Past All Forgetting by Sara Craven Page A

adaptability would have been enough, she thought. Any child, but especially one who had apparently spent her earliest years in the war-torn inferno of Vietnam, needed security and stability.
    Perhaps Rian intended to provide this now. Maybe this was why he had come home to this small grey market town nestling in the slopes of the Pennines, but was this the right setting for Fleur? Could the little girl be happy in an environment so totally alien to everything she had been used to?
    As she returned to the classroom with the children when assembly was over, she glanced round furtively, but Rian was nowhere to be seen. In this topsy-turvy day, it wouldn't have come wholly as a surprise if Mrs Parsons hadn't invited him to sit in on her classes for the rest of the morning, she thought, seething.
    Once back in her room, she closed the door on the world and her problems and devoted her mind and energies to the children. While the other children worked and whispered in their groups, she gave Fleur a reading test, discovering that the child had an extensive vocabulary, although her fluency in stringing words together was poor. At the end of the test, she spoke encouragingly to Fleur, telling her she. had done well, and added a few words in French. She was rewarded by a flood of eager words in the same language, far too fast for her to follow, as she was laughingly forced to admit. Fleur looked disappointed but resigned, and Janna guessed she must be getting used to this reaction in this cold grey country which was now her home.
    Although she was not on playground duty, she kept a wary eye open out of the staff room window when playtime came to see how the other children reacted to this stranger in their midst. Fleur was engaged in a game of hopscotch with the girls at her work-table, but watching her across the expanse of tarmacadam, Janna got the oddest feeling that although she was joining in the game, Fleur would have been just as happy on her own. She had none of that eagerness to be accepted that so often marked newcomers to the school. She accepted the other children's overtures, but if they had not been made, she would have been equally unconcerned Janna thought, puzzled. Yet it was impossible to feel sorry for her. She gave an inward sigh, and turned her attention back to Beth, who had spent a few days in London during the holiday and was eager to regale her with the details, including a visit to the Festival Hall.
    During the afternoon break, someone remarked how the first day after the holidays always dragged, but Janna could not join in the general chorus of agreement. She felt the day had flown by, after the awkwardness of its beginning. After the promised painting session, she was glad to have an excuse to stay behind in the classroom and finish clearing up. Rian Tempest would almost certainly be collecting his daughter from school, and she wanted to keep out of his way as much as possible. She was terrified that he would make some excuse to seek her out. He seemed to have Mrs Parsons' permission to come and go as he pleased in the school, she thought crossly. But the only masculine footsteps to pass her door were those of the caretaker, Mr Reynolds, and when she left the school a quick glance around assured her that Rian's car was nowhere in sight. She breathed a quick sigh of relief and hurried home.
    Her mother had a neatly laid tea tray waiting
for
her in the sitting room, and the house was full of baking smells and the promise of a casserole. Janna sniffed appreciatively as she sank down on the sofa and accepted the steaming cup her mother handed to her.
    'Thanks, Mummy.' She pointed with mock-dismay to a vivid splash of yellow at the side of her skirt, the result of a piece of short-lived action painting by one of the boys. 'See what I meant about old clothes?'
    Mrs Prentiss' reply was noncommittal as if her thoughts were elsewhere, and Janna gave her a surprised glance. But the explanation was soon