Porterhouse Blue

Chapter 8

Zipser was drunk. Eight pints of bitter, each drunk in a different pub, had changed his outlook on life. The narrow confines of his compulsion had given way to a brighter, broader, more expansive frame of mind. True, his haircuts had left him shorn and practically bald and with an aversion for the company of barbers which would last him a lifetime, but his eyes sparkled, his cheeks had a ruddier, rosier look, and he was in a mood to run the gauntlet of a hundred middle-aged housewives and to face the disapproval of as many chemists in search of an immaculate misconception. In any case a flash of inspiration had robbed him of the need to publicize his requirements. As he had wandered up Sidney Street after his second haircut he had suddenly recalled having seen a contraceptive dispenser in the lavatory of a pub in Bermondsey, and while Bermondsey was rather too far to go in search of a discreet anonymity, it occurred to him that Cambridge pubs must surely offer a similarly sophisticated service for lovers caught as it were on the hop. Zipser’s spirits rose with the thought. He went into the first pub he came to and ordered a pint. Ten minutes later he left that pub empty-handed and found another only to be similarly disappointed. By the time he had been to six pubs and had drunk six pints of bitter he was in a mood to point out the deficiency of their service to the bartenders. At the seventh pub he struck gold. Waiting until two elderly men had finished a protracted pee Zipser fumbled with his change and put two coins into the machine. He was about to pull the handle when an undergraduate came in. Zipser went out and finished his seventh pint keeping an eagle eye on the door of the Gents. Two minutes later he was back and tugging at the handle. Nothing happened. He pulled and pushed but the dispenser refused to dispense. He peered into the Money Returned slot and found it empty. Finally he put two more coins in and pulled the handle again. This time his money dropped into the slot and Zipser took it out and looked at it. The damned dispenser was empty. Zipser went back to the bar and ordered an eighth pint.

“That machine in the toilet,” he said conspiratorially to the barman.

“What about it?” the barman asked.

“It’s empty,” said Zipser.

“That’s right,” said the barman. “It’s always empty.”

“Well, it’s got some of my money in it.”

“You don’t say.”

“I do say.”

“A gin and tonic,” said a man with a moustache next to Zipser.

“Coming up,” said the barman. Zipser sipped his pint while the barman poured a gin and tonic. Finally when the man with the moustache had taken his drink back to a table by the window, Zipser raised the subject of faulty dispensers again. He was beginning to feel distinctly belligerent.

“What are you going to do about my money?” he asked.

The barman looked at him warily.

“How do I know you put any in?” he asked. “How do I know you’re not just trying it on?”

Zipser considered the question.

“I don’t see how I can,” he said finally. “I haven’t got it.”

“Very funny,” said the barman. “If you’ve got any complaints to make about that dispenser, you take them to the suppliers.” He reached under the bar and produced a card and handed it to Zipser. “You go and tell them your problems. They stock the machines. I don’t. All right?” Zipser nodded and the man went off down the other end of the counter to serve a customer. Zipser left the pub with the card and went down the road. He found the suppliers in Mill Road. There was a young man with a beard behind the counter. Zipser went in and put the card down in front of him.

“I’ve come from the Unicorn,” he said. “The dispenser is empty.”

“What already?” the man said. “Don’t know what happens to them, they go so quickly.”

“I want…” Zipser began thickly but the young man had disappeared through a door-to the back. Zipser was beginning to feel distinctly light-headed. He tried to think what he was doing discussing wholesale contraceptive sales with a young man with a beard in an office in Mill Road.

“Here you are. Two gross. Sign here,” said the clerk reappearing from the back with two cartons which he plonked on the counter. Zipser stared at the cartons, and was about to explain that he had merely come to ask for his money back when a woman came in. Zipser suddenly felt sick. He picked up the ballpen and signed the slip and then, clutching the two cartons, stumbled from the shop.

By the time he got back to the Unicorn the pub was shut. Zipser tried knocking on the door without result and finally gave it up and went back to Porterhouse.

He weaved his way past the Porter’s Lodge and headed across the Court towards his staircase. Ahead of him a line of black figures emerged from the door of the Council Chamber in solemn processional and moved towards him. At the head of them waddled the Dean. Zipser hiccupped and tried to focus on them. It was very difficult. Almost as difficult as trying to stop the world going round. Zipser hiccupped again and was sick on the snow as the column of figures advanced on him.

“Beg your pardon,” he said. “Shouldn’t have done that. Had too much to drink.”

The column stopped and Zipser peered down into the Dean’s face. It kept going in and out of focus alarmingly.

“Do you… do you… know how red your face is?” he asked, waving his head erratically at the Dean. “Shouldn’t have a red face, should you?”

“Out of the way,” snapped the Dean.

“Shertainly,” said Zipser and sat down in the snow. The Dean loomed over him menacingly.

“You, sir, are drunk. Disgustingly drunk,” he said.

“Quite right,” said Zipser. “Full marks for perspic… perspicac… ity. Hit the nail on the head firsht time.”

“What is your name?”

“Zhipsher shir, Zhipsher.”

“You’re gated for a week, Zipser,” snarled the Dean.

“Yesh,” said Zipser happily, “I am gated for a week. Shertainly, shir.” He struggled to his feet, still clutching his cartons, and the column of dons moved on across the court. Zipser wobbled off to his room and collapsed on the floor.

Sir Godber watched the deputation of Fellows from his study window. “Canossa,” he thought to himself as the procession trudged through the snow to the front door and rang the bell. For a moment it crossed his mind to let them wait but better judgement prevailed. Pope Gregory’s triumph had after all been a temporary one. He went out into the hall and let them in.

“Well, gentlemen,” he said when they had filed into his study, “and what can I do for you now?”

The Dean shuffled forward. “We have reconsidered our decision. Master,” he said.

Behind him the members of the College Council nodded obediently. Sir Godber looked round their faces and was satisfied. “You wish me to remain as Master?”

“Yes, Master,” the Dean said.

“And this is the general wish of the Council?”

“It is.”

“And you accept the changes in the College that I have proposed without any reservations?” the Master asked.

The Dean mustered a smile. “Naturally, we have reservations,” he said. “It would be asking rather much to expect us to abandon our… er… principles without retaining the right to have private reservations, but in the interest of the College as a whole we accept that there may be a need for compromise.”

“My conditions are final,” said the Master. “They must be accepted as they stand. I am not prepared to attenuate them. I think I should make that plain.”

“Quite so. Master. Quite so.” The Dean smiled weakly.

“In that case I shall postpone my decision,” said Sir Godber, “until the next meeting of the College Council. That will give us all time to consider the matter at our leisure. Shall we say next Wednesday at the same time?”

“As you wish, Master,” said the Dean. “As you wish.”

They trooped out and Sir Godber, having seen them to the door, stood at the window watching the dark procession disappear into the winter evening with a new sense of satisfaction. “The iron fist in the iron glove,” he murmured to himself, conscious that for the first time in a long career of political manoeuvring and compromise he had at long last achieved a clear-cut victory over an apparently intransigent opposition. There had been no doubting the Fellows’ obeisance. They had crawled to him and Sir Godber indulged himself in the recollection before going on to consider the implications of their surrender. No one – and who should know better than Sir Godber – crawled quite so submissively without good reasons. The Fellows’ obeisance had been too complete to be without ulterior motive. It was not enough to suppose that his threat had been utter. It had been sufficient to force them to come to heel but there had been no need for the Dean, of all people, to wag his tail so obsequiously. Sir Godber sat down by the fire and considered the character of the Dean for a hint of his motive. And the more he thought the less cause he found for premature self-congratulation. Sir Godber did not underestimate the Dean. The man was an ignorant bigot, with all the persistence of bigotry and all the cunning of the ignorant. “Buying time,” he thought shrewdly, “but time for what?” It was an unpleasant notion. Not for the first time since his arrival at Porterhouse, Sir Godber felt uneasy, aware, if only subliminally, that the facile assumptions about human nature upon which his liberal ideals were founded were somehow threatened by a devious scholasticism whose origins were less rational and more obscure than he preferred to think. He got up and stared out into the night at the medieval buildings of the College silhouetted against the orange sky. It had begun to snow again and the wind had risen, blowing the snowflakes hither and thither in sudden ungovernable flurries. He pulled the curtains to shut out the sight of nature’s lack of symmetry and settled himself in his chair with his favourite author, Bentham.

At High Table the Fellows dined in moody silence. Even the Chef’s poached salmon failed to raise their spirits, dampened by the obduracy of the Master and the memory of their capitulation. Only the Dean remained undaunted, shovelling food into his mouth as if to fuel his determination and mouthing imprecations on Sir Godber simultaneously, his forehead greasy and his eyes bright with the cunning Sir Godber had recognized.

In the Combination Room, as they took their coffee, the Senior Tutor broached the topic of their next move. “It would appear that we have until Wednesday to circumvent the Master’s proposals,” he said, sipping brandy fastidiously.

“A relatively short time, if you don’t mind my saying so.”

“Short but enough,” said the Dean tersely.

“I must say I find your confidence a little surprising, Dean,” said the Bursar nervously.

The Dean looked at him with a sudden ferocity. “No more surprising than I find your lack of discretion. Bursar,” he snapped. “I hardly imagine that this unfortunate turn of events would have occurred without your disclosure of the financial state of the College.”

The Bursar reddened. “I was simply trying to point out to the Master that the changes he was proposing would place an intolerable strain on our resources,” he protested. “If my memory serves me right you were the first to suggest that the finances should be brought to his attention.”

“Certainly I suggested that. I didn’t however suggest that he should be made privy to the details of our admissions policy,” the Dean retorted.

“Gentlemen,” said the Senior Tutor, “the mistake has been made. Nothing is to be gained by post-mortem. We are faced by an urgent problem. It is not in our best interest to apportion blame for past mistakes. If it comes to that we are all culpable. Without the divisions that prevented the election of Dr Siblington as Master, we should have avoided the nomination of Sir Godber.”

The Dean finished his coffee. “There is some truth in that,” he admitted, “and a lesson to be learnt. We must remain united in the face of the Master. In the meantime I have already made a move. I have arranged a meeting with Sir Cathcart D’Eath for this evening. His car should be waiting for me now.” He rose to his feet and gathered his gown about him.

“May one inquire the purpose of this meeting?” the Praelector asked. The Dean looked down at the Bursar. “I should not like to think that our plans are likely to reach Sir Godber’s ears,” he said deliberately.

“I can assure you…” began the Bursar.

“I have requested this meeting because Sir Cathcart as you all know is President of the OPs. I think he should know what changes the Master proposes. Furthermore I think he should know the manner in which the Master has conducted himself in the matter. I fancy that there will be an extraordinary meeting of the Porterhouse Society next Tuesday to discuss the situation and I have high hopes that at that meeting a resolution will be passed censoring Sir Godber for the dictatorial attitude he has adopted in his dealings with the College Council and calling for his immediate resignation from the Mastership.”

“But, Dean, surely that is most unwise,” protested the Senior Tutor thoroughly alarmed. “If a motion of that sort is passed, the Master is bound to resign and to publish his confounded letter. I really don’t see what that is going to accomplish.”

The Bursar put down his coffee-cup with unwonted violence. “For God’s sake. Dean,” he said, “consider what you are doing.”

The Dean smiled grimly. “If Sir Godber can threaten us,” he said, “we can threaten him.”

“But the scandal, think of the scandal. It will involve us all,” muttered the Bursar desperately.

“It will also involve Sir Godber. That is precisely the point of the exercise. We shall get in first by demanding his resignation. The force of his letter to the PM will be dulled by the fact that the College authorities and the Porterhouse Society have both demanded his resignation on the grounds of incompetence and his letter to the press with its so-called disclosures will have the appearance of being the action of a slighted and bitter man. Besides I rather think you overestimate Sir Godber’s political courage. Faced with the ultimatum we shall present at the Council meeting on Wednesday I doubt if he will risk a further confrontation.”

“But if the call for his resignation has already been published…”

“It won’t have been. The motion will have been passed, I trust unanimously, but its publication will be dependent on Sir Godber’s attitude. If he persists in demanding the changes in the College, then we shall publish.”

“And if he resigns without warning?”

“We shall publish all the same,” said the Dean. “We shall muddy the issue until it is uncertain whether we forced his resignation or not. Oh, we shall stir the pot, gentlemen. Have no fear of that. If there must be dirt let there be lots of it.” The Dean turned and went out, his gown billowing darkly behind him. In the Combination Room the Fellows looked at one another ruefully. Whatever changes the Master proposed appeared minor by comparison with the uproar the Dean seemed bent on provoking.

It was the Chaplain who broke the silence. “I must say,” he shouted, “that the Chef excelled himself tonight. That soufflé was delicious.”

Outside the main gate Sir Cathcart’s Rolls-Royce waited ostentatiously as the Dean, swaddled in a heavy coat and wearing his blackest hat, hurried past the Porter’s Lodge.

Skullion opened the car door for him.

“Good evening, Skullion.”

“Good evening to you, sir,” Skullion murmured humbly.

The Dean clambered in and the car moved off, its wheels slushing through the snow. In the back the Dean stared through the window at the flurries of snowflakes and the passers-by with their heads bent against the driving wind. He felt warm and contented, with none of the uneasy feelings that had driven the Master to his Bentham. This was weather he appreciated, cold bitter weather with the river rising and the biting wind creating once again the divisions of his youth, that hierarchy of rich and poor, good and bad, the comfort and the misery which he longed to preserve and which Sir Godber would destroy in his search for soulless uniformity. “The old order changeth,” he muttered to himself, “but damned slowly if I have anything to do with it.”

Skullion went back into the Porter’s Lodge.

“Going to supper,” he told the under-porter and trudged across the Court to the kitchen. He went down the stone stairs to the kitchen where the Chef had laid a table for two in his pantry. It was hot and Skullion took off his coat before sitting down.

“Snowing again they tell me,” said the Chef taking his seat.

Skullion waited until a young waiter with a gaping mouth had brought the dishes before saying anything.

“Dean’s gone to see the General,” he said finally.

“Has he now?” said the Chef, helping himself to the remains of the poached salmon.

“Council meeting this afternoon,” Skullion continued.

“So I heard.”

Skullion shook his head.

“You aren’t going to like this,” he said. “The Master’s changes aren’t going to suit your book, I can tell you.”

“Never supposed they would, Mr Skullion.”

“Worse than I expected. Chef, much worse.” Skullion took a mouthful of Ockfener Herrenberg 1964 before going on.

“Self-service in Hall,” he said mournfully.

The Chef put down his knife and fork. “Never,” he growled.

“It’s true. Self-service in Hall.”

“Over my dead body,” said the Chef. “Over my bloody dead body.”

“Women in College too.”

“What? Living in College?”

“That’s it. Living in College.”

“That’s unnatural, Mr Skullion. Unnatural.”

“You don’t have to tell me that, Chef. You don’t have to tell me. Unnatural and immoral. It isn’t right. Chef, it’s downright wicked.”

“And self-service in Hall,” the Chef muttered. “What’s the world coming to? You know, Mr Skullion, when I think of all the years I’ve been Chef to the College and all the dinners I’ve cooked for them, I sometimes, wonder what’s the meaning of it all. They’ve got no right to do it.”

“It’s not them that’s doing it,” Skullion told him. “It’s him that says it’s got to change.”

“Why don’t they stop him? They’re the Council. He can’t do it without their say-so.”

“They can’t stop him. Threatened to resign if they didn’t agree.”

“Why didn’t they let him? Good riddance to bad rubbish.”

“Threatened to write to the papers and tell them we’ve been selling degrees,” Skullion said.

The Chef looked at him with alarm.

“You don’t mean he knows about your…”

“I don’t know what he knows and what he don’t,” Skullion said. “I don’t think he knows about them. I think he’s talking about the ones they let in because they’ve got money. I think that’s what he means.”

“But we’ve a right to let in who we like,” the Chef protested. “It’s our college. It’s not anyone else’s.”

“That’s not the way he sees it,” Skullion said. “He’s threatened them with a national scandal if they don’t toe the line and they’ve agreed.”

“What did the Dean say? He must have said something.”

“Said they’d got to buy time by seeming to agree. He’s gone to see the General now. They’ll think of something.”

Skullion finished his wine and smiled to himself. “He don’t know what he’s tackled,” he said more cheerfully.

“Thinks he’s dealing with the pipsqueaks in Parliament, he does. Wordmongers, that’s what MPs are. Think you’ve only got to say a thing for it to be there next day. They don’t know nothing about doing and they don’t have nothing to lose, but the Dean’s a different kettle of fish. He and the General, they’ll do him down. See if they don’t.” He grinned knowingly and winked his unblacked eye. The Chef nibbled a grape moodily.

“Don’t see how they can,” he said.

“Digging for dirt,” said Skullion. “Digging for dirt in his past, that’s what the Dean said.”

“Dirt? What sort of dirt?”

“Women,” said Skullion.

“Ah,” said the Chef. “Disreputable women.”

“Precisely, Chef, them and money.”

The Chef pushed his hat back on his head. “He wasn’t what you might call a rich undergrad, was he?”

“No,” said Skullion, “he wasn’t.”

“And he’s rich now.”

“Married it,” Skullion told him. “Lacey money, that’s what it is. Lady Mary’s money. That’s the sort of man he is, Sir Godber.”

“Boney woman. Not my cup of tea,” said the Chef. “Like something with a bit more meat to it myself. Wouldn’t be surprised if he hadn’t got a fancy woman somewhere.”

Skullion shook his head doubtfully. “Not him. Not enough guts,” said Skullion.

“You don’t think they’ll find anything then?”

“Not that sort of thing. They’ll have to bring pressure. Influential friends the College has got, the Dean said. They’ll use them.”

“They’d better use something. I’m not staying on to run a self-service canteen and have women in my Hall,” said the Chef.

Skullion got up from the table and put on his coat. “The Dean’ll see to it,” he said and climbed the stairs to the Screens. The wind had blown snow on to the steps and Skullion turned up the collar of his coat. “Got no right to change things,” he grumbled to himself, and went out into the night.

At Coft Castle the Dean and Sir Cathcart sat in the library, a decanter of brandy half empty on the table beside them and their thoughts bitter with memories of past greatness.

“England’s ruin, damned Socialists,” growled Sir Cathcart. “Turned the country into a benevolent society. Seem to think you can rule a nation with good intentions. Damned nonsense. Discipline. That’s what this country needs. A good dose of unemployment to bring the working classes to their senses.”

“Doesn’t seem to work these days,” said the Dean with a sigh. “In the old days a depression seemed to have a very salutary effect.”

“It’s the dole. Man can earn more not working than he can at his job. All wrong. A bit of genuine starvation would soon put that right.”

“I suppose the argument is that the wives and children suffer,” said the Dean.

“Can’t see much harm in that,” the General continued. “Nothing like a hungry woman to put some pep into a man. Reminds me of a painting I saw once. Lot of fellows sitting round a table waiting for their dinner and the lady of the house comes in and lifts the cover of the dish. Spur inside, what? Sensible woman. Fine painting. Have some more brandy?”

“That’s very kind of you,” said the Dean, proffering his glass.

“Trouble with this Godber Evans fellow is he comes from poor stock,” continued Sir Cathcart when he had filled their glasses. “Doesn’t understand men. Hasn’t got generations of county stock behind him. No leadership qualities. Got to have lived with animals to understand men, working men. Got to train them properly. A whack on the arse if they do something wrong and a pat on the head if they get it right. No use filling their heads with a whole lot of ideas they can’t use. Bloody nonsense, half this education lark.”

“I quite agree,” said the Dean. “Educating people above their station has been one of the great mistakes of this century. What this country requires is an educated elite. What it’s had in fact, for the past three hundred years.”

“Three meals a day and a roof over his head and the average man has nothing to grumble about. Stout fellows. The present system is designed to create layabouts. Consumer society indeed. Can’t consume what you don’t make. Damned tommy-rot.”

The Dean’s head nodded on his chest. The fire, the brandy and the ubiquitous central heating in Coft Castle mingled with the warmth of Sir Cathcart’s sentiments to take their toll of his concentration. He was dimly aware of the rumble of the General’s imprecations, distant and receding like some tide going out across the mudflats of an estuary where once the fleet had lain at anchor. All empty now, the ships gone, dismantled, scrapped, the evidence of might deplenished, only a sandpiper with Sir Godber’s face poking its beak into the sludge. The Dean was asleep.