Jamie is confused by the picture he’s looking at. Mrs Baird is trying to tell him that this animal, an elephant, is four times the height of a human. He doesn't trust her, but then again, she was right about the crocodile. He had been allowed to hold its tooth and it was bigger than his thumb. He is glad there are no animals like that here on the Orbiston estate. He loves animals, but the tooth had given Jamie the shivers.
Jamie has been living on the Orbiston estate as a part of the Babylon Community for about five months now. It was a nice place where he went to school instead of working in the mills. Folk shared food, everyone had a comfy bed, and his mum and dad had a bit more time to spend with him. A rich man called Robert Owen had made a ‘socialist village’ called New Lanark nearby and had given Jamie’s community £10,000 to help set it up! Babylon was smaller than New Lanark but similar, not exactly paradise but one thousand times better than the Calderbank Cotton Mill.
Before Babylon, he and his father would leave for work in the dark, his mother shoving bannocks in their pockets for lunch. Then he’d spend the day crawling under the monstrous, clanking machines cleaning up oil drips and fishing out lint and scraps of material that could jam the mills. These were children’s jobs because their fingers were small enough to reach inside the mechanisms, but it was dangerous, and there were horrible accidents. It was exhausting too. Jamie had often worked 12-hour shifts, and if he took too many breaks the factory foreman could be very cruel and would punish him. Jamie was always scared. He still has nightmares about terrible machine monsters trying to catch and eat him.
"A word, Jamie?” Mrs Baird calls. Jamie blinks. His mind has been away back in the cotton mill, and he has only just noticed that his classmates are all getting up to leave for lunch. He quickly gets to his feet too.
“After lunch we will be on the green practising our dance for the May Day festival. I trust you won’t be late again, Jamie? “
“No, Mrs Baird” he says.
“No stomach aches? Sore heads? No trips to the laundry to clean the mud off your smock, which I note you still haven’t done?"
“No, Mrs Baird,” he repeats sheepishly.
"On the green when you hear the bell then, Jamie."
He nods. He is determined not to get into any more trouble. He might get thrown out, and his family might get thrown out, and he can’t let that happen. He will just have to deal with his own secret work quickly.
The Babylon dining hall is a large wooden room with big windows overlooking the trees and fields of the Orbiston estate. Someone has put little bunches of lilac flowers on the long rows of tables, adding colour and a sweet smell to the room. The hall is not yet busy as the workers have lunch a little later, but Jamie sees his mother. She has a sprig of lilac tucked behind her ear and though she is busy chatting with the other women in the kitchen, she gives him a big wave through the serving hatch when the children come in. He hopes he might get an extra biscuit today, but he doesn’t. He gets a bowl of chicken broth, a roll and one biscuit - like everyone else. Adults here talk a lot about making things equal.
Jamie is in a hurry. He wolfs down his soup but is careful to avoid eating the thin chicken strips. When no one is looking, he fishes them from the bottom of the bowl and wraps them in his handkerchief.
Jamie takes his dish to the clearing hatch, catching a kiss blown by his mother, then slips out of the dining hall, weaving through the arriving workers like a quiet little stoat. As soon as he’s outside he runs across the green, around the back of the sleeping quarters, making his way through the trees towards an old shed.
It is dark inside the shed. Jamie makes his way to the back. Every surface is covered in spider webs and decades of dust. Coiled ropes and metal boxes are stacked against walls, and serious-looking hammers and sharp tools litter shelves.
Jamie carefully lifts an oil cloth he has stretched over two barrels. Nestled in the shadow beneath, on an old potato sack, is Jamie’s secret - a barn owl he has been nursing back to health.
"Hello, Minerva," he greets softly. Her bright eyes slowly look up at Jamie and blink.
Jamie checks that there is plenty of water in the chipped bowl he had found for her. Then, he unwraps his handkerchief and dangles the strips of chicken close to her beak. Minerva continues to look at him but doesn’t move. "C'mon, I know it's not worms, but it'll help you get your strength back." And as if understanding, the bird tentatively begins to peck at the chicken.
“So this is Minerva?”
Jamie jumps. Mrs Baird is standing in the doorway; she must have followed him. He turns weak with fear. He’s in for it. He has ruined everything; his family will surely be thrown out of Babylon, and they’ll have to go back to Calderbank Mill. His whole body starts shaking.
“Did you name her after the Roman gods we were learning about?” Mrs Baird's voice is calm but curious. Jamie, still shaking, manages to nod in response.
“And is this why you've been late to dance practice?" Mrs Baird continues, her tone softening slightly. Jamie nods again, feeling heavy guilt settle in his chest.
“Can Minerva fly?”
Jamie finds his voice, but it comes out in a whisper. “Not yet. She injured her wing somehow, but I don’t think it’s broken, and she’s getting stronger every day.”
He can’t help himself blurting out. “Am I in trouble? Are you going to send my family back to the mills? I really don’t want to go back there.” “No, Jamie,” answers Mrs Baird. “In fact, I think an announcement should be made at dinner tonight that everyone is to avoid this area, as an owl is recuperating under expert supervision. Perhaps, if you permit it, the class can visit in small groups tomorrow? I also think the vet in question should be allowed an extra portion of treacle tart for pudding.”
Jamie looks at her. And then, suddenly, tears start to fall, surging out of him like water through a weir dammed up from all those years working in the mill, now finally able to flow.
Mrs Baird sits with him in the dark, continuing to marvel at Minerva and the excellent care Jamie has been providing, and slowly his tears dry up. Eventually, he takes a great big, heaving, shuddery breath. Mrs Baird helps him place the oilcloth back into position over Minerva, and they leave the shed together.
"One of the good things about being the teacher, Jamie,” says Mrs Baird with a spring in her step, “Is that I decide when to ring the bell, so I'm never late." With a playful smile, she rings the handbell, and Jamie runs to join his friends on the green.
