Bums on Seats (8 page)

CHAPTER 10

1988

The Zombek Embassy Rolls Royce glided with impassive nonchalance up the long driveway to the turning circle in front of Tillfield School's grand old portico. The weathered Ionic columns stared back down the broad steps at the huge black mechanical form of transport with indifference. There was a time when the pupils returned from an exeat day in a gig or brougham. The liveried chauffeur assisted the ambassador. His young charge, Luke Nweewe, son of the President, ran around from the other side and gave a hand.

“Here we are Uncle. Hold on to my arm. Come and sit on a seat in the sun.”

“You're a thoughtful boy, Luke.”

“Not at all, Uncle. I'm very grateful that you took me out for my exeat. We did have a good day, though, didn't we?”

“We bloody well did. I won three hundred pounds on that last steeplechase. How about you Luke?”

“I've ended up ahead overall. Has the day brought on your arthritis, though?”

“No! It's the weather here. Such a shame. It's a safe place to live, with good people and many things to do. But you never know from one day to the next if you'll ever see the sun again. The women are friendly, when you get to know them, though a bit bony. Not like home, Luke.”

“I like it here Uncle. The chaps are a good lot.”

The Ambassador noted the boy's typically English public school statement with satisfaction. It would all help with the three-monthly progress report to his brother, the President. “Have you enough money, Luke?”

“Yes, thanks. Dad gives me an allowance and then expects me to make my way.”

“And do you … make your way?”

“Very nicely, Uncle. Now that I've started my final year, I've become the sixth-form bookmaker! I think I'd prefer Dad not to know that, though. He might worry.”

“I shan't tell him, Luke.” And he wouldn't, but it was a further helpful insight. “What sort of things do they bet on?”

“Oh, all sorts. I'm in partnership with Abraham Goldbloom. He's good at statistics and in our dorm. When we started, and one of the masters found out, he had a quiet word with us. He said we could carry on as long as what we did helped our punters understand how life worked. So we don't try and compete with proper bookmakers. We offer odds on things like ‘Who will be the next Government Minister to be disgraced?' ‘Which country might the U.S. bomb next?' ‘Who will be the first chap in our dorm to have the head gardener's daughter?' That sort of thing. Almost all the fifth and sixth year bet on something or other. It's a substitute for sex and it's profitable.”

The Ambassador laughed. “That's very enterprising, Luke. Who will be the first with the gardener's daughter?”

“Well, Uncle, only six boys have been backed so far. But we've taken a lot of money. The hot favourite is Alastair McGivern, he's captain of the school cricket team and nearly eighteen. He's had a woman before. I'm the outsider and we're offering long odds about me.”

“So who will be the first, Nephew?”

“Oh, I shall, Uncle, but not for another two weeks, when we've taken more cash. I managed to chat the girl up in the refreshment tent at the summer fête. She'd had some drink at the time and so had I. Well, she looked to me like a bit of a goer, so I just explained outright about the betting and offered her half the profits.”

“Half the profits is rather a lot isn't it, Luke?”

“I've come to the conclusion that it usually pays to be generous and then to ask a lot for your money.”

The ambassador looked both thoughtful and pleased. “What did she say, Luke?”

“She laughed like a drain, shook hands on it, said ‘You're on mate' and walked away. Since then, at our suggestion, she's attended all our cricket matches here and clapped Alastair all the way out from the pavilion to the wicket, and back. We've taken more than eighty pounds on him!”

The ambassador, his arthritis quite forgotten, was still laughing when the Rolls Royce was 10 miles up the road. There was no doubt about it, he thought, English public schools are excellent at bringing out people's initiative and determination.

*************

“Right then! Who can produce an algebraic expression for the sum and difference of the binomial (A + B)
₂
(A – B)
₂
? Nobody? Wonderful! Flaming wonderful! I can see you need double prep on algebra all this month!” Jeremy Smythe, Maths Master, turned back to the blackboard, filling it with scribbled expansions as fast as his fingers would move.

Luke looked at the back of the master's head and marvelled. It was shaped a bit like a cannonball, or perhaps a Christmas pudding, but that couldn't account for his superiority, surely. His brain seemed crammed full of useful things to make sense of numbers. Luke applied himself valiantly to absorbing the information this man was so desperately keen to share.

*************

“Keep the noise down, you'll get us rusticated!” Luke turned the duplicate key in the caretaker's landing cupboard door. They manhandled his aluminium ladder into position and the six lads climbed into the roof space. They pulled the ladder up after them and replaced the trapdoor. Alastair McGivern struck a match and lit candles. They made off to the front-most corner of the building, over the music room. You knew you'd arrived by the strange sight and the even stranger noises. Some wag had stuck a handwritten sign to the brickwork, “Tillfield Winery”.

They had taken to brewing their own wine. Between them, they had more than a hundred bottles on the go: some for personal consumption, some for selling on to augment funds. The unique feature of the brewery was that each bottle, instead of the usual air trap, had a condom attached at the neck by an elastic band. As the brew fermented, the gas built up in the condom causing it to erect and expand. When the pressure in the condom reached a high level, the gas escaped back past the elastic band and immediately deflated the condom, causing it to flop. When you were close by, you heard a strange and rhythmic cacophony of hisses and flops. Luke thought the physics and chemistry masters would have thoroughly approved. The music mistress would have orchestrated it, in no time at all!

Alastair McGivern felt pleased. After yesterday's match, Sharon, the gardener's daughter, had come around the back of the pavilion for a kiss and cuddle. She'd even let him put his hands inside her blouse. He'd felt as if his trousers would burst with the pleasure of it, before she pulled herself away. He told no one, but now sought out Abe Goldbloom. What price on me today, Abe?”

“Well, you're the clear favourite. I can only give you five to four, I'm afraid.”

“Go on, that's not very good, is it? You can do better than that!”

“Alright then, for you Alastair, six to four!”

“I'll take it,” he said triumphantly, “Another five pounds on myself!”

Word soon got round, thanks to Abe ensuring that it did, that Alastair was backing himself again. This produced a further flurry of betting on him. Meanwhile, however, Sharon was having second thoughts about her bargain with Luke. The money would be great for new clothes. But Alastair was good-looking and seemed to really like her. And he'd felt terrific behind the pavilion. It had been as much as she could do to push his hands away. She might be able to land him as her bloke, if she played it carefully. Well, she was good-looking, too and there's nothing wrong in aiming high! This wanted thinking about.

“Luke, we need to be a bit careful with this betting about Sharon. We've taken nearly £200 pounds, mostly on Alastair.”

“But that's good, Abe, isn't it? What's the worry?”

“My Dad says it's always a good thing to leave 10% to the other party!”

“What does that mean, Abe?”

“It means, don't try to squeeze every last penny out of a deal, Luke. While you're gloating about what you're going to make, you stop thinking about how to ensure you don't lose it. My Dad says you need to make sure the other party stays happy, too. In this case perhaps we should give Sharon more? It will make it harder for her to let us down.”

Thinking about it, Luke saw the simple, common sense in what Abe said. “When we've settled the few winning bets that people have made on me, how much will we have left?”

“About a hundred and seventy pounds, Luke. Let's give Sharon a hundred. It sounds a nice sum and it will look nice as a bundle of five-pound notes. Much better that we end up with seventy pounds rather than nothing!”

“Agreed!” Abe's business acumen would result in him becoming a millionaire before his 26th birthday. Luke's ability to select the right associates and, also, to take their counsel and act upon it, would bring him great political success, later in life. But neither of them were blessed or, according to one's point of view, cursed with an ability to see the future.

Henry Bladesworth, English Master, chalked another faulty sentence on the blackboard. ‘As our Minister for European Affairs, no one did more to help understanding.' “I heard a Member of Parliament say that on the radio last evening. What's wrong with that sentence?”

Luke thought he knew, but said nothing. He was keeping a low profile in everything at the moment. After a few seconds Justin Mayhew offered, “As said, the Minister for European Affairs appears to be no one. That's because the participial phrase does not refer to the grammatical subject.”

“Well done, Mayhew!”

Luke enjoyed Language Studies. He could parse sentences competently and had an aptitude for declensions and conjugations. He recognised the power of language and worked at mastering it. But at this point he stopped listening and thought about Mayhew.The chap had aspirations to be a journalist.To that end, he wrote and produced the sixth form news broadsheet called ‘Happening Now!' He wrote under the by-line of Yazza. Luke had just realised how Yazza might help solve a problem for himself and Abe.

*************

It was the final match of the county schools' cricket tournament. Tillfield were at home to the Prince Henry School, one of the remaining independent grammars. Luke and Abe decided that this had to be the day. Luke showered and shaved and splashed his face and torso liberally with Vice! This was a much-advertised aftershave of the moment, guaranteed to ensure success with women, and very popular with young men. He pulled on freshly pressed grey flannels and a sparkling white shirt, before donning the bright red Tillfield regulation blazer. He wanted to look the part in a crowd of perhaps a hundred spectators. There would be some parents and relatives and a few dignitaries in attendance. What a beautiful day. England at it's very best.

At the field, people were unloading deckchairs and food hampers from car boots. Luke walked about casually, ensuring he was seen. In a while, he spotted Sharon arrive. She looked stunning in full-skirted, flowery dress and white sandals, with matching white, chunky beads around her neck. Luke forced his eyes to travel on. On the pavilion veranda, Yazza jotted notes in his reporter's notebook. More cars arrived. Alastair emerged from the pavilion in his immaculate whites. Sharon moved into his line of sight. Alastair gave a gleaming smile. Sharon responded with a little wave. Yazza scribbled.

Fate, as often seems the case, intervened at that moment and rewarded the adventurous. One of the last cars to arrive disgorged an imperious looking woman and an attractive girl in her late teens. They made their way to the spectators' lawn. Alastair had been waiting for his aunt and cousin. He loved a personal audience. He would reward them, he thought, with some flashing cover drives and heroic boundaries. He hurried to them.

His aunt presented her cheek, which he duly saluted. When it was his cousin's turn the poor girl, who fancied him something rotten, got carried away and turned her face to receive him full on the lips. She compounded the act by wrapping her arms around his neck and clinging on for a few seconds. Luckily, by then her mother was striding off and didn't see. But Sharon did! She felt sick with jealousy. Yazza's pen went into overdrive.

Alastair made his way out to the wicket with the opposing captain for the toss. He won, and elected for Tillfield to bat. When Alastair, with batting partner, again strode to the wicket, Sharon did not clap. Instead, she disconsolately found a seat just below the pavilion rail. Ten seconds later Luke lowered himself into the next chair. The match started. The third ball was loosely delivered. Alastair caught it in the middle of the bat and sent it whizzing to the boundary. Luke clapped vigorously. Sharon said casually. “Who are those guests of Alastair's?”

On the spur of the moment Luke said, “Oh, they're family friends of his. They're all in the same hunting set, I believe. The girl is his fiancée and the woman is her mother.”

“Fiancée!”

“Yes,” he continued imaginatively, “They've been friends for years. They became engaged a few months ago. They'll wait of course until Alastair finishes university. But they wanted it to be official.”

Luke instantly regretted his inspiration. The girl looked crestfallen. But her face soon recomposed. He reached in his blazer pocket and produced a large hip flask. It had been a present from his uncle and was meant to sustain him when they visited the horse races in winter. An hour before he set out today, Abe had filled it with a strong gin and lemon mix. Abe was too sensitive to ask if Luke needed to augment his courage but he had thought that Sharon might react better if she was softened up. Abe had extraordinary insight for a seventeen-year- old.

Luke took a swig, applauded an easy two-run stroke from Alastair, wiped the neck of the flask with a clean hanky and offered a drink to Sharon. “Gin and Lemon?” Alastair's cousin, sitting a few chairs away, had jumped to her feet to applaud his last hit. Sharon reached for the flask and drank deeply. After a minute's glum silence, Luke ventured, “Life's a bugger sometimes Sharon. Anyway, I'd prefer you to her any day!”