The Short, the Long and the Tall

by Jeffrey Archer

  On Monday night after a resplendent dinner with the Master of Merton, he decided to take a walk along the banks of the Cherwell to clear his head before going to bed. The May evening was still light as he made his way down through the narrow confines of Merton Wall, across the meadows to the banks of the Cherwell. As he strolled along the winding path, he thought he spied his rival ahead of him under a tree reading. He considered turning back but decided she might already have spotted him, so he kept on walking.

  He had not seen Philippa for three days although she had rarely been out of his thoughts: once he had won the Charles Oldham, the silly woman would have to climb down from that high horse of hers. He smiled at the thought and decided to walk nonchalantly past her. As he drew nearer, he lifted his eyes from the path in front of him to steal a quick glance in her direction, and could feel himself reddening in anticipation of her inevitable well-timed insult. Nothing happened so he looked more carefully, only to discover on closer inspection that she was not reading: her head was bowed in her hands and she appeared to be sobbing quietly. He slowed his progress to observe, not the formidable rival who had for three years dogged his every step, but a forlorn and lonely creature who looked somewhat helpless.

  William’s first reaction was to think that the winner of the prize essay competition had been leaked to her and that he had indeed achieved his victory. On reflection, he realized that could not be the case: the examiners would only have received the essays that morning and as all the assessors read each submission the results could not possibly be forthcoming until at least the end of the week. Philippa did not look up when he reached her side – he was even unsure whether she was aware of his presence. As he stopped to gaze at his adversary William could not help noticing how her long red hair curled just as it touched the shoulder. He sat down beside her but still she did not stir.

  ‘What’s the matter?’ he asked. ‘Is there anything I can do?’

  She raised her head, revealing a face flushed from crying.

  ‘No, nothing William, except leave me alone. You deprive me of solitude without affording me company.’

  William was pleased that he immediately recognized the little literary allusion. ‘What’s the matter, Madame de Sévigné?’ he asked, more out of curiosity than concern, torn between sympathy and catching her with her guard down.

  It seemed a long time before she replied.

  ‘My father died this morning,’ she said finally, as if speaking to herself.

  It struck William as strange that after three years of seeing Philippa almost every day he knew nothing about her home life.

  ‘And your mother?’ he said.

  ‘She died when I was three. I don’t even remember her. My father is—’ She paused. ‘Was a parish priest and brought me up, sacrificing everything he had to get me to Oxford, even the family silver. I wanted so much to win the Charles Oldham for him.’

  William put his arm tentatively on Philippa’s shoulder.

  ‘Don’t be absurd. When you win the prize, they’ll pronounce you the star pupil of the decade. After all, you will have had to beat me to achieve the distinction.’

  She tried to laugh. ‘Of course I wanted to beat you, William, but only for my father.’

  ‘How did he die?’

  ‘Cancer, only he never let me know. He asked me not to go home before the summer term as he felt the break might interfere with my finals and the Charles Oldham. While all the time he must have been keeping me away because he knew if I saw the state he was in that would have been the end of my completing any serious work.’

  ‘Where do you live?’ asked William, again surprised that he did not know.

  ‘Brockenhurst. In Hampshire. I’m going back there tomorrow morning. The funeral’s on Wednesday.’

  ‘May I take you?’ asked William.

  Philippa looked up and was aware of a softness in her adversary’s eyes that she had not seen before. ‘That would be kind, William.’

  ‘Come on then, you silly woman,’ he said. ‘I’ll walk you back to your college.’

  ‘Last time you called me “silly woman” you meant it.’

  William found it natural that they should hold hands as they walked along the river bank. Neither spoke until they reached Somerville.

  ‘What time shall I pick you up?’ he asked, not letting go of her hand.

  ‘I didn’t know you had a car.’

  ‘My father presented me with an old MG when I was awarded a First. I have been longing to find some excuse to show the damn thing off to you. It has a press button start, you know.’

  ‘Obviously he didn’t want to risk waiting to give you the car on the Charles Oldham results.’ William laughed more heartily than the little dig merited.

  ‘Sorry,’ she said. ‘Put it down to habit. I shall look forward to seeing if you drive as appallingly as you write, in which case the journey may never come to any conclusion. I’ll be ready for you at ten.’

  On the journey down to Hampshire, Philippa talked about her father’s work as a parish priest and enquired after William’s family. They stopped for lunch at a pub in Winchester. Rabbit stew and mashed potatoes.

  ‘The first meal we’ve had together,’ said William.

  No sardonic reply came flying back; Philippa simply smiled.

  After lunch they travelled on to the village of Brockenhurst. William brought his car to an uncertain halt on the gravel outside the vicarage. An elderly maid, dressed in black, answered the door, surprised to see Miss Philippa with a man. Philippa introduced Annie to William and asked her to make up the spare room.

  ‘I’m so glad you’ve found yourself such a nice young man,’ remarked Annie later. ‘Have you known him long?’

  Philippa smiled. ‘No, we met for the first time yesterday.’

  Philippa cooked William dinner, which they ate by a fire he had made up in the front room. Although hardly a word passed between them for three hours, neither was bored. Philippa began to notice the way William’s untidy fair hair fell over his forehead and thought how distinguished he would look in old age.

  The next morning, she walked into the church on William’s arm and stood bravely through the funeral. When the service was over William took her back to the vicarage, crowded with the many friends the parson had made.

  ‘You mustn’t think ill of us,’ said Mr Crump, the vicar’s warden, to Philippa. ‘You were everything to your father and we were all under strict instructions not to let you know about his illness in case it should interfere with the Charles Oldham. That is the name of the prize, isn’t it?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Philippa. ‘But that all seems so unimportant now.’

  ‘She will win the prize in her father’s memory,’ said William.

  Philippa turned and looked at him, realizing for the first time that he actually wanted her to win the Charles Oldham.

  They stayed that night at the vicarage and drove back to Oxford on the Thursday. On the Friday morning at ten o’clock William returned to Philippa’s college and asked the porter if he could speak to Miss Jameson.

  ‘Would you be kind enough to wait in the Horsebox, sir,’ said the porter as he showed William into a little room at the back of the lodge and then scurried off to find Miss Jameson. They returned together a few minutes later.

  ‘What on earth are you doing here?’

  ‘Come to take you to Stratford.’

  ‘But I haven’t even had time to unpack the things I brought back from Brockenhurst.’

  ‘Just do as you are told for once; I’ll give you fifteen minutes.’

  ‘Of course,’ she said. ‘Who am I to disobey the next winner of the Charles Oldham? I shall even allow you to come up to my room for one minute and help me unpack.’

  The porter’s eyebrows nudged the edge of his cap but he remained silent, in deference to Miss Jameson’s recent bereavement. Again it surprised William to think that he had never been to Philippa’s room during their three years. He had climbed th
e walls of all the women’s colleges to be with a variety of girls of varying stupidity but never with Philippa. He sat down on the end of the bed.

  ‘Not there, you thoughtless creature. The maid has only just made it. Men are all the same, you never sit in chairs.’

  ‘I shall one day,’ said William. ‘The chair of English Language and Literature.’

  ‘Not as long as I’m at this university, you won’t,’ she said, as she disappeared into the bathroom.

  ‘Good intentions are one thing but talent is quite another,’ he shouted at her retreating back, privately pleased that her competitive streak seemed to he returning.

  Fifteen minutes later she came out of the bathroom in a yellow flowered dress with a neat white collar and matching cuffs. William thought she might even be wearing a touch of make-up.

  ‘It will do our reputations no good to be seen together,’ she said.

  ‘I’ve thought about that,’ said William. ‘If asked, I shall say you’re my charity.’

  ‘Your charity?’

  ‘Yes, this year I’m supporting distressed orphans.’

  Philippa signed out of college until midnight and the two scholars travelled down to Stratford, stopping off at Broadway for lunch. In the afternoon they rowed on the River Avon. William warned Philippa of his last disastrous outing in a punt. She admitted that she had already heard of the exhibition he had made of himself, but they arrived safely back at the shore: perhaps because Philippa took over the rowing. They went to see John Gielgud playing Romeo and dined at the Dirty Duck. Philippa was even quite rude to William during the meal.

  They started their journey home just after eleven and Philippa fell into a half sleep as they could hardly hear each other above the noise of the car engine. It must have been about twenty-five miles outside of Oxford that the MG came to a halt.

  ‘I thought,’ said William, ‘that when the petrol gauge showed empty there was at least another gallon left in the tank.’

  ‘You’re obviously wrong, and not for the first time, and because of such foresight you’ll have to walk to the nearest garage all by yourself – you needn’t imagine that I’m going to keep you company. I intend to stay put, right here in the warmth.’

  ‘But there isn’t a garage between here and Oxford,’ protested William.

  ‘Then you’ll have to carry me. I am far too fragile to walk.’

  ‘I wouldn’t be able to manage fifty yards after that sumptuous dinner and all that wine.’

  ‘It is no small mystery to me, William, how you could have managed a first-class honours degree in English when you can’t even read a petrol gauge.’

  ‘There’s only one thing for it,’ said William. ‘We’ll have to wait for the first bus in the morning.’

  Philippa clambered into the back seat and did not speak to him again before falling asleep. William donned his hat, scarf and gloves, crossed his arms for warmth, and touched the tangled red mane of Philippa’s hair as she slept. He then took off his coat and placed it so that it covered her.

  Philippa woke first, a little after six, and groaned as she tried to stretch her aching limbs. She then shook William awake to ask him why his father hadn’t been considerate enough to buy him a car with a comfortable back seat.

  ‘But this is the niftiest thing going,’ said William, gingerly kneading his neck muscles before putting his coat back on.

  ‘But it isn’t going, and won’t without petrol,’ she replied, getting out of the car to stretch her legs.

  ‘But I only let it run out for one reason,’ said William, following her to the front of the car.

  Philippa waited for a feeble punch line and was not disappointed.

  ‘My father told me if I spent the night with a barmaid then I should simply order an extra pint of beer, but if I spent the night with the vicar’s daughter, I would have to marry her.’

  Philippa laughed. William, tired, unshaven, and encumbered by his heavy coat, struggled to get down on one knee.

  ‘What are you doing, William?’

  ‘What do you think I’m doing, you silly woman? I am going to ask you to marry me.’

  ‘An invitation I am happy to decline, William. If I accepted such a proposal I might end up spending the rest of my life stranded on the road between Oxford and Stratford.’

  ‘Will you marry me if I win the Charles Oldham?’

  ‘As there is absolutely no fear of that happening I can safely say, yes. Now do get off your knee, William, before someone mistakes you for a straying stork.’

  The first bus arrived at five past seven that Saturday morning and took Philippa and William back to Oxford. Philippa went to her rooms for a long hot bath while William filled a petrol can and returned to his deserted MG. Having completed the task, he drove straight to Somerville and once again asked if he could see Miss Jameson. She came down a few minutes later.

  ‘What, you again?’ she said. ‘Am I not in enough trouble already?’

  ‘Why so?’

  ‘Because I was out after midnight, unaccompanied.’

  ‘You were accompanied.’

  ‘Yes, and that’s what’s worrying them.’

  ‘Did you tell them we spent the night together?’

  ‘No, I did not. I don’t mind our contemporaries thinking I’m promiscuous, but I have strong objections to their believing that I have no taste. Now kindly go away, as I am contemplating the horror of your winning the Charles Oldham and my having to spend the rest of my life with you.’

  ‘You know I’m bound to win, so why don’t you come live with me now?’

  ‘I realize that it has become fashionable to sleep with just anyone nowadays, William, but if this is to be my last weekend of freedom I intend to savour it, especially as I may have to consider committing suicide.’

  ‘I love you.’

  ‘For the last time, William, go away. And if you haven’t won the Charles Oldham don’t ever show your face in Somerville again.’

  William left, desperate to know the result of the prize essay competition. Had he realized how much Philippa wanted him to win he might have slept that night.

  On Monday morning they both arrived early in the Examination Schools and stood waiting impatiently without speaking to each other, jostled by the other undergraduates of their year who had also been entered for the prize. On the stroke of ten the chairman of the examiners, in full academic dress, walking at tortoise-like pace, arrived in the great hall and with a considerable pretence at indifference pinned a notice to the board. All the undergraduates who had entered for the prize rushed forward except for William and Philippa, who stood alone, aware that it was now too late to influence a result they were both dreading.

  A girl shot out from the mêlée around the notice board and ran over to Philippa.

  ‘Well done, Phil. You’ve won.’

  Tears came to Philippa’s eyes as she turned towards William.

  ‘May I add my congratulations,’ he said quickly, ‘you obviously deserved the prize.’

  ‘I wanted to say something to you on Saturday.’

  ‘You did, you said if I lost I must never show my face in Somerville again.’

  ‘No, I wanted to say: I do love nothing in the world so well as you; is not that strange?’

  He looked at her silently for a long moment. It was impossible to improve upon Beatrice’s reply.

  ‘As strange as the thing I know not,’ he said softly.

  A college friend slapped him on the shoulder, took his hand and shook it vigorously. Proxime accessit was obviously impressive in some people’s eyes, if not in William’s.

  ‘Well done, William.’

  ‘Second place is not worthy of praise,’ said William disdainfully.

  ‘But you won, Billy boy.’

  Philippa and William stared at each other.

  ‘What do you mean?’ said William.

  ‘Exactly what I said. You’ve won the Charles Oldham.’

  Philippa and William ran to t
he board and studied the notice.

  CHARLES OLDHAM

  MEMORIAL PRIZE

  The examiners felt unable on this occasion to award the prize to one person and have therefore decided that it should be shared by

  They gazed at the notice board in silence for some moments. Finally, Philippa bit her lip and said in a small voice:

  ‘Well, you didn’t do too badly, considering the competition. I’m prepared to honour my undertaking but by this light I take thee for pity.’

  William needed no prompting. ‘I would not deny you, but by this good day I yield upon great persuasion, for I was told you were in a consumption.’

  And to the delight of their peers and the amazement of the retreating don, they embraced under the notice board.

  Rumour had it that from that moment on they were never apart for more than a few hours.

  The marriage took place a month later in Philippa’s family church at Brockenhurst. ‘Well, when you think about it,’ said William’s room-mate, ‘who else could she have married?’ The contentious couple started their honeymoon in Athens arguing about the relative significance of Doric and Ionic architecture, of which neither knew any more than they had covertly conned from a half-crown tourist guide. They sailed on to Istanbul, where William prostrated himself at the front of every mosque he could find while Philippa stood on her own at the back fuming at the Turks’ treatment of women.

  ‘The Turks are a shrewd race,’ declared William, ‘so quick to appreciate real worth.’

  ‘Then why don’t you embrace the Muslim religion, William, and I need only be in your presence once a year.’

  ‘The misfortune of birth, a misplaced loyalty and the signing of an unfortunate contract dictate that I spend the rest of my life with you.’

  Back at Oxford, with junior research fellowships at their respective colleges, they settled down to serious creative work. William embarked upon a massive study of word usage in Marlowe and, in his spare moments, taught himself statistics to assist his findings. Philippa chose as her subject the influence of the Reformation on seventeenth-century English writers and was soon drawn beyond literature into art and music. She bought herself a spinet and took to playing Dowland and Gibbons in the evening.