Grantchester Grind

40

'I can fully understand your feelings, Master,' said Schnabel when he finally came up to Porterhouse. Hartang said he couldn't. No one could live in a fucking mausoleum with a whole lot of deadbeats who didn't know a dollar from a peso and had to use their fingers to count to ten, and even begin to understand what it felt like.

'I don't think you should allow appearances to mislead you,' said Schnabel. 'Academics are deceptive people and the English have always been known for their understatement. It's part of the national character. They don't like to show their feelings. You mustn't take them at face value.'

Hartang looked out of the window at the marquees on the Fellows' Lawn and wished he could express his feelings. He had never taken anyone at face value except maybe in movies. Some of the best contractors from Chicago and Miami had nice faces. 'Have you ever met a fat woman with a blue hair rinse and a shopping bag who doesn't give her name?' he asked. Artificial pearls and a voice like a pointed Luger. Has two men with her who could be SAS. They're living in the house with me. Not the woman. The men.'

'For your protection, I'm sure,' said Schnabel. 'They'll see you through this early period until you're settled in and then they'll pull out. That's the agreement. You wouldn't want non-professionals who don't know their job.'

'I certainly hope so. Anyone show around Transworld? You know "anyone"?'

'My information is no. You're keeping the money flowing into the same accounts so there's no reason to think you have been involved in any way. If you'd blown with it, that would be different. There's a man in your office your height and dressed the same, lives the same way you do. So you're there if they ask the staff. And one day, say in six months, he'll have an infarct and they'll have a big cremation at Golders Green and an obituary in _The Times_ about how you built Transworld up from nothing.'

'Someone's going to want to see the body.'

'Naturally,' said Schnabel. 'No one will stop them. Same build, same face, wig and glasses. They'll be able to take photographs but no touching. The people protecting you have morticians who could make Boris Karloff look like Marilyn Monroe. How do you think they get IRA informers new identities?'

'You going to tell me they embalm them? Shit, I don't want to know.'

'They embalm some dead guy. Plastic surgery like you wouldn't believe. The real guy's different too. So who's to know? No one. Got a new identity and could be living in the same street as always. That's the way they are. Professionals.'

'Just so long they don't change their minds about me. I don't want to end up this place Golden Green.'

'You aren't going to,' said Schnabel. 'You're too valuable. So Hartang's dead, long live the Master of Porterhouse.'

Hartang thought about it for a bit. 'I'm not making a will,' he said finally. 'They want my money they keep me alive.'

'Very wise. They want your financial genius. That's what they're buying-keeping you alive and out of circulation. Ross Skundler making out all right?'

'That shit,' said Hartang and felt better.

And Skundler was. Every few days he would look at the old bound ledgers and ask the Bursar for a quill but the new financial position was good. The Bursar was happier too. He didn't have to worry about money or the College debts but could go and inspect the work being done in the Chapel and see how much better the College looked. Even Skullion's disappearance didn't bother him. He'd never liked him and Skullion had never bothered to hide his contempt for the Bursar. In fact from every point of view things were working out very well.

In Onion Alley Purefoy was exhausted. So was Mrs Ndhlovo. For a week they had sat and listened to Skullion and they felt they had been living in Porterhouse for ever. It was the repetition that had this effect, repetitions and digressions, trips Skullion took them on down the tributaries of his main concern, the treachery he had suffered, not just once, not even twice, but from the moment he had set foot in Porterhouse and had doffed his cap to the gentlemen there. It was that sense of betrayal, stronger now than it had been even when Sir Godber had him sacked, that gave him the strength to keep talking, dredging his memory for details of those slights and little insults he knew now to be the pilot fish for the greatest betrayal of all.

'That bloody Sir Cathcart D'Eath promised me, swore on his oath as a gentleman, that I wouldn't go to the Park. Gave me his word I could stay at Coft Castle if I agreed to retire. The bloody bastard,' he told them any number of times. And I said I had the right to name my own successor as Master and I have, and he agreed. Had to. College tradition since time immemorial. The dying Master has the right to name his own successor. And I did. "Lord Pimpole," I said, "The Honourable Jeremy Pimpole of Pimpole Hall in the County of Yorkshire." That's who I named and a nicer young gentleman you never met. Came up in 1959. Him and Sir Launcelot Gutterby were the best.' Skullion paused, recalling their ineffable superiority and arrogance.

Then he spat into the fireplace. 'So what happens next? That bastard Sir Cathcart has me bundled into an ambulance and I'm locked in the Park and they've got some fucking Yank or something in the Master's Lodge.' The enormity of this final betrayal overcame him and he was silent, staring into the meaningless abyss of hatred this final act of treachery had led to. Worst of all he had only himself to blame. He could have kept his independent mind, he'd always believed he had, but he hadn't. He'd surrendered it to Porterhouse, to his cosy job and his self-indulgent consciousness of doing his duty. Duty! About as much duty as a fucking poodle jumping through hoops in a circus and walking on its back paws and doing tricks to satisfy an audience of idiots. That's what his duty had been. He knew that now. He knew it because they had betrayed him.

He knew it even more because they had betrayed Porterhouse by their stupidity. Any fool could have seen what was happening to the College years ago and taken measures to protect the place and keep it independent. He'd seen that himself and had denied it too because he'd trusted them. And because there'd been nothing he could do about it. He hadn't wanted to think about it and had told himself it would all come right in the end. Instead it had all come wrong. There was a worse thought at the back of his mind: that it had always been wrong and that his life had been wasted in the service of the rotten. That was what he thought now but he didn't say it to Purefoy and Mrs Ndhlovo and the tape recorder. They were young and there was no point in hurting them so early. Life would do that. Besides, he needed them for what he had to do.

'Still no news of Skullion?' the Praelector asked, looking out of the Fellows' Private Dining Room at the marquees and the tables and wooden dance floors arranged on the lawn. A group of sound technicians were setting up speakers and lights were already installed round them.

'None,' said the Dean. And Osbert hasn't been into College since that first night. None of the College servants has any idea where they've got to.'

'Wouldn't tell you if they knew,' the Senior Tutor said. 'They've always kowtowed to Skullion even before he became Master.'

'True, but they're worried too. If they knew and weren't telling, they'd be in a different mood. I'm certain they have no idea.'

'The police have no information either. All they have found out is that Dr Osbert hired a van in Hunstanton and brought it back two days later. They've contacted hospitals but he hasn't been admitted. It is all most disturbing.'

'Since there is nothing we can do about it, I don't think we should waste time worrying about it,' said the Praelector. 'I have to confess the new Master is giving me more cause for concern. He is an even more unpleasant individual than I had supposed.'

'He was your choice and you have no one to blame but yourself,' said the Senior Tutor.

'I accept that responsibility and I do blame myself. On the other hand he is yet to be inaugurated and if anyone can think of a suitable alternative, someone who can provide the College with the financial resources we so desperately require, I daresay we can persuade the authorities to take him off our hands.'

'By "authorities" I take it you mean the people with him in the Master's Lodge,' said the Senior Tutor. 'I have to say they are not very pleasant themselves. I gather they body-searched Professor Pawley when he made the mistake of going to pay his respects. He hasn't got over their thoroughness yet.'

'Well, at least they are subduing the wretched man they are looking after,' said the Dean. 'We must be grateful for that, and they are on our side.'

The Praelector left them and walked pensively across the Court to the College kitchen. He wanted a word with the Chef.