Wilberforce

by H. S. Cross

  —I can see I’ve undermined your illusions, Grieves said.

  —How long have you known, sir?

  —September, if I recall.

  Morgan took another drink.

  —Of your Fourth Form year, wasn’t it?

  And choked.

  —Careful.

  Three years? He’d known for three years?

  —Who else knows, sir?

  —None that I’m aware.

  Morgan drained his glass and signaled to Polly. Mr. Grieves nodded for another mug of tea.

  —Drinking alone is never a good sign, you know.

  —I suppose I’m turning bad, sir.

  Mr. Grieves sighed and twisted his signet ring.

  —How’s that arm, by the way?

  —It’s the shoulder, sir. And it’s fine.

  —Not a shrewd tackle, I didn’t think.

  —No, sir.

  —But it was brave.

  Morgan glowered and looked around for Polly. She was working her way towards them, carrying a full tray.

  —I thought masters only came here Sunday afternoons, Morgan said.

  —Clearly.

  Clearly? Clearly he thought that, or clearly it was true? Was it more offensive that Mr. Grieves had known about them for three years, or that he’d harbored such a secret and said nothing?

  Polly set two steaming mugs before them.

  —That isn’t my order, Morgan said.

  —All there is, luv.

  —What do you mean, all there is?

  —Don’t snap at Polly, Mr. Grieves scolded. And don’t look at me like that. You’ve been cut off.

  —Sir!

  —Two is more than enough for a growing boy.

  Two wasn’t enough, and he wasn’t a boy!

  —And you still haven’t told me what brings you here.

  —What makes you think I will?

  —I think you should.

  —Or you’ll tell S-K?

  Challenge. Dare. Ultimatum? Mr. Grieves tipped a spoonful of sugar into Morgan’s mug.

  They sat at the table as their tea cooled enough to drink. The brown moment persisted, but with it lingered something novel, something stirring and even welcome. He hadn’t the first idea of Grieves’s game, or why in the name of Hermes he had chosen this evening to intervene, having known about them for three years and having watched Morgan come to the pub on his own two nights in a row. Did Grieves imagine he might wrest tearful confessions from him (of what, even?) or that he might shine the light of his intellect upon Morgan’s evasions?

  —You’re letting yourself get carried away, Grieves said at last.

  If Grieves imagined it was his place to say such things, then he was going to have to be taught a lesson. Morgan was forced to endure a good many things, but he drew the line at being toyed with.

  —That’s me, sir. A regular tearaway.

  —You know what I mean.

  Morgan laughed; Mr. Grieves didn’t.

  —Heaven only knows what will have to happen before your … generation gets it into your heads—

  —To respect our elders and betters and be grateful to the dead, Morgan said, supplying one of the Headmaster’s favored phrases.

  Mr. Grieves held his gaze:

  —I would have said the other way around. Be grateful to your elders and respect the dead.

  —What’s there to respect about death? Morgan balked.

  —I’d have thought you had a notion about that.

  A cheap shot. Shabby and cheap. How dare Grieves speak of—though it was possible the man was not alluding to his mother but was instead resurrecting the ghastly Gallowhill Ghastliness?

  Of course he was. The man was sitting there at Morgan’s table accusing him once again—of tearing from a yearbook a photograph of Gordon Gallowhill (Old Boy 1884–90, history master, war hero, suicide), of placing it inside a human skull stolen from REN’s lab, of burying it in the wretched archaeology pit for a prank. Except that he hadn’t, and in any case the whole affair had happened years ago! This man had a memory like a steel trap, and he held grudges longer than a perverse elephant. If anyone was off his dot, it was Grieves. Morgan got up from the table.

  —The Eagle’s been offered a post, Grieves continued blithely. Housemaster at Pocklington.

  A surge of alarm overtook Morgan:

  —Will he take it, sir?

  —Can’t see why not. Burton-Lee’s got an offer somewhere, too.

  —Burton?

  Morgan did not know what was more unsettling: the idea of losing Burton-Lee or the fact that Grieves was telling him unsolicited secrets from the Senior Common Room.

  —But Burton’s been here forever, sir. The Eagle almost forever. Why leave now?

  Mr. Grieves gave him a look that made him feel culpable of any number of sins, venial and mortal:

  —Why indeed, Wilberforce?

  6

  The next morning, Grieves had the gall to take breakfast in the refectory without looking once in Morgan’s direction. In chapel, the Headmaster droned about bounds-breaking, veering periodically into windy reminders about Prep: the Third, Fourth, and Remove were not to leave their form rooms without written permission; the Fifth ditto their studies; the Lower and Upper Sixth likewise belonged in their own studies, not loitering in the library … The SCR lounged just beyond S-K’s line of sight, Clement dozing openly, Hazlehurst consulting a newspaper, Grieves resting his head against his hand, whether to soothe a headache or to conceal closed eyes, Morgan couldn’t tell.

  Morgan had woken that morning with a curious waft of hope, a hope that evaporated once he remembered the unsavory nature of his conversation with Grieves: not only had Grieves ruined his refuge at the Keys, but the Academy was on the verge of losing the Eagle and the Flea, who, with Grieves, were the only switched-on masters in the place.

  The Headmaster dismissed them after a prolonged lecture, but with a scant ten minutes left to the first lesson, Burton-Lee declined to teach them, instead directing them to begin their prep while he attended to some correspondence. It took all of Morgan’s restraint not to tell Nathan and Laurie everything of the night, up to and including the fact that the Flea’s correspondence could only be with the horrible other school. Instead Morgan gossiped about sport and wandered restlessly to French.

  There Hazlehurst set them to reading from Le Figaro and writing précis, a task Morgan ignored so he could concentrate on dreading History. What precisely he dreaded, he wasn’t sure. If Grieves was going to peach on him, he’d have done it years ago. Besides which, to whom would he peach? Not to the JCR, who would turn teetotalers before they entertained complaints from undermasters. Not S-K, since revealing his knowledge to the Headmaster would expose Grieves to an inconvenient line of questioning, beginning with why he’d not spoken up three years earlier. And as for informing Morgan’s Housemaster, why would anyone bother? Hazlehurst encountered worse offenses almost daily and avoided taking action on all of them.

  At the Cross Keys, Mr. Grieves had revealed that he’d noticed Morgan, that he’d been noticing him for some time. And Mr. Grieves had revealed his own connection to the Keys, for he evidently possessed some signal with Polly—Morgan’s Polly!—a signal with the authority to cancel Morgan’s order. It dawned on Morgan that the Keys might be Mr. Grieves’s personal haunt even more than it was theirs. Nathan and Laurie would have been scandalized if Morgan had been in a position to tell them.

  * * *

  They poured into the quad for break and queued outside the tuckshop.

  —Here come the Fleas, Nathan murmured.

  A cluster of Burton-Lee’s XV crossed the quad like a wolf pack. Their own XV did not go round together, but Burton-Lee’s XV, perhaps as an expression of their dominance, traveled everywhere in groups.

  —Ods bodkins, Laurie breathed, it’s the King’s bodyguards.

  —Who’s the king? Nathan muttered.

  —Spaulding, Morgan said.

  —Prob’ly can’t
even shit on his own.

  The bodyguards arrived and cut into the queue.

  —How’s the wing? asked Buxhill.

  Bux played wing forward, like Morgan.

  —Mending, Morgan said.

  —Fast, Nathan added.

  —Not fast enough to save you from Clem’s this afternoon, said Bux.

  —Or REN’s tomorrow, added Ledger.

  Ledge was Burton-Lee’s other wing forward, just as arrogant as Bux but less blatant about it.

  —Not that it would’ve made a difference, said a voice from the pack.

  Bux and Ledge stepped aside for the voice: Spaulding himself, towering, lean, powerful, with a mouth that seemed always amused. Nathan stepped closer, violating the buffer Spaulding’s bodyguards had established:

  —You’ve got a lot of nerve after what you did to Wilberforce.

  —What exactly did I do? Spaulding asked.

  Spaulding crossed his arms, supremely confident, his teeth miraculously straight. Unlike the bodyguards, Spaulding possessed intelligence, humor, and a magnetic presence. Nathan squared his shoulders but did not reply.

  —He didn’t do anything, Bux said, except stand there and be plowed down by yon minotaur.

  Ledge addressed Morgan:

  —Hear Matron’s sidelined you the rest of term.

  —That’s a lie, Laurie snapped.

  —It doesn’t matter, Ledge told the pack. They wouldn’t have come to anything even with their young wing.

  —Now wingless.

  —Hilarious, Laurie muttered.

  Morgan drew himself to his full height and addressed Spaulding:

  —Unfortunately for you, you’ll never know.

  —Know what?

  Spaulding defiant, curious, tempted. Morgan held his gaze, heart thudding.

  The pack reached the front of the queue, but Spaulding kept looking at him even after the others had turned away, sustaining a kind of silent conversation Morgan hadn’t had since—

  There could be no shred of truth in the rumor that Spaulding had been seduced by Rees. Spaulding was in the Sixth, Rees the Fifth; Spaulding excelled on every field, Rees on none; Spaulding was adored, Rees hated.

  Indeed, Rees slumped into History well after the bell, daubing his nose ostentatiously with a handkerchief. Grieves squinted at him but said nothing. When it came to Rees, Grieves had no notion. Rees was a swot, though not half so clever as he imagined, and Grieves allowed him to show off. Despite having passed three and a half years at the Academy, Rees still failed to understand just how much showing off was reviled. Add to this his lugubrious manner, his laziness at Games, his inability to listen to what anyone was saying, and his spots, which he insisted on picking, and you had someone irredeemably obnoxious, someone they in the Fifth were forced to tolerate every single day of the year. If someone had bloodied his nose during break, it was the least he deserved.

  —Well, then.

  The form’s attention drifted to Mr. Grieves, who leaned against the window, newspaper in hand. His habit was to begin lessons by reading them an article from The Times. Today’s turgid offering concerned the new German cabinet: Herr Luther’s choice, a liberal policy. Morgan deliberately looked away. If Grieves imagined that Morgan was going to start courting his approval, then he had another think coming. Morgan owed him nothing, and there was no way in Hades he was going to start swotting like beastly Rees. Grieves could drone until he was hoarse, but Morgan refused to show the least interest in Herr Luther’s cabinet, his cupboards, his credenzas, his wardrobes, or his water closets.

  —So.

  Having concluded his reading, Grieves watched them until they began to fidget. His object apparently accomplished, he sauntered to the blackboard, pulled down the slate with the Tudor diagram, and announced that they could expect a composition during tomorrow’s double lesson. A groan of protest filled the room, but Grieves ignored it.

  —Any boy, he began—

  They resented being called boys at their age.

  —earning less than twelve out of twenty tomorrow will find himself in extra-tu Saturday.

  They fell silent, not from fear but from grim recognition. Saturday afternoon was the match against Sedbergh School, their greatest rival. Having to miss it for extra tuition would be a severe penalty, but they knew Grieves well enough to realize he wasn’t bluffing. Apparently the man still possessed the will and the wherewithal to make them work, if only for a day.

  Grieves sat behind his desk and unfolded his newspaper, airily oblivious as they retrieved their exercise books and crowded the blackboard to decipher his notes.

  Morgan copied the chalky schemata as well as he could. Under no circumstance was he willing to miss the Sedbergh match or to allow Grieves the satisfaction of giving him extra-tu. Obviously the man had decided to punish him (for bounds-breaking? For cheek? For…?) by oppressing the whole form with a composition. Obviously, it was personal. Obviously, Morgan’s only option was mental warfare: outclassing Grieves by actually swotting and then writing a composition clever enough to irk the man.

  Copying complete, Morgan leafed back through his earlier notes and glimpsed something that hadn’t been there before: Grieves’s script at the bottom of the page, To be continued.

  * * *

  That afternoon it rained with the force of punishment. Laurie and Morgan watched miserably from the sidelines as Clem’s XV slaughtered their own. Nathan came away with a blackening eye, and Morgan with a chill that resisted the influence of hot tea before the study’s grate.

  Three long hours until tea, then Prep, bed, and ten more days—twenty-four hours apiece—until the holidays, which themselves promised nothing. He had squandered PE before lunch and was quickly feeling persuaded by the idea that twice a day wasn’t really any different from once, provided he adhered strictly to a schedule. He felt himself on a precipice, unable to retreat and helpless to resist the plunge into grave error. He was powerless to stop the XV losing, powerless against whatever the shadow had planned, and powerless now to restore himself to sanity through physical exertion or stout porter. It was enough to drive a person to suicide, if a person were so inclined.

  Morgan poked at their dismal excuse for a fire. The din of wireless dance music filled the study. Nathan took possession of the wing chair and began to browse last week’s paper, tapping his feet in rhythm against the grate. Laurie lounged on the window seat behind a book of sonnets, which Morgan knew contained leaves of Uncle Anton’s magazine. How he was meant to keep his head with Nathan’s senseless racket and Laurie’s blatant pursuit of Lady Pokingham, he had no idea.

  —I’m off to the bogs, he announced.

  Nathan and Laurie looked up listlessly but did not stir. His arm itched under its wrapping. His legs ached from lack of exercise. His stomach grumbled.

  He avoided the lavatory (was twice a day any different from once?) and made for the cloisters. A din assaulted him even there, and in the lower corridor he discovered a full-on rugby match, attended by the Third and some of the Fourth. He could not remember having seen quite so much bedlam in a corridor, on a rainy half holiday or any day. He shoved his way through it to his own form room, only to find a knot of Third Formers, attending … Alex. Of course.

  —What’s the idea? Morgan demanded.

  Alex looked up, surprised and annoyed:

  —What are you doing here?

  —It’s our form room, Morgan said, not yours.

  —Don’t see anyone using it.

  Morgan evaluated the group. There were eight of them, and while he would not normally have trouble thumping sense into eight fags, circumstances were subpar.

  —Do you want something? Alex asked irritably.

  Morgan opened his desk and removed a book to justify his presence:

  —I was supposed to come and see Grieves.

  —Grievous ain’t here, Alex said, turning back to his friends.

  Morgan seized Alex from behind, shoved him over a desk, and kicked him unt
il he yelped.

  —If you even think about messing the Fifth, Morgan barked, we’ll send the lot of you to the Tower. Hear?

  —Pardon? Alex quipped.

  Morgan slammed Alex’s head against the desk. He howled.

  —Anyone else have trouble hearing?

  The fags backed away. Morgan kicked Alex upright:

  —Shut up before I give you something to bawl about.

  * * *

  He left more unnerved than he’d been. His good arm shook, his bad arm twanged, his trousers strained. He’d overdone it, obviously, but hopefully no one would find out. If word got back to Nathan and Laurie, he’d explain that he’d merely been trying to slam sense into Alex’s skull. There hadn’t been any blood, and anyway Alex was a virtuoso of crocodile tears.

  Twice a day couldn’t be a serious departure from once a day. What was important, surely, was that PE be contained within some bounds and not become a fixation. It was important not to be too rigid! Circumstances had changed since the Spaulding Smashup, so PE routines might change with them, for the time being, without unleashing madness. Twice a day; once per twelve-hour period. Done.

  What he needed was privacy, a rare commodity on a rainy half hol. He tramped up to the boxrooms, but found them full of rival parties. What was the point of renegotiating PE if he couldn’t get five minutes’ privacy? Stomping down the back staircase, he cursed the Lower School, cursed the rain, and cursed the Academy. Someone was going to commit murder before the day was—

  Out the rainy window, a figure crossed the playing fields, a figure out of uniform, a figure he knew: Spaulding, alone and clandestine, achieving the south-bounds hedgerow and disappearing through it.

  * * *

  A bang startled Morgan awake. The study floor was hard, the light fading, his right side hot.

  —You look like someone who let the kettle burn dry, Laurie announced, dumping books on the table and kicking the study door closed.

  Morgan squinted. It wasn’t night. It was day. He’d fallen asleep in front of the fire after PE, after … he jolted up—

  —There’s something—

  Stood, unsteadily—

  —Back in a tick.

  And stumbled out the door.

  Downstairs, around the kitchens, and up the passage to Burton-Lee’s empty changing room. Twilight seeped in the half windows. It would be call-over soon. In his own House, call-over had sunk to the level of charade, but Burton-Lee ran a strict House, and his Head Boy, Spenser, possessed a legendary right arm. Still, Morgan doubted that someone of Spaulding’s stature could have much respect for call-over.