Noel Streatfeild - White Boots

The doctor thought about Harriet’s father’s shop and sighed. He could well believe Uncle William ate the best of everything for the shop looked as if he did. All he said was:

“You tell your father and mother I’ll be along to have a talk with them this evening.”

Since she had been ill Harriet was made to go to bed at the same time as Edward, which was half-past six. This was a terrible insult, because Edward was only just seven, whereas she was nearly ten, so when Dr Phillipson arrived, only Alec and Toby were up. The Johnsons lived over the shop. There was not a great deal of room for a family of six. There was a kitchen-dining room, there was a sitting room, one bedroom for the three boys, a slip of a room for Harriet and a bedroom for George and Olivia. When Dr Phillipson arrived Olivia was in the kitchen cooking the things George had not sold, Alec and Toby were doing their homework at one side of the table in the sitting room, while on the other side their father tried to work out the accounts. The days when their father did the accounts were bad days for Alec’s and Toby’s homework, because accounts were not their father’s strong point.

“Alec, if I charge ninepence each for four hundred cabbages, and twopence a pound for four dozen bundles of carrots, three and sixpence each for eight rabbits, and thirty shillings for miscellaneous fish, and we’ve only sold a quarter of the carrots, half the cabbages, one of the rabbits, and all the fish but three, but we’ve made a very nice profit on mushrooms, how much have I earned?”

Toby, who was eleven and had what his schoolmaster called a mathematical brain, was driven into a frenzy by these problems of his father’s. He was short-sighted, and had to wear spectacles, and a piece of his sandy-coloured hair was inclined to stand upright on the crown of his head. When his father asked questions about the finance of the shop, his eyes would glare from behind his spectacles, and the piece of hair on the crown of his head would stand bolt upright like a guardsman on parade. He would be in such a hurry to explain to his father that he could not present a mathematical problem in that form that his first words fell out on top of each other.

“But-Father-you-haven’t-told-Alec-the-price of the mushrooms on which the whole problem hangs, nor the individual prices of the fish.”

It was in the middle of one of these arguments that Olivia brought Dr Phillipson in. In spite of having to cook all the things Uncle William sent which would not sell, Olivia succeeded in looking at all times as if she was a hostess entertaining a very nice and amusing house party. In the kitchen she always wore an overall but underneath she had pretty clothes; they were usually very old because there was seldom money for new clothes, but she had a way of putting them on and of wearing them which seemed to say, “Yes, isn’t this pretty? How lucky I am to have nice clothes and time to wear them.” As she ushered Dr Phillipson into the sitting room it ceased to be full of George, Alec and Toby all arguing at the tops of their voices, and of Alec’s and Toby’s school books, and George’s dirty little bits of paper on which he kept his accounts, and she was showing a guest into a big, gracious drawing room.

“Dr Phillipson’s come to talk to us about Harriet.”

The Johnson children were properly brought up. Alec and Toby jumped to their feet murmuring, “Good evening, sir,” and Alec gave the doctor a chair facing George.

The doctor came straight to the point.

“Harriet is not getting on. Have you any relations in the country you could send her to?”

George, though he only had two, offered the doctor a cigarette.

“But of course, my dear fellow, my brother William has a splendid place, love to have her.”

The doctor was sure George would not have many cigarettes so he said he preferred to smoke his own. Olivia signalled to Alec and Toby not to argue.

“It’s quite true, Dr Phillipson, my brother-in-law William would love to have Harriet, but unfortunately he has only got two rooms, and he’s very much a bachelor. All my relations live in South Africa. We have nowhere to send Harriet or, of course, we would have sent her long ago.”

The doctor nodded, for he felt sure this was true. The Johnsons were the sort of people to do almost more than was possible for their children.

“It’s not doing her any good hanging about by the river at this time of year.”

Toby knew how Harriet felt.

“What she would like is to go back to school, wouldn’t she, Alec?”

Alec was very like his mother; he had some of her elegance and charm, but as well he had a very strongly developed strain of common sense. He could see that Harriet in her present daddy-long-legs stage was not really well enough for school.

“That’s what she wants, but she’s not fit for it, is she?”

“No, she needs to exercise those legs of hers. Do they do gymnasium or dancing at her school?”

“Not really,” said Olivia. “Just a little ballroom dancing once a week and physical exercises between classes, you know the sort of thing.”

The doctor turned to George.

“Would your finances run to sending her to a dancing school or a gymnasium? It would have to be a good one where they knew what they were doing.”

George cleared his throat. He hated that kind of question, partly because he was a very proud father who wanted to give his children every advantage, and who, except when he was asked direct questions by doctors, tried to pretend he did give them most advantages.

“I don’t think I could manage it just now. My father left me a bit, and Olivia will come into quite a lot some day, but just now we’re mainly dependent on the shop, and November’s a bit of an off-season. You see, my brother William…” His voice tailed away.

The doctor, who knew about the shop, felt sorry and filled in the pause by saying “Quite.” Then suddenly he had an idea.

“I’ll tell you what. How about skating? The manager of the rink is a patient of mine. I’ll have a word with him about Harriet. I’m sure he’d let her in for nothing. There’d be the business of the boots and skates, but I believe you can hire those.”

Alec nodded.

“You can. I think skating’s a good idea. If you can get your friend to give her a pass we’ll manage the boots and skates.”

The doctor got up.

“Good. Well, I’ve got to go and see the manager of the rink tomorrow; I’ll have a word with him; if he says yes I’ll arrange to pick Harriet up and drop her off and introduce her to him. It’s no distance, she could have a lot of fun there, plenty of kids, I imagine, go, it’s a big, airy place and she can tumble about on the ice and in no time we’ll see an improvement in those leg muscles.”

George showed the doctor to the door. While he was out of the room Olivia said in a whisper:

“Alec, whatever made you say it would be all right about the skates and boots? What do you suppose they cost?”

Toby answered.

“We know what it cost because we went that time Uncle William packed that goose by mistake. They’re two shillings a session.”

Olivia never lost her air of calm, but she did turn surprised eyes on Alec. He was usually the sensible, reliable one of the family, not at all the sort of person to say they could manage two shillings a day when he knew perfectly well they would be hard put to it to find threepence a day. Alec gave her a reassuring smile.

“It’s all right. I’ll find it, there’s a lot of delivering and stuff will want doing round Christmas and in the meantime I saw a notice in old Pulton’s window. He wants a boy for a paper round.”

Olivia flushed. It seemed to her a miserable thing that Harriet’s skates and boots had to be earned by her brother instead of by her father and mother.