Ultimate Prizes (29 page)

“We belong to different generations, Darrow.”

“Yes—and mine was the one infatuated with scientific advances! I’d have thought that your generation would have recovered from that love affair by now, particularly after Hiroshima.”

I suddenly identified the missing half of the
déjà vu
experience: Alex had used almost identical language in expressing his relief that I would be keeping a benign eye on his secret family if Ashworth failed to come home. He had seen the easing of his anxiety about Lyle’s boys as a sign of God’s forgiveness. They, like Arthur, would be “all right.” He no longer needed to worry about them. They had become a symbol of God’s saving grace and atonement.

“By the way,” I said abruptly, thinking of Lyle, “how’s Charles Ashworth?”

“Much better. He’s going to spend some time with me later this week.”

“It’s a miracle he’s alive. I never thought he’d come back,” I said, for Ashworth had survived not only the prison camp where he had spent the months following the fall of Tobruk, but the concentration camp to which he had been transferred in 1944 after aiding fellow-prisoners to escape. Once he had passed through those gates he had sunk to the status of a missing person, unable to write letters and beyond the reach of the enquiries made by the Red Cross. In 1945 after the liberation of the camp he had been obliged to spend some time in a military hospital, but now he had been discharged and Lyle, leaving her temporary home in Starvale St. James, had resumed her married life in Cambridge. I thought of little Charley, shining-eyed, waving his Union Jack. Amidst all the bereavement I encountered as a clergyman it was heartening to hear of a family who had not hoped for a reunion in vain.

“What made you ask about Charles out of the blue like that?” said Darrow curiously as I drove under the archway into the Close.

I could hardly talk about Alex’s secret family and my guilty memories of Lyle. “You mentioned Hiroshima,” I said, “and I thought of the prisoners of war in the Far East, able to come home as the result of the bomb. Then I thought of the POWs in Europe.” In an effort to change the subject I asked: “What happens now?”

“Drive to the College, please. You can leave your car there and come home with me for a few hours. I’ve made all the arrangements.”

I boggled. “You’re not working this afternoon?”

“By a fortunate coincidence I’d already arranged to take the afternoon off. I’ll tell you about that later.”

“But what about
my
work? I’m supposed to be making a visitation at—”

“So your senior curate informed me. It’s been cancelled.”

“Well, in that case perhaps I should stay at home and catch up on my other work. Quite apart from the usual pile of letters which have to be answered, I’ve got to write a homily for a wedding next Saturday, a sermon for Sunday Matins, a draft report for the diocesan committee on—”

“There’ll be time for all that later—the weekend’s still a long way away. I’m sorry, Aysgarth, but I’m not letting you out of my sight at the moment. It’s too dangerous. You might start drinking again.”

“I must say I find that a most offensive statement!”

“Are you going to pick a fight with me? Save your energy and just accept that you’ve been removed from circulation for twenty-four hours!”

“
Twenty-four hours?
”

“After you’ve passed the afternoon with me at Starrington Magna you’ll take the five-thirty train to London to see Aidan and spend the night at the Fordite headquarters. Everything’s arranged,” said Darrow, and dimly I grasped how relieved I was that he was still playing the tank in his characteristically highhanded fashion. Some unexpected emotion stirred within me. For a moment I was unable to identify it. Then I realised it was gratitude.

Feeling weak and confused but improbably
compos mentis
, I began to drive down the North Walk to the Theological College.

4

No sooner had I turned into the North Walk than I spotted the vast black Rolls-Royce waiting for us outside the College entrance. This magnificent motor, which I had long secretly coveted, belonged to Darrow’s second wife, the wealthy landowner whom he had swept to the altar soon after he bounced out of his monastery in 1940. It was typical of Darrow that he had wound up marrying a Rolls-Royce and a manor house in addition to a woman twenty-eight years his junior. Darrow never did anything by halves. He usually managed to avoid flaunting the Rolls and was careful to stress how much he enjoyed bicycling (like many men of his generation he had never learnt to drive), but there were times when he commandeered the motor and brazenly left it lying around in the Close to scandalise the inhabitants. Clergymen are just not supposed to swoop around in chauffeur-driven Rolls-Royces. Dr. Ottershaw used to cringe whenever a sighting was reported to him.

“I sent for the Rolls to save time,” said Darrow airily. “I have an appointment at home with an architect at quarter-past three.”

“I see,” I said dryly, parking my car a respectful six feet from the Rolls’s noble bumper.

The ancient chauffeur crept out of the front seat and raised his cap. I wondered how fit he was to be in charge of a car, and as I slumped onto the sumptuous upholstery I tried not to eye the steering wheel with longing.

“What’s all this about an architect?” I said in an attempt to divert myself from covetous thoughts.

“I wanted to talk to you about that.” As the motor glided away from the curb Darrow said to the chauffeur without raising his voice: “Can you hear me, Jarvis?” but there was no response. “Poor old boy!” said Darrow, although the chauffeur was probably only a few years his senior. “He’s very deaf, I’m afraid, but at least we can talk in privacy. Now let me explain how I’ve managed to take you out of circulation for twenty-four hours. I’ve told everyone you’re conducting an urgent enquiry into my new plan for the Theological College, an enquiry which obliges you to stay overnight at Starrington Magna. The Bishop was a little startled to hear I had a plan, but I told him I’d explain everything later.”

My heart sank. I feared the worst. I only hoped Mrs. Ottershaw had replenished her husband’s supply of indigestion tablets.

“Might I be so bold as to ask,” I said, “precisely what plan you have in mind, or am I to be kept temporarily in ignorance, like Dr. Ottershaw?”

“That’s up to you. We don’t have to discuss the matter today if you don’t feel like it.”

“It sounds like a splendid diversion from my troubles. Keep talking.”

The Theological College was in fact a private institution which should have been independent of the diocese, but since its nineteenth-century endowments had long since depreciated in value it had turned increasingly to the diocese for financial support and was now firmly under diocesan control. The Bishop was always a member of the Board of Governors, and the Archdeacon of Starbridge was obliged, as the Bishop’s henchman, to keep an eye on the place. I began to suspect my eye was about to be sorely tried.

By that time, the May of 1946, the College was facing the problem of accommodating all the men who had received a call to the ministry during the war and who were now free to embark on their training. In an effort to meet this challenge Darrow, I was now informed, had conceived the idea of opening a temporary extension of the College at his home and had invited an architect to call that afternoon to estimate the cost of converting the unused east wing into a suitable habitation for the ordinands. It was typical of Darrow that he should have engaged an architect without bothering to consult the Bishop, but Darrow was an old hand at riding roughshod over Dr. Ottershaw.

I was unable to stop myself saying: “The diocesan funds may well be unable to afford such a scheme—wouldn’t it have been better to present your idea to the Bishop before roping in an architect?”

“But how can the Bishop and I have a useful discussion unless I have some idea of the expense involved?”

“I take your point, but the conversion of the building would be only one of many expenses. How are you going to provide for these new residents? You’ll need extra domestic staff, extra—”

“Those are the expenses I can calculate without seeking professional help, and naturally I shall allow for them when I draft my proposal.”

His casual arrogance never failed to set my teeth on edge. Realising that I was yet again being obliged to deal with an attempt to create havoc in my archdeaconry, I reflected that he was incurably addicted to playing a lone hand. He would dream up an idea, implement it without consulting anyone and then be both amazed and offended when those in authority failed to be convinced that his pipe-dream was a manifestation of the Holy Spirit. I thought of his faith-healing phase and shuddered. I could still see an ashen Dr. Ottershaw reaching for his indigestion tablets.

“And what does your wife think of your plans to requisition her family home?” I enquired, blissfully oblivious of my own troubles by this time and unable to resist the temptation to lunge straight at the jugular vein. “I suppose she sees it as a nice little retirement job for you.”

“
Retirement?
” Darrow was scandalised. “Who said anything about retirement?”

My worst suspicions were confirmed as I realised he was planning to slip into his favourite role: the wonder-worker. “My dear Darrow,” I said, “this may surprise you, but you can’t possibly be in two places at once. Either you run the Theological College or you run the extension—assuming the diocese can afford it—but you can’t do both! However, since you’re now nearer seventy than sixty, I quite see that this may well be an appropriate moment for you to step down from your present position and—”

“Age is quite irrelevant!” Darrow was now outraged. “Anyone would think, to hear you talk, that I was going to be seventy tomorrow! In fact I’ve only just celebrated my sixty-sixth birthday, I’m extremely fit and I’m more than capable of supervising—with the appropriate delegation of authority, naturally—both the College and the extension.”

I gave up and spent the rest of the journey plotting the advice I should give to the Bishop. It’s not easy when a clerical buccaneer like Darrow goes on the rampage in pursuit of a power-mad pipe-dream. In fact it’s enough to make strong archdeacons weep.

I was still meditating on this magnificent diversion from my troubles when the Rolls reached the parish of Starrington Magna and purred down the main street of the village. Beyond the last cottage lay the Manor, tucked away behind the high brick wall which encircled the grounds. The house was large but not nearly so grand as Starmouth Court, and even poor Grace had been able to enjoy her visits there. Although Anne Darrow was very much a member of the county aristocracy, her unpretentiousness, her sincerity and her down-to-earth common sense had combined to put Grace at ease, with the result that an unlikely but genuine friendship had been formed. Anne was Primrose’s godmother; Grace and I had been guests at Anne’s small, quiet wedding in 1940. Liking her as I did I could only wish she had married someone other than Darrow.

The Manor appeared to have grown out of the soil like some eccentric species of vegetation, an illusion created by the fact that the colour of its pale golden bricks blended so pleasingly with the lawns, shrubberies and trees which surrounded it. As the Rolls drifted up the drive I saw a child’s tricycle parked on the gravel sweep in front of the main entrance. Beyond the steps leading up to the porch the front door stood open, instantly creating the atmosphere of a tranquil country life. For a moment I imagined the tricycle’s owner, growing up in such idyllic surroundings but only realising years later what a paradise he had enjoyed when he had been too young fully to appreciate his good fortune.

“How’s your boy?” I said civilly to Darrow. As I was to be his guest I had decided it was time to make amends for my assault on his jugular vein.

“Fine, thanks.” Darrow, who had not only children but grandchildren from his first marriage, was never loquacious on the subject of his progeny, but whenever the subject of this latest offspring was raised he seemed to vibrate with pride. I supposed that any man who had achieved fatherhood at an advanced age was entitled to be proud of himself, but I still felt that procreation was an unsuitable activity for elderly clerics.

As we emerged from the Rolls the child came out of the house to meet us. He was not yet four but was sturdy and tough, with thick fair hair and eyes the colour of flint. He was rumoured to be a terror at tea-parties, but at that moment he looked mild enough. He was carrying a huge tabby-cat which appeared to be in ecstasy. The purring was clearly audible as we advanced towards the porch.

“Hullo,” said Darrow. “How well you’re carrying William! Is Mummy in?”

The little boy shook his head and impulsively offered Darrow the cat.

“We’re late for lunch,” said Darrow to me as he accepted the offering, “so my wife probably decided she couldn’t wait for us. She’s very busy at the estate-office at the moment.” Entering the hall he nodded towards the room on his right and added: “Have a seat in the library while I tell Cook to take the food out of the oven.”

He and the boy went off hand in hand, the cat still purring in the crook of Darrow’s arm, and the child’s nanny came through the green baize door to meet them as they headed in the direction of the kitchen. Retiring obediently to the library, a chaotic room where dusty Victorian volumes on field sports fought for wall-space with glass cases of stuffed fish, I reflected that what I wanted most at that moment was not a seat, as Darrow had offered, but a drink. Fortunately before leaving the house that morning I had taken the precaution of filling a small cough-syrup bottle with whisky, and now, whipping the bottle out of the inside pocket of my jacket, I quickly unscrewed the cap. I was on the point of taking a hefty swig when Darrow crept into the room and caught me red-handed.

“A makeshift hip-flask,” he said. “I thought so.”

I said in my flattest voice: “You told me you were going to the kitchen.”

“I delegated that task to Nanny. If you’d care to give that bottle to me, Aysgarth, I’d be delighted to look after it for you.”