The Big Day

by Barry Unsworth

  Hans sat up straight in his desk. ‘I do not understand this word “torso”,’ he said. ‘Is it including the head?’

  ‘I think we should try not to listen to Mr Binks,’ Mafferty said. ‘It is this part of the body.’ He again indicated. ‘You have to be more specific if you want to include the head. You have to say “head and torso”, but in this case, apparently, there was only the torso … What do you mean, exactly?’ he said to the Libyan.

  ‘The rose is imperialism,’ Abdu said. ‘And that is all corrupted by worms, the worms is the corrupting in the Imperialist State, which is a decadent one, because of exploiting the oil producers, for example. “Rose thou art sick” means England is sick because of exploitings going rotten now that the producers can put all their heads together and fix the prices. England is a decadent flower. Also, she is too much civilize.’

  He glanced round again, his mass of tightly curly hair rising above the general level like a small dome on the skyline.

  ‘… can’t have a head,’ Mr Binks said from the next room. ‘No, definitely excludes the idea of a head …’

  ‘That is basically what I would call a political – ’

  ‘Blake was interested in nature, wasn’t he?’

  ‘Well, Henry, all poets, practically all poets – ’

  ‘I don’t mean only plants and that, but wild animals.’

  ‘The area of a poet’s likes is a pretty broad spectrum,’ Mafferty said. ‘But why “invisible”?’ he said to Abdu, ‘Why “invisible worm”?’ He set his finger tips together in unconscious parody of Cuthbertson, and looked at his students over the bridge so formed.

  I attended the wounded as best I could for an hour. It was difficult to know where to start. There were pieces and fragments of bodies …

  Abdu shook his fuzzy head. ‘Corrupting from the insides,’ he said. ‘Hopelessly roddled.’

  ‘Riddled,’ Mafferty said. ‘Well, all these remarks have been very interesting and I think illuminating in certain respects – ’

  ‘It is a girl,’ Mustapha said suddenly.

  ‘I beg your pardon?’

  ‘ “Riddled”?’ they heard Mr Binks say querulously. ‘What means “riddled”? It means shot through with holes. Please try to ignore the sounds from Mr Mafferty’s classroom.’

  ‘I am in agreement with Abdu. It is a beautiful girl. Rose is the name of her.’

  ‘He didn’t quite say that, did he?’

  ‘Your English rose, no?’

  ‘Well,’ Mafferty said doubtfully, ‘I’m not sure whether that is really the interpretation I would have – ’

  ‘Excuse please, I am not saying that,’ Abdu said, turning to look indignantly at Mustapha.

  ‘Yes, yes,’ Mustapha said, ‘I am saying the same as you. She is the English rose that has got clapped. Else why it say about bed and secret love?’

  In the weighty pause that followed upon this, they all heard Mr Binks say, ‘ “Clapped?” what means “clapped”? You mean, What does “clapped” mean? Or alternatively, what is the meaning of “clapped”. It means “applauded”. Now could we get back to – ’

  ‘Clapped?’ Mafferty said. ‘I don’t quite see – ’

  ‘He said the same thing.’ Mustapha pointed at Abdu. ‘He said too much syphilis. That is the age-old problem of unlawful fornications.’

  ‘It is not really a problem in this country,’ Mafferty said. ‘Actually. Very unpleasant of course, and all that, but with these new wonder drugs it is not the disaster it used to be.’

  ‘Too much civilize,’ Abdu said to Mustapha.

  ‘What you say?’

  ‘I did not say what you say, I say – ’

  ‘Excuse me please, what means “wonder drugs”?’ Javier said, pencil poised between thick eager fingers.

  ‘Penicillin, stuff like that,’ Henry said.

  ‘Antibiotics,’ said Mr Butler, suddenly and loudly. ‘The marvels of modern medical science.’

  Perhaps because Mr Butler spoke so seldom, there was a little silence after this, during which they all heard Mr Binks saying, ‘… face blown off. Maimed? No, I don’t think we can call having the face blown off the same as being maimed. I would call that disfigured rather than maimed. I would reserve the word maimed for – I beg your pardon? Mutilated? That is a good idea, Costas, yes, but wait a minute now, if you say mutilated, are you not implying that the surface of the face still remains, though badly damaged of course, whereas according to the newspaper account, this person had his face blown off. You must give due weight to the preposition …’

  ‘In which this country has led the field,’ Mr Butler said, as if there had been no pause whatever. ‘You would still be biting on bullets and getting blotto on raki if it hadn’t been for us,’ he said looking across at Mustapha, who did not, however, pay him much attention, being still too occupied with his own interpretation of the poem.

  ‘Not at the same time, surely,’ Mafferty said.

  ‘They sit here running us down,’ Mr Butler said. ‘This country has led the world in relieving pain and prolonging life.’

  ‘Excuse please, what means “mutilated”?’

  ‘They speak of beds and of dark love. Why they do that? That is not imperialism or society corrupting. That is extra-marital.’

  ‘What means “maimed”?’

  ‘It all demonstrates what we were saying last week,’ Mafferty said, raising his voice, ‘that a good poem, and it is possibly the test of a good poem, can be read on a number of different levels.’ His head had begun to ache slightly. ‘We can disagree as to detail,’ he said, ‘and yet we can be fully agreed as to the inherent, er, and that is possibly the real test of – ’

  ‘Civilize,’ Abdu said, glaring at Mustapha.

  Javier said slowly, ‘It is a microcosmos of what is going on, you have not to see it only in the physical side.’

  ‘Good point,’ Mafferty said. ‘Excellent point.’ He glanced at his watch. Only three minutes to go. ‘Perhaps,’ he said, ‘we could end by copying the poem, and then at home you could write a paragraph or so outlining your views on the meaning of it all…’

  The yough engaged in painting Cuthbertson’s door did not seem to have had any lunch break. When Cuthbertson returned, after his own modest sandwich, he was still at it, shoulders hunched forward in commendable concentration, brush held like a pen.

  Cuthbertson paused benevolently. He was going through a phase of optimism and had quite forgotten his former distrust of the painter. The words, ‘Ah, still at it?’ were on his lips, to be delivered in a genial manner, when he noticed something terribly wrong with the lettering of ‘Principal’. A disproportionately wide gap had been left between the ‘r’ and the ‘i’, and again between this and the following ‘n’. Moreover, it was obvious to any impartial scrutiny that not enough space had been left for the ‘pal’ part, which the youth was embarking on now. The end of the word was thus certain to be marked by an undignified congestion. In short, it would have been difficult to imagine how anyone could have made a worse job of the lettering. This incompetent oaf had obviously failed to take into account the lesser bulk of the letter ‘i’. He had allotted too much space to it, then tried to put the matter right by leaving an equivalent space after it, with the result that the letter was isolated from the others, and stood out with an unnatural boldness. The word, and with it the concept, was made totally ridiculous by this loss of symmetry.

  Cuthbertson stood still for a moment longer, jaws clenched. It was the arbitrary, absurd look of the word on the door, his door, his identity, that finally drove him, after this rigid pause, to furious utterance. He felt his face suffuse with blood. His eyes grew humid.

  ‘What the devil,’ he said, very loudly, ‘do you think you are up to?’

  These words, uttered with such angry emphasis, and from such close quarters had an electrifying effect on the painter, who did not seem to have been aware of Cuthbertson’s presence until this moment. He started violently and t
urned, holding the brush breast high. His eyes stared wildly and a commotion set up in his adam’s apple communicated to the corners of his mouth a series of twitches. He regarded Cuthbertson for some moments in this shocked goggling manner.

  ‘I knew you would make a mess of it,’ Cuthbertson said loudly. ‘And do you know how I knew?’

  The youth essayed a reply, but all that emerged was a series of gutterals interspersed with loud clicking noises.

  ‘It was the arrogant way you reacted to my remarks about stencils.’ Cuthbertson spoke more quietly, perceiving that the other had a speech defect. It was occurring to him, in any case, that this person was too poorly endowed all round to be a proper recipient for his wrath. Bishop, Bishop was the man. At this moment, as if called forth by the very urgency of his rage, Bishop appeared, hurrying towards them along the passage.

  ‘I’ve just had the reply about Mafferty,’ he said. ‘He hasn’t – ’

  ‘Never mind that,’ Cuthbertson said in low, vibrant tones. ‘Never mind that.’

  ‘Is there anything wrong?’ Bishop looked from Cuthbertson to the goggling painter. ‘I thought I heard shouting,’ he said.

  Cuthbertson’s cheeks began to tremble. At the sight of Bishop’s face and the sound of his voice, an appalling rage began to possess him. His vision was clouded, and he felt a dry constriction in the throat. The rage was like an ordeal, the effort to control it was an effort to survive.

  ‘Have you seen this?’ he said. ‘Have you seen it?’

  Bishop craned awkwardly, stretching his short neck to get a sight of the door, and this awkwardness of posture, so typical of him at any time, now acted as an extra irritant on Cuthbertson, who saw in his subordinate’s ungainliness a sort of living proof of his ineptitude.

  ‘Would you call that symmetrical?’ Cuthbertson said. ‘Would you call those letters evenly spaced?’ Distinctly audible during the latter part of this question was the dry clicking of Cuthbertson’s tongue against his rage-parched palate, a most unnerving sound, the more so as it reproduced on a smaller scale the characteristic effects of the painter’s impediment, making this seem somehow infectious.

  Bishop blinked at the door a moment longer. Then, perhaps to postpone meeting Cuthbertson’s regard, he addressed himself to the painter. ‘What’s all this?’ he said sternly. ‘Is this the best you can do?’

  The painter had not yet quite recovered from the shock Cuthbertson had given him. His eyes still had a wild look, and his mouth, though firmer now, stretched convulsively at the edges from time to time. He stared at them for a few moments, then uttered some words.

  ‘What’s that, what’s that?’ Bishop said, leaning forward in severe interrogation.

  The youth spoke again.

  ‘What does he say?’ Cuthbertson demanded, licking dry lips. ‘I can’t make it out. The accent, I mean. Apart from anything else. He must be from another part of the country. Are – you – from – another – part – of – the – country?’ he said to the youth, spacing the words out menacingly.

  ‘What’s that?’ Bishop leaned forward again. ‘Glamorganshire? He comes from Glamorganshire, Donald.’

  ‘Ask him what he said before,’ Cuthbertson said.

  ‘Glamorganshire eh?’ Bishop said. ‘What did you say before? Before he asked you where you came from? What? No, before that, before Mr Cuthbertson asked you – ’

  ‘I cannot stand much more of this,’ Cuthbertson said.

  Bishop brought his face quite close to Cuthbertson’s and said in low tones, ‘He has a speech impediment.’

  ‘Good God,’ Cuthbertson said violently. ‘Do you think – ’ He was interrupted by a further series of sounds from the painter.

  ‘He says it looks all right to him,’ Bishop said, and stood alertly, waiting to relay a message back.

  ‘Looks all right to him?’ Looks all right to him? Ask him if he considers the word he has written on my door to be symmetrical, will you? Just ask him that simple question.’

  ‘I doubt if the word is within his range,’ Bishop said, ‘I’ll do my best.’

  ‘Never mind,’ Cuthbertson said loudly. ‘It’s no good blaming him.’ The absurdity of the intermediary, interpretative role which Bishop was adopting added fuel to his rage.

  ‘You have let the side down,’ Bishop said to the painter. It was obvious that he was keen to stay on the side of outraged authority as long as possible. ‘You have made a very serious blunder,’ he said.

  ‘No good blaming him,’ repeated Cuthbertson, very loudly. ‘The labourer is worthy of his hire. I blame you, Bishop. I hold you entirely responsible.’ He was not aware of having chosen to speak so loudly. The volume of his voice seemed curiously arbitrary, as if decisions about it were being made elsewhere.

  Bishop glanced around. Even at this moment of pressure, under fire as it were, he was concerned to protect the chief from the consequence of being overheard, the consequences of some student or member of staff seeing Mr Cuthbertson out of control like this.

  Cuthbertson noticed the glance and understood it. He paused, breathing heavily. Then he said, ‘We’d better go inside my office.’ To the youth he said coldly, ‘Just paint it over, will you? If that will not be taxing your skills too much.’

  ‘I ought to have known,’ he said, when they were inside the office. ‘I ought to have known that something would go wrong with the enterprise.’ He felt himself trembling in various parts of his anatomy, mainly in the area round his mouth, and behind his knees. ‘I built this place up with my own hands,’ he said.

  ‘I know you did, Donald.’

  ‘I saw the possibilities. I rose to the challenge.’

  ‘Donald,’ Bishop said, ‘you are not looking at all well. Don’t you think you ought to take one of those pills?’

  Some weeks previously, when Cuthbertson’s tensions had started to become severe, Bishop had persuaded him to go and see a doctor, who had prescribed tranquillizing tablets.

  ‘Now?’ Cuthbertson said. ‘Barely two hours from the Degree Ceremony? With the Briefing Session to conduct before that? You know perfectly well that those pills have a stupefying effect on me.’

  ‘I thought – ’

  ‘That is the trouble with you,’ Cuthbertson said. The trembling behind his knees was increasing. He went round behind his desk and sat down. ‘You never think things through,’ he said. The ordeal of his rage had left him weak, not far from tears.

  ‘By the way,’ Bishop said, hoping by his news to avert further reproof, ‘Mafferty – ’

  ‘That is all right, I have spoken to Mafferty. I don’t think we’ll have any more trouble on that score. No, you mean well, but you have a propensity to make a hash of things.’

  Bishop stood in a position of respectful immobility, holding his hands at his sides. He seemed to be waiting, after this reprimand, for some N.C.O. to march him out.

  ‘You were at a good school,’ Cuthbertson said. ‘You became a prefect in due course, or so at least you told me when applying for this post. You taught for some years at a prep school before coming here. You were in the Territorial Army.’

  ‘Right on every count,’ Bishop said, full of admiration at the Chief’s grasp of detail.

  ‘Such a course of life should have made you a shrewd judge of men, and I had always considered you in this light. A man used to appraising his fellows, making swift assessments of their worth and so forth. Yet you engage an obvious imbecile to paint my door, and to do that delicate and crucial lettering job.’

  ‘He assured me he was up to it.’

  ‘How could he possibly assure you of anything, with a delivery like that?’

  ‘I think you may have startled him, Donald.’

  ‘I hope you are not seeking to shift the blame?’

  Bishop squared his shoulders and met his superior’s gaze firmly. ‘No, of course not,’ he said. ‘I accept full responsibility.’

  ‘I should think so,’ Cuthbertson said. This staunchness, which he though
t of as truly British, was having its due effect. He was feeling steadier now, the trembling had passed. After some moments of uncertainty he suddenly experienced the triumphant sense of being about to embark on a speech. He placed his finger tips together, forming a bridge.

  ‘It’s not only that,’ he said, ‘but the slight to me, my authority. Think of it that way. There is more than just personalities at stake here. I am a symbol. I am both base and apex. I don’t suppose you can readily conceive that, can you?’

  ‘Well,’ Bishop began, dutifully making the attempt, ‘let me see now …’ He made a line in the air with his forefinger and then with a prodding motion indicated a point above it. ‘It is a spatio-temporal concept, isn’t it?’ he said.

  ‘You cannot conceive it,’ Cuthbertson said firmly, ‘because it is inconceivable. Like alpha and omega, you know. Everthing depends on me. The whole structure of this small community of ours, this world in miniature, this little world of school. And there must be due order and proper government in every part, just as there must be in the world at large. I am the visible symbol of that order and government. I must be beyond repoach. I must be seamless. The smallest flaw in the design, the smallest suspicion that this or that was inadvertent, unforeseen, slipping out of control, this throws into discredit the whole structure, our world collapses. And the barbarian is always at the gate, never forget that.’

  ‘Some of them have got in,’ Bishop said, feeling bold enough now to venture a more joking tone, in spite of the Chief’s strictures. He had, in any case, something in reserve, if things got sticky again, this bombshell about Mafferty – a sure way, whenever he chose to trot it out, of diverting the Chief’s displeasure.

  ‘Some of them are in our midst,’ he said. ‘Judging by the faces I see. There’s a chap in Group Three who looks as if he’d be more at home with an assegai than a writing implement.’

  ‘They need discipline,’ Cuthbertson said. ‘They need a touch of the spur, some of them. That is my whole point. Everything must seem to be intended. There is an overall design here. Everything has been foreseen, everything has been taken into account, from the interveiw procedures on the student’s first arrival, to his graduation and translation to higher things twelve weeks later. Now if a student with some query not covered in the brochure and not dealt with in any of the various notices appearing on the notice board, if such a one – and he would already be a disaffected, potentially subversive person, since all possible queries are anticipated in one or the other of the ways I have mentioned – if he should find himself applying to my door and if the word ‘Principal’ on that door were grotesquely unsymmetrical…’