The World According to Bertie - Alexander Hanchett Smith [30]
These thoughts, though, were not really very charitable and Miss Harmony accepted that she should put them firmly from her mind; but not before she had allowed herself a final reflection on how Hiawatha, too, might also benefit from home-schooling, which would remove the constant problem of his socks and their somewhat unpleasant odour. Would a letter to his mother be in order? she wondered. It was difficult to imagine how one might put the matter tactfully; parents were so sensitive about such things.
‘Yes,’ said Miss Harmony. ‘A lot has happened! First of all, you will notice that Merlin is no longer with us. We have said farewell to him, as he is going to be studying at home this year.’
This announcement was greeted with silence, as the children looked at one another. Then Olive put up her hand.
‘He won’t be studying, Miss Harmony,’ she said. ‘He told me. He said that his mother wanted him to help her with her weaving. He said that he was going to be getting paid for it.’
‘Now, Olive,’ said Miss Harmony. ‘We mustn’t always believe what others tell us, must we? Especially when they are having a little joke, as I am sure Merlin was. We all know that Merlin will be working very hard in his little home classroom and that his head will soon be bursting with knowledge.’ She stared hard at Olive. ‘Yes, Olive, bursting with knowledge.’
Tofu now joined in. ‘I saw something about this on television,’ he said. ‘It was about carpet factories in India. The children all worked in the factories and made rugs.’
Miss Harmony laughed. ‘That’s child labour, Tofu, dear. And it is no longer allowed in this country. Certainly it used to be – chimney sweeps would make little boys – like you – go up the chimney for them. Charles Dickens wrote about that sort of thing. But now we do not allow that any more.’ She paused. ‘Merlin will not be a child labourer, I assure you.’
She gave Tofu a discouraging look. ‘Now then,’ she said. ‘The news that Merlin has left us is very sad news for us, of course. But there has also been some happy news. And I’m going to ask Bertie to tell us himself.’
All eyes swung round to Bertie, who blushed.
‘Come on, Bertie,’ said Miss Harmony. ‘You tell us about the little event which happened in your house over the holidays.’
Bertie bit his lip. He had not been sure at first what Miss Harmony was alluding to, but now he knew.
‘My mother had a baby,’ he muttered.
‘Now, now, Bertie,’ encouraged Miss Harmony. ‘Good news must be given loud and clear.’
‘A baby,’ said Bertie. ‘My mother had a baby.’
‘See!’ said Miss Harmony. ‘That’s good news, isn’t it everybody? Bertie now has a little brother. And what’s his name, Bertie?’
Bertie looked down at the top of his desk. There was no escape, or at least none that he could identify. ‘Ulysses,’ he said.
Tofu, who had been staring at Bertie, now looked away and sniggered.
‘Tofu,’ said Miss Harmony. ‘Ulysses is a very fine name.’
Tofu said nothing.
‘Yes,’ said Miss Harmony. ‘And we don’t laugh at the names of others, do we, Tofu? Especially . . .’ She hesitated. It was so tempting; impossible to resist, in fact. ‘Especially if we are called Tofu ourselves.’
‘Tofu’s a stupid name,’ volunteered Olive. ‘It’s that horrid white stuff that cranky people eat. It’s a stupid name. I’d far rather be called Ulysses than Tofu, any day of the week. And anyway, Tofu, it’s nice to hear that Miss Harmony thinks your name is stupid too.’
‘That is not what I said, Olive,’ said Miss Harmony quickly. ‘And let’s move on, boys and girls. We are all very pleased, I’m sure, to hear about Bertie’s new baby brother and we look forward to meeting him some day soon. I’m sure that Bertie is very proud of him and will bring him to the school to introduce us all. But in the meantime, boys and girls, we are going to start today with sums, just to see whether we’ve remembered what we learned last term!’
Much had been forgotten, and the rest of