He had tried to guide him towards poetry, suggesting Yeats and Tennyson, but that was a stage Lance had not aspired to, fearing the scorn of his mates, which told Daniel he would never do anything worthwhile. Even so, without preamble; he had one day read ‘Byzantium’ to the class and, a few lines in, no face moved, frozen images as never to be forgotten as the verse itself.
‘Can I buy you a drink, sir?’
‘All teachers should be shot,’ Garry said, ‘though maybe not when it’s snowing and we’re up shit’s creek together.’
‘Not Old Ferret,’ Wayne said. ‘That’s what we used to call him. We liked him, though, didn’t we — sir? We’ll drive your van anywhere you want it to go, being as we’re the only ones who can. Anything to do you a favour, after all them years you tried to drum knowledge into our big soft heads.’
They were amiable at the moment, boasting, stoned perhaps and soon to be drunk as well, the best the world had to offer, except that they were on the wrong side, as far as he was concerned, the worse side because it was no side at all.
‘It depends what’s in the van, don’t it?’ Garry said. ‘We wouldn’t want to flog our goolies off if it wasn’t important, would we?’
‘Forget about it, for the moment,’ Daniel said quickly. Perhaps they did have the grit to get it to Coventry. He could telephone and say it was on its way, and if they argued for not having got it there himself, that would be their problem, though it would be his as well when they caught him. Then he recalled that the telephone lines were dead.
‘We can have a rave-up,’ Lance said. ‘To think we met our old teacher when we got stuck in a blizzard.’
‘I always wondered what became of you,’ Daniel said. ‘You were different to the others.’ He couldn’t stop his tongue from being the schoolmaster, Mr Chips of the slums, the man his mother had decided he would be, and what the greater part of him in those days had wanted to be. Looking at him from Heaven, the only place for her, if she was anywhere, she would be happy in that shark-like possessive way which had ruined his life by forcing him to be something which was not part of his nature. But he became even more of what she had in mind, a caricature in fact, to prove to himself that he at least had some independence. Therefore he could allow himself to enjoy being the schoolmaster, idolized by two old boys, rough and common as they were, who recalled what he had tried to do for them.
They stood as if expecting wisdom that only he as an old teacher could provide. He was sorry to disappoint them, yet they took the blow calmly, he thought, tamed at the moment by his presence. What he wanted — and craved for them to desire, though it was an accolade he knew he could never have, and therefore a blessed state that they could never have though he hoped for it against all odds nevertheless — was to be a god and run their lives from birth to death on the principles of love and justice and the mellow rules of sweet reason, till the world became perfect for teachers and taught alike, the harmony of the just and the elect to prevail over all rough beasts, pain and bloodshed banished for ever.
SEVENTEEN
Sally felt culled by the hair, out of a doze between icy terylene sheets, as if barbaric assailants were at the castle drawbridge of her dreams, vandals spilling in for rapine and plunder. Eyes pinned open, and sleep impossible, she would go down and find out what mayhem had broken loose.
It was a poor show, she thought, not having the wherewithal in her luggage to change from skirt and blouse into a frock: stockings and knickers instead of tights: her favourite amber beads and a Liberty’s silk scarf. With a state of mind so altered such formality would have kept her within range of who she was, and stopped that happening which she might not like to remember. No, that wasn’t how she felt at all. What she really wanted to be clad in was her leopardskin trousers, highnecked white shirt (opened a button or two) and black high heels. Stanley hated a rig that was outlandish enough to get everyone looking her way.
Standing in the doorway, she observed Daniel’s ruminations, his eyes beamed downwards, deepening as if some recollection was coming full thunder on him, a pushing out and drawing back of the lower lip, and a more subtle alteration of his visible cheek. He was at the point of speaking to himself, or action of some sort, or even — a notion that caused her to hold back a laugh — a mild kind of fit.
She supposed the state of people’s souls was marked on their faces, especially when they didn’t suspect scrutiny, though Stanley’s smooth visage showed so little he had to talk for her to know what was on his mind, and whatever was revealed proved that he didn’t exist at the intensity she sensed in Daniel, whose differing layers of expression only increased her curiosity.
He looked up at this rangy blonde holding the bannister just outside the door. He had never known whether he was quick to show the red face on being surprised out of his reflections; or whether he was generally calm at any disturbance, always unable to decide which personality to use. With the short-fuse version he sometimes felt close to madness, and for that reason rarely employed it, knowing it was his responsibility when he did, and having no sympathy for people who couldn’t control it (like some who also worked for the Cause) and might therefore be considered mad. To be mad was a matter of choice, it seemed to him, because on losing his temper he could watch himself doing so, and revert to a calm state easily enough.
He thought she was the sort who might laugh long and loud if he showed irritation at her gaze meant only for him. ‘You seem to be curious about me.’
‘I’m sorry if it annoys you.’
‘I’m flattered. Let me get you a drink.’ It was always hard to bring the fascinating conversations in his own mind into the open. Women suspected such concentrated silence while he wondered whether he should and how he could do it. Or they were bored, or took his inability as indicating that they themselves were at fault. They might question what the man was trying to hide, though you weren’t expected to talk nonstop either, because that would be worse than silence. But, above all, and this he felt from the most bitter experience, he must never mention even the mildest of his dreams.
‘I’d love a sherry. Dry.’ She sat at the nearest table, much better than staying in that draughty bedroom. The storm was so dreadful that no one could complain about their accommodation, however. Poor Stanley would wish he hadn’t left Singapore, though she shouldn’t keep thinking of him if she wanted to get the best out of being marooned. ‘Cheers! Here’s to getting out — sometime.’
‘You seem uncertain about it.’ The English loved a crisis. Even the bikers were quiet, sitting before their drinks and heaps of sandwiches. ‘I expect we’ll be on our way by tomorrow.’
Percy, jived by some chemical engine, swayed away from his table. ‘We’re on the way to Heaven. That’s our destination.’ He smacked the middle of his forehead. ‘I can feel it here. It’s a wide road into the blue beyonder. A lot of light up there. You’ll enjoy it. I can’t wait, talking for myself, though I don’t know if any of us deserve it.’ He lurched towards the bikers, caught a chairback to right himself. ‘We’ll all go together when we don’t, won’t we, lads? No matter how old you are you always look young in the mirror.’
Garry reached for another sandwich. ‘I reckon you’re a teeny-weeny bit stoned, Dad.’
‘Never felt better.’ Percy flailed away. ‘You won’t stone me, young ’un. That’s what them Arabs do when you’re caught having a bit on the side.’
‘I have this awful feeling’ — Sally knew she could say it, since his behaviour at the telephone had indicated that his life seemed to depend on getting out as soon as possible — ‘that we’ll be cooped up for days.’