The Boy Who Was Afraid of Butterflies - Chapter 4 'Sunday School'

Chapter 4 Sunday School

My social life revolves around events at the East Molesey chapel. The summer outing by charabanc to Bognor or Littlehampton, Harvest Festival, the Christmas Carol services and New Year’s Social, the annual Scripture Exam each March, the Sunday School Anniversary, are but highlights in a routine which ensures my presence there not only three times each Sunday, but once or twice during weeknight evenings also.

Then there are garden parties at Mrs Moss’s house, with hoopla and bowls and sack races; an annual Sunday School sports, where last year I disgraced myself by running off the course when lying last on the fourth leg of the relay race. I was so far behind the other runners that I had not seen the point of continuing toward the milling children at the finishing tape now trailing in the grass. But I was scolded by Mr Knight, the gaunt Sunday School Superintendent, who had sought me out when I trailed off into the anonymous bystanders, and to my embarrassment, had trilled in a penetrating falsetto voice:

“Poor show, young Maidment. Always finish what you begin. You let us down, you know.”

I thought of protesting that I had inherited a hopeless position, that the third runner had handed me the baton when the winner had already passed the tape, and the nearest boy was over fifty yards in front. But I didn’t bother. If I’d tried to argue with Mr Knight, I’d lose; better not to make a scene, that would make my humiliation even more public. I flushed scarlet and sought protection in the bosom of my family.

This year there had been an Eisteddfod, an inter Sunday School arts competition, that was always entered with great fervour. I won the drawing and bible-reading prizes for my age group and I’d come third in writing - ‘far-fetched as a fairy story’ had been the adjudicator’s comments on my offering. I wanted to justify myself by pointing out that the basis of the story, but thinly disguised, had been good enough for one of a series of children’s books; then with a sense of guilt, it tumbled to me that there was no credit in plagiarism, so I held my tongue and not even my parents realised I’d copied most of it from a book. The climax on the Saturday evening was the singing competition and against my will, but pushed by my family and chapel peers, I found myself in the final with five other competitors in my age group - all girls. I wished the tawdry wooden stage would swallow me as, in front of an audience of a hundred seated chapel-goers and smaning children peering from doorways at the back of the hall, I thrust my arms horizontally as I had been trained to do, and trilled the ‘Scarecrow Song’. I got through it somehow, my confusion only compounded as I was announced the winner. Amid the sickening adulation of my elders, including the awful Mr Knight again, the boys in my class poked me in the ribs and chortled:

“What a pretty voice you have. Why don’t you borrow your sister’s dress next time?”

“David Maidment, first prize sissy!”

Every Sunday that I could remember started with morning Sunday School in the little room at the back of the chapel where grandma collected together a motley group of boys and girls for half an hour before the main Sunday morning service. Grandma would tell a bible story - she was good at that and always made it interesting; they would sing from a very limited repertoire of hymns as she was no great pianist. Although it was all familiar and varied very little, I felt comfortable here. Grandma was the focus, other children were interested too, and I felt special that she belonged to me. I felt good each week, condescending to loan her to the others.

Afternoon Sunday School was not so homely. Mr Knight, the Superintendent, was leader of the Junior Department, and took his duties very seriously. At half past two precisely the outer doors would be closed and he would post two children to act as doorkeepers to prevent latecomers entering until the second hymn had been sung. If all the children did not stand at the precise moment when Mrs Parrish thumped out the first chord on the ancient piano, he would sit us down again and repeat the process until we got it right. When we chattered in circles around our teachers, he would suddenly pause and throw one palm high in the air like a prophet of old, and demand silence ‘until I can hear a pin drop.’ I spent a long time on Sunday afternoons waiting for that pin to drop, because some of the other children thought it funnier to provoke Mr Knight than to have to sing an extra hymn, or hear a homily from him at the end, which he would concoct to prevent Sunday School finishing early.

I can remember one afternoon in particular. Mr Knight has just commenced an interminable prayer, when I hear the entrance doors being pushed open (my class, the oldest boys, sits at the back of the hall). There are a couple of soft footsteps as the person outside recognises their lateness and that entry is already barred. Usually at the end of the second hymn a stream of latecomers will be admitted. But on this occasion, when he is ready, Mr Knight pushes back imaginary hairs onto his polished scalp and announces in his piercing reedy voice:

“Doorkeepers, you may throw wide the pearly gates! Let us see what miserable latecomers we have gathered in our nets today!”

All eyes turn to stare at the swing doors and focus on one miscreant only.

“Why, it’s Barbara Hunt! Take your seat quickly, my child. Miss Shaw, see that you give her a late mark!”

The poor girl flushes a bright red under accumulated stares of fifty inquisitive children, hesitates a moment at the back of the hall right opposite me, then darts quickly to the senior girls’ class on the other side of the room. I haven’t really noticed her before this. I find myself keep taking a peep at her throughout the session, even while my own teacher is telling the story. She has a pretty face, with curly brown hair just like the picture of Princess Margaret that is in one of mother’s books that she lets me look at sometimes. She is wearing a thin summer dress, with green and yellow flowered patterns and an embroidered butterfly on the crimped bodice and her bare thin legs look brown against her spotless white ankle socks. I feel sorry for her and keep looking across at her until my teacher suddenly says:

“Maidment, you seem very inattentive today. Is anything the matter?”

I come round with a start and mumble:

“No, sir,” and hope no-one has noticed where I was looking.

When I’m eleven, I’m promoted to the Senior Department which meets in the chapel itself. My new teacher is grandpa and I begin to realise as I listen to him, week by week, that I have never really known him properly before. I listen enthralled as he tells us of events in his past during the Great War, or his later posting in the Middle East. He tells us bible stories too, but often relates them to things that have happened to him - and, of course, he has been to the places he is describing. One of my classmates, John Perry, is being particularly troublesome and is expressing his rebellion in petty ways which embarrasses me, especially when they are aimed to upset my own grandfather. Perry knocks his hymnbook off the pew shelf onto the floor with a clatter. Grandpa ignores it for a moment, then quietly says:

“John, pick your book up.”

Perry does nothing, but stares back with a look of insolence. Grandfather, after telling a few more phrases of the story, bends and picks up the hymnbook himself, replacing it without comment. A few seconds later there is another scuffling noise as the hymnbook is nudged, then flips onto the floor. This time grandpa wordlessly picks up the book again and replaces it on the shelf. A third time and the action is repeated.

Perry looks at his teacher’s eyes and quite deliberately tips the hymnbook off the shelf. Without a word, grandfather bends down and picks it up once more and looks Perry straight in the eyes, as if daring him to do it again. I’m squirming with discomfort and embarrassment.

“Please, Perry, don’t do it. We want to listen.”

“Creep!”

But he sits back and doesn’t do it any more.

Shortly after my promotion to the Senior Department, in the month of June, the annual Sunday School Anniversary is celebrated. This is a big occasion at the church, weeks of practising new hymns, learning rhymes and readings to be displayed in serried ranks in front of an audience of proud parents and starchy chapel widows who bemoan the new and reminisce over the old days when they did it properly. One of the rituals is the election of the Sunday School Queen who will preside over some of the events, particularly the Saturday evening concert. Mr Knight has come into the chapel this week and holds up his hand in characteristic gesture to obtain silence, while the Senior Department leader seeks to shush the signs of hilarity that are threatening to puncture the Superintendent’s solemn pose.

“Boys and girls. The teachers have decided this year that you should be allowed to choose your own Sunday School Queen. I have asked your teachers to hand out a slip of paper to each of you, and you will leave them at the end with the name of your choice. I ask you to think carefully about whom you choose. Let it be someone who will bring honour to our Sunday School, a girl of good behaviour and thoughtfulness like Rose Foster or Peggy Brewer.”

We begin to whisper among ourselves. A name runs up the row between cupped hands, amidst giggles and chortling guffaws. I am blushing inwardly and am trying to shield my voting slip from the other’s gaze while I write in my neat script ‘Barbara Hunt’.

Grandfather watches his charges with amused tolerance during the proceedings, deliberately turning away and pretending not to hear our machinations. He knows, of course, perfectly well whom we are choosing and why. He knows that if we are challenged outright, we would all deny the obvious, this first flexing of our emergent sexual stirrings. He thinks of poor dumpy Rose Foster and gangling bespectacled Peggy Brewer and pities them that their unprepossessing appearance is now joined by Mr Knight’s endorsement, the coup de grace. Barbara Hunt, on the other hand, will be elected for all the wrong reasons but in his view, she’ll make an admirable Queen. She will be natural and graceful; she will not be self-conscious, nor fall up the chancel steps on her way to be crowned. And it might even get her non-churchgoing family interested. She is popular with the other girls; there will be no jealousy or resentment. Grandfather lets the world take its natural course without any attempt to steer or influence it as bidden in the staff meeting beforehand.

Sunday lunch is always a grand occasion. Grandma and Grandpa, Nanna, and Aunt Eva always come to join my parents, Jill and myself in our tiny dining room, squashed around the table in such a way that I always find that I have to manoeuvre myself uncomfortably round one of its thick angular legs. Often we have extra visitors; then the kitchen table is squeezed alongside and I am told to bring down all the chairs from upstairs including the white bathroom stool. Mum will cover the kitchen furniture with her best tablecloth, and with much fussy juggling, we are all wedged into position until only she can move, tripping in and out of the kitchen with steaming tureens.

This Sunday we are being joined by the Misses Allnutt, friends of my Aunt Eva, and teachers, both, in the Primary Department of the Sunday School where one, whom I used to call Auntie Gladys, is the leader, and her sister, who has a fascinating double-chin, is the pianist. I have to remember to keep my elbows off the table to avoid a public scolding, but otherwise I keep myself to myself as I fidget between grandpa and my younger sister, cutting up my meat and putting scraps of fat to the side of the plate, where they are being eyed by our long-haired tabby, ‘Dumpy’, who is sitting sphinx-like on the sideboard, his habitual lunchtime vantage point.

As I eat, the grown-up’s conversation wafts meaninglessly over my head. I am vaguely conscious of dark dresses and rows of pearls, and the fact that the second Miss Allnutt is still wearing her wide-brimmed black hat, an eccentricity that always causes us children much amusement. However, I found out in later years, this was to disguise the fact that her gingery-grey hair was thinning to the point of baldness. My main concern is to avoid detection as I carry out a game of ‘footsies’ with Jill, seeing if I can get away with a sharper kick against her ankle than the activity warrants, without her bursting into tears and complaining about me.

The main course is cleared away and while we are waiting for desert, I become conscious that they are discussing the forthcoming Sunday School Anniversary. I pick my ears up and begin to listen.

“I think the concept of a Sunday School Queen is outmoded,” ventures my father who is immediately rounded on by several of the women present.

“Surely not; it brings in the parents who would otherwise never come near the church…..”

“On the contrary, it is one of the most attractive parts of the Anniversary….”

“We’ve always had a Queen, it’s part of our tradition!”

The sharp featured Miss Gladys then says in a penetrating voice which causes my heart to stop:

“Fancy Barbara Hunt being elected this year! Poor Rose Foster - her mother said she was crying with disappointment afterwards.”

This is the first I know of the result of the election. I feel strangely excited and want to say something, but think better of it and decide to keep my secret.

“You take that risk when you let the children themselves decide. I don’t see why we couldn’t have picked the Queen ourselves as usual. It would have been much fairer and we could have avoided the upset.”

“Why Barbara Hunt though? She’s only been coming to chapel for a few months and her parents have never been near the place.”

“Eva, surely you can see why the children voted for Barbara? She’s much the most popular of the girls,” interposes my grandmother.

“Fred Knight shouldn’t have tried to push the other girls. That just got everyone’s back up.”

“I don’t think whatever he said or did made any difference,” says my grandfather. “All the boys would have voted for her anyway. She’s a pretty little thing!”

At that moment my Aunt Eva catches my eye, and drawing everyone’s attention to her words, suddenly speaks directly to me:

“David, who did you vote for? Did you vote for Barbara Hunt?”

I squirm and hesitate, flushing bright pink. I find I cannot tell a lie although my instinct is to keep my secret. My aunt, sensing that she has struck home, follows up:

“Come on David, tell us! Did you vote for her like all the other boys?”

I think I mutter in the affirmative. My answer, such as it is, is seized upon with glee.

“Why, David, did you vote for her because she is the prettiest?”

I try to deny the obvious, but it is too late now. I have gone redder and redder. Someone, I think it is one of my aunts, suddenly, in a clarity that rings out in the momentary silence, declares:

“I do believe the boy’s in love!”

All of a sudden, everyone around the table bursts into spontaneous laughter. My panicking eyes search each face in turn. Aunt Eva has removed her glasses and is wiping her eyes with her handkerchief, she is laughing so much. Miss Gladys Allnutt’s teeth are grimacing at me through her leering mouth, the other Miss Allnutt’s chins are rippling with mirth. Even my own family is laughing, my grannies, dad, even mum is grinning. Jill is giggling next to me, although I’m sure she’s laughing because everyone else is.

Only grandpa seems to sense my plight.

“Let the boy alone. He only did the same as all the others.”

But the laughter has taken on a life of its own by now. Wave upon wave shakes the little room, even the cat has fled in terror. My obvious embarrassment only increases their hilarity. As I look around, all I can see are gaping mouths, red and raucous, and eyes, spearing me. I feel a surge of panic; I push my stool back and try to extricate myself from the table leg. The laughter still rattles on as I shove with superhuman strength, knocking the stool over and nearly tripping as I turn and try to run out of the room. But my escape is blocked, there are three adults firmly seated between me and the door and I cannot get by them, unless each in turn gets up to make way for me.

I burst into tears and throw myself on the floor and crawl under the legs, blindly bumping into things. I do not care. I claw my way through, bruising myself and them. I nearly leave a foot stuck awkwardly behind a chair leg, but I wrench it free and send another piece of furniture crashing to the ground. I fight my way to daylight, pick myself up and hurl my lightweight frame at the door. Still I am pursued by laughter. Somewhere above the din. I hear my mother calling,

“David, come back, they didn’t mean it! Come back!”

But I shut them from my mind, I escape into the darkness of the hallway and slam the door behind me. I run up the stairs, two at a time, into my own bedroom, throw myself onto my bed and pull the eiderdown over my head.

Vaguely in the distance I hear murmured voices. Then they trail off. “Let him be.” was the only phrase I could decipher.

No-one ever mentioned the incident again.