by David Nobbs
Henry’s heart sank.
‘The mechanic…’ he began.
‘Yes?’
‘The mechanic has put the hare all over the furniture.’
‘Are you trying to be funny, Pratt?’
‘No, sir.’
‘Hargreaves?’
‘The mechanic…has taken…the book…at once,’ said Paul, pretending that he found it difficult, so as not to humiliate his friend.
‘The mechanic took the book at once,’ said Sweaty W. ‘What did you learn in French at your prep school, Pratt?’
‘How to take out tonsils and gall-stones, sir.’
‘What???’
‘He means he went to Brasenose College, sir,’ said Mallender.
Sweaty W stared at Mallender.
‘What?’ he said.
‘The French master at Brasenose is a failed doctor, sir. He spends most of his time telling the boys how to do operations, in English,’ said Mallender. ‘My father teaches English there.’
Henry stared at Mallender in surprise, and wondered if he’d ever had to copy out the whole of Keats’ ‘Endymion’.
Sweaty W believed in improvisation, to give a certain vitality and edge to his French lessons. Should a window-cleaner ever fall off his ladder and drop head-first past the window onto the asphalt, no boy would have been allowed to go to his assistance until the class had produced the French for ‘a window-cleaner has just fallen off his ladder and dropped head-first past the window onto the asphalt’.
‘In French, Mallender,’ said Sweaty W now. ‘In French. My father is an English teacher.’
‘Mon père est un professeur de l’Anglais.’
‘Yes, though perhaps professeur’s putting it a big high for Brasenose College, and the French don’t use un before an occupation. It’s “Mon père est professeur”.’
They went briefly round the class then, saying what their fathers did. ‘Mon père est fermier.’ ‘Mon père est aussi fermier.’ (‘No, he isn’t, Fuller.’ ‘I know, sir, but I don’t know the French for estate agent.’) ‘Mon père est…il…he’s a lawyer, sir.’ (‘Votre père est avocat, Tremlett.’) ‘Mon père a laissé mon mère pour cinq ans.’ (‘It’s ma mère, and depuis cinq ans, and I’m sorry, Bairstow.’) ‘Mon père. . .’ Henry hesitated. Did Paul remember that he’d said that his father was a test pilot? Whether Paul remembered or not, should he now tell the truth? How could he, since he didn’t know the French for a cutler, or a maker of penknives? Wasn’t it an academic point, since he didn’t know the French for test pilot either? Wouldn’t it be simpler just to say that his father was dead?
‘Il essaye les avions,’ said Paul. ‘He’s a test pilot, sir.’
‘Votre père est pilote d’essai, Pratt,’ said Sweaty W.
Fair enough, thought Henry.
The second link occurred in Dalton Town. Boys were allowed into the town at certain times, and one of Henry’s duties as a fag was to shop for Lampo Davey and Tosser Pilkington-Brick. On this occasion, as it chanced, he required writing paper, envelopes, instant coffee, condensed milk, drinking chocolate, a loaf and a tin of sardines.
Two unpleasant incidents occurred on this particular day. As he trudged down Eastgate in the rain, he was drenched from head to foot when a Carter Patterson removal van ploughed through a huge puddle outside Boots.
The second unfortunate incident happened in the market place, outside Butcher’s the draper’s. A charming square, in those days, Dalton market place. A jumble of Tudor and Georgian stone buildings with the Georgian Town Hall at the east end and the cathedral-like early-English parish church at the west end. Those are still there, but the north side is now totally disfigured by the hideous new shopping precinct, built in the late-sixties balance-sheet style. On that day, in early October, 1948, the north side of the market place was disfigured by an equally unpleasant sight, a human portent of the institutionalised vandalism to come. Tubman-Edwards.
‘I thought you were going to Eton,’ said Henry.
‘It fell through,’ said Tubman-Edwards, colouring. ‘What’s it worth to shut me up?’
‘I don’t understand,’ said Henry.
‘It doesn’t understand,’ said Tubman-Edwards. ‘Well it soon will. It’s changed a bit since I first knew it. It’s still a pretty oiky individual, but it has toned down its accent quite a lot. Not totally successfully, of course, but still, it stands a reasonable chance of avoiding the nickname “Oiky”. Specially now its father turns out to be a test pilot. Amazing. When Fuller told me there was a chap from Brasenose in his class, and it was you, and your father was a test pilot, I said nothing. Quick thinking, eh, Oiky? The possibilities struck me immediately. What’s it worth for me not to reveal the truth, Oiky?’
Tubman-Edwards smirked. It was not a pretty sight. The church clock struck two, and reverberated into silence. Henry wished he was stronger than Tubman-Edwards.
‘Seven hundred boys calling you “Oiky”. Seven hundred boys knowing you’re a shitty little liar. How much is it worth to shut me up, Oiky?’
‘Twelve jars of Gentleman’s Relish,’ said Henry.
Perhaps, if it hadn’t been for those twelve jars, he would have told Tubman-Edwards to shove off. The truth would have been out, and after some initial unpleasantness the matter might eventually have been forgotten. But it seemed like a master-stroke, a golden opportunity to get rid of Tubman-Edwards and his Gentleman’s Relish at the same time.
‘I don’t like Gentleman’s Relish,’ said Tubman-Edwards.
‘It’s marvellous stuff,’ said Henry. ‘Every sandwich a treat. Every mouthful a poem.’
‘Why are you so eager to get rid of it, then?’ said Tubman-Edwards.
‘I’m not,’ said Henry. ‘But I’ve got to give you something, and it’s all I’ve got.’
‘I can swop them, I suppose,’ said Tubman-Edwards. ‘All right, you’ve got yourself a deal.’
Henry’s reading had just passed through its detective-story period and was just coming onto its John Buchan, A. E. W. Mason and Scarlet Pimpernel stage. He should have been familiar with the old adage that ‘the blackmailer always comes back for more’.
The following week, when he handed over his twelve jars of Gentleman’s Relish outside Baker’s the butcher’s (they’re all multiple stores now, but in those days an additional charm of Dalton market place was its cluster of shops whose proprietors bore the names of other kinds of shop), Tubman-Edwards said, ‘That’ll do for the first week.’
When they met the following week, outside Draper’s the chemist’s, Henry found himself committed to giving Tubman-Edwards all his pocket money for the rest of the term.
It was too late for Henry to tell the truth now. Tubman-Edwards was busily spreading false information about his father. Henry learnt that his father was testing amazing new prototypes. He was involved in a secret space project which might eventually make him the first man on the moon. He didn’t need to boast. Tubman-Edwards did it for him. It was out of his control.
The following week, Tubman-Edwards took the money that he had been given by Lampo Davey and Tosser Pilkington-Brick for the purchase of instant coffee, condensed milk, drinking chocolate, mayonnaise, eggs and a tin of anchovies.
Henry walked back to Orange House in utter dejection, mocked by the soft sunshine of late October. The one ray of light in the whole gloomy business had been that Tubman-Edwards was in Plantaganet House. Orange House had remained a safe haven. How safe would it be, when he returned to Lampo Davey and Tosser Pilkington-Brick empty-handed?
He knocked timidly on their study door.
Davey was on his own, Pilkington-Brick having gone to train for the first fifteen.
Henry stood by the door, irresolute, silent.
‘What is it, Pratt?’ said Lampo Davey irritably.
‘I dropped all your money down a drain,’ said Henry, and to his horror his eyes filled with tears.
‘Well for God’s sake don’t blatt,’ said Lampo Davey.
‘Sit down and have a coffee,’ said Lampo Davey, his voice a mixture of kindness and disgust.
Henry sat down, and Lampo made two mugs of coffee, thickened and sweetened by the condensed milk. Henry felt ill-at-ease, a fag being made coffee by the boy for whom he fagged.
‘Tosser’ll be livid,’ said Lampo. ‘Serve him right. He eats the chocolate in powder form, with a teaspoon. He’s disgusting.’
Mr Satchel (Dopy S) didn’t allow senior boys to choose their study mates. He believed that you learnt more by being thrown together. Lampo Davey and Tosser Pilkington-Brick might have existed to justify his system. Total opposites, they had formed a bond of scorn and affection which was to survive a lifetime.
‘I am the most sensitive and artistic and subtle boy in Orange House, which isn’t saying much,’ said Lampo Davey. ‘Tosser is a thick ape. Because he’s good at games, House worships him. I have far too much natural good taste to be envious. You’re not playing rugger today, are you? Good. Let’s go for a walk before evening school.’
They turned right by the Methodist Chapel. ‘They mistrust pleasure so deeply that even their buildings have to be hideous,’ said Lampo Davey. They took the narrow lane that climbed up behind the town, winding through apple orchards, where sheep grazed between the trees. The countryside was a luscious green after the autumn rains. Now, the soft Indian summer had come and the trees were beginning to turn.
‘Winter. I welcome it with open arms,’ said Lampo Davey.
‘Really?’ said Henry.
‘Oh yes,’ said Lampo Davey, as if it was obvious. ‘Autumn colours in England are beautiful, if a bit much. The first pale greens of spring have a certain brief charm. But winter! Ploughed fields. Farm buildings. The magnificent outlines of trees. It’s spare. It’s strong. Summer in England is dreadful. The banality of all that bright green, which slowly fades into weariness. The grotesque excess of plant life. The English countryside in summer is a featureless confusion of weeds. Compare it with Tuscany, Pratt. Compare it with Umbria. The English summer, like so much of English life, is totally without taste. Give me Italy every time.’
‘I prefer England,’ said Henry. ‘Italy’s full of wops.’
‘My father works in the Italian embassy in Rome. They’re the most civilised people in Europe,’ said Lampo Davey, with a touch of anger.
A grassy path ran along the edge of the woods, above the orchards. Lampo Davey flung himself onto the ground, beside the path. Henry sat down beside him, after testing the grass to see if it was dry. Lampo Davey laughed.
‘Mr Sat On Wet Grass went rusty inside,’ said Henry, and blushed.
‘What?’ said Lampo Davey.
‘Miss Candy said things like that all the time,’ said Henry. ‘She was our teacher.’
‘Priceless,’ said Lampo Davey. ‘Utterly priceless. Tell me more.’
‘Mr Pick-Nose was carried off by the bogey man,’ said Henry boldly.
‘Priceless,’ said Lampo Davey. ‘When I first saw you, I thought, “Oh dear. Clueless clotto, I’m afraid.” I didn’t even think you were remotely pretty. A little fatty-legs, I thought. But I’ve decided that I rather like little fatty faggy-chops.’
Lampo Davey put his arm round Henry. Henry went red and wriggled free desperately.
‘Don’t be so shocked,’ said Lampo Davey. ‘We’re in the nineteen forties, not the Middle Ages. Come on. Walkies. No further advances, I promise. I’m a connoisseur of sexual pleasure, not a child molester.’
They walked on into the woods, although Henry longed to go back, to the communal safety of Orange House. He felt shocked, surprised, even a little flattered, which shocked him also. He also felt a bit of a spoil-sport, which struck him as ridiculous.
An aeroplane zoomed loud and low over their heads, crossed the valley and disappeared low over the woods on the other side.
‘Your father, perhaps,’ said Lampo Davey.
‘You what?’ said Henry.
‘Flying that plane.’
‘Oh. Yes. Happen. I mean “maybe”.’
‘How could a father like yours have such a clueless clot as a son?’ said Lampo Davey. ‘You are a clueless clot, aren’t you?’
Henry nodded. In the presence of this young man with the long, sad, slightly twisted face and the deep, sardonic eyes, he felt ignorant, innocent, ugly, unwordly, oiky and a liar. Yet Lampo fancied him.
‘Oh, I’m all in favour of clueless clots,’ said Lampo Davey, sensing that he’d hurt Henry more than he’d intended. ‘Come on. Time to go home. Enough of Confuse-A-Fag.’
That evening, after school, when Henry was alone with Tosser Pilkington-Brick for the first time, Tosser grinned and said, ‘Lampo’s livid about your losing that money. He has the most affected eating habits. He would have hard-boiled two eggs, covered them in bottled mayonnaise and bits of anchovy, and pretended that he was sophisticated. He’s pathetic. Don’t worry, though. I’ll defend you. He fancies you, you know.’
‘Yes,’ said Henry.
‘You are actually rather more appealing than I thought at first,’ said Tosser Pilkington-Brick. ‘Any chance of a bit of “how’s your father?”?’
‘Sorry,’ said Henry, feeling six inches taller because he wasn’t blushing.
‘No hard feelings,’ said Tosser Pilkington-Brick. ‘Getting any hard feelings yet? No? Late developer. Well, you will soon. If you do, promise me one thing. Don’t get involved with Madame Lampo. She’s devious. She’s poison. She’s a corrupter of youth. With me it would just be a bit of fun. Good, clean filth.’
The third link was added to the chain on the following Satuday. It was a raw, misty forerunner of winter. The venue was the Bald-Headed Angel, an ancient coaching house whose name constituted its only flirtation with originality. Henry was suffering from a minor ailment, made the mistake of ordering soup, and met an old flame in highly embarrassing circumstances. The minor ailment was a streaming code in the dose, the soup was oxtail, and the old flame was Belinda Boyce-Uppingham.
Henry had been invited to take luncheon with the parents of his best friend, Paul Hargreaves. Also present would be Paul’s twin sister Diana, and Diana’s schoolfriend, who was staying with the Hargreaves for half-term.
Paul and Henry were picked up at the school gates in the family Bentley after Saturday-morning school. Boys were streaming back to Orange House on foot and bike. All the pleasure of driving past them in a Bentley was destroyed by the presence in the car of Belinda Boyce-Uppingham. Even the fact that she had a brace on her teeth didn’t cheer him up. The four young ones were squashed together in the back seat. Had Belinda recognised him? Had she ever known his name?
They drove through the market place, it charms ruined by its association with Tubman-Edwards. Dr Hargreaves steered the Bentley expertly under the narrow arch at the side of the Bald-Headed Angel, and parked in the long, narrow courtyard. They entered through a side door and made for the cocktail bar. The Hargreaves parents exuded elegance well-heeled enough to look as if it was attempting to hide how well-heeled it was. Dr James Hargreaves wore a sober, well-cut suit. Mrs Celia Hargreaves favoured the new Parisian ‘tube look’ in grey. When she took off her tight-fitting cloche hat, her hair was revealed in its daring, post-war shortness. Eating out was no longer a total mystery to Henry, thanks to Uncle Teddy and Auntie Doris, but he would have felt at his oikiest, in the world of brain surgeons and their elegant spouses, even if Belinda Boyce-Uppingham hadn’t been there, and even if his nose hadn’t begun to run, in the warmth of the cocktail bar.
The younger element had squashes, the grown-ups dry sherry. The head waiter gave them menus, and returned all too quickly to take their orders. Henry hadn’t even begun to choose. How could he, when he was supposed to be the son of a famous test pilot, but was sitting next to a girl who might recognise him as the son of a private soldier who had made penknives in civvy street, and whom he had knocked off her horse, to which she ha
d responded by calling him an oik, providing a foretaste of the unpleasant soubriquet by which a whole school was later to identify him, and when he wanted to blow his nose but didn’t dare in this elegant company, and when the whole menu was in French, one of his worst subjects?
The head waiter was standing over him.
‘Are you all right, Henry? We’re waiting for you to order,’ said Paul.
‘Oh. Right. I’ll…I’ll have the same as Paul.’
‘That’s silly,’ said Diana.
‘Not if it’s what he wants,’ said Dr James Hargreaves.
‘It isn’t,’ said Diana. ‘He’s just saying it cos he can’t decide.’
‘Don’t I know you?’ said Belinda Boyce-Uppingham.
Henry’s heart sank. On its way down it passed his blood, which was rushing up towards his cheeks. He went into violent internal convulsions, pumping, throbbing, sinking, burning. He sneezed five times.
‘What on earth’s wrong?’ said Dr James Hargreaves.
‘What did you say your other name was? said Belinda Boyce-Uppingham.
Henry opened his mouth, but no sound came.
‘Pratt,’ said Paul.
‘I knew I knew you,’ said Belinda Boyce-Uppingham. ‘You were an evacuee at Rowth Bridge.’
‘I wasn’t an evacuee,’ said Henry, finding his voice. ‘I was staying with relations.’
‘Of course he was,’ said Paul, defending his friend. ‘His father was fighting the war.’
Belinda Boyce-Uppingham frowned slightly. Perhaps she had just remembered calling him an oik, thought Henry.
Paul Hargreaves frowned too. His friend wasn’t putting up a good show.
It was the memory of anger, not guilt, that had caused Belinda Boyce-Uppingham to frown. ‘You knocked me off my horse,’ she said.
‘You called me an oik,’ said Henry.
Belinda Boyce-Uppingham flushed.
‘Surely not?’ she said. ‘I mean…’
‘It’s frightening when you’re thrown off a horse,’ said Mrs Celia Hargreaves. ‘Do you ride, Henry?’
‘No,’ said Henry. How he wished he could have said ‘yes’, but he wasn’t going to tell any more lies. If he did say ‘yes’, he’d probably discover that a string of thoroughbreds had been laid on for their post-prandial delectation.