Wilt in Nowhere

Chapter 3

Next morning Wilt was up early and he cycled down to the Tech. He had to speak to Swinburne and get him to agree to swap.

‘The Canadian course has been scrapped. I thought you knew,’ Swinburne told Wilt when he finally found him in the canteen at lunch-time. ‘Not that I care though I could have done with the money.’

‘Any particular reason?’

‘Sex. Roger Manners screwed some woman from Vancouver last year.’

‘What’s so special about that? He’s always acting like a goat. The silly ass is sex mad.’

‘Chose the wrong woman,’ said Swinburne. ‘Got her pregnant which wasn’t very wise because her husband had had a vasectomy. Came as a nasty surprise having a pregnant wife. So nasty he flew over from Vancouver and tracked Roger the Lodger down and then went to the Principal with the good news.’

‘Which was?’

‘That he was getting a divorce and Roger was the corespondent. And secondly that he owned a TV station and several newspapers across Canada and that he intended to see the Tech got maximum publicity for running a course on British Culture and Tradition that included extramarital sex. Bam went the course. I’m surprised you didn’t know.’

Wilt took the bad news back to Peter Braintree.

‘I’ve got to think of something quick. I’m damned if I’m going to Wilma.’

‘It sounds a nice trip to me. All expenses paid, and Americans are very hospitable. Or so I’ve always understood.’

Wilt shuddered.

‘Hospitality is one thing but you obviously haven’t met Uncle Wally and Auntie Joan. Last time they were over here we had to go to dinner with them at their hotel in London. And of course it had to be the biggest, newest and most expensive hotel with dinner served in their suite. It was unadulterated hell. First we had to have what Wally calls ‘real’ dry martinis. God alone knows what proof the gin was but I’d say it was liquid Semtex. I was stewed to the gills by the time lobsters came. Then the biggest steaks I’ve ever seen. No wine. Uncle Wally reckons wine is for pansies so we had to switch to malt whisky and Coke. I ask you, malt whisky and Coca-Cola. And all the time Auntie Joan was bleating on about how wonderful it was Eva having quads and how nice it was going to be when we all came over to Wilma. Nice? Sheer murder and I’m not going.’

‘Eva isn’t going to be pleased,’ said Braintree.

‘Maybe not but I’ll think of something. Stratagems and deceptions that will make my not going seem a positive boom. We must approach the problem from the psychological angle and ask why Eva is beside herself with joy. I can answer that. Not because she’s visiting the Land of the Free for the first time. Oh no. She’s got a hidden agenda and that is to suck up to Uncle blasted Wally and Auntie J to such good effect that, they being childless and therefore necessarily without issue, will leave their vast fortune to our four dear daughters when they finally drop off the Dralon perch and go to the Bible Belt in the sky.’

‘You really think…’ Braintree began but Wilt raised a hand.

‘Hush, I am trying to. That being Eva’s intention, what will put the mockers on the diabolical scheme? Frankly, loving father that I am, I’d still have to say that having Penny, Samantha, Emmy and Josephine about the house for two months ought to do the trick quite nicely. By the time they leave even Auntie Joan, who oozes sentimentality and drools on about how cute things are, will be dying to be rid of them and Wally will celebrate their departure by throwing the biggest party Wilma’s seen for years. The only snag is that I would have to be there sharing the inferno and getting the blame for their appalling behaviour. No, I shall have to think of something in the way of a pre-emptive strike. I shall go away and meditate.’

He did so through an hour of Gender Assertiveness for Mature Women none of whom had anything to learn about asserting themselves. In fact they asserted themselves so thoroughly that all he had to do was to get them going. After that he could sit back and nod and agree to everything they had to say. He had learnt the trick from Eva who was always pointing out how inadequate he was as a husband, a father and a sexual partner. Wilt had long since given up disputing his failings and now let the tide of her disapproval roll over him without really noticing it. He did the same with the Mature Women but first he had to provoke them. He did this now by pointing out that there could be no such thing as male menopause because men didn’t menstruate. The resulting storm of disagreement occupied the class very happily for the rest of the hour while Wilt wondered why it was so easy to provoke people who had fixed ideas and also why, having got them going, they adamantly refused to listen to any counterarguments. It had been the same with his old classes of Gasfitters and Printers. Then it had only been necessary to say he thought capital punishment was wrong or that there was a perfectly sound case for thinking homosexuals were born that way and all hell would break loose. Wilt considered Wally Immelmann’s most violent prejudice and realised it was socialism. He particularly loathed trades unions and equated them with communists, devil worshippers and the Evil Axis. Wilt had once admitted he’d voted for the Labour Party and belonged to a trades union. The explosion that had followed suggested Uncle Wally was about to die of apoplexy. Remembering the occasion, Wilt realised he had found the solution to his problem.

When the class finished and the mature women dispersed to assert themselves somewhere else, Wilt went across to the library and took out six books.

‘And where do you think you are going with those?’ Eva demanded when he got home and put them on the kitchen table and she spotted their titles.

‘I’ve got to give a course on Marxist ideology and revolutionary theory in the Third World next term. Don’t ask me why but I do. And since I don’t know the first thing about revolutionary theory or Marxism and I’m not even sure there is a second world let alone a third, I have to bone up on it. I’m taking them to Wilma.’

Eva was gaping at the title of another large volume which read _Castro’s Struggle Against American Imperialism._

‘Are you insane? You can’t take that to Wilma,’ she gasped. ‘Wally would kill you. You know what he feels about Castro.’

‘I daresay he doesn’t like him very much…’

‘Henry Wilt, you know perfectly well…you know…you know he was involved with whatever that attempt to invade Cuba was called.’

‘The Bay of Pigs,’ said Wilt and considered saying how appropriate it was for Wally Immelmann but Eva had found another book.

‘_Gaddafi. The Libyan Liberator_. I don’t believe it.’

‘Nor do I as a matter of fact,’ said Wilt. ‘But you know what Mayfield’s like. He’s always inventing new courses and we’ve all got to–’

‘I don’t care what you’ve got to do,’ Eva said furiously. ‘You are not going to Wilma with those dreadful books.’

‘You think I want to?’ said Wilt ambiguously and picked up another. ‘This one is about how President Kennedy wanted to use the atom bomb on Cuba. It’s really rather interesting.’

There was no need to go on but Wilt did.

‘Well, if you want me to lose my job, I’ll leave them behind. They’ve already made five Senior Lecturers redundant this year and I know I’m on the short list. And with the pension I’d get we wouldn’t be able to keep the girls at the Convent. We’ve got to think about their education and their future and there’s no point my taking the risk of getting the sack simply because Uncle Wally doesn’t like my reading about Marxism in Wilma.’

‘In that case you are not coming,’ said Eva, now thoroughly convinced. ‘I’ll tell them you’ve had to stay here and teach during the holidays to pay for the girls to go to school.’ She stopped, struck by a sudden thought. ‘That course for the Canadians. You said last night you couldn’t come because you had to stand in for Swinburne.’

‘Cancelled,’ said Wilt hurriedly. ‘No problem there. Not enough students.’