Treasure by Degrees

by David Williams

  Treasure wished he could feel that Witaker intended to sound reassuring; in fact, what the lawyer had said had been delivered in tones that suggested a threat.

  ‘In short, the bondage is going to be permanent.’ Goldstein was not mincing words – or deeds. He stood up. ‘If this arrangement goes through I shall exert all the influence in my power to ensure that degrees in agriculture cannot be awarded through this College. That should provide your Foundation with adequate grounds for dissatisfaction, madam. I shall also resign my position here. Good afternoon.’

  The Senior Tutor’s angry departure was followed by an embarrassed silence. The Dean treated the others to a sickly smile that was meant to inspire confidence. ‘High spirits,’ he said, ‘nothing more than a display of high spirits, I assure you.’ A remark that Treasure considered might constitute the most dangerous understatement he had heard in several months. Equally, however, in view of Goldstein’s comments during lunch, he had found the Senior Tutor’s expostulations and threats somehow less unnerving and damaging that he had been led to expect.

  ‘Can he wreck the deal, Dean?’ Mrs Hatch was characteristically direct.

  ‘Certainly not,’ replied Ribble firmly. ‘The Senior Tutor’s relationship with our degree-awarding authority is remote; they may note any protest he makes, but I happen to know they won’t act upon it.’

  ‘And Dr Goldstein’s resignation?’ Miss Stopps sounded anxious.

  ‘Is unlikely to materialize.’ On this point Ribble seemed more than confident. ‘Daniel Goldstein threatens to resign over some issue or other almost annually – last term because we proposed putting up student fees – but as you see, he’s still here.’

  ‘We didn’t put up the fees, Dean,’ offered Hunter-Smith.

  ‘Technically, no we didn’t.’ Ribble still appeared sure of his ground. ‘We made some economies, and thanks to a most generous gift – an anonymous gift – we expect to balance the books.’

  ‘Even so, Dean, as a Trustee of the Foundation, and its legal counsellor, I need absolute assurance . . .’

  ‘And I can give you just that, Mr Witaker, oh dear me, yes,’ Ribble interrupted. ‘An overwhelming majority of the Governing Body plus a substantial majority of the Faculty are in favour of accepting the endowment. It’s only natural, even in an establishment as relatively small as this one, that there should be some dissentient voices to a proposition as . . . er . . . original as the one you are making. In general, however, I can promise you we shall fulfil our obligations in the spirit as well as the letter.’

  ‘And that’s good enough for me and Irv,’ said Amelia, with a meaningful glance directed at Witaker — but one which he chose to disregard.

  ‘I ought to tell you,’ said the lawyer, ‘in view of the opposition that’s been expressed, we received another application this morning from another apparently respectable establishment. We intended to disregard it, but I guess now we may need to consider it.’

  Ribble looked surprised. ‘Might I ask the name of the establishment?’

  ‘The Torchester Polytechnic. They already have a school of agriculture but they want to enlarge it. The conditions they propose are pretty well identical to the ones you put up.’ The Bursar was suddenly overwhelmed with a coughing fit which resulted in his becoming extremely red in the face as Witaker continued. ‘Mr Treasure agrees that Torchester would normally deserve consideration.’

  ‘I certainly think it’s a candidate,’ said Treasure with emphasis on the last word. He was anxious to sound impartial, and in any case, he hardly knew the place.

  ‘Oh, most respectable,’ put in Miss Stopps, implying a surprisingly intimate knowledge of educational facilities in the far north of England. ‘I believe you might be well advised to investigate its potential, Mrs Hatch.’

  Ribble smiled confidently. ‘They’ve got over their left-wing troubles, then?’

  ‘Left-wing troubles? Jeepers, are they a bunch of Commies?’ demanded Mrs Hatch, quickly transformed into a predictably outraged, if repentant, daughter of an eighteenth-century revolution.

  ‘International Socialists, I believe,’ responded Ribble, as though the point were academic. Treasure remembered the events – two years earlier – that had provided the Dean with his telling and well-timed observation. Torchester, like a number of other similar establishments, had been subject to a wave of student rioting. Dissatisfaction with the size of student grants had been channelled into political disaffection. A mood of normal unrest had long since replaced the turmoil that had been short-lived; the facts were nevertheless undeniable.

  ‘That settles it,’ said Amelia, ‘we ain’t backing any Reds, and that’s for sure. Why, one of the fine things I bin told about Itchendever is the way you’ve avoided any such nonsense.’

  ‘The undergraduates here are extremely sensible and well-behaved.’ It was Miss Stopps who volunteered the confirmation. Treasure found her gratuitous offering surprising until her following remark. ‘It remains to be seen, of course, whether they will welcome the Funny Farms Faculty of Agriculture.’ Miss Stopps gave full emphasis to the alliterative aspect of the name, in a manner that gave maximum advertisement to its comic quality.

  ‘Ah yes, students come and go, of course.’ Ribble stated the obvious as though it were the essence of profundity. ‘In three years there will be few in residence who will have known Itchendever without its illustrious new appendage.’ Treasure found the description a trifle strong, but the presumption was nicely gauged.

  ‘I guess we can leave the kids out of this.’ Mrs Hatch had long since taken the view that student democracy was something you put down. ‘Dean, we’ve made up our minds.’ This time the glare directed at Witaker could only be interpreted one way. ‘Mr Treasure said yesterday we’d be impressed, and we are. I’m sorry about Dr Goldstein, and I sure wish Miss Stopps here was a crack more enthusiastic about the deal – but maybe you’ll come round in time, dear. What I mean to say is, we’re goin’ ahead. Irv here has a fancy agreement of intent all ready and he can get with your lawyers again tomorrow for the signing.’ She paused to glance around the table. ‘I just want you all to know, I’m tickled to death about the whole thing.’

  CHAPTER VIII

  TREASURE DEPLORED the decreasing importance and observance attaching to afternoon tea as a national institution. He had been known to suffer attendance at village fetes for the compensation of savouring homemade rock cakes. Golf clubs he was inclined to judge, at least in winter, more by the standards of the buttered toast than by the condition of the fairways. If obliged to visit an academic or an ecclesiastic, he tried always to do so at tea-time. Lunch en famille with a Vice Chancellor or a Bishop was rarely a culinary delight; tea, in the tradition of things, could be quite a different matter. He frequently recalled some truly outstanding Scotch pancakes appropriately provided by the waggish Dean of St Paul’s following the memorial service to an Irish banker of Jewish descent.

  It had thus been a wrench to leave the Senior Common Room at the point where Miss Stopps had been supervising the preparations for a serious tea. Treasure had actually seen a plate of cress sandwiches; there was mention too of cherry cake – a rapture unforeseen which might better have remained so since Treasure was not destined to consume any. The collation had been timed for four-thirty to suit Ribble who had hurried out after the meeting upon some evidently urgent occasion. Since Treasure was due to call upon Sheikh Al Haban at the half-hour there had seemed no purpose in hanging about: it would hardly have been seemly to start stuffing himself with sandwiches and cake unilaterally, and in a standing position, when it was clearly Miss Stopps’s instruction and intention literally to serve tea around the SCR table, and at the appointed time.

  Finding himself in the Stable Quadrangle some few minutes early for his appointment, Treasure had lit a pipe and ambled around the square. Although some distance from the staircase shared by Peter Gregory and Prince Faisal, he could not fail to deduce that the noise of a loudly slammed door
had come from that same opening. There was also the following clatter of footsteps descending the uncovered wooden steps. Treasure was approaching from the north when the Dean had emerged and turned south looking ruffled and perturbed. He had marched off in the direction of the Hall without noticing Treasure. Whatever had upset Ribble, at least he was returning to the consolation of cherry cake – or such was the thought in Treasure’s mind as, after glancing at his watch, he had knocked out his pipe, and climbed the steps to the Prince’s rooms.

  ‘My dear Mr Treasure, it was good of you to come. My son will give us some tea, then I hope you can make the time for a private chat. Is that chair quite comfortable?’ Sheikh Al Haban was all amiability, and without some of the trappings that at first sight had made him look fearsome and unapproachably dignified. The two retainers were not in evidence. The Sheikh was bare-headed. The moustache which had earlier accentuated its owner’s air of Eastern superiority now, in conjunction with a balding pate and the neck-high white robe, helped give him the appearance of a mild and middle-aged altar-server preparing for Holy Communion.

  ‘You will perhaps enjoy some of this delectable cake; we get it from your Fortnum and Mason’s. The tea is a blend I have made up at the same store. A splendid habit, the English tea-time.’

  Treasure was warming to his host by the second. Al Haban spoke English slowly and with a just detectable effort; there was a trace, too, of American accent and idiom. The young Prince, having provided the two men with tea and cake, picked up some books and excused himself on the pretext of visiting the library.

  ‘I fear I have angered the Dean — though that was not my intention.’ Al Haban smiled good-naturedly before continuing. ‘He perhaps thinks I have been . . . er . . . taking him for a ride. In truth I believe I am more justified in thinking it is he who has been doing the driving.’

  ‘I’m afraid I don’t follow, Your Highness.’ In the case of Arab dignitaries Treasure invariably carried lack of presumption to extremes.

  ‘You don’t know of my negotiations with Mr Ribble?’

  ‘He hasn’t raised the subject,’ Treasure answered truthfully.

  Al Haban studied Treasure for a moment, then nodded as though to affirm to himself the rightness of some decision. ‘So, I will tell you. But first it is necessary that I acquaint you with some detail of my personal position.’

  ‘As you please, Your Highness. You know I am a merchant banker?’

  ‘The Vice-Chairman of Grenwood, Phipps who do not advise my family in this country. Is that what you were going to say?’ Treasure smiled assent. ‘Have no fear that I shall compromise through . . . lack of professional etiquette, Mr Treasure. Our meeting here today is fortuitous but not coincidental. I desire to own this College. You represent an American commercial interest with a similar aim. It is proper that we should talk. Should your Americans fail in their object you would, I think, be free to represent me here . . . and in other ways.’

  Treasure had the uncomfortable feeling that he had just been offered a bribe; the discomfort was not, however, acute. Al Haban was probably aware that the Funny Farms business was an ad hoc assignment for Grenwood, Phipps, and one that could hardly compare with the prospect of handling his own family’s financial affairs on and enduring basis. The American bank that served the Emir of Abu B’yat had no London office of its own. If Al Haban’s family were having a change of heart in their attitude to Britain, then Grenwood, Phipps would be happy to be of immediate service; though not in the matter of University College, Itchendever.

  ‘This is most interesting, Your Highness, I doubt you could buy this College – it’s controlled by a complicated charitable Trust. Mrs Hatch isn’t trying to buy it; she wants to endow it — and it looks as though she’s succeeded. I’ve just come from a meeting . . .’

  ‘Where this lady agreed to give her million dollars a year to Itchendever. Mr Treasure, that is over double the College’s present income. She has bought the institution.’

  ‘I see what you mean, certainly, but really these things don’t work quite that way. The College Trustees, and the Governing Body – they make pretty effective buffers against outside influences – no matter how powerful.’

  Al Haban appeared not to be impressed. ‘Six months ago, Mr Treasure, I was led to understand that, in return for a gift of one million pounds, my family or its representatives would be permitted a majority of seats on the Board of Trustees. That too, I agree, would not give us ownership of the College – only control of it.’

  Treasure laughed aloud. ‘I agree the distinction is slim.’

  ‘It is not our intention to exert undue influence. For myself I simply require places for my sons.’

  ‘How many sons do you have?’

  ‘Sixteen; I have been well blessed. But there are other considerations. My brothers, too, have sons.’ Treasure decided not to enquire after the number of brothers or their progeny, but calculated that UCI might be hard pressed to accommodate all comers from the ruling house of Abu B’yat if the blessing had been universal. ‘The education here is good,’ the Sheikh continued. ‘Frivolity and useless sport are not encouraged – we are a devout family.’

  ‘Knowing your family’s connections with the USA, I am a little surprised . . .’

  ‘That we do not send our children there, Mr Treasure? We are not so enamoured with America as in time past. My father, the Emir, is – how do you say? – disenchanted with some aspects of American policy.’

  ‘How is His Majesty?’ Treasure enquired politely while thinking about something quite different.

  ‘He doesn’t like me.’

  ‘I beg your pardon?’

  ‘You heard correctly, and we speak in confidence. I am out of favour with my father – a shameful circumstance for one of my race and position, Mr Treasure. I have displeased my father, and so I labour to regain his favour. To control a British University will please him.’

  ‘Itchendever is not quite a university, Your Highness; just a college.’

  ‘Now it is you who make the fine distinctions, my friend. Degrees are awarded to students here. If numbers increase, university status would be conferred.’

  Treasure was disinclined to argue the point. ‘Was it the Dean who made you the offer in the summer? I must say, I doubt he was entitled.’

  ‘Quite so; now, I doubt it too. At that time, however, the College was seriously short of funds. I believe the Dean was counting on a near-bankrupt situation to force the acceptance of my . . . my rescue bid.’

  ‘Since we are speaking in confidence, Your Highness, were you perhaps responsible for an anonymous gift used to tide the College over into the present academic year?’

  Al Haban looked perplexed. ‘I know of no such gift. I have just been informed, however, by the Dean himself, that it will not be necessary – as he put it – for me to make so large a contribution as I had offered. At the same time, it will not be . . . er, it will not be appropriate for my family to be given more than one seat on the Board of Trustees.’

  ‘And the number of places available to students from Abu B’yat will be strictly limited?’

  ‘You are very perceptive, Mr Treasure. That is precisely the situation. It is suggested that I donate a quarter of a million pounds to the College Trust. In return, twenty-five student places will be guaranteed for ten years,’ Al Haban paused to utter a short sigh. ‘The Dean is requiring the penny and the bun, but this is not serving my purpose. More cake, Mr Treasure?’

  The banker helped himself to a third slice of Fortnum’s Rich Madeira. ‘The Funny Farms endowment plus your gift would, of course, put the College on a very firm financial footing. Control would effectively remain with those who hold it now. Quite a neat arrangement if it comes off. But I suppose you’re not inclined to cooperate?’ Treasure recalled the Dean’s ruffled expression when he had seen him leave the quadrangle earlier.

  ‘I find the proposition quite preposterous, Mr Treasure – it is also presumptuous. Understand, I am n
ot easily insulted.’ The Sheikh stood up and began walking around the room. ‘I do not easily take offence,’ he continued, giving the appearance still of a white-robed acolyte, but one who had mislaid the offertory plate. ‘My offer was generous. I understood it was accepted . . . oh, it was clear there would be formalities, that the Dean would need to gain the approval of his colleagues. But he had given me his word. Is not the word of an Englishman still his bond, Mr Treasure?’

  There were occasions when Treasure reflected that this particular aphorism featured more often as a personal liability than a national asset. ‘Mm,’ he murmured, examining the pipe – always a prop to sagacity – that he had just produced from his pocket. ‘An academic less familiar with financial transactions than, for instance, you or I, Your Highness, may perhaps be forgiven for allowing enthusiasm to cloud prudence and good judgement.’

  Al Haban flashed a look at Treasure implying that if the compliment was noted the pompous apologia left something to be desired. ‘So; we make allowances for Mr Ribble, but I do not accept his new propostion – even assuming he is entitled to make it. I have said so. This caused him to be uneasy. Am I correct to assume that the American deal is not quite done?’

  ‘The formal part still has to be completed, Your Highness. D’you mind if I smoke?’ Al Haban smiled and nodded. ‘Mrs Hatch, whom you met briefly, has given her word . . .’

  ‘And her word is her bond.’ The Sheikh sounded bitter. He stopped pacing about and slumped into the chair opposite Treasure. ’I have promised to speak with the Dean – and perhaps Mrs Hatch – here later, after the display of fireworks. It would be most helpful if you were present.’

  ‘Delighted, Your Highness.’ There seemed no way of avoiding the fireworks short of praying for rain. ‘I ought to warn you, though, that I don’t see the Funny Farms Foundation endowing a College controlled from outside this country – that is if you’re still of a mind to press for acceptance of your first offer.’