First Fruits (3 page)

She turns her back and starts to sweep
the blackboard with the eraser, arms outstretched so as to be sure to catch all
that stray chalk in the folds of her gown. 'Pages open, girls. Book three.
Lydia you can start.'

And so Lydia starts. Reads the Latin,
then translates it into unfaltering English, sentence by sentence, never stops
for breath, or to think even. Around the class girls are catching each others'
eyes, and opening their mouths in mock horror. Hilary however dreams up another
tactic all of her own, and sticks two fingers down her throat, pretending to be
sick.

But Lydia, she doesn't notice a thing.
Lydia is enjoying herself. The tiredness that had her slumped in her seat has
completely disappeared. It's as if someone has come and slipped ice-cubes down
her neck, given her oxygen, put the bubbles back in her brain.

And the effect goes on. When it comes to
other people's turn to translate, Miss Jamieson is like a crocodile that has
eaten its fill, allowing small fish to swim between her paws without harm. Time
after time, people make mistakes and Jamieson just sits there, smiling, doesn't
bite off a single head. You can feel what folk are thinking. Lydia Morris is an
asset to the class.

Unless of course, you're Hilary. Who
hasn't forgiven Lydia for sitting in her rightful place all morning, for taking
up my time.

And it's not over yet. As we're putting
away our books,  Miss Jamieson raps her desk. She has an announcement to make.
She tells us that she is considering teaching Greek as an extra subject to
anyone who is interested. She needed two pupils at the very least. Lessons
would have to take place in free periods and some lunch breaks. Was anybody
interested?

I suppose I should have warned Hilary.
In her book, friends know everything there is to know about each other. No
secrets. But that's Hilary for you, not understanding that we don't belong on
the same page, she and I, let alone the same book. As if it was all planned, I
put up my hand to be the first to volunteer. Miss Jamieson merely nods.

'Yes, Kate, I know all about you. That's
been discussed with your father.'

You see, it
was
planned. Hilary
looks at me, piggy eyes wide. I knew this announcement was coming. They talked
about it at the end of last term, Miss Jamieson and Dad. Worked the whole thing
out between them. It was Dad who suggested it actually, the one who had the
vision.

You'd think Miss Jamieson could have
shown a bit of gratitude then, managed something better than a nod. Instead,
she looks straight past me, mouth twitching, impatient because no-one else has
put up their hand. Her face is browner than usual, hair curlier, though just as
grey. She'll have just come back from Greece, goes there every long vacation.
Next week, after the brown has begun to fade, she'll be bringing in her
photographs. She always does, passing them round as if it's some kind of treat.
But they're all the same. Ruins and lots of blue sky. Usually there aren't even
any people to make them interesting - except the odd fat person maybe, bursting
out of their holiday clothes. Or just occasionally, this one woman who crops up
time and time again. Miss Jamieson says she's only there to give a sense of
scale.

Meanwhile she is still waiting for
another hand. But who in their right mind would want to give up their free
periods, not to mention lunch breaks? There's no-one here with a Dad like mine
to steer them in the right direction. All the same, suddenly I become aware of
a little local difficulty beside me. It's Hilary, taking gulp after gulp of air
as though in distress.

And you know why, of course. Ever since
I had put up my hand, she had been struggling. I can read her mind. Hilary
likes
her lunchtimes. She even likes school mashed potato and rice pudding,
though she tries to pretend otherwise. Best of all, she likes doing absolutely
nothing - and yet even that is difficult for her. One lunch break is taken up
with piano lessons, and another is Sewing for the Disabled in the domestic
science block, which she does because there are biscuits provided.

Now there's Greek. Yet it's not as if
she's even any use at Latin. But Hilary has read all the books about girls at
school, going through everything together, sticking close no matter what. No
wonder she's having problems.

And I can't resist it.

I lean across the desk and whisper, 'I
thought you were supposed to be my friend.'

Well you have to have fun sometimes.
Poor old Hills-are-Alive. A slow despairing look at me, then up goes her hand.

Miss Jamieson looks surprised, pursing
her lips which just for now are pale next to her skin, tanned by so much
unScottish, not to say Mediterranean, sun. Come to think of it, she looks quite
handsome, though you couldn't imagine anyone actually falling for her. Right
now, she's regarding Hilary in almost kindly fashion, the way she might some
poor animal she has found run over - before she pulls herself together and puts
it out of its misery. Miss Jamieson likes animals. She has a cat called
Cassandra that she mentions now and then.

Then she remembers that Hilary is not a
cat and she frowns. 'Hilary Cross, I can't believe you have time for Greek.
You'll have no lunch breaks left to play with, child.'

Now there's a surprise, Miss Jamieson
letting someone down lightly. When she could so easily have said, Hilary
Cross
you don't have the brain for what Kate is doing
. Hilary however puts down
her hand, and begins to perspire with sheer relief.

But the relief only lasts a second.
Because now, behind us, we become aware of another hand climbing upwards,
calling attention to itself. Hilary freezes, then forces herself to turn round.
Sure enough, Lydia is holding up a scrawny wrist as though to test the air.

Miss Jamieson smiles briefly. 'Lydia?'

But the only sound that answers her is
the soft thud of Hilary's head hitting the desk in despair.

Which Miss Jamieson ignored. She writes
down Lydia's name, and then drops the subject. I don't believe she wanted more
than two anyway. This was to be her treat to herself, teaching Greek. Can you believe
it?

Trust Dad to know all about it. One
conversation, that's all he needed. He can do that, get people to tell him
things they would never dream of letting on to anyone else. He knew Miss Jamieson
was just itching to teach Greek.

The trouble is, then you have to ask
yourself why I have to be the one who has to go and learn it. I mean, who in
their right mind would
choose
to learn Greek? (Well there's Lydia of
course. But then, she's hardly what you would call normal.)

The answer is simple. Anyone can go to
school and learn French, or German or whatever. But I'm his daughter, and that
changes everything. That's what he says. It changes
everything
. That's
the reason for the Greek. It's important to have something special, something
no-one else has got, something that marks you out.
He
realised this when
he taught himself Greek years ago, Hebrew too.

So that's why I will be learning Greek.
Greek will make us even more special than before. We'll be able to read the New
Testament together as it was first written. It will put us in a class of our
own.

Except, now there's Lydia too. Which
makes you wonder. Maybe I'm not the only the one. Maybe there's someone else
with a dad like mine.

Silly me. That's impossible. I know very
well, better than anyone. There's no-one like my dad, not in the whole wide
world. And I'm his daughter, the luckiest girl alive.

TIME
TO GO HOME,  AND here's Hilary - who has been ready for the last ten minutes -
insisting on waiting for me. The idea is to walk out of school together, arm in
arm just like the rosy-cheeked schoolgirl pals on the covers of her books. As
if she didn't know that, with my leg the way it is, people would take one look
and think she was needing to help me.

So Hilary, who keeps on having to wait,
has to walk unaided.

What she can't understand though, is the
reason for the wait, for why we invariably have to be last out. And that's
where I despair of Hilary. Because she wouldn't get it, not even if I told her.

He
will be waiting for me.

In other words, it's no good making my
exit along with everybody else, just another person in the crowd. You may as
well be an ant among five hundred other ants, he says. When I walk out of
school, he wants to be able to see me, standing out, unmissable.

Like him.

It means I have to keep
him
waiting too, but he doesn't mind a bit. He parks the car next to where the
sixth formers come out, stalking past on legs way too long for skirts that
haven't fitted them since the fourth year. Well, you can imagine what they look
like. Yet he doesn't complain - or look away - ever. He just stares and stares,
never takes his eyes off them. He says it's a God-given opportunity to spot
souls.

That's what he's so good at, you see,
identifying souls. My Dad, he can spot them from a hundred yards, the folk who
are destined for Heaven and the folk who aren't - the Sheep and the Goats. 
Though of course you can't tell them that, not nowadays, not even at his
Service. Nobody wants to hear how, in God's eyes, they are no more than
livestock. But that's what it's all about; and my dad can sit there in the car
and spot them, the ones who are chosen and the ones who are not.

Appearances have nothing to do with it,
not even amongst the tiny ones, still clutching the hands of their older
sisters, straight out of nursery, all big cheeks and curls. They look like
angels already, don't they? But it makes no difference. It's all been decided.
If they're not chosen they'll go the same way as the others, finished before
they've even started.

And of course they don't suspect. Bad
teaching in the churches, he says, the reason that those girls in the sixth -
the ones who pass by him the closest, the very people who would have the most
to learn - can carry on walking, pretending he's not there. But
he
knows. Everything's temporary. In the next world it could all be different.

I only wish he would tell me who they
are, the ones who haven't been chosen. I always have. Once when I was little I
had the idea that I could go round warning them, not understanding it was the
worst sin of all: wanting to interfere with God's will.

I shouldn't have told him what I had in
mind.  I was old enough to know better. It was my fault, then, forcing him to
take steps, making sure it never happened again. Some people have to be saved
from themselves, including even a child of his. Especially a child of his.

Yet even now, I'd still love to know.
Especially about Fiona McPherson, and where she's headed. There'd be no danger
of me trying to interfere with God's will.

In the meantime, today, as every day,
Hilary thinks she is the first to see the car. 'Oh, there's your dad,' she
says, trying to sound casual. As if I hadn't managed to spot my own father. He
sees us coming and winds down the window. It makes an awful scraping noise, the
car is that old. One of the things it doesn't do to mind.

Hilary bends down and inserts her nose
through the gap. Her bottom sticks out, blocking half the pavement. It's the
sort of thing Hilary forgets. Just how much space she takes up.

And so I have to wait while she has her
time. Everyone has to have their time. Hilary, the old ladies, everyone. He'll
not turn anyone away. And when she stands up again, her entire face is red.
Even her neck is glowing. And you know why of course. He'll have found
something to say to her, something that will have made her blush. He can do it
with the most unlikely material.

Sometimes I think that's the real reason
she hangs on after school. Just for those few words which will have her
believing she's special, something no-one else would give her. Nothing to do
with me.

But she has to stand back now, go home
to her mother and a life so ordinary it makes you wonder how she can bear it.
Meanwhile I get to go with him. The luckiest girl in the world.

Poor old Hilary, she's still standing
there as we swing out into the road. Horns blare and lights flash, but it
doesn't matter. Nothing ever touches us. Once I overheard Miss Jamieson say to
Mrs. Chatto: 'Kate Carr's father drives in accordance with his beliefs.' Those
were her exact words, and she sniffed as she spoke them. As if driving in
accordance with your beliefs was something to disapprove of.

Meanwhile, I have a last sight of
Hilary, shoulders drooping under her duffle coat, wistfully shrinking as we
leave her behind.

One final thing though, just before
school disappears altogether; I catch sight of Lydia. She is walking with a
little girl of six, maybe seven. The kid is everywhere, skippety hopping along
the pavement, all dancing curls and milk teeth. Lydia meanwhile is plodding
along behind her, her mouth pursed, grudging every minute of her time.

I didn't know Lydia had a sister. Not
much alike, though, were they? But really, it's only of passing interest. This
is not the moment to be distracted by either of them. I have to think about
us
now. We've been apart a long time, all day in fact. He worries about me; all
those poor influences. All those bad lessons to be unlearned and learned again.
So think hard, Kate. Say the right thing. Try to forget all the times when
you've got it wrong, save yourself another lesson.