Susannah
April 1954
Susannah marched up the hill ahead of Kate, who was, as usual, dawdling on her way to school.
‘Come on, we’re going to be late,’ Susannah called back. But Kate seemed to be going even slower.
They had a big math test today, and Susannah was anxious to get to school early so she had time to go over the book again. Math was her weakest subject, but she knew it was crucial she did well if she was to have any chance of getting off this island and going to college. It was a big dream, but Susannah was determined to aim high. She believed it was what her father would have wanted.
She stood at the top of the hill by the church, her hands on her hips.
‘Hurry up!’ she scolded.
Kate broke out into a reluctant run to join her. ‘Aw, Susie, we’re going to be there before everyone else.’
‘That’s the point,’ Susannah said crossly.
‘Why are you always so serious?’ Kate complained. ‘You never come out in the yard at recess. You don’t know about anything that’s going on with anyone else in school.’
‘I don’t care to know what’s going on,’ Susannah said.
‘Sometimes I have to stop the boys calling you names,’ Kate said, looking at her slyly.
‘Like what?’ Susannah asked, surprised. She hadn’t even thought any of the boys noticed her in school. They were all so loud and stupid.
‘Matthew Young said you’re like a schoolteacher already; an old woman, he called you,’ Kate told her. ‘I said you were three times as clever as him and he’s only jealous of you.’
Susannah linked Kate’s arm, touched by her sister’s defence.
‘Thanks, Katie.’
‘You’re welcome,’ Kate said. ‘But you should come out and talk with me and the girls, because you know you do act like an old woman sometimes.’
‘But you know I want to go to college, Kate,’ Susannah said. ‘I have to stay in and study as much as I can.’
Her sister was quiet for a moment. They could hear the patter of rain on the leaves above them as the sky clouded over.
‘Come on, it’s starting to rain, let’s run the rest of the way,’ Susannah said, tugging on Kate’s arm, but her sister held back.
‘Why are you so fixed on getting off the island, Susie?’ Kate said. ‘Don’t you love me and Mom enough to stay?’
‘You know that’s not why, Katie,’ Susannah said, exasperated. She had given up trying to get her mother to understand, but she had hoped Kate would. The rain began to fall in earnest. ‘Come on,’ she said, tugging her again. ‘We’re going to get wet.’
The two girls broke out into a run for the last stretch to the school gates.
The math test went better than Susannah had hoped. Rather than stay in the classroom and read as she usually did at recess, Susannah decided to go out and look for Kate. Try to be a bit more social. They were in different years, but even in the dinner hour they didn’t hang out together. Susannah wasn’t fond of Kate’s two best friends in school – Annie Young, the sister of Matthew and Silas, who was as dim as her two brothers, and Rachel Weaver, the daughter of the owner of the island hotel, a spoilt Daddy’s girl who was always boasting about how rich her father was.
As she walked out of the building, she noticed all the kids were standing in a circle on the other side of the yard, and some of the girls were crying. She saw Kate’s blonde hair among the throng.
‘Hey what’s going on?’ she asked Kate as she pushed in next to her.
‘Oh, look at the poor thing,’ Kate said, pointing to a seagull which was thrashing around in the yard. ‘It just dropped out of the sky right in front of us.’
‘Its wing is broke,’ Annie said, stating the obvious.
‘Oh, I can’t stand to look,’ Rachel said, burying her head in her hands.
‘But how did it happen?’ Susannah asked. For a seagull to drop out of the sky with a broken wing was completely illogical.
None of the girls answered her. Instead, Annie’s two brothers came busting into the crowd.
‘Don’t worry, girls,’ Silas said to them. ‘We’ll put the poor thing out of its misery.’
Matthew knelt down by the bird, while Silas handed him a stone. Matthew raised his arm, and with one swift movement slammed the stone down onto the poor bird’s head. All the girls screamed in unison; even some of the other boys looked white. Matthew kept repeating the action until the bird was clearly long dead. Susannah felt her stomach lurch. That was just too quick. Couldn’t they have tried to fix the bird first?
‘What’s going on here?’ Mr Samuels said, marching towards the gang of teenagers.
‘It had a broken wing, Sir,’ Silas said.
‘We did the kindest thing,’ Matthew joined him.
‘I see, well, good. Thank you, boys,’ Mr Samuels said. ‘Go on back inside, everyone. We’ll get Mr Jenkins to clear it up.’
They all moved away towards the school buildings. Susannah couldn’t bear to look at the dead bird again. It made her stomach churn.
‘Oh, the poor bird,’ Kate said to her. ‘But they did the right thing, didn’t they?’
‘I guess,’ Susannah said as they walked behind Matthew and Silas Young. But as they were going through the doors back into school, she got
