The Big Day

by Barry Unsworth

  While she was making her way to the taxi-rank, she saw a mad person. He was short and fat and joyously smiling. He stopped frequently in his walk, raising his round unshaven face to the sky, and making a gesture with arms extended, palms upward, as if in blessing.

  4

  The first of several checks and frustrations experienced by Baines on this day was caused by the fact that there was no theatrical costumier in the town. He had to apply to the local repertory theatre, where, after a good deal of discussion, they agreed to let him hire a costume. There were no masks, but he was able to obtain dark glasses and a false moustache.

  He returned to his room with a costume, left it there, and retrieved the brown carrier bag from its hiding place under his bed. When he left again he was carrying this. He was early for his appointment and since it was a warm sunny morning he decided to walk. In the High Street he was stopped by a girl rattling a famine-relief tin. She stuck a little blue flag in his lapel and gave him a pamphlet, with a picture of a naked, starving African woman on the cover. Baines thrust this into his pocket. He was beginning to feel anxious, now that the meeting with the man he knew of as Kirby was imminent.

  The meeting-place was in the area of waste ground known locally as The Tips, which lay on the other side of town, beyond the railway station and the canal, a desolate hummocky area of considerable extent, full of hollows, sudden steep declivities and pits, combed with narrow clay paths that led nowhere except to intersections with other paths, or into tangled slopes of bramble and willowherb. The area owed its name to the fact that years previously many tons of earth and rubble had been dumped here and left. Now the mounds and slopes had settled, softened with vegetation, and the whole area had taken on an identity quite distinct and separate from any other part of the town. It was a refuge for vagrants and drinkers, who made little shelters for themselves in the remoter hollows, and a place of resort for all those who had no work to do, and for alienated or outcast people.

  It was to this place, the ridge that ran along the upper part of it, where the clay was covered with rank glass, that Baines made his way, carrying his little brown bag, whistling between his teeth. Here the man named Kirby should be waiting for him just below the ridge where it levelled, where one could stand against the bankside, more or less screened from view. He did not know Kirby by sight but he would be wearing a white flower in his buttonhole – sufficiently unusual, it had been thought at Headquarters, to provide identification, given the coincidence of time and place. On a level area just before the ridge began, a thin, red-haired man was standing on a box addressing a small knot of listeners. ‘Oh my dear friends,’ Baines heard him say, ‘Jesus died on the cross for you.’

  Baines went past with averted face. After some minutes he saw from above a man sitting against the bankside below the ridge. He made his way down the narrow path towards this person. When he drew near, the man turned his head and Baines found himself regarding a youngish, plump man with a white face and a soft-looking, unpleasantly vivid mouth. Some limp daises looked out of the top pocket of his stained and shabby blue suit. Could this be regarded as a button-hole? Baines wondered. He stood there for some moments in something of a quandary. Then he decided to try the first line of dialogue that had been pre-arranged up at Headquarters.

  ‘It is a good day today,’ he said.

  The other man smiled a gap-toothed smile and began fumbling in the pockets of his jacket. After a moment he took out a piece of paper which Baines recognized as one of the pamphlets the girl in the High Street had been handing out.

  ‘Looka them tits,’ the man said, holding out the paper invitingly towards Baines. ‘Looka them tits.’

  After a moment Baines realized that he was referring to the drooping breasts of the emaciated African woman on the front of the pamphlet. This could not be Kirby.

  ‘Clear off,’ Baines said, in a voice thick with loathing. ‘Get away from here.’ He took a step towards the other man, raising a fist.

  The man got up quickly, went at a rapid shambling walk diagonally away up the hillside. This obedient promptness made it seem as if he had expected to be ordered away. Baines found himself trembling slightly: he had always felt a horrified repugnance for sick or abnormal people; he was daunted too by the coincidence of finding someone in just this place, wearing what might have been taken as a buttonhole. He was still staring up the hillside, though the man had disappeared now, when he heard a voice behind him, saying, ‘It is a good day.’

  Baines turned, and found himself facing a man of about his own age, short and thickset, with a white carnation in his buttonhole. ‘I’m supposed to say that,’ he said. ‘Not you.’

  ‘Better ones coming,’ the other man said promptly. He had very pale, quick-glancing eyes.

  ‘Better for all of us,’ Baines said. He held out his hand and the other man shook it. ‘You should have waited for me to speak,’ Baines said. ‘Here it is.’ He handed over the brown bag. ‘It is set for eleven-fifteen tonight,’ he said. ‘You can plant it whenever you like. All you have to do is press – ’

  ‘I know what to do.’

  ‘You have had your instructions, I suppose,’ Baines said. ‘Do you know the town well?’

  ‘Well enough. I know where the Municipal Art Gallery is. That is all I need to know.’

  ‘Municipal Art Gallery? But it is the Conservative Committee Rooms you are supposed to blow up.’

  ‘My instructions are to cause maximum damage to the Municipal Art Gallery.’

  ‘I don’t understand,’ Baines said. ‘I made personal representations at Headquarters. This is the first I have heard of the Municipal Gallery as a target. From whom did you get your instructions?’

  ‘I am not at liberty to say.’

  ‘But surely,’ Baines said, ‘the question should be – ’

  ‘Looka them tits,’ a soft sibilant voice said behind them.

  Turning sharply, Baines saw the white-faced, shambling character whom he had driven off before, now standing only a few feet away from them, holding out the crumpled pamphlet. He had approached quietly, over the grass.

  ‘Looka them tits,’ he said again, not venturing closer, but leaning forward, holding out the picture of the dying African woman, his soft, too-red lips curving in a gentle smile.

  ‘You filthy – ’ Baines said. He stared at the smiling man, his mouth dry with rage and loathing.

  ‘Shall I stretch him?’ Kirby said, with immediate savagery. ‘I’ll knock your teeth in,’ he said. ‘You bloody pervert.’

  ‘Don’t touch him,’ Baines said. ‘We don’t want to attract attention to ourselves. Get away from here,’ he said to the man, taking a step forward.

  With the same curious promptness as before, the man began to back away. He backed for some yards, then turned and made off, at the same rapid, shambling pace.

  Baines turned to face Kirby again. He felt shaken by this reappearance. ‘We’d better go our separate ways,’ he said. He looked closely at the other’s face for a moment or two, at the narrow forehead, pale unsteady eyes. Kirby did not look a very intelligent type of man.

  ‘I still don’t understand this confusion over the target,’ Baines said. ‘But you must follow your instructions, I suppose.’

  ‘There were them that wanted the Conservative Committee Rooms,’ Kirby said, ‘and them that wanted the Municipal Art Gallery. And a third school of thought that felt it didn’t make no difference.’

  ‘They know what they are doing, up at Headquarters,’ Baines said loyally. ‘There are some very shrewd people up there.’

  ‘I daresay we shall manage,’ Kirby said, gripping the bag, turning away.

  ‘Odd,’ Baines said. ‘If it is the Art Gallery, I shall be at a party in the next road.’

  ‘Well, Mr Baker,’ Cuthbertson said. ‘Perhaps you could give me some indication of your requirements?’

  He looked steadily through his glasses at the person seated opposite, across the desk. He liked the sober
suiting and deferential posture of this person. The letter before him was illiterate in phrasing. On the basis of the letter he had formed certain prognostications. It was deeply reassuring, when there was so much lately to frighten and confuse him, to find that these had been entirely correct: this was a person who had worked hard, accumulated capital in some lowly calling, and now wished to better himself.

  Cuthbertson had realized at a very early stage that all applicants could be divided into two main categories: self-improvers and careerists. The former, naively vain and self-deceiving, were able to regard the degrees awarded by the School as both worthless and worth having; the latter had no such illusions, intending to use the degrees in areas of the world where their true nature might be kept indefinitely concealed. This great perception, though the basis of the School’s prosperity, Cuthbertson had of late years largely ceased to acknowledge, even to himself, as it conflicted with his sense of the School as a force for good. None the less it was useful on occasions like the present, when a student might slip off the hook if clumsily handled.

  ‘We make it our endeavour,’ he said, ‘to, ah, tailor the needs of the … to, ah, tailor the instruction to the needs of the individual student.’

  Gentle brown eyes returned his regard. The man had a weatherbeaten face, thinning hair. He leaned forward, keeping his knees unpresumptuously together. Cuthbertson smiled, aware of the power at his disposal, power as it were diffused through all the appurtenances of his office, particles of power rebounding from the quiet walls and gleaming surfaces; all emanating from himself, the generating and controlling force. An urge rose in him to keep absolutely still, keep this generative power at its optimum, sit there for ever, no fear or doubt admitted, in absolute immobile mastery, dominating Mr Baker throughout eternity. His hands rested heavy on the desk before him. Something, however, some alien element in the room, only vaguely sensed before, now began more definitely to trouble and disturb him. His hands moved, and he glanced momentarily aside.

  ‘You spoke of history in your letter,’ he said.

  ‘Yes,’ Mr Baker said. ‘Yes, I’ve always been interested in history, right from my school days. That is going back a bit.’

  ‘You will find a number here of your generation,’ Cuthbertson said, smiling, moving his hands restlessly on the desk.

  ‘Of course we wasn’t well taught,’ Mr Baker said.

  ‘Some of the teaching in our schools leaves much to be desired,’ Cuthbertson said. ‘We often find ourselves having to do a certain amount of remedial work before the true process of education can begin. Which of our history courses are you interested in? You’ve seen the prospectus, I take it?’

  ‘I’m more interested in the modern, really. It helps you to understand your own society more, doesn’t it?’

  ‘That is an interesting point of view,’ Cuthbertson said. ‘Mr Mafferty does Modern History. A very keen, incisive mind. He is a Cambridge man.’

  Thinking of Mafferty caused him to glance at the clock. It was a quarter to eleven. He was again troubled by a returning sense of something different about the room, something not quite right. He glanced around uneasily. Nothing seemed out of place …

  ‘I didn’t want just a correspondence course, you know,’ Mr Baker said.

  ‘Oh, no, no, no.’ Cuthbertson bestirred himself, looked back with something of an effort at his prospective student’s face. ‘The student-teacher relationship is of the essence of our system here, of the absolute essence,’ he said.

  Mr Baker leaned forward suddenly. Great earnestness marked his demeanour. ‘I would like to obtain a degree,’ he said.

  ‘That would be the twelve-week course to the first degree, the Bachelor of Arts, or Science.’

  ‘Would that entitle me to put B.A. after my name?’

  ‘Certainly, certainly. And to a certificate which you would be at liberty to frame and display, if you so wished.’

  ‘The terms for that…’ Mr Baker said.

  ‘For the twelve-week course,’ Cuthbertson said, knowing the other knew already, ‘the inclusive fee – ’

  At this point, however, he fell silent, again glancing round the room. Stray peppering thoughts began to bombard him, sensations rather, that he could not isolate or meet squarely. He looked at the immaculate expanse of dark-blue carpeting, the fawn armchairs, the two low tables, the cushioned window seat. Everything was in exact position, as it always was …

  Mr Baker coughed, and Cuthbertson thought he saw an expression of embarrassment or uncertainty on the other’s face. ‘Of the absolute essence,’ he said, as if there had been no intermission. ‘Or such, at least, is our belief.’

  Suddenly, he realized what the matter was: it was scent, not sight, that was being offended. There was a faint alien sweetness in the air, disturbing the usual plushy, neutral odours of his office. Some perfume, perhaps, that Mr Baker … He did not look that kind of man. The scent, once recognized, seemed stronger now, it pervaded the room like a leak of something dangerous. Cuthbertson shifted his bulk in the chair and opened his mouth, with a sudden audible intake of breath.

  ‘Are you feeling all right?’

  ‘I beg your pardon?’ Cuthbertson blinked several times. Mr Baker’s long-jawed weatherbeaten face resettled into focus. ‘Excuse me,’ Cuthbertson said. ‘I have a lot on my mind today. Today is Degree Day, you know. It is also my wife’s birthday. And there is a delegation from Turkey coming to be shown round. We were discussing …’

  ‘Fees,’ Mr Baker said.

  ‘For the twelve-week course,’ Cuthbertson said, reverting smoothly to the point at issue, ‘the inclusive fee for tuition and degree is seven hundred and fifty pounds. Payable in advance. That is the honours course. The general degree comes to one hundred and fifty less.’

  ‘I think I’d be more interested in the honours.’

  ‘Quite right,’ Cuthbertson said. One must aim high. You are the sort of student we want here, Mr Baker. There is one condition, however, which is also mentioned in the prospectus.’

  ‘Condition?’

  The smell seemed to be getting stronger. A voice at once his own and another’s urged Cuthbertson to his feet, to seek out and destroy this subversive sweetness. He sat there some moments longer, looked fixedly at Mr Baker. Then he stood up abruptly, moved out from behind his desk, turned his head this way and that. Aware that this behaviour, however necessary, might seem eccentric to Mr Baker, he went on talking in a manner as equable as possible. ‘Yes,’ he said, ‘the course must be completed satisfactorily on your part. If not, you would be charged for tuition only, part of the fee would be refunded, and the degree would not be awarded.’

  ‘How do you mean, satisfactorily?’

  Cuthbertson looked round. Mr Baker had turned in his chair and was watching him alertly.

  ‘I mean as to conduct,’ he said beginning to walk slowly forward near to the wall. We cannot permit, the voice said. Oh dear me, no. The voice was bland, remorseless, and often omitted verbs. A certain give and take, yes, but not this. ‘Conduct, attendance, that sort of thing,’ he said. ‘And style of dress. We like to see students wearing ties, for example. Navy blue is a colour we favour. We find that uniformity of appearance encourages the sense of community we are aiming at. Yes.’

  Reaching a point about half-way along the wall, Cuthbertson stopped and turned inwards. This enabled him to see that Mr Baker had also risen and was standing with his hands on the back of his chair, watching him intently.

  ‘I thought you meant failing the exam,’ Mr Baker said, laughing falsely.

  Cuthbertson looked gravely for some moments at this laughing face of Mr Baker. ‘There is no examination,’ he said. ‘The matter rests with the tutor’s report.’

  After a moment he resumed his soft, circumspect padding, moving this time across the room, towards the opposite wall. Coming to one of his fawn armchairs he edged and felt his way cautiously round it. The scent was strong now, and Cuthbertson was beginning to feel personally en
dangered, as if a scented pad were being moved slowly and inexorably towards his mouth. He felt it to be vitally necessary to go on talking, to preserve the structure of the interview and keep his own fears at bay. ‘Each student,’ he said, ‘is taught individually, with particular reference to his abilities and general attainment. Progress is necessarily relative, depending as it does on the level of the student at the beginning of the proceedings. Degrees are awarded in accordance with this relative assessment.’

  He thought he heard Mr Baker say something somewhere behind him. ‘Quite so,’ he said, without looking round. He could get no clue as to where the smell might be coming from, and Mr Baker’s presence inhibited him from making a thorough-going search. He raised his face towards the ceiling and sniffed delicately twice. Hearing a movement behind him he turned sharply but Mr Baker was in the same position. More strongly than before he had the sense of a scented, suffocating pad being moved slowly towards him. He opened his mouth to get more air. With an instinct of survival he sought to stopper the scent with some memory, find in the past a container for this muffling pad that threatened to cut off all senses with his breath … A certain give and take, yes, the voice said, very clearly and distinctly. But this, this cannot be permitted. Daffodils, the white light. No, daffodils are scentless … With a heaving of the mind he had it, just in time, honeysuckle. August honeysuckle, the smell of it in the hedges and on our hands.

  ‘Honeysuckle’, Cuthbertson said. He stood in the middle of the room, stilled by the memory. The pad receded. Remembering Mr Baker, he said, ‘Relative assessment and capacity credit marking. None of the older foundations have been prepared to adopt it. Hidebound, you know. Of course, as I point out in my … in the Prospectus, our degrees are not everywhere recognized, our graduates sometimes meet with prejudice.’