R. Delderfield & R. F. Delderfield (56 page)

'But if he's going to the country…'

'You don't understand,' she shouted at him, 'this is the worst thing that could happen to us as a party, worse than being beaten at the polls ten times in a row! Ramsay Mac, the first Socialist Prime Minister. The man who stood out against everybody, when men like you were up to their necks in mud and blood. He's sold out lock, stock and barrel. Don't ask me why he did it. To keep office, I imagine, but it makes nonsense of everything we've believed since the war.'

'But you always agreed you couldn't survive long as a minority government. You must have suspected something like this would happen, sooner or later.'

'I thought he would resign, and try for a real majority.'

'He'd never get one, with the country's finances in the state they are. You've said that too.'

'It wouldn't have mattered. It was the honourable thing to do, wasn't it?'

'You don't look for scruples among politicians, Chris.'

'I do. How will this look to the electorate? Leading Socialists, who can be bought and sold.'

'You intend to throw in with the backbenchers?'

'Good heavens, of course I do. You've learned that much about me, haven't
you? Is a National government, overweighted with Tories, likely to do a damned thing for the unemployed. You've only glanced at that paper. There's talk of a ten per cent cut in unemployment benefits. There'll be hell to pay everywhere.'

'If Ramsay and some of the others are still in office they'll block unfair economies.'

'As prisoners of bankers and industrialists? Don't be naïve, Davy. And anyway, we're wasting time. I'm going to phone my Chairman. Go over to the station and find out about trains.'

'You intend going back today?'

'Of course I do. With an election in the offing I can't waste an hour. I'll head for London and try and catch the paper train out of Paddington early tomorrow.'

She climbed out of the skiff and moved towards a telephone kiosk outside the harbourmaster's, opening her bag as she went. He watched her for a moment, then went off to the station to study a timetable pasted to a hoarding in the yard. There was a London train via Kendal and Birmingham at twelve-thirty. It would give her plenty of time to cross to Paddington and catch a late evening train for Taunton, then on to Bilhampton. She could, with luck, be back in her constituency by breakfast time tomorrow.

She was still in the kiosk when he returned, talking earnestly, one elbow propped on the bracket, one leg raised and resting on the ledge. She seemed smaller and remote somehow, a serious, animated girl, but removed from him, deep in her own concerns. The sudden change in their relationship made his heart ache.

She rang off at last and came out, flushed and distant. When he gave her the times of alternative trains, she said. 'I'll catch that twelve-thirty. You go back, collect our things, lock up, and give the key to Witherby's clerk.'

'But you haven't even got a toothbrush, woman. Besides, it'll be damned cold travelling all night down to that Godforsaken place.'

'I've got a mac. How much money have you on you?'

'About three pounds.' He gave it to her. He knew her well enough to know that a protest would only mean they parted with acrimony and this he was determined to avoid. 'Could you bring my things on? Leave them in the left-luggage office at Taunton, then send me the ticket? There's no mad hurry in that respect. I've got a change at the digs.'

'I can bring your bags to you on my way back with Grace.'

Her expression softened. For the first time since she had read the poster she looked at him as a friend and not a stranger who happened to be standing around. 'No, Davy. It's sweet of you, and I'm terribly sorry it had to happen like this, but you don't get yourself mixed up in this election. Not until you see how things work out at Bamfylde.'

'But that's silly. Term doesn't begin for a fortnight. I'll have time on my hands once I've parked Grace.'

'No, Davy, this is my show. You've got a battle on yourself, remember? Don't give them ammunition to fire at you. This election is going to be very bitter indeed. All kinds of smears are going to be laid on, all kinds of abuse thrown about, so stay clear of it until you straighten things out back there. If they make life impossible for you, and you decide to pack it in, I'd be very glad of your help. But not otherwise.'

He made one last effort. 'Look here, you know you can't possibly win that seat now. Everyone will be waving the Union Jack like mad in Tory-held constituencies. Is there any point in it, really? I mean, why don't we concentrate on getting Rowley off our backs and marrying as soon possible?'

She said, slowly, 'We'll marry, Davy. Some time, some place. That much I promise you, providing you don't find someone else. And if you did I wouldn't blame you. I'd always remember you with love, and a lot of respect. But in the meantime I owe it to myself to make a fight. I owe it to those people down there, who backed me against male candidates, but even more to myself. You've achieved something, but I haven't. Not a damn thing so far and here's what might be my last chance to have another go. Don't deny it me.'

There was no kind of answer to that. They walked to the station, hand in hand, and when the train came in he saw her aboard, buying her an armful of papers and journals to enable her to get up to date en route. He said, as the whistle blew, 'I'm beginning to hate railway platforms. You won't object to me phoning from town, will you?'

'Phone every night if you can afford it,' she said. 'I'll need that where I'm going.'

He kissed her and held her hand after the train had begun to move. Then, releasing it, he watched her face until it was blotted out by smoke, just as it had been on most of the occasions they had met since he walked her to the station at Cardiff after that Christmas confessional in a pub.

2

The showdown, for him, came within a week of the commencement of the Michaelmas term.

The old warrior rang late at night, a few moments after he had had his talk with Christine, battling it out against frightful odds at South Mendips. The brigadier said, testily, 'Been trying to raise you for nearly an hour, they said you were engaged speaking.'

'So I was, Briggy. Long-distance.'

'Well, it's happened. There was a special meeting of the Executive yesterday, and there's a full meeting in the library tomorrow. More than half the Board have promised to attend and they'll hear you both. One at a time of course. You first, I understand. Thought you might like to go over your brief. I'd be kicked off the Board if anyone knew I'd tipped you off!'

'I know that, Briggy. You've been a brick, all the way through. Can you give me a hint how it might go?'

'No, I can't. Might go any way. No precedent for a dam' silly confrontation like this. But if it means anything at all I'd say it was a point in your favour, them agreeing to meet in this way, I mean. Damn it, you don't carpet a headmaster every day of the week, do you, and that's what it amounts to! You'll get a fair hearing, both of you. That dry old stick, Sir Rufus, will make sure of that. It'll depend on him in the end. The O.B.s will stand with you but there's only three of us on the committee. God knows how the odds and sods will react. Depends on the sort of case you put up, I imagine. I've only got one more piece of advice and it's the same as I've given you time and again since this blew up. Stick to the point. Don't lambast him or his policy. Keep to the personal issue, my boy.'

'Sure. And thanks again, Briggy.'

'Been a pleasure. Can't stand that fellow. Too bloody pernickety. Best o' luck.'

'Thank you.'

The phone clicked and David slowly replaced his own receiver, pouring himself a drink and carrying it to the armchair that faced the window. In the summer, and throughout the earliest weeks of the Michaelmas term if the weather was fine, he kept his armchair here, facing south-east across the moor. The moon was full and silver light lay on the pastures, silhouetting the beeches in the
drive, trees still wearing their full spread of leaves, for the earliest south-wester lies were still a week or two away.

It was very still and empty out there. An owl hooted in Algy's thinking post, his favourite perch because it was within easy killing-range of vermin in the planty. He tried to marshal his thoughts, but instead of rehearsing his brief found his mind ranging over random incidents of the past, back to the night he first sat here as Bat Ferguson's lodger, a callow, inexperienced youth, beginning to get the feel of the place. Towser, Ferguson's dog, now twelve by his reckoning, was the only Havelock survivor of that time, apart from himself. He ran his hand over the dog's head, recalling how his barks had averted what might so easily have been a terrible tragedy the night of the fire. Other memories stole upon him, smoke from a bonfire that had never burned itself out. Beth's laughter as, five months gone, she had waddled up and down in Yum-Yum's costume; Stratton-Forbes, earnestly discussing the root causes of bedwetting in the Junior dorm; Chad Boyer, making his final call, with the gift of Bourgoyne's and Marbot's memoirs; Carter, offering him a partnership with no strings, Chris's one visit here last Sports Day, and her light-hearted remark, 'It's the only room in the entire place that doesn't
smell
like a barracks. It's got another smell. It smells of bachelors.'

He thought, 'I wish to God she was here now, to hold my hand. This time tomorrow it'll be over, one way or the other, and I don't know whether to be relieved or not. If they come down on Alcock's side it's curtains for me, as far as Bamfylde is concerned. And if they don't it can only mean an indefinite period of “passed to you, Stoic", and “passed to you, Powlett-Jones…” Do I really want that? Won't it rob us all of what dignity we've got left?'

The owl hooted again and he got up to put the fireguard over the grate. Fire was an ever-present hazard here. If he stayed on he would find a way to bully the Governors into installing a fire-escape in every house, but would he ever have his way in decisions of that kind? He doubted it. He doubted it very much. He carried his whisky glass into the kitchen, washed it and went to bed.

It was like a playback of his vigil here more than four years ago, when he had sat waiting for his interview on the outside chance they would select him in preference to Carter, or the man who would be asked to submit a full
report on him, perhaps within minutes of his own dismissal. It was a repeat performance, played to a mildly hostile house, so that he felt slightly sick and had recourse, for the second time since breakfast, to the brand of indigestion tablets Carter had always carried about. He was not too familiar with the men closeted behind that door. He could count on Briggy, of course, and his two Old Boy allies, whereas Alderman Blunt, still throwing his weight about as a Governor, would surely see this as a second chance of getting his revenge for the bust-up about the War Memorial business all that time ago. Of the others he barely knew them by sight, had never spoken to two of the latest additions. All he could count on, apart from Cooper's championship, was Sir Rufus Creighton's neutrality, until the full facts were before him.

They seemed to enjoy keeping him on tenterhooks in this dusty little lobby, one of the few school backwaters Alcock's spring-cleaning mania had by-passed. He had sat here, biting his finger nails and sucking his indigestion tablets, for twenty minutes now, and Miss Rowlandson, the head's secretary, had still not appeared. Down in the quad the bell rang for luncheon parade and the familiar buzz and scuffle of assembly reached him, a sound inseparable from any gathering down there. Then he heard Heffling's raucous voice calling them to attention – '
Paraaaaaade
-shun!
Leeeeeft
-turn! Dissssss-
miss!'
– and another clatter of shoes on gravel and stone, and after that a heavy silence that lasted another five minutes. The library door opened and Miss Rowlandson bobbed out – 'Mr Powlett-Jones?' He got up stiffly, flexing his fingers, a surge of devil-may-care fatalism routing his extreme nervousness and went in, anticipating the Chairman's wordless offer of a chair.

They were ranged in their familiar horseshoe and again they reminded him of Roundhead inquisitors in that picture Carter had mentioned – 'When Did You Last See Your Father?' He avoided the brigadier's eye, knowing it would be too sympathetic. Somebody coughed. Someone else rustled papers. Sir Rufus Creighton sat in the Chairman's seat, looking like a Venetian Doge in a fifteenth-century Italian painting, small, compact, infinitely old and wrinkled, but terrifyingly alert. He said, impersonally, 'We have considered all your correspondence, Mr Powlett-Jones. At two earlier meetings, and again this morning. You will agree, I think, that this is a somewhat unpleasant business for everyone. Yourself included.'