‘The dons, of course. Or at least the Provost – and I’ll bet the others follow him like sheep. I’ve just found a letter from my father. I was going to show it to somebody I’m fairly thick with in Harbage. But I’d like to show it to you. You’re the only person who’s ever given me any good advice about the damned place.’ Ivo paused on this handsome acknowledgement, which somehow I found myself not quite trusting. ‘Look, won’t you come in for a minute, sir?’ Rather amazingly, Ivo had turned and thrown open the door of his room. I went in, and he at once offered me a drink. It was still afternoon, so I was able civilly to decline. Ivo hesitated, and then refrained from pouring anything for himself. I supposed him to be on his best behaviour.
‘I say,’ he said abruptly,’ who was that old man?’
‘That I was walking with this afternoon? Don’t you know? His name is Arnold Lempriere.’
‘Really?’ Just as when he had first glimpsed Lempriere and myself side by side, Ivo looked distinctly startled. ‘I don’t think I’ve ever noticed him around the college before. But I’ve heard of him. He was my father’s tutor.’
‘He was nothing of the kind. He had a job in America when your father and I were up. But he was your grandfather’s tutor – which is quite something, Ivo, you must agree.’
‘He couldn’t have been!’
‘I assure you he was. I don’t suppose there were four years between them.’
‘And he’s still a don at this college? How very odd.’
I have probably remarked before that undergraduates are capable of remaining in the most astonishing ignorance about those aspects of college life that fail to interest them. But this unawareness of Ivo’s was quite out of the way. I reminded myself again that he was a very unnoticing type of young man.
‘No – I don’t think I’ve ever spotted him shambling around,’ Ivo said, much as if obligingly confirming me in this conclusion. ‘Comes, perhaps, of not going in and eating those awful meals in hall.’
“If you haven’t been aware of him, it doesn’t mean he hasn’t been aware of you.’
‘Just what do you mean by that?’ Ivo’s voice had sharpened. I wondered why he was suddenly so interested in someone whose very existence within the college he’d contrived to remain in ignorance of.
‘I mean that Mr Lempriere has been doing his best to have people view your affairs and prospects, Ivo, in as favourable a way as possible. You might pretty well call him your friend at court.’
‘I thought it was you who’d tried to sign on for that.’
I was now so puzzled by some unknown factor underlying Ivo’s bearing that this familiar flash of insolence struck me as almost reassuring. I found it rather too offensive to reply to, all the same.
‘So he’s another guardian angel,’ Ivo said. ‘I’ve had enough of guardian angels. They can all get stuffed, as far as I’m concerned.’ Ivo’s face twitched, and then suddenly he laughed – wildly, and to an unnerving effect of momentarily releasing panic. ‘I suppose it makes it a damned sight funnier,’ he managed to say. ‘I can see that.’
‘Ivo, I don’t know what you’re talking about. But you obviously need to sort yourself out. I’ll leave you to it.’
‘No, don’t go away. I want to tell you about . . . about the capitulation.’ Ivo was still holding his father’s letter. He now raised it in air, but didn’t offer to show it to me. He seemed to have thought better of this. ‘The Provost has given my father lunch at the Athenium.’
‘Do you mean the Athenaeum?’
‘That’s right – a club. Or not exactly a real club. Not like Boodle’s or Buck’s. A place for bishops and people of that sort.’
‘Quite so. But what’s so remarkable about this bit of news?’
‘Well, for a start there’s another bit. The plot’s thickening, speeding up. My father’s coming up to dine in their grotty Lodging. And he has a nose for such things. The way the Provost talks and writes, tells him that what’s in the wind is a little quiet wheeling and dealing about the black sheep of the family.’
‘Does your father express it that way?’
‘No, of course not. But it’s what he means. I’ve got a bit of a nose too.’
‘Why should the Provost wheel and deal about you, as you express it?’
‘I haven’t a clue. And I don’t think I like it much, as a matter of fact. Which is jolly decent of me, wouldn’t you say?’
‘I don’t think I’m prompted to say anything. Except that if you feel this whole business is a bit silly, I agree.’
‘Families are a bit silly, if you ask me. I’m fed up with being clucked over. When a man’s my age he ought to be through with all that. Here’s my father talking about a conciliatory move, and a reasonable accommodation. It’s not my sort of language at all.’
‘I’d suppose not. Do you mean your father is giving you advice?’
‘He wants me to scrub Priapus. That would be conciliatory.’
I had forgotten about Priapus. But now I remembered it was clearly a venture the character of which made it very relevant to any politic efforts Tony was still making on Ivo’s behalf.
‘If I know anything about Priapus’ I said firmly, ‘any sane person would advise you to scrub it. But can you? What about your associates?’
‘What do you mean – my associates?’
‘That man Bobby Braine – and the other people at Trinity or wherever it is.’
‘Oh, them! They’ve all ratted.’
‘You mean you’re on your own?’
‘Yes – right out on a limb. Except, of course, for my grandfather. I’m still in partnership with him. I think perhaps I’ll consult him – although I can pretty well guess what his advice would be.’
I judged the behaviour of Mr Braine and his colleagues ominous. Their sudden circumspection was unendearing, but it clarified the character of the forthcoming publication, supposing one felt in any doubt about it. I wanted to tell Ivo that for good advice he need look no further than the letter in his hand. I refrained out of a sense that this would be counterproductive. Ivo, whom I had always sensed as being his grandfather’s man, was in some phase of confused antagonism towards his father. I even had a notion that, if something new was really stirring in his mind, it actually had to do with what he was pleased to call his partnership with Cedric Mumford. I tried a fresh tack.
‘Ivo, your grandfather’s quite an old man – and I’ve a feeling that, as he grows older, it will be your job to protect him a bit. His judgement’s not too good already, if you ask me. And I rather wonder about the effect of its becoming known that he’s backed your magazine and put up the money for it. Young men can do outrageous things and in a sense get away with it. Even if they’re clobbered at the time, people feel it has been high spirits and inexperience and so forth. But for a much older man to be mixed up in something even mildly scandalous is quite different. It will be held to be demeaning, or embarrassingly and disablingly gaga, or something of that sort.’
‘Yes.’ Ivo nodded decisively, and I realised – rather to my surprise – that he had understood every word of this. ‘You’re quite right in a way. I’ve thought about it. But the point about my grandfather is that he’s tough. He’s a damned sight tougher than my father. And he likes guts.’ Ivo paused, and suddenly his face lit up with a vivid smile. ‘I say!’ he exclaimed, ‘do you think my grandfather liked that guardian angel of mine? One’s supposed to venerate one’s old tutor. His signed photograph in one’s book-lined den. That sort of thing.’
‘I doubt whether your grandfather cherishes Mr Lempriere’s photograph, although it’s you who ought to know about that. In fact I’m fairly clear they didn’t care for each other very much.’
‘Understatement?’
‘Probably.’ The drift of Ivo’s thought had become obscure to me. But at least it wasn’t moving in an attractive direction. Deciding that I’d again had enough of his society, I moved towards the door.
‘My grandfather doesn’t muc
h like the Provost either, does he? Think of that day at Otby.’
‘I’d rather not, Ivo. It was distinctly not a success. Not that your grandfather didn’t try quite hard at times. But the academic classes are not congenial to him. No more are they to you. But you know what I think about that.’
‘Yes, I do.’ Ivo was smiling again, and seemingly even more pleased with himself than before. Observing my disposition to depart, he stepped quickly forward and opened the door politely. “Don’t worry,’ he said.
‘Grace! Gentlemen!’
I got into hall that evening just in time to hear the butler bellow out this injunction to silence. It had always struck me as a curiously phrased prelude to common supplication – the more so as we were at once going to be described therein as miserable and needy wretches. And nowadays there was the further circumstance that dinner was no longer a one-sex affair; the young men had gained the right to bring in girls if they wanted to, and their seniors had followed them in this abnegation of an immemorial rule – only with the austere proviso that at high table female guests had to be of a certifiably learned sort. The butler was thus chargeable with ungallantly insinuating that the deus omnipotens, pater caelestis whom the bible clerk was about to address might be offended if it were divulged to him that there were ladies present.
I communicated these thoughts to Charles Atlas when he presently sat down beside me. Very decently, he managed to be amused. Perhaps it wasn’t before reflecting that having been an undergraduate at the college I was entitled to talk nonsense about it if I wanted to. Atlas never talked nonsense. A disposition to give much time to administrative affairs was making him, at what was almost a tender age, a man of mark on our local scene. Any chore shoved at him would be faithfully carried out. His background differed from Cyril Bed- worth’s, but it seemed to me he would be the Bedworth of the place a generation – or half a generation – on. It may have been this association that made me inclined to tease Atlas, much as Tony and I had gone in for teasing Bedworth long ago. Atlas and I got along very well on this basis – a circumstance much more to his credit than to mine.
‘Charles,’ I asked, ‘does being Tutor for Admissions automatically make you Tutor for Expulsions as well?’
‘I haven’t tested my powers in that direction, Duncan. But I rather imagine not. When useless people go down prematurely it’s commonly a matter of saeva necessitas on the economic front. The Secretary of State for Education and Science, rummaging round on her desk, has come on a chit telling her that such and such a young gentleman refuses to pass any examinations. So she stops his grant, and that’s it. He transfers his energies to selling detergents or motor-cars, and never looks back.’
‘What if there’s no grant? What if it all comes on dad?’
‘The college loses patience at precisely the point the Minister would. Or at least I hope so.’ Atlas paused for a moment. ‘The chap departs with its blessing – although he probably feels he’s had a kick on the arse.’ Atlas, always rather prim in manner, employed a normal public school vocabulary. ‘I don’t think there’s any large problem involved.’
‘Look at those rows of young men,’ I said, ‘swallowing tepid soup. About three hundred of them, I suppose. I can’t see half a dozen who look as if they ever opened a book in their lives.’
‘No, indeed! It’s thoroughly heartening, wouldn’t you say?’ Atlas wasn’t going to show himself unequal to this banter. ‘Actually, two hundred are working hard, and ninety-four are working like mad. Or thereabout. But it’s all most splendidly disguised.’
‘That’s on the charitable side, isn’t it?’
‘Well, yes. We could do a bit better in the Examination Schools, I admit. And even a few dead idle people are potential sources of infection, whom it’s wise to keep an eye on. But we needn’t panic. For example, your old friend’s son – Ivo, is he called? He sounds a complete young nuisance, with singularly little claim to be tolerated around the place much longer. Arnold seems to think otherwise, but I doubt whether he really knows much about the boy.’
There was a moment’s silence while we both finished our own soup – which had arrived tolerably hot. I didn’t think it was quite casually that Atlas had narrowed this desultory talk to a specific instance.
‘You’re entirely right,’ I said. ‘Arnold’s young Mumford is pretty well an imaginary creation.’
‘My point is that the boy oughtn’t to be blown up into an issue of principle, or anything of that kind. It would be perfectly proper and reasonable to go quietly easy with him for a time – even on the score of some extraneous consideration unconnected with his own merits.’
‘Yes, I suppose so.’ I wasn’t going to dispute the proposition, although for a moment it surprised me. I’d known Atlas express opinions less accommodating in this field. Here in our academic microcosm, I told myself, was the political man whose macrocosmic representative was for me Lord Marchpayne. Tony would avoid head-on collision, feel ahead into a situation in the interest of compromise, precisely as I suspected this young man of doing now. ‘Only,’ I said, ‘the thing mustn’t be ludicrous? What you call the extraneous consideration must have a bit of weight to it.’
‘Exactly!’ Having agreed with emphasis, Atlas compressed his lips and glanced round him warily. ‘I’ve heard something about your mission to Otby,’ he murmured. ‘Would you say the Provost was prepared to go a long way in the interest of that confounded letter-book?’
‘It looked like that. But Cedric Mumford was so impossibly outrageous that we simply got nothing off the ground.’
‘You were surprised, Duncan?’
‘I was surprised.’
It must be Tommy Penwarden, you know. The thing has become a perfect King Charles’s Head with him. And he has simply badgered our unfortunate Provost into losing all sense of proportion about it too. Don’t you think?’
‘I don’t know that I do. The Provost doesn’t strike me as that sort of person. And there’s another thing. That Otby expedition wasn’t – or wasn’t in the first instance conceived as being – to do a slightly shameless deal over young Mumford. We were going to show ourselves as a thoroughly fair-minded crowd Ivo-wise – not much more than that. And hint that we might make Cedric Mumford an Honorary Fellow, like his son the eminent Lord Marchpayne.’
‘Good God!’
I had difficulty in not laughing. My incautious revelation of this particular wile on the Provost’s part had really shocked Atlas. It had to be concluded that Honorary Fellows were Sacred Cows of no common order.
‘Yes, it’s deeply alarming,’ I said – and at once repented a remark so patently offered in a spirit of frivolity. ‘But the Provost does at least think round a situation. He knows he couldn’t on his conscience go easy – as you call it – on one boy, and not easy on another boy identically circumstanced. You’ll find he’s got anything of that sort well in hand.’
‘The whole affair could so readily become an occasion of ridicule in the university at large. We’re not popular, the Lord knows. One has to face it, although it’s uncommonly unfair. It’s not as if we had delusions of grandeur. We are grand, and damned well can’t help it. So why should we get the stick? But there it is.’
This time I did laugh, although not by way of denying the justness of Atlas’s remarks. I said I supposed it to be the sort of penalty attached to being cock house in a public school.
‘It’s much worse. That jealousy is mitigated by the knowledge that one house pretty rapidly succeeds another house at the top of the tree. But we’ve been in permanent possession for centuries.’ Atlas stared gloomily at a fresh dish which had been set before him. ‘Duncan,’ he asked suddenly, ‘you remember that party of Anthea Gender’s? Did you have any further talk with Christopher Cressy at it later on?’
‘No, I didn’t.’ This abrupt change of subject took me by surprise. ‘But I met him again at a dinner-party the other evening.’
‘Did he have anything to say about that tedious busin
ess?’
‘The letter-book? Yes, he did – and quite unprompted by me, I need hardly tell you. I had a feeling he was up to something. You must know him better than I do, Charles. Would he be up to something?’
‘Christopher’s enormously entertaining.’
‘No doubt. In fact, I don’t deny it. He talked amusingly enough to me. But that’s not the point.’ I said this rather sharply, having grown tired of these tributes to Cressy’s social charm.
‘It might be the point, in a way.’ Atlas again glanced circumspectly round the table. ‘He likes to have a good thing to tell. Would you be inclined to say he was disposed to whet your curiosity?’
‘I think he wanted me to go round whetting other people’s curiosity. He was producing the tip of a mystery.’
‘That sounds just like Christopher. What sort of mystery?’
‘I’m not going to tell you, Charles. Don’t misunderstand me. It’s simply that I decided not to play – not to run around, that is, reporting his enigmatical remarks. He doesn’t get any curiosities whetted by me.’
‘But Duncan!’ Forgetting his low-toned caution, Atlas cried out in dismay. ‘That precisely is to whet. You can’t leave me all agog. Do say.’
‘Then I’ll tell you just one thing. Cressy declared it to be wise and charitable in him to hold on to that hunk of stolen property. And if you can make anything of that, Charles, you’re a long way ahead of me.’
XV
We were now over the hump of the Sixth Week, coasting downhill towards the Christmas vacation with a rising breeze behind us. For the undergraduates there would be an abrupt dispersal: singly or in consort or in small faithful flotillas, they would scatter over England, the continent, the habitable globe. The state of feeling this prospect engendered I could remember clearly. It was complex, compounded of regrets for ploys and relationships suspended and impatience to get cracking on some fresh scheme whether of pleasure or improvement according to the temperament of the individual concerned.
The dons too felt the gale, but not quite to the same effect of tacking idly round before being blown afar. For them their corporate life would continue, and although their present pupils would cease hammering importunately on their doors as the clock struck the hour they themselves would be hard at work on the entrance examination, knowing that the boys on whom their choice fell would be privileged so to hammer through three or four long years to come. When the examining was over, learned leisure would be theirs for a time.
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