The Turnarounders and the Arbuckle Rescue

by Heneghan, Lou

  ‘Looks like Mr Lance’s Games lesson is cancelled. Second Form to the gym straight after lunch!’ Winters called over the boy’s sniggers.

  Ralf arrived in the gymnasium to find the History Master handing out fencing masks, plastrons and foils. He grimaced. He was rubbish at fencing and Seth, he noticed, looked ashen.

  ‘Right,’ said Winters, when they were all tooled up. ‘The partners you had last time, please!’ He pointed to Seth, ‘Goldberg, you can swap in and out with Alloway and Childs.’

  The boys hurried to obey and Ralf was left hesitating by the wall. King strode over, foil whipping the air in a series of intricate moves. He had the confidence of Zorro.

  For a second Ralf was paralysed. This was going to be little short of murder, he thought. But then he noticed King’s expression. Surprisingly, he looked quite friendly.

  ‘It’s alright, Ralf,’ he said. ‘I’m not going to gut you. Aston gave me your message. Let’s get this over with and then we can talk, suit you?’

  Ralf nodded.

  ‘Splendid. Let’s just continue as we were before. I’ll come in on the attack and you work on that riposte.’

  As they put on their masks, Ralf’s mind was whirling. Yes, King had been helping him with his fencing last year! And, aside from speaking to him like he was a five-year old moron, he’d actually been quite a good teacher. He picked up the foil, weighed it in his hand and got into the correct stance.

  King nodded behind the mask. ‘Ready? En garde!’ He lunged at Ralf but slowly, the move exaggerated so Ralf would know exactly where it was aimed. Ralf parried easily.

  ‘Excellent,’ said King. ‘Again!’

  Warily Ralf prepared for King’s next move but again the lunge was deliberately obvious and half the speed it could have been. He parried the stroke and smiled inside. Maybe this was going to turn out alright after all?

  The sound of foil on foil filled the gym and all around them pairs of fencers battled but Ralf did not see or hear them. He was completely focused on his own moves and King.

  ‘A bit faster now?’

  Ralf parried the next few strokes, concentrating hard and was surprised at his success. It was coming back, now. That back foot needed adjusting a bit but, there, that was better!

  Well done both of you!’ Winters exclaimed. ‘How about you have a real assault now and we can see what we need to work on next?’

  Behind his mask, Ralf smiled. This was great! It would be brilliant not to have to worry about King or Tank and his other cronies on the corridors again. If they were on speaking terms, he might even be able to speak to him about Seth. Get him to lay off...

  ‘En garde!’ said Winters.

  King attacked immediately. Ralf quickly parried his thrust, following it with a hesitant riposte that King counter-parried with ease. King feinted to the left and Ralf fell for it, leaving his target area open long enough for the other boy to strike. The foil jabbed Ralf’s stomach, making him gasp.

  ‘Touché!’ Ralf panted, acknowledging the hit.

  King nodded. Then ‘En garde!’ from Winters and they began again. Ralf was forced back several steps, he parried two strokes and then felt the circular movement of King’s foil as the taller boy disarmed him. Ralf’s foil clattered to the floor.

  He felt his face flush and was glad of the mask. He picked up his weapon and straightened.

  ‘Concentrate on the lines, Osborne,’ said Winters encouragingly. ‘Try to anticipate where the next attack will come from.’

  Ralf nodded. He saw the flash of white teeth as King grinned behind his mask and they began again.

  The attack was quicker this time – and harder. Ralf’s grip tightened. He managed to hold on to his weapon – just. His heart thumped. He couldn’t anticipate what King was going to do and think about his feet at the same time and so he stopped thinking altogether.

  This, it transpired, was what he should have done from the start. His instincts took over. The foil was a feather-light extension of his arm that seemed to move with a will of its own. His feet danced across the floor. He felt like he was flying and he had a sudden, intense rush of delight at the ease with which he fought. He could do this, he thought with wild joy. He was good at this!

  King hesitated and their blades locked. Ralf looked up to see King’s shadowed smile falter. He could feel King’s press and he pushed back all the harder. The foils sang apart, King’s arms flew wide and Ralf lunged. He hit King squarely in the chest.

  ‘Touché!’

  ‘Oh, Bravo Ralf!’ called Winters. ‘You’ve been practicing!’

  Behind the mask King’s expression changed from disbelief to angry determination. The last assault was a flurry of foils. The tall boy was extremely good. But, Ralf felt like he’d done this a thousand times before and realised, gleefully, that in his previous lives he probably had.

  As King and Ralf fought on, the other boys lost interest in their own bouts and drifted towards them. Soon they were standing in a loose circle around the duelling figures, most cheering King on, but the odd voice every so often calling Ralf’s name.

  Ralf did not hear them. He was in a different place entirely, noiseless and calm – a place where only his body and the foil existed. King, on the other hand, did hear. Enraged, he began a complex compound attack, feinting first one way and then the other. His lunges were fierce now and he cut wildly. Ralf flicked his foil in a circular motion, throwing King off guard. He recovered enough to parry and their blades locked again but the mood in the room had changed,

  ‘Put up!’ Winters called but neither boy heard. King slashed and thrust, his foil whirling in a frenzy. Ralf just managed to keep him on the back foot, but it was getting dangerous.

  ‘Put up, I said!’ Winters shouted. ‘Osborne! King! Foils down!’

  King was hacking at him now. This would have been disturbing enough but each violent slash was accompanied by a rage filled cry.

  ‘STOP!’ A slight figure was running towards them, foil raised. ‘What do you think you’re doing, you idiot? WOLF STOP!’

  The spell was broken. Out of the corner of his eye, Ralf saw Seth try to step between them, arms raised. He could not follow through his riposte for fear of spearing his friend and had to pull up short. King’s thrust went unchecked and Ralf watched helplessly as it stabbed into his own shoulder. The foil bent in a sharp arc then snapped. The capped tip sprang away but the broken foil jabbed into his padded plastron making him wince. Meeting no resistance, and with a foil six inches shorter than it had been a second ago, King slammed into Ralf knocking his mask off and sending his head, closely followed by the rest of him, crashing to the floor.

  The room fell silent. A stunned circle of boys stared in disbelief and anticipation. Winters had never looked so angry. He turned a furious glare to Ralf who, pain boiling through his head, couldn’t have met his eye if he’d wanted to. He started to say something to King but the other boy tore off his mask, glared at Ralf, and stormed from the gym.

  Ralf’s head felt like it had been prodded with a red-hot poker and he cupped his hand over his left eye.

  ‘Touché!’ he whispered.

  He was slow changing and by the time he’d put his equipment away and was properly dressed he found himself alone in the locker room. Why hadn’t he just let King beat him? If he’d handled it differently they might be on speaking terms again now. Instead he’d made things worse with King and he’d made Seth and Winters angry with him too. Well, he could do something about that, at least.

  Winters was in an armchair in the corner of the staffroom rapidly checking off clues in The Times crossword when Ralf knocked tentatively on the open door. Weedy Green started to get out of his chair but Winters waved him back down and joined Ralf in the corridor.

  ‘Well?’

  ‘I came to apologise, sir,’ said Ralf. ‘I behaved stupidly.’

  ‘Quite,’ said Winters, tartly. ‘You do realise how dangerous all that was, don’t you?’

  ‘Yes, sir
. Sorry, sir.’

  ‘I’ve always had you pegged as one of the more sensible sorts, Osborne. What I can’t understand is what on earth you thought you were doing!’

  ‘I wasn’t thinking at all, sir, I’m afraid,’ Ralf confessed honestly. ‘I was so surprised at how well I was doing I pretty much forgot everything else.’

  ‘Well, at least one of you has had the manners to apologise.’

  ‘King was pretty upset, sir. I’m sure –’

  ‘Ridiculous of him to lose his temper like that,’ said Winters.

  ‘I think Seth’s pretty hacked off with me now as well.’

  ‘Why don’t you go and patch things up, then? He’ll be finishing OTC in about half an hour. You can talk to him then.’

  ‘OTC? Officer Training?’ Ralf couldn’t have kept the shock out of his voice if he’d tried. The thought of Seth in uniform, mucking around with guns and playing soldiers was just too weird to be believed.

  ‘I thought it was out of character too,’ said Winters. There was a movement in his cheek, not quite a twitch but a flicker of concern. ‘It’s what he wants, though. He spread his hands helplessly.

  ‘Are you sure, sir? I knew he was staying behind but...’

  ‘Quite sure.’ Winters drew the staffroom door closed behind him. ‘He had a letter from his grandfather, Osborne. Disturbing news from home.’

  Ralf blanched. An awful thought hit him. ‘His parents? Gosh, they’re not – not dead are they sir?’

  ‘No – no, they’re not dead.’ There was a definite twitch that time.

  ‘But what’s happened?’

  He took his pipe out of his pocket and tapped it meditatively against his palm. He seemed to be considering something. Evidently he decided one way or the other because then he drew in a deep breath. ‘Not for me to say.’ He put a hand on Ralf’s shoulder. ‘Things are difficult for him at the moment. Just leave him be for a while, Ralf. Give him time. He’ll come right again soon enough.’

  Unable to truly believe what Winters had said without witnessing it for himself, Ralf said goodbye then hurried from the staffroom to the main quad to peer through one of the windows into the Hall. Sure enough, Asinus, holding a stopwatch and dressed in a pristine uniform, was standing at the front of a group of twenty or so similarly clad boys who were assembling rifles. Hardly daring to breathe, he watched Seth, somehow smaller than the others, his face a stark mask of concentration, snap a final clip into place and stand to attention – the first to finish.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  Lurking Urk

  The snow continued to fall. For the first few days everyone was filled with excitement. The Crispin’s boys and village children competed in snowball fights and sledge races down the hill from Short Face Cross. Snowmen were built and demolished on the Village Green. Crispin’s boys who owned boots trooped down to the village in droves to skate on a now dead-fish-free Sparra's pond.

  As November gave way to December though, and the snow did not budge, the novelty began to wear thin. People began to mutter about it. The snow was too early. It was staying too long and the birds were behaving strangely. Large numbers of them had gathered in the village but were slow to migrate. Swallows and martins, swifts and nightjars called shrilly to each other from the trees.

  Even when the blizzard hit late one Friday the birds stubbornly refused to move on. They froze to telephone wires and rooftops as fishermen battened down their hatches and villagers checked their stores and closed their doors. The wind raged all weekend and snow fell in a swirling mass. The harbour froze. The sea froze. No one could quite believe it but when the wind stilled and the first few people ventured from their homes, it was clear to see. The water sloshed beneath a thick grey blue layer of ice, which only thinned and broke into sheets about a mile out to sea.

  Fishermen emerged to check their boats and villagers waded through snowdrifts to their shops, each attempting to carry on as normal despite the conditions. The farm children had work to do tending livestock and the boys from the school were conscripted to clear paths.

  Then, one arctic night in the second week of December the temperature fell still further and tempers flared.

  Tension between the school and village, which had been simmering under the surface because of the competition over raffle ticket sales, reached breaking point when Mallison made the mistake of knocking at Mrs Tomkins’ door. Her worry over her husband away in France, her patience worn thin by her five children and the anxiety over where their next meal would be coming from, made her a trifle less than friendly. The words ‘raffle tickets’ were hardly out of Mallison’s mouth before she threw a bucket of dirty dishwater over him.

  Afterwards everyone commented how unlike her this was. Rosie Kemp, when she saw her later, said she looked demented. Ben Cheeseman thought ‘the school had a nerve sending snooty lads with silver spoons in their mouths to beg off hardworking people’. Frank Duke insisted ‘the snotty little blighter had it coming’ having knocked on the Tomkins’ door twice before.

  It was the turning point in relations between the school and village. Within hours Will Tomkins was set upon by three Crispin’s youths and beaten soundly.

  By five o’clock, when Ralf and Leo met up with Valen and Alfie outside the Hall, the village was in uproar and Valen was livid.

  ‘Cowards! That’s what they are!’ she cried. ‘Three against one and all of them older than him too! You should have seen him, Ralf. His eye was all swollen shut and it took ten minutes to stop his nose bleed.’

  ‘How was Mrs Tomkins?’

  ‘Well vexed,’ said Alfie. ‘Everyone was. Will’s not sayin’ who did it, but my money’s on that Tank geezer and maybe Aston and Childs.’

  As they skidded down the High Street on hard packed ice, people peered out at them shaking their heads and they saw many of the shops now had notices in their windows reading: ‘No Crispin’s Boys.’

  ‘Everything seems so different now,’ said Leo. ‘Do you remember what it was like when we first arrived? People were happy then.’

  ‘The villagers have changed,’ Ralf agreed, trying to rub some warmth back into his chilled fingers. ‘And it’s not just the war.’

  ‘Everyone’s changed since we got here,’ said Leo. ‘Even us.’

  The going got easier as they reached the lower end of the High Street, the snow had been cleared and piled high on corners, and they hurried down towards Ralf’s house anticipating the warm stove and a hot drink.

  ‘Seth’s changed, that’s for sure,’ said Ralf. ‘I hardly ever see him now.’

  ‘Talk of the devil,’ said Leo.

  Seth was coming out of the newsagents. He saw them immediately and came over.

  ‘Have you seen this?’ said Seth, furiously slapping at the newspaper he was holding. ‘Can you believe if it had just been a bit less foggy in Munich last month, this whole war could have been over by now!’

  ‘Fog in Munich?’ Alfie repeated, looking blank. ‘Seriously bruv, you gonna have to give us a bit more to go on, on this one. I’ve got no clue what you’re on about.’

  ‘Look!’ Seth thrust the paper into Ralf’s hands. Ralf frowned, trying to decipher how the report in front of him had any bearing on their own situation.

  ‘Yeah,’ said Alfie, annoyed. ‘Give it to him, why don’t you? It was me who asked the bleedin’ question! Oh, forget it,’ he said when Ralf looked at him. ‘I’ll have it after.’

  Ralf scanned the page. Underneath a grainy photograph of a dimple-cheeked man, the headline read:

  WOULD-BE ASSASSIN QUESTIONED BY GESTAPO.

  Frowning, he was about to start reading the article aloud to the others, but Seth never gave him a chance.

  ‘So, Hitler went to a Munich Beer Hall to give some crazy, Jew-hating speech and this poor swine tried to kill him.’

  ‘So what happened?’ said Leo. He couldn’t quite see how any of this had anything to do with them, but it was best not to challenge Seth when he was in this kind of mood.<
br />
  ‘The bomb went off but Hitler had already gone – because of the weather of all things!’ Seth said savagely. ‘Can you believe that? It was too foggy for him to fly so he finished fifteen minutes early and caught the train instead.’

  ‘Come on, Seth,’ Ralf said quietly. ‘It’s history. I mean, we can’t do anything about it, can we?’

  Seth flashed him a defiant look then kicked at the snow. ‘It could be different, though!’ he shouted, snatching the paper back. ‘If it hadn’t been for the last minute change of plans, Hitler would be gone and maybe no one else would have to die!’

  ‘Hitler’s had luck on his side so far,’ said Alfie.

  ‘There are other attempts, too,’ said Leo. ‘I remember reading about it. Two or three, I think. They all fail.’

  ‘You’re missing the point. It’s not about success or failure. It’s the man!’ snapped Seth. ‘This man,’ he said pointing at the picture. ‘Elser his name was. Johan Elser. Do you know who he was?’

  They stared at Seth dumbly.

  ‘Exactly! He was nobody. He was a carpenter, for goodness sake! He was no one powerful or important. He just realised what was going on. He saw what Hitler was capable of and he took action.’

  No one knew quite what to say.

  ‘I don’t know.’ Seth ran his hands through his hair then pushed up his glasses to rub at his eyes. ‘I don’t know about anything anymore!’ He turned and stalked away leaving them staring after him.

  They didn’t see Seth the next day but on Sunday, after church they called for him at Winters’ cottage. When he answered the door, dressed in his oversized coat and scarf, his mood had changed completely.

  ‘Have you lot noticed the weather?’ he asked.

  ‘Noticed it!’ said Valen. ‘You're deranged!’

  Seth glared at her. ‘What I mean is, have you been paying attention to the temperature?’