R. Delderfield & R. F. Delderfield (52 page)

'That wouldn't be the slightest use. I've already confronted him, on three separate occasions.'

'You might frighten him with a solicitor's letter.'

'Without anything but hearsay to back it?'

'That's a point. All I know is you can't let it go on. Talk it over with one of the old hands, Howarth or Barnaby, maybe. What I'm really driving at, I imagine, is that if he can whip up a sufficient body of opinion against you he could offer his resignation unless you submitted yours.'

'Would that be best for Bamfylde in the long run?'

'No, it damned well wouldn't! I told you I know more about committees than you do and here's proof of it. If he tendered his resignation on those terms they'd be obliged to ask him to withdraw it, then put the pressure on you. His seniority assures him of that. Can't go above the head of a C.O. on behalf of a sub. Throws the whole damned system out o' gear. The Old Boys would back you, of course, and so, I daresay, would some of those who voted for you, but there are the neutrals, the Any-Way-For-A-Pinters, to think of. In the end they'd come down on Alcock's side, leavin' you high and dry.'

'Then it looks as if I've got to mount a counter-offensive and I think I know how to do it. Isn't that a maxim you professionals favour? The thing to do when your retreat is cut off is to advance?'

'I daresay,' Cooper said, gloomily, 'but damned if I can see how you'll go about it. Keep me in touch when you do, however.'

'You can be sure of that. Could I have that scruffy bit of paper of yours? I'll copy it out and destroy it and I won't quote you, not even with my back against the wall.'

'If I hadn't been sure of that, young feller-me-lad, I'd have kept mum and let things take their course.' He stood looking down across the field at the buildings, etched in the clear evening light. 'Place means a lot to me, P.J.'

'More than Alcock or Powlett-Jones, I imagine.'

'Yes, if I'm honest, but that's how it should be with a man's school. I spent six happy years here. Dam' place taught me everything I know. Funny thing, I often used to picture it in this light when I was sweating it out in temperatures of a hundred plus, on the far side of the world. Always cheered me up somehow.'

4

He had had an inkling of what to do while the brigadier had been listing his shortcomings, according to Alcock. Now, as twilight stole down from the moor, he sought out Molyneux, who he knew was living in school for the holidays while his lodging in the village was being decorated. He did not want Molyneux's advice but he needed his motorcycle, a heavy Brough Superior, that the French master kept in the cycle shed when he was on duty. Molyneux said he wouldn't need the machine until the following day, so David thanked him and called Algy Herries's rectory at Yatton-under-edge, the far side of the moor, catching Algy just as he was leaving to take confirmation class. 'How long will that keep you, Algy?'

'No more than an hour if you're thinking of coming over. Haven't seen much of you this winter but I realise why. The weather's been foul.'

'It's not that,' David said, 'I didn't want to involve you. But now I've no option if I'm to survive.'

'You sound worried, P.J.'

'I am. May I come right over?'

'Of course, I'll warn Ellie. She'll be delighted. We don't get much company until the warm weather sets in.'

Algy's rectory was a large, tile-hung house, built in the era when church attendance was obligatory among a larger population, most of whom had now moved off, the young to the cities, and the middle-aged to places like Lynmouth and Ilfracombe, where the tourist pickings were good. Ellie used no more than half the house but what she called the snuggery was a very cosy room, already beginning to reek of Algy's tobacco.

He told his story simply, guessing that both Algy and Ellie already knew most of it, either from village gossip, Old Boys who had visited them and the one or two conversations he had already had with them on the subject of Alcock. He said, 'I'm not asking you to take sides, Algy. That wouldn't be fair now that you're out of it. It wouldn't be fair on Alcock, either, although he isn't so squeamish by the sound of things. All I want is a straight “Yes” or “Nay” to a course of action I propose taking. After that I'll ask a question or two as to tactics and leave you to await results. Is that understood?'

'Are you lecturing me or asking me how to hit back, P.J.?' but when Ellie exclaimed, 'I think it's
disgraceful…!'
he silenced her with what was, for him,
a savage gesture. 'Keep out of this, woman, it's a man's business,' and she tightened her lips, looking quite unhappy. 'Right, now let's hear what you propose doing.'

'Going over to the offensive before Alcock does. I'm going to write to the brigadier in formal terms, saying it has come to my knowledge that Alcock is slandering me, and request a special meeting of the Governing Body to lay down a directive concerning how much liberty a man has or has not to engage in political activity while serving on the staff.'

'Well, that would certainly stir 'em up, but it would also have a very predictable side effect as regards your future, P.J.'

'In what way, Algy?'

'I really have to tell you that?'

'I came here for advice.'

'Very well, I'll give you more than you bargained for. Point one, write to the Governors by all means, but not to one of them known to be predisposed in your favour. Write to Sir Rufus, the Chairman, and do it officially, through the bursar.'

'But Briggy hinted that Sir Rufus was one of those Alcock had approached.'

'Precisely, and made a bad error of judgment when he did it Why? Because Sir Rufus has been a judge and is the only man on that Board trained to keep an open mind. Dry as a fossil, no doubt, but entirely free of prejudice, take it from me. Make sense?'

'Good sense, Algy. And point two?'

'The crucial one. Don't be the first to introduce that political angle. If it is raised let Alcock be the one to raise it, thereby taking upon himself the risk of involving Bamfylde in a national how-de-do. I went astray there myself during the war. Burnt my fingers defending an Old Boy who claimed exemption as a conscientious objector. Never again. Some of the mud thrown takes years to scrape off. No, no, my boy, your strategy is professional, but your tactics are amateur. Believe me, I've been dealing with Governors the better part of my working life, and if I don't know how many beans make five, nobody does.'

'But surely, that's the main point at issue, isn't it? The one where I can fall back on democratic principle.'

'Democratic fiddlesticks! Do I have to tell you, a crusader in the cause, that only the theory of democracy holds any attraction for the majority? And only then when it suits their book. Face the facts, man. How many headmasters or
school Governors in Britain today wear a red tie? Two per cent? I doubt it, for even the Liberals don't muster a handful. The row would flare up. It would have to if you alleged political persecution. The press would get hold of it, there would be questions in Parliament, God help us all, and I daresay you'd be vindicated in the end – famous, maybe, for twenty-four hours. After that your life would be made so damned uncomfortable you'd be glad to leave, Alcock or no Alcock. There's a much craftier approach than that, my lad, and you're lucky. You have a weapon in your armoury you don't even know about and he put it there!'

'You mean his allegations of disloyalty and indiscipline?'

Herries sighed and said, as an aside to Ellie, 'Bring the brown sherry, m'dear. Several terms under that fool has dulled the man's intellect,' and Ellie rose and crossed to the cupboard where she kept what she still called her 'Old Boys' Decanter'. Herries spread his knees, re-addressing himself to David. 'He's impugned your teaching methods, hasn't he? He's claimed they are eccentric and old-fashioned. Fair enough. So tell me, in terms of round figures, how many boys got a history pass last June?'

'Nineteen. Three distinctions.'

'Out of?'

'I'm not sure, without checking. Twenty-eight or twenty-nine, maybe.'

'You haven't even done your homework, P.J. But you'll have to set about it, quicksticks. In that letter to Sir Rufus you'll enclose a summarised table of pass percentages and distinctions in your subject over all the years you've taught at Bamfylde. They should be impressive, especially when set against those of preceding years. Norrington, the fellow you followed when you came in, like a dog out of the rain, averaged under a dozen a year, I believe. Less in his last three years. I have a flair for remembering these things. I didn't spend all my time sitting on Spyglass Hill, listening to quad gossip.' He got up and moved over to one of his leaving presents, a black-oak Bible box, converted into a desk. In less than a minute he was back again with a file entitled
'Examination Results, 1911-17'.
Opening it he did a quick cast, then beamed at David over the top of the file. 'Better than I thought,' he said. 'Norrington's history passes averaged nine a year, over seven years. Making allowances for the smaller numbers we had in the Fifth throughout the war, that gives you a substantial margin. Around double, I'd say. Something to be said for historical jingles, eh?'

The sherry warmed his belly, and Algy's lively handling of the situation
gave him a foretaste of victory. He said, 'I've always thought of you as the best friend I ever had, Algy… you and Ellie. The best Beth ever had too, and she often said as much. It was different when you were around… we all missed you, but I missed you more than most, perhaps because the others were established when you got to them whereas in my case – it was as you said, a dog coming in out of the rain. And pretty sorry for himself into the bargain. I had no idea how closely you were watching us. I suppose I'd come to think of you as disengaged.'

'It doesn't say a lot for your powers of deduction, boy. Do you imagine Ellie and I could spend half a lifetime building something, then never look at it again? Even from a distance?'

'I've felt damned lonely, particularly since Carter left.'

'Well, I gave you a hint there but you didn't profit from it. Like everyone else you had to learn from experience.'

'Don't we all?'

'Yes, I suppose we do,' Herries conceded, 'even in a backstairs business such as this, but there's no sense in turning up your proud Celtic nose at a short cut, is there?'

'No sense at all. Thank you, Algy, more than I can say. I'll hurry off now, for I mean to get that letter off tonight.'

'Ah, you can't do that, I'm afraid. It's been a long day. A wedding, three christenings, a funeral and a confirmation class. Frankly, I don't feel up to it.'

'You don't feel up to what?'

'Do you think I'd trust you to write that letter without an edited draft? What's on the diary for tomorrow, Ellie?'

'Tomorrow is Sunday,' Ellie said, primly.

'My God, so it is! Well, that's a bore. You'll just have to contain yourself until Tuesday, won't you. Afternoon post probably. And tell me all about that book of yours. Ellie was very impressed to hear it was being published at last.'

'You know about “The Royal Tigress"? But I only told Grace!'

'I have a very long telescope,' Algy said. 'It can range freely over three parishes, yours, mine and the one in between.' Somewhere, deep in the recesses of the rambling house, a small bell tinkled.

'That,' said Ellie, 'will be Mrs Shawe, telling us dinner is served. Imagine ringing a bell for cold pheasant and pickles? I've always thought it silly but she will do it.'

'It came to her ears,' Algy said, 'that for years and years and years our lives had been regulated by bells, my dear.'

'Ah, but that was a real bell, Algy. Hers is an Alpine tinkle, half-heard among the edelweiss.'

'I say, that's rather neat,' Algy said, cocking his head like a robin, ' “Half-heard among the edelweiss". Yatton-under-Edge has reawakened the muse in you. Perhaps you can go back to composing your greeting verses thus augmenting our pitiful stipend.' He turned to David. 'Did I ever tell you that family secret, P.J.? Before we married, Ellie earned pinmoney writing verses for birthday and anniversary cards. What did they pay you, m'dear?'

'A guinea a gross,' Ellie said, 'and it was very hard work, I can tell you.'

'Sweated labour, I'd say. P.J. will get somebody at Westminster to look into it.'

They were now, he decided, well launched on one of their time-honoured pursuits, an elaborate leg-pull that had, as its unspoken object, the disarming of an audience and a general relaxation of tension. Over the years he had watched them at it. With boys, with parents, with visiting notabilities, all manner of people who drifted in through Big School arch with their problems and grouses. They were very, very good at it, so good indeed that it was impossible not to humour them.

He got up, and Algy led the way into the austere dining-room across the hall. Three places were laid at the Sheraton table. Presentation silver winked from the sideboard. Above it, hanging three degrees out of true, was an oval portrait of a rotund little man in the frock coat and punishing cravat of the early nineteenth century, Ellie's grandfather, he believed, who had been a vintner with a prosperous business in Tunbridge Wells. The vintner looked very much at home here, far more so than when he had sat peering down between framed photographs of First Elevens in what was now Alcock's monastic parlour at Bamfylde.