by H. S. Cross
—Mistakes are a part of growing up, Burton said. Mistakes can be corrected. But only if we’re brave enough to face them.
The boy nearly bared his teeth. John had caught boys lying. He knew the expression. Was it possible that nothing this boy had said was true?
—You walked, Burton was saying, around the quadrangle? Fine. The cloisters? Where else? The changing rooms, perhaps? You smoked, perhaps. It was late. You weren’t yourself. You did things you regret.
—Really! John cried.
Jamie seized his arm to silence him. He had given Jamie his word. He’d believed what this one said. Had he been so blinded by pique towards Burton that he’d missed what was obviously true? The simplest explanation was usually correct, even if it monotonously cribbed from the past. People weren’t original. All sins, in the end, banal.
* * *
The girl had told him what Mr. Grieves had said of him: If only he would trust me. If only he could see he isn’t alone. If Mr. Grieves would turn to him and show his face, he’d know where he stood. If the face hated: battle lost, forever and always. But if there was a chance, a sliver, that he was mistaken, that Mr. Grieves could ever be rashly on his side …
—Thomas.
Mr. Grieves stepped away from the Head, his voice like the arm that pulled him from the window seat when he’d been hiding: Come on, you, that’s enough of that.
—The cab’s here, Mrs. Firth announced at the door.
—It seems you’ll have to leave undone more than your meeting with Farmer McKay, Burton said.
—I really do implore you, the Head said to Burton, as a personal favor—
—Think before you speak, Mr. Grieves said like a code he should know.
The Head pushed back his chair:
—Have you nothing to say to Mr. Burton-Lee?
The Head looked at him like filth, like a beast who did things without names, things to make a mother sick.
—Qui tacet consentit, the Flea said.
—Tell the truth, Thomas!
—Enough, said the Head. Riding, go and wait in the—
—We were looking for something!
—What? said the Head.
Mr. Grieves looking, urging, knowing?
—A box, he said. A box.
* * *
There was a way his heart worked when he bowled hard and forced it to pump, except now it strained without his leave.
—Let me get this straight.
Burton’s voice distant from the rush in his ears. Like that dream of the school on fire, when he woke himself up hurling out of bed and was fumbling with the doorknob before he realized it wasn’t true.
—Your walk last night was to McKay’s barn?
The liar, having ringed them in confusion, now took his blade and slaughtered them with the truth.
—To fetch a box full of stories?
Made-up stories, invented, not true. Left there years ago. The barn their Keep. They’d been going there for three years. Reading, talking, smoking. Of course, that’s what Pearce had smelled, but only because they’d just finished. Nothing was on fire. They always took care.
John had fought for this boy from the day that woman left him in the study. He’d given him Moss and then Morgan. He took time over his compositions. What if the boy never meant anything he’d written?
The box that night was nowhere to be found. Riding didn’t have it. They could search him and his realm. It had been there on the afternoon, but last night the barn was empty.
—And Mainwaring?
—He did fall, but it was an accident jumping out of the loft.
—Mainwaring jumped from the loft of the barn?
Cold and sharp, sour in his throat like that other time, with Wilberforce and Spaulding, that time he couldn’t bear to recall but would never be able to forget.
—He’d done it before and never been hurt.
History was like that. People feasted over fields of the dead, never knowing or suspecting the ruin humans suffered.
—We weren’t drinking or … or anything else. We only went for the box. I promise.
Not drunkenness, not beastliness. Just the godforsaken barn. How could a shack bring so much devastation?
—It’s my father’s. It’s all I’ve got.
The voice trailed off. Was this, then, the heart? All this for a father’s—
—I’ll never … I’m sorry.
The adamant liar, turned penitent, turned supplicant, spoke now in a flood, tightening the vise on their teeth.
—I could do a double holiday task.
He would learn whatever they told him to learn. Learn it by heart. Anything, he’d do it if they please would not dispose him.
—I didn’t mean to cause trouble.
Didn’t mean to be bad. Wasn’t that sort of person.
An urgent knock sent John’s heart working faster.
—Fardley says you must leave if you want any chance for the train, Mrs. Firth called.
—Yes, I know, Jamie snapped.
Burton stood and leaned over the desk:
—I can ring Overall. I’ll go and see McKay, and then I’ll let Overall know we’re—
—Don’t do anything.
Jamie stepped away from Burton, brushing John into the curtains.
—But Overall will expect—
—I shall answer, Jamie said, for this and everything.
* * *
As the Head rounded the desk, Gray braced himself for a blow.
—Riding.
The man came to stand beside him, voice like honey.
—You have been sorely dishonest.
Words said to beasts, but here softly, so near he could smell his aftershave.
—You have been shamefully self-willed. And you’ve been abominably … naive.
Sunburn, heartburn.
—I hope you’re ashamed of yourself.
Nowhere to hide.
—Consider yourself on notice. If I should ever have to speak to you like this again …
On notice. Not death, but life. Axe put aside, prison door flung—
—Meantime, you are on tic for the remainder of term.
His throat whispered thanks. The Head touched his shoulder, as Morgan did when—
—Robert, would you kindly see to Mainwaring as we discussed?
—Certainly, said Burton-Lee.
—And give my apologies to the Colonel.
Hand on shoulder still, pressing as though he were his.
—And, John, since you’ve taken such a personal interest, you can see to the rest.
The stain on the carpet looked like a snail.
—Will you do me the honor of twelve of the best?
Mr. Grieves made a noise.
—A dozen of the finest, tonight please.
—Headmaster, if you wish—
—Thank you, Robert, but Grieves has this in hand. Please tell the cab I’m on my way.
Burton-Lee looked at them, gave a nod, left. The Head stepped away, disowning him.
—If only you’d warned me, John.
Twelve of the best?
—Why didn’t you tell me it was that wretched barn?
Not the same kind of best that came in sixes?
—I’d no idea.
He meant something else. Mr. Grieves had never, would never.
—I think I see, said the Head. I think I finally see.
* * *
They were coming for him, the whole host he’d escaped. No Greek outran his fate, and no man avoided judgment. It might wait years, through wars, deaths, across miles or even seas, but eventually, one hour, it would find you.
—You’re on quicksand, John.
Too far from shore, and the whole horde, everything renounced, everything sidestepped and parried since Jamie came, everything he wasn’t, everything he wouldn’t, everything he tried with every moment to undo, all arrived. His punishment, now.
—We’ll speak after Easter, Jamie said. This, your word, t
hings requisite and necessary.
Those eyes saw and remembered: John knew very well how to do what he’d been ordered.
The door closed on Jamie, leaving him alone with the one who lied. Someone spoke, maybe it was he. The liar moved for the first time, looked at him with a stupid half grin, as if he’d known something secret all along.
He wasn’t a person luck followed. If things could go wrong, they always did with him. There in the cupboard, on the hook where he’d left it, there it waited, a patience colder than Hell. It had waited this long, all these years, but no longer. Fingers knew what they gripped.
Quick, certain, hard. Sixty seconds to the other side. But then, once there, he could never go back. Never again be this man, the man he’d labored to become. It would be done, but so would he.
—What are you waiting for? You know the drill.
He was done with this one. Damn Jamie, and damn him. Who refused? Who lied? Who started fire and fed it as it grew? He would never forgive him. If this one had something to say, he could say it to the cushions. After everything he’d lost, everything that had been taken, to have to give up this, and for such a one as that.
* * *
It was too drastic to happen, even though he was standing there, holding it, having spoken to him as if they both knew what they were doing.
—Feet there, stay down.
It was a charade for ears outside the door. The Head had said it to placate Burton-Lee. No one got more than six, and never from Mr. Grieves. The Head knew. Had to.
Mr. Grieves hadn’t said where to put his jacket, so he set it on the desk with his spectacles. He could play his part for form’s sake. The settee where they’d sat that morning scratched his face, dust like a library centuries old. He could say he was sorry. He could explain. He hadn’t meant to lie to Mr. Grieves, who never had, never would, even Morgan said—
Light. Breath. Not charade, not the first. All right, he deserved that, but—light, light, hard as he’d ever—harder. All his will to keep from moving. Breathe in then out—fast, faster even than—not enough time to—this, this—
A sound beyond his command, but sound only, not tears, never further. Something professional had intervened. He was cool, eyes dead, self snatched away before this thing could maim. Six, now seven, eight, who cared? They could trick him and trap him, but they had no idea what he could do and what he was doing—not one drop of this would ever touch him. He’d never been calmer. It was like that, after murder.
* * *
After nine, the boy flinched and started to choke. Or so he tried to make it seem, gasping and hacking, on what? Did he actually believe he could rook him into—
—You can stop that right now. I wasn’t born yesterday.
* * *
Breath regained from spit like spite to drown him. Back down for the last. Could not care any less what this man thought of him. Almost disappointment when told to get up. Espionage? Easy. Torture? Nothing. Cupboard door slammed so hard he felt it in his feet. Somehow the handshake was being omitted. The man stood, back to him still, hands on the mantel as if he could faint.
—Go to bed.
13
She was working up the nerve to knock. Dr. Sebastian and the other man had left. That meant she could go in. There were sounds, but she didn’t think she could say what they were. Coughing. Was he shouting down the telephone? On the count of three … the count of ten … when the hand on the clock reached the blue square … But the door was opening and he was there, her yes-no-sorry boy, the heat of him, face red and wet, handkerchief in one fist, spectacles in the other. He looked at her like an enemy, and the electrics went wrong. There across the room, his back to them both, Uncle John stood at the grate, a likeness of her father, decanter in one hand, glass in the other, the way it always smelled when things turned real.
* * *
She stood in the doorway, weeping. The other gone.
—Darling, what’s the matter?
He went and drew her into the room. Wherever he put her, tears streamed down her face. Should he offer her something against the shock?
—Now, now, it isn’t too late to ring the hospital. We’ll do it straightaway. Sit here.
She wouldn’t sit. She had a splinter, she said. He asked to see it, held her hand under the lamp. It was deep in her palm, and she’d dug until it bled. Kardleigh would have to get it out.
He put his arms around her as he always did, but she stood ramrod, hand held out before her alien and rigid. Wouldn’t she sit down? Here in his chair. They’d ring this moment if she’d dry her eyes. He’d speak to whoever answered. He’d insist they fetch her mother even if she’d gone to sleep. And then, once they spoke to her, and she really must dry her eyes, once they’d seen everything was fine as wine, then they’d see about the splinter.
She jerked away as he bent to kiss the top of her head. She didn’t want to ring now. Better, she said, to ring in the morning.
If that’s what she wanted, of course they could ring in the waking up, but about the splinter—
Mrs. Firth said she’d help. She wanted Mrs. Firth. He wasn’t to touch it.
She was overtired. It was no surprise. She’d had a long journey and a long drink of worry. Tomorrow in the daytime he’d make her feel at home.
She wanted to go to bed. She wanted to go. She turned and rushed from him, wrenching the door open despite the splinter. The back of his mouth throbbed. The brandy was better than he’d realized. Mrs. Firth got it in. She knew things, things to get, and got them. It was touching the back of his mouth and doing something inside the flesh of him and to the bell in his head or the hall. The shaking all over was starting to slow. Another dose—there was the piece of twine! Caught in the latch of the windows. He tore it off and swung them open and stepped onto the bricks and then the grass, where the water rushed in his shoes as he dashed across the field. Under the goalposts, a knife in his side, but he didn’t want to bring everything up because it was good and if he brought it up he’d need more and Mrs. Firth would know he needed things sooner than he should. A bell was ringing into his head, to kneel, to sink, ice-mud-trench, if only the shells would fall.
* * *
Under no circumstances would she let that person speak to her mother. Forget her own feelings. She was used to words said strangely, to breath you could set alight, to talking as if she were six. She knew what to do with people possessed of spirits.
Mrs. Firth she found bustling down the stairs. She couldn’t help just now, telephone or splinter. She should go to the Tower. Like a prisoner, self-arresting? She should like any boy go across the quadrangle and in those doors, they looked closed but weren’t, and climb the staircase all the way to the top. Dr. Kardleigh could help her. He’d see to the splinter. He had a telephone.
Boys didn’t wear ankle socks or a hem that ended at the knees. They crossed gravel like men, looking as though they used their fists every day. Anyone who used his fists at her school was sent home. Ditto fingernails or even cruel words. The staircase was stone and dark, smooth from prisoners, princes at the top?
The doctor looked aghast when she came into his room, but when she explained, he had her sit beside the lamp. Alcohol stung, and he told her to look away. He asked about her mother and the hospital where she was. It smarted and throbbed and ached deep inside, but he wrapped it in a bandage and told her to keep it dry. Then he jangled the telephone and made them ring the hospital, where he knew someone, he thought. He made them fetch her mother even though it was after hours, and while they went to look, he made her tell him the story of her parents, her mother a child of Saffron Walden, the town that lived on crocuses, a town of Friends, that meant Quakers, she met him at Cambridge, he’d come to speak on the Irish Question, and she’d heard him and loved him and he’d loved her. There had been a price when he’d asked her father for her hand, but he had not blinked. He’d taken her to the maze, there was one in the center of the village green, no not hedges, just grass paths, of c
ourse you could cheat but who would?, he took her there and got down on his knee. If I must give up Rome to have you, Margaret Drayton, then so be it, let me quake.
—Darling?
Her feeling-ill voice, but brighter than she’d left it. Oh, better, much better, everyone so kind, skies cleared just this afternoon and she knew what a difference that could make. Eating? Doctors pleased, right as rain soon. She got her to laugh by describing St. Stephen’s food and the dull things they said at the masters’ table. Uncle John, oh, yes, excellent, boys kept him running like a rabbit, oh, yes, like one caught with clover in its mouth, springing here, spronging there, yes, boing!, she hadn’t gone in the chapel but it looked ever so stern, of course Paris was just what he needed before he turned Puritan hare. They’d drink French coffee and eat pastries but she wouldn’t eat frog legs no matter what they said, oh, yes, it would be beautiful and gay, she would ring again tomorrow, all right the day after, but she must work hard at her resting so she’d be ready when they came next week. Why, that man had been the school physician, name of Dr. Kardleigh, why, yes, he was handsome, nearly as tall as Uncle John and dark as well, with an army moustache, was it an army moustache? He said it was to cover the scar on his lip, yes, he was here, right beside her, of course—
He was so pleased to hear she’d improved, her daughter was delightful, no, she hadn’t bothered the boys, so far as he was aware!, certainly he’d keep an eye, he advised her to rest, to put all worries from her mind, wrap her troubles in dreams, dream her troubles away, hey … He put down the telephone laughing.
—Your mother is charming.
—Yes.
—And you were brave about that splinter.
—Not really.
14
The bell fag was clanging down the corridor, but still Riding hadn’t stirred. It was to him, Timothy Halton, to ensure everyone was out of bed, but Riding had ignored him the first time and was ignoring him now. The last thing he needed was a docket for failing to do what he was trying to do.
