Lord Dismiss Us (48 page)

‘You don’t seem much upset.’

‘I’d have been ruined if I hadn’t expected it.’

‘I’ll never understand.’

‘Well, that’s how it is. I’m going . . .’

‘In twenty years I won’t understand. I’ll still wonder. All my life I’ll wonder.’

‘That’s silly, that’s the sin of pride. There are things much greater
than us.’

‘But I don’t believe in them! I believed in
this
. I’ll never forget it, never understand. I’ll always wonder.’

‘Good-bye. Don’t come near me!’

‘And I’ll never have complete trust in anyone again. I’ll always be afraid of this. Because I don’t understand it.
You
got tired of me – is that it? Say no. Help me. Now.’

‘I can’t. You can only help yourself – with the help of God.’

‘Oh stop that – stop it. . . . You’re pretending, Nicky. You
must
be. I know you feel as I do. But you’re stronger. Or else you’re weaker and you’re afraid to go on with it. I don’t know . . . I don’t know. . . .’

‘Good-bye.’

Nicky walked smartly away.

Carleton watched his retreating back with disbelief. It was impossible. It couldn’t have happened. The last time he would ever see him. He stood there paralysed with tears in his eyes. The sunny day was a mockery.

How could he face anyone in this state?

But it had to be done. He went apprehensively down to the drive and back up towards the school. Nicky gone. No one in the world now. More and more cars were arriving. No sign of Nicky. Yes, the Rover was there, outside the Music Building. His father sat placidly at the wheel, with a pipe in his mouth. Parents were marching about, with haughty voices, helping to heave trunks, which were piled beside the drive. ‘Derek’ . . . ‘John’ . . . christian-names one had never heard. He reached the window and said, ‘Hallo, my trunk’s across the way.’

‘Right.’

Tall, distinguished, greying, in a brown tweed suit. Very nearly a stranger. He followed his son over the drive, and they lifted the trunk on which Mother had painted ‘T.P.C.’ in large black letters, and carried it over to the boot.

His father dusted off his hands and said, ‘You seem to be taking it badly, old fellow. Sorry to leave?’

‘No, no. It’s . . . nothing.’

They got in the car and his father took an envelope out of the dashboard, saying, ‘Oh, by the way, your mother thought you might be anxious to see this. It came yesterday.’

On the back of the envelope was printed ‘New Arts Review’.

His heart began to beat faster. He tore it open. His father put his hand on the ignition key. Carleton said, ‘Wait! Just a minute!’ The letter read –

Dear Mr Carleton,

Thank you for sending us the ms of ‘Carter and McCracken’, which we are indeed anxious to publish at the earliest possible date. We both considered it a delightful little story. We gather from Eric Ashley’s accompanying letter that you are still at school. In which case you show rare promise.

As you may know, unfortunately literary magazines are not goldmines. We wonder if you would be content with a fee of
15
guineas?

Congratulations.

Angus Davidson

Frank Salmon, Joint Editors

p.s. We particularly liked your ending. It comes off beautifully.

‘Gosh! Look.’

His father read it in a considered manner, moving his pipe between his teeth.

‘That’s good work. I didn’t know you were going in for writing. Of course, you can’t expect these people to come up with much more these days. They’ve got their printing costs and . . .’

But Carleton wasn’t there. Carleton was sitting up somewhere on a bright cloud in the sky.

‘Look, could you wait five minutes? I’ve got to tell Eric Ashley about this. It’s all due to him. I’ve got to tell him. I’ll run. I’ll be back in a minute.’

‘Oh, no, write him . . .’

‘No, no, I must tell him, and thank him. I’ll be back in a second.’

Carleton jumped out, and closed the door. His father looked resigned again. He felt he was several feet above the ground. He wanted to dance, sing, shout. . . . He was a writer. He wanted to tell them all; though he didn’t really see anyone, as he dodged between the parents and trunks, and ran up the stone steps. Eric was the only person worth seeing. Yes, he was Eric now. They were both men, equals, writers. And out in the adult world. Yes, he had the curious feeling as he ran that this little faded place was already nothing; had diminished; the tight little garden, the lawns, the mulberry tree, all tiny, tiny, past and over. The Quad – a few square yards of green. The buildings – small and grey. For goodness sake, how had he ever bothered? . . . shrunken . . . and, blast it, old Rowles came out of the Big Schoolroom door, right in his way, and
he
was totally different already. An old, limited, parochial fogey, stuck in this place. Small, stale, frightened of adventure; not understanding anything when people reached eighteen. The same pitiful polished shoes. Content to stick; unable to do anything else. Old and half-alive and pathetic and a waste of one’s time when the real world began.

‘Sorry, I’m in a terrible hurry.’

‘He didn’t need to do it, Carleton! He didn’t need to do it!’

Carleton paused for a second, thought ‘he’s still on about the Pedant, he must be going off his rocker,’ said ‘Sorry, my father’s waiting,’ and dodged past him round the corner of the Schoolroom. But, gosh, hadn’t there been tears in those pale blue eyes, and hadn’t his voice sounded almost desperate. Why? Why? Was the poor old fellow giving up? End-of-Term and no strength to go on with the farce? Never mind, he would work it out later. He was going to work out
all
these things. Know and contain them all. Eric said he had to. He had to have an insight into people as well as being a writer.

Exuberant, deeply happy, he plunged into the New Buildings and up the stairs, ready to wave the letter, ready to shout – ‘Look at this! The story! – It’s taken!’

He was about to knock on Eric’s door when he saw something pinned there: a small piece of paper and two drawing-pins. On it were written in a complete circle the words – ‘The birde has flowne.’

Puzzled and disappointed, he tried the handle. The door opened. The rather too familiar room was deserted.

‘Ah well,’ he thought, departing. ‘It can’t be helped. I’ll write to him.’

He hurried out of the building and along between the borders. The room had recalled to him the amazing fact that in all this excitement Nicky had passed from mind. That was it. It was over. He was cured. What had Eric said? – ‘freedom comes when the relationship is over.’ It was a memory. A nice one – not like Mr Brownlow. A sweet, gentle, nostalgic one: perhaps he’d see Nicky’s name from time to time in the Old Boys’ Magazine. Meanwhile, he was free. He was walking out into the world, unharmed: it was simply something that was over, and childish. It had left no mark at all. None whatever. Far more important, he was going to write Eric a very special letter of gratitude. He had already begun composing it as went down the steps, and crossed the drive, and joined his father in the car.

‘Sorry. He wasn’t even there.’

‘Do you know where to find him?’

‘No. But if I write they’ll send it on.’

His father started up the engine and drove slowly out between fathers and mothers, and sons who already belonged to Carleton’s past.

Dear Eric,

The most marvellous thing has happened, and it’s all due to you. . . .

Down the rippled concrete, between the oak-trees, for the last, last time.

Dear Eric,

We’ve brought it off! . . .

‘What was your final average?’

‘What?’

‘Batting.’

‘Oh . . . uh . . . fifty-two . . . I think.’

‘You sound rather casual about it. I presume you’ll keep it up at Oxford?’

‘Um . . . I suppose so. I don’t really know.’

Out past the Gate Lodge, on to the main road.

They were humming along in Buckinghamshire, in a new existence.

‘Well . . . it’s over. What does it feel like, knowing that the basis of your life has been formed?’

‘Oh, fine,’ Carleton replied. But he was scarcely listening. He was thinking about that letter.

‘You’ll discover it will all stand you in good stead,’ his father said. ‘Our boarding-school system is still the best in the world.’

He didn’t hear this. He was trying to get that first sentence correct. The letter must be good. It must be absolutely the best he could do.

After all, he was a writer.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Michael Campbell
was born in Dublin in
1924
, the son of Charles Henry Gordon Campbell,
2
nd Baron Glenavy, and Beatrice Elvery. He was educated at St Columba’s College, a boarding school in Dublin – which later served as the model for Weatherhill in
Lord Dismiss Us
(1967)
– and Trinity College, Dublin. He was called to the Bar by King’s Inns, Dublin in
1947
, but quickly turned from the law to journalism, working as an
Irish Times
correspondent in London for several years. Campbell’s first novel,
Peter Perry
, was published in
1956
but was withdrawn after the threat of a libel action. His other comic novels, including
Oh Mary
,
This London
(
1959
),
The Princess in London
(
1964
), and
Nothing Doing
(
1970
), were well received, but Campbell is chiefly remembered for
Lord Dismiss Us
, which was widely praised by critics in Britain, Ireland, and the United States, and is regarded as perhaps the finest novel ever written about English public school life.

  Campbell and his partner, William Holden, a publicity director for the publishing firm of William Heinemann, lived for many years in Oxfordshire, where they were friends and neighbours with the novelist Iris Murdoch and her husband John Bayley; Murdoch was particularly effusive in her praise of
Lord Dismiss Us
.

  When Campbell’s older brother, the humorist and television personality Patrick Campbell, died in
1980
, Michael Campbell succeeded to the title of
4
th Baron Glenav
y
. He died in
1984
.