Summer Half: A Virago Modern Classic (VMC)

by Angela Thirkell

  The young man walked over to a window and looked out at the school chapel with his back to Colin.

  ‘What are you doing?’ he asked, without looking round.

  ‘Waiting to see Mr Carter.’

  ‘Oh, you’ll see him when he wants to come. If he’s looking at the cricket pitch with Harwood that may be after dark.’

  ‘Don’t you like cricket, then?’ said Colin, who thought all schoolmasters were athletic, except the old scholarly ones.

  ‘Like it!’ shouted the red-haired young man, turning round. ‘That’s not the question. The money that is spent on that cricket pitch would keep hungry men from starving.’

  ‘I expect it would,’ said Colin, ‘but probably no one could do it. I think Southbridge is a foundation with its money vested in governors or trustees, and they wouldn’t agree.’

  ‘Of course they wouldn’t. One is up against that sort of thing all the time. Are you doing Junior Classics?’

  ‘I was to,’ said Colin, ‘but Mr Birkett says it is to be the Mixed Fifth. I think that was the name.’

  ‘Did he say who was going to take Junior Classics?’ said the young man, his green eyes glittering in his pale face.

  ‘Winter was the name I think.’

  The young man gave an angry laugh.

  ‘Winter,’ he said, ‘it would be, of course. Oh, there you are, Everard.’

  A man of about thirty-five, with fair hair and a thin, amused face, came into the room.

  ‘Sorry not to be here to welcome you,’ said the newcomer to Colin. ‘Harwood, the cricket pro, wanted me to look at the pitch, and I couldn’t get away. I see you two have broken the ice.’

  ‘Look here, Everard,’ said the red-haired young man, ‘I can’t stand it.’

  ‘What?’ asked Mr Carter. ‘Sit down, won’t you?’

  Colin sat down, but the red-haired young man remained furiously standing.

  ‘It’s Swan,’ said he.

  ‘What has he done this time?’

  ‘He looks at me through his spectacles. I can’t stand it.’

  ‘But, my dear fellow, if he has spectacles he must look through them.’

  ‘It isn’t that. It’s the way he looks. I believe he has gone into spectacles on purpose.’

  ‘Now, be reasonable, Philip. You know his mother wrote saying he had been ordered to wear them for close work, and asking me to see that he did.’

  ‘I’m not close work. He needn’t wear them to look at me.’

  ‘I can’t very well tell him to take his spectacles off every time he speaks to you,’ said Mr Carter.

  ‘Then I’ll go to the Head,’ said the red-haired young man, whose name appeared to be Philip.

  ‘You can’t do that,’ said Mr Carter seriously.

  ‘Can’t I? No, I suppose I can’t,’ said Philip. ‘Things being as they are. But I won’t stand it. Keith saw how he looked at me.’

  ‘Did you, Keith?’ said Mr Carter.

  ‘No, sir,’ said Colin. ‘I mean I didn’t notice anything.’

  ‘You have to notice more than that if you take the Mixed Fifth,’ said Philip. ‘What do you think I’m to do, Everard? Junior Classics again!’

  ‘You do them very well when you keep your temper,’ said the imperturbable Mr Carter. ‘I’ve seen far worse scholars than you.’

  ‘Well, I’ll send in my resignation at once,’ said Philip. ‘To be looked at by boys in spectacles and then have people put over one’s head! It’s intolerable!’

  As he spoke a bell began to ring from the chapel.

  ‘Good God! Orchestra practice and I haven’t got my books,’ he shouted, and rushed out of the room.

  ‘Who was that?’ asked Colin.

  ‘Philip Winter. He’s an extraordinarily good classic and very keen on music and can’t keep his temper. He wanted the Mixed Fifth, but it needs a cooler man. I hope you are cool.’

  ‘I think so,’ said Colin cautiously. ‘I mean, I don’t go off the deep end in a hurry.’

  ‘Good,’ said Mr Carter. ‘Now we’ll have a talk.’

  He then plunged into timetables and technicalities with Colin, who, concentrating on what he was shown, found it all seemed pretty simple.

  ‘You’ll do it all right,’ said Mr Carter, ‘as far as the theory goes. How you will get on with the boys, only time can decide.’

  ‘Are they difficult to get on with?’ asked Colin, his original fears reviving.

  ‘I’ll have to ask you that question at half term,’ said Mr Carter. ‘If Eric Swan and Tony Morland approve of you, you’ll have no trouble. Don’t come to me if you have. And don’t go to Birkett, as he’ll only send you back to me again. It’s a pity you got across Philip so soon, but it can’t be helped.’

  ‘I never meant to,’ said Colin, surprised.

  ‘No, but you’ve got the Mixed Fifth, and you didn’t back him up about Swan’s spectacles.’

  ‘I couldn’t, sir.’

  ‘I never said you could. And, by the way, it’s all Christian names here. I don’t like it, but it is the fashion. The housemasters call Mr Birkett Henry, the assistant masters don’t, so you may as well get used to it. I’m Everard, and Winter is Philip, as you heard.’

  ‘I’m Colin,’ said Colin, ‘and if you don’t mind my being eccentric I’d much rather say sir than Everard; I suppose Carter isn’t done.’

  ‘Hardly,’ said Mr Carter. ‘You could say Mr Carter whenever you speak of me if you like. That would be considered quite a good eccentricity. Morland and Swan, who of course are Tony and Eric, say Mr to everyone, but if a junior boy did it he would be sat on. Birkett calls all the senior boys by their first names because he knows them. Matron uses surnames. You’ll learn it quite soon.’

  ‘Mr Birkett said a few lessons on how to address a Dean or a D.B.E. would be useful for the Mixed Fifth,’ said Colin, ‘but it looks to me as if lessons on how to address schoolboys and schoolmasters would be more to the point.’

  ‘Like all those moderns who wish to simplify, they have made it much more complicated,’ said Mr Carter. ‘My father and his oldest friend lived to be over eighty. They were at school and college together and on intimate terms all their lives, but they always called each other Carter and Jones. Come up and see your room.’

  He led the way upstairs, stopping to point out objects of interest.

  ‘Lower Dormitory,’ he announced, flinging open a door. ‘Mark on wall where Harwood once sent a ball from the nets through the dormitory window, crushing an Arundel print of the Martyrdom of St Ursula into a thousand fragments. The mark is officially known as the Martyr’s Memorial. The Upper Dormitory, as its name doubtless suggests to you, is upstairs again. The prefects have cubicles of their own. It is all very civilised. No pillow fights, barring-outs, or if you prefer it barrings-out, stealing of exam papers, or Damon and Pythias. Not even a passion for the headmaster’s wife. I really don’t know what boys are coming to. This is where you live. Plenty of shelves for your books. Nice view of English landscape. I won’t point out the local landmarks because you’ll be sick of them before the half term. By the way, how long are you staying here?’

  ‘I don’t quite know, sir. A term anyway, I suppose.’

  ‘Any particular reason for applying for the job?’

  ‘Well, I thought I ought to be earning something. Reading law is no inheritance.’

  ‘No, it isn’t,’ said Mr Carter thoughtfully, adding, ‘So long as it isn’t because you like boys,’ in what appeared to be a tone of relief.

  ‘Oh, no, sir. As a matter of fact,’ said Colin in a burst of confidence, ‘I’m terrified of them.’

  ‘You’re all right, then,’ said Mr Carter. ‘Once they’ve got you where they want you, they treat you very kindly. The wheel has come full circle, Keith. The beggarly usher has his Trade Union now and gets a good salary, holidays half the year round, and quite good social standing. But the boys are our masters. Benevolent tyrants, I admit, but despots. It is far more difficult to
expel a troublesome boy than to dispense with the services of an unpopular master. Supper at seven o’clock. A bell will ring.’

  Colin found that Simnet had been as good as his word, and his luggage was there, so he unpacked his clothes and lovingly arranged his law books on the shelves. The more he looked at Lemon Upon Running Powers, the more he wondered why he had put his head into a den of lions. If Mr Carter, so wise, so skilled in the great subject of boys, spoke of masters as anachronisms, upholders of lost causes, what chance would he, Colin Keith, have against his pupils? His mind played about the subject, sometimes seeing the masters as the last stand of civilisation against a horde of barbarians, mild because of their overwhelming superiority in numbers, but irresistible. And then he wondered if it were not the boys who should be compared to the imperial legions of Rome, steadily marching over all obstacles to surround and capture a handful of terrified tribesmen lurking in their dens, massacre the weakest, and carry off the rest to be palace slaves, treated with the same careless, humane consideration that an expensive, well-educated Greek slave might have received from his Roman master.

  The bell rang. Colin went down to supper, which was much less terrifying than he had expected. Mr Carter, Mr Winter, and a couple of other masters whose names he didn’t catch were at a sort of high table. The food was unexpectedly good and the boys ate in a very gentlemanly way. After supper the two unknown masters went off, and Mr Carter invited Mr Winter and Colin to come into his study for coffee.

  ‘I’ll ask Tony and Eric to come, too,’ said Mr Carter, ‘they are sensible animals. There is a kind of common room over in the big building for the assistant masters, but no one minds if you don’t go. You can always work in your own room if you want to. Tony and Eric, come and make my coffee.’

  The two boys stood aside while the inferior fry swirled past them, and followed their housemaster into his study, where they began, apparently in fulfilment of a well-known ritual, to collect from a cupboard cups and saucers, a large glass coffee machine, sugar, spoons and a jug, which Morland was taking out of the room when Mr Carter stopped him.

  ‘Which jug are you using, Tony?’ he said.

  ‘The glass one, sir.’

  ‘All right. The blue one had some dead flies in it.’

  ‘Those must be Hacker’s flies, sir. You let him use it last term to keep his flies in for his chameleon. There were a few over at the end of term that he forgot about, and I expect they died. Do you want them, sir?’

  ‘No, no, boy. Don’t wilfully play the sham innocent. Get the water for the coffee at once.’

  Swan smiled grim approval of his friend’s discomfiture, and laid the coffee-things neatly out on a tray, while the masters settled themselves in large creaking chairs. Mr Carter lit his pipe, Philip pulled out a battered packet of cigarettes, lit one, and as an after-thought offered the packet to Colin.

  ‘No thanks,’ said Colin. ‘To save trouble, I don’t smoke at all.’

  ‘Any reason?’ asked Mr Carter.

  ‘I don’t care for it.’

  ‘So long as it isn’t principle,’ said Mr Carter.

  ‘Sir,’ said Morland, coming back with his jug full of water, ‘Hacker says do you think dead flies would be bad for his chameleon, because if you don’t he would like to have them, as he has run rather short. He’s here, sir.’

  A pale boy with untidy hair, a slouching gait, and a slightly vacant look, partly intruded himself into the doorway.

  ‘All right, Hacker, take your flies, and if the chameleon dies don’t blame me,’ said Mr Carter.

  Hacker took the blue jug, muttered some words of thanks, and retired.

  ‘He doesn’t look very fit,’ said Colin.

  ‘Classical Sixth, sir,’ said Swan. ‘They all get like that the minute they go into that form. They are awfully brainy, but quite mad, and can’t stand up straight. It’s the influence of environment on character.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Keep your mind on the coffee, Eric,’ said Mr Carter, ‘and don’t be clever. When you have seen our Mr Lorimer, Keith, who takes Senior Classics, you will know what Eric means. How did orchestra practice go, Philip?’

  ‘Pretty well. God! I wish I could get those boys to understand three-four rhythm with a dotted crotchet at the beginning. TUM-ti-ty, TUM-ti-ty, with that short second beat. It’s the most exhilarating thing in the world, and they go and give the notes equal lengths, young devils.’

  ‘Proputty, proputty, proputty,’ said Eric Swan to the coffee machine as he began to pour out the coffee.

  ‘All right, Eric, we all know that you are a specialist on Tennyson,’ said Mr Carter.

  ‘Anyway, sir, you couldn’t have three notes of equal value in a bar,’ said Morland. ‘Theoretically perhaps, practically no. The first note must have more stress than the others. You can put the stress on the second or third, of course, but it comes to the same thing. Any average bar of three comes out as a dactyl.’

  ‘I thought a dactyl was a long and two shorts,’ said Philip sarcastically.

  ‘Yes, sir, according to the books: but the long isn’t as long as two shorts. I thought of writing a little waltz, sir, called the Virgil Waltz, and the school orchestra could play it on Speech Day.’

  ‘Ingenious idea, Tony,’ said Mr Carter, ‘but slovenly. How long have you had it?’

  ‘About two minutes, sir.’

  ‘Journalist,’ said Mr Carter.

  ‘It all comes of those rotten, up-to-date books on history and economics we have to read in the Mixed Fifth, sir. They ruin a boy’s mind and style. I absolutely heard myself telling matron my mind wasn’t conditioned to tepid bath water. Conditioned! Is it fair, sir,’ he continued to Colin, ‘to corrupt youth like that?’

  ‘What happened to the bath water?’ Colin asked.

  ‘It improved, sir. I had to draw up a five weeks’ scheme for improving the running of the house. First I got matron into my power by letting her rub my ankle which wasn’t at all in need of it, and after that it was child’s play. Our bath water is now the hottest in any house, sir,’ he went on, including Mr Carter in his speech. ‘Simnet is green with envy.’

  ‘Good,’ said Mr Carter. ‘Now it would be a good thing, Tony, if you abstracted your mind from world politics and devoted it to whatever prep you are supposed to be doing. You and Eric can go.’

  The boys rose, returned thanks in well-chosen words for their pleasant evening, and departed.

  ‘What do you think of the new arrival?’ said Morland to Swan, as they strolled towards the prep room.

  ‘They are all alike,’ said Swan wearily. ‘This one looks too sensible to stay long. I wonder why all masters go mad sooner or later?’

  ‘It must be mixing with each other,’ said Morland. ‘We don’t go mad, because we keep them at a suitable distance.’

  ‘What about the Classical Sixth?’ said Swan. ‘They all go mad.’

  ‘Exactly what I was trying to prove, you dull oaf. They live with Lorimer, breathe Lorimer, they even confide in Lorimer, though what they have to confide except false quantities, we shall never know, for they obviously have no human feelings. Therefore they go mad.’

  ‘My attitude to masters,’ said Swan sententiously, ‘may be summed up in the classic words of a celebrated English general to a small Expeditionary Force some twenty-odd years ago: “Be courteous to women, but no more.” For women, read masters, and there you are.’

  ‘Mr Winter will not love Mr Keith, if Mr Keith is to have the Mixed Fifth,’ said Morland, ‘and that will give us something to look at this term.’

  ‘My dear boy,’ said Swan in a pained voice, ‘don’t be childish. To watch assistant masters quarrelling is a sport unbecoming to our age and station. Flies on a window-pane if you like; masters, no.’

  A short silence followed the boys’ departure from Mr Carter’s room. Philip, who was nearest the window, said there was still an unknown car with chauffeur outside the Head’s house, which meant that the
last parent hadn’t gone yet.

  ‘What, roughly, is the feeling about parents?’ asked Colin.

  ‘What is yours?’ asked Philip.

  ‘I hardly know. I happen to like my own, but I was wondering what masters would think of them as a class.’

  ‘There’s a lot to be said on that subject,’ said Mr Carter. ‘I might be a headmaster myself some day, so I have devoted some thought to it. They are, of course, in a sense fellow sufferers with us, because they also are under the monstrous regiment of boys.’