Room 2D

From New Blushes 2.20 ‘Hello Fiona.’ ‘Hello sir.’ She closes the door quietly behind her, then goes to stand at attention in front of Mr Brunton’s desk. It is five o’clock, after normal school hours, but school hasn’t finished for Fiona Daltry. It is time for a special training session with Mr Brunton. Henry Brunton, fiftyish and with his bald head and round glasses giving him a somewhat owlish look, is in charge of the school WRAF Cadet Unit. It is an active group because St Monica’s has the RAF Western Command Headquarters just a few miles away and quite a few of the staff send their daughters to the school. Service officers are keen to have proper discipline for their daughters. Well-trained girls make decorous, disciplined young women, the kind of young women a fellow officer will be happy to have as a wife. So the school’s Cadet Unit is well supported. And Henry Brunton you could say has a pretty free hand in disciplining...

For most of its modern incarnation Janus magazine featured a one-off drawing by one of its resident artists on the Contents page. These warrant more attention than a glance in passing as one avidly checks the line up of delights in a newly acquired mag. Paula Meadows provided the illustrations from issue 16 to 43 and then returned to do a few more from issue 152 onwards. Here is a first batch of five. From Janus 16. A smashed vase while dusting will cost this young chambermaid dearly at the hands of the stern housekeeper. From Janus 18. Some priceless facial expressions — the schoolgirl awaiting her turn with the Head looks like she might wet herself with fright. From Janus 19. A nice schoolgirl portrait but nothing particularly indicating that a punishment is in the offing. From Janus 20. Some nautical discipline being applied to a young rating by the Captain. From Janus 21. This is clearly a household with old-fashioned...

From Uniform Girls 1 Group Captain Brian Marshall’s office was to say the least, sparsely furnished. However, he liked it that way. His desk was bare but for his diary and a single sheet of paper. In front of his desk was a plain wooden chair; on the wall facing him hung a mirror. In this the Group Captain could see himself reflected. Vanity? Possibly… but the mirror had been there when he had arrived on the station and he had never bothered to have it removed. Now he looked into that mirror, seeing a head which was steadily balding and a face somewhat lined after twenty four years in the Royal Air Force — ever since he was twenty. One year to go before he could take retirement and a nice fat gratuity. But would he do that? Now, having risen steadily through the ranks to become a Station Commander, with his highly respectable rank, there were quite a number of perks which he would surely miss in civilian life. Like Flight Lieu...