest for a short while.

The two pupils in question had been Patricia O'Connor, a vivacious and highly popular girl from Co. Wicklow in Ireland, and Eleanor, whom she had befriended at a very early stage during their shared school years. They had become inseparable contrasts in just about every way and they were extremely well-liked by the other girls, unlike the distant and, as it turned out, deeply unhappy Julia Beaulieu.

The discovery of a pair of green knickers, matching an item missing from Julia's inventory of clothing, in the inside pocket of Mr. Harding's ex-RAF greatcoat, had shocked Polly, his wife, who had felt it her duty to bring this matter first to his attention and then to that of Miss Frobisher. The latter's reaction had, initially, been one of total bewilderment, but, anxious to satisfy the demands both of justice and of the need to maintain a good reputation, she had decided to investigate the matter herself, without recourse to outside agencies. As it turned out, this proved to have been one of the wisest moves in her long career and it spared an honest and decent family the shame of wrongful prosecution and public humiliation.

Miss Frobisher resembled an 'old school' nursing sister, a professional whose ability to accumulate and sift through information from the most unlikely and, in the view of the majority of onlookers, impossible sources was legendary. These skills she applied with the utmost finesse in her investigation, during which, as a precaution, she had suspended Mr. Harding on full pay. Such was her confidence in his innocence and such were her powers of persuasion that she was able to convince Polly very quickly that the presence of young female underwear in her husband's greatcoat had been the result of schoolgirl malice, not of male perversion.

It had taken the best part of three weeks for Miss Frobisher to complete her enquiries, which had culminated in the presence of a senior girl in her Study one Wednesday morning, two days before the end of term and her departure for summer holidays, before embarking upon her final year at school. She had sat at the desk, recited the facts as she had found them and then waited for Julia to explain how her underwear had found its way into the caretaker's great coat.

The denials were vehement, but the weight of evidence was beginning to build against her. The spare key to the caretaker's office had been found in Julia's locker, which she could not explain and which, she claimed, had been a plant. Then there was the piece of dark green wool found on a splinter of wood close to where Mr. Harding's coat had been hanging. This matched the fabric of Julia's cardigan, a garment that featured a small damaged area close to a pocket, an area that was almost invisible and that was at exactly the height where the fragment had been found. Then there was the single sheet of paper found in Julia's locker, bearing the names of Mr. Harding and one of his junior assistants, along with imprints from what had been the page above it, revealing prose that would not find its way onto publications on the lower shelves in magazine racks. In her usual manner, Miss Frobisher had let Julia weigh up the evidence for herself. However, Julia denied any knowledge of the offence and was still protesting her innocence as she was ordered to stand in the centre of the room and bend down, holding her ankles.

Knowing the consequences of the humiliation that would have resulted from failure to comply with this order, Julia had suppressed her protest at that point and had walked to the centre of the room where, as many of her peers would have felt to have been long overdue, she had heard the door lock mechanism close, the unmistakable sound of the cupboard door opening and footsteps approaching her from behind, preceding the lifting of her skirt, which had been folded over her back. She had tussled with anger and fear as the cane brushed very lightly on the seat of her knickers and then tapped out six lines with the lightest of touches.

Julia had heard the legends relating to The Dragon and to the way in which it always forecast where it was planning to land. It came, therefore, as no surprise when each of the six gasp-generating impacts landed exactly at the intended spot and, with tears running freely down her cheeks, Julia had ultimately and painfully left the Study in silence and total defiance, refusing either to acknowledge her wrongdoing or to apologise.

It was at this juncture that a worrying shadow of doubt had crossed Miss Frobisher's mind, as she returned The Dragon to its lair for what she had intended to be the last time in its working life. She remained intellectually convinced that justice had been done and she added her red ink entry to the slim punishment register, in which no girl's name had appeared twice, before closing the book and returning it to its locked drawer.

There had been little sympathy for Julia amongst the pupils, some of whom approved openly of the punishment that had been meted out, considering that it was the least that the unpleasant girl had deserved for her treatment, not only of Mr. Harding but also of other girls at the school. Patricia and Eleanor were discreetly silent on the subject, uncharacteristically so in the case of Patricia, and it was this that caught the observant eye of Miss Frobisher, who was feeling increasingly uneasy about the entire matter, with the growing conviction that Julia Beaulieu had been 'fitted up' for the offence. Despite the fact that the Headmistress knew full well that Julia had certainly earned more than that caning by her other misdeeds, this did not sit comfortably with a woman of integrity, wedded inseparably to the notion of fair play, and she resolved to talk to Julia again after the summer holidays, once the girl had returned from a planned six-week stay in Italy with her boyfriend's family.

Miss Frobisher also resolved to have all three girls, Julia, Patricia and Eleanor, in the Study and to rely on her highly individual inquisitorial technique to elicit the truth from these three young women at the start of their final year at school.

The news that a passenger train in Ireland had been derailed just south of Greystones, causing multiple fatalities, brought a sense of deep shock to all the pupils at the school, but to none more than it had to Eleanor and Miss Frobisher and it was, therefore, in an atmosphere very different from that which she had intended that the Headmistress had called Eleanor and Julia to her Study to announce that she, like all the pupils, had been shocked and saddened by the untimely and tragic loss of Patricia. In the circumstances, she said, vital evidence that could possibly have shed light on the unfortunate incident involving the now-reinstated Mr. Harding was unavailable, unless, of course, either of the two girls had further light to shed on it.

Both remained totally silent and Eleanor, skilled in mastering her feelings, displayed not a hint of the turmoil that had taken hold inside her. Thus it was that both girls left the Study and, ten months later, left the school for their respective university places.

After a lengthy round of farewells, Mr. Mackinnon finally made his way, somewhat wearily, along the corridor to his Study, where he found Eleanor and Sophia Louise waiting, as requested, as girls would once have done, trembling, to see Miss Frobisher. He smiled warmly and ushered them inside.

Once the door had been closed behind them, he showed them to the leather settee and invited them to sit down in this masculine oasis in an area dominated almost entirely by things feminine. Eleanor shivered almost imperceptibly as she adjusted her olive green silk dress and Sophia Louise felt a strange sense of unease in her Mother as she took her place alongside her. Both women allowed their gaze to wander around the room, past the door to the annex that was slightly ajar, quickly past The Dragon's lair and along the bookshelves towards the wide lattice window. Sophia Louise was reminded of her Father's magnificent Study at Pendene Manor, as was Eleanor, but not so much on account of the furnishings as for other reasons.

Sophia Louise noticed how her Mother had shivered slightly as her gaze had fallen upon The Dragon's lair and, whilst Mr. Mackinnon was tidying up, having asked the ladies to wait for just a couple of moments, she whispered into Eleanor's ear, asking if everything was alright.

Eleanor flushed slightly and, whilst Mr. Mackinnon's back was turned to them, whispered in reply about the legendary creature had once resided in the lair.

It is a great mistake to underestimate the hearing of an experienced teacher, particularly a Headmaster groomed by no lesser a person than Miss Frobisher. Mr. Mackinnon turned round and looked at Eleanor and Sophia Louise. He smiled in a manner that was so inscrutable as almost to be sinister. Eleanor shivered again and Sophia Louise found her curiosity increasing.

"So, Mrs. Penbury, you remember the legend of The Dragon, do you?"

One could have been forgiven for believing that Eleanor was about to go down with a cold, such was the frequency with which she was beginning to shiver. She returned a wan smile and giggled in slight embarrassment.

"But I understand that you were never acquainted with it, Mrs. Penbury", the Headmaster added.

Eleanor blushed slightly and shook her head, unusually lost for words. However, even allowing for the dread that the very mention of the cane had induced amongst potential beneficiaries of its corrective power, this was not in character and Mr. Mackinnon knew this full well, having come to know Eleanor better than she realised during the shared time in which they had followed their respective paths at the school. He recalled the Valentine card that had been slid under the door to his office at the school, also the strange confession letter that had been sent to Miss Frobisher on the day of her retirement, both of which had been written in a very distinctive italic hand, with a pen of good quality fitted with an unusual nib.

Mr. Mackinnon sat back in his leather armchair, his gown giving him the appearance of an American judge as he looked kindly, but quizzically towards his two guests.

Suddenly, as if taken by surprise, he stood up and walked towards the lair with a purposeful stride. Eleanor was in a state of almost visible shiver by the time the door to the cupboard had been unlocked and it was only when a beautifully bound leather volume was withdrawn from it that she began to relax. She was, nonetheless, distracted, for she failed to notice that the door had not been locked again, an omission the significance of which ought not to have been overlooked.

Mr. Mackinnon walked to the desk and placed the volume on the polished surface. He opened it to the flysheet and then looked over to Eleanor.

"I'm sure you must realise that it's Miss Frobisher's 95th birthday in a couple of weeks' time and we decided that we wanted to present her with something very special to remind her of her time here. Since you were held by her to be an almost perfect role model, a girl for whom she had the greatest respect and admiration in the way in which you conducted yourself as a pupil, I was wondering if you would like to add your signature to the gift card please."