The Complete Stories (38 page)

  The House Room rose noisily. Charles underlined the date at the head of his page—Wednesday Sept. 24th, 1919—blotted it and put the notebook in his locker. Then with his hands in his pockets he followed the crowd into the dusk.

  To keep his hands in his pockets thus—with his coat back and the middle button alone fastened—was now his privilege, for he was in his third year. He could also wear coloured socks and was indeed at the moment wearing a pair of heliotrope silk with white clocks, purchased the day before in Jermyn Street. There were several things, formerly forbidden, which were now his right. He could link his arm in a friend's and he did so now, strolling across to Hall arm-in-arm with Tamplin.

  They paused at the top of the steps and stared out in the gloaming. To their left the great bulk of the chapel loomed immensely; below them the land fell away in terraces to the playing fields with their dark fringe of elm; headlights moved continuously up and down the coast road; the estuary was just traceable, a lighter streak across the grey lowland, before it merged into the calm and invisible sea.

  "Same old view," said Tamplin.

  "Give me the lights of London," said Charles. "I say, it's rotten luck for you about the Settle."

  "Oh, I never had a chance. It's rotten luck on you."

  "Oh, I never had a chance. But O'Malley."

  "It all comes of having that tick Graves instead of Frank."

  "The buxom Wheatley looked jolly bored. Anyway, I don't envy O'Malley's job as head of the dormitory."

  "That's how he got on the Settle. Tell you later."

  From the moment they reached the Hall steps they had to unlink their arms, take their hands out of their pockets and stop talking. When Grace had been said Tamplin took up the story.

  "Graves had him in at the end of last term and said he was making him head of the dormitory. The head of Upper Dormitory never has been on the Settle before last term when they moved Easton up from Lower Anteroom after we ragged Fletcher. O'Malley told Graves he couldn't take it unless he had an official position."

  "How d'you know?"

  "O'Malley told me. He thought he'd been rather fly."

  "Typical of Graves to fall for a tick like that."

  "It's all very well," said Wheatley, plaintively, from across the table; "I don't think they've any right to put Graves in like this. I only came to Spierpoint because my father knew Frank's brother in the Guards. I was jolly bored, I can tell you, when they moved Frank. I think he wrote to the Head about it. We pay more in Head's and get the worst of everything."

  "Tea, please."

  "Same old College tea."

  "Same old College eggs."

  "It always takes a week before one gets used to College food."

  "I never get used to it."

  "Did you go to many London restaurants in the holidays?"

  "I was only in London a week. My brother took me to lunch at the Berkeley. Wish I was there now. I had two glasses of port."

  "The Berkeley's all right in the evening," said Charles, "if you want to dance."

  "It's jolly well all right for luncheon. You should see their hors d'oeuvres. I reckon there were twenty or thirty things to choose from. After that we had grouse and meringues with ices in them."

  "I went to dinner at the d'Italie."

  "Oh, where's that?"

  "It's a little place in Soho not many people know about. My aunt speaks Italian like a native so she knows all those places. Of course, there's no marble or music. It just exists for the cooking. Literary people and artists go there. My aunt knows lots of them."

  "My brother says all the men from Sandhurst go to the Berkeley. Of course, they fairly rook you."

  "I always think the Berkeley's rather rowdy," said Wheatley. "We stayed at Claridges after we came back from Scotland because our flat was still being done up."

  "My brother says Claridges is a deadly hole."

  "Of course, it isn't everyone's taste. It's rather exclusive."

  "Then how did our buxom Wheatley come to be staying there, I wonder?"

  "There's no need to be cheap, Tamplin."

  "I always say," suddenly said a boy named Jorkins, "that you get the best meal in London at the Holborn Grill."

  Charles, Tamplin and Wheatley turned with cold curiosity on the interrupter, united at last in their disdain. "Do you, Jorkins? How very original of you."

  "Do you always say that, Jorkins? Don't you sometimes get tired of always saying the same thing?"

  "There's a four-and-sixpenny table d'hôte."

  "Please, Jorkins, spare us the hideous details of your gormandizing."

  "Oh, all right. I thought you were interested, that's all."

  "Do you think," said Tamplin, confining himself ostentatiously to Charles and Wheatley, "that Apthorpe is keen on Wykham-Blake?"

  "No, is he?"

  "Well, he couldn't keep away from him in Evening School."

  "I suppose the boy had to find consolation now his case Sugdon's left. He hasn't a friend among the under-schools."

  "What d'you make of the man Peacock?" (Charles, Tamplin and Wheatley were all in the Classical Upper Fifth under Mr. Peacock.)

  "He's started decently. No work tonight."

  "Raggable?"

  "I doubt it. But slack."

  "I'd sooner a master were slack than raggable. I got quite exhausted last term ragging the Tea-cake."

  "It was witty, though."

  "I hope he's not so slack that we shan't get our Certificates next summer."

  "One can always sweat the last term. At the University no one ever does any work until just before the exams. Then they sit up all night with black coffee and strychnine."

  "It would be jolly witty if no one passed his Certificate."

  "I wonder what they'd do."

  "Give Peacock the push, I should think."

  Presently Grace was said and the school streamed out into the cloisters. It was now dark. The cloisters were lit at intervals by gaslamps. As one walked, one's shadow lengthened and grew fainter before one until, approaching the next source of light, it disappeared, fell behind, followed one's heels, shortened, deepened, disappeared and started again at one's toes. The quarter of an hour between Hall and Second Evening was mainly spent in walking the cloisters in pairs or in threes; to walk four abreast was the privilege of school prefects. On the steps of Hall, Charles was approached by O'Malley. He was an ungainly boy, an upstart who had come to Spierpoint late, in a bye-term. He was in Army Class B and his sole distinction was staying-power in cross-country running.

  "Coming to the Graves?"

  "No."

  "D'you mind if I hitch on to you for a minute?"

  "Not particularly."

  They joined the conventional, perambulating couples, their shadows, lengthened before them, apart. Charles did not take O'Malley's arm. O'Malley might not take Charles's. The Settle was purely a House Dignity. In the cloisters Charles was senior by right of his two years at Spierpoint.

  "I'm awfully sorry about the Settle," said O'Malley.

  "I should have thought you'd be pleased."

  "I'm not, honestly. It's the last thing I wanted. Graves sent me a postcard a week ago. It spoiled the end of the holidays. I'll tell you what happened. Graves had me in on the last day last term. You know the way he has. He said, ‘I've some unpleasant news for you, O'Malley. I'm putting you head of the Upper Dormitory.' I said, ‘It ought to be someone on the Settle. No one else could keep order.' I thought he'd keep Easton up there. He said, ‘These things are a matter of personality, not of official position.' I said, ‘It's been proved you have an official. You know how bolshie we were with Fletcher.' He said, ‘Fletcher wasn't the man for the job. He wasn't my appointment.'"

  "Typical of his lip. Fletcher was Frank's appointment."

  "I wish we had Frank still."

  "So does everyone. Anyway, why are you telling me all this?"

  "I didn't want you to think I'd been greasing. I heard Tamplin say I had."

  "Well, you are on the Settle and you are head of the dormitory, so what's the trouble?"

  "Will you back me up, Ryder?"

  "Have you ever known me back anyone up, as you call it?"

  "No," said O'Malley miserably, "that's just it."

  "Well, why d'you suppose I should start with you?"

  "I just thought you might."

  "Well, think again."

  They had walked three sides of the square and were now at the door of Head's House. Mr. Graves was standing outside his own room talking to Mr. Peacock.

  "Charles," he said, "come here a minute. Have you met this young man yet, Peacock? He's one of yours."

  "Yes, I think so," said Mr. Peacock doubtfully.

  "He's one of my problem children. Come in here, Charles. I want to have a chat to you."

  Mr. Graves took him by the elbow and led him into his room.

  There were no fires yet and the two armchairs stood before an empty grate; everything was unnaturally bare and neat after the holiday cleaning.

  "Sit you down."

  Mr. Graves filled his pipe and gave Charles a long, soft and quizzical stare. He was a man still under thirty, dressed in Lovat tweed with an Old Rugbeian tie. He had been at Spierpoint during Charles's first term and they had met once on the miniature range; in that bleak, untouchable epoch Charles had been warmed by his affability. Then Mr. Graves was called up for the army and now had returned, the term before, as House Tutor of Head's. Charles had grown confident in the meantime and felt no need of affable masters; only for Frank whom Mr. Graves had supplanted. The ghost of Frank filled the room. Mr. Graves had hung some Medici prints in the place of Frank's football groups. The set of Georgian Poetry in the bookcase was his, not Frank's. His college arms embellished the tobacco jar on the chimneypiece.

  "Well, Charles Ryder," said Mr. Graves at length, "are you feeling sore with me?"

  "Sir?"

  Mr. Graves became suddenly snappish. "If you choose to sit there like a stone image, I can't help you."

  Still Charles said nothing.

  "I have a friend," said Mr. Graves, "who goes in for illumination. I thought you might like me to show him the work you sent in to the Art Competition last term."

  "I'm afraid I left it at home, sir."

  "Did you do any during the holidays?"

  "One or two things, sir."

  "You never try painting from nature?"

  "Never, sir."

  "It seems rather a crabbed, shut-in sort of pursuit for a boy of your age. Still, that's your own business."

  "Yes, sir."

  "Difficult chap to talk to, aren't you, Charles?"

  "Not with everyone. Not with Frank," Charles wished to say; "I could talk to Frank by the hour." Instead he said, "I suppose I am, sir."

  "Well, I want to talk to you. I dare say you feel you have been a little ill-used this term. Of course, all your year are in rather a difficult position. Normally there would have been seven or eight people leaving at the end of last term but with the war coming to an end they are staying on an extra year, trying for University scholarships and so on. Only Sugdon left, so instead of a general move there was only one vacancy at the top. That meant only one vacancy on the Settle. I dare say you think you ought to have had it."

  "No, sir. There were two people ahead of me."

  "But not O'Malley. I wonder if I can make you understand why I put him over you. You were the obvious man in many ways. The thing is, some people need authority, others don't. You've got plenty of personality. O'Malley isn't at all sure of himself. He might easily develop into rather a second-rater. You're in no danger of that. What's more, there's the dormitory to consider. I think I can trust you to work loyally under O'Malley. I'm not so sure I could trust him to work under you. See? It's always been a difficult dormitory. I don't want a repetition of what happened with Fletcher. Do you understand?"

  "I understand what you mean, sir."

  "Grim young devil, aren't you?"

  "Sir?"

  "Oh, all right, go away. I shan't waste any more time with you."

  "Thank you, sir."

  Charles rose to go.

  "I'm getting a small hand printing-press this term," said Mr. Graves. "I thought it might interest you."

  It did interest Charles intensely. It was one of the large features of his daydreams; in chapel, in school, in bed, in all the rare periods of abstraction, when others thought of racing motor-cars and hunters and speed-boats, Charles thought long and often of a private press. But he would not betray to Mr. Graves the intense surge of images that rose in his mind.

  "I think the invention of movable type was a disaster, sir. It destroyed calligraphy."

  "You're a prig, Charles," said Mr. Graves. "I'm sick of you. Go away. Tell Wheatley I want him. And try not to dislike me so much. It wastes both our time."

  Second Evening had begun when Charles returned to the House Room; he reported to the house-captain in charge, despatched Wheatley to Mr. Graves and settled down over his Hassall to half an hour's daydream, imagining the tall folios, the wide margins, the deckle-edged mould-made paper, the engraved initials, the rubrics and colophons of his private press. In Third Evening one could "read"; Charles read Hugh Walpole's Fortitude.

  Wheatley did not return until the bell was ringing for the end of Evening School.

  Tamplin greeted him with "Bad luck, Wheatley. How many did you get? Was he tight?"; Charles with "Well, you've had a long hot-air with Graves. What on earth did he talk about?"

  "It was all rather confidential," said Wheatley solemnly.

  "Oh, sorry."

  "No, I'll tell you sometime if you promise to keep it to yourself." Together they ascended the turret stair to their dormitory. "I say, have you noticed something? Apthorpe is in the Upper Anteroom this term. Have you ever known the junior house-captain anywhere except in the Lower Anteroom? I wonder how he worked it."

  "Why should he want to?"

  "Because, my innocent, Wykham-Blake has been moved into the Upper Anteroom."