Edward

Sometimes I worried about the kids I taught. Really worried about them. Not because they did not learn, but because they seemed so vulnerable in such an unforgiving environment. It was these kids who kept me awake at night.

Just one day home from the maternity hospital, Edward was crying uncontrollably.

His mum went round to see Maggie next door, and Maggie, knowing the family well, came right away. Had Edward been fed ? No. Had Edward been changed ? No. Did they have any nappies ? Yes, but not sure when to use them. Or how.

Changed and fed, Edward quietened down, and began the arduous and chancy road to survival.

His parents were characters, well known in the community, and supported by it. But they were not easy and often did not even realise that they needed a little help.

Maggie, elderly and endlessly loving, was some kind of over-worked voluntary guardian angel. Everyone called her Auntie Maggie.

Edward was in my class. At 10 he was unique in my experience. He had an unfinished look about him, and slightly crazy Boris Johnson hair which he continually swept back with surprisingly delicate fingers. He appeared to have been built from blueprints drawn using a confusion of scales.

He spoke in an unlikely falsetto monotone which was slightly unnerving. He was eager, so eager, to please, and worked very hard to make sure he gave satisfaction. He would be the first to volunteer for any job, and occasionally I would give him one, knowing that it would need a team to rectify the damage afterwards.

Edward was always jumpy, nervous, on edge. He jiggled a lot, as if something was trying to get out. He was forever glancing round when he was talking to me, looking for unseen attack. It was as if he was being pursued by an invisible swarm of angry bees. 

Edward was an unguided missile. His clumsiness was legendary. He would trip over chalk lines, dust-bunnies, contours. Negotiating even flat surfaces could leave him ambushed and prone. But he would be vertical again in a second, with profuse falsetto apologies, and he would be breathlessly away on his mission to please. 

Safelty was always a concern, and in his hands the most docile of everyday objects could suddenly become unpredictable. During a Christmas pageant in church, Edward carried the candle snuffer, a sort of narrow brass cone on a pole which had been entrusted to him by the vicar. Placed gently over a candle, the little cone would extinguish the flame, leaving a wisp of meditative smoke twisting languidly to the rafters. We had no actual candles, and the candle snuffer was merely ornamental. What could possibly go wrong ? 

Edward processed up the aisle with an odd mixture of pride and nervousness, glancing side to side at the audience. Looking ahead, he missed his footing, fell over a small step, and lunged at the vicar, the candle snuffer, now a sort of spear, held before him. The vicar, seized with unexpected agility, leapt out of Edward's path and the candle snuffer, now airborne, thwacked into the woodwork where the vicar had been only nano-seconds before. Without missing a beat, and ignoring the gasps of the assembled, he helped Edward to his feet and the show went on, with Edward glancing anxiously over both shoulders.

In class, Edward loved work. As he saw it, the main idea was to fill as many exercise books as possible, some with maths, some with writing. And with that unswerving mission he set to number and stories as a child possessed. No matter that he wrote nonsense, or that none of his maths ever came close to a right answer. He eagerly took work home and returned with page after relentless page of diligent drivel. He could not be deterred. This was what he felt school was about, and he was determined to make a good job of it, to do his level best.

Every child in my class had a tree. We had been given some land, and we planted trees there. Everyone had their own, and tended it from sapling onwards. We went down now and then to weed and to check the stakes. The kids were very proprietorial about their trees. 

Kneeling one cold day to hack away weeds too stubborn for the kids, Edward's falsetto appeared behind me. "Mr Hepworth, there is something wrong with my tree." 

Without turning round, I assured him that I would be over in a minute and would check his tree. There was a silence, and then the falsetto repeated. "Mr Hepworth, there is something wrong with my tree." Impatiently I repeated my answer, and the line went dead for a minute as Edward went away.

Then the voice came again, and I was ready for it.... "Mr Hepworth... " I turned and saw Edward standing still, holding his tree in both hands. He had brought it over to save me the walk.

Playing rounders or stool-ball Edward was as ineffectually determined as ever, and never tired of trying to hit the ball. Though he had no friends as such, and seemed unconcerend by the fact, the kids were enlessly patient and supportive. When he failed to hit the ball, they were always keen for him to have another try. One day when he accidentally hit it, they all cheered warmly, genuinely. 

The candle snuffer incident opened doors for Edward. He decided that he liked the church, and wanted to take an enthusiastic part. The vicar was happy to give Edward a safe haven and I suppose he continued in much the same incorrigible spirit as when he had been in my class.

One evening, when walking home to his parents' house, Edward stumbled in front of a car. He was 25.

Today, and every day, he rests, all nervousness gone, on the soft hillside overlooking his tree and just 50 metres from his home.

A girl from his class wrote to tell me the news. She knew I would want to know.