Everybody looked up.
“There is too much chatter at the moment,” he remarked evenly. “It will be very unpleasant for anyone I catch talking. Bleaney, come up here.”
The discussion of essays proceeded.
Mr. Crouch enjoyed his visit to the Kemps’ house a few nights later. Holding his hat in his hand, he walked with pretended humility into the front room, where a fire had been lit (he guessed) specially for the occasion. The house was small, but not poverty-stricken: there were a table of photographs, a fern and some heavily-framed sepia reproductions of execrable pictures on the walls. Mr. Crouch stood before the fire. He felt like a diplomat on a visit to some barbarous ruler, with the job of persuading him to allow a railway to run through his territory.
Presently Joe Kemp, having put on his jacket, came in, passing a huge hand over his oiled hair. He was a retired policeman, who now supplemented his pension by job-carpentering; his enormous body was topped by a small head, with ears closely set against it. He had an expression of agreeable truculence, and wore a ludicrous pair of gold-rimmed spectacles which gave him at times a puzzled look. Mr. Crouch held out a hand:
“Good evening, Mr. Kemp. My name is Crouch.”
“How d’yer do?”
They shook hands.
“Sit down, will yer?”
“Thank you.… I expect your son has told you what I suggested to him. I should like to hear what you think about it, Mr. Kemp.”
Joe Kemp passed his hand over his hair again and kept it there to scratch perplexedly.
“Ay, well, it’s a bit of a winder. I reckon it’s a bit of a tall order.”
“I think John is capable of it, Mr. Kemp. Otherwise, I wouldn’t suggest it.”
“Ay, he’s a clever enough lad.…”
“And the advantages of a university education are really very great, you know. It’s not just a sausage machine for turning out school teachers. It’s the stepping-stone to all the higher professions—the bar, the Civil Service, Parliament——”
“You missed t’road, it seems,” said Joe Kemp, looking at him shrewdly.
“Ah, but I chose to be a schoolmaster. As a matter of fact, I wanted to be able to help boys like your son—help them to reach the positions their intelligence deserves.”
Mr. Kemp raised a few half-hearted objections. But it was clear that his imagination had been caught by the scheme, and only a fixed determination “not to be rushed into anything” prevented him from agreeing with what Mr. Crouch said.
“I don’t think there’d be any difficulty on the financial side, either, Mr. Kemp.… The governors——”
“Nay, well, that’s not so important. I want to do what’s right by John——”
“Yes, of course.”
“I mean, we don’t want, Mr. Crouch.” Joe Kemp looked at the schoolmaster with dignity. “I know some chaps as’ve taken their lads away from school as soon as they could—well, I’m not blaming them, I’m just luckier than what they are. Between you an’ me, it was more of a struggle ter get t’lass settled—she’s a teacher, yer know, in Manchester. You ain’t talkin’ to a man with backward ideas, Mr. Crouch, not like some fellers I could name. As I say, I want to do t’best by the lad as I can. But——”
“Yes, Mr. Kemp?”
“Don’t yer think you’re lookin’ a bit far ahead and aimin’ a bit high? What I mean is, you say ’e’ll get a good Certificate. Granted. But then suppose you find ’e’s not up to what you thought?”
“It’s not a matter of chance, Mr. Kemp. I can tell from his work that he will win a good School Certificate. And if he does that he’ll win a good Higher School Certificate. His mind will develop as time goes by.”
“Well, I’ll let him decide for himself,” said Joe Kemp. He threw open the door and called to his son. “After all, it’s his life, and if he fancies it I’m not goin’ ter stand in his light. Ay, come in, John, lad. I’ve been ’aving a talk with yer teacher. Now, what about it? Does ta want to go to Cambridge, or Oxford?”
The boy kept glancing from one to the other of them, painfully shy. Mr. Crouch kept his eyes on his face, smiling encouragingly, shifting his hat in his hands.
“If—if you think I could,” he said hesitatingly.
“Eh, well, that’s up to you, lad.” Joe Kemp chuckled and put an arm round his son’s shoulders. “But ta would like a bang at it, eh?”
The boy kept glancing from one to the other, painfully shy. Mr. Crouch kept his eyes on his face, smiling encouragingly, shifting his hat in his hands.
“If you think I’m—good enough?”
“No danger—eh, Mr. Crouch? No danger!”
From this night onwards, Mr. Crouch regarded himself as John Kemp’s particular guardian, but of course he was far too wise to make any move in this role until the School Certificate was over and done with. John Kemp won seven credits in this examination and informed the Headmaster of his intention to stay on into the sixth form.
Just before the end of the summer holidays, Mr. Crouch invited John to have tea with him at his lodgings, and chatted amicably to him about things in general, what he had done during the holidays, what he had read and so forth. He was conscious that the boy watched him warily without relaxation, and this charmed him, as if he had the task of taming some elusive animal. By casual questions he discovered the extent and directions of the boy’s reading, and made some suggestions for what he should read in the future. Soon he had put aside four of his own books for John to take home.
“And when you read anything, make notes on it.” He had taken off his spectacles to polish them, and his face looked blind and simple. “Look, in this manner.” Crossing to his desk, he replaced his spectacles and pulled a sheaf of notes out of a drawer: he held them out, and the boy stirred to take them. “It’s an invaluable habit. You’ll see the qualities and points to look for; they form the headings of your sections.…”
A deep sense of pride filled him as he saw the boy begin turning over the notes, his head bent; the feeling that he was delegating his knowledge caught at his heart, and made the action seem noble and queerly unselfish. He began to walk about the room. “You must remember that what you are reading from now onwards will not be useful for a week or a year even, but for all time, until your last examination is over. And naturally you can’t expect to remember every single thing you read, so you must make notes. You must aim at reproducing the book you are reading in miniature. When I made those notes,” he continued, halting in front of the window and looking out over the park, “I couldn’t afford to buy a quarter of the books I read. And even if I had been able to own a copy of every one, I couldn’t have read them all before an examination—so the obvious thing to do was to make careful notes, gutting each book so that when the time came I could turn up my notes on it and there have all the essential facts under my hand on one page.”
The boy looked at the notes with admiration.
“Perhaps you’d like to borrow some, to get the idea of what to look for?”
“Oh, yes, thank you, sir.”
“But don’t copy them. Second-hand notes never did anyone any good.”
Despite the fact that when school restarted John had other subjects to attend to, Mr. Crouch was more than satisfied with the progress he made. He had not known the full measure of ability the boy had. His brain was tireless. He could read swiftly, remember what he read and was quick to point out analogies between dissimilar things and to take suggestions that Mr. Crouch made. At first the master had made a habit of saying carelessly: “You should have a look at so-and-so” or “It’s a pity we’ve no time to read such-and-such,” but at their next meeting Kemp would invariably say, shyly, “Oh—er—I had a look at the things you mentioned, sir——” so that he quickly realized he had to be very careful what he said. It was like manipulating a powerful but delicate machine. By the end of John’s first year in the sixth form, he had scampered through all the important English writers, and was beginning to explore
critical theory, philosophical and social backgrounds, and elementary philology. His knowledge became remarkable: hardly ever was he at a loss for a quotation or a reference.
Some months later Mr. Joseph Crouch was sitting in his lodgings reading a newspaper. “Pilots and crews of the aircraft which took part in the successful attack on the German naval bases of Wilhemshaven and BrunsbÜttel, at the entrance of the Kiel canal, returned to their bases in fine fettle,” it said. “They were proud to have been chosen to strike the first blow at the German war machine.”
As he turned the page to read of news elsewhere, he heard the landlady admit someone at the front door, and in a few moments John was shown in. He wore a blue overcoat and no school cap, and Mr. Crouch saw him for a moment as merely an undistinguished boy of sixteen, who might be earning his living in a shop or as a clerk in some sort of office.
“Hallo, Kemp; come in. I’m glad you’ve called. This is something we hadn’t bargained for.”
“No, sir.”
“No, indeed we hadn’t. I haven’t quite decided what the effect will be.” Mr. Crouch folded up his newspaper, lighted a long spill at the gas fire, and applied it to his cigarette. “You’re sixteen, aren’t you?”
“No, sir. Seventeen last month.”
“And they’re calling up the twenties and over.” He stood looking over the park once more, where working men were digging an air raid shelter. The trees that lined the railings were still in full luxuriance of autumn decay. “Do you know,” he said slowly, “I almost think it would be better if you had a shot at that scholarship this year—after Christmas.”
“But——”
Mr. Crouch could feel without looking at him the bewilderment that his face held. It annoyed him slightly: he did not feel sufficiently secure himself to be over-considerate about the futures of others.
“Yes, why not?”
“But, sir—— Surely I couldn’t, sir.”
“You mustn’t be so pessimistic.” The master turned to him with a grin that was almost hostile; a bar of sunlight on the wall by his head dimmed slightly. “Nothing venture, nothing win.”
“But surely, sir——”
“My dear boy, circumstances have changed. Nobody knows what’s going to happen. In five years time it may well be that Oxford and Cambridge will be nothing but ruins.” Mr. Crouch made an expressive gesture. “It seems to me that if you went up next autumn, you’d have nearly three clear years, if they allowed you deferment.… Of course, one just doesn’t know what line they’re going to take.”
The boy moved to the table, his eyes lowered, and, taking up a strand of the tablecloth’s fringe, began to twist it and turn it slowly. Obviously Mr. Crouch’s suggestion had come as a great shock, and he was loth to adopt his mind to it. Mr. Crouch watched him impatiently. The outbreak of war had quickened the growth of a feeling he now recognized to have been growing for some time: an indifference to Kemp and his career, and a desire to get the whole business over as quickly as possible. The idea of tutoring the boy for two more years seemed intolerable, and he was prevented from being more curt than he was by the belief that in a few months, or perhaps even weeks, they would be scattered irrevocably by greater events. Further, during the summer holidays he had come as near to falling in love as his temperament allowed, and being parted from the girl made him not sorrowful, but irritable, as a child is vexed by confiscation of a box of sweets.
Finally, he felt he had been cheated. Although Kemp worked hard and intelligently, being quick to take suggestions and with a memory retentive enough to add every fresh thing to his mind, he was a burden to teach. His character was almost purely negative: if there had come one spontaneous idea from him during all the span of their acquaintanceship, Mr. Crouch would have felt repaid, but the hesitancy and heaviness that he had imagined would wear off as the boy’s imagination widened and deepened persisted month after month, until Mr. Crouch was forced to admit it was native to him and would never go. He could not advance a step without guidance. The poetry and good writing he studied seemed to mean nothing personal to him: at first Mr. Crouch was pleased with this (Jarrett having been insufferably boring on the subject of the Romantics), but later on he found it a leaden weight. There was no fun in teaching so matter-of-fact a mind, however swift it was to take and develop points that ordinarily the immature mind would miss.
“The fact of the matter is,” thought Mr. Crouch to himself bitterly, “he could be a really efficient engineer with as just as little trouble and with probably more benefit to the community at large.”
Aloud he said:
“In any case, it would be experience.”
“But an open scholarship, sir.… Surely at my age no one——”
“Not in ordinary circumstances, no. But these circumstances aren’t, ordinary, surely you realize that. I think you’d stand a fair chance.”
He questioned John about the progress he had made during the holidays, and decided to see the Headmaster next day.
The Headmaster could not give him more than half his attention, for he was badgered by problems of blacking-out many windows and of conducting a ballot among the parents regarding evacuation. “No, I don’t agree,” he flung back over his shoulder as he strode along a corridor. “My advice to anybody now is to get all the scholarships they can in the normal way, and then to go into the Army. Oxford’ll wait. It’s waited long enough.”
Mr. Crouch shuffled obediently after him.
“That’s true, sir, but I think he’s got the ability.… It’s only a question of this year instead of next—in his own interests I think it would be advisable for him at least to try.… And in any case, it would be experience.”
“Does he want to? What does he say?”
“Oh, he’s very keen, sir.”
“Well, he can if he likes. I don’t advise it, but he can if he likes.” The Headmaster took out a carpenter’s rule and began measuring a window. “Tell me when you want the arrangements making. Twelve by five and a half.”
John was irritated by the calm way Mr. and Mrs. Kemp received the news that he was to sit for a scholarship not in a year next spring, but next spring—in a little over six months.
“Next March?” said Joe Kemp at tea. “Well, that’s a hustle-up.”
“You’ll not be eighteen—eh, we’re all ’aving to change our plans.” Mrs. Kemp put the teapot down. “Take yer tea, John.”
“Yes, but it’s not just a matter of time—I shan’t know enough. No one ever sits for an open scholarship till their third year——”
“Nobbut clever ’uns,” grinned Joe, folding a piece of bread-and-butter to eat with his tinned fish.
“You don’t understand, dad!” John’s nervousness became flecked with bad temper. “It’s a silly idea.… I don’t know what Crouch is thinking of.”
“Eh, there’s no harm in trying,” said the father, munching.
“But there’s no point! … I can’t get a scholarship before I’ve even sat for Higher—no one ever has.”
“You never know what you can do till you try.” Mrs. Kemp tilted the bowl of fish. “Here, John, have some of the liquor.”
He held out his plate resentfully. “Oh, you don’t understand. It’s all daft. I s’ll fail, so what’s the use of trying? As sure as I’m sittin’ here——”
“Well, no one’ll think owt less of you for that,” said Joe Kemp in a reasoning voice. “An’ it’ll be practice.”
The boy fell silent. Later, when the six o’clock news had been switched off, he renewed his complaints to his father, who was sitting comfortably in the armchair. Joe Kemp said nothing but things he hoped would comfort the boy, but privately he decided to have a word with Mr. Crouch, and later that evening called round to see him. Mr. Crouch was packing a suitcase; he was returning the next day to Watford. The Headmaster had called all the masters together for an emergency staff meeting immediately following the outbreak of war.
He was not over-pleased to see Joe Kemp, but
welcomed him in, and they sat by the fire with the half-full suitcase open on the table. When he listened to what Joe Kemp had to say for three minutes he began nodding his head wisely, in order to halt Joe’s monologue by suggesting that he knew everything he was going to say next. “Yes,” he said. “Yes … yes.… What you’re afraid of, Mr. Kemp, if I see it rightly, is that John will try for this scholarship and the Higher School Certificate in one year—and miss both of them. I don’t think there’s any danger of that. Even if he doesn’t bring the scholarship off, he’ll still have four months to prepare for the Higher Certificate, and he’ll meet the second examination with all the more experience and confidence through having taken the first. But apart from that, I think he has a very good chance of success in both. Next year it would be a certainty: this year it’s just very likely. I’m not suggesting the impossible, Mr. Kemp. John has an exceptional brain. In fact, he is the most remarkable pupil I have ever taught. I don’t deny that I would rather have waited, but circumstances have changed, and we have to change our plans too. And the authorities will recognize this, and make all due allowances. No, I understand your doubts, but they’re quite groundless—you can take my word for it.”
“You take my word for it,” said Joe Kemp later that evening to John, who sat miserably by the fire unable to concentrate on the book he held. “Mr. Crouch knows what he’s doin’. You needn’t worry; you think too little of yourself, lad. You don’t know what you can do. You’re shapin’ fine, I reckon; don’t worry thaself.”
“Eh, John was always a modest one,” put in Mrs. Kemp, who was putting a new heel on a sock. “Wasn’t ’e?”
The boy sighed, guessing his father had been to see Mr. Crouch, and feeling too weary to struggle against the alliance. He pushed his hair back and bent his attention to the book again. Resistance was useless.
Not even Mr. Crouch had foreseen the energy with which John threw himself into his work during the autumn and winter, that haphazard period when hours were topsy-turvy and lessons were frequently interrupted by real or imaginary air-raid warnings. Indeed, it passed unnoticed for a week or two, until Mr. Crouch noticed the number of notebooks Kemp was using up and the number of books he borrowed from the school library, and the pallor of his face. He had always, of course, worked hard, but effortlessly, within his own capacity: now there seemed a danger that he would outrun even his own powers. Mr. Crouch noticed that when he was asked a question in class, a momentary flash of panic came into his face, as he sought about his brain for the answer, caused by the fear he would not know, that he would be found wanting. Indeed, Mr. Crouch forbore to ask him questions for this reason.
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